Explain Your Religious Views or Lack Thereof

[Blasveck]

You lack an understanding of physics, biology, etc if you believe that that's what atheists believe.

Does no one bother to read that last line?? I was making it oversimplified on purpose to show him how people mock it idiotically, just like people oversimplify religion to mock it.

Ah. My mistake. Apologies.

[Torcularis Septentrionalis]

The "Problem of Evil" argument makes two assumptions:
1. That God is here to serve us;
2. That there cannot be a lesson learned in Evil that God wishes for us to learn.

“God whispers to us in our pleasures, speaks in our conscience, but shouts in our pains: it is His megaphone to rouse a deaf world.”

Indeed.
However, the first assumption must be made, because if God does not serve us, then why worship God? Simply because he is? Do I also worship the clouds for simply giving me shade? Or the sun for shining?

But does God need us to learn something from Evil, why could he not teach us it himself. Why does he need to make a lesson?

God is not here to serve us, we are here to serve Him.
And because He wants us to have experiences and to have a life that has suffering so that when we are capable of coming to the ultimate joys of paradise we can fully appreciate it, and because sometimes knowledge of bad is pointless without having had it happen to us.

[Ermiopa]

I'm not asking for respect, I'm simply asking that you don't disrespect me, or my religion. Because, by disrespecting my religion, you disrespect me. Its like if you disrespect my mom, you disrespect me.

Oh, and its not that hard to mock atheism.

How atheists think the world was created:
A bunch of nothing and even more nothing collided into a big explosion with created something which started expanding in even more of that something which created the earth.

Its easy to make anything sound ridiculously stupid.

The way you described the Big Bang did sound ridiculously stupid. I think that was intentional based of your last sentence.

Also how do Christians think God was created?

Depends, Theistic Evolution Christians or the...unusual Young World Creationists.

[Seperates]

You lack an understanding of physics, biology, etc if you believe that that's what atheists believe.

Does no one bother to read that last line?? I was making it oversimplified on purpose to show him how people mock it idiotically, just like people oversimplify religion to mock it.

Religion is overly complex. It really is quite simple when you strip away all the circular reasoning. The history is fascinating and complex, but the ideas are painfully illogical and fade in the light of empirical evidence.

[The Scientific States]

Indeed.
However, the first assumption must be made, because if God does not serve us, then why worship God? Simply because he is? Do I also worship the clouds for simply giving me shade? Or the sun for shining?

But does God need us to learn something from Evil, why could he not teach us it himself. Why does he need to make a lesson?

God is not here to serve us, we are here to serve Him.
And because He wants us to have experiences and to have a life that has suffering so that when we are capable of coming to the ultimate joys of paradise we can fully appreciate it, and because sometimes knowledge of bad is pointless without having had it happen to us.

Some people never have true joy. There's a lot of people in this world who just suffer, and according to the abrahamic religions(except Judaism) they won't reach heaven because they never believed in God simply because they were raised in another faith.

[Shaggai]

"IT'S ALL A TEST."

That's the answer that I've heard.

I reply with, what is he testing for then? A test requires that there are results needed for something. One does not run tests to run tests.

Aperture Science disagrees. "We do what we must, because we can."

[Blasveck]

Indeed.
However, the first assumption must be made, because if God does not serve us, then why worship God? Simply because he is? Do I also worship the clouds for simply giving me shade? Or the sun for shining?

But does God need us to learn something from Evil, why could he not teach us it himself. Why does he need to make a lesson?

God is not here to serve us, we are here to serve Him.
And because He wants us to have experiences and to have a life that has suffering so that when we are capable of coming to the ultimate joys of paradise we can fully appreciate it, and because sometimes knowledge of bad is pointless without having had it happen to us.

Why is Paradise "the ultimate reward"?

Why does the afterlife matter?

[Menassa]

The way you described the Big Bang did sound ridiculously stupid. I think that was intentional based of your last sentence.

Also how do Christians think God was created?

Depends, Theistic Evolution Christians or the...unusual Young World Creationists.

OEC
YEC

Are the same things because of the C.

[Liriena]

My father is an agnostic, very critical of the Catholic Church, and my mother is a retired veterinarian who later on became a moderate Catholic catechist, who opposes compulsory celibacy for priests and nuns and sees nothing wrong with birth control.

I was baptised and educated in a conservative Catholic school that shared the block with a relatively progressive Catholic church, attended mass almost every Sunday for most of my childhood, but stopped going as I reached puberty.

I had my Confirmation at age sixteen, even when I seldom attended mass and found it hard to take doctrine seriously, and prayed on occasion, mostly as stress release.

By age eighteen I had lost all interest in Catholicism, and by age nineteen I had started to regard myself as a 'cultural Catholic'. A few months into 2012, I attended my last mass (an awful experience) and fell in love with Naturalistic Pantheism.

Naturalistic Pantheism and I have been together for quite a few months now, and I couldn't be happier.

Do I believe there is a God of any sort? Yes and no. I believe that there is something slightly magical/miraculous about the Universe I live in, but I see it as a beautiful and complex, self-made and self-sufficient system, rather than the product of a greater supernatural being's power.

Do I believe in an afterlife? No, but I do hope that, if an afterlife exists, it is the Hindu afterlife, or a similar one. I would rather return to the realm of the living to enjoy this Universe and keep working to make it a bit more perfect for my fellow living beings than spend eternity in some sort of supernatural spa.

Any questions?

[Ermiopa]

I'm not asking for respect, I'm simply asking that you don't disrespect me, or my religion. Because, by disrespecting my religion, you disrespect me. Its like if you disrespect my mom, you disrespect me.

Oh, and its not that hard to mock atheism.

How atheists think the world was created:
A bunch of nothing and even more nothing collided into a big explosion with created something which started expanding in even more of that something which created the earth.

Its easy to make anything sound ridiculously stupid.

Then don't be so attached to your ideas if they are so easily mocked.

Cute. That's not mocking atheism. That's mocking physics.

Those physics (Not the oversimplified, the real ones) are what every atheist in their right mind believes, except scientists with differing theories of course.

[The Scientific States]

The way you described the Big Bang did sound ridiculously stupid. I think that was intentional based of your last sentence.

Also how do Christians think God was created?

Depends, Theistic Evolution Christians or the...unusual Young World Creationists.

Not the world, God. How was a deity created. How come God only represents Earth? There are other planets. But looking at religious books they only apply to Earth.

[Menassa]

If we're not worthy, then our design is flawed.

We are flawed because its our fault.
Because of Adam and Eve.

(I am not a Christian, but this is how some answer)

You should read Ezekiel 18.

[The Silence of Night]

I reply with, what is he testing for then? A test requires that there are results needed for something. One does not run tests to run tests.

Aperture Science disagrees. "We do what we must, because we can."

For the good of all of us... Except the ones who are dead.

Truly a philosophical AI, that one.

[Blasveck]

My father is an agnostic, very critical of the Catholic Church, and my mother is a retired veterinarian who later on became a moderate Catholic catechist, who opposes compulsory celibacy for priests and nuns and sees nothing wrong with birth control.

I was baptised and educated in a conservative Catholic school that shared the block with a relatively progressive Catholic church, attended mass almost every Sunday for most of my childhood, but stopped going as I reached puberty.

I had my Confirmation at age sixteen, even when I seldom attended mass and found it hard to take doctrine seriously, and prayed on occasion, mostly as stress release.

By age eighteen I had lost all interest in Catholicism, and by age nineteen I had started to regard myself as a 'cultural Catholic'. A few months into 2012, I attended my last mass (an awful experience) and fell in love with Naturalistic Pantheism.

Naturalistic Pantheism and I have been together for quite a few months now, and I couldn't be happier.

Do I believe there is a God of any sort? Yes and no. I believe that there is something slightly magical/miraculous about the Universe I live in, but I see it as a beautiful and complex, self-made and self-sufficient system, rather than the product of a greater supernatural being's power.

Do I believe in an afterlife? No, but I do hope that, if an afterlife exists, it is the Hindu afterlife, or a similar one. I would rather return to the realm of the living to enjoy this Universe and keep working to make it a bit more perfect for my fellow living beings than spend eternity in some sort of supernatural spa.

Any questions?

You make me really want to look into Pantheism, Liri.

[Grave_n_idle]

If we're not worthy, then our design is flawed.

We are flawed because its our fault.
Because of Adam and Eve.

(I am not a Christian, but this is how some answer)

That is an answer I've heard - and I (personally) object to the idea that it's fair to test someone based on a handicap you applied to them, because of someone else.

[Uiiop]

God is not here to serve us, we are here to serve Him.
And because He wants us to have experiences and to have a life that has suffering so that when we are capable of coming to the ultimate joys of paradise we can fully appreciate it, and because sometimes knowledge of bad is pointless without having had it happen to us.

Some people never have true joy. There's a lot of people in this world who just suffer, and according to the abrahamic religions(except Judaism) they won't reach heaven because they never believed in God simply because they were raised in another faith.

the problem with that statement is your experience might have set the deity perceived standards to be higher than they actually are. It might not matter whether you believe in something or not to get to the good afterlife. The ones who believe that could have gotten it all wrong.

[Shaggai]

God is not here to serve us, we are here to serve Him.
And because He wants us to have experiences and to have a life that has suffering so that when we are capable of coming to the ultimate joys of paradise we can fully appreciate it, and because sometimes knowledge of bad is pointless without having had it happen to us.

Why is Paradise "the ultimate reward"?

Why does the afterlife matter?

Because it's just that awesome, I assume. Of course, such a belief cannot be reconciled with a belief in hell. At worst there can be purgatory.

[Torcularis Septentrionalis]

God is not here to serve us, we are here to serve Him.
And because He wants us to have experiences and to have a life that has suffering so that when we are capable of coming to the ultimate joys of paradise we can fully appreciate it, and because sometimes knowledge of bad is pointless without having had it happen to us.

Some people never have true joy. There's a lot of people in this world who just suffer, and according to the abrahamic religions(except Judaism) they won't reach heaven because they never believed in God simply because they were raised in another faith.

I believe that no just God would send someone to eternal damnation for not believing, which is why I don't believe in that kind of God. And suffering on Earth brings us greater pleasures in Paradise. The ones who suffer the most are the ones most grateful for what they are given.

God is not here to serve us, we are here to serve Him.
And because He wants us to have experiences and to have a life that has suffering so that when we are capable of coming to the ultimate joys of paradise we can fully appreciate it, and because sometimes knowledge of bad is pointless without having had it happen to us.

Why is Paradise "the ultimate reward"?

Why does the afterlife matter?

I'm not even sure I understand what you mean.

[Ermiopa]

Depends, Theistic Evolution Christians or the...unusual Young World Creationists.

Not the world, God. How was a deity created. How come God only represents Earth? There are other planets. But looking at religious books they only apply to Earth.

Never mentioned how he was created in the Bible, maybe its so complex that it wouldn't be worth going into to explain to the simple minds of the classical Israelites. There is, for example, a theory that he exists in another dimension, without time. Due to those circumstances, the idea of cause and effect no longer comes into play because it requires the passage of time.

[Blasveck]

We are flawed because its our fault.
Because of Adam and Eve.

(I am not a Christian, but this is how some answer)

That is an answer I've heard - and I (personally) object to the idea that it's fair to test someone based on a handicap you applied to them, because of someone else.

They would reply that God didnt apply the handicap.
We did it ourselves.

To much self-hating, IMO.

[Seperates]

Indeed.
However, the first assumption must be made, because if God does not serve us, then why worship God? Simply because he is? Do I also worship the clouds for simply giving me shade? Or the sun for shining?

But does God need us to learn something from Evil, why could he not teach us it himself. Why does he need to make a lesson?

God is not here to serve us, we are here to serve Him.
And because He wants us to have experiences and to have a life that has suffering so that when we are capable of coming to the ultimate joys of paradise we can fully appreciate it, and because sometimes knowledge of bad is pointless without having had it happen to us.

Really? What a turn on the Judaism concept. Such a shame, it was the one thing I liked about that Abrahamic tradition... Islam is so Babylonian, I don't even know why it claims Abrahamic descent (then again, I say the same of Christianity).

Really, I should worship the tyrant simply because he rules? I didn't know he was so egomaniacal as to require my worship.

Really? I'm pretty sure God could just hook up some shit to our mental faculties and spam us with happy messages and we wouldn't need any suffering to know how good it feels and OH HOW SWEET IT IS.

Give me one bourbon, one scotch and one beer anyday.

[Lammatrey]

You're fucking joking, right? Why the fuck do you have the right to tell other people who they can and can't worship?

HOW DARE YOU BAN MY HUMAN SACRIFICE.

YEAH MAN, WHAT THE FUCK.

Yeah, because all religion practices human sacrifice. You have no right to ban who people worship and what they do with their lives.

[The Scientific States]

Not the world, God. How was a deity created. How come God only represents Earth? There are other planets. But looking at religious books they only apply to Earth.

Never mentioned how he was created in the Bible, maybe its so complex that it wouldn't be worth going into to explain to the simple minds of the classical Israelites. There is, for example, a theory that he exists in another dimension, without time. Due to those circumstances, the idea of cause and effect no longer comes into play because it requires the passage of time.

That theory defies logic.

[Menassa]

We are flawed because its our fault.
Because of Adam and Eve.

(I am not a Christian, but this is how some answer)

That is an answer I've heard - and I (personally) object to the idea that it's fair to test someone based on a handicap you applied to them, because of someone else.

Ezekiel as well rejects that answer.

[The Silence of Night]

God is not here to serve us, we are here to serve Him.
And because He wants us to have experiences and to have a life that has suffering so that when we are capable of coming to the ultimate joys of paradise we can fully appreciate it, and because sometimes knowledge of bad is pointless without having had it happen to us.

Why is Paradise "the ultimate reward"?

Why does the afterlife matter?

Because it's paradise, a perfect world, with anything you could ever want.