how many people actually BELIEVE in God,and trust in him?

[Cheshire6]

I believe in and trust what I think god should be.
Apparently my belief is blasphemes.

[Hurricane_Scrambles]

sakura-haruno77777

SomeKid93

Heartfout

I don't.

People say if I look, I'll find him.

So far, the evidence suggests these people are wrong.

I must agree with Heartfout. This, and other reasons. There is no god, I can give you some of my reasons for this belief if you wish.

fine, try me

Alright, here's a few simple ones.
1. According to christian belief, god created the universe. This means he was present before anything else, and created everything else. This makes him supernatural. However, supernatural beings require natural roots. Without anything to base itself on, it cannot exist.
2. The world is beautifully complex. And I'm talking about just this world. There's thousands. There are hundreds of species of fish, birds and mammals. There are creatures such as the platypus, which are in their own category. Wonderfully complex beings. Now, according to your belief, a god, with NOTHING WHATSOEVER to base anything on, created all this complexity. In billions of galaxies. Trillions of stars. Countless worlds. Even if you came first, you cannot be that imaginative.

I have more to add, but I want to post this now.

[I got bored one day]

fatal_GRACE

OneWithDunamis

I think we have to acknowledge the fact that God doesn't love everyone to the same degree. It'll be like saying I'm not real because I won't talk to you. Not true.

Another logical fallacy. You can't say God loves us all, created love in fact, and is a being of INFINITE love, then go on to say he loves you more because you happen to be a part of the religion that prays to him juuuuust right.

"Fallacy"? Actually quantity doesn't undermine any of your given qualities or requirements. God loves Timmy more than Tommy, God is still a being of Infinite Love ( actually regardless of both persons ), God still Loves Tommy, and God can create love regardless of Loving either one. The only fallacy here is strawman.

[MemoriesThatKill]

Death and Misery

MemoriesThatKill

Fact: No one KNOWS if they are going to heaven because...

Fact: no one KNOWS what happens after they die.

I believe you rot. I know this. I've seen in a book, once. It's a process called "decomposition".

Well we all know what happens you your body. rolleyes I'm pretty sure she is talking about one's soul.

[Djavlepik]

Death and Misery

fatal_GRACE

Thank you for bringing up the best argument against the God of organized religion EVER!

If there is a God, and he is wise and merciful and blah blah blah, then he won't give a ******** what you believe.

To put this in simple perspective of real life if your parents are wise and merciful on you they won't care if you turn on them, if you stab them, and if you outright defame their names driving them underground and ruin their reputation. Why would they be angry?
Be sure to give your mom a good slap for me, see how she accepts it, or is your retort the simple "my mom isn't god!?" argument?

The thing is, when brought down to earth, just in most basic of situations, you sound foolish.

Nonsense.

I wouldn't tell my mother I don't believe in her. And I am not trying to attack your god, just pointing out the inconsistencies in your argument.

Even so, I could turn on my mother, slap her silly, and insult her name, but I am her child, and she will never stop loving me. In fact, I can take this a step further by pointing out that there is absolutely NOTHING AT ALL that my own son could EVER do to make me stop loving him. Are these people better than God, then?

I cannot reconcile the concept of a infinitely loving and merciful being who stops loving someone for skepticism, or for NOT KNOWING to love him back. It's like locking a child in a room from birth with no knowledge that you exist, then letting them out 20 years later, asking them if they love you, and punishing them for not telling you they do.

I do not know what god you worship, or Dunamis either, but I wouldn't want to worship him.

[Tiamat]

fatal_GRACE

The way I see it, if God exists (which I do not believe to be the case), then it is a moot point. If he does exist, and actually operates by the rules of basic reasoning, then I'll go to heaven if I'm a good person, and to hell if not. If he operates by crazy religious reasoning, then I'd rather go to hell than get to heaven on what amounts to little more than a goddamn technicality.

agree totally, though do believe in the existence of 'God'. What form I have no idea, and while I may consider myself most akin to a christian I would be happy to follow the rules and worship of any religion I could identify with due to the belief all are equal.

[I got bored one day]

MemoriesThatKill

Death and Misery

MemoriesThatKill

Fact: No one KNOWS if they are going to heaven because...

Fact: no one KNOWS what happens after they die.

I believe you rot. I know this. I've seen in a book, once. It's a process called "decomposition".

Well we all know what happens you your body. rolleyes I'm pretty sure she is talking about one's soul.

We don't even know if you have one, let alone if anything happens to it; I recommend we stick to square one. I mean, at least considering you, or ... do you believe in souls?

[Hurricane_Scrambles]

sakura-haruno77777

SomeKid93

sakura-haruno77777

i no that i cant make up peoples minds for them, but i'm gonna try to save as many people i can by showing them what God can do. i want people to live in paradise when they die, i dont want them to burn in hell. i hate to see people suffer.

Wooow. I'd say reason numuro uno right here.

what do u mean?

God: Oh, I love you all so MUCH, buuuuuut...I'm kinda bored, so here's what we'll do. I'll stop giving evidence of my existance for a couple thousand years, and those that believe in anything else get to burn in eternal flames! Won't this be fun? And remember, I love you all! Okay, I'ma start counting! Onnneee....twoooo...
All non-Christians: Ah, s**t.

[sakura7897]

Death and Misery

OneWithDunamis

The way I interpret this idea is that He won't let anyone come to His party uninvited. If you don't respect the host you ain't getting in.

And I don't think He's completely merciful, in the sense that He chooses not to save everyone.

And before anyone starts bashing me or Christianity for what I say, I'd like to point out that I'm not a Christian.

What if God made you responsible for your own salvation? What if we're not powerless, and we stop sitting with our thumbs up our butts waiting for God to fix everything? Progress was never made just waiting around.

God wont fix everything because He doesnt necessarily control us. He already knows what we're gonna do next before we even think of it. God wants us all to go to heaven but He wants us to chose for ourselves.

[Djavlepik]

OneWithDunamis

fatal_GRACE

Another logical fallacy. You can't say God loves us all, created love in fact, and is a being of INFINITE love, then go on to say he loves you more because you happen to be a part of the religion that prays to him juuuuust right.

Don't forget the part that He's wrathful as well. And that's not a contradiction. I can love and hate as much as I want myself. So can He.

And I would say He doesn't love me more BECAUSE I'm part of a religion. It's the other way around. If He never loved me I wouldn't be a part of His religion. I go by Calvinist theology if I had to choose a Christian theology to go by.

You can believe what you want, I suppose.

God is wrathful, yes. But no matter how wrathful, you cannot call that an excuse for hell.

If I slap my mother, I will be punished, probably very severely, but she will not torture me in the most excruciating manner imaginable for the rest of existence.

No being of infinite love, no matter how wrathful, would be capable of taking a grudge to that magnitude and length of time against someone whose only crime is ignorance.

[OneWithDunamis]

Death and Misery

OneWithDunamis

The way I interpret this idea is that He won't let anyone come to His party uninvited. If you don't respect the host you ain't getting in.

And I don't think He's completely merciful, in the sense that He chooses not to save everyone.

And before anyone starts bashing me or Christianity for what I say, I'd like to point out that I'm not a Christian.

What if God made you responsible for your own salvation? What if we're not powerless, and we stop sitting with our thumbs up our butts waiting for God to fix everything? Progress was never made just waiting around.

Well you probably know how I feel from my other thread. Progress to me is just the plot building up in His story. It's not that meaningful.

[YaMi_SeNpAi]

I believe in God and I know that I am going to heaven. The real problem is people who claim to be Christians that really arent making all the real ones look bad in the eyes of non-believers and the media; but hey isnt that what being persecuted is all about. Stay strong in faith and keep your head up.

[I got bored one day]

fatal_GRACE

[Nonsense.

I wouldn't tell my mother I don't believe in her. And I am not trying to attack your god, just pointing out the inconsistencies in your argument.

Which, in the end, has no refutation. The only thing you're doing is telling me you wouldn't do something. That's wonderful.

Quote:

Even so, I could turn on my mother, slap her silly, and insult her name, but I am her child, and she will never stop loving me. In fact, I can take this a step further by pointing out that there is absolutely NOTHING AT ALL that my own son could EVER do to make me stop loving him. Are these people better than God, then?

No, as a matter of fact you've hit the keypoint all by yourself, though perhaps you don't quite understand. The fact that your mother loves you doesn't mean she will take no action against you for your wrongs, and it doesn't mean that if you beat her you will be welcome into her house, or if you otherwise ruin her she will want you around. She'll still love you, and perhaps unlike God come to forgive you someday when you ask, holding her grudges and sorrow closer to her for longer, but she will not stop loving you.

Quote:

I cannot reconcile the concept of a infinitely loving and merciful being who stops loving someone for skepticism, or for NOT KNOWING to love him back. It's like locking a child in a room from birth with no knowledge that you exist, then letting them out 20 years later, asking them if they love you, and punishing them for not telling you they do.

No, what's it is actually like is asking your child if they love you but never attending their games, never encouraging their learning, never playing with them, never celebrating them more often than once a year, and never putting time into them. Your example is unrealistic, but sadly this occurs all the time; children in houses, not homes, is a fact of life where the people who "love them the most" are never there. Can we really blame them for being skeptical of their parent's love?

I hope you never went through that, and never put anyone through it, but it happens. Not only do these children suffer the loneliness of not knowing their physical parents are there, but society does indeed reprimand them for not loving their parents and perhaps even the parents themselves do. After all you even built up upon, and I allowed it, the dream state that your mother will always love you. There are mothers who couldn't care less about their own offspring, and of course fathers as well.

Quote:

I do not know what god you worship, or Dunamis either, but I wouldn't want to worship him.

To be honest He wouldn't want your worship in your current disillusioned state. You are confirmed in the idea that your assaults make sense, but in reality they only make sense to the ill-learned and unrealistic, those who pick and choose their worlds rather than submitting to the real one. For all you know, in reality, your mother might hate you for things you couldn't control more than anything else, putting on a false grin. You don't actually know she isn't, but that's where faith comes in. Faith and love are inseparable.

[OneWithDunamis]

SomeKid93

sakura-haruno77777

SomeKid93

Heartfout

I don't.

People say if I look, I'll find him.

So far, the evidence suggests these people are wrong.

I must agree with Heartfout. This, and other reasons. There is no god, I can give you some of my reasons for this belief if you wish.

fine, try me

Alright, here's a few simple ones.
1. According to christian belief, god created the universe. This means he was present before anything else, and created everything else. This makes him supernatural. However, supernatural beings require natural roots. Without anything to base itself on, it cannot exist.
2. The world is beautifully complex. And I'm talking about just this world. There's thousands. There are hundreds of species of fish, birds and mammals. There are creatures such as the platypus, which are in their own category. Wonderfully complex beings. Now, according to your belief, a god, with NOTHING WHATSOEVER to base anything on, created all this complexity. In billions of galaxies. Trillions of stars. Countless worlds. Even if you came first, you cannot be that imaginative.

I have more to add, but I want to post this now.

1. So we're disproving God by definitions of terms? What is supernatural is beyond the natural by my dictionary. And just because that's how we understand the concept it doesn't mean it's the best term to apply to God. God is God. If we throw in "supernatural" and it doesn't add up anymore, maybe we're using the wrong words.
2. Why is that impossible? Because we can't do it? If that's the case, how is God God if He can't do what we can't do?

[MemoriesThatKill]

Death and Misery

MemoriesThatKill

Death and Misery

MemoriesThatKill

Fact: No one KNOWS if they are going to heaven because...

Fact: no one KNOWS what happens after they die.

I believe you rot. I know this. I've seen in a book, once. It's a process called "decomposition".

Well we all know what happens you your body. rolleyes I'm pretty sure she is talking about one's soul.

We don't even know if you have one, let alone if anything happens to it; I recommend we stick to square one. I mean, at least considering you, or ... do you believe in souls?

Eh, I believe in souls or something of the like. I'm pretty much sticking to the OP and what she is talking about rather than go into semantics. And at the very least she is speaking of some sort of sentience within the human budy.

Although I suppose it's possible she thinks your body magically floats into the sky, or where ever "heaven" is supposed to be. It's not out of the realm of possiblility for someone like her.