@philokalia saidThere is nothing "silly" about what I said. You appear to be fending me off rather than engaging what I am saying.
Are you suggesting that one can choose to believe in things when putting forward sincere effort, e.g., wanting to go and experiment with Hinduism in Bali... But not when setting up a transparently silly exercise, of only believing for a specific period of three weeks...?
@sonship saidMost atheists don’t steal from their friends.
@FMF
My faith leaked out because my conscience got soiled from sins unconfessed which made the presence of my heavenly Father evaporate over time. I think it started with an event of stealing something from a friend after a period of battling the temptation to do so.
@sonship saidWhat FMF said wasn’t an ad hominem, you should look up the meaning. What he said was that, based on your admission that you stole from your friend during a period when your faith was at a low ebb, it appeared that you turned into a bit of an a-hole.
@FMFSounds like you turned into a bit of an arssh0le.
Ah, right on time. I was wondering when you would go for the ad hom.
And I SAID I was arguing for ME and NOT for you.
But here’s the thing; FMF may one day return to or recover his faith and during the period of his lack or loss of faith, he will not have stollen from his friends. The points being that:
a) the idea that without God we are sinful is still not an excuse to steal from people
b) the credibility of our faith is not validated by how badly behaved we are without it.
@philokalia saidYou don’t believe what the Bible says about belief and faith then?
Personally, though, I still believe we have free will, and we are responsible for what we believe.
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To the subject of "Why do I have to believe . . . " in this case the resurrection of Christ.
The New Testament is a Will. The Will is filled with all kinds of bequests bequeathed to the heirs who are positioned to receive it.
The Testator DIED in order to leave the Will, the Testament.
But the Testator who died is profoundly ALSO the Executor of the Will.
The one who executes the Will as its Executor rose from the dead in order to
fulfill that function - to be the Executor of the testament, the will He left when
He died.
If you don't believe the Testator is now alive then you will not come to Him for receiving the bequests bequeathed to you in the Will, the New Testament.
But there is something further. All the bequests are IN the Person of the Executor. In the grandest sense the greatest benefit of the Testament is the Executor Himself. For all the bequests are associated with what He is.
So for this reason, to benefit from all the bequests left to the heirs of the testament it is necessary to believe the Executor is alive in order to come to Him to receive all the benefits bequeathed in Him and dispensed BY Him. If you don't believe the Testator is now the raised and living Executor you cannot inherit any of the blessings left to the heirs in the Testament.
@divegeester saidThe Orthodox Church endorses compatibalism, and that is what I endorse. I also believe it is the case that doing an act of free will is very difficult because we are bogged down so much by conditioning, habit, addiction, necessity, and our own feebleness.
You don’t believe what the Bible says about belief and faith then?
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@divegeester saidIs that how things are in your little gathering in the upper room?
Well I’m having fun repeatedly asking him the same question and watching him run.
@philokalia saidIt's subjective, not objective. And it's only "rational" in so far as how one sifts through the relevant non-empirical evidence, within the subjective and relatively narrow framework created by the gut feeling acceptance of supernatural notions. I don't think religious people are deluded, deceived, demented or unintelligent.
So it is impossible to have an objective, rational view that God exists or..?
@fmf saidI think it is the case that there is no such thing as an objective position...
It's subjective, not objective. And it's only "rational" in so far as how one sifts through the relevant non-empirical evidence, within the subjective and relatively narrow framework created by the gut feeling acceptance of supernatural notions. I don't think religious people are deluded, deceived, demented or unintelligent.
I also think it is the case that believing something for rational reasons without non-empirical evidence does not mean that someone is going off of a gut feeling, but I suppose it's irrelevant to me if someone insists that the gut feeling is still the deciding factor.
@philokalia saidOf course there is. One can take objective positions on how many books there are in the OT, how many in the NT, what the words on the page are according to a range of translations, how many Christian denominations (approx) there are, what each one's exact stance on Jesus is [identity, significance] in so far as they have published it, how many Orthodox Catholic churches there are in Seoul, what the average congregation is, etc. etc.
I think it is the case that there is no such thing as an objective position...
When it comes to the Christian religion and the beliefs it propagates, there is almost no end to the number of objective positions one can take.
@philokalia saidReligious faith stems from gut feelings.
I also think it is the case that believing something for rational reasons without non-empirical evidence does not mean that someone is going off of a gut feeling, but I suppose it's irrelevant to me if someone insists that the gut feeling is still the deciding factor.
Once there are the gut feelings about the supernatural claims the religion makes, then all the non-empirical evidence and subjective perspectives feel objective.
Inevitably, one's own certainty - rooted in those gut feelings and the supposedly "objective" evidence they have attracted like iron filings to a magnet - becomes perhaps the most convincing "self-evident" proof one needs.
What you have, Philokalia, is firm faith that affects your personal reality. If your talk of "objectivity" is for your own benefit, then perhaps your faith needs bolstering in your own mind. If your talk of your supposed "objectivity" is for my benefit, then you're wasting your time.