"There is neither good nor bad, but thinking makes it so" ~ Shakespeare

what is significant about this quote is that people tend to think that they are doing the good thing. if the good person sees a bad person stealing a car, that bad person will say "i am doing this to live, so is that so bad?" well guess what that isnt so bad. God cannot decide what is good or bad, being good or bad is indefinite.So does this rule out gods explanation of the world?

questions:

Also, if god set up our faith doesnt that seem like you are being controlled even though you can choose which path you go?

Why would the american government ban the learning of the evolution theory in the US? Moreover, why did the church ask the government to do it so?

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"If something must be true for us as humans, to exist then it is true because we exist" ~ Anthropic principle
this is telling me that we only believe in god because we want to believe in him. we exist because we or someone believes we exist

"There is only a case of perspective, and how one justifies his or her actions to be the morally correct one. It's like trying to define which grey is blacker than the other." ~try to find out who is that from
we may think one or another but we cannot judge someones thinking blindly and act like it is wrong, and what another person is doing is right.

++=+++=++=

"Hope is the worst of evils, for it prolongs the torment of man." ~sparking up any ideas? the jew only suffered longer because they chose not to rebel agains the nazis, in a perspective.



i vote no because if Catholicism is the ultimately the right religion, then why are there people still believing in other religions?

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Remeber kids

Hope is the worst evil of all, for it prolongs the torment of man.

That's a rather stupid reasoning. 'If this is right, why do people believe in other stuff?' It's ridiculous to expect that a correct idea is a universally accepted idea. Galileo was burned at stake, remember. Or was it Copernicus? Whatever.

As for me...well, I'm a Christian, but I still answered maybe. Should I be answering yes? Well, that there is a God is a choice I'm betting on, but that doesn't mean I'm right. Perhaps I'm being too detached, but I don't suppose it's hurting you.

however, doesn't christianity require absolute faith?... and your not believing and surrendering yourself to him completely means that you're doing a disfavor to God, right?

hum. at least, that's what i thought about christianity. O_O;

But, no, I don't believe it's terrible reasoning on his part. you say that it's ridiculous for him to not believe in christianity because it's not a universally accepted idea, but to me, it seems like you're saying that he should believe in christianity because it's right... but there isn't a way to back that up. it all sounds too circular to me.

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-Max

I am a Catholic. I believe I am in the right faith not generally as a Christian but as a Catholic - Christian. Technically to speak, I am not certain if protestants will go to Heaven just by accepting Jesus as our saviour. (yes Im canadian with the 'u' )

if Catholicism is the one true religion why are there other religions? I think this question contradicts many atheists/agnostics follow-up question of why God is controlling us with right and wrong - Heaven and Hell afterlife. If one wishes to start up his own religion with an elephant as their god, go ahead. Its your free will.

What is important here is that you freely chose to be away from God.
Hell is basically absence of God. You chose to be away from God and you got your wish. You are away from God for all eternity. congrats.

Why is hell torment then? Because humans cannot live without God's presence. That is not what humans were created for. Humans were created to live as God's most perfect creation in harmony. I personally do not think we will be burning in an actual fire in hell as human senses only exist in this world.


Now this has always worked for me whenever I had doubts. It goes something like

can a car make itself? of course the answer is No
can a universe make itself? ______________

or.... who caused the big bang? the theory states that the universe was condensed into a tiny ball and SOMEHOW exploded. So much for concrete science proof eh? 'somehow'

o btw go Love Hina, NHK ni youkoso, School Rumble

your going about your theory the wrong way of corse a car cant create its self because it is not Natural but don't animals evolve not in the sense of monkeys to humans but more like adapting also if you want to get on topic of who created who i think it isman who created god. a big bang happened because you mix the wrong things and there will be an explosion " example" gasoline fumes and a match. man evetulally came about then man started to learn then man started to fear and to save him self from fear he creats a being that he can depend on a coincedence occors and pow you got a full blown religion the reason for this is man needs to learn but man is also lazy so the unexplain able is just chalked up as god. and if god does exist who created him/her/It?

P.S i voted no because i think there is an anwser to all questions we just have to look for them.

When you tell someone "see ya tomorrow", are you really, completely and irrefutably sure that you're gonna see them tomorrow? Do you have a vast and complete knowledge of what is to come or can you see beforehand any events so that you can be sure that between today and tomorrow nothing bad is gonna happen to that person or to you that may prevent you to meet each other? How can you know that maybe that person is NOT going to have a sudden appointment with another person he must see or that you're NOT going to suffer an accident?

Simply, that's called "having faith". Yeah, I know. Shut up. As incredible and astounding as this 1000-year-old secret has been uncovered, all people and their mom around the freakin globe do this sort of thing *all* the time, unfortunately, like n00bs on a Starcraft LAN party, they just won't admit this DEAR-GOD obvious fact and instead decide to just go on about as if "faith" is exclusive to the "close-minded" (whatever the hell that means) and the non-intellectuals (aka retarded) lest they be damned into religious fanatists or cuban revolunitionaries.
Don't even start on me that you don't have faith. You do. All the time. You're mangaphiles, for Christ's sake, waiting for the next scanlated chapter of your favorite commercial-generated (fanservice, if you'd like) series or your beloved hentai just to find out that it has been dropped cuz either it's licensed or the fansub just lost interest on it. All of you should know this first-hand. I'm pretty SURE about this (haw, haw). =P

And seriously, what the crap is wrong with these people who get the brilliant ideas of "believing"? Are they from this dimension? Because last time I checked it was pretty damn resolved that just because you believe or not in something is not gonna pop into existence or be blasted into oblivion. I always get this feeling that deep, deep down these people actually believe that if they desire it so strong until they fart, fairies will happily appear to pollute our environment. I mean, you see, in the early 19th century no taxidermist believed that such a thing like a platypus could actually exist, but that didn't stopped the platypuses to respond them "Screw you!!".

cronolink: what?

hahaha. now, i know you have some points in there, but wow. haha... i understand your reasons for believing, but i'm very very much confused by your argument.

i still stand by my question because i have been told that God requires absolute faith (in christianity) for those people to be saved. from this, i understand that there can be no doubt in your mind that God exists.

so, when you throw the argument about absolutes... the thing I'm getting from your paragraphs is:

1. You don't know everything.
2. Everyone has faith that is supposed to fill the holes of uncertainty.
3. Believing and having faith (or not) doesn't define existence.

So... I mean, from your arguments, it seems like you're saying that faith is only the "best guess" portion of your knowledge... and because of that, it's okay to doubt the existence of god, even if you're a christian.

but, there it is... I've had plenty of christians arguing against me: you need to have ABSOLUTE faith that God exists in order for him to save you!! You need to believe in his existence!

...so, my question is posed again.

Don't you need to be absolutely sure (even if you have faith filling in those unknown regions of knowledge) that God does exist... for you to be saved by God?

It's fine if you do or you don't... but, I'm just wonderin'... because lukannon said that he isn't absolutely certain that he's right... but... doesn't he have to be..? O_o;

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-Max

"God did not create man. It was man who created god."

I have never believed in god because it has never been prominent in my life. And when I was old enough to realize there was such a thing called religion I ignored it because I did not want to have faith in unpredictability (Although that just might be the definition of faith). I mean that there is no proof that god exist, people just say he does.

Last edited by chaire at 1:54 am, Jun 30 2007

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"Existence before essence. Man must first exist, encounter himself and then he defines himself afterwards."
Jean-Paul Sartre

I find it ridiculous to believe in a single deity governing all of existence, and even if it were the truth; he doesn't deserve to be "worshiped".
If there truly is a God "watching over us" he is doing one crappy job of making the world a better and safer place, everything that keeps us safe and happy we've gotten ourselves.

Instead of worshiping this God he should be rebelled against, overthrown and killed, removing the position of "God" forever.

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Tarutaru WHM tank FTW!!!
Anything so conspicuously small and cute MUST be evil to the core.
(\__/)
(+'.'+) <(Mwahahaha!!!)
(")_(")
This is Bunny. Copy and paste Bunny into your signature to help him gain world domination!

Has anyone read the "Old Testiment"? it is hard to get a free copy and book stores in Australia shun it. why?

Because the words supposedly from the "good book" support the barbaric social beliefs that tooks thousands of years to stop. Below here is an exerpt i read in church and is not in ye olde tongue:

NOTE: there are many stories like this, all bad. p.s the old man was a deciple of god and lived by his words.

Once there was a tired traveler upon a tired land took to the refuge of a wise man, and they dinned and he spied a glance with his daughter. 1 night and 1 day of rest (sunday) he prepared to leave whence a thick mob raged onto his property and raised thier weapons upon the traveller."NO! Stop! do not dirty your hands with this mans blood, cast your eye's onto my daughter to rape, when live to rape when cold with death, for the traveller is man; he deserves better" and the mob heeded his words and marched towards...

the real question should by: should i worship a god who discriminates against me!? (i'm female)

Didn't you just say that the bible has "stories" in it? its a collection of stories. just cause rape happens doesn't mean it supports it. the old testsment has many stories with kings in them. those kings had multiple wives. the bible(and God for that matter) never says that it supports the idea of polygamy. it is just something that took place.

practically banning the old testament from the book store is a bit extreme IMO.

gotta admit i don't think i read that story u said as an example. sounds gross.

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HUBBY of DUBBY

I saw this discussion only when it was already several pages long, so I didn't read all of it, but I noticed some points that I don't agree with.



I find this idea very flattering as well as stupid. First of all, if we are God's most perfect creation then I don't want to meet his worst creation. Also, there is this. Try to imagine:

On a random piece of rock, you have a billion people. That piece of rock orbits around a burning ball of gas that lots bigger than that rock. That star floats in a group of a few billion other stars. This group is part of a bigger group that contains ten to hundred other groups. about 20 of these bigger groups for yet another group. Several of these giant groups make up the universe.

Now compair the size of the universe with the size of those billion people.
What the hell made them believe that God would actually create them as the his image, would send them his only son to bring them salvation and would start the end of times on that particular planet?

If there is a God that created the universe, there's little chance that he made us the center of his creation. I doubt he'd even know of our existance and if he knows I can't imagine that he would actually care. Our sun will explode far before the end of times and that will probably be the end of us. (if not earlier) The rest of the universe will barely be affected by this and live on.

-------------------------

Many people believe in the afterlife. I don't.
I believe it is just something to comfort people who don't want to believe that their existance is going to end. While there are scientific results that might explain the existance of God, there are no such facts for heaven or hell.

The only way you would be able to live on after you death would be through your soul. The body simply rots. So to explain the afterlife, you need to believe in a soul. However, nobody ever actually saw/felt/smelled/tasted or percepted one in any way. However, that alone is not enough to proof that it isn't there. In astrophysics, there is one thing that fits the description we need: black matter. We have no way of percieving black matter, but we know it is there because it influences the movements of the stars. This could explain where the souls come from, and this could also explain God. They could both be hidden somewhere in that mass that could be considered as an alternate dimension. However, there are some things that cannot be explained. How could we have descriptions of a heaven or hell? No one can switch between a physical and a "black matter state". It's impossible for us to cross dimensions to tell the tale. Also, how could body and soul coöperate? Black matter can move freely through atomic masses, at least with a normal density. (not through black holes for example) To keep it together in one body would be impossible. That makes the theory of souls less believable. In my opinion souls don't exist. It's just the chemical hocus pocus in the brain. But, assuming that a soul does exist, how would it be possible for God to tell a good one apart from an evil one? The structure of a soul would probably be based on the shape of the body and not on the mindset. Also, where you enter the other dimension is only determined by your physical location, not wether you're good or evil. You might as well end up in "hell" even though you're a good person. And also, just like some others, I believe that good is merely a perception.

Thats sad... to not believe in the after life. In my heart i know there is nothing afterwards but.... if i "believe it" and it gives me peace of mind why not continue to? its not gonna do anything bad to believe a lie right?

i'm currently pretending to believe in reincarnation since if fits the scientitic thingy that nothing can be destroyed but CHANGED y'know.

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even so you don't see any female heroes in it, do you? suppose he diddn't feel women were good enough...

i can't say i really remember any besides Esther. if you don't call her a hero then i guess it doesn't exist. either way that is besides the point. yes men had more rights and were glorified in the past. women were seen more so as objects.it's wrong but you can't change history.


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HUBBY of DUBBY

Who knows? I'll freely admit that I'm not a particularly upstanding Christian. Perhaps I need to have absolute faith and therefore even what little faith I do have is invalidated.

But I do know it's absolutely ridiculous to say 'there is a 100% chance that God exists.' Humans are incapable of presenting an absolute, and indeed, there's nothing particularly absolute about God. Is there proof? Well, there might be(I've heard the records that Romans kept confirmed a lot of things, but I haven't verified it yet), but an absolute guarantee doesn't exist for humans unless it comes from God.

Do you need absolute faith? I don't know. I don't believe anyone's ever told me anything along those lines.

@the old man who sent his daughter to be raped: I do hope you know that this was a demonstration of the lawless state of Israel at the time, and the Bible doesn't support the actions of the man or the crowd at all. Context is important, you know.



We were his most perfect creation. After Adam and Eve sinned, we were corrupted. We might still be his 'highest' creation, but we aren't perfect in any way.



'The end of time' is open to interpretation, I hope you know. :\ Perhaps I'm simply forgetting the tenets of my own religion, which will make me feel inordinately stupid later, but I don't remember anything ever being said about 'the universe' ending during the end of times. Just earthly reign and such.

And why wouldn't he know of our existence? He's supposed to be omniscient, omnipotent, and omnipresent. Why would he be limited to the level of human constructs?

I should probably mention that as far as I know, there's nothing in the Bible arguing against aliens or against the salvation of aliens. The Bible was made for humans specifically. Why should it bother itself with the discoveries made more than 15 centuries after it's final creation? You're misunderstanding the purpose of the Bible. It's not so you can understand the mysteries of the universe, and it's not to say 'hey, d00d, humans, you guys are the only people in this entire universe I care about.' It's to say 'hey, you're going to hell, I'm giving you a way out.'

Augh, I lost my train of thought.