**Official Religious Debate Thread**

[huskerjack23]

But suppose God is outside of time.

 

I'm not gonna suppose that...there's no evidence for it.

 

In that case, what we call 'tomorrow' is visible to Him much the same way that 'today' is visible. Every moment in time is 'now' to God, so he doesn't see you doing things yesterday, he simply sees you doing them, because even though you have lost yesterday (meaning it no longer exists for you), He has not. You never suppose that your actions at this very moment are any "less" free than future actions because God knows what you are doing right now, well He knows tomorrow's actions the exact same way that he knows your actions right now. Another way of putting it is that God doesn't know your actions until you have done them, but that in the moment you acted (although it was a certain place in time for you) it was right now to God.

 

You just defined God as not omniscient. All knowing means everything, past present and future, you can't redefine it.

 

God does deal within the boundaries of logic and reason, yes, but that's not really the set of rules that the other poster was talking about, and he only operates inside of logic and reason because he chooses to, not becuse he has to.

 

What? Read that sentence to yourself please and understand how dumb that sounds.

 

He is (we will assume he exists for the sake of the argument), obviously, outside of our universe, and does just as obviously intervene, but that doesn't make him subject to universal law, although he can choose to be. It would be impossible, even for an omnipotent being,

Why is he obviously outside of the universe? Only things that are demonstrably verifiably are "obvious". We can't even demonstrate that there is anything beyond the universe OBVIOUSLY.

 

Also impossible task for an omnipotent being? Seriously? You're tugging at straws to find answers that aren't there...

[Landlord]

I'm not gonna suppose that...there's no evidence for it.

 

Why are you posting in this thread again? You realize we are talking about God?

 

You just defined God as not omniscient. All knowing means everything, past present and future, you can't redefine it.

 

I don't know what you think I am redefining? I was merely trying to provide a different way of perceiving how God most likely works.

 

Also impossible task for an omnipotent being? Seriously? You're tugging at straws to find answers that aren't there...

 

This is taken out of context, you know, just a little bit. I said it would be impossible for an omnipotent being to create a society of free souls without also creating an independent world. You are the one who keeps trying to make the point how God operates within logic and reason, so I don't know why this is hard to understand for you. Omnipotence doesn't allow a being to do that which is intrisically impossible. If you were to say "God can give a creature free will and at the same time withhold free will from it", you haven't really said anything about God at all. All things are possible with God, intrinsic impossibilities (such as creating a race of free creatures without creating an independent world) are not things at all, but nonentities, and thus, impossible.

[TheCheshireCat]

This has been a peaceful conversation, color me impressed. I thought I would share my thoughts for those that would like to read them.

 

I have always questioned religion. I have always had a scientific mind. Why, how, when. How does it work, what makes it work. You are getting the picture. I am a "prove it to me" person. With that said religion really is a big question for my thought process. How can something people are so certain about, have no proof? Just because there was a Jesus, that doesnt mean there is a god. I mean, what makes Jesus different from any of the other teachers of the worlds religions? And speaking of religions, which one is right? Who is 'the' god? Is there even a god at all? If Christian are correct, does that mean that 2/3rds of the world is going to hell? What if Islam is the real religion? Are nearly 80% of the worlds population in for a surprise?

 

These are all questions that I struggle with. And I have tried to seek answers from many sources. I just dont know what to think. But this is what I know. People want to be comforted. They want some certainty. Heaven, 20 something virgins, hell for sinners, damnation. I believe people want to feel there is more, there is a 'higher' being out there. There is someone with a plan. someone to watch out for us. I dont know if any of that is true. But I know that the belief that there is something is calming to billions of people. If a faith that there is something, however little or big, however leading or hands free, that faith is a comfort tool. And i find nothing wrong with that.

 

Ultimatly religions help to establish a common law. Most can transfer from one to another. Some are little quirks within their own. But as far as I am concerned if you believe in a christian/islam/hindu/buddist/jewish/primal/scientific alien god, and you just live a good life and have your faith, good for you.

 

My only issue is with people who would take the 'word' as the only thing that matters. The church was a corrupt business that ran nations, started wars, killed to protect their backwords views and destroyed mans progresive thought. The catholic church is one of this worlds greatest evils. No different than the crazies that kill for their gods in todays time. But that is a whole different issue and rant. Just remember that you are reading a political view that was changed thousands of times from the original story to the one that you are reading. If you are able to take out of the story a general teaching of being/doing good, then you have it right. But then again these are only my thoughts, to each their own. I wont tell you that you are right or wrong, just like I would expect you to not do that to me.

 

 

Here is what C.S. Lewis believes regarding how to know if there is a higher being or not (Note: This isn't even him trying to prove the existence of the Christian God, he has different arguments for that entirely, this is just his philosophy regarding some kind of higher intelligence), I apologize if it gets long, but I know it's helped me make sense of things a bit.

 

 

Ever since childhood, we have all experienced times where someone gets the raw end of a deal, and you hear the "How would you like it if someone did that to you?" or "Come on, you promised", etc. This is a universal feeling between all humans, and it isn't only a feeling that something displeases you personally, it's an appeal to some kind of standard or behavior that we expect other people to know about and live up to. This is a common thing I'm sure everyone would agree, and when a person is pleading for someone else to live up to this standard, the other person rarely responds "Screw your standards.", instead they try and find some way to justify their actions so that they don't really go against the standard at all. It looks a lot like both parties involved had some kind of idea of a Law or Rule of decent behavior or morality, whatever you want to call it, that they both agreed upon.

 

Now this Law or Rule (let's call it a law), back in the days of the older thinkers, used to be called the Law of Nature. They didn't mean gravity or genes when they talked about laws of nature, they meant the law of right and wrong, or the Law of Human Nature. The idea was that, just as all of us are governed by what we call natural laws today (gravity, genetics, etc.), that man also had this Law of Human Nature, but the difference was that it was the only law which we could actually choose to disobey. The Law was called the Law of Nature because people thought that everybody knew it by nature, that the idea of morality was obvious to every one, and that it didn't need to be taught, speaking for the majority.

 

Now the first thing most would argue is that this Law is unsound, since different civilizations, cultures, ages, etc. have different moralities, but that isn't really true. There are differences between groups sure, but there is never anything even close to a total difference. What does that mean exactly? Think of a civilization where people were admired and worshiped for running away from battle, or where children looked up in pride at someone who betrayed the people who trusted him, it just doesn't work, and there aren't any examples of that kind of morality in any recorded history. Men have disagreed about who you should be unselfish towards or how many wives you should have, but they don't disagree that you shouldn't always put yourself first or that you should take every woman you like (again, speaking for the majority of people, there will always be perversions of everything).

 

Even people who claim not to believe in a Right and Wrong still ultimately argue in their favor. If someone breaks a promise to you, and you try breaking one back to him he will complain about it being unfair. A nation may say that treaties don't matter, but then they say the treaty they were trying to break was an unfair one. But if treaties don't matter, or if there is no such thing as Right and Wrong, then what's the difference between a fair and unfair treaty?

 

If you can accept the existence of a universal Law of Right and Wrong then the next point is that none of us are really keeping the Law. Every single day we all fail to practice the behavior that we expect out of those around us (even if you don't believe in a universal moral code you would still probably agree with this, unless you have shamefully low standards of decency), and we all try and come up with excuses or justifications, which serves as more evidence that we all believe in this Law of Nature. After all, if we don't believe in universal decency, why do we try and justify our actions? And I'm not just talking about petty things like being late to work, I'm talking about lying to yourself. I'm talking about when you're married and you take a peek down another woman's blouse, but tell yourself that your eyes were just wondering, or about when you pass someone accepting donations for charity, and you decide that you shouldn't be bothered wasting your time just to give a dollar.

 

So what does this tell us about the universe we live in? Obviously, as far as we can remember men have been trying to figure out what the universe really is, how it came to be, etc., and there are two popular opinions. The first is the materialist view, that says matter and space just happen to exist, and nobody knows why. Everything just happened the way it due to chance. The other view is the religious view. According to it, there was something behind the creation of everything, and that it is conscious, has a purpose and prefers one thing to another. And on this view it made the universe, partly for reasons unknown to us but partly to creat creatures like itself - that is creatures that have the ability to think and reason. Now the question "why anything comes to be" is not really a scientific question, not knocking science, but it's job is to observe what can be seen as existing. The statement that there is such a thing behind the things science observes, or that there isn't are not statements science can make, and the more scientific a man is the more he would agree with this statement. Even if science had all knowledge of everything in the whole universe, the questions "Why is there a universe?" or "Does it have any meaning?" would remain the same. Given that, if there is something behind the creation of the Universe, it will either have to remain unknown or will have to reveal itself in some other way.

 

The great side of this seemingly bleak situation is that there is one thing in the universe that we know more about than we could learn from external observation, and that is ourselves, because we obviously do not only observe men, but we are men. I guess you could say we have "inside information". Since we do have this intimate knowledge of ourselves, we know that we find ourselves under this universal moral law, which we didn't create, but that we still can not escape. Now anyone studying Man from the outside would have no clue as to this moral law, because he could only observe what we do (the same as science can only observe what nature does) when the moral law is about what we ought to do.

 

The final point is this. If there is a controlling power outside the universe, it could not show itself to us as one of the facts inside the universe - the same way that an architect of a house could not actually be a wall or ceiling or stairway. The only way it could reveal itself would be inside of ourselves as an influence or a command trying to get us to behave in a certain way, which is exactly what happens inside of all of us.

 

 

 

 

Ok yeah, that was really long, sorry Anyways, that is the basis (I actually paraphrased the best I could), and I can post more if it generates responses.

 

I really enjoyed that and it brought some interesting points up. I have thought about where we get our "higher" feelings from. For instance, if we simply evolved (no God) and just fit into the scheme of biology like every other living thing, shouldn't our priority be nothing but reproducing? I love my girlfriend very much, so why would I feel overwhelming guilt if I went out and impregnated 10 other girls? Technically I would be spreading my genes like I should be, and my girlfriend might never have to know, but why would I feel guilt over this? I don't have the answers and I have more than enough doubt, but it's quite amazing to think that billions of people believe in some higher power and besides a few individuals, we all set our foundations of religion and society on love and goodness.

[HuskersNow]

 

Now the first thing most would argue is that this Law is unsound, since different civilizations, cultures, ages, etc. have different moralities, but that isn't really true. There are differences between groups sure, but there is never anything even close to a total difference. What does that mean exactly? Think of a civilization where people were admired and worshiped for running away from battle, or where children looked up in pride at someone who betrayed the people who trusted him, it just doesn't work, and there aren't any examples of that kind of morality in any recorded history. Men have disagreed about who you should be unselfish towards or how many wives you should have, but they don't disagree that you shouldn't always put yourself first or that you should take every woman you like (again, speaking for the majority of people, there will always be perversions of everything).

 

An individual's sense of morals exists because it is advantageous for an individual to have one. Individuals that don't have a "conscience" have not historically been as successful in evolutionary terms. Simply put, most of them died out. Thus the similar consciences of people in completely different cultures isn't that odd. It's just natural selection.

 

Even people who claim not to believe in a Right and Wrong still ultimately argue in their favor. If someone breaks a promise to you, and you try breaking one back to him he will complain about it being unfair. A nation may say that treaties don't matter, but then they say the treaty they were trying to break was an unfair one. But if treaties don't matter, or if there is no such thing as Right and Wrong, then what's the difference between a fair and unfair treaty?

 

If you can accept the existence of a universal Law of Right and Wrong then the next point is that none of us are really keeping the Law. Every single day we all fail to practice the behavior that we expect out of those around us (even if you don't believe in a universal moral code you would still probably agree with this, unless you have shamefully low standards of decency), and we all try and come up with excuses or justifications, which serves as more evidence that we all believe in this Law of Nature. After all, if we don't believe in universal decency, why do we try and justify our actions? And I'm not just talking about petty things like being late to work, I'm talking about lying to yourself. I'm talking about when you're married and you take a peek down another woman's blouse, but tell yourself that your eyes were just wondering, or about when you pass someone accepting donations for charity, and you decide that you shouldn't be bothered wasting your time just to give a dollar.

 

So what does this tell us about the universe we live in? Obviously, as far as we can remember men have been trying to figure out what the universe really is, how it came to be, etc., and there are two popular opinions. The first is the materialist view, that says matter and space just happen to exist, and nobody knows why. Everything just happened the way it due to chance. The other view is the religious view. According to it, there was something behind the creation of everything, and that it is conscious, has a purpose and prefers one thing to another. And on this view it made the universe, partly for reasons unknown to us but partly to creat creatures like itself - that is creatures that have the ability to think and reason. Now the question "why anything comes to be" is not really a scientific question, not knocking science, but it's job is to observe what can be seen as existing. The statement that there is such a thing behind the things science observes, or that there isn't are not statements science can make, and the more scientific a man is the more he would agree with this statement. Even if science had all knowledge of everything in the whole universe, the questions "Why is there a universe?" or "Does it have any meaning?" would remain the same. Given that, if there is something behind the creation of the Universe, it will either have to remain unknown or will have to reveal itself in some other way.

 

I accept the first view of the universe because it is much simpler than the second. The first view says that before the universe came into existence, neither space nor time existed. Now some might say that this violates many known physical laws, but I disagree. Our laws make sense in terms of space and time, but take time and space out of the equations and suddenly the laws don't make sense. Proving that the universe was created out of nothing could be impossible then, because we live in a universe where time and space are integral parts of everything.

 

Now I do not accept the second view at all. A theist will say that God created the universe and leave it at that like there are no more questions remaining as to how this God came into existence in the first place. The theist only introduces another more complicated problem into the question of creation. Most theists will say that God always existed, but does that really make sense? And why is this reason any more satisfying than saying that the universe came into existence out of nothing? From whence did God come? And if God has always existed, then God has existed for an infinite amount of time, which is logically absurd. Try counting to infinity if you don't believe me.

 

The great side of this seemingly bleak situation is that there is one thing in the universe that we know more about than we could learn from external observation, and that is ourselves, because we obviously do not only observe men, but we are men. I guess you could say we have "inside information". Since we do have this intimate knowledge of ourselves, we know that we find ourselves under this universal moral law, which we didn't create, but that we still can not escape. Now anyone studying Man from the outside would have no clue as to this moral law, because he could only observe what we do (the same as science can only observe what nature does) when the moral law is about what we ought to do.

 

The final point is this. If there is a controlling power outside the universe, it could not show itself to us as one of the facts inside the universe - the same way that an architect of a house could not actually be a wall or ceiling or stairway. The only way it could reveal itself would be inside of ourselves as an influence or a command trying to get us to behave in a certain way, which is exactly what happens inside of all of us.

 

It sounds like you just said that God is not all-powerful. He can create an entire universe, but he can't show himself to us?

 

Ok yeah, that was really long, sorry Anyways, that is the basis (I actually paraphrased the best I could), and I can post more if it generates responses.

[HuskersNow]

 

I really enjoyed that and it brought some interesting points up. I have thought about where we get our "higher" feelings from. For instance, if we simply evolved (no God) and just fit into the scheme of biology like every other living thing, shouldn't our priority be nothing but reproducing? I love my girlfriend very much, so why would I feel overwhelming guilt if I went out and impregnated 10 other girls? Technically I would be spreading my genes like I should be, and my girlfriend might never have to know, but why would I feel guilt over this? I don't have the answers and I have more than enough doubt, but it's quite amazing to think that billions of people believe in some higher power and besides a few individuals, we all set our foundations of religion and society on love and goodness.

 

The guilt you feel is not due to evolutionary processes. That is nothing less than 1000's of years of Christian theology bearing down upon you and making you feel great shame. Some religions encourage multiple spouses and most of those that practice polygamy don't feel shame like you would feel if you were a polygamist.

[HuskersNow]

 

I really enjoyed that and it brought some interesting points up. I have thought about where we get our "higher" feelings from. For instance, if we simply evolved (no God) and just fit into the scheme of biology like every other living thing, shouldn't our priority be nothing but reproducing? I love my girlfriend very much, so why would I feel overwhelming guilt if I went out and impregnated 10 other girls? Technically I would be spreading my genes like I should be, and my girlfriend might never have to know, but why would I feel guilt over this? I don't have the answers and I have more than enough doubt, but it's quite amazing to think that billions of people believe in some higher power and besides a few individuals, we all set our foundations of religion and society on love and goodness.

 

The guilt you feel is not due to evolutionary processes. That is nothing less than 1000's of years of Christian theology bearing down upon you and making you feel great shame. Some religions encourage multiple spouses and most of those that practice polygamy don't feel shame like you would feel if you were a polygamist.

[TheCheshireCat]

 

I really enjoyed that and it brought some interesting points up. I have thought about where we get our "higher" feelings from. For instance, if we simply evolved (no God) and just fit into the scheme of biology like every other living thing, shouldn't our priority be nothing but reproducing? I love my girlfriend very much, so why would I feel overwhelming guilt if I went out and impregnated 10 other girls? Technically I would be spreading my genes like I should be, and my girlfriend might never have to know, but why would I feel guilt over this? I don't have the answers and I have more than enough doubt, but it's quite amazing to think that billions of people believe in some higher power and besides a few individuals, we all set our foundations of religion and society on love and goodness.

 

The guilt you feel is not due to evolutionary processes. That is nothing less than 1000's of years of Christian theology bearing down upon you and making you feel great shame. Some religions encourage multiple spouses and most of those that practice polygamy don't feel shame like you would feel if you were a polygamist.

 

I see. So before Christian theology, or 2000 years ago, no one felt guilt? I believe if there were people isolated from everything else in the world, there would still be guilt. And love. And a sense of goodness. Perhaps not all the same as those of a Christian or Islamic man, perhaps they wouldn't feel guilt or love over the same things, but they would be there.

[zoogs]

Nothing is random, nor will anything ever be, whether a long string of perfectly blue days that begin and end in golden dimness, the most seemingly chaotic political acts, the rise of a great city, the crystalline structure of a gem that has never seen the light, the distributions of fortune, what time the milkman gets up, the position of the electron, or the occurrence of one astonishingly frigid winter after another.

 

Even electrons, supposedly the paragons of unpredictability, are tame and obsequious little creatures that rush around at the speed of light, going precisely where they are supposed to go. They make faint whistling sounds that when apprehended in varying combinations are as pleasant as the wind flying through a forest, and they do exactly as they are told. Of this, one can be certain.

 

...

Mark Helprin

 

* emphasis mine. Sorry - but that's a little idiotic. To put it extremely charitably. Mr. Helprin seems to be almost a century behind in his conception of electrons. I realize this is probably not too relevant anymore, but couldn't let it pass. "Of this, one can be certain?" The Heisenberg Uncertainty Principle has something to say about that.

[fro daddy]

 

I really enjoyed that and it brought some interesting points up. I have thought about where we get our "higher" feelings from. For instance, if we simply evolved (no God) and just fit into the scheme of biology like every other living thing, shouldn't our priority be nothing but reproducing? I love my girlfriend very much, so why would I feel overwhelming guilt if I went out and impregnated 10 other girls? Technically I would be spreading my genes like I should be, and my girlfriend might never have to know, but why would I feel guilt over this? I don't have the answers and I have more than enough doubt, but it's quite amazing to think that billions of people believe in some higher power and besides a few individuals, we all set our foundations of religion and society on love and goodness.

 

The guilt you feel is not due to evolutionary processes. That is nothing less than 1000's of years of Christian theology bearing down upon you and making you feel great shame. Some religions encourage multiple spouses and most of those that practice polygamy don't feel shame like you would feel if you were a polygamist.

 

I see. So before Christian theology, or 2000 years ago, no one felt guilt? I believe if there were people isolated from everything else in the world, there would still be guilt. And love. And a sense of goodness. Perhaps not all the same as those of a Christian or Islamic man, perhaps they wouldn't feel guilt or love over the same things, but they would be there.

 

What you both say is true. Why is it that we feel that way? (not all of us, but most). Most would say that their upbringing helped to install those beliefs. (Christian theology) However even those without religion can also be monogamous. In fact, there are animals in this world of ours that choose one and only one mate and have a monogamous relationship. I think we would argue that neither a 'god' nor communal teachings have influenced the animals life. Humans are a unique creature. The ability to love and have compassion does separate us from other animals. Some would say that it is a divine creation. But I would ask why does a dog loyally love its family, even risking its own death to protect members of its pack. Why do other animals live in their own societies with rules and law? It is true that some animals run in the wild, killing and eating each other. They mate as often with who ever they can. But others are closer to us then the other end of things. Is god guiding those 'chosen' animals as well?

 

There are many questions out there. And I have enjoyed the information and ideas shared here. And I must say that it is nice to know that I am not the only one that questions this stuff and questions it often.

[knapplc]

I'm not even saying I disagree with your assessment of your own faith, but the question about whether or not belief is harmful is important. After all, your search for truth, I can say from personal experience, is an extremely rare one among any brand of the faithful. In some fundamentalist circles, doubting your faith is the equivalent of the Unpardonable Sin. These are the same people that continually prosecute a war on science.

 

Your anecdotal experience that searching for truth is "rare" among the faithful doesn't make it true. It means that in your singular experience that is your understanding. But my experience is that many, many people seek truth for truth's sake, and it's not rare at all. It's my experience that such a search is almost universal. The question of "why are we here?" or "what's it all about?" isn't new – it's as old as the hills.

 

And while yes, some fringe people are choosing to ignore science in the name of their religion, so too are there atheists who use science as a cudgel against people of faith. A pretty short google search will show you plenty of examples of anti-Christian rhetoric in the form of jokes, demotivation posters, etc. Does their existence make Christians right? Of course not – not any more than those atheists hating on Christianity make the atheists right. It simply means that on both sides of the aisle there are people for whom hate is a tool. I denounce anyone, no matter what side of the question they're on, who promotes such hate.

 

I like the question Sam Harris frequently raises. Is faith itself a good thing? Is it moral to believe something for which we have absolutely no evidence? To say that it has no harmful effects is debatable. To say that it has no effect would be absurd. Because again, the burden of proof is on anyone who advances the claim that they believe a supernatural entity did or wants something in the physical universe. As you've seen even in this thread, Christians––take Landlord, for example––make a number of bald assertions about the nature of the existence and desires of a deity. How far is that from legislation, science, or social theory?

 

We all have our measure of faith, though. Faith is inherent in our existence. You have faith as much as I have faith; we just have faith in different things. You put your faith in Bo that he'll put out a good product on the field. You have faith in your friends that they'll remain loyal to you. You have faith that your wife will not cuckold you. Faith is simply a belief without rock-solid proof. We can infer from Bo's past that he'll continue to be a good coach, we can infer that our friends will remain true to us, we can infer by our relationship history that our wives will not cuckold us, but since there is no guarantee in a relationship, it is necessarily based on faith. How is that a bad thing?

[The Maudfather]

I think it is funny that the OP has yet to chime in other then to post the original question, a follow up question (which was basically a play of the first question) 10 minutes later and then bolt.

 

Carry on.

Apologies. When I started the thread, I got a tid bit busy. Here is my opinion. Recently I have started to question my faith in Christianity...posing the very same points as the non believers in this thread. Like if we do have free will and God knows exactly what is going to happen, then logically we do not have free will or God doesn't know what is going to happen. I will say that the verse that really got me thinking was Ephesians 5:21-6:9.

 

"22Wives, submit to your husbands as to the Lord. 23For the husband is the head of the wife as Christ is the head of the church, his body, of which he is the Savior. 24Now as the church submits to Christ, so also wives should submit to their husbands in everything.

 

25Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her 26to make her holy, cleansing[a] her by the washing with water through the word, 27and to present her to himself as a radiant church, without stain or wrinkle or any other blemish, but holy and blameless. 28In this same way, husbands ought to love their wives as their own bodies. He who loves his wife loves himself. 29After all, no one ever hated his own body, but he feeds and cares for it, just as Christ does the church— 30for we are members of his body. 31"For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife, and the two will become one flesh." 32This is a profound mystery—but I am talking about Christ and the church. 33However, each one of you also must love his wife as he loves himself, and the wife must respect her husband.

Ephesians 6

Children and Parents

1Children, obey your parents in the Lord, for this is right. 2"Honor your father and mother"—which is the first commandment with a promise— 3"that it may go well with you and that you may enjoy long life on the earth."[c] 4Fathers, do not exasperate your children; instead, bring them up in the training and instruction of the Lord.

Slaves and Masters

5Slaves, obey your earthly masters with respect and fear, and with sincerity of heart, just as you would obey Christ. 6Obey them not only to win their favor when their eye is on you, but like slaves of Christ, doing the will of God from your heart. 7Serve wholeheartedly, as if you were serving the Lord, not men, 8because you know that the Lord will reward everyone for whatever good he does, whether he is slave or free.

 

9And masters, treat your slaves in the same way. Do not threaten them, since you know that he who is both their Master and yours is in heaven, and there is no favoritism with him."

 

This really makes me think...if God truly is a loving creator, then why would he advocate a something as terrible as slavery?

 

Werein do you see advocacy that man shall enslave man. The author here clearly intended that the behavior of all men is thier responsibility regardless of station or circumstance. One could as easily be a rich a-hole or a poor a-hole, likewise one can make the best of what is given and strive always to act accordingly. Far too often people reationalize horrible behavior and cruelty because they themselves have suffered (mommy never loved me, so it's not my fault that I shot the people at the mall). Remember, Christ offered himself as a servant, not a king and clearly prefered humility to celebrity.

Maybe advocate was the wrong word here. Let me rephrase... It upsets me that the Bible embraces slavery. I would expect a holy text to denounce such a terrible thing the way it denounces murder, stealing, etc.

[knapplc]

Maybe advocate was the wrong word here. Let me rephrase... It upsets me that the Bible embraces slavery. I would expect a holy text to denounce such a terrible thing the way it denounces murder, stealing, etc.

 

Did you not read my response regarding slavery?

[WVhuskerXX]

Maybe advocate was the wrong word here. Let me rephrase... It upsets me that the Bible embraces slavery. I would expect a holy text to denounce such a terrible thing the way it denounces murder, stealing, etc.

 

Did you not read my response regarding slavery?

 

Maudfather, You should scroll up and read what knapplc wrote about slavery, because he is spot on IMO.

[Husker_x]

I'm not even saying I disagree with your assessment of your own faith, but the question about whether or not belief is harmful is important. After all, your search for truth, I can say from personal experience, is an extremely rare one among any brand of the faithful. In some fundamentalist circles, doubting your faith is the equivalent of the Unpardonable Sin. These are the same people that continually prosecute a war on science.

 

Your anecdotal experience that searching for truth is "rare" among the faithful doesn't make it true. It means that in your singular experience that is your understanding. But my experience is that many, many people seek truth for truth's sake, and it's not rare at all. It's my experience that such a search is almost universal. The question of "why are we here?" or "what's it all about?" isn't new – it's as old as the hills.

 

And while yes, some fringe people are choosing to ignore science in the name of their religion, so too are there atheists who use science as a cudgel against people of faith. A pretty short google search will show you plenty of examples of anti-Christian rhetoric in the form of jokes, demotivation posters, etc. Does their existence make Christians right? Of course not – not any more than those atheists hating on Christianity make the atheists right. It simply means that on both sides of the aisle there are people for whom hate is a tool. I denounce anyone, no matter what side of the question they're on, who promotes such hate.

 

I like the question Sam Harris frequently raises. Is faith itself a good thing? Is it moral to believe something for which we have absolutely no evidence? To say that it has no harmful effects is debatable. To say that it has no effect would be absurd. Because again, the burden of proof is on anyone who advances the claim that they believe a supernatural entity did or wants something in the physical universe. As you've seen even in this thread, Christians––take Landlord, for example––make a number of bald assertions about the nature of the existence and desires of a deity. How far is that from legislation, science, or social theory?

 

We all have our measure of faith, though. Faith is inherent in our existence. You have faith as much as I have faith; we just have faith in different things. You put your faith in Bo that he'll put out a good product on the field. You have faith in your friends that they'll remain loyal to you. You have faith that your wife will not cuckold you. Faith is simply a belief without rock-solid proof. We can infer from Bo's past that he'll continue to be a good coach, we can infer that our friends will remain true to us, we can infer by our relationship history that our wives will not cuckold us, but since there is no guarantee in a relationship, it is necessarily based on faith. How is that a bad thing?

 

First part, I think when I said 'extremely rare' in my experience, I need to qualify that. What I meant to say was, take a hundred Christian that I've met. I've met or been around a few thousand, all told, in different circumstances I'd guess. Maybe five of them that I ever met could intelligently contribute to the thread we're having now. Maybe two or three of them had ever actually read seriously the arguments presented by an atheist or from another religion. The quest for truth and seriously challenging your beliefs are not necessarily synonymous. However, I know nearly all Christians who ever gave themselves any thought have doubts, some of them even to the most basic question. But from what I've seen personally, the rarest breed of question the faithful ask themselves (and look for an answer with an open mind) is whether or not their faith is true to begin with.

 

But on your second paragraph, I think that's a fallacy of equivocation. In two cases. First, the word faith has now lost its meaning. I don't believe Bo is a good coach in the same way I believe in God. With Bo I have mountains of evidence, game tapes, stats, historical trends. With God I have no physical evidence at all. The second equivocation is between evidence and proof. There really is no such thing as rock-solid proof in science. But evidence for God––take the Christian God––is theoretically possible and some would argue necessary, since he's said to have intervened in the universe many times. Yet double blind studies on prayer prove ineffective, natural sciences contradict the Genesis myth, and we have not a single demonstrated case of the miraculous under any kind of test conditions in the modern world. All of which would provide sure evidence for a creator, and even a personal God.

[Husker_x]

I'd like to pose a question on the slavery issue, if that's all right.

 

For those of you who are defending the bible's position on slavery, let me ask you this. Would you vote to go back to that system if we had a choice in the matter? Would you consciously vote for a system that allows one human being to own another human being?

 

If not, are you saying that our morality in the 21st century is superior to Christ's or God himself?