My gf feels that she needs christianity because if it weren't for a promise of afterlife, and the christian community, she would be an immoral person, and would not live her life with others in mind. I think she is wrong, and just thinks that because she wants to be christian, wants there to be an afterlife, etc. It's obvious that people can be moral without religion, but is that true for everyone? What do you think?
Yes, Christianity teaches people to FEAR so many things. That's the HOOK they use to grab you, and keep you. If you don't bow down to Jesus, you will have these FEARS to look forward to: Fear Sin! Fear God! Fear Hell! Fear Satan! Fear Demons! Fear Apocalypse! Fear Eternal Damnation! But if you join the club, Jesus will magically remove these threats to you! You can go on sinning, but since you're now forgiven, everything is cool! Ain't it great! Of course Christianity created these false fears (just like Saddam with WMD), to manipulate people so that they become Christians and never leave out of FEAR! It's perfect fodder for SHEEP, because they live their lives in FEAR of everyone, strangers, child molesters, terrorists, liberals, abortionists, free speech even! Jesus is the perfect opium where you forget about all those manufactured fears and just let Jesus make all the moral judgements for you. You no longer need to THINK! You can close your mind to everything else, pretend so many problems like Global Warming and Christians killing innocent Muslims everyday don't exist. Why care about the environment when Christ is coming to take you away from that cesspool you've turned the Earth into. Why care about dying muslims cause the more who die only advances the day when the Apolcalypse occurs and you get to go hangout with Jesus! You can forget ALL your cares with Jesus!
And yes you can be VERY MORAL without being part of ANY religion. There are millions of examples walking around...
Skip, I like the points that you made. And to the OP, yes, I do believe that some people "need" to have someone looking after them to feel secure. And "god" is a pretty damn big security blanket. No one NEEDS this per se; they just can't imagine anything different. Peace and love
No body needs religion. Organized religion sucks. What people need is something better than this shithole earth.
Your missing the point, its not that we need religion, its that we need God. The best religion is the one that brings you closest to God.
Well its just my opinion. I believe religion is a path to God. And when i say we need God, im just saying i believe that God is way to peace on earth, and w/o him you cannot be in peace.
The right religion for anybody really depends on the person. Theres no "right" religion, just a relationship with God and a loving and giving heart is all we need for eternity with him. I believe God is love, so he wouldnt ever send any of his children to eternal "hell". I believe hll is just seperation from God when you die, but remember God is love, he forgives. Just like humans are supposed to. Every religion does have some flaw, yall need to stop taking every word so litterally.
Hell cannot separate you from God, first because Hell doesn't exist, and second because God is the Alpha and the Omega, it must include everything you could possible conceive, including Hell, if it did indeed exist...
Some of you are right in the sense that yes, you can forget all of your cares with Jesus, you can let Jesus do the thinking for you, etc., but that's the entire POINT. Any religion, any moral code, is simply a backbone to live by... an official code of conduct for life. There's nothing wrong with wanting to live by a set moral system. A lot of people agree with Jesus's message of faith and love. I'm not a Christian per se, but I agree with most of Jesus's teachings and can see why the religion is so popular. Of course, lots of morons abuse the religion and turn it into something bad, but don't judge Jesus's message by those people.
But it's not just a code of conduct. It's a belief. The moral code part I get, and JC is a great role model, but going from that to saying this is TRUE, there is heaven and hell, god sees everything you do, he somehow controls things and yet you have free will, and if you accept christianity, your feelings somehow become a reflection of this god's feelings. That's the part that seems not only unnecessary, but unfounded and illogical. She's told me she wants there to be god and heaven and whatnot, which makes it seem like a facade. And I think that's the case for many more people than would be willing to admit it.
Well the point is there is a God. My reasoning for this is because of the ultimate beauty that we live in, but mankind fucked up society. This earth is perfect for substaining life, and God gave man free will, and look what we did with it.
Derrrr lets all believe that the sun, stars, planets, plants, sky, animals, humans, water, EVERYTHING was made randomly by absolutley nothing. Now that FedupAmerican is "Basically it is shutting your eyes and plugging your ears and going la la la la la la la"
Uh, the randomness of the Universe seems to be one of its most basic truths. Science supports this 100%, so far. As far as where the matter/energy came from and how it was created, there is no answer yet. I suppose we should all believe the Church's teaching that Earth is only 6,000 years old, everything was created at once (or at least over the course of a week, which was of course impossible to measure before we had calendars or even a sun or planet). And evolution is a LIE of course. Let's not forget too that the Church used to teach that the Earth is the center of the universe, and the sun revolves around the Earth. When scientists like Galileo tried to inform the church about the truth they were met with "shutting of eyes and plugging of ears and going la la la la la la la". And that was only the start of the Church's battle against scientific truth.
That is not reasoning. I agree that the world is beautiful, and that society is messed up, and that the earth is good, not perfect, at sustaining life. However, none of that is indicative that there is a god. If you look at the randomness of the earth, mountains, stars, species, and life in general, they do no seem to be the work of anything but natural laws. To say they indicate god is to tack on a preconcieved judgement. Therefore, it is not a reason, it is an excuse.
What people need is a sence of comunity, belonging. It just a real shame that there arnt more choices for them in mainstream society. But what we don't need is someone telling us how to be a good human, any more than a wolf needs to be told how to be a good wolf. This knowledge is inate within all creatures, otherwise the whole thing wouldn't work. As far as christian teaching the world was one hell of alot more peacfull before them warmongers came marching out of the dessert forcing there religon on everyone, the ten commandments in one hand and the OK to break then in the other
Exactly! This is what I've been saying. Good people are good people, not Good Christians or whatever. Being a christian doesn't make you a good person. Good "christians" are just good people who happen to be christian. It it the height of pompousness for Christianity or Christians to claim that Christianity or Christ make them Good. My belief is that we are ALL born good people. Original Sin is a LIE, a convenient recruiting tool that states that we are all EVIL SINNERS, even if we lived our lives as Christ did. It's completely absurd, and INSULTING to all non-Christians. Yet Christians still believe this, and thus feel superior to those who haven't "found" Christ. So Christians allow each other to denigrate every non-Christian on the planet, and we let them get away with these lies?
...Skip, not every Christian is mean >.< You say that Christians are intolerant, well...youre displaying the same intolerance you profess to be against.
I believe you've already said this. You are repeating yourself, no? I AM NOT THE SUBJECT OF THIS THREAD, AM I? Can't you read the title? So WHY GET PERSONAL? NEXT TIME, I'LL GET PERSONAL and you'll be BANNED permanently FOR PERSONAL INSULTS. Got it?
