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Jun 6 2011 10:39am
Quote (Megalo @ Jun 6 2011 04:26am)
This is the kind of answer I'm looking for, because now I can see where you're all coming from ^_^


That's good! I'm glad my post helped you.

Most of what I said lies underneath the surface of warranted Christian belief. I would have to say that most Christians have not been educated about these things themselves though.
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Jun 6 2011 04:15pm
Quote (Mezen @ 5 Jun 2011 23:32)
There can only be 1 God. Two doesn't make sense it's like saying the same thing in a sentence twice.
Therefore that 1 God has the power, u accept jesus as ur savior and u will feel wat nothing else can give u.

Sometimes ppl get discouraged for example: Person tries to accept Jesus as their savior but retains very harmful things.

Like i'm talking about Drugs, Heavy Alchohol, Smoking Cigs. Also hanging out with the wrong ppl goes downhill. Like negative relationship, illegal manipulation of business, youngster stealing, negative work enviroment, family deterioration(u have to hang out with them and supposed loved ones but if not handled correctly-boom)


There is only 1 God, but whose God is the right God? No need to answer this question because I can only assume depending on which religion you are, you will pick yours.
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Jun 6 2011 05:21pm
Haha .. Once again, this will sound offensive.
I can't stress enough that I don't mean to sound offensive, but get rather into the whole Religious discussion thing.
I just figured if I'm asking you to provide your reasoning, I should at least provide my reasoning for staying away from Religion:


The most common reason that people believe in a faith is because they were born into it ..
So what makes somebody born into the Christian faith more entitled to a relationship with God, than somebody born into a separate faith?
It comes down to a matter of luck whether or not people follow the "correct faith", and luck can't possibly be the determining factor for whether or not somebody gets to go to heaven.
Nobody born into the Islamic faith is going to make the conversion to the Christian faith, even if they wanted to. Most would be killed. Yet for some reason, God is practically saying "Get yourself killed in the name of my Religion, or you'll have to endure an eternity of suffering."

What kind of moral values produced that idea?
For a perfect entity, this sure does stretch the meaning of "love".

My point is, this all just sounds like a bunch of different teams fighting each other.
Religion practices complete control over people, and it's hard for me to believe that man hasn't utterly corrupted Religion.
Man has managed to take over every other source of power in existence, whether it's political power, financial power, etc.
What's stopping them from taking over the largest power of all? It certainly would be the easiest to corrupt. Nothing has to be shown, certain ideals can simply be blamed on "the word of God", and mostly every question can be dismissed with the statement: "That's why it's called a faith."

Religious cults have shown just how easy it is to construct a faith and use it for control, why would any mainstream faith different?

I strongly believe that there is a God, that he is a perfect entity, and that he preaches only good things.
I just don't have enough faith in man to believe that Religion isn't simply a tool for control.

Sorry for the essay.

This post was edited by Megalo on Jun 6 2011 05:23pm
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Jun 6 2011 06:12pm
Megalo, sorry for the essay in response, but please read on if you want to further understand some things about religious beliefs.

First of all, thank you for making it clear that you do not intend to be offensive. Thank you also for being honest with us and stating that you believe in God.

Secondly, I can sympathize with your view that it can seem that one's religious beliefs seem to mostly come from religious upbringing, and even cultural and geographic accidents. However, this is not a logically valid way of thinking and falls under the category of what is known as the "genetic fallacy." The genetic fallacy is a line of reasoning that makes the inference that a belief cannot be true because of the way one came to hold that belief. For example, one might say, "The only reason that you believe in democracy is because you were born in America!" But what does that do to undermine the truth of the claim one makes if they hold that democracy is the only valid and good form of government? It does nothing, which is why it is a logical fallacy! In the same way, you have said, "What makes somebody born into the Christian faith more entitled to a relationship with God, than somebody born into a separate faith?" In essence, it seems to me that you have said, "Why should somebody believe Christianity is true when people are born into other faiths just as people are born into Christianity?" This is just the genetic fallacy, Megalo, because it attacks how a person came to hold a belief, not their reasons why they believe what they believe.

Furthermore, even if that person came to hold a particular belief that was true for a bad reason, that still does not undermine the truth of what they believe. For instance, the Pythagorean school of philosophy before Plato's time held that the world was spherical, but they did so because of their religious and philosophical agendas. Even though they were mistaken in coming to this belief that the earth was spherical, we can now verify that the earth is in fact spherical through scientific mean, which means they were right all along!

We cannot let these things distract us when we want to examine the truth claims of Christianity. We also cannot dismiss whether or not a particular religion may be true because individuals have used them wrongly. The Nazis, for instance, used scientific studies to try and find ways to create a master human race and even dissected human beings, but that does not mean we should dismiss any truth claims that science may give us!

When we speak of the love of God, for example, we must also consider further aspects of his perfection, which you attest to. If God is truly a perfect entity and encompasses only good things, this means that God must also be just, because justice is a good quality. Now, if God were to reveal Himself in a particular religion, as Christianity and other world religions hold, then it makes sense that the ultimate reproach to that God would be to reject the way He has revealed Himself. As a result, this perfect God must also bring judgment upon those that reject Him to carry out His justice. This does nothing to undermine His love for humanity, but it only shows that God must act in particular ways if He is truly a morally perfect entity.

In essence, if there are truly plausible reasons for believe that God has revealed Himself in Christianity and we can conclude that it is true (based on some of the reasons I mentioned before), this does nothing to undermine God's judgment upon those who reject Him. (The same would go if we had plausible reasons for believing in the God of Islam - Allah - but there simply are few good reasons as opposed to Christianity.)


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Jun 10 2011 01:10pm
Christianity is the only form of religion saved by grace and not actions alone.
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