HolyGoat Posted July 11, 2015 Share Posted July 11, 2015 My wife and I were having one of our reoccurring debates about Christianity, the Bible in specific, and she said something BAFFLING to me. Before I start, let me state for those who have not read my extimony (it's horrendously lengthy, I know) that my wife is still a believer, though an incredibly moderate one, more of a social Christian than anything much of the time (quite a religious background, but has been repeatedly burned by the church, so is pretty "arms-length" with it). She is also quite intelligent and thoughtful. Thus I h ad trouble understanding how she could say such a thing . . . Anyways, we are lying in bed and I am having another bout of emphatically stating all of the things that are either bat-shit crazy or just plain evil about god, particularly in the OT. (Everything is falling into place so quickly, so every day it seems I have something new to add to that list.) She sits up, turns to me and says, I don't remember her exact words, but something to the effect of "So god did some bad things, people do that all the time and you have no problem getting over that, why can't you do the same for god?" I swear I felt my jaw hit the floor. WHAT!?! I can't even remember my response. Probably something like "Ya, but they don't claim to be perfect" or some such. I was just so dumbfounded... Would I be crazy to think that maybe pointing out all of the crazy shit, specifically genocide, rape and slavery (she is a HUGE humanitarian, and actually for humanistic reason rather than religious ones), has actually gotten through to her. I mean, why else would she make a comment like that instead of making some vapid excuse for his divine majesty? *insert heavily exaggerated eye roll* Has anyone heard someone say something like that before? It just seemed so out of character, for her or for christians in general. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Daffodil Posted July 11, 2015 Share Posted July 11, 2015 Can't say I have. She may be starting to feel overwhelmed as you ramp up the passion, which I totally understand. I get passionate about this stuff as well. I find my husband is a little appalled at how far I've gone in my commitment to atheism. I think he's secretly hoping I mellow out a little. Anyway, you might want to tone it down a bit for her sake. Give her little bits and pieces instead of the full force of your outrage. As for the logic of her statement, yeah a being who is supposed to be perfect and a model for how we should behave shouldn't need "forgiving"! 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
HolyGoat Posted July 11, 2015 Author Share Posted July 11, 2015 I appreciate the concern, it probably would be best to tone it down a bit. I am usually very even keel and chill, but have a tendency to get VERY fired up about certain things. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Moderator TrueFreedom Posted July 11, 2015 Moderator Share Posted July 11, 2015 Yep, she might be in The Shack camp. God is a lot like us, and not all-powerful, or he would do something to fix some of the shit going on down here... Making the leap to the non-existence of God is too great a leap for most people. We tend to just make him look more like ourselves. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mymistake Posted July 11, 2015 Share Posted July 11, 2015 Ultimately all Christians subscribe to a set of beliefs that contradict each other. They try not to think about the details. When you forced your wife to think about these contradictions she experienced cognitive dissonance. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Llwellyn Posted July 12, 2015 Share Posted July 12, 2015 I actually like her response -- it is more honest than the typical Christian response. As long as Yahweh does actually have murder, lies, and cruelty in his heart, as the Bible says that he does, it is better to just accept that if he is real, he is real like we are real. We, too, have murder, lies, and cruelty in our hearts. To your wife, he is "good" the way that I am "good." He is "powerful" the way that I am "powerful," he is different from us in degree rather than in kind. One day, you too, will get over the so-called "wickedness" of Yahweh, it won't bug you that he is a jackass, because so are we all. His "perfection" is nominal, it is a kind of act of worship to call him "holy" when he is just like us but invisible... and older. I agree that you should rant about Yahweh just as much as you rant about me. We are all the same. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
HolyGoat Posted July 12, 2015 Author Share Posted July 12, 2015 Cognitive dissonance, that was the term I was looking for. I had a thought that it was something like that, but I couldn't remember what it was called. Who knows if that was in fact the case, but it is likely. I agree that her response is quite a bit more honest than most. She doesn't try to pretend those things aren't in the Bible when they clearly are and doesn't try to make some vapid excuse that "God is all powerful and the creator of everything, he can do what he wants and we can't say anything about it." Quite frankly I have always called bullshit on that. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
♦ ficino ♦ Posted July 12, 2015 Share Posted July 12, 2015 I think her response raises questions that are most economically explained on the theory that "God" (at least Bible-God) is a human invention. People are mean, CynicalGoat understands that and deals with them. The "God" character acts like a human. Compelling conclusion: the "God" character is an invention of humans. 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
LifeCycle Posted July 14, 2015 Share Posted July 14, 2015 I appreciate the concern, it probably would be best to tone it down a bit. I am usually very even keel and chill, but have a tendency to get VERY fired up about certain things. I'm the same way. 3 years into this deconversion thing and I still get riled and continually berate Christianity... To be fair, it's usually a response to Christian behavior or statements made by Christians on social media. I think your wife is teetering and sometimes that discomfort manifests itself in outward anger. But I'm just speculating. If she's intelligent as you say, she has to be pondering your points and is probably inwardly frustrated that she might secretly be in agreement with you. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
GraphicsGuy Posted July 14, 2015 Share Posted July 14, 2015 ...She may be starting to feel overwhelmed as you ramp up the passion... This is most likely the case. It is difficult for someone to take in all the information when they just aren't quite prepared to take the steps in that direction. Sounds like she is willing to listen though and her response was...well...surprisingly reasonable. She didn't yell it at you, correct? That's a very good sign. My ex resorted to yelling and berating the second a conversation turned a direction she didn't like. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
qadeshet Posted July 14, 2015 Share Posted July 14, 2015 Anyways, we are lying in bed and I am having another bout of emphatically stating all of the things that are either bat-shit crazy or just plain evil about god, particularly in the OT. (Everything is falling into place so quickly, so every day it seems I have something new to add to that list.) She sits up, turns to me and says, I don't remember her exact words, but something to the effect of "So god did some bad things, people do that all the time and you have no problem getting over that, why can't you do the same for god?" The Christian "god" is supposedly All Powerfull, All Knowing, and All Good. There's a big difference between an ordinary human sin and a god who would destroy all life on Earth in a Great Flood. If she were talking about Zeus, I might agree with her. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
HolyGoat Posted July 15, 2015 Author Share Posted July 15, 2015 Ya, no yelling. She doesn't really do that though. I do know for a fact that she is seriously thinking about what I have presented. I overheard her tell my mom "The scariest part is: a lot of what he says actually makes a lot of sense." I may have to ask her about her comment, see what she thinks about it because I know she wasn't really thinking when she made it. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
LifeCycle Posted July 15, 2015 Share Posted July 15, 2015 God gave you a brain so you could discard it and just rely on faith. Makes sense. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Blue elephant Posted July 16, 2015 Share Posted July 16, 2015 Some intuitive sense tells me that you might want to back off just for a little while now. You have given her a LOT to think about and I suspect she might want to quietly chew this over in her own mind for a week or two. Some members have had the experience where their partner worries that this is going to lead to a rift in the relationship and they need to just feel that nothing else has changed re your love, affection and faithfulness. Admittedly, your wife doesn't sound like this, but there is a time for chewing things over in the mind, especially if your partner is introverted / instrospective. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Lilith666 Posted July 19, 2015 Share Posted July 19, 2015 Yes, CG's Wife and Llewellyn, we have done bad things and god has also done bad things. But our bad things might be envy, pettiness, thoughtlessness, even sometimes cruelty. But do we burn people? Do we kill them for touching our things when we didn't want them to (ark of the covenant)? Do we say that raping POW's is okay? Do we justify murdering children? Jackasses are one thing. God is absolutely beyond the pale of jackass and far beyond most of humanity. We can forgive a snarky comment and "get over" being snubbed. But telling someone to get over biblegod's behavior is like telling a murdered person's loved ones to get over the murderer's crime. It's bullshit. Many people have had those they love abused, hurt or killed, or been hurt themselves, because of biblegod and his bible. We're not going to "get over" it and I reject that response. 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
HolyGoat Posted August 1, 2015 Author Share Posted August 1, 2015 I think this video brings to light a very interesting point that you touched on Lilith. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest immoralchristian Posted August 2, 2015 Share Posted August 2, 2015 My wife and I were having one of our reoccurring debates about Christianity, the Bible in specific, and she said something BAFFLING to me. Before I start, let me state for those who have not read my extimony (it's horrendously lengthy, I know) that my wife is still a believer, though an incredibly moderate one, more of a social Christian than anything much of the time (quite a religious background, but has been repeatedly burned by the church, so is pretty "arms-length" with it). She is also quite intelligent and thoughtful. Thus I h ad trouble understanding how she could say such a thing . . . Anyways, we are lying in bed and I am having another bout of emphatically stating all of the things that are either bat-shit crazy or just plain evil about god, particularly in the OT. (Everything is falling into place so quickly, so every day it seems I have something new to add to that list.) She sits up, turns to me and says, I don't remember her exact words, but something to the effect of "So god did some bad things, people do that all the time and you have no problem getting over that, why can't you do the same for god?" I swear I felt my jaw hit the floor. WHAT!?! I can't even remember my response. Probably something like "Ya, but they don't claim to be perfect" or some such. I was just so dumbfounded... Would I be crazy to think that maybe pointing out all of the crazy shit, specifically genocide, rape and slavery (she is a HUGE humanitarian, and actually for humanistic reason rather than religious ones), has actually gotten through to her. I mean, why else would she make a comment like that instead of making some vapid excuse for his divine majesty? *insert heavily exaggerated eye roll* Has anyone heard someone say something like that before? It just seemed so out of character, for her or for christians in general. Even when God does a good thing to people it's still a bad thing. So what ya gonna do? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Cousin Ricky Posted August 2, 2015 Share Posted August 2, 2015 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mymistake Posted August 2, 2015 Share Posted August 2, 2015 Even when God does a good thing to people it's still a bad thing. So what ya gonna do? Yet it can never be shown that God did anything to anybody. All we have is old stories or rumors. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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