Questions To Ask Yourself

By redharry ~

There are times in the lives of atheists, agnostics and freethinkers when the shouts of dogma are heavy and intense. As the days go by, the Christian theocracy sharpens its claws into the trees of knowledge relentlessly. For struggling believers grappling with their faith, there will be doubts. Is Hell a real place? What if I'm wrong? Why is God invisible? Whose God is correct? And why did Yahweh bother with us if we're born in "original sin? For both groups these questions, I hope, will serve as both an encouragement and an enlightenment in these trying doubting times when Christianity threatens to incite unnecessary fears into our minds.

1) Would a loving god ask you to fear your death, which is natural to all existence? After 200,000 years of evolved homo-sapien existence, would it make sense to believe that our primate ancestors were in any more fear of punishment then we are?

2) At what point did humanity decide that god was male? Notice that the bible describes a patriarchal deity, which is typical of Abrahamic faith systems. If god is male, he had a sexual origin. Who made him? What materials is he composed of that would predetermine his persuasion? What's his source of origin? If your holy book cannot answer this, it is inevitable that this deity is a reflection of the male minds that created him in the bible.

3) If no man does good according to the bible, why was man needed to write it?

4) If Jesus was the son of god, or god incarnate, how come he didn't see fit to write a single bible verse or creed himself, firsthand? A man who holds your eternal destiny and the destiny of all mankind in his hands would see fit to write his own revelations and relay his message himself in his own writing, so why didn't he?

5) How could you so easily dismiss the revelations of Mohammed with the Koran, L. Ron Hubbard with Dianetics, Joseph Smith and the Book Of Mormon, and every other divine revelation yet accept Paul at face value with his vision on the road to Damascus? What honestly makes his story more credible than theirs?

6) There is definitive proof that the belief in eternal salvation and damnation did not start in Christianity, but with the Sumerian and Zoroastrian religions, up to 1,500 years in advance before the first century of the Christian church. What makes Christians automatically safer than anyone else if god has the power to emphatically state that Zoroaster was the true god after all, and send the Christian to hell? Would you call that god loving or fair if you were taught to follow a certain belief with 100% sincerity only to be punished for it? And if that thought disturbs you, why is it any less acceptable for Jesus to do the same to other nonbelievers in his authority?

7) Does it make sense to you that only humans have an afterlife and a soul, but the rest of the animal kingdom does not, particularly amongst the ape kingdom, whose biology mirrors us homo-sapiens almost exactly as dictated by evolution?

8) Finally, to lighten the mood, if the god of the bible created the universe, why did he not talk about cold weather once in the bible or snow? Why u no have ice, Yahweh? (Hint: because the bible writers were isolated in the desert and were cocooned, which once again exposes it's man-made origins.)

My posts will get better in time, but hopefully this helps to clear the minds of the dogma that daily creeps in to disturb our peace. If anyone has feedback for me on my posts, please tell me.

Be encouraged in your journey of freethought!!

Comments

So Just How Dumb Were Jesus’ Disciples? The Resurrection, Part VII.

By Robert Conner ~ T he first mention of Jesus’ resurrection comes from a letter written by Paul of Tarsus. Paul appears to have had no interest whatsoever in the “historical” Jesus: “even though we have known Christ according to the flesh, we know him so no longer.” ( 2 Corinthians 5:16 ) Paul’s surviving letters never once mention any of Jesus’ many exorcisms and healings, the raising of Lazarus, or Jesus’ virgin birth, and barely allude to Jesus’ teaching. For Paul, Jesus only gets interesting after he’s dead, but even here Paul’s attention to detail is sketchy at best. For instance, Paul says Jesus “was raised on the third day according to the Scriptures” ( 1 Corinthians 15:4 ), but there are no scriptures that foretell the Jewish Messiah would at long last appear only to die at the hands of Gentiles, much less that the Messiah would then be raised from the dead after three days. After his miraculous conversion on the road to Damascus—an event Paul never mentions in his lette

Are You an Atheist Success Story?

By Avangelism Project ~ F acts don’t spread. Stories do. It’s how (good) marketing works, it’s how elections (unfortunately) are won and lost, and it’s how (all) religion spreads. Proselytization isn’t accomplished with better arguments. It’s accomplished with better stories and it’s time we atheists catch up. It’s not like atheists don’t love a good story. Head over to the atheist reddit and take a look if you don’t believe me. We’re all over stories painting religion in a bad light. Nothing wrong with that, but we ignore the value of a story or a testimonial when we’re dealing with Christians. We can’t be so proud to argue the semantics of whether atheism is a belief or deconversion is actually proselytization. When we become more interested in defining our terms than in affecting people, we’ve relegated ourselves to irrelevance preferring to be smug in our minority, but semantically correct, nonbelief. Results Determine Reality The thing is when we opt to bury our

ACTS OF GOD

By David Andrew Dugle ~ S ettle down now children, here's the story from the Book of David called The Parable of the Bent Cross. In the land Southeast of Eden – Eden, Minnesota that is – between two rivers called the Big Miami and the Little Miami, in the name of Saint Gertrude there was once built a church. Here next to it was also built a fine parochial school. The congregation thrived and after a multitude of years, a new, bigger church was erected, well made with clean straight lines and a high steeple topped with a tall, thin cross of gold. The faithful felt proud, but now very low was their money. Their Sunday offerings and school fees did not suffice. Anon, they decided to raise money in an unclean way. One fine summer day the faithful erected tents in the chariot lot between the two buildings. In the tents they set up all manner of games – ring toss, bingo, little mechanical racing horses and roulette wheels – then all who lived in the land between the two rivers we

Christian TV presenter reads out Star Wars plot as story of salvation

An email prankster tricked the host of a Christian TV show into reading out the plots of The Fresh Prince of Bel Air and Star Wars in the belief they were stories of personal salvation. The unsuspecting host read out most of the opening rap to The Fresh Prince, a 1990s US sitcom starring Will Smith , apparently unaware that it was not a genuine testimony of faith. The prankster had slightly adapted the lyrics but the references to a misspent youth playing basketball in West Philadelphia would have been instantly familiar to most viewers. The lines read out by the DJ included: "One day a couple of guys who were up to no good starting making trouble in my living area. I ended up getting into a fight, which terrified my mother." The presenter on Genesis TV , a British Christian channel, eventually realised that he was being pranked and cut the story short – only to move on to another spoof email based on the plot of the Star Wars films. It began: &quo

On Living Virtuously

By Webmdave ~ A s a Christian, living virtuously meant living in a manner that pleased God. Pleasing god (or living virtuously) was explained as: Praying for forgiveness for sins Accepting Christ as Savior Frequently reading the Bible Memorizing Bible verses Being baptized (subject to church rules) Attending church services Partaking of the Lord’s Supper Tithing Resisting temptations to lie, steal, smoke, drink, party, have lustful thoughts, have sex (outside of marriage) masturbate, etc. Boldly sharing the Gospel of Salvation with unbelievers The list of virtuous values and expectations grew over time. Once the initial foundational values were safely under the belt, “more virtues'' were introduced. Newer introductions included (among others) harsh condemnation of “worldly” music, homosexuality and abortion Eventually the list of values grew ponderous, and these ideals were not just personal for us Christians. These virtues were used to condemn and disrespect fro

I can fix ignorance; I can't fix stupid!

By Bob O ~ I 'm an atheist and a 52-year veteran of public education. I need not tell anyone the problems associated with having to "duck" the "Which church do you belong to?" with my students and their parents. Once told by a parent that they would rather have a queer for their sons' teacher than an atheist! Spent HOURS going to the restroom right when prayers were performed: before assemblies, sports banquets, "Christmas Programs", awards assemblies, etc... Told everyone that I had a bladder problem. And "yes" it was a copout to many of you, but the old adage (yes, it's religious) accept what you can't change, change that which you can and accept the strength to know the difference! No need arguing that which you will never change. Enough of that. What I'd like to impart is my simple family chemistry. My wife is a Baptist - raised in a Baptist Orphanage (whole stories there) and is a believer. She did not know my religi

Search This Blog