As admin, I'm pretty sure I won't get an infraction for using a really large font-size to ask the following, again:
Which Scientists? When? Link to published paper?
(By 'published', I mean published in a peer-reviewed journal accessible through a source such as PubMed and not a paper published on the website of a religious group.)
Oh, you mean this paper that I keep on my nightstand for just such an occasion as this?
The study was referenced in a book I read, but I don't watch TV and have read many, many books. I have no idea where to look for this particular reference, short of re-reading a good number of books.
Note, however that there haven't been any people on the atheistic side offering citations for things 'scientists' claim.
Regarding the paper publication, I find your bias against religious folks interesting. You really aren't looking for an unbiased position, since you say it can't have been published by a religious group.
A thousand years ago 99.9999999999% of the earth population believed the earth was flat but it is not, is it?
It was true for them at the time, wasn't it? We say it's round today, but maybe tomorrow, with more advanced science, we'll find out it's clover-shaped. Each view is valid within the context of its own school of thought, as you are saying.
It was so sad to see that one mother couldn't forgive her daughter until she committed suicide--but wonderful what the mother did afterwards.
God calls us to forgive people for sinning, but not to accept sin. A Godly mother is in a tough position in such a situation. She should love her daughter. She should forgive her daughter when she repents, which means to turn away from sin. But she can't accept her daughter's sin as being O.K. It is a gut-wrenching and spirit-wrenching thing to go through.
God calls us to forgive people for sinning, but not to accept sin. A Godly mother is in a tough position in such a situation. She should love her daughter. She should forgive her daughter when she repents, which means to turn away from sin. But she can't accept her daughter's sin as being O.K. It is a gut-wrenching and spirit-wrenching thing to go through.
The daughter came out in a letter. The mother's response (also written) was that she would never accept her daughter's homosexuality. The daughter didn't contact her mom the following Mother's Day. Mom called her daughter a few months later, and still couldn't accept it. The daughter committed suicide a few months later, because she couldn't deal with her mother not accepting her. This is a good thing?
GLBT people are 7 times more likely to attempt suicide.
Left-handed people used to be considered evil, too. That's where the word "sinister" comes from.
No, it was never true. At the time people may have believed it was flat but the reality is that it has never been flat.
Quote:
We say it's round today, but maybe tomorrow, with more advanced science, we'll find out it's clover-shaped.
You have to be kidding. We say it is round because we have already found out that it is round. It is a fact not a belief. Facts do not change over time.
Your problem is that you have been blinded by your faith and clearly mistake beliefs for facts.
I posted this fact earlier, but it needs to be reiterated:
More killings have happened in the 20th century in the name of atheism than all religious killings in history. Hitler. Stalin. Pol Pot. They killed in the name of atheism.
So don't blame religion. It is not the cause. Evil exists apart from 'religion', and more evil comes from non-religion than from religion. To blame religion for evil is flimsy cop-out on your part so that you don't have to deal with your own evil.
Read my post again. And notice I mention faith more than I mention religion.
Faith is the problem.
Stalin's actions were based on his faith. He held an unshakable belief in communism every bit as corrosive and damaging as any religion. Do you think Hitler or Pol Pot did not have faith? Watch Downfall to see Hitler full of messianic zeal.
Hitler, who was a catholic, did not kill in the name of Atheism, or Catholicism. But a philosophy. As did Stalin, as did Pol Pot.
You are right these evil philosophies didn't feature invisible sky fairies at the heart of their belief structure. But in many other ways they were religions. They demanded belief from their followers. They suppressed normal human compassion and replaced it with fantasy and zealotry.
When the Nazi guards were turning on the gas chambers, they were fuelled by the same sort of thinking which empowers Mullahs to throw stones at young girls or the rednecks who hurl abuse at gays.
Note, however that there haven't been any people on the atheistic side offering citations for things 'scientists' claim.
Regarding the paper publication, I find your bias against religious folks interesting. You really aren't looking for an unbiased position, since you say it can't have been published by a religious group.
That's the whole god damn point. Science has nothing to say in regards to religion, nor does it have anything to say in regards to atheism. Neither are a testable hypothesis.
You made a scientific claim which you obviously made up, audiopollution asked you to back it up with scientific evidence (since you voluntarily made a claim from the realm of science) and, shockingly enough, you don't have shit.
Hell, your claim may even be correct. Not something i have read up on myself, but the chances for amino acids to get together and perform the requisite reactions to make a protein without an enzyme should be highly unlikely, although it certainly wouldn't shock if it happened plenty of times back in our primordial soup. Of course, that's not a requirement for life beginning, as protein is not genetic material. I imagine you don't realize that either.
There are a number of theories of how life first formed on earth. Non of these, of course, deny God. Do you think that they do? Do you think God is out there just nodding its head like Barbara Eden? How old do you think planet Earth is?
Read my post again. And notice I mention faith more than I mention religion.
Faith is the problem.
Stalin's actions were based on his faith. He held an unshakable belief in communism every bit as corrosive and damaging as any religion. Do you think Hitler or Pol Pot did not have faith? Watch Downfall to see Hitler full of messianic zeal.
Hitler, who was a catholic, did not kill in the name of Atheism, or Catholicism. But a philosophy. As did Stalin, as did Pol Pot.
You are right these evil philosophies didn't feature invisible sky fairies at the heart of their belief structure. But in many other ways they were religions. They demanded belief from their followers. They suppressed normal human compassion and replaced it with fantasy and zealotry.
When the Nazi guards were turning on the gas chambers, they were fuelled by the same sort of thinking which empowers Mullahs to throw stones at young girls or the rednecks who hurl abuse at gays.
Faith --> Evil
C.
You say that faith is the problem, but then you go to say that atheists like Stalin and Hitler have faith. (Hitler was no Catholic.)
So theists have faith. And atheists have faith. And anyone with 'a philosophy' has faith. That means everyone has faith. And you say faith is bad. So everyone is bad. That we can agree on, because we are all sinners in need of salvation. QED
Show me someone who doesn't have 'a philosophy'. We all have 'a philosophy', which you are calling 'faith.' Only someone with no idea of right or wrong, good or bad, wise or foolish, would be without 'faith', as you define it. Only a complete imbecile would not have 'faith', as you define it.
The daughter came out in a letter. The mother's response (also written) was that she would never accept her daughter's homosexuality. The daughter didn't contact her mom the following Mother's Day. Mom called her daughter a few months later, and still couldn't accept it. The daughter committed suicide a few months later, because she couldn't deal with her mother not accepting her. This is a good thing?
GLBT people are 7 times more likely to attempt suicide.
A few years ago my brother announced to the family that he was a 'furry'; someone who likes to dress up as a fox or bear or hedgehog or whatever, and hang out at furry conventions and online. Then a year later he announced he was gay, and was moving in with his furry partner.
My parents were worried about the furry business, and thought it was weird and disturbing. They didn't know that only 25% of furries are heterosexual. When he came out of the closet, my parents were shocked and saddened. They still are to this day, something like 5 years later. The two of them have been welcome at family gatherings, but the homosexuality or furriness have not been accepted as O.K. We can't consider his partner as family, yet they have been invited and have come to family Christmas get-togethers. My parents don't allow them to sleep together in the same room of their house, so they choose to stay at a hotel. Lately, though, they haven't been attending family get-togethers.
It's conceivable that he could commit suicide. It's not what we want or what anyone wants. However, we can't change God's rules and say that homosexuality is O.K. No parent wants their child to commit suicide. But at the same time, each of us has been given free will by God. The choice to put a gun to your head or to down a bottle of pills is a personal choice.
At a certain point, when a child does things that shouldn't be done, the parent has to let the child go. For the parents to disobey God, too, would be adding to the wrongs.
My parents' hearts are still broken to this day. They've pretty much lost their son. But there is one who has higher power, and they can't go against him even for the sake of their own son.
A few years ago my brother announced to the family that he was a 'furry'; someone who likes to dress up as a fox or bear or hedgehog or whatever, and hang out at furry conventions and online. Then a year later he announced he was gay, and was moving in with his furry partner.
My parents were worried about the furry business, and thought it was weird and disturbing. They didn't know that only 25% of furries are heterosexual. When he came out of the closet, my parents were shocked and saddened. They still are to this day, something like 5 years later. The two of them have been welcome at family gatherings, but the homosexuality or furriness have not been accepted as O.K. We can't consider his partner as family, yet they have been invited and have come to family Christmas get-togethers. My parents don't allow them to sleep together in the same room of their house, so they choose to stay at a hotel. Lately, though, they haven't been attending family get-togethers.
It's conceivable that he could commit suicide. It's not what we want or what anyone wants. However, we can't change God's rules and say that homosexuality is O.K. No parent wants their child to commit suicide. But at the same time, each of us has been given free will by God. The choice to put a gun to your head or to down a bottle of pills is a personal choice.
At a certain point, when a child does things that shouldn't be done, the parent has to let the child go. For the parents to disobey God, too, would be adding to the wrongs.
My parents' hearts are still broken to this day. They've pretty much lost their son. But there is one who has higher power, and they can't go against him even for the sake of their own son.
I honestly feel sorry for the people who believe in your non-Christian God, and let that misguided belief tell them what to do.
God (of a false prophet), or not, it is your parents' choice not to accept your brother. They choose not to. They are the ones in the wrong here. And a great amount of damage is done by people like that.
May 17th is the anniversary of the international declassification of homosexuality as a mental disease by the WHO in 1990.
Today there are marches and demonstrations around the world.
Please do all you can to end the disgusting bigotry shown by frugality and his parents.
You say that faith is the problem, but then you go to say that atheists like Stalin and Hitler have faith. (Hitler was no Catholic.)
So theists have faith. And atheists have faith. And anyone with 'a philosophy' has faith. That means everyone has faith. And you say faith is bad. So everyone is bad. That we can agree on, because we are all sinners in need of salvation. QED
Show me someone who doesn't have 'a philosophy'. We all have 'a philosophy', which you are calling 'faith.' Only someone with no idea of right or wrong, good or bad, wise or foolish, would be without 'faith', as you define it. Only a complete imbecile would not have 'faith', as you define it.
Yes, but fundamentalist religious bigots' "faith" is not driven by their conscience, but by unsupported interpretation done by the church.
Yes, but fundamentalist religious bigots' "faith" is not driven by their conscience, but by unsupported interpretation done by the church.
Not true at all. You don't need a pastor or anyone else to spoon-feed you any interpretation. A true believer simply reads the bible and learns for himself or herself. When that believer chooses a church, s/he chooses a church based on whether s/he believes that that church's beliefs are in line with the bible, not vice-versa.
I listen to my pastor, to speakers, to podcasts, and to Christian radio pastors and programs. It's a wide variety of viewpoints. But I filter it all through what God says in his word. If someone says something that's contradictory to what's in God's word (like, for instance, that homosexuality is not a sin, when everyplace in the bible that homosexuality is mentioned it is called out as a sin), then I don't listen to that pastor or teacher.
God (of a false prophet), or not, it is your parents' choice not to accept your brother. They choose not to. They are the ones in the wrong here.
They accept my brother (their son.) They just don't accept what he's doing.
You don't understand how this has torn my parents' hears up. Their conscience tells them that it's wrong. Their choice is to go against their conscience, their faith, and what they believe is totally wrong. You want them to deny their essence for the sake of his perversions.
You say that faith is the problem, but then you go to say that atheists like Stalin and Hitler have faith. (Hitler was no Catholic.)
So theists have faith. And atheists have faith. And anyone with 'a philosophy' has faith. That means everyone has faith. And you say faith is bad. So everyone is bad. That we can agree on, because we are all sinners in need of salvation. QED
Show me someone who doesn't have 'a philosophy'. We all have 'a philosophy', which you are calling 'faith.' Only someone with no idea of right or wrong, good or bad, wise or foolish, would be without 'faith', as you define it. Only a complete imbecile would not have 'faith', as you define it.
We atheists get this alot.
You say we-believe this. Whereas you believe that. They are equivalent. We are the same you and I.
No. Wrong. 100% Wrong. Go to the back of the class.
Atheism and skepticism are a LACK OF BELIEF. An utter avoidance of faith. Because faith is a psychological weakness. A disease of the brain where people willingly chose to believe things to be true, IN SPITE of any rational reason.
People believed in superiority of the Master Race, and the superior fairness of Communism, not based on rationality and logic and evidence. But on an emotional desire for them to be true.
When a scientist constructs a scientific theory, it's a bit like making a bridge. Each well-understood bit of science is like a steel girder. One rests on another. Sometimes there are unknowns and they require a little guess. A tiny leap of faith. Those are like gaps in the structure. We try to avoid the gaps. When we have gaps we try to fill them in.
Religion & cults try to make a bridge out of ONE GIANT GAP!
Scientific ideas, and rational philosophy have rules. One of these rules is they must be falsifiable.
If they can't be falsified, it is a pointless theory. It can't be tested. Science is humble, if you will.
Real scientific laws mean that one single observation can destroy the whole theory. Darwin, Newton, Einstein - all their stuff could be unravelled with a single repeatable observation.
They sky-fairy myth has no disproof. It is not humble. It makes lavish claims, and offers up no proof and no means of disproof. Nothing can happen which would convince the faithful that their belief system is flawed. Because the faithful are have replaced rationality with fiction.
They accept my brother (their son.) They just don't accept what he's doing.
What you don't realize is that to your brother, that means they don't accept him. At all. And that's all that matters.
I'm so sorry that your parents are torn up about this. If they just stop listening to the church and do what they know is right (to simply love their son and allow him his own choices and support him in them), they won't have that pressure.
You have interpreted the Bible the way someone told you to interpret it. The way you have been intoctrinated to believe it is to be interpreted. There are plenty of very logical interpretations of the Bible that are just as clear as yours that say that nowhere in the Bible does it say homosexuality is a sin, except perhaps in Leviticus (and there are many who believe that even in Leviticus, the "abomination" was in reference to homosexuality in idol worship, not in and of itself). Leviticus is already proven to be obsolete, and you can't possibly believe that eating shrimp or touching a menstruating woman don't deserve the death penalty under Leviticus but homosexuality does. You claim that times have changed, so you are allowed to eat shrimp. Well, times have changed, so you are allowed to be homosexual. The only thing stopping you from believing that is bigotry and false church and social indoctrination.
It was true for them at the time, wasn't it? We say it's round today, but maybe tomorrow, with more advanced science, we'll find out it's clover-shaped. Each view is valid within the context of its own school of thought, as you are saying.
Mmm.... no. We have pictures from space that show a distinctly spherical, non-clover-shaped object known as Earth. We also have plenty of astronauts who've viewed Earth in its entirety from space.
When you say stuff like the above, it really harms your credibility. I guess if your faith tells you the Earth is a giant kazoo, then you automatically believe that we're all living on a giant kazoo, even if its easily scientifically provable otherwise.
This is part of why many ppl have stopped listening to the very religious on matters other than strictly moral ones... and even on morals, we're not so sure about you any more, since so many use their faith to justify their hatred, instead of looking in the mirror and recognizing the problem actually lies within themselves to a large extent.
So I guess I can kiss off any hope of a discussion on the Blackberry Thunder, eh?
Thanks AI, for burying that news item completely by putting it right next to what was obviously going to be a very controversial topic, i.e. homosexuality. On the plus side, for you anyway... you probably got a ton of hits off this.
Not having to actually prove something has always been convenient for religious "no it all's" Just make something up and call it god's will or god's word. Use the bible for the parts you need to condemn someone else of judge them or decide how they should live their lives. If it's not to your liking make it up.
Bible verses that even fundamentalists don't take literally...
Here are some verses which come directly from the Bible that even fundamentalists do not take literally for today, proving that they selectively pick and choose verses out of context which justify their pre-existing prejudice against gay and lesbian people. Take a look for yourself...
"Women should be silent in the churches, for they are not permitted to speak, but should be submissive, as the law also says." (1 Corinthians 14:34)
This verse says that women can't speak in church. Period. It is completely ignored today. Applying this verse to the modern day church would be ancient, absurd and nonsensical.
When it comes to the verses about homosexuality, however, fundamentalists suddenly insist that they must be interpreted literally, word for word!
When it comes to this verse, however, they admit the facts. They acknowledge that it was only meant for that day. The truth is that the Apostle Paul wrote this verse because, during his time, women and men sat on opposite sides of the church aisle. Women would yell questions across the aisle to their husbands, causing a disruption of the service.
It would be all too easy for a fundamentalist who disliked women to use this verse to exclude women from participating in the service, just as fundamentalists who dislike gay people currently misuse those seemingly anti-gay scriptures to exclude people who are gay.
Realizing that a particular scripture was only relevant for its time (and should not be applied literally to our modern day) is an interpretational option that is conveniently ignored when it comes to the verses which discuss homosexuality.
"Judge for yourselves: Is it proper for a woman to pray to God with her head uncovered? Does not even nature itself teach you that if a man has long hair it is a disgrace to him, but that if a woman has long hair, it is her glory? For her hair is given to her as a covering." (1 Corinthians 11:13-15)
Upon visiting any fundamentalist church, you will discover that more than a few women have short haircuts. This verse, however, indicates that women should have long hair, as their "head must be covered."
It has a familiar ring to it, doesn't it? Arab fundamentalists require women to put a veil over their heads and punish them if they do not. The fact of the matter is that the length of your hair has nothing to do with your spiritual condition.
"If any man takes a wife, and goes in on her, and detests her, and charges her with shameful conduct, and brings a bad name on her, and says, 'I took this woman, and when I came to her I found she was not a virgin..." (Deuteronomy 22:13,14)
"But if ... evidences of virginity are not found for the young woman, then they shall bring out the young woman to the door of her father's house, and the men of her city shall stone her to death with stones..." (Deuteronomy 22:20,21)
If a man discovers that a woman is not a virgin on her wedding night, all the men in town can murder her by flinging stones at her young female body as she screams in pain.
Is this the word of God? Hardly.
The command to stone to death a young girl who is not proven to be a virgin on her wedding night is simply an ugly man-made rule of murder that found its way into the Biblical text.
WHY are fundamentalists so afraid to admit the obvious, that such verses like the one listed above are simply not the Word of God? How mature is one's faith if one cannot even admit that a verse which commands that young girls be stoned to death isn't the Word of God?
Here are the facts . . .
The belief in Biblical times was that if a woman was indeed a virgin, she would bleed on her wedding night because her first sexual intercourse would result in the breaking of the hymen, the thin tissue that covers the vagina. This blood was considered the "evidence" of her virginity that the scripture speaks of.
Medical science has since discovered that the hymen is often already broken in many young girls because of their participation in athletic sports and things like horseback riding. Quite tragically, this indicates that many girls who actually were virgins on their wedding night were nonetheless stoned to death because they were ignorant of this scientific fact. Little did many young girls in Biblical times know that their wedding nights would end in their own murder.
"If your hand causes you to sin, cut it off. It is better for you to enter into life maimed, rather than having two hands, to go to hell, into the fire that shall never be quenched." (Mark 9:43)
While fundamentalists insist (due to their pre-existing bigotry) that all seemingly anti-gay scriptures be taken literally, without exception, they admit that the above verse was not meant to be taken literally even though the words above were spoken by Jesus Himself.
This proves that fundamentalists are willing to say that certain scriptures weren't meant to be believed literally, even those which contain the actual words of Jesus Christ!
"One of illegitimate birth shall not enter the congregation of the Lord." (Deuteronomy 23:2)
If you were born to an unwed mother, the Bible says that you shouldn't be allowed in church. Do "Bible-believing" fundamentalists follow this rule? Nope. They acknowledge that this verse was meant for a different time.
Yes, even fundamentalists acknowledge that certain scriptures were only meant to be applied to the particular time and place in which they were written.
When it comes to those scripture verses which seem to speak against homosexuality, however, they suddenly and indignantly demand that every word be followed to the letter and applied to our modern day!
The idea of refusing membership in the church to a child born to an unwed mother is seen as being unreasonable today, even though the scripture instructs it. The idea of quoting scripture to abuse people who are gay and lesbian is just as unreasonable and antiquated.
"Slaves, obey your human masters with fear and trembling, in the sincerity of your heart, as to Christ." (Ephesians 6:5)
"Slaves, obey your human masters in everything; don't work only while being watched, in order to please men, but work wholeheartedly, fearing the Lord." (Colossians 3:22)
"Slaves are to be submissive to their masters in everything, and to be well-pleasing, not talking back ." (Titus 2:9)
"Slaves, submit yourselves to your masters with all respect, not only to the good and gentle but also to the cruel. " (1 Peter 2:18)
Slaves should obey their masters? Hardly. Slavery was one of the most offensive institutions to ever befall humanity. Sadly, the scriptures condoned it, and, as you can see from the above verses, demanded that slaves obey their masters...even cruel ones. Are those verses the "Word of God?" Of course not. They are merely reflective of cultural biases which found their way into the Biblical text.
Conclusion
When it comes to the scriptural verses which seem to be against homosexuality, fundamentalists boldly declare their belief in the "infallible, inerrant Word of God", demanding that every single word be taken literally, without exception. But when it comes to the awkward verses listed above, they become much less sure of themselves. So much less sure, in fact, that they don't follow what their own Bible says.
Now this is the Word of God . . .
"Jesus said to him, You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind. This is the first and great commandment. And the second is like it: You shall love your neighbor as yourself. On these two commandments hang all the Law and the Prophets." (Matthew 22:37-40)
The Bible deserves respect if you truly believe in god . . .
We do NOT say these things to disparage the Bible. Far from it, we deeply respect the Bible. We believe that a person is actually greatly disrespecting the Bible if he or she is unwilling to ask tough questions about it. After all, you wouldn't ask tough questions about a comic book, right?
"Test all things; hold fast what is good." (1 Thessalonians 5:21, NKJV)
We believe that the way to respect the Bible is to study it carefully and with a sobriety of mind that should be common amongst people who want to understand God's will for our lives.
The Bible is greatly disrespected when it is used to justify anti-gay prejudice. The Bible was never intended to be used as a weapon of intolerance against people who are gay or lesbian. The time has come for the church to put a stop to that sin.
Comments
Great movie.
It was so sad to see that one mother couldn't forgive her daughter until she committed suicide--but wonderful what the mother did afterwards.
As admin, I'm pretty sure I won't get an infraction for using a really large font-size to ask the following, again:
Which Scientists? When? Link to published paper?
(By 'published', I mean published in a peer-reviewed journal accessible through a source such as PubMed and not a paper published on the website of a religious group.)
Oh, you mean this paper that I keep on my nightstand for just such an occasion as this?
The study was referenced in a book I read, but I don't watch TV and have read many, many books. I have no idea where to look for this particular reference, short of re-reading a good number of books.
Note, however that there haven't been any people on the atheistic side offering citations for things 'scientists' claim.
Regarding the paper publication, I find your bias against religious folks interesting. You really aren't looking for an unbiased position, since you say it can't have been published by a religious group.
A thousand years ago 99.9999999999% of the earth population believed the earth was flat but it is not, is it?
It was true for them at the time, wasn't it? We say it's round today, but maybe tomorrow, with more advanced science, we'll find out it's clover-shaped. Each view is valid within the context of its own school of thought, as you are saying.
http://www.forthebibletellsmeso.org/
Great movie.
It was so sad to see that one mother couldn't forgive her daughter until she committed suicide--but wonderful what the mother did afterwards.
God calls us to forgive people for sinning, but not to accept sin. A Godly mother is in a tough position in such a situation. She should love her daughter. She should forgive her daughter when she repents, which means to turn away from sin. But she can't accept her daughter's sin as being O.K. It is a gut-wrenching and spirit-wrenching thing to go through.
God calls us to forgive people for sinning, but not to accept sin. A Godly mother is in a tough position in such a situation. She should love her daughter. She should forgive her daughter when she repents, which means to turn away from sin. But she can't accept her daughter's sin as being O.K. It is a gut-wrenching and spirit-wrenching thing to go through.
The daughter came out in a letter. The mother's response (also written) was that she would never accept her daughter's homosexuality. The daughter didn't contact her mom the following Mother's Day. Mom called her daughter a few months later, and still couldn't accept it. The daughter committed suicide a few months later, because she couldn't deal with her mother not accepting her. This is a good thing?
GLBT people are 7 times more likely to attempt suicide.
Left-handed people used to be considered evil, too. That's where the word "sinister" comes from.
Who are we going to demonize next?
It was true for them at the time, wasn't it?
No, it was never true. At the time people may have believed it was flat but the reality is that it has never been flat.
We say it's round today, but maybe tomorrow, with more advanced science, we'll find out it's clover-shaped.
You have to be kidding. We say it is round because we have already found out that it is round. It is a fact not a belief. Facts do not change over time.
Your problem is that you have been blinded by your faith and clearly mistake beliefs for facts.
I posted this fact earlier, but it needs to be reiterated:
More killings have happened in the 20th century in the name of atheism than all religious killings in history. Hitler. Stalin. Pol Pot. They killed in the name of atheism.
So don't blame religion. It is not the cause. Evil exists apart from 'religion', and more evil comes from non-religion than from religion. To blame religion for evil is flimsy cop-out on your part so that you don't have to deal with your own evil.
Read my post again. And notice I mention faith more than I mention religion.
Faith is the problem.
Stalin's actions were based on his faith. He held an unshakable belief in communism every bit as corrosive and damaging as any religion. Do you think Hitler or Pol Pot did not have faith? Watch Downfall to see Hitler full of messianic zeal.
Hitler, who was a catholic, did not kill in the name of Atheism, or Catholicism. But a philosophy. As did Stalin, as did Pol Pot.
You are right these evil philosophies didn't feature invisible sky fairies at the heart of their belief structure. But in many other ways they were religions. They demanded belief from their followers. They suppressed normal human compassion and replaced it with fantasy and zealotry.
When the Nazi guards were turning on the gas chambers, they were fuelled by the same sort of thinking which empowers Mullahs to throw stones at young girls or the rednecks who hurl abuse at gays.
Faith --> Evil
C.
Note, however that there haven't been any people on the atheistic side offering citations for things 'scientists' claim.
Regarding the paper publication, I find your bias against religious folks interesting. You really aren't looking for an unbiased position, since you say it can't have been published by a religious group.
That's the whole god damn point. Science has nothing to say in regards to religion, nor does it have anything to say in regards to atheism. Neither are a testable hypothesis.
You made a scientific claim which you obviously made up, audiopollution asked you to back it up with scientific evidence (since you voluntarily made a claim from the realm of science) and, shockingly enough, you don't have shit.
Hell, your claim may even be correct. Not something i have read up on myself, but the chances for amino acids to get together and perform the requisite reactions to make a protein without an enzyme should be highly unlikely, although it certainly wouldn't shock if it happened plenty of times back in our primordial soup. Of course, that's not a requirement for life beginning, as protein is not genetic material. I imagine you don't realize that either.
There are a number of theories of how life first formed on earth. Non of these, of course, deny God. Do you think that they do? Do you think God is out there just nodding its head like Barbara Eden? How old do you think planet Earth is?
Read my post again. And notice I mention faith more than I mention religion.
Faith is the problem.
Stalin's actions were based on his faith. He held an unshakable belief in communism every bit as corrosive and damaging as any religion. Do you think Hitler or Pol Pot did not have faith? Watch Downfall to see Hitler full of messianic zeal.
Hitler, who was a catholic, did not kill in the name of Atheism, or Catholicism. But a philosophy. As did Stalin, as did Pol Pot.
You are right these evil philosophies didn't feature invisible sky fairies at the heart of their belief structure. But in many other ways they were religions. They demanded belief from their followers. They suppressed normal human compassion and replaced it with fantasy and zealotry.
When the Nazi guards were turning on the gas chambers, they were fuelled by the same sort of thinking which empowers Mullahs to throw stones at young girls or the rednecks who hurl abuse at gays.
Faith --> Evil
C.
You say that faith is the problem, but then you go to say that atheists like Stalin and Hitler have faith. (Hitler was no Catholic.)
So theists have faith. And atheists have faith. And anyone with 'a philosophy' has faith. That means everyone has faith. And you say faith is bad. So everyone is bad. That we can agree on, because we are all sinners in need of salvation. QED
Show me someone who doesn't have 'a philosophy'. We all have 'a philosophy', which you are calling 'faith.' Only someone with no idea of right or wrong, good or bad, wise or foolish, would be without 'faith', as you define it. Only a complete imbecile would not have 'faith', as you define it.
The daughter came out in a letter. The mother's response (also written) was that she would never accept her daughter's homosexuality. The daughter didn't contact her mom the following Mother's Day. Mom called her daughter a few months later, and still couldn't accept it. The daughter committed suicide a few months later, because she couldn't deal with her mother not accepting her. This is a good thing?
GLBT people are 7 times more likely to attempt suicide.
A few years ago my brother announced to the family that he was a 'furry'; someone who likes to dress up as a fox or bear or hedgehog or whatever, and hang out at furry conventions and online. Then a year later he announced he was gay, and was moving in with his furry partner.
My parents were worried about the furry business, and thought it was weird and disturbing. They didn't know that only 25% of furries are heterosexual. When he came out of the closet, my parents were shocked and saddened. They still are to this day, something like 5 years later. The two of them have been welcome at family gatherings, but the homosexuality or furriness have not been accepted as O.K. We can't consider his partner as family, yet they have been invited and have come to family Christmas get-togethers. My parents don't allow them to sleep together in the same room of their house, so they choose to stay at a hotel. Lately, though, they haven't been attending family get-togethers.
It's conceivable that he could commit suicide. It's not what we want or what anyone wants. However, we can't change God's rules and say that homosexuality is O.K. No parent wants their child to commit suicide. But at the same time, each of us has been given free will by God. The choice to put a gun to your head or to down a bottle of pills is a personal choice.
At a certain point, when a child does things that shouldn't be done, the parent has to let the child go. For the parents to disobey God, too, would be adding to the wrongs.
My parents' hearts are still broken to this day. They've pretty much lost their son. But there is one who has higher power, and they can't go against him even for the sake of their own son.
A few years ago my brother announced to the family that he was a 'furry'; someone who likes to dress up as a fox or bear or hedgehog or whatever, and hang out at furry conventions and online. Then a year later he announced he was gay, and was moving in with his furry partner.
My parents were worried about the furry business, and thought it was weird and disturbing. They didn't know that only 25% of furries are heterosexual. When he came out of the closet, my parents were shocked and saddened. They still are to this day, something like 5 years later. The two of them have been welcome at family gatherings, but the homosexuality or furriness have not been accepted as O.K. We can't consider his partner as family, yet they have been invited and have come to family Christmas get-togethers. My parents don't allow them to sleep together in the same room of their house, so they choose to stay at a hotel. Lately, though, they haven't been attending family get-togethers.
It's conceivable that he could commit suicide. It's not what we want or what anyone wants. However, we can't change God's rules and say that homosexuality is O.K. No parent wants their child to commit suicide. But at the same time, each of us has been given free will by God. The choice to put a gun to your head or to down a bottle of pills is a personal choice.
At a certain point, when a child does things that shouldn't be done, the parent has to let the child go. For the parents to disobey God, too, would be adding to the wrongs.
My parents' hearts are still broken to this day. They've pretty much lost their son. But there is one who has higher power, and they can't go against him even for the sake of their own son.
I honestly feel sorry for the people who believe in your non-Christian God, and let that misguided belief tell them what to do.
God (of a false prophet), or not, it is your parents' choice not to accept your brother. They choose not to. They are the ones in the wrong here. And a great amount of damage is done by people like that.
May 17th is the anniversary of the international declassification of homosexuality as a mental disease by the WHO in 1990.
Today there are marches and demonstrations around the world.
Please do all you can to end the disgusting bigotry shown by frugality and his parents.
You say that faith is the problem, but then you go to say that atheists like Stalin and Hitler have faith. (Hitler was no Catholic.)
So theists have faith. And atheists have faith. And anyone with 'a philosophy' has faith. That means everyone has faith. And you say faith is bad. So everyone is bad. That we can agree on, because we are all sinners in need of salvation. QED
Show me someone who doesn't have 'a philosophy'. We all have 'a philosophy', which you are calling 'faith.' Only someone with no idea of right or wrong, good or bad, wise or foolish, would be without 'faith', as you define it. Only a complete imbecile would not have 'faith', as you define it.
Yes, but fundamentalist religious bigots' "faith" is not driven by their conscience, but by unsupported interpretation done by the church.
Yes, but fundamentalist religious bigots' "faith" is not driven by their conscience, but by unsupported interpretation done by the church.
Not true at all. You don't need a pastor or anyone else to spoon-feed you any interpretation. A true believer simply reads the bible and learns for himself or herself. When that believer chooses a church, s/he chooses a church based on whether s/he believes that that church's beliefs are in line with the bible, not vice-versa.
I listen to my pastor, to speakers, to podcasts, and to Christian radio pastors and programs. It's a wide variety of viewpoints. But I filter it all through what God says in his word. If someone says something that's contradictory to what's in God's word (like, for instance, that homosexuality is not a sin, when everyplace in the bible that homosexuality is mentioned it is called out as a sin), then I don't listen to that pastor or teacher.
God (of a false prophet), or not, it is your parents' choice not to accept your brother. They choose not to. They are the ones in the wrong here.
They accept my brother (their son.) They just don't accept what he's doing.
You don't understand how this has torn my parents' hears up. Their conscience tells them that it's wrong. Their choice is to go against their conscience, their faith, and what they believe is totally wrong. You want them to deny their essence for the sake of his perversions.
They can't do that in good conscience.
You say that faith is the problem, but then you go to say that atheists like Stalin and Hitler have faith. (Hitler was no Catholic.)
So theists have faith. And atheists have faith. And anyone with 'a philosophy' has faith. That means everyone has faith. And you say faith is bad. So everyone is bad. That we can agree on, because we are all sinners in need of salvation. QED
Show me someone who doesn't have 'a philosophy'. We all have 'a philosophy', which you are calling 'faith.' Only someone with no idea of right or wrong, good or bad, wise or foolish, would be without 'faith', as you define it. Only a complete imbecile would not have 'faith', as you define it.
We atheists get this alot.
You say we-believe this. Whereas you believe that. They are equivalent. We are the same you and I.
No. Wrong. 100% Wrong. Go to the back of the class.
Atheism and skepticism are a LACK OF BELIEF. An utter avoidance of faith. Because faith is a psychological weakness. A disease of the brain where people willingly chose to believe things to be true, IN SPITE of any rational reason.
People believed in superiority of the Master Race, and the superior fairness of Communism, not based on rationality and logic and evidence. But on an emotional desire for them to be true.
When a scientist constructs a scientific theory, it's a bit like making a bridge. Each well-understood bit of science is like a steel girder. One rests on another. Sometimes there are unknowns and they require a little guess. A tiny leap of faith. Those are like gaps in the structure. We try to avoid the gaps. When we have gaps we try to fill them in.
Religion & cults try to make a bridge out of ONE GIANT GAP!
Scientific ideas, and rational philosophy have rules. One of these rules is they must be falsifiable.
If they can't be falsified, it is a pointless theory. It can't be tested. Science is humble, if you will.
Real scientific laws mean that one single observation can destroy the whole theory. Darwin, Newton, Einstein - all their stuff could be unravelled with a single repeatable observation.
They sky-fairy myth has no disproof. It is not humble. It makes lavish claims, and offers up no proof and no means of disproof. Nothing can happen which would convince the faithful that their belief system is flawed. Because the faithful are have replaced rationality with fiction.
C.
They accept my brother (their son.) They just don't accept what he's doing.
What you don't realize is that to your brother, that means they don't accept him. At all. And that's all that matters.
I'm so sorry that your parents are torn up about this. If they just stop listening to the church and do what they know is right (to simply love their son and allow him his own choices and support him in them), they won't have that pressure.
You have interpreted the Bible the way someone told you to interpret it. The way you have been intoctrinated to believe it is to be interpreted. There are plenty of very logical interpretations of the Bible that are just as clear as yours that say that nowhere in the Bible does it say homosexuality is a sin, except perhaps in Leviticus (and there are many who believe that even in Leviticus, the "abomination" was in reference to homosexuality in idol worship, not in and of itself). Leviticus is already proven to be obsolete, and you can't possibly believe that eating shrimp or touching a menstruating woman don't deserve the death penalty under Leviticus but homosexuality does. You claim that times have changed, so you are allowed to eat shrimp. Well, times have changed, so you are allowed to be homosexual. The only thing stopping you from believing that is bigotry and false church and social indoctrination.
It was true for them at the time, wasn't it? We say it's round today, but maybe tomorrow, with more advanced science, we'll find out it's clover-shaped. Each view is valid within the context of its own school of thought, as you are saying.
Mmm.... no. We have pictures from space that show a distinctly spherical, non-clover-shaped object known as Earth. We also have plenty of astronauts who've viewed Earth in its entirety from space.
When you say stuff like the above, it really harms your credibility. I guess if your faith tells you the Earth is a giant kazoo, then you automatically believe that we're all living on a giant kazoo, even if its easily scientifically provable otherwise.
This is part of why many ppl have stopped listening to the very religious on matters other than strictly moral ones... and even on morals, we're not so sure about you any more, since so many use their faith to justify their hatred, instead of looking in the mirror and recognizing the problem actually lies within themselves to a large extent.
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Thanks AI, for burying that news item completely by putting it right next to what was obviously going to be a very controversial topic, i.e. homosexuality. On the plus side, for you anyway... you probably got a ton of hits off this.
Sigh.
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Bible verses that even fundamentalists don't take literally...
Here are some verses which come directly from the Bible that even fundamentalists do not take literally for today, proving that they selectively pick and choose verses out of context which justify their pre-existing prejudice against gay and lesbian people. Take a look for yourself...
"Women should be silent in the churches, for they are not permitted to speak, but should be submissive, as the law also says." (1 Corinthians 14:34)
This verse says that women can't speak in church. Period. It is completely ignored today. Applying this verse to the modern day church would be ancient, absurd and nonsensical.
When it comes to the verses about homosexuality, however, fundamentalists suddenly insist that they must be interpreted literally, word for word!
When it comes to this verse, however, they admit the facts. They acknowledge that it was only meant for that day. The truth is that the Apostle Paul wrote this verse because, during his time, women and men sat on opposite sides of the church aisle. Women would yell questions across the aisle to their husbands, causing a disruption of the service.
It would be all too easy for a fundamentalist who disliked women to use this verse to exclude women from participating in the service, just as fundamentalists who dislike gay people currently misuse those seemingly anti-gay scriptures to exclude people who are gay.
Realizing that a particular scripture was only relevant for its time (and should not be applied literally to our modern day) is an interpretational option that is conveniently ignored when it comes to the verses which discuss homosexuality.
"Judge for yourselves: Is it proper for a woman to pray to God with her head uncovered? Does not even nature itself teach you that if a man has long hair it is a disgrace to him, but that if a woman has long hair, it is her glory? For her hair is given to her as a covering." (1 Corinthians 11:13-15)
Upon visiting any fundamentalist church, you will discover that more than a few women have short haircuts. This verse, however, indicates that women should have long hair, as their "head must be covered."
It has a familiar ring to it, doesn't it? Arab fundamentalists require women to put a veil over their heads and punish them if they do not. The fact of the matter is that the length of your hair has nothing to do with your spiritual condition.
"If any man takes a wife, and goes in on her, and detests her, and charges her with shameful conduct, and brings a bad name on her, and says, 'I took this woman, and when I came to her I found she was not a virgin..." (Deuteronomy 22:13,14)
"But if ... evidences of virginity are not found for the young woman, then they shall bring out the young woman to the door of her father's house, and the men of her city shall stone her to death with stones..." (Deuteronomy 22:20,21)
If a man discovers that a woman is not a virgin on her wedding night, all the men in town can murder her by flinging stones at her young female body as she screams in pain.
Is this the word of God? Hardly.
The command to stone to death a young girl who is not proven to be a virgin on her wedding night is simply an ugly man-made rule of murder that found its way into the Biblical text.
WHY are fundamentalists so afraid to admit the obvious, that such verses like the one listed above are simply not the Word of God? How mature is one's faith if one cannot even admit that a verse which commands that young girls be stoned to death isn't the Word of God?
Here are the facts . . .
The belief in Biblical times was that if a woman was indeed a virgin, she would bleed on her wedding night because her first sexual intercourse would result in the breaking of the hymen, the thin tissue that covers the vagina. This blood was considered the "evidence" of her virginity that the scripture speaks of.
Medical science has since discovered that the hymen is often already broken in many young girls because of their participation in athletic sports and things like horseback riding. Quite tragically, this indicates that many girls who actually were virgins on their wedding night were nonetheless stoned to death because they were ignorant of this scientific fact. Little did many young girls in Biblical times know that their wedding nights would end in their own murder.
"If your hand causes you to sin, cut it off. It is better for you to enter into life maimed, rather than having two hands, to go to hell, into the fire that shall never be quenched." (Mark 9:43)
While fundamentalists insist (due to their pre-existing bigotry) that all seemingly anti-gay scriptures be taken literally, without exception, they admit that the above verse was not meant to be taken literally even though the words above were spoken by Jesus Himself.
This proves that fundamentalists are willing to say that certain scriptures weren't meant to be believed literally, even those which contain the actual words of Jesus Christ!
"One of illegitimate birth shall not enter the congregation of the Lord." (Deuteronomy 23:2)
If you were born to an unwed mother, the Bible says that you shouldn't be allowed in church. Do "Bible-believing" fundamentalists follow this rule? Nope. They acknowledge that this verse was meant for a different time.
Yes, even fundamentalists acknowledge that certain scriptures were only meant to be applied to the particular time and place in which they were written.
When it comes to those scripture verses which seem to speak against homosexuality, however, they suddenly and indignantly demand that every word be followed to the letter and applied to our modern day!
The idea of refusing membership in the church to a child born to an unwed mother is seen as being unreasonable today, even though the scripture instructs it. The idea of quoting scripture to abuse people who are gay and lesbian is just as unreasonable and antiquated.
"Slaves, obey your human masters with fear and trembling, in the sincerity of your heart, as to Christ." (Ephesians 6:5)
"Slaves, obey your human masters in everything; don't work only while being watched, in order to please men, but work wholeheartedly, fearing the Lord." (Colossians 3:22)
"Slaves are to be submissive to their masters in everything, and to be well-pleasing, not talking back ." (Titus 2:9)
"Slaves, submit yourselves to your masters with all respect, not only to the good and gentle but also to the cruel. " (1 Peter 2:18)
Slaves should obey their masters? Hardly. Slavery was one of the most offensive institutions to ever befall humanity. Sadly, the scriptures condoned it, and, as you can see from the above verses, demanded that slaves obey their masters...even cruel ones. Are those verses the "Word of God?" Of course not. They are merely reflective of cultural biases which found their way into the Biblical text.
Conclusion
When it comes to the scriptural verses which seem to be against homosexuality, fundamentalists boldly declare their belief in the "infallible, inerrant Word of God", demanding that every single word be taken literally, without exception. But when it comes to the awkward verses listed above, they become much less sure of themselves. So much less sure, in fact, that they don't follow what their own Bible says.
Now this is the Word of God . . .
"Jesus said to him, You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind. This is the first and great commandment. And the second is like it: You shall love your neighbor as yourself. On these two commandments hang all the Law and the Prophets." (Matthew 22:37-40)
The Bible deserves respect if you truly believe in god . . .
We do NOT say these things to disparage the Bible. Far from it, we deeply respect the Bible. We believe that a person is actually greatly disrespecting the Bible if he or she is unwilling to ask tough questions about it. After all, you wouldn't ask tough questions about a comic book, right?
"Test all things; hold fast what is good." (1 Thessalonians 5:21, NKJV)
We believe that the way to respect the Bible is to study it carefully and with a sobriety of mind that should be common amongst people who want to understand God's will for our lives.
The Bible is greatly disrespected when it is used to justify anti-gay prejudice. The Bible was never intended to be used as a weapon of intolerance against people who are gay or lesbian. The time has come for the church to put a stop to that sin.