The Claim That There Is No God Is An Escape From All Realities

[so what]

Yeah, obviously in your relationship your parents and parents in law are wearing the pants.

I assume your wedding in Indonesia was done in Arabic/Indonesian. Thats good news for you. If you ever want to get rid of your wife, all you need to say is: "we were wed in a different language, so it was meaningless to me".

I doubt however you will get away with this when your wife sues you for alimony.

Its also good to know that you do not want people to use their moral judgement based on religious dogma to effect your life.
Thats most likely why you converted to Islam and why you got married in a mosk.
I guess at some point your wifes parents must have told you "Hey buster, if you do not convert, you cannot marry our daughter".
I might be mistaken, but that seems to me a pretty judgemental and life effecting.

Well, the good part is that since the religious language of the catholic church is Latin, and wild guess, I assume you do not understand Latin, its meaningless to you.
And with you all catholics that do not understand Latin can now behave any way they like...meaningless, right?

And then you dont have to be judgemental...ooops...you already did.

Finally yes, if I wanted to marry a woman and her family would force me to say "red is my favourite color" whilst it was not, I would tell them to p*ss off.
(And I am talking from experience)
Anyone considering the color of red more important than my happiness and wedding, may gladly stay away from it.

You do care about your family and thats why you converted, now you have to wonder if they would have granted you the same consideration if you would have refused...I bet you, they would not.
Great to know your family cares as much for you, as you care for them.

This is how it happened:

You did not ask your Indonesian family to come to Australia, because you would have given them a heart attack and they would have refused.
You did not ask your Australian family to come to Indonesia for the exact same reasons.
The next best thing was to do both sides and to keep up appearances.
Perhaps you even didnt tell both sides about your overseas plans.

Now you are here on the board, condemning pretentious religious people who, same as you, dont really prectice what they preach.
And you advise people who are religiously oppressed to stand up and fight.

Hmmm, there was this expression about a pot, kettle and black.

Well, English is not my mothertongue, so all I just wrote is actually meaningless and I didnt really say it, unless you think I did but then I lied except for the points I really meant.

[Joseph27]

Yeah, obviously in your relationship your parents and parents in law are wearing the pants.

I assume your wedding in Indonesia was done in Arabic/Indonesian. Thats good news for you. If you ever want to get rid of your wife, all you need to say is: "we were wed in a different language, so it was meaningless to me".

I doubt however you will get away with this when your wife sues you for alimony.

Its also good to know that you do not want people to use their moral judgement based on religious dogma to effect your life.
Thats most likely why you converted to Islam and why you got married in a mosk.
I guess at some point your wifes parents must have told you "Hey buster, if you do not convert, you cannot marry our daughter".
I might be mistaken, but that seems to me a pretty judgemental and life effecting.

Well, the good part is that since the religious language of the catholic church is Latin, and wild guess, I assume you do not understand Latin, its meaningless to you.
And with you all catholics that do not understand Latin can now behave any way they like...meaningless, right?

And then you dont have to be judgemental...ooops...you already did.

Finally yes, if I wanted to marry a woman and her family would force me to say "red is my favourite color" whilst it was not, I would tell them to p*ss off.
(And I am talking from experience)
Anyone considering the color of red more important than my happiness and wedding, may gladly stay away from it.

You do care about your family and thats why you converted, now you have to wonder if they would have granted you the same consideration if you would have refused...I bet you, they would not.
Great to know your family cares as much for you, as you care for them.

This is how it happened:

You did not ask your Indonesian family to come to Australia, because you would have given them a heart attack and they would have refused.
You did not ask your Australian family to come to Indonesia for the exact same reasons.
The next best thing was to do both sides and to keep up appearances.
Perhaps you even didnt tell both sides about your overseas plans.

Now you are here on the board, condemning pretentious religious people who, same as you, dont really prectice what they preach.
And you advise people who are religiously oppressed to stand up and fight.

Hmmm, there was this expression about a pot, kettle and black.

Well, English is not my mothertongue, so all I just wrote is actually meaningless and I didnt really say it, unless you think I did but then I lied except for the points I really meant.

And again - why would there be an issue with doing a religious ceremony to keep them happy?  Its not a matter of them wearing the pants...  I have several friends who have gotten married only after they said they were muslim despite it being meaningless to them.  I also know people who have had their hearts ripped apart when their greek partners havent been able to get married because of religion.  Others couldnt say they were muslim because their particular sky god jesus would have disowned them and sent them to hell.   I loved my wife and i didnt want to make her disown her family because of religion, similarly i wasnt going to walk away because of it. 

Oh and catholic ceremony in Latin.... how old are you?  Early 1960's ring a bell?  Vatican II?  Anything coming back to you now??? 

Anyway... at the time I was married in Aus and in Indo - I did believe in some form of deity though i was searching all over.... and i did spent a lot of time studying though the more i studied the more i realised that i couldnt get my questions answered because how can anyone with a book written so long ago by men, really seek to answer questions in the 21st century?

When I lived in Aus - my indo family came down every other month... my aussie family came up to indonesia... even now that i am in singapore,  my indo family was down there earlier this week staying at my parents house.   You seem to have a bug in your butt...  perhaps it comes from letting something so petty stand in the way of your own happiness... 

If i reference to a writer whose style and sharp intellect enthrall me, christopher hitchens, i see he went through even more religions - i think 2 more but is still a noted atheist and did so because he wanted to be with a particular partner.  If in centuries past when asked at pain of death if you were Jewish, Muslim, Christian you seem like the type who would have happily be burnt at the stake but keep your religion in tact....  for me i would happily say i am christian, jewish or muslim to get them to go away and leave me to be me... 

Afterall we are only talking once again about an imaginary crime - appeasing someone who cannot transcend a worldly manifestation of darker days when religion answered all questions based on superstition.  We have entered a time when science can answer so much more... where we now know for a fact that evolution occurred,  and we have such a rich, readily available list of great thinkers who have wrestled with the concept of a divine creator over history.  Different people engage in different searches - I searched - I hoped and though I keep engaging but there are no answers short of having hope... but once the religion is subjected to a historical deconstruction, there is nothing to have faith in. 

   

[Vulcanl]

Here is a good reason for belief in the divine, and why even man-made religion can have a huge positive impact in the midst of misery:

Devout Port-au-Prince survivors create makeshift altars, turn to prayer to deal with tragedy

BY Christina Boyle   
NEW YORK DAILY NEWS
Sunday, January 17th 2010, 8:45 PM

PORT AU PRINCE, HAITI - The Sunday church bells were eerily silent on Sunday, but the voices of people praying in the ruins was loud.

"We have not lost faith in God. We are still here, and to be alive is to have faith," said Germain Jameson, 22, who worshipped at a Mass held next to the destroyed St. Louis Roi de France church.

Across the city, survivors gathered around makeshift altars in the rubble to celebrate Mass.

They joined hands and raised their arms to the sky in unison, singing beautiful French and Creole hymns which echoed through the air.

Every night since the earthquake, Port au Prince's devoutly Catholic residents camping out on the streets have used song and prayer to get themselves through the pitch-blackness til dawn.

Sunday was their first chance to pray together in daylight hours, and it seemed to bring on the tears that have been remarkably absent in the past five days.

For one woman, it was all too much. She turned her back to the crowd of about 60 singers in the parking lot of St, Louis Roi de France walked away, before letting out a deep, howling cry.

A few blocks away, at the Sacre Coeur church, another group gathered by a painting of the Virgin Mary tacked onto a tree. The sat around a statuette of Jesus, salvaged unscathed from the wrecked church building.

"Protect us, and look after the spirits of all those who died," the priest told the throng.

They sat on folding chairs and breeze blocks, undeterred by the hot sun or the helicopters hovering noisily overhead, while they sang, wept and prayed together for more than two hours.

"The people pray at night because they say they it's better to die with your eyes open than with your eyes shut," said Dolan Volcy, who was praying at Sacre Coeur church.

"But they always have hope. I don't know why, maybe they have been born with that, but they hope."

An elderly woman was brought to the service in a wheelbarrow, covered in blankets, her legs jutting over the end.

"I was trapped in my home, and they didn't get me out until 10 o'clock the day after," 75-year-old Marie Carme Morancy explained.

She had two blackened puffy eyes and a huge lump on her head from where debris came crashing down on her, her right leg was also badly bruised. "It was important to be here," she said, simply.

In the crumbled remains of Port-au-Prince's once-imposing main cathedral, the Rev. Henry Marie Landasse said Mass in place of the city's beloved archbishop, crushed to death in his home.

"I want to send a message of hope because God is still with us even in the depths of this tragedy, and life is not over," he said.

A blind man sang softly as he strummed a guitar in the cathedral's ruins.

"I am singing for my country, for the razed presidential palace, for the razed justice palace, for my dead father, my dead sister," he sang. "There aren't enough tears for all my sorrow."

The prayers were strong in Brooklyn's Haitian community, too, where the pews were packed and hot tears flowed freely.

"We can't go and help. We can just pray for them," said Joseph Jeudy, 54, at Mary Queen of Heaven Church in Old Mill Basin, who lost five relatives.

"There are no more churches in Haiti. So all prayers count," said Woodly Sainrose, 13, whose cousin was killed.

Mary Queen of Heaven's special noon Mass for the victims of the earthquake was packed and sounds of sobbing echoed throughout the church during the service.

Members shouted the names of their loved ones missing or dead.

"So far, I lose seven people from my family," said Suzelle Augustin, 58, a nurse from Old Mill Basin.

[scarbowl]

New Testament Psalm 137:9

Happy is the man who takes your little ones, crushing them against the rocks.

------------------------------------------------------------

1 Timothy 2: 12

But I suffer not a woman to teach, nor to usurp authority over the man, but to be in silence.

[Vulcanl]

scarbowl,

Anything that is man made (organized religion, the bible) is imperfect.  You can pick and choose as many obscure bible passages as you want to, it doesn't change the fact that God is real.

It is interesting to note that the Roman Catholic Church does NOT recommend a literal interpretation of the bible; it acknowledges that this holy book was written (approximately) two thousand years ago, and not all in one sitting, so to speak.  It is actually an amalgamation of passages from many different authors from different eras (separated by decades, perhaps more) and to a certain extent internal church politics dictated what made the final cut.

I have met Christians who interpret the bible literally and I think that this is a mistake.  The fundamental moral concepts are what should be taken away, and for this we need proper clergy to study and assist the layman in its interpretation.

[scarbowl]

scarbowl,

Anything that is man made (organized religion, the bible) is imperfect.  You can pick and choose as many obscure bible passages as you want to, it doesn't change the fact that God is real.

  The fact that the Bible is imperfect (created/written by man) is relevant to the discussion.  As well as the fact that god is also a creation of man.  It isn't for atheists to prove that god doesn't exist, though, as one cannot prove a negative.  And I don't need to prove it, I am confident of that fact.

[working_mom]

It isn't for atheists to prove that god doesn't exist, though, as one cannot prove a negative.  And I don't need to prove it, I am confident of that fact.

and god need not prove his existence to you or any of his creations. He is as real as the air you breathe.

[Vulcanl]

Scarbowl,

"... The fact that the Bible is imperfect (created/written by man) is relevant to the discussion..."

It is relevant to a discussion about religion, but not to a discussion about the existence of God (which is what the topic is about and what I am focusing on)

"...As well as the fact that god is also a creation of man.  It isn't for atheists to prove that god doesn't exist, though, as one cannot prove a negative.  And I don't need to prove it, I am confident of that fact..."

Belief is all about taking the leap without 'proof.'  If I were able to describe to you 3 things that you yourself would have to admit were real - but you could not prove any of them, would you be more open to the possibility that God is real?

[$Pripps]

scarbowl,

Anything that is man made (organized religion, the bible) is imperfect.  You can pick and choose as many obscure bible passages as you want to, it doesn't change the fact that God is real.

  The fact that the Bible is imperfect (created/written by man) is relevant to the discussion.  As well as the fact that god is also a creation of man. 

and man is also imperfect, man wrote the Bible so the Bible is imperfect, seems like a reasonable assumption.

[God himself]

Here is a good reason for belief in the divine, and why even man-made religion can have a huge positive impact in the midst of misery:

Devout Port-au-Prince survivors create makeshift altars, turn to prayer to deal with tragedy

BY Christina Boyle   
NEW YORK DAILY NEWS
Sunday, January 17th 2010, 8:45 PM

PORT AU PRINCE, HAITI - The Sunday church bells were eerily silent on Sunday, but the voices of people praying in the ruins was loud.

"We have not lost faith in God. We are still here, and to be alive is to have faith," said Germain Jameson, 22, who worshipped at a Mass held next to the destroyed St. Louis Roi de France church.

Across the city, survivors gathered around makeshift altars in the rubble to celebrate Mass.

They joined hands and raised their arms to the sky in unison, singing beautiful French and Creole hymns which echoed through the air.

Every night since the earthquake, Port au Prince's devoutly Catholic residents camping out on the streets have used song and prayer to get themselves through the pitch-blackness til dawn.

Sunday was their first chance to pray together in daylight hours, and it seemed to bring on the tears that have been remarkably absent in the past five days.

For one woman, it was all too much. She turned her back to the crowd of about 60 singers in the parking lot of St, Louis Roi de France walked away, before letting out a deep, howling cry.

A few blocks away, at the Sacre Coeur church, another group gathered by a painting of the Virgin Mary tacked onto a tree. The sat around a statuette of Jesus, salvaged unscathed from the wrecked church building.

"Protect us, and look after the spirits of all those who died," the priest told the throng.

They sat on folding chairs and breeze blocks, undeterred by the hot sun or the helicopters hovering noisily overhead, while they sang, wept and prayed together for more than two hours.

"The people pray at night because they say they it's better to die with your eyes open than with your eyes shut," said Dolan Volcy, who was praying at Sacre Coeur church.

"But they always have hope. I don't know why, maybe they have been born with that, but they hope."

An elderly woman was brought to the service in a wheelbarrow, covered in blankets, her legs jutting over the end.

"I was trapped in my home, and they didn't get me out until 10 o'clock the day after," 75-year-old Marie Carme Morancy explained.

She had two blackened puffy eyes and a huge lump on her head from where debris came crashing down on her, her right leg was also badly bruised. "It was important to be here," she said, simply.

In the crumbled remains of Port-au-Prince's once-imposing main cathedral, the Rev. Henry Marie Landasse said Mass in place of the city's beloved archbishop, crushed to death in his home.

"I want to send a message of hope because God is still with us even in the depths of this tragedy, and life is not over," he said.

A blind man sang softly as he strummed a guitar in the cathedral's ruins.

"I am singing for my country, for the razed presidential palace, for the razed justice palace, for my dead father, my dead sister," he sang. "There aren't enough tears for all my sorrow."

The prayers were strong in Brooklyn's Haitian community, too, where the pews were packed and hot tears flowed freely.

"We can't go and help. We can just pray for them," said Joseph Jeudy, 54, at Mary Queen of Heaven Church in Old Mill Basin, who lost five relatives.

"There are no more churches in Haiti. So all prayers count," said Woodly Sainrose, 13, whose cousin was killed.

Mary Queen of Heaven's special noon Mass for the victims of the earthquake was packed and sounds of sobbing echoed throughout the church during the service.

Members shouted the names of their loved ones missing or dead.

"So far, I lose seven people from my family," said Suzelle Augustin, 58, a nurse from Old Mill Basin.

That would be funny if it wasn't so ***ing tragic.

Only a brainwashed moron could possibly praise god for delivering them from an earthquake which killed 150,000 other people..

[Vulcanl]

PP,

I find your comments most offensive and I imagine others here do.  Have some respect.

[Old Mike]

Only a brainwashed moron could possibly praise god for delivering them from an earthquake which killed 150,000 other people..

What sort of people build a city in a place known to be subject to earthquakes? Then do not build earthquake proof structures.
What sort of people form a government that does nothing to look after the people and merely enriches itself?
God did not tell them to do this and when He saves some from the results of their stupidity, greed and corruption those saved should be grateful.

[working_mom]

Firstly, this discussion is only on the christian context of which i am unware. As per Hinduism, the vedas and Gita are delivered to man-kind directly from gods. For centuries it was passed just by word from one person to another. According to hindu text when there is absolute breakdown of law and evil takes over good, mother earth will shake due to unbearable pain. Haiti is a prime example.  True innocent lives are lost but we must remember that in any war there is a collateral damage. I read a column by Bill Clinton in TIME magazine of how international community is now focussed on bringing sanitation and development to Haiti. Medicine is always bitter but it goes in to cure your body. So, no matter how bitter the loss of lives maybe in Haiti we must look at the positive aspect so that those who survived can lead a better life.

[God himself]

Only a brainwashed moron could possibly praise god for delivering them from an earthquake which killed 150,000 other people..

What sort of people build a city in a place known to be subject to earthquakes? Then do not build earthquake proof structures.
What sort of people form a government that does nothing to look after the people and merely enriches itself?
God did not tell them to do this and when He saves some from the results of their stupidity, greed and corruption those saved should be grateful.

:lol:

Of the 150,000 dead, some 90,000 were aged under 12.

Well done God for punishing them for their stupidity, greed and corruption. You sure as *** showed 'em.

[working_mom]

:lol:

Of the 150,000 dead, some 90,000 were aged under 12.

Well done God for punishing them for their stupidity, greed and corruption. You sure as *** showed 'em.

What do you expect God to do? Transport the children to another continent/planet and then kill the rest? Sometimes to destroy evil a little bit of good has to be destroyed. Yes, when lives of children are lost I do question God (remember not my faith in God) and I am sure there is answer somewhere. We just need to look hard enough