Christianity takes advantage of humans' biggest weakness: fear. The fear of "spending eternity in hell". This scare-tactic brings in a lot of believers. Heaven, likewise, takes advantage of the fact that man must be sustained in suffering by a hope so high that no conflict with actuality can dash it; so high that no fulfillment can satisfy it: a hope reaching out beyond this world.
Faith and reason are opposites: faith meaning the will to avoid knowing what is true since reason needs justification or an explanation of a belief through facts and logic. A common thought among Christians is that because faith gives pleasure and the hope that god will shew mercy unto the thousands that love him and obey his laws, because he is a jealous god, it therefore is true. When faith is exalted above everything else, it necessarily that reason, knowledge and patient inquiry have to be discredited: the road to the truth becomes a forbidden road and a sin to pursue it. The priest rules through invention of sin and knows of only one great danger: science. But science flourishes, on the whole only under favorable conditions: a man must have time, he must have an overflowing intellect in order to 'know.' When the natural consequences of an act are no longer "natural," but are regarded as produced by the ghostly creations of superstition: by "God," by "spirits," by "souls." and reckoned as merely "moral" consequences, as rewards, as punishments, as hints, as lessons, then the whole ground-work of knowledge is destroyed; then the greatest crimes against humanity has been perpetrated.
Christianity in my opinion is incredibly hypocritical. A Christian starts his or her day with a certain set of values and rules knowing that he or she will be violated and broken and will have to ask for forgiveness at the end of the day. No successful business man, politician or even priest for that matter, can perform and live in today's society without willingly and knowingly violating all the rules of Christianity. That being said only furthers the belief that faith just gives pleasure and security to those who choose to believe in god and obey his laws.
Chris Lozano
email: axlthekid at gmail dot com
These letters were published between January 2001 and February 2010. To view recent posts, go to The Main Blog at ExChristian.Net
23 comments:
Actually, you will probably be able to like a full and rewarding like as an atheist.
It often include many blessings, and you may indeed have a better time that some theists.
But, in the end, hell will still be waiting.
It easy to defend your position when you redefine terms for your argument. Faith has never meant what you have claimed, and contrary to your argument, is never devoid of reasoning. Its a common appeal that faith and reason are in seperate circles, this is no new idea; however, faith is never held without evidence. An analogy would be that someone has faith that their wife will not commit adultery because...they know her character, they know her commitment, etc., etc., or I have faith that the chair I am sitting in will continue to hold me up off the floor because...it is in good condition, there is no rot, it has done so hundreds of times before. I have faith that my medicine will work because...it has been studied, it has worked before, it was designed to work in the way that it does. My faith in God works much the same way, faith is never blind (Although it makes everything sound mystical and supernatural when we say "Blind faith" which is a mistake) faith is based on evidence. We all have faith in something. But it is only as good as the evidence it is based on.
"faith meaning the will to avoid knowing what is true since reason needs justification or an explanation of a belief through facts and logic. A common thought among Christians is that because faith gives pleasure and the hope that god will shew mercy unto the thousands that love him and obey his laws, because he is a jealous god, it therefore is true. When faith is exalted above everything else, it necessarily that reason, knowledge and patient inquiry have to be discredited: the road to the truth becomes a forbidden road and a sin to pursue it."
"But, in the end, hell will still be waiting."
Spoken like a true fear monger. All hype, no evidence.
Anonymous wrote::
It easy to defend your position when you redefine terms for your argument.
OK, lets look a definition of faith:
"Belief that does not rest on logical proof or material evidence."
Considering that definition of faith the rest of your argument makes no sense. A chair is a physical object, you do not have to have faith that it will support you, you can test and verify that it will do so (apply test weights to the chair to see if it breaks, for example.) In fact if it is a relatively new chair the manufacturer has already done that for you by testing the various materials of construction. On the other hand you have no testable or verifiable evidence of God's existence (no one has,) psychological events such as being "born again" don't count, as they can be explained without any reference to the "divine" .
Emanuel Goldstein wrote:
But, in the end, hell will still be waiting.
Again, show us the evidence that supports your claims. Anything other than Bible verses would be extremely helpful.
faith is based on evidence
So, where is the evidence that Jesus is a flying un-dead man-god that everyone must worship or risk an eternal horrific life in hell?
As said above, something other than verses in a so-called holy book would be quite helpful.
I dont live in fear of any imaginary place created by any imaginary madman in the sky.
Emanuel Goldstein,
Your little bit of fear mongering is wasted on the educated adults of this comunity,
Go try your shit on ignorant children.
"Go try your shit on ignorant children."
No, don't.
(Sorry d laurier, I know what you mean though.)
The believer must be willing to agree with ancient ignorant thinking, and one must reverse and extract from their present day knowledge learned by common reasoning and science and retract into dumbed-down ancient thinking and commit to a faith, based upon a belief that cannot be proven true.
The believer must be willing and long to reject science and todays technology and be willing to trade his/her born-with common sense for a myth based upon a threat of a Hell using emotional fear, that is the reason one must be born again, one must revert(reborn)to ignorance and imbecilic thinking and to abide to the teachings with unrelenting conformity.
Thus the outcome, a perfectly molded cookie-cutter scripture-quoting, Jesusbot Christian zombie.
Congratulations, Chris and welcome. I hope you will visit often and investigate the rest of the site.
This is one place where evangelizing and prosletyzing are little more than passing (and frequently boring) amusements.
If that is how you wish to waste your time, Mr. Goldstein and Anony, so be it. But IMO, it would behoove you to take it to the forums section of this site and stop stealing the thunder of the people who have come here to share their anti-testimonies.
I was fortunate to get mostly well-reasoned discussions on my conversion story, but many are not and it doesn't seem fair to me, but I guess they don't want to tangle with the posters in the forums. :P
As my signature states at other sites: logic is the bane of theists.
As my signature states at other sites: logic is the bane of theists.As Keith Parsons puts it that the god notion is faith in an unknown being for unknown reason does things through unknowwn ways! Faith is just the I just say so of credulity!
A Flying Un-Dead God Man, now that was fucking funny Webmaster.
Just remember the Bible is the word of God because the Bible says it's the word of God you idiots, so every word in it must be true. That is why the people in the documentary I am watching at the moment are lying when they say that Sturgeon have been swimming on this planet for 250 million years. Those people on the National Georgraphic Channel are so dumb, they need to read their Bibles before they start spewing that kind of misinformation.
Hey Mr. Goldstein that is the first time you have ever posted and you didn't mention the uncle with the 2500 books on Ateism. What's up with that?
spacemonk,
Well and fully understood,
light a candle and pour a pint.
"OK, lets look a definition of faith:
Belief that does not rest on logical proof or material evidence."
Convenient. It was already defined that way in the original post. That defintion, fits your argument. I am not arguing for or against God here, just stating that we can all sound real smart if we change the definition of things to fit our arguments. However, it is a logical fallacy and any logical person would see this and realize that it weakens your argument. Its a slight of hand on your part.
Anonymous wrote:
"...we can all sound real smart if we change the definition of things to fit our arguments."
No, we all sound real stupid if we make up definitions of words that aren't in any dictionary:
"...faith is based on evidence. We all have faith in something. But it is only as good as the evidence it is based on."
Anonymous: "I am not arguing for or against God here, just stating that we can all sound real smart if we change the definition of things to fit our arguments."
So, what is the absolutely "correct", and "universally true", definition of "faith"? Tell me you are not going to pull out the dictionary... we wll know that Webster et al., created those definitions so that they would support any argument he would make.
Exploring the definitions of faith:
faith (n):
1 a : allegiance to duty or a person : LOYALTY b (1) : fidelity to one's promises (2) : sincerity of intentions
2 a (1) : belief and trust in and loyalty to God (2) : belief in the traditional doctrines of a religion b (1) : firm belief in something for which there is no proof (2) : complete trust
3 : something that is believed especially with strong conviction; especially : a system of religious beliefs "the Protestant faith"
synonym see BELIEF
on faith : without question "took everything he said on faith" (Merriam-Webster)
1. Confident belief in the truth, value, or trustworthiness of a person, idea, or thing. 2. Belief that does not rest on logical proof or material evidence. See synonyms at belief. , trust. 3. Loyalty to a person or thing; allegiance: keeping faith with one's supporters. 4. often Faith Christianity The theological virtue defined as secure belief in God and a trusting acceptance of God's will. 5. The body of dogma of a religion: the Muslim faith. 6. A set of principles or beliefs. (American Heritage Dictionary)
It should be obvious that no one has redefined anything. That is indeed one of the definitions of faith, and the one that is particularly applicable to discussions involving religious faith. The truth is - and the Bible supports this by the way (Jn 20:29, 2 Cor. 4:18, 2 Cor. 5:7, Heb. 11:1) as did most of the early church fathers from Augustine through Luther and into the present day - that faith in God is not to be predicated on logic, reason, or evidence.
In other words, Christians themselves have used that very same definition ("belief that does not rest on logical proof or material evidence") since the 1st century. I daresay it's among the most accepted definitions, so sounding smart has nothing to do with it; it's about knowing which definition fits.
The christian hell is horseshit. Nobody will burn forever. That is a misconception based on the nonsensical christian interpretation of the screwed up mess of a book called the bible. Nowhere in the bible does it say that anybody will burn forever in hell. The bible says that hell will exist forever, not that anyone will burn in hell forever. I once studied somthing that taught that "hell" is a word that was originally used to describe reincarnation and that there will always be a "spiritual plane" of existence where souls can be seen reincarnating. That "spiritual plane" is the hell that Christ saw in his visions as a spiritual master and that he referred to when mentioning hell, according to those teachings which I studied. The bible still remains nonsensical at times, but said teachings make far more sense out of it than any christian denomination that I know of.
Christianity is nonsense.
Emmanuel, for as long as you've been coming here, you've always been an ass. Why does christianity produce so many assholes? The answer is that you people think that you're "saved," with the rest of us doomed to burn forever. So much for unity, harmony, and peace on earth. Thanks to people like you. Typical, that a christian would promote anything but unity, harmony, and peace on earth despite the fact that this is exactly what Christ taught.
Go jump in a lake.
FAITH, n. [L. fides, fido, to trust; Gr. to persuade, to draw towards any thing, to conciliate; to believe, to obey. In the Greek Lexicon of Hederic it is said, the primitive signification of the verb is to bind and draw or lead, as signifies a rope or cable. But this remark is a little incorrect. The sense of the verb, from which that of rope and binding is derived, is to strain, to draw, and thus to bind or make fast. A rope or cable is that which makes fast. Heb.]
1. Belief; the assent of the mind to the truth of what is declared by another, resting on his authority and veracity, without other evidence; the judgment that what another states or testifies is the truth. I have strong faith or no faith in the testimony of a witness, or in what a historian narrates.
2. The assent of the mind to the truth of a proposition advanced by another; belief, or probable evidence of any kind.
3. In theology, the assent of the mind or understanding to the truth of what God has revealed. Simple belief of the scriptures, of the being and perfections of God, and of the existence, character and doctrines of Christ, founded on the testimony of the sacred writers, is called historical or speculative faith; a faith little distinguished from the belief of the existence and achievements of Alexander or of Cesar.
4. Evangelical, justifying, or saving faith, is the assent of the mind to the truth of divine revelation, on the authority of God's testimony, accompanied with a cordial assent of the will or approbation of the heart; an entire confidence or trust in God's character and declarations, and in the character and doctrines of Christ, with an unreserved surrender of the will to his guidance, and dependence on his merits for salvation. In other words, that firm belief of God's testimony, and of the truth of the gospel, which influences the will, and leads to an entire reliance on Christ for salvation.
Being justified by faith. Rom. 5.
Without faith it is impossible to please God. Heb. 11.
For we walk by faith, and not by sight. 2Cor. 5.
With the heart man believeth to righteousness. Rom. 10.
The faith of the gospel is that emotion of the mind, which is called trust or confidence, exercised towards the moral character of God, and particularly of the Savior.
Faith is an affectionate practical confidence in the testimony of God.
Faith is an affectionate practical confidence in the testimony of God.
Faith is a firm, cordial belief in the veracity of God, in all the declarations of his word; or a full and affectionate confidence in the certainty of those things which God has declared, and because he has declared them.
5. The object of belief; a doctrine or system of doctrines believed; a system of revealed truths received by christians.
They heard only, that he who persecuted us in times past, now preacheth the faith which once he destroyed. Gal. 1.
6. The promises of God, or his truth and faithfulness.
shall their unbelief make the faith of God without effect? Rom. 3.
7. An open profession of gospel truth.
Your faith is spoken of throughout the whole world. Rom. 1.
8. A persuasion or belief of the lawfulness of things indifferent.
Hast thou faith? Have it to thyself before God. Rom 14.
9. Faithfulness; fidelity; a strict adherence to duty and fulfillment of promises.
Her failing, while her faith to me remains, I would conceal.
Children in whom is no faith. Deut. 32.
10. Word or honor pledged; promise given; fidelity. He violated his plighted faith.
For you alone I broke my faith with injured Palamon.
11. Sincerity; honesty; veracity; faithfulness. We ought in good faith, to fulfill all our engagements.
12. Credibility or truth. Unusual.]
The faith of the foregoing narrative.
Do you agnostics have your own dictionaries too?
It is really sad and funny how all of you flatter yourselves with your deluted thoughts and schemes. Its quite confirming to see truth in action with most of you, when it was said that people will believe anything as long as its not in the bible. Or how Hittler put it"it's harder to get people to believe a little lie but much easier to get them to believe a big one."
Can I ask you to ask yourselves four great questions?
1. Who am I? (and what am I worth?)
2. Where did I come from?
3. Why am I here?
4. Where am I going when I die?
How do you answer these questions?
Heres another challenging thought, do you all realize you've been brain washed by the devil?
Like for instance the word "evolution" has many meanings, only one of which is scientific.
1. Cosmic evolution: the origin of time, space and matter, i.e. Big bang.
2. Chemical evolution: the origin of higher elements from hydrogen.
How did we get all of these other elements? you expect me to believe we got iron from hydrogen?
3. Stellar and planetary evolution: Origin of stars and planets. No one has ever seen a star form.
4. Organic evolution. Origin of life.
5. Macro evolution:Changing from one kind into another. No one has ever seen a dog produce a non-dog.
6. Micro evolution. Variations within the kinds. Only this one has been observed. The other five are purely religious, a belief in something completely made up by man to comfort him in his sin. All you can give is examples of #6 which there's no arguement about it, it happens, but don't emply that that is some how magically evidence for the other five. It's not, it's completely made up to trick you into believing there is no God. And the bible says "He that says there is no God is a fool." and I totally agree and sadly so should you if you were only willing to admitt that your the decieved ones and the Christians who are truly born again and know God personally are right and you hate that fact don't you? In any case you continue to dicieve yourselves that there is no God and I'll kindly continue to remind you that there is and He knows every thought and deed we all have done. I have a great story of someone alive today who has seen God do something rather miraculous mabey I'll share it with you next time. If anyone believes me or the testimony. I'll be shocked but crazier things have happened. God bless you all and hope the temp is just right when you fall. :)
1. Who am I? (and what am I worth?)
I'm a sentient, self-aware bipedal being resident on the planet Earth. I am worth whatever value I choose to put upon myself.
2. Where did I come from?
Organic matter.
3. Why am I here?
No particular reason. But while I'm here I'm going to do stuff that interests me.
4. Where am I going when I die?
Don't know, don't care because I doubt that my consciousness and ego are capable of continuing once my brain stops functioning. Probably will revert to non-living matter and perhaps become another life-form later.
Oh, and Peter, your ignorance of evolutionary science is appalling. If you can't even get that right without puking out canned answers from apologists, I doubt very much you're in a position to understand what the word "truth" actually means.
And I declare you the loser of this debate by virtue of Godwin's Law.
I have a great story of someone alive today who has seen God do something rather miraculous mabey I'll share it with you next time.
Tell ya what....instead, why don't you grab a can of Campbell's alphabet soup, and save tomorrow's bowel movement. I bet it would randomly spell out a better argument for your "Jesus".
Scram, and take your subjective religious tripe with you.
Peter,
What on earth are you trying to accomplish? Yes, we can all look things up in the dictionary. (By the way, you forgot to cite your source.) How do those definitions help your case? Consider this snippet from your own post:
1. Belief; the assent of the mind to the truth of what is declared by another, resting on his authority and veracity, without other evidence;...
So one meaning of faith is to assent to the truth of something based on what someone has told you without other evidence. Yes, I completely agree with that, and it's something we point out here all the time. It's not a very reliable way to obtain beliefs, by the way (as I'm sure you are aware).
You asked "Do you agnostics have your own dictionaries too?"
Well, I'm an atheist, but I'll answer anyway. Yes, I own quite a few. Why do you ask?
Peter: "It is really sad and funny how all of you flatter yourselves with your deluted [deluded?] thoughts and schemes. Its quite confirming [comforting?] to see truth in action with most of you, when it was said that people will believe anything as long as its not in the bible."
That's a really interesting assertion, Peter. So you're suggesting that our only criterion for truth is whether it appears in the Bible or not; i.e. in = false, out = true. Well, I won't presume to speak for everybody, but that's not exactly how I go about it. You see, I'm a big advocate of evidence and reasoning. If there is substantial evidence to back an assertion, I'll generally accept it as being true (provisionally). If there is substantial evidence that contradicts an assertion, I'll generally reject it as being false (provisionally). If there is little or no evidence one way or the other, I try my best not to jump to any conclusions. That probably sounds a little crazy, but that's how I do it.
Peter: "Can I ask you to ask yourselves four great questions?"
Those questions are "great" according to whom? Most of them are question-begging and subjective by my assessment. By "Who am I?" I presume you are not asking for my name, right? So, what is your meaning? As to what I am "worth", that's very subjective and dependent upon context. My "worth" to an employer is not the same as my "worth" to my child, for example. So again, what is your intended meaning? Where did I come from? That's very vague. I could answer "I came from Michigan", or "I came from a fertilized egg", or "I came from a lower species", or "I came from second-generation stellar matter", etc. Please explain your intended meaning. The "Why am I here?" and "Where will I go when I die?" questions are a little more interesting syntactically, because they assume answers to questions that were not asked explicitly: to wit, "Is there a *reason* that I'm here?" and "Will there be anything left of me to go anywhere when I die?" So, I think you mistakenly glossed over those more basic questions in your zeal to ask a penetrating question. Shall we back up and ask those first?
Peter: "Heres [sic] another challenging thought, do you all realize you've been brain washed by the devil?"
That is indeed challenging, Peter. It's challenging to figure out how to get through to you. You realize that asking a question does not automatically make its premises true, don't you? For example, I could ask "How will you react when Allah sends you to Hell for your blasphemies against Him?" You see? It's like "Have you stopped beating your wife?"
Peter: "Like for instance the word 'evolution' has many meanings, only one of which is scientific."
Goodness, Peter, you need to read something besides creationist tracts. Many words have multiple meanings; usually context is sufficient to disambiguate them. If that nasty old devil is trying to trip me up with multiple meanings of the word "evolution", then I'd have to say he's chosen a rather simple-minded strategy. Wouldn't you? Next thing you know, he'll be messing up my sock drawer, or hiding my favorite ballpoint pen. Yikes.
By the way, have you ever read a book on the theory of evolution? Give it a try. It's really interesting stuff.
Peter, your long-ass post is hardly worth reading and responding to. Christianity is and always has been nonsense.
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