Is Faith Moral?

[knapplc]

I find it funny that it's ok to come on a message board, and post this stuff, and anyone who is the least bit defensive is just told to stay out of the conversation, but those same people get all offended when someone even mentions religion around them.

 

You're not supposed to have noticed that for another few posts.

[muzicman0]

I find it funny that it's ok to come on a message board, and post this stuff, and anyone who is the least bit defensive is just told to stay out of the conversation, but those same people get all offended when someone even mentions religion around them.

 

You're not supposed to have noticed that for another few posts.

lol!

 

Sorry...I was in a hurry...end of the work day for me, so I got a little ahead of the thread...I'll do better next time, I promise!

[Husker_x]

Since you must have missed it:

 

Why is knowing them part of the equation? Do you know me? Do you know Landlord? Do you know muzicman? I'm curious why that's a factor.

 

Because it makes it difficult to hold conversations with people you don't know. And it was one of four factors. Guess you missed those. I don't know any of you, but neither was this thread directed at any of you. It was open to anyone, Christian, atheist, buddhist or hindu.

 

So you're afraid of critiquing strangers about their sexual preferences, but not about their religious beliefs. What is it about religion that seems safer to you?

 

It took almost two pages for you to ask that? Holy sh#t. Dude, you don't have to sugarcoat it. Just spit it out.

 

I also don't walk up to Christians or Muslims or Jews on the street and say, "Hey. HEY! Knock that sh#t off." However on a message board forum entitled 'politics and religion' where a free exchange of ideas is expected and encouraged, this seemed like an appropriate place to have this discussion. As for a personal view, no, religion unlike a person's sexuality which is a private matter is almost never kept to yourself. You take your morality from it, your politics in some cases, and your worldview, and these have very real consequences for yourself and others, for good or for bad. Even still I have the courtesy of raising the issue in an open forum where you can have time to examine the topics and craft responses. I guess you're not interested in that.

 

Homosexuals by and large don't proselytize, either. They aren't looking for converts. Civil rights, maybe, but not world domination. You're developing a talent for comparing apples and bowling balls. I'm not afraid of critiquing strangers sexual preferences because unlike Christians, as long as the preferences in question don't involve rape or child abuse, it's not my business and there's nothing to critique. Religion makes itself my business every day in this country. I'm also interested in what other people believe and why. I've never found two Christians who hold the same views on everything, so there's a lot of room for questions. Who knows, maybe I'll learn something.

[knapplc]

Homosexuals by and large don't proselytize, either. They aren't looking for converts. Civil rights, maybe, but not world domination. You're developing a talent for comparing apples and bowling balls. I'm not afraid of critiquing strangers sexual preferences because unlike Christians, as long as the preferences in question don't involve rape or child abuse, it's not my business and there's nothing to critique. Religion makes itself my business every day in this country. I'm also interested in what other people believe and why. I've never found two Christians who hold the same views on everything, so there's a lot of room for questions. Who knows, maybe I'll learn something.

 

Atheists want an end to religion. There is no place for Christians in an atheist world. Atheists want world domination, they just want to cloak it in "free thinking." It's not free if I can't think what I wish.

 

This is just a discussion about religion and atheism. It's fine to have in a forum marked "Politics & Religion." But in a free, open forum like this, you shouldn't make the mistake of thinking that a thread will go whichever way you wish. Free forums engender free conversations. I'm just trying to learn about your stance, man. Just like you.

 

Here's something fun. Let's count all the threads in this forum started by Christians where they've proselytized and looked for converts. Then let's do the same with atheists. Care to guess which is going to have more threads?

[Husker_x]

Homosexuals by and large don't proselytize, either. They aren't looking for converts. Civil rights, maybe, but not world domination. You're developing a talent for comparing apples and bowling balls. I'm not afraid of critiquing strangers sexual preferences because unlike Christians, as long as the preferences in question don't involve rape or child abuse, it's not my business and there's nothing to critique. Religion makes itself my business every day in this country. I'm also interested in what other people believe and why. I've never found two Christians who hold the same views on everything, so there's a lot of room for questions. Who knows, maybe I'll learn something.

 

Atheists want an end to religion. There is no place for Christians in an atheist world. Atheists want world domination, they just want to cloak it in "free thinking." It's not free if I can't think what I wish.

 

This is just a discussion about religion and atheism. It's fine to have in a forum marked "Politics & Religion." But in a free, open forum like this, you shouldn't make the mistake of thinking that a thread will go whichever way you wish. Free forums engender free conversations. I'm just trying to learn about your stance, man. Just like you.

 

Here's something fun. Let's count all the threads in this forum started by Christians where they've proselytized and looked for converts. Then let's do the same with atheists. Care to guess which is going to have more threads?

 

Not all atheists want to end religion because not all religions involve an unsupported supernatural entity in the first place, and one can be a deist who doesn't try to impose his beliefs on the world. Atheism means as close to nothing as a word can, 'not-theism', and can cover a broad range of transcendent or 'spiritual' practices, as well as social and political stances. I have never said you are not free to believe what you want to––even for bad reasons––or that there is no place for you in the world. I think astrology is nonsense, too, but like with religion that bizarre form of magical thinking will at worst be met with questioning and satire, not forcibly or violently attacked.

 

Yes, this is a discussion about religion, and I suppose not religion, too. Is your religion supported by faith or evidence? How does your God work and how do you know? If you have any questions about what I think, feel free to ask. I have no problem at all answering them. I would like to keep topics on topic where possible, but if you have questions you can start your own thread and I'll answer them. And I won't claim persecution if at some point you tell me you think I'm on the highway to hell, either (which I assume you believe). I like to call myself an agnostic because technically speaking I'm both atheist and agnostic, but I like to emphasize the part where I don't know if there's a God or gods.

 

Want to have even more fun? Look at the surveys asking whether or not people in America would vote for an atheist president over a religious one even if he was in every way equally or more qualified for the position. Then tell me how persecuted Christians are around here.

[jnkyrdoff6]

FAITH (jnkyrdoff6 definition) - A blind belief in something that cannot be empirically proven or dispelled in any way

[muzicman0]

Websters (for the verb form - which this discussion is based on):

 

2 a (1) : belief and trust in and loyalty to God (2) : belief in the traditional doctrines of a religion b (1) : firm belief in something for which there is no proof (2) : complete trust

 

just because there is no proof, doesn't mean that there is no evidence.

 

mm0 - yep...back online.

[jnkyrdoff6]

FAITH (jnkyrdoff6 definition) - A blind belief in something that cannot be empirically proven or dispelled in any way

I'd like to add to this that this is why I believe it is pointless to dispute religion. I know that religion has, at times, produced bad results, such as the Westboro Baptist Church, or whatever. I've never seen those guys. It doesn't matter though. Do you really think that erasing the idea of religion would change the atrocities associated with religion? Maybe I should rephrase that. It will, obviously, change them. Do you really think, erasing the idea of religion will erase the atrocities associated with religion? It won't. People will always find a scapegoat. People will always find a way to push that kind of ugliness upon other people. If it's not religion, cultural unity or something else will do just fine.

[Husker_x]

Websters (for the verb form - which this discussion is based on):

 

2 a (1) : belief and trust in and loyalty to God (2) : belief in the traditional doctrines of a religion b (1) : firm belief in something for which there is no proof (2) : complete trust

 

just because there is no proof, doesn't mean that there is no evidence.

 

mm0 - yep...back online.

 

Point of difference. Do you think that the disciples––the twelve––had faith? And if so do you think that their faith was the same as yours, or can you draw a distinction between the two?

[muzicman0]

Point of difference. Do you think that the disciples––the twelve––had faith? And if so do you think that their faith was the same as yours, or can you draw a distinction between the two?

 

by the above definition, yes, they had faith. I would guess that they're faith was different than mine (in some ways), as they witnessed first hand the miracles of Jesus. But there was faith none the less. They had faith that Jesus was in fact the Son of God. Probably not an easy thing to believe in their culture. Peter had faith to believe he could walk on water. It's one thing for the son of God to do it...something different when it was him. Peter and John had faith to heal the lame man outside the temple.

[Husker_x]

Point of difference. Do you think that the disciples––the twelve––had faith? And if so do you think that their faith was the same as yours, or can you draw a distinction between the two?

 

by the above definition, yes, they had faith. I would guess that they're faith was different than mine (in some ways), as they witnessed first hand the miracles of Jesus. But there was faith none the less. They had faith that Jesus was in fact the Son of God. Probably not an easy thing to believe in their culture. Peter had faith to believe he could walk on water. It's one thing for the son of God to do it...something different when it was him. Peter and John had faith to heal the lame man outside the temple.

 

The point in asking the question about the disciples was that I would say no, they did not have faith, at least not in the sense that you or I experience it. According to someone (and not even them, as it happens), they saw the miracles of Jesus, walked with him, talked with him, saw the signs, and were around when he died and rose from the dead. Assuming these events even took place, I wouldn't call it faith that they had in Christ so much as a reasonable conclusion based off the evidence presented to them. There is a reason I push this distinction in the definition, because again we are not talking about the same phenomena. The disciples didn't have faith in Christ any more than I have faith in gravity. Did they have to trust him when he said he was God or the Son of God (depends which gospel you read)? Sure, but he said so and he backed it up with the kind of deeds one would expect a deity to be able to preform.

 

You, on the other hand, didn't witness these things. You read about them in a book. There are lots of books that tell lots of stories like this. Without any way of verifying anything written in the book, and in fact having every reason historically to treat it with heavy skepticism, I'm trying to understand why this is an acceptable standard of evidence?

[knapplc]

See, what you have to do is justify your faith. It's not OK for you to have a belief. You must be able to support that belief with facts.

 

This is called not proselytizing atheism. This is not "ramming my belief down your throat."

[Husker_x]

See, what you have to do is justify your faith. It's not OK for you to have a belief. You must be able to support that belief with facts.

 

This is called not proselytizing atheism. This is not "ramming my belief down your throat."

 

If you read up the page a little further you'll notice that he said there was evidence. Well that put a smile right on my face. What a simple way to clear up 6,000 years worth of debate.

 

You don't have to do anything. But in a discussion between two people if there's an event or a point in question, supporting yourself is usually the best way to solve the issue. If you can't support it with evidence, you can't support it, which means that both my definition of faith and my subsequent question about its morality both stand. In essence you're claiming that believing in something without evidence is moral, and answering my question. So thank you.

[knapplc]

And you're saying that your version of proselytizing is justified, while that of others is not. It's OK for you to ram your belief down the throats of others, but not for them to do it to you. So thank you for that.

[Husker_x]

And you're saying that your version of proselytizing is justified, while that of others is not. It's OK for you to ram your belief down the throats of others, but not for them to do it to you. So thank you for that.

 

What's actually more amazing to me than your stunning admission of my definition of faith is the fact that you DON'T feel the need to try to ram your faith down peoples' throats. I'm sort of amazed at this live and let live Christianity, who smiles at you one minute and the next sighs because they know that God has reserved an eternal fire for people who reject the gospel, but never has the balls to open up about it. The level of negligence a person who won't talk about their faith must have if they really believe what they say they do is beyond criminal.

 

Unless, of course, they really don't believe it.

 

I guess you're not cut out for the apologist job.