Questions for all sceptics, atheists, agnostics, mockers, God hatters, and others?

Question

When atheists or others read the Bible do they actually read it for any other reason than to mock and scoff, do they read it in it's entirety, or stop at a few verses in the old testament (The Bible will always be misinterpreted when read out of context) Why do they blame Christianity for the acts of perverted priests, the Crusades, or the Salem witch Trials. According to the Bible none of these were true Christians. Jesus said a sign of his true disciples(Christians) is that they love .

another sign of a true Christian OR FAKE is this

1 John 3
10. In this the children of God are manifest, and the children of the devil: whosoever DOETH NOT RIGHTEOUSNESS is not of God, neither he that LOVETH NOT his brother.

Why does Christianity in general get a bad name, because of false Christians

Titus 1
16. They profess that they know God; but in works they deny him, being abominable, and disobedient, and unto every good work reprobate.

Not all professing Christians are Christians

Do people use these things to discredit the faith so that they can avoid moral accountability ?

Answer 1

I don't mock the Bible and regularly defend Christians and their beliefs, but do not believe myself. What I realized years ago, while my father was giving communion to the congregation, was the religion in itself is relief from the ability not to ask questions that are unanswerable. It is solace in not knowing and is needed to keep the progression of humanity moving forward.

What a single individual can learn about humanity during one lifetime is limited to a very small area. It is as a collective that additions can be made, and as a collective where the extent of the knowledge gained can pool to allow for a broader view of the existence of humanity with all of its idiosyncrasies.

In order to assist individuals along we as a collective have created a number of means to ease the thought over the big unanswerable questions of “Why are we hear?”, “Is there a God?”, and “What is my purpose?”. This diversion is done through religion or public policy (sometimes in combination) and allows the vast majority of our collective to focus on either maintaining civilization or advancing it through small steps.

As for the repetition, it is inevitable. The process which is intrinsic to the allowance of the forward movement of humanity will hit the same problems and milestones over and over again because they are not the main goal, but an ends to a mean. Remember, that it is the collective knowledge and understanding that is the final objective, and not distractions that permit the process to continue.

The Bible is the latest step (not the first or last) in a line of successful lessons on how to live a calm, productive life, full of brotherhood and compassion. It's is a guide on how to give yourself to the great good of humanity. Someday we will not need such perceived heavenly inspiration to help us to better ourselves as a race - but probably we will.

Just read the Bible and follow it's teachings (not literally mind you, but the overall point of the lessons) and you will be helping move us all towards understanding more and more of the universe and ourselves.

Answer 2

Given the blatant contradictions and obvious cherry picking of belief by Christianity in general, I say that those who adhere to the Bible avoid intellectual accountability. And someone who denounces it without studying the whole text does too. I can make such generalizations because noone that I know of has killed their child for talking back (it's there, or have you read the whole text?) I wonder, do you consider a loving and moral Buddhist to be one of the "children of God"? Have you read the texts of other religions before deciding to be a Christian? The ONLY criteria for being a Christian is to accept Jesus as ones lord and savior. Nothing else; no special behavior, no special love for anyone, no special anything. That's the theology, no matter what you may say. The point is that anyone who reads a text with preconception and uses the words to rationalize those preconcepts, Atheist or Christain or otherwise, is wasting everyones time.

Answer 3

I read the bible when I was a Christian, simply to know what God had said, and when I read it it sounded like a load of BS. Not because I wanted it to, but becuase my knowledge and better judgement told me that it was. I am much happier with the religion I follow now.

As for the Crusades, the Witchcraft trials, and all of that, why does Muslim get a bad name from the christians for terrorism? Because it is the truth. And now a days you Christians may interpret the word of God as saying love your enemy, but back then, and still to some now, it is enterpreted as kill the wicked who are against god. The biggest fault in your religion is that is says "good works don't get you into heaven, but having faith in the Lord" therefore I can murder witches and babies so long as I have faith I will see you in heaven.

And why is that? Because that whole religion, and its Roman Catholic counterpart, were created for the soul reason of having power. The power to strike fear into people and a power to control people.

Don't you ever look at history?

Answer 4

The reason so many people disagree with the Christian religion is because of these (as you call them) "Fake Christians." The problem is that these are the ones you meet all the time. The ones that say "You will go to HELL if you don't believe exactly what I believe" drive more people away than they convert.

Forcing people to believe in some mystic thing to provide morals is wrong. Give the morals. Do as Jefferson did and delete all of the mystic things from the bible and listen to the morals. Those are the important things, not whether Jesus rose from the dead or not, or whether he turned water into wine.

Answer 5

I don't go to church. Not to say I don't believe in god, I just chose not to go to a place where several dozen hyprocrites sit around singing the praises of god and then go home to cheat on their spouses, drink, smoke, beat up their children / spouses, have sex with their own children or other children of their community etc. (this is what happened in my OLD church). I read the bible 2 times at home, and was in sunday school from 1 year until I turned 14.

It says in the bible that prayer is to be done in private, in quiet and without reservation. So why go to church to listen to a bunch of people yelling out prayers, when God himself wrote that is the wrong thing to do.

It also says that we are NOT to listen to the side street person as he is not spreading the word of god. Even though this is yahoo answers, it's basically the same thing. So, for all your religious ramblings, you are no better than the street worshipper. Christians (real ones that is) do not point fingers, they love no matter what and never look down on others for their beliefs.

Think you need to reread a few scriptures yourself. Then you'd see the error of your ways.

Answer 6

The truth concerning Christ and His divine Revelation has been proved for the last 2000 years: How many scholars, philosophers, rulers...had bowed down before Him and made great contributions to the Christian civilization.
However, nowadys there are probably more believers in name than true disciples; so I think the true Christians should make greater efforts in applying the teachings of the Bible to safeguard His Cause. Yes, He says people know the tree by its fruits.

Answer 7

I read the bible extensively for many years, attended church and bible studies several times a week. I was on the worship team and taught women's bible studies.

I found modern Christianity to be rife with self-promoting arrogance. I don't believe it's anything like what Christ had in mind, for the most part. It's just another group of people who insist they are right and everyone else is wrong.

Your use of scriptures illustrates why many people are turned off by Christianity. I think all Christians should be required to live in silence. Then they might learn something useful.

Answer 8

Is God really male? If that be the case then it is Gender discrimination which God would certainly not do. Is God asexual then? Belief is one thing but are you ready to accept that what is written in the Bible is absolutely true? Wouldn't a number of facts been changed over a period of time as different people interpreted the Bible in a different manner.

Answer 9

Many of the people you mentioned have read and are well-versed in the Bible and othe religious texts. In many cases, they know more about the Bible than many Bible-thumpers who parrot what their preachers preach. Many of the groups that you mentioned just want to be left alone but many bible-thumping Christians insist on pushing their beliefs on them and judging them.

As far as your statement regarding true Christians who are you to say they are or not? There are people out there who may not consider you to be a Christian. Jesus also said "Do not judge others lest they judge you".

Answer 10

Why do people take Islam out of context and say it is a religion of hate? Because it serves their purpose. I believe YOU are taking Christianity out of context and only saying the "nice" bits, and not the "smite thine enemy" bits. Those who took part in the Inquisition or the Crusades would say YOU aren't a Christian, and to deny that these were part of Christian history is selecting what parts of history you want to believe. You cannot dismiss the bad side of your religion as if it never happened. And you cannot say that people who disagree with your point of view don't have the "holy spirit" to help them see "the truth" - it's like saying disease is caused by immoral people, it's impossible to PROVE wrong, as it's a metaphysical thing, but it blatantly IS wrong.

People will always disagree with your point of view, there's nothing you can do about it.