18 Dec 14
I find it interesting how post renaissance Christianity is so obsessed with hell and the surety of eternal damnation. The early patristic writers absolutely did not agree on hell, the eternalness of punishment or any of this stuff. They were far more interested in talking about grace and the forgiveness of sins by Christ, the good news and all that jazz. They would find this discussion absurd and ill informed.
18 Dec 14
Originally posted by DowardI'm not sure if the analogy will resonate, but the "glories" of propagating the Torture Ideology often remind me of people with an orange, a leather belt and a plastic bag for whom conventional shagging will just no longer suffice..
I find it interesting how post renaissance Christianity is so obsessed with hell and the surety of eternal damnation. The early patristic writers absolutely did not agree on hell, the eternalness of punishment or any of this stuff. They were far more interested in talking about grace and the forgiveness of sins by Christ, the good news and all that jazz. They would find this discussion absurd and ill informed.
18 Dec 14
2 edits
-Removed-May the season find favor for you!
To answer your question, specifically, "for unbelievers"; I have to go back to what i said before. God's judgement is not based on whether you have faith or knowledge. What REALLY matters is your ability to LOVE.
There are three things that come to mind, off the top, and they are all from scripture. 1)Jesus says the two greatest commandments are these. (and I'll shorten it) Love God with all your heart, mind, soul and body. And love your neighbor as yourself. 2) Jesus is talking about the Judgement. And the people are set into two groups. The one group He says away from me. And in response they state, "but Lord, we cast out demons in your name. We healed people in your name, etc. etc." And the second group Jesus says, come up here. And in response they say, "when did we see you?" And Jesus says, when you fed the hungry, clothed the naked, helped those who could not help themselves, you did it for me to! 3) Paul states that faith without love is like a gong clanging in the wind.
I'm sorry if this seems a bit long, but what i'm trying to show is that it doesn't matter if a person doesn't believe. It is in our actions that show where are heart is. And our heart is what God sees.
Do i believe in extreem suffering, as in hell, yes! Do i believe it is eternal...
plainly, i am not certain.
I am glad i am not God.
18 Dec 14
Originally posted by FMFI must say, I'm quite relieved to have NO idea what you're talking about, for once.
I'm not sure if the analogy will resonate, but the "glories" of propagating the Torture Ideology often remind me of people with an orange, a leather belt and a plastic bag for whom conventional shagging will just no longer suffice..
18 Dec 14
Originally posted by SuzianneThe whole notion of revenge by eternal torture for non-belief is central to the entire concept of a "loving God" and also affects the credibility and basis of claims about "perfect justice", "fairness" and morality.
You certainly are... it's all you ever talk about anymore.
Frankly, I'm at the point where I just skip over your posts because it's all just more of the same old, same old.
18 Dec 14
Originally posted by SuzianneAs opposed to your posts which are full of cutting-edge
You certainly are... it's all you ever talk about anymore.
Frankly, I'm at the point where I just skip over your posts because it's all just more of the same old, same old.
up-to-the-minute insightful philosophical thoughts and ideas.
18 Dec 14
1 edit
Originally posted by SuzianneDon't forget MY hateful diatribes. The whole edifice of religion is built on a house of cards.
And yours, which are nothing more than hateful diatribes.
I keep pointing out, for instance, the Leviticus 27 thing, a man is worth (AND supposedly assigned such by GOD) 50 shekels but a mere woman only 30.
Now you can do the cop out thing, say, we are modern, we don't follow the OT any more. But that is not true. Take a look at just how much women make today. Sound familiar? You think that is just how the culture works?
Think again. Go back in the past WAY past the Egyptians, the early Jews, Christians, Muslims, Hindus and so forth and you find the Minoan civilization.
In that place and in that time, women were top dogs. It was to the point where men would cut their genitals to imitate menstruation cycles. You think there was anything in THEIR literature that women were worth only 75% of men?
You should think about that VERY carefully. This is NOT a cultural thing. We have solid proof that in the deep past women were not treated like they are now.
I am not saying anything one way or the other about the value of women in our society. I am saying the way women are perceived comes DIRECTLY from religion, modern religions. Take a look at Arab countries like Saudi Arabia, women are not even allowed to have DRIVERS LICENSES. This is not cultural, this stems from changes in religion from female dominated religions of the deep past to the takeover of religion by men starting around 4 or 5 thousand years ago. When the overlord mentality started up and they had horses to augment warriors, men became the top dogs and it was religions that drove that push, making men now the top dogs supplementing the female dominating religions from before that time.
THEN it started being encoded into religious dogma that women were second class citizens.
My thesis is this: Neither the deep past female dominated religions OR the modern male dominated ones came from ANY sort of god.
ALL of them came from people who just made up their religions, maybe from what they thought were visions, whatever, they made up their dogma and convinced many other people of the validity of that dogma and it was the same 10,000 years ago as it is today but with different players now.
It is my contention a REAL god (whether there is one is still up in the air for me), said god would NEVER say women are on a higher plane than men or as it is now, men would NEVER have been said BY A GOD to be on a higher plane than women.
And further, given the idea that a deity made the entire universe by some super intelligent design, it therefore designed Earth as it is, as it was, and how it will be, it WANTED Earth that way, verdant with life, great diversity of species, a strong biological environment.
So this deity would NEVER have wanted humans to have the power to cause mass extinctions as it is happening right in front of our noses as we speak, 100% caused by the excesses of mankind, the greed, the absolute stupidity of mankind destroying his own living space and the inability of mankind to actually see on a gut level, what we are doing to our jewel of a planet.
The fact there are so many climate change deniers speaks clearly to the source: The idea that mankind is WAY too small in the big picture of things to EVER be able to have effected the changes we are seeing. Therefore it is nature working to do this, NEVER would it be admitted that mankind has had ANY culpability in this obvious on-going process.
JUST like the asssholes who say mankind was too stupid, too naive, whatever, to have EVER had the engineering talent needed to build the pyramids. THEREFORE aliens exist. THEREFORE it was those aliens who for some reason came down to Earth and helped build those pyramids we see stretched all over the deserts in Egypt.
Totally bypassing the question of why an alien race would come to Earth to help build monuments made for one person and one person only, the current Pharaoh to the detriment of the entire society, draining entire national fortunes to do this.
Just like the assumption that mankind is so far down the totem pole, we cannot POSSIBLY have the creativity to have EVER written down the bible or the Quran or the Veta's or any of the other million separate religions.
A REAL god would NEVER have created religions that start religious wars.
THIS I am convinced of and will NEVER deviate from that.
It just SCREAMS man made or women made, EVERY SINGLE ONE OF THOSE RELIGIONS.