to be honest, I believe the children are our future, teach them well and let them lead the way
as the bible says
evolution
to be honest, I believe the children are our future, teach them well and let them lead the way
That is all very well but by simply labeling God as supernatural or 'abnormal' you are just providing yourself with an easy way out. Saying that God is in no way physical is just a way to avoid defining Him.Originally Posted by Galant
You cannot understand him so he is 'abnormal'? This misses the point. God is in no way supernatural or abnormal He is always with us, looking over us, always there for us. You cannot then say he is 'supernatural'. If we are to believe the bible he is the most natural thing there is.
If He created the universe then he is the most original, the most existant thing ever.
My point is that just because we cannot scientifically understand spirituality at this time there is no reason to suppose it will always lie outside of physical definition.
This is not directed at you in particular Silent just a general observationOriginally Posted by |SilentDeath|
People seem to be having a go at Galant but he's only trying to answer your questions. He clearly has a knowledge of the matters at hand and is only putting across the christian side of things. This would be a very one sided discussion without it.
He is not preaching. Some people seem afraid even to listen to the Christian side of things let alone think about them. Yet your happy enough to listen to the various anti religious rants in this thread.
I don't think its the fact that people don't agree with religious people its just when they have it rammed down their throats saying god this and god that and you should hang your head in shame as you are not one of his children. That's the problem I think Silent is getting at. In a way religion is a simple set of rules from back in the day when moses hung out with his posse and got sick of people stealing his bling so he made the 10 commandments in order to stop the back in the day charvs from stealing his loot basically
Everyone has their opinion and in threads such as this its good to get both sides of the tale, but as with anything, you are brought up to be part of a religion or not, old habbits die hard as they say.
Steam: (Grey_Mata) || Hexus Trust
String theory sounds interesting, and could possibly provide a mechanism for spiritualism to exist, but I still don't believe in a single divine creator.
There certainly are oddities in life that neither science nor religion can explain (In general I'm with Vaul on the concept of religion, it's used more as a control device than anything else, some of it entirely sensible though), and as science and technology advances perhaps our great great grandchildren will look back on us as somewhat primative.
As an aside if I were forced to follow any religion, I think Bhuddism is probably the most sensible out there, besides, some of those monks can do neat tricks
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Firstly I must point out that anything said in this post is not meant in a nasty/flaming/malicious way, all just my opinion
Also I must apologise for my rather long winded (some would say ranting ) style of writing!
I am a physics student, and as u would expect I favour the evolutionary model simply because it has more evidence (but by no means conclusive evidence) than the theory of a god (whether they be Christian/Hindu or any of the other uncountable religions). I choose to believe that there is no god because I have weighed up the evidence both for and against and I have decided that there is more/better evidence for the evolutionally/non god based theory (I went to a Christian school and have been to many religious meetings/discussions/talks/seminars – so I would like to think that I have some religious background knowledge). However I will be first to admit that there are several inconsistencies (some quite major) within the scientific approach to this question. However even though I will admit this, I am still of the opinion that the evidence against a supernatural creator outweighs the evidence for such a being. In my opinion I would say the most likely reason for the bible being written (note that I’m not saying that this is THE reason for it being written – just the most likely reason in my opinion), is as others have suggested before me, is as a means of control. However most importantly, I do not go around telling people that their religious beliefs are wrong.
Whilst I do not generally agree (nor believe) in the theories of God, I do believe that (in most cases) the message in the Bible* is what is important (i.e. generally be nice to your fellow human), not that there is actually a god with supernatural powers. I am quite happy to agree with Christians when they say things like “love thy neighbour” or “treat others as you would like to be treated yourself”. I just disagree with them (but do not in any way completely discount the possibility that they may be correct) when they say that there is an all powerful god/creator that made everything.
*note that I do not have enough knowledge about other religions books to be able to say the same thing
The important thing to note is that the above is my opinion, I do not believe (yet) that the theory of evolution is 100% true nor do I believe that the theory of a god/creator (whether it be Christian or any other religion) is 100% true – I merely lean towards the former.
That happens to by my personal answer to the original question, here is my answer (this is the bit most likely to offend) to the general chat that has been going on:
This applies to people from both sides of the argument;
How predictably human that there are those arrogant enough to claim that they know the true, un-arguable, answer to such questions. How typically arrogant as a species are we to say that one group of peoples’ religious beliefs are wrong and that another set is correct (in my opinion a belief is nothing more than an opinion – as such CANNOT be completely proved or disproved). To me, a Christian saying that Christianity is correct and Hinduism is not is no better than me saying that Christianity is complete rubbish (which I would not dare of saying). As such I would claim that most (not all) Christians (bearing in mind that this same argument applies to practically any religion) have no right to have a go at people when they say that their religion is untrue simply because, by truly believing in their own religion, they are in essence saying that all other religions are untrue. Reference to all the ‘non believers’, you just as bad by saying that all religions are untrue – as u cant actually prove this.
Despite all of our technology and all of our knowledge, we are (in many cases) no better than animals (and in some cases much, much worse). I would like to share with you all a quote from a film (first person to guess the film and scene wins an imaginary gold star). It nicely sums up how I sometimes (but not always) feel about our so called “most intelligent life form on the planet” species.
“I would like to share a revelation that I have had, during my time here. It came to when I tried to classify your species. I realised that you are not actually mammals. Every mammal on this planet instinctively develops a natural equilibrium with the surrounding environment, but you humans do not. You move to an area and you multiply. You multiply until every natural resource is consumed and the only way you can survive is to spread to another area. There is another organism on this planet that follows the same pattern. Do you know what it is?
A virus.
Human beings are a disease, a cancer of this planet, you are a plague.”
(hopefully quoting a film like this is not gonna get me sued, or banned from the forums)
Whilst this is a very negative view to sometimes have, I do hope that one day we will, as a species as a whole, ‘grow up’. I would say that it at the very least, is a thought provoking view concerning our attitude to each other, the other inhabitants of this planet and the planet itself.
By no means am I telling anyone what to say/think, I would say that it would be nice to have any further posts for this thread contain only peoples own personal views and not be full of statements like: “God does exist” or “God does not exist”, because you CANNOT conclusively prove one way or the other. I am so confident in this statement that I will say that if anyone can conclusively prove one way or the other I will give them the computer I am using to write this reply (containing 2gig corsair ram and a 9800XT among many other things and worth at least £2000).
PS, I do hope that I have not offended anyone, as this was not the intention of my reply, I’m merely saying that in a issue this big, people must be able to have their own opinions, but more importantly cannot go around saying that other peoples views are wrong simply because I believe that u cannot prove the argument conclusively one way or the other.
PPS, I commend your patience if you have managed to get this far though my reply without getting bored…..
khaine
Life is a disease, Death is the cure
I offered you eternal life, I just didn't say where
Dargh! I just got back from work, and Im knackered, so I can't be bothered to provide a christian viewpoint to all of the above points, maybe later.
One thing that does strike me, is how much as a christian I have atheism rammed down my throat. People trying to 'show me' that my God doesn't exist, people saying Im stupid for believing in what I believe in, and people getting annoyed at when I try to provide an alternative way of thinking.
Im sorry, but can't you see the hypocrisy here? This isn't at anyone here, this is just something I've noticed since becoming a christian. Preaching christianity at all is frowned upon, where preaching atheism loudly is completely acceptable.
Its a minor niggle I have with society.
if god created everything then surely he created the devil and everything evil
if he is all knowing surely he would have known that adam (or was it eve) would be tempted by the devil, why would god even give them the chance to betray him if he knew they would?
if he loves everyone why are babies born with malformaties and desease is he punishing the mother or the baby? how has the baby sinned before its even been borna and why wouldnt he just give the desease to the mother?
if you dont believe in god and god asks you to say whether you believe in him or not when you die couldnt you just say i dont want to be part of 'your devine plan' or would you just be sent to hell, even if you hadnt sinned all your life?
doe anyone have any answers to these?
Pete
Well, looks like there's a lot to reply to here. To be honest though, I don't think I'll bother. All I've tried to do is give an open, honest defense of Christianity and belief in God. I don't believe I've tried to 'convert' anyone or make them accept my beliefs.
No trees were harmed in the creation of this message. However, many electrons were displaced and terribly inconvenienced.
silent death, please please do read up on wiccan beliefs and theories and the religion itself, it really is very very interesting. If you would like to read more, i can recommend a book that i've just read that's very good.
a) I believe in God's method of creation.
b) The film quote was from the Matrix and Agent Smith when he was torturing morpheous
c) Well.......
Back to the actually topic of the thread I personally believe that God created the earth, universe and all that is in it and I also believe that evolution was NOT his mechanism for doing so. I would go into that a bit more but I have exams coming up so I'll study up on those instead!
One thing I have noted in this thread (yes I have read the whole thing) is that there are quite a few generalised comments about bible situations with very little substance to them. I know I can't get my arguements across because I simply don't have the knowledge or experience to do so like Galent has but I just want to clear up some questions asked from a Bible believing Christian point of view.
Example someone asked why we call God "He" or "Him".
Simple answer - Bible states that God created man in his own image (before women existed) so that gives us a fairly clear indication of what He may look like. (all coming from the perspective that you believe the bible)
Why does God allow all this suffering in the world? Well the "fall" occured. Adam was placed in the garden of Eden in perfect harmony with nature in that there was no disease, no suffering, no animals were malicious to humans (they did have to eat each other but not humans) and basically it was all honky dory. The original pair of Adam and Eve ate the forbidden fruit and so fell out of favour with God for disobeying him. They were cast into the land of Nod (Nod meaning wandering) where Adam would suffer by working the land and generally not get everything handed to him on a plate. Along with this came the other sufferings of man many of which we live with today.
Why does God let people do the bad things they do? God gave us as Humans dominion over the earth and a consciousness. We can make our own decisions and have constructive thoughts. If God had made us so that we just blindly followed him it would have been as if he made mindless worship slaves. When I (as well as a few other on this board as it seems) decided to follow God and accept him as our saviour we did so of our own accord and made a conscious decision to do so. Basically when we worship it has a real meaning to it.
Jesus was just nailed to a cross by a few random guys for speaking out. (just remember this is all assuming I believe the Bible before anything is pointed out)
When Jesus died 2 things happened - the earth trembled (earthquake) and the curtain in the temple which separated the world from the "Holy of Holies" where the convenant lived tore. So assuming this is true (which I do) is it coincidense that these things coincidened with Jesus' death?
Vaul can I just say that I really do respect the way youve conducted your posts in this thread. I disagree with much of what you say but you haven't ever flamed or made a flipant comment about what any other Christian or non evolutionist has said! Kudos to that man.
So where's my imaginary star for the film spotting....
Very interesting question Pete. It is not an easy one to answer and I am definitely not qualified to answer it but IMO i think that if you follow Gods teaching you will probably live an easier live. I would not expect him to protect me from all physical malaise. As far as I can see one cant expect complicated physical miracles to save us from accidents etc just because we believe in God. Its just these accidents etc may be a bit less likely.Originally Posted by Pete
Life just goes smoother.
As for the devil i think of him as a beng created by the sins of man. Not neccesarily created by God himself.
IT would be nice though if we could persuade Galant or Ab1385 to give their views on this question.
I, at least, will not accuse them of preaching.
I was bought up Cof E, but never really believed, looked into all sorts when I was a teen, and these days generally try & live according to Taoist teachings. I say generally because I take from it what's relevant to me and that suits me just fine. More of a philosophy than a religion really.
Devil - originally an angel in heaven which decided he was better than God and tried to oust him. Heaven was split and there was a fight and basically lucifer lost and was cast into hell. (Not 100% sure if this is correct but he was definately cast into hell pre mans existance)
Incidently Lucifer was described as the most beautiful angel in heaven. Parallels to temptation many people suffer can be drawn from this.
I am sure this is the correct Biblical answer to the question but it does cast God as a rather unforgiving and spiteful being. The exact opposite of Jesus' teaching.Originally Posted by RoGuE|SaBeR
Again it makes a nice simple explanation but doesnt bear much weight.
If you believe this biblical explanation then you are admitting that God does not live by his own Creed. This does not really fit well with the strong Christian ideal of God as the almighty father etc etc.
Yet if you deny this explanation how do you explain all the bad in the world?
How very strange. In the space of 24 hours, I've been told that my posting style is spot on, and gets the point across without resorting to anything negative, and I've had a brief discussion via PM with one of our esteemed moderating folk, about my posting style perhaps needing a bit of a review. (Not because of a post in this thread)Originally Posted by RoGuE|SaBeR
Interesting.
Anyway, cheers Rogue, I did try to remain civil, which I find is easy to do, when people are simply putting across their views, as opposed to posting for the sake of slagging someone \ something off.
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