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I am religious and believe in free will

71 (27.7%)

I am religious and do not believe in free will

10 (3.9%)

I am not religious and believe in free will

114 (44.5%)

I am not religious and do not believe in free will

61 (23.8%)

Total Members Voted: 251

[origamiscienceguy]

I believe I read your post. That was exactly my point though.

If it was irrelevant then, what is to say that some newer, equally ceremonial part (Baptism, say, having replaced circumcision, being replaced by something else, or even be dropped; you cannot save the souls of others simply by dipping their heads in water as newborns. They must accept Christ into their hearts) is not irrelevant now? My point is not that 'God says murder is bad', but that 'the Bible says X is bad, but perhaps it isn't really, because A. Bible was written by man, who is flawed, and keeping a text, even a holy one, accurate through the better part of two millenia, in multiple and changing languages, accurate for that long is...difficult; B. God changes His mind, apparently, as shown by the fact that the Old Testament and the New disagree at times; and C. I can only know, truly, in my heart(I won't speak for other people here), that I do good, when I do good that affects this life. If I do something which appears to be good, but the Bible disagrees, why is my moral intuition, granted by God, subservient to the fallacies of men a thousand years over? People change their mind on what the bible means, and different interpretations result in different translations, leaving out all the other things I said.

God's Word may be law, if I take that as my moral code, but the Bible is not His Word unfiltered and uncorrupted, as near I can tell.

The Bible has actually remained nearly unchanged as far back as we can tell. The modern translations are usually taken directly from the hebrew and greek versions to maintain correctness. As for the differences of the old and new testament, they are mostly saying that things are different now, he normally acknowledges the old testament and then shows the change.

[Rolepgeek]

Right. And things are even more different between the Roman Empire days of crucifying people who promoted uncommon religious beliefs, and now, where freedom of religion is a state mandated thing that I like to bring up to people when they try to use religious views as justification for civil/criminal laws.

[origamiscienceguy]

Right. And things are even more different between the Roman Empire days of crucifying people who promoted uncommon religious beliefs, and now, where freedom of religion is a state mandated thing that I like to bring up to people when they try to use religious views as justification for civil/criminal laws.

I meant differences in the spiritual world (with Jesus coming to earth and all).

[Orange Wizard]

There's a little bit of corruption in the translation, but the key points are all there, and have remained unchanged. If you want to poke at the Bible's credibility, there are much lower hanging fruit than "the laws have changed over time".

[Descan]

You keep saying "If you accept christ you become a better person," but I'm curious on how you explain all the people who... that... doesn't fit at all. There's no real study that's shown that any faith, let alone faith in Christ, leads to statistically creating more 'moral' people out of 'immoral' people, or to people behaving more morally. All the atheists (let alone Muslims, Hindu, Buddhists, Shinto, Norse Pagan, African Pagan, etc) who are good people, even great people. All the Christians, from Catholics to old school Baptists to Evangelicals to Unitarian Universalists (I guess), anyone who calls themselves a christian (or if you want to be stricter) anyone whose belief involves accepting jesus into their heart, who are terrible terrible people. From the Planned Parenthood shooter to Adolf Hitler (who WAS a Catholic, don't give me that "He was an atheist!" crap, read what he wrote/spoke about. Atheists will cop to Stalin and Mao but we ain't taking Hitler) to all the rest who obviously the holy spirit dropped the ball on.

have you thought about this before or were you just repeating something your pastor told you without thinking about the implications

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

I'll cop, this is half a "gotcha" question, but I'm genuinely trying to get you to think through the implications of the things you say... :v that's my excuse anyway.

[Orange Wizard]

They're not true Soctsmen Christians, obviously.

[Descan]

that's partly why i included the point about good atheists

what, are they christians in the closet?

[origamiscienceguy]

You keep saying "If you accept christ you become a better person," but I'm curious on how you explain all the people who... that... doesn't fit at all. There's no real study that's shown that any faith, let alone faith in Christ, leads to statistically creating more 'moral' people out of 'immoral' people, or to people behaving more morally. All the atheists (let alone Muslims, Hindu, Buddhists, Shinto, Norse Pagan, African Pagan, etc) who are good people, even great people. All the Christians, from Catholics to old school Baptists to Evangelicals to Unitarian Universalists (I guess), anyone who calls themselves a christian (or if you want to be stricter) anyone whose belief involves accepting jesus into their heart, who are terrible terrible people. From the Planned Parenthood shooter to Adolf Hitler (who WAS a Catholic, don't give me that "He was an atheist!" crap, read what he wrote/spoke about. Atheists will cop to Stalin and Mao but we ain't taking Hitler) to all the rest who obviously the holy spirit dropped the ball on.

have you thought about this before or were you just repeating something your pastor told you without thinking about the implications

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

I'll cop, this is half a "gotcha" question, but I'm genuinely trying to get you to think through the implications of the things you say... :v that's my excuse anyway.

I'm repeating what the bible says, and I believe it too. It would be nigh impossible to actually set up a study to find that out anyways. And just because somebody says that they are christian doesn't necessarily mean that they have accepted Christ. It is something only you and God would know. Unfortunately, this is often because people do what you mentioned and just blindly follow what someone tells them, without ever reading what the actual core of the religion is.

[Frumple]

that's partly why i included the point about good atheists

what, are they christians in the closet?

Look, desc, you spend over two thousand years without coming down to tune the mechanisms and see how well your corrective processes still work. For all we know the actual spirit emitting thingjigger is buried under a desert or somethin' and ain't been workin' right for centuries.

Though nah, it's pretty easy to set up studies to see how effective religious adherence of various sorts are at doing... y'know, most things. Last I checked there's been all sorts of stuff along those lines, if not as much as there could be. Stuff's fascinating for psychologists, anthropologists, sociologists, neurologists, etc., etc., etc. Last I paid much attention the results are middling at best, when it's not actively detrimental, especially compared to programs that inculcate similar behavior without the troublesome parts. Lotta' stuff that's a lot better than church service and bible readin' and so on for breedin' ethical behavior and whatnot.

[Bohandas]

Has anubody else noticed that Sagittarius A-Star fits most of the criteria for being Azathoth?

Seriously!

-Knows nothing
-Unstoppable force of destruction
-Cosmically huge/massive
-While it isn't the center of the universe it is the center of the galaxy
-Orbited by lesser entities: the entire milky way galaxy

EDIT:
Speaking of astronomy - before I forget, as a SubGenius I would like to wish you all a happy Northern Martian Summer Solstice this Northern Martian Summer Solstice Season. It's on January 3rd.

EDIT:

Lotta' stuff that's a lot better than church service and bible readin' and so on for breedin' ethical behavior and whatnot.

Yeah. I think In many cases they even do an active and significant disservice to the values they wish to promote. In the matter of abortion, for instance. I'm convinced that many on the pro-choice side are actually examples of the Nietzschean axiom that "At times one remains faithful to a cause only because its opponents do not cease to be insipid", and that if the pro-life side would frame their position in terms of a valid argument concerning the non-ethicality of eugenics, and the fact that while many are medically necessary the majority have no valid reason (or at any rate no more so than liposuction or penis enlargement or any other such medically frivilous surgical procedure at any rate) rather than a bunch of spiritual woo-woo they might actually win some people over

[Orange Wizard]

that's partly why i included the point about good atheists

what, are they christians in the closet?

Sorry, I was being facetious.

People can be good or bad (humanly speaking) with or without the influence of a religion. And they can change over time, to be better or worse (humanly speaking) with or without the direct influence of religion.

Under Reformed doctrine (meaning most Christians think this is wrong, but personally I believe it to be a more accurate and consistent representation of the Bible's teaching) people are unable to do anything that is truly good (spiritually speaking), even if it is fantastically so by human standards, because their intentions are not pure (i.e. doing it for the glory of God alone).
Once the Holy Spirit works in one's heart (sounds cheesy but I can't think of a better way to put it), a believer becomes able to do good things with pure intentions, but not necessarily likely, varying from person to person. Obviously they still commit sin, but there's a little bit of good sprinkled in here and there.

Basically, "good" atheists can do good things from a human perspective, but not good in a Christian context, because that would mean doing it for God, and not for yourself or some other person. We really need to stop using the word good for that. Pure would be better, I think.

I cannot and will not defend people who claim to be Christian, but use the religion to justify things that are flagrantly hateful or selfish. Their actions are effectively blasphemy, and cause no small amount of harm to everyone around them.

[TD1]

You keep saying "If you accept christ you become a better person," but I'm curious on how you explain all the people who... that... doesn't fit at all. There's no real study that's shown that any faith, let alone faith in Christ, leads to statistically creating more 'moral' people out of 'immoral' people, or to people behaving more morally. All the atheists (let alone Muslims, Hindu, Buddhists, Shinto, Norse Pagan, African Pagan, etc) who are good people, even great people. All the Christians, from Catholics to old school Baptists to Evangelicals to Unitarian Universalists (I guess), anyone who calls themselves a christian (or if you want to be stricter) anyone whose belief involves accepting jesus into their heart, who are terrible terrible people. From the Planned Parenthood shooter to Adolf Hitler (who WAS a Catholic, don't give me that "He was an atheist!" crap, read what he wrote/spoke about. Atheists will cop to Stalin and Mao but we ain't taking Hitler) to all the rest who obviously the holy spirit dropped the ball on.

have you thought about this before or were you just repeating something your pastor told you without thinking about the implications

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

I'll cop, this is half a "gotcha" question, but I'm genuinely trying to get you to think through the implications of the things you say... :v that's my excuse anyway.

I'm repeating what the bible says, and I believe it too. It would be nigh impossible to actually set up a study to find that out anyways. And just because somebody says that they are christian doesn't necessarily mean that they have accepted Christ. It is something only you and God would know. Unfortunately, this is often because people do what you mentioned and just blindly follow what someone tells them, without ever reading what the actual core of the religion is.

So someone who accepts Christ is more moral than someone who doesn't?

So you're more moral than me, and most people on this thread?

without ever reading what the actual core of the religion is.

The "core" of religion has long been debated. Moral, focused on afterlife, knowledge. Really, there is no core - it's all interpretative.

[Orange Wizard]

So someone who accepts Christ is more moral than someone who doesn't?

With strict relevance to Christian morality, yes. It's like saying "I'm smarter than you if we use this definition of smartness that means skill at underwater basket weaving".

...

without ever reading what the actual core of the religion is.

The "core" of religion has long been debated. Moral, focused on afterlife, knowledge. Really, there is no core - it's all interpretative.

The core of the religion is all interpretative, yes. The core of the Bible's teaching is interpretative in the same way that I can interpret Common Sense as a denouncement of Dutch shoemaking techniques.
The Bible is very clear on what Christ was all about. Peace, love, magically conjuring food, that sort of thing. The problem is that it's thrown in with a bunch of other stuff that has a tendency to confuse things.

[TD1]

The other stuff is what's interpretative. What's other, and what's canon? And which parts of the canon take precedence?

[origamiscienceguy]

So someone who accepts Christ is more moral than someone who doesn't?

So you're more moral than me, and most people on this thread?

Orange Wizard summed it up pretty good. It appears he is much better at explaining things than I am.