Jesus Christ . .
- Thread starter BillyL
- Start date
Well, he definitely isn't a Bucs fan.
Bro being a Christian is not a club. I hope and pray one day you will get it. Not going to change anyone on this silly board.
I do get it. I have it. I never lacked it. I'm not trying to get you to change your mind.
Fair enough .... the crazy thing is we'll never have a chance to come back on here and say "see, I told you so." 100% chance we're all going to die. If I'm wrong about heaven/hell, I haven't missed out on ANYTHING and have made a great choice living for Christ and the "fairy tale." However, if you're wrong about heaven/hell ...
This is known as pascal’s wager and it’s one of the silliest philosophical arguments that’s ever been made.
What if I’m god? If you worship me and you’re wrong then you lose nothing. But if you’re right then I’ll send you to heaven. I prefer medium rare ribeyes over prayer.
Believing in something because it might be good for you is a terrible basis for belief. We should only believe a claim if the evidence supports the claim.
Wrong about heaven/hell in what way? The christian church cant agree on it. The bible isnt even remotely clear on it. Theres dozens of different interpretations of the concepts. Which one exactly is correct?
Regarding Heaven and Hell:
A retired Catholic priest once offered me this impervious explanation (for me, anyway).
He asked me if I had any relatives who had died and hadn't "Accepted Jesus", or whatever the vague criteria might be. I said "Yes, my paternal grandfather and step-grandfather. My biological grandfather was killed before I was born, and my grandmother remarried and I knew him until he died." He said that that it might be difficult for me to really apply this to my grandfather because I never knew him. But, I knew my step-grandfather well. He asked me "If you were God, would you have sent your step-grandfather to hell?" I said "Absolutely not! That man was kindness, humility, and he was just a model individual." His first wife had died in her forties from terminal cancer and she had devoted her life to the church and donated money her whole life and I he was resentful toward the church, I think. Anyway, the priest says "If you can have the compassion to not send someone who hasn't accepted Jesus to Hell, do you think God has less compassion and forgiveness than YOU have for 'non-believer'?" Of course, I said "Yeah, but I'm not God." He said "But, you are God's Creation, and any part of God's Creation is a part of God."
It was like a hand had reached down and pulled me right up.
A retired Catholic priest once offered me this impervious explanation (for me, anyway).
He asked me if I had any relatives who had died and hadn't "Accepted Jesus", or whatever the vague criteria might be. I said "Yes, my paternal grandfather and step-grandfather. My biological grandfather was killed before I was born, and my grandmother remarried and I knew him until he died." He said that that it might be difficult for me to really apply this to my grandfather because I never knew him. But, I knew my step-grandfather well. He asked me "If you were God, would you have sent your step-grandfather to hell?" I said "Absolutely not! That man was kindness, humility, and he was just a model individual." His first wife had died in her forties from terminal cancer and she had devoted her life to the church and donated money her whole life and I he was resentful toward the church, I think. Anyway, the priest says "If you can have the compassion to not send someone who hasn't accepted Jesus to Hell, do you think God has less compassion and forgiveness than YOU have for 'non-believer'?" Of course, I said "Yeah, but I'm not God." He said "But, you are God's Creation, and any part of God's Creation is a part of God."
It was like a hand had reached down and pulled me right up.
Oh, and I forgot...
He said "And, everyone has someone, just like you have your step-grandfather. So, Hell is an empty place, isn't it?"
He said "And, everyone has someone, just like you have your step-grandfather. So, Hell is an empty place, isn't it?"
I was speaking from my own personal interpretation: Heaven means eternity with my Savior ... Hell means eternity separated from my Savior. Simple as that.
So like I said, if I'm wrong, big deal, I'll never know the difference. If I'm right, awesome deal.
That interpretation makes sense to me. The cavernous fire pit with reptilian/humans with tridents is too farfetched for me.
That's partially due to calling God a "He", or "Him", or "His", or "Father", or "King." All of those are unique to human beings... MALE human beings. Since most of our thoughts originate from our language, it forces God to be a man. A super-human father figure that floats in the clouds, or some parallel plane, somehow... who punishes and rewards based on a human values system. It's completely patriarchal and monarchical. It always seemed like it was minimizing the magnitude of divinity, or the origin of the universe, the source energy, to me.
It's pretty amazing how the present-day Abrahamic religions still identify God as exactly what is depicted in that Michelangelo painting. Well, maybe not quite so European... but, then again... probably VERY European! I believe one of the most misunderstood biblical messages is "created in God's image."
You seem to privilege the Bible as being a document of divine wisdom. I could be wrong about that but it’s just kinda the sense I’m getting. My problem with that is the people who wrote it had even more antiquated views of god than the one you describe here.
The other reason that god fits your description is because it was the first attempt at science and philosophy. People forget that the idea of god(s) originated from natural phenomena that we didn’t understand. At one time the best explanation for thunderstorms was an angry god. I can’t fault primitive people for believing that. I just don’t understand why we still try to invent new definitions and explanations for what a god would be like if it existed.
Well, when it was written, it was considered divine wisdom. I'm not implying that it lacks divine wisdom! For me it is about context and understanding who wrote it, and how those people's world view is unique for them, given what they knew.
I think the reason people invent new definitions of what God is "like" is because WE are GOD! Everything is GOD. It's like we intentionally forgot we were God so we could experience ourselves outside of the perfection of the source. It's pretty intense and I don't feel like writing-it-out here. Besides, I'm always realizing more and more as I go along! I might realize something new in a few minutes!
I was just responding, or commenting on how your meme reminded me of God as a human male who is really powerful and... old, apparently.
From my experience, Atheists perceive God a lot like religious people. They ridicule/deny "Him" is the only difference.
Well sure. Atheism is the rejection of a claim, which requires one to understand what the claim is. The atheistic view of god is similar to the religious view of god, because that’s what we are disputing.
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