The God thread

tiny · Mar 22, 2006

So anyone who has not accepted Christ is damned?

(I can't believe I'm letting myself get sucked into this)

LightShadow · Mar 22, 2006

That's what I believe. If you believe otherwise, that is your perogative, and in your eyes that should be my shortcoming for not agreeing with you as it is in my eyes that it is your shortcoming that you don't see it the way I believe. It is just a matter of opinion. I just believe that if I am right I need to spread the word because I want as few as possible to have to experience such damnation.

trumancoyote · Mar 22, 2006

Seeing other's beliefs as a shortcoming is a damnation in and of itself.

blacbird · Mar 22, 2006

LightShadow said:
the second statement holds true for everybody

So . . . if, as Creationists propound, Evolution is a religion . . . why are you criticizing Evolutionists?

caw.

reph · Mar 22, 2006

tiny terror said:
(I can't believe I'm letting myself get sucked into this)

Quick, grab my hand. Together we can escape the pull of the big vacuum pump.

tiny · Mar 22, 2006

reph said:
Quick, grab my hand. Together we can escape the pull of the big vacuum pump.

Thank you, I almost started to think I might care about some else's belief system, that it actually mattered in the great scheme of things.... sheeew. That was close.

fallenangelwriter · Mar 22, 2006

criticizing a religion has NOTHING to do wiht religious tolerance.

the constitution says that people get to practice thier religions, and you can't discriminate against them.

it doesn't say you can't disagree with them. it doesn't say you can't voice that disagreement. it doesn't say you can't point out inconsistencies in other people's beliefs. it doesn't say you can't mock people mercilessly for their beliefs.

I have plenty of religious tolerance, in that i don't hold someone's religion against them, i'm willing to consider their religious npoint of view, and i'm willing to accommodate other people's religious practices.

I'm also tactful enough not to comment on people's religious choices unasked for in a public context.

however, my current girlfriend is a christian scientist. while i see a lot fo value in christian science, i can't agree with all of her church's doctrines. I have explained this, and laid out the reasons for my dissent quite clearly. in return, i've done my best to udnerstand christian science, that is, the religion i'm disagreeing with. it's made for some interesting conversations.

religious tolerance in no way means that one can't state the one personally feels a given religion is a nothing but a delusional pack of lies, if oen wants to, as long as it's not discrimination or harassment.

LightShadow · Mar 22, 2006

blacbird said:
So . . . if, as Creationists propound, Evolution is a religion . . . why are you criticizing Evolutionists?

caw.

Because it is natural to criticize what you don't believe. Why do you criticize creationism? maybe for similar reasons? Maybe cause you find it hard to find all of such teachings plausible? Same here. I just don't see the feasibility of all of science's teachings. Note, I didn't say all of such teachings. It's just a matter of perspective. You are entitled to believe what you may. My opinion is only my opinion. I may be compelled to tell you my side of it, but ultimately what you believe is entirely up to you, as is what I believe is entirely up to me.

blacbird · Mar 22, 2006

I'm just trying to make sure I understand the relationship between this:

LightShadow said:
I believe that when people criticize someone's religion or put's it down it is wrong

and this:

LightShadow said:
Because it is natural to criticize what you don't believe.

And if you look, you'll see that the Evolution thread started with a criticism of the Theory of Evolution. I have no desire whatever to alter your beliefs in any way. I just want to understand clearly what you're saying, and to insist that what you say about factual matters is, in fact, factual.

caw.

LightShadow · Mar 22, 2006

blacbird said:
I'm just trying to make sure I understand the relationship between this:

and this:

And if you look, you'll see that the Evolution thread started with a criticism of the Theory of Evolution. I have no desire whatever to alter your beliefs in any way. I just want to understand clearly what you're saying, and to insist that what you say about factual matters is, in fact, factual.

caw.

Criticism often goes both ways. That's the wonderous advantage of living in a free society. We can spout various opinions and not be jailed or persecuted for such. And you are right, the thread began as a challenge against evolution. I am not saying that all points of evolution is in error, anyway. For example, the famous example of the white moth in Britain changing to black during the industrial revolution out of necessity of the specie's survival is a wonderful example that to a point natural selection is a reality. Bravo. Point for science. And, although I felt I was being accused of such, I never said that science was an entirely bad thing. And I understand the argument that in the eyes of some science believers creationism is nowhere near being scientific, especially when you can't apply the scientific method to it. But, my concern is that I thought science believed that until something was proven (and maybe I am way off on this) anything could be possible. Okay, maybe not anything, I am sure there are some possibilities that fall outside the so-called scientific laws that are impossible and never even considered, but I just figured that in the search for truth that science would consider something like creationism and the existence of God until it was proven entirely wrong.

trumancoyote · Mar 22, 2006

On the contrary, scientists seek to disprove their hypotheses.

Or such is my understanding.

LightShadow · Mar 22, 2006

trumancoyote said:
On the contrary, scientists seek to disprove their hypotheses.

Or such is my understanding.

Well, then, does that mean that you agree that most scientists are athiests? Because someone said something earlier along the line that many evolutionists believed in God. I'm not challenging you, just asking for clarification.

ColoradoGuy · Mar 22, 2006

reph said:
Quick, grab my hand. Together we can escape the pull of the big vacuum pump.

No, no, no: give in and follow me down the rabbit hole. Here is another wrinkle to consider. Are humans intrinsically good, or are they inherently bad? Traditional Christian theology, of course, holds that we are all fallen and need grace to reach paradise. So can that grace be earned? That viewpoint has always been deemed heretical by Christian theologians, but Catholicism, with its Purgatory and whatnot, has always tiptoed down that heretical line because the alternative seems so bleak. That alternative is pure predestination theology: that God knew before time began (because He knows everything) who would be saved and who would not. Puritans drove themselves nuts wondering if they were among the Elect, and there was nothing that they could do about it; nothing would get you into the Elect if you were not already chosen before the universe began.

So to me it all still comes down to the ancient Free Will problem. This dilemma should very much trouble evangelical Christians, who implore us to “choose Jesus,” but it has never seemed to me that it does bother them in the way that it tortured St. Augustine (and then Martin Luther and colleagues). Because if a human can freely decide to accept the Christian God (or not), that diminishes God’s putative omnipotence.

Me, I have no problem here because I continue to believe that, given the chance, nearly all of us will choose to do good. The Inner Light guiding us to do so is God. Yes, there is the occasional person (sociopathic killers spring to mind) whose Light is so dim that it may soon go out. There is that, and I don’t know what to do about them. But for the rest of us, God can save us if we choose to allow it. But that salvation doesn’t come by submitting to some higher power; it comes from the God within each of us reaching to our fellow humans and saving them. Heaven is really here on earth. Or Hell. We choose. As Red Green (my favorite Canuck) says: “Remember -- we’re all in this together. I’m pulling for you.”

So it seems to me that the right-wing evangelists are correct, but for entirely the wrong reasons. Now that’s ironic; God must have a sense of humor.

End of sermon. Hallelujah.

LightShadow · Mar 22, 2006

Left to our own devices, we sin. One must only look at the state of society to prove that one. The proof is in the pudding.

trumancoyote · Mar 22, 2006

And we don't sin when we're not left to our own devices?

I've never met anyone who could make me believe otherwise.

ColoradoGuy · Mar 22, 2006

LightShadow said:
Left to our own devices, we sin. One must only look at the state of society to prove that one. The proof is in the pudding.

Yes, I look around me and see people doing bad things. But I also see people doing good things. Why would they do that if it is not in their immediate best interest? Why do many persons, many times, choose to do good?

LightShadow · Mar 22, 2006

ColoradoGuy said:
Yes, I look around me and see people doing bad things. But I also see people doing good things. Why would they do that if it is not in their immediate best interest? Why do many persons, many times, choose to do good?

Not all good things are right. Sometimes the best things can be wrong because the motives behind them. Just an observation.

rtilryarms · Mar 22, 2006

So.... how about that Japanese Baseball team.......?

LightShadow · Mar 22, 2006

rtilryarms said:
So.... how about that Japanese Baseball team.......?

Oh, did that chap your.....wait, oh, I was confused. Sorry, baseball is a love that gives me goosebumps. I'm going to have to go have that checked out...

blacbird · Mar 22, 2006

LightShadow said:
I thought science believed that until something was proven (and maybe I am way off on this) anything could be possible.

There's a serious conceptual problem here concerning this issue of "proof" in science, and it's one that seems never to be really understood by Creationists. Science most often works by a process of elimination; through an accumulation of observational evidence, the least likely possibilities for any theory or hypothesis become so unlikely that they are discarded, leaving only those with greater likelihood. Eventually, through an accumulation of such observational evidence, the better theories stand and the weaker ones fall, and the scope of inquiry becomes narrower and better focused. Proof? There's never "proof" in the austere intellectual sense of a mathematical proof. And that's what Creationists always seem to demand.

An example: Creationists have a lot of trouble with radiometric age-dating, because what it has revealed of the history of the earth gives them grave problems in maintaining the validity of their ideas. So, they attack it as "unproven" or "unreliable." The reality is, that a group of radiologically-derived ages for, say, the Cretaceous-Tertiary boundary, might get measured 100 times from a set of sample material. Ninety-eight of those fall with values between 63.8 and 66.4 million years. One gives a value of 150 million years, and the other gives a value of 2 million years. The scientist, recognizing the imperfection of sampling and measurement techniques, reasonably throws out the two anomalous values, and derives a bell curve of probability from the other 98, which winds up having a peak at 65 million years, plus or minus about 1 million.

The Creationist typically looks at this data and says, "Aha! See? They got a measurement of 2 million years and another of 150 million years. Obviously radiometric dating is unreliable." Such an evaluation is, of course, nonsense from a scientific standpoint, but that doesn't stop the Creationist.

All "possibilities" are not equal, and the idea that science is equally open to all possibilities until something is "proved", there being no clear definition of "proof", is disingenuous at best.

caw.

Sassenach · Mar 22, 2006

LightShadow said:
And I believe that when people criticize someone's religion or put's it down it is wrong, and society agrees and would call such actions intolerance and narrow-minded, until someone challenges virtually every traditional belief of Christianity, then that person is more often than not hailed by our society for their intellectual courage and honesty, winning respect in certain circles, and enjoy a certain vogue.

That's my take. I am not sticking around to debate this, I've already gotten into pickles in other threads over this subject. Take it or leave it. Believe it or not. That is between you and God.

I think anyone--Christian, Muslim, whatever--who believes theirs is the only way, is wrong. And the very antithesis of 'intellectual courage and honesty.'

I'll 'leave it'.

MacAllister · Mar 22, 2006

yes...but, Blacbird...what do you believe about a higher power?

I'm really intrigued at the premise of this thread--and everyone seems to be playing nice.

Thanks, folks.

LightShadow · Mar 22, 2006

process of elimination? So has God been eliminated by the equation? Oh, and I said somewhere, I can't remember which thread, that I think that since God created space and time the seven days of creation was just a way of keeping it simple so that we could understand, but actually what's a day to God? A million years? More? So the dating may be very accurate.

SpookyWriter · Mar 22, 2006

MacAllister said:
yes...but, Blacbird...what do you believe about a higher power?

What, like aliens? Or the power company???

Pat~ · Mar 22, 2006

ColoradoGuy said:
Alright folks, here is your chance to bring together into one thread the question that has been dodging in and out of several other threads: what does the term God (or, if you prefer the lower case – god) mean to you? It’s your chance to wax lyrical or satirical, serious or mysterious.

Just to preface this, I am a Christian, though not affiliated with any one Christian denomination; I consider myself a sort of hybrid. I was raised Plymouth Brethren, but as an adult attend both Episcopalian and Bible Church services.

The term God 'means' something to me on various levels. On the purely theological level, I could tell you that I have a certain set of firm beliefs about who God is (and I'll post that last). But I thought I'd also 'wax lyrical' since Colorado Guy invited that, and share with you the first poem I ever had published, which tells what God means to me on a personal level. It's taken from the 23rd Psalm:

SHEPHERD PSALM

(Psalm 23)

Oh Lord, how can I tell You

Just what You mean to me?

In every vale I go through

Your shepherd’s love I see.

When I am lost and helpless,

And stumbling in despair,

You come and gently lift me

With arms of tender care.

You take me to fresh pastures,

Where I can lay my head;

You lead me by still waters,

And there my soul is fed.

There is no surer comfort

Than Your protective rod;

No greater joy exists than

The presence of my God!

(First printed in The Lutheran Digest,

Summer 2005, Vol. 53, p. 40, “Oh Lord,

How Can I Tell You?”)

The following is a run-down of my beliefs about God...(I am aware that many of you believe differently, and I respect your right to differ. I'm not interested in taking part in contentious debate, but am always open to amiable discourse.)

The sixty-six books of both the Old and New Testaments comprise the inspired Word of God and are without error in the original writings. The Bible is God’s complete written revelation for the salvation of man and is the final authority regarding Christian life and faith.

There is one uncreated eternal God, eternally existing in three persons, the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit (Deut. 6:4; Isa. 43:10; John 1:1; Acts 5:4; Eph. 4:6). These three are not merely one in purpose, but are also one in essence.

Jesus Christ is God manifest in the flesh (1 Tim. 3:16), was born of a virgin (Matt. 1:23), led a sinless life (Heb. 4:15), died on the cross and rose again bodily on the third day (1 Cor. 15:1-3). Because He ever lives, He alone is our High Priest and advocate (Heb. 7:28).

The ministry of the Holy Spirit is to glorify the Lord Jesus Christ. The Holy Spirit convicts of sin, regenerates, indwells, guides, and instructs, as well as empowers the believer for godly living and service (Acts 13:2; Rom. 8:16; 1 Cor.2:10; 3:16; 2 Pet.1:20, 21). The Holy Spirit will never contradict what God the Father has already revealed.

All mankind is sinful by nature (Romans 3:23; Eph. 2:1-3; 1 John 1:8,10). This condition makes it impossible to earn his salvation through good works. Good works are a by-product of saving faith, not a pre-requisite to be saved (Ephesians 2:8-10).

Mankind is saved by grace through faith alone in Jesus Christ (John 6:47; Gal.2:16; 24). Believers are justified by His shed blood and shall be saved from wrath through Him (John 3:36; 1 John 1:9).

The God thread

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Luftmensch Emeritus, A.D.D.