My Atheist friends, can we talk? I mean, really dig deep, wayyy down?

Question

II’m going to be very frank and sober on this point. I want you guys to take a deep breath and search your souls for truth with a capital “T”.
Many of you are far more intelligent than I am and I take my hat off to you. However, faith in Christ and believing the scriptures is really not about having a high or low I.Q. As intelligent as some of you may be, I know and you know, there are some Christians that are far more intelligent than any of you. I am not putting you down in anyway I just want you to grasp that there is something about the word of God that goes beyond the immediate perception. It actually blesses countless lives! Again, it’s not about intelligence it’s about suspending attitude, pride and ego in the inner most part of our psyche. Listen to the spirit of the words of the bible and not just the words themselves. Come on, let’s be real, even using your logic and science, the numbers in favor of probable intelligent design far out weigh the astronomical numbers of CHANCE. Jesus put it this way…
"I praise You, O Father, Lord of heaven and earth, that you have hidden these things from the wise and intelligent and have revealed them to infants. Yes, Father, for this way was well-pleasing in Your sight.”¬¬_ Luke 10:21
Finally, my question. Could you possibly be overlooking the find of your life?

Answer 1

Well, that was politely worded. Thanks. I would encourage you to really get to know some of us. Many of us USED to be bible believing creationists and it was through study of the bible that we aren't anymore. If you'd like I can send you my testimony.

Thanks again for being polite. ((polite hugs))

Answer 2

Hey, I'm agnostic, so I almost count. This is my response to some of what you had to say, thank you for caring :-).

Faith in Christ and believing the scriptures is really not about having a high or low I.Q.
~That is very true.

As intelligent as some of you may be, I know and you know, there are some Christians that are far more intelligent than any of you.
~Kind of a mute point, faith and intelligence are mutually exclusive.

I am not putting you down in anyway I just want you to grasp that there is something about the word of God that goes beyond the immediate perception.
~I honestly that belief in God making someone happy is really just a matter of the power or suggestion.

It actually blesses countless lives!
~Once again, that's a matter of perception, the same wonderful things that have happened to you as a Christian/Thiest have probably happened to other Athiests/Thiests.

Again, it’s not about intelligence it’s about suspending attitude, pride and ego in the inner most part of our psyche.
~It was quite the opposite for me, I was mormon, and "knew" that I had the truth in my life and was humbled to find out that I had it all wrong.

Listen to the spirit of the words of the bible and not just the words themselves.
~Again, the power of suggestion....

Come on, let’s be real, even using your logic and science, the numbers in favor of probable intelligent design far out weigh the astronomical numbers of CHANCE.
~Why take a chance on your religion, why not take a chance on Buddhism, or Hinduism or Judiasm, or Islam?

Jesus put it this way…
"I praise You, O Father, Lord of heaven and earth, that you have hidden these things from the wise and intelligent and have revealed them to infants. Yes, Father, for this way was well-pleasing in Your sight.”¬¬_ Luke 10:21
~To me you're just quoting a great work of fiction.

Finally, my question. Could you possibly be overlooking the find of your life?
~Sorry, but I don't think so.

Answer 3

Ah, so if we haven't found God, it's because WE, the searchers haven't looked hard enough, or in the right way? I'm happy to suspend my pride if need be, but not my logical capabilities.

Saying there are christians smarter than me is undoubtedly true, but that doesn't mean they're right and I'm wrong. I'm supported by intelligent atheists. An appeal to authority does not make a good argument.

"Come on, let’s be real, even using your logic and science, the numbers in favor of probable intelligent design far out weigh the astronomical numbers of chance."

False. You conclude that, since the world suits us, it must have been designed to suit us. I conclude that we adapted to the environment we found ourselves in. You see the universe is capable of supporting life, so think it must have been created that way. I think that life could be supported by the universe, so it is. What you consider "cause", I consider "effect" and vice versa.

When christians say "the odds are against us because if condition X was different we couldn't survive" I think they have limited themselves to current lifeforms. For instance, while it may be true that no CURRENT lifeform could exist nearer the sun, that doesn't mean a DIFFERENT lifeform could thrive if we did happen to be nearer.

In claiming the odds are against us, theists are even limiting their omnipotent god. If god can do anything, surely he can make us survive in any condition. So claiming that we could only survive if the universe was exactly like this is a bad argument from all viewpoints.

Answer 4

Christianity is the same old religion which was copied from other religions so on and so forth, Zeus was a son of God (Cronus), Hercules was the son of God (Zeus), Horus was a son of God, look at the Isis w/ baby Horus statue, 2000 years later it's the same thing, but with Mary w/ baby Jesus, the new religion copies the old, revamp and rebuilt to suit their needs for there generation.
Even the prophecies are revamped and rehashed, it's real history of mankind repeating itself over and over, which religion took, twisted it, and claim it was a prophecy that will come true in the future.

I believe the idea of all religions were copied from Nature.

Believe it or not, but it was Nature that made the universe, galaxies, the stars and planets, life on earth (possibly life on other planets) and the natural order of all things. Mankind just substitutes nature (with real facts) with a religious god figure (with faith).

Simple and to the point.

Answer 5

Your sincere and honest question deserves my most sincere and honest response.

About 400 BC Plato invented the philosophy of Idealism, which holds that the idea of an object is more perfect and therefore more real than the actual object itself. Aristotle followed immediately with the philosophy of Solipsism, which maintains that subjective experience actually is reality and that the objective (physical) realm is but an illusion created by our minds. Jesus Christ, His disciples, and all the men who wrote and edited the New Testament were undoubtedly idealistic solipsists who believed the "theater of their mind's eye" was actually reality.

About 400 AD, St. Augustine invented the concept of the human soul to explain both the mechanism of conscious awareness and how Christ's promise of eternal life was actually possible. The idea was that God loaned each new human being a tiny bit of His own immortal essence for the duration of their life. God's essence was transformed into a human soul by the experience of having lived and was returned to God in Heaven when the human died. For 1200 years, Idealism, Solipsism and the human soul were the only officially sanctioned definitions of reality.

About 1590, Galileo's physics began to challenge Aristotle's philosophical speculations. Science, with it's absolute requirement that conclusions be supported by physical evidence, began to blossum. Independent investigators from all over Europe began to publish results which contradicted revealed wisdom and the doctrine of Papal infallibility. Other planets did have moons. It was actually possible to create a vacuum. The Earth did indeed revolve around the Sun. Lightning was actually electrical current. Step by step, the entire unsubstantiated philosophy and much of the sacred dogma of the mystical Church was found to be utterly false. It became painfully obvious that God's "revealed" wisdom had nothing whatever to do with how the universe actually operated.

Eventually, at the beginning of the twentieth century, the electronic vacuum tube was invented. Soon, high impedance differential amplifiers were devised and the first electroencephelographs (EEGs) were constructed. This device proved conclusively that the origin of all thoughts, emotions, memories, and perceptions was a living human brain that was powered by metabolic (not metaphysical) processes. Not only was St. Augustine's soul not responsible for human consciousness, but Aristotle's Solipsism was also utterly false. Countless physics experiments proved beyond any possible doubt that the objective (physical) realm is absolutely real and that all subjective experience (the mind) is a clever illusion created by every living human brain. The scientific truth is that reality actually operates pretty much exactly opposite from the way the ancient philosophers (including Christ and His followers) imagined. Without a shred of evidence to back its claims, the blind philosophy and narrow-minded scholasticism of Christianity had seriously misled humanity toward a deeply flawed conclusion.

It is important to understand that God is not dead. What has really happened is that humanity has changed the way it defines reality. The objective (physical) realm is where all matter and all energy in the universe exists. Beginning with the Big Bang, the objective realm is where the laws of physics operate and where mankind's clever inventions are manifest. The God of our ancestors still exists where he always has, within each believer's subjective experience. It's just that humanity has finally realized that Aristotle got it backwards -- subjective experience is a mental construct created by our living brains and it is actually the objective (physical) realm which is tangibly real. This engineer/scientist has thus redefined his own atheism to apply only to physical reality and now happily concedes that God is alive and well within each believer's subjective experience.

Answer 6

One problem I have with quoting the buybull is that I can cherry pick anything to mean whatever I want. For instance, Leviticus clearly states that eating swine (pigs), shellfish, et al are an abomination. It also describes homosexuality in the same way, an abomination.

That cherry picked passage does not have to do with ID. It has to do with the fall of Lucifer (the light bearer).

Evolution is like math. It exists whether you understand it or not. Math and evolution occur in ever area of the universe. Every planet that has life has life that has evolved. It is as well proven as how stars and their systems are born.

Evolution (again) is a Scientific Theory proven by thousands of individual experiments over thousands of years. Have you read Origin of the Species? Scientific theory is a fact, just like Scientific Law. The difference is that a Theory is far more complex.

Answer 7

Miles, your well-meaning, albeit rather condescending and patronizing post says a great many things. And in all honesty, it proves we're right about a lot of things, too.

We don't say that all Christians are stupid and mindless sheep. We are well aware that there are a few of you who are extremely intelligent. But why would God hide himself from the intelligent ones, as you quoted in that scripture? Why would he need to hide at all?

Further, many of us were believers - born and raised in the church. So, no, I don't think we're overlooking anything. We studied, researched, and found it sorely lacking. Please stop trying to convert us. It's just not going to work, and it's really a waste of time on your part that could be spent in some other way.

Answer 8

Ugh this is vomit-inducing.

We do not believe in your invisible flying beings. We do not believe it. I have no soul, I am a human being, not an space alien. I am going to die, and be dead. I am not going to float about on a cloud with wings, playing a harp until the end of time.

Your delusions and fantasies are child-like without any of the cuteness that usually accompanies child-like thoughts.

You are a living a superstitious, woo woo, demon saturated life which is beyond insane.

I Have a great life, wonderful friends, a great family. I plan to live to a ripe old age, hopefully leaving the Earth a teeny bit better than the way I found it. That is all we get. deal with it, or sit around waiting to die and meet, no one.

Answer 9

it would basically gain this if the atheist acquaintances have been reason on deconverting the guy (it particularly is the term i've got considered some atheists use, besides). basically as atheists do in contrast to for Christians to have a hidden schedule of conversion, so Christians does no longer want an atheist pal to have that as an schedule. If the two acquaintances care related to the friendship as a replace of adjusting one yet another, i won't be able to work out a concern.

Answer 10

I can see that you are very sincere in your beliefs, but you need to understand...not everyone shares your beliefs. And it has nothing to do with attitude, pride or ego. No matter how "deep" I dig, I still don't come up with YOUR beliefs. I do not believe in the existence of a God because I have NO reason to believe that there is a God. And as for the scriptures...we have no reason whatsoever to believe that they are anything other than the inventions of men. YOU might believe in them, and that's fine, but I do not. I can NOT believe in something for which there is no evidence. What would your reaction be to my telling you that if you just suspended your attitude, pride, and ego then you would see that MY belief in Zeus was *truth*? You'd find that to be a very arrogant statement.
YOUR beliefs are not something that would be the "find of my life." Your beliefs are *your* beliefs. And it really does irritate atheists to have believers call their beliefs "truth". It's BELIEF, and belief is not the same thing as truth. If I offered you a million dollars to prove that Jesus even EXISTED, let alone that he is God in the flesh, you couldn't do it, so please don't tell me that anything regarding him is *truth*. Believe me, there is NOTHING that atheists are more interested in than TRUTH. But someone's unsubstantiated beliefs are not something that we consider to be truth.

Answer 11

There are some very intelligent people that buy into that stuff. That is what really confounds me. I suspicion is that they have "compromised" out of fear, insecurity etc.

Even if there is a God, the christian notion of him is obviously completely contrived. In no way, shape or form does any evidence indicate the existence of a God, much less one that is sympathetic to the human condition. Let the evidence make your mind up, not your own desires and inclinations.