Fweethawt Posted September 1, 2015 Share Posted September 1, 2015 This is a guest post written by Michael Runyan. Michael is a recently-retired risk analyst for the U.S. government. A former Catholic, he currently works as a freelance writer focusing on critical assessments of the Christian religion. http://www.patheos.com/blogs/friendlyatheist/2014/08/26/40-problems-with-christianity/ Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
sdelsolray Posted September 1, 2015 Share Posted September 1, 2015 Excellent blog post. The comments are interesting, to say the least. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Burny Posted September 1, 2015 Share Posted September 1, 2015 Sweet. Thx for sharing. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ironhorse Posted September 12, 2015 Share Posted September 12, 2015 (1) Relative Time We choose our ultimate destiny, not God. Time lived on earth does not matter in the outcome of our choice.No person has a valid excuse for rejecting God. Every person has a chance to God’s offer of salvation and life eternal. What if some persistently refuse to "join the party"?God will grant their request. Now, as to the “whys and hows” God works all this out, I can’t answer. I’m just glad He made it so easy and fair. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mymistake Posted September 12, 2015 Share Posted September 12, 2015 (1) Relative Time We choose our ultimate destiny, not God. Time lived on earth does not matter in the outcome of our choice. No person has a valid excuse for rejecting God. Every person has a chance to God’s offer of salvation and life eternal. What if some persistently refuse to "join the party"? God will grant their request. Now, as to the “whys and hows” God works all this out, I can’t answer. I’m just glad He made it so easy and fair. Bullshit bullshit bullshit bullshit How is it that not believing in heaven and not believing in hell is choosing our destiny? You dodged the point of relative time. You have no evidence that your God is real but there is a ton of evidence that indicates your God is imaginary. However not believing your God is real is not rejecting your God. One cannot reject somebody who is not real. There is nothing fair about the psychopathic rules found in Christian salvation theology. Live an evil life of 50 years of rape and murdering but accept Jesus on your death bed? You go to heaven forever and ever! Live a nobel life of sacrificing for the good of others but were born in the wrong place or time so that you never heard of Jesus? You go to hell forever and ever! Be a good person your whole life but get raised in the wrong religion? You also get hell forever and ever. It's boneheaded stupid and absolutely evil. Your God is a joke. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Fweethawt Posted September 12, 2015 Author Share Posted September 12, 2015 Don't forget the 'ol, "not everyone who calls upon the lord..." line of shit, also. Which is right up there with, "if anyone calls upon the lord..." Because of the other, "one can only call upon the lord if the lord wills it..." You know -- THAT whole 'Circle of Madness'. No reason at ALL to reject THAT! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
yunea Posted September 12, 2015 Share Posted September 12, 2015 Easy and fair, right. How about the other 39 problems for easiness, Ironhorse? And where is the fairness in, assuming God is real, us being created in a way that makes it an impossible thought for some of us that the Biblical God, Heaven, Satan, or eternity after death are there? I don't persistently refuse to join the party. No one's persistently asking me to join it. I obviously can't go there in my own power either, because the Bible says so. Or does it? Fwee's post is making my head spin. Yelp. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mymistake Posted September 12, 2015 Share Posted September 12, 2015 40 Reasons to be lie ve! 1 Because God is being mysterious 2 Because God is so much better than you that you couldn't even imagine 3 Because we say so 4 Because to God four is like forty all done! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bornagainathiest Posted September 12, 2015 Share Posted September 12, 2015 Please do not fill the stomach of this troll by feeding it! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Furball Posted September 12, 2015 Share Posted September 12, 2015 1. We choose our ultimate destiny, not God. 2. No person has a valid excuse for rejecting God. 3. Every person has a chance to God’s offer of salvation and life eternal. 4. What if some persistently refuse to "join the party"? 4a.God will grant their request. 5. Now, as to the “whys and hows” God works all this out, I can’t answer. 6. I’m just glad He made it so easy and fair. 1. Then what do you do with the doctrine of election? 2. Oh, I can think of a few reasons to reject a divine murderer. Here's one ----> 3. That is a bold face lie. What about people born severely mentally challenged who have no idea what is happening around them? Do they have a choice in the matter? They cannot even choose what food they get to eat, because someone has to do the choosing for them. 4. If christianity were true, backed with evidence, no one in their right mind would persistently refuse. 4a. You already said this in another thread. 5. So you fill in the gaps with nonsensical fairy tales? 6. Uhm, judging how you don't have the first clue as to beginners bible doctrine, I would never make that statement again. If buybull god did exist, he certainly did not make it so fair and easy. I am utterly at a loss that you would say something so colossally stupid. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
sdelsolray Posted September 12, 2015 Share Posted September 12, 2015 Mr. "I'm Not Here to Preach" preaches. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ironhorse Posted September 12, 2015 Share Posted September 12, 2015 (2) Lack of Gradation I agree there are complexities and varieties of human experience, but that does not demand that offering only two judgments is absurd. Indeed people are born into many different circumstances. As I stated in response to the first point, God will take everything into account and his judgment will be fair and just. I agree that the teaching of “purgatory” is completely made up without any scriptural support. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bornagainathiest Posted September 12, 2015 Share Posted September 12, 2015 Despite the provocation, please don't give in to the temptation to feed this troll. It's what he wants. If you do it, you'll be giving him power over you. Please let this thread become a sterile wasteland that he's forced to walk alone. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mymistake Posted September 12, 2015 Share Posted September 12, 2015 I agree there are complexities and varieties of human experience, but that does not demand that offering only two judgments is absurd. Indeed people are born into many different circumstances. As I stated in response to the first point, God will take everything into account and his judgment will be fair and just. Hell is never fair or just. Not even Hitler deserved an infinite punishment for a finite crime. Heaven could never be fair or just either. Nobody could ever earn an infinite reward. This is ridiculous. And only having two extremes is the epitome of black and white extremist thinking. Blatant absurdity. @BAA - sorry but until the thread is locked I will shoot down apologetics. I'm not going to leave Christian thinking unchallenged. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ironhorse Posted September 14, 2015 Share Posted September 14, 2015 (3) Barbaric Punishment From the link posted: “Hitler sent Jews to the concentration camps and gas chambers for no reason other than their ethnic identity. This was a temporal punishment; it sometimes lasted only a few days. God, on the other hand, is prepared to send good, well-accomplished, and generous people to a place of everlasting punishment and torture for the crime of not believing in something for which no credible evidence exists. The God of the Bible is, in effect, worse than Hitler.” The scriptures teach we are all sinners. We all “miss the mark” of being perfect beings. God is a perfect being. We are not perfect. It is only though Christ that we appear perfect in God's eyes. The writer here seems to believe that goodness, success, or being generous should tip the scales. Even at our best, we are still far from perfection. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mymistake Posted September 14, 2015 Share Posted September 14, 2015 I sure am glad that I will never be "perfect" enough to create a Hell, trick billions of people so I can send them there and then enjoy torturing them for all eternity. What a perfect monster. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ironhorse Posted September 15, 2015 Share Posted September 15, 2015 (3) Barbaric Punishment Here Runyan continues in much the same position as he stated in his second point: the irrationality of hell. “A belief in Hell is unavoidable if one is to believe in Jesus. If Hell doesn’t exist, then why would God have allowed it to be so prominently addressed in the Bible?” ~Runyan I agree. Jesus describes hell as a .reality and He spoke on hell three times as much as He ever did on heaven. He wanted to make sure we heard the warning. Why is such a place (condition) necessary? God will not violate the free will of a person and force his convictions to change. He does not force people to modify their beliefs and behavior to coerce them into the kingdom. “God, on the other hand, is prepared to send good, well-accomplished, and generous people to a place of everlasting punishment and torture for the crime of not believing in something for which no credible evidence exists. The God of the Bible is, in effect, worse than Hitler.” ~Runyan Here Runyan uses the word “torture” to describe hell. It conveys the idea that God gets delight in inflicting endless torture. I do not read that in scripture. It is described as torment. Torment is not torture. It is to be separated from God's love and goodness for an eternity. That is hell. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mymistake Posted September 15, 2015 Share Posted September 15, 2015 Jesus is a fictional character in a book. Harry Potter talking about magic spells doesn't make magic real. Why would Jesus talking about Hell make Hell real? If you God created eternal torment then your God is not good and not loving. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
◊ crazyguy123 ◊ Posted September 17, 2015 Share Posted September 17, 2015 (3) Barbaric Punishment From the link posted: “Hitler sent Jews to the concentration camps and gas chambers for no reason other than their ethnic identity. This was a temporal punishment; it sometimes lasted only a few days. God, on the other hand, is prepared to send good, well-accomplished, and generous people to a place of everlasting punishment and torture for the crime of not believing in something for which no credible evidence exists. The God of the Bible is, in effect, worse than Hitler.” The scriptures teach we are all sinners. We all “miss the mark” of being perfect beings. God is a perfect being. We are not perfect. It is only though Christ that we appear perfect in God's eyes. The writer here seems to believe that goodness, success, or being generous should tip the scales. Even at our best, we are still far from perfection. The scriptures do not teach anything, they only claim. They claim that we are all sinners who miss the mark of being perfect beings (which, if you really think about it, the only way we can all be sinners is if we are programmed to be such, otherwise, we would not all be sinners). If this is even the case, what is it about "God" that actually makes him perfect? Christians just assume that this is the case, instead of actually trying to demonstrate that it is so. By what standard would you define this god of yours as perfect? Is it his standard? If so, then why trust it? Just because he said so doesn't make it so. If he makes up his own standard of perfection and applies it to himself (assuming he exists of course, for the sake of discussion), then doesn't that make his standard completely subjective and arbitrary? If that is so, then your attempt at refuting this particular problem with Christianity fails completely and the problem is still present. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
◊ crazyguy123 ◊ Posted September 17, 2015 Share Posted September 17, 2015 @BAA - sorry but until the thread is locked I will shoot down apologetics. I'm not going to leave Christian thinking unchallenged. Doing so will also be helpful for newly deconverted ex-Christians or doubting Christians who are currently too afraid to admit that their faltering faith is all bunk, if they decide that they are brave enough to see what is going on in the Lion's Den. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
amateur Posted September 17, 2015 Share Posted September 17, 2015 What about numbers 20 and 21? The Roman Census and the Prisoner Release? Even as a kid, I knew that censuses were taken by people at home for purposes of taxation and how to spend tax money. It never made sense to me that any census ever would have people go back to the land of their ancestors. My mom would've had to go back to Czechoslovakia, which makes no sense no way. And my dad would've had to go back to an unknown town in Russia. Both my parents' families were way too poor to afford a trip back to the Old Country, and by the 1970's, when I learned about the census when we received our form at home, we wouldn't have known where to go in the Old Country. And what relevancy would those trips have had to people who were currently living in Southwest Pennsylvania, working and raising kids and paying their taxes right here? Our family of four used the infrastructure and school system of Southwest Pennsylvania, why should we be counted in Czech or Russia? Likewise, why would it be relevant for a middle eastern family to be counted in another city when they used resources from the city they actually lived in? The truth is: it was not relevant. The Romans did not conduct censuses like that. I've read more documentation of how Romans did their censuses and how they, indeed, would never have sent people back to "homelands" (what does that mean, anyway, when generations move a lot?), and documentation that there was no such thing ever as choosing a prisoner to release in exchange for someone else, a la Jesus' crucifixion. This type of errancy or storytelling or LYING in the bible makes the rest of the stories bullshit, in my opinion. How would our resident xians explain these discrepancies, I mean downright lies? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
yunea Posted September 18, 2015 Share Posted September 18, 2015 Ironhorse, the Bible does talk about a lake of fire. How is that not torture? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ravenstar Posted September 18, 2015 Share Posted September 18, 2015 Adam and Eve did not exist... no fall, no salvation needed. End of debate. 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
sdelsolray Posted September 19, 2015 Share Posted September 19, 2015 ... Torment is not torture. ... Except when it is. Thesaurus.com indicates that the word "torture" is a synonym for the word "torment" and, similarly, that the word "torment" is a synonym for the word "torture". In addition, Dictionary.com indicates the definitions of both words include the other. Of course, these are secular sources. ... Torment [means] to be separated from God's love and goodness for an eternity. ... Nowhere does the definition of "torment" mean "to be separated from God's love and good ness for an eternity" (your words), except in the minds of those who redefine words to fit their own religious apologetics and dogma. 3 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
duderonomy Posted September 19, 2015 Share Posted September 19, 2015 New International Version And the smoke of their torment will rise for ever and ever. There will be no rest day or night for those who worship the beast and its image, or for anyone who receives the mark of its name." From: http://biblehub.com/revelation/14-11.htm Nope, no torture described there. God isn't jealous, doesn't get angry, and never ever would he drown so much as a flea. His son Jesus would never called someone of a different race (that he created) a dog. He would never come back from the dead with wrath on his mind. God is so loving and full of goodness that he would never harden someone's heart, and then kill his firstborn and send him to Hell for having a hardened heart. God is so loving and full of goodness that he won't even consider having an attitude of reserving vengeance to himself so he can repay his enemies. A person would have to be an idiot to want to be separated from that kinda guy for eternity, right Christians? 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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