Thoughts and Prayers: The Religion Thread

Interesting quirk of the English language:
To say someone is a theist or atheist has completely different meaning.
It's not bad when you are writing it, but you have to be very careful with vocal pronunciation, especially in the Bible Belt.

 

Religion is all about labels. Who is. Who isn't. It's almost as if it's more about exclusion and division than faith.

 

Nobody has to pick a label. I'm trying to figure out what non-sentient God means.

I do believe everyone is, essentially, religious about something. I do believe we all worship something. And if people are going to post more than anyone ITT about religion, I figure they have some descriptor for what they believe. Surely they're not here to solely rain on the parade of people of faith for the hell of it. So, I say, let's hear it out.

The pattern that has generally emerged is, there are people ITT who are openly religious, and there are people ITT who want to cryptically mock that. I'm merely asking: Hey, let's see your cards.

 

The most divisive people in this thread aren't the religious ones, but the ones who reject religion. Imagine a coffee shop discussion about religion where a couple people sit down and tell everybody how horrible and mentally ill they are. Or, hell, make it about sports or politics.

This actually happened to me, recently, at a church group meeting, when, in the midst of us talking about the NCAA Tournament for a few minutes, the youngest and frankly most immature person in our group piped up about how he didn't understand why anyone watched sports on TV - any sports ever - since we weren't participating and some other nonsense related to something John Eldridge wrote 14 years ago. Having dropped that turd, we then had to unpack his ill-considered worldview for 10 minutes, patronizing a person whose final, inch-deep summary - when pitted against the community-building and joy-producing aspects of spectator sports, when pitted against folks having their alma maters in the Sweet 16, or the celebration of human achievement in the Olympics - was something along the lines of "well, it just seems kinda dumb to me." OK. Good for you.

 

White Evangelical Resistance Is Obstacle in Vaccination Effort

More demented religionists engaging in dangerous behavior, justified by nothing except a fairy tale of a magic invisible man.

 

You said you weren't telling him what his wife would want, then you did it again.

You say you aren't rejecting him, yet you are telling him to get off the thread. You aren't telling him to do that for his own sake. You are telling him that because you are upset by his comments. I'm sure he is upset by some of your comments, too. In his place, I would be deeply offended by your implication that his wife wouldn't approve of his behavior. Your implication that he doesn't mean what he is saying is also rude and disrespectful. Just because you aren't using offensive language doesn't mean you aren't offending others. I'm not sure if you understand that.

I don't agree with all of what he is posting here or how he is posting it, but honestly, you are no better.

 

What is it you believe again? There is a God, there is no God, there's a God but that God is no longer aware? What?

 

I believe for every drop of rain that falls a flower grows. But only an undeveloped mind believes in a sentient being. God is a figment of man’s fears. And religion is the greatest toolFor man’s oppression of man.

 

Do you not think there's a difference between someone who is faithful and the overwhelming weight of organized religion, which is often wielded as a weapon and has been for centuries? My grandma was an incredibly faithful woman, so deeply religious. Didn't stop her from getting used and abused by television evangelists, when she could no longer go to church. She was certainly not happy when her 12-year-old granddaughter walked out of Sunday school one day and said I'm done, none of this makes sense. The more I learn, the more true that becomes. But when you don't really know a person, it's hard to know if they have faith or if they've just been taken for a ride.

 

You can be a good and moral person without faith in a deity and adherence to a religion. You can be a bad person who believes that Christ was born and died for your sins and is your personal lord and savior.

I’d also argue that people who believe they are morally right and virtuous because of their mantra about a God and religion, and will have eternal salvation based only on saying magic words, are the most dangerous, selfish and hurtful people on earth

 

So...you're an atheist?

 

I don’t know what that means. I know the laws of physics, mathematics, chemistry exist and they exist without exception. I know that biology and the laws of nature exist, without exception. I think our language is imperfect to completely understand it, but those who have a greater grasp of the sciences find it, for lack of a better term, elegant. I also know gravity never solicited a man to kill his child to prove he believes in gravity. Or that kinetic energy never sacrificed its son and simultaneously committed suicide to forgive you of your mistakes.

BTW if God and Jesus are the same, no polytheism for Christians lol, the wasn’t the crucifixtion also a suicide?