Question for unbelievers in Jesus (sorry for question length)?

Question

Say you were anti-traditional marriage, and you spent considerable effort trying to educate people on the evils and pointlessness of monogamy, how it only restricts and removes any sort of sexual freedom. Then you meet a happily married couple of 20 years, who seem so in love and at peace with each other and the world that your only option, based on the foundation you've already laid, is to mock them and try your best to break up their relationship to save face. But instead of them returning the insults or questioning their own relationship, they show you many more couples just like themselves, almost like a world unknown and unimagined by you until that time.

For many Christians, their relationship with Jesus is the same, consisting of such love and peace that life without Him is incomprehensible. I know Christians can be annoying, like a happy couple, but why try to break down love when it is such an incredible thing to so many?

Answer 1

It's wonderful that you have that kind of faith. Because you believe in Jesus does not mean you are right or that anyone else needs to believe the same as you.

What bothers me is how Christians don't share this - the thing you shared - Christians generally want the threat of hell to be what makes someone decide to be a Christian. I believe that is a form or terrorism - scaring someone into believing what you think is right is terrorism.

Your question is great because it does not threaten, just explains what you believe. I wish more Christians were like you.

Answer 2

I am sitting here with nothing to say. There are no words to better describe me then this.

For many Christians, their relationship with Jesus is the same, consisting of such love and peace that life without Him is incomprehensible. I know Christians can be annoying, like a happy couple

Answer 3

Rather a skewed analogy, comparing Christianity to happy marriages.

Let me run one by you. Supposing that you lived in a world where lots of people believed that aliens were beaming them messages. Some of them told you the messages were peaceful and loving. Others said that the messages insisted that only some of the messages were real, the others lies and that the aliens hurt us if we don't follow the true messages. Some fought wars over the messages they thought they got. Some built hospitals and helped the sick based on the messages. Many felt that morality and love are based solely on the messages and they argued over which messages were the real ones and which deceptions. Many felt that your laws should be based on the messages they got and that your children should be educated in the true messages. Let's say that useful advances in science were opposed by some because the science they were based on disagreed with the messages.

Wouldn't your first step be to see if there was any strong enough evidence to believe the aliens even exist? Most atheists have tried this first step to see if there's reason to believe in a god and found no reasonable evidence. If you found no evidence for the aliens, would you go ahead and believe in the messages anyway because believing in them made some people happy?

Now you, a non-alienist, might find that life is perfectly worth living without belief in alien messages. You wouldn't force people to acknowledge there are no aliens, I'm sure. But wouldn't you feel some obligation to defend your position that morality and love are not alien based? Wouldn't you try to defend your laws and schools from being dictated by perceived alien broadcasts? if you think what you would do in this circumstance I think you might get some idea of why atheists don't stay silent about what it is we believe.

Answer 4

First of all, in "traditional marriage," women were treated like chattel; they were literally *property*. So, in that sense, I am against traditional marriage. Marriage has changed to a more equal union. And let's also remember that in many parts of the United States, interracial marriage was illegal. This, fortunately, is no longer the case. I believe a marriage is a union between two people designed to indicate their devotion and commitment to each other. Whether they are two men, two woman, or a man and a woman is immaterial to me.

However, you cannot have a relationship with a dead person, except in your imagination. Jesus has been dead for nearly 2,000 years. And if multiple people are in relationships with him, that would make him a polygamist. And considering some men are in such "relationships" with Jesus, that means he has many same-sex marriages going on all at once! I didn't know he was so decadent!

If you want to have a relationship with Jesus, that's fine. I just ask that you don't use your beliefs to tell me what to do with my life.

Answer 5

How is sharing our beliefs and opinions breaking anything down? All I do is come here and answer questions posted to atheists, then hear about how I am hurting them by answering. Maybe if Christians didn't proselytize, they would be better off. That comes off as arrogant and exclusive to those of use who are not Christians. But you don't seem to care what forcing your beliefs on others does to them. To me, my beliefs are just as valid as yours are to you. I have every right to my beliefs and every right, in a forum such as this one, to express my views. Especially when specifically asked in a question. Maybe you should not have such a thin skin. The place is all about people of opposing beliefs expressing themselves.

atheist

Answer 6

When is the last time you met an atheist who tried to convert you? Even here, none of us are really concerned with "converting" you....most of the rants come after we've just read 18 posts from christians that are so rude and judgemental that we can't help but rave momentarily.
This loving couple analogy only works if we actually saw christians acting according to their religion. If I actually saw on a daily basis christians helping the poor, being kind to others, going out of their way to follow their religion I would be completely supportive of the way you think. Rather, I see on a daily basis people cutting people off on the highway, screaming at their kids in the grocery store, looking askance at others of different colors and cultures, etc...and don't tell me these people don't consider themselves christian. i love to see the crosses they wear, the silly fish on their back bumper, etc...as they do these things.

Answer 7

preachy little guy arnt you? i dont mock inteligent chrsitians, just the stupid ones that think there way is the only way. if they are happy and dont try to shove it down my throat I'm happy for them. but if they want me to be just like them then there will be a problem. and your languge is just so negative. an "anti- traditional" couldent you have just said non traditional? why does everything that isnt the same have to be against it cant just be not it? I am in a non traditional relationship, that we hope to take poligamus but that doesnt mean we are trying to break up traditon monogamus relationships, just like i am a pagan, that doesnt mean i want drag other people kicking and screaming into paganisim. I just want to do what I do and let other people do what they do .

Answer 8

There are about a dozen things wrong with your comparisons. I will name a few.
Is this couple told to kill all people that are in relationships that are different than theirs and have done it before?
Is this couple insisting that every one else be married like them?
Is one of the people in this marriage abusive and/or clearly imaginary?
The answers to all these questions would have to be yes for it to compare to christianity.

Answer 9

I find your comparison very telling. You make the "unbelievers" the "bad guys" trying to "break up" the marriage. You have become your own stereotype! I am an atheist and Buddhist (FYI Buddha is not a "God"), and I do not try to break down Christian beliefs, my Mom is a devout Catholic and that is fine with me. Those who do are malcontents, bent on forcing their beliefs down others throats, just as many Christians do.

Answer 10

If someone's loving relationship with Jesus doesn't affect me, I could care less. I only get concerned when they speak on the behalf of Jesus and start demaning political power to do his will. This is what I oppose.