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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

[Shadowlord]

I, too, would rather be a wolf than a good doggie. It it were true, if the biblical God existed, I could still never worship someone whose holy book says that they genocided more living beings than Adolf Frakking Hitler. (See: The great flood)

[Arx]

If God really existed the way many conservative/fundamentalist Christians portray him, I'd be an anarchist anti-God rebel, channeling Nietzsche as I lead the assault on God. God is dead, and I should know because I just killed him. NO GODS NO MASTERS

Don't cut yourself on all that edge you have there.

For instance, abrahamic God tells you that you are sinful and horrible man even before you really do anything because of the original sin and whatnot, and says that if you worship him and be obedient you get rewarded in afterlife because he "forgiving".

Small correction: the Christians says the abrahamic god says so.

Not really. The prophet Isaiah spoke of every person being a sinner, and I think it's quite safe to say he wasn't a Christian.

Hey, he's a Prophet, isn't he? Who're you to say he didn't follow Christian doctrine

The fact that he predated Jesus by a few centuries kind of rules out the idea of original sin being a Christian Fabrication.

Thing is, I see absolutely nothing as deserving of worship (which, in my personal definition, includes placing something on a pedestal higher than oneself and throwing praise at it). I mean, it's all perspective. Compared to monkeys, we have what could be conceived of as conceptually similar to unlimited power. But I wouldn't want a monkey to worship me. If I met a being three times as powerful, or even as kind, as I am, I would not want to worship it and would be insulted were it to suggest I do so.

God combines vast power with supposedly infinite goodness (though there have been challenges to that last). That he expects me to worship him before he gives me my treat, even if he were to exist, would make a rebel of me.

See, I would hesitate to say I 'worship' God in this sense. I have immense respect for Him, but most of what might be called worship from me is just things like thanking Him for something that I would say He did (although I'm sure you'd disagree on that point...). I'm sure that if you met a being three times as powerful as you that was generally benevolent, you wouldn't object to respecting it. And if you would, that seems really childish to me, I guess.

[Rolepgeek]

The tricky part there is the whole 'generally benevolent part'.

I respect a being who is generally benevolent regardless of their power, as long as they truly are benevolent.

The abrahamic god as described in the old testament and portrayed in the new is not, to my eyes and reasoning, benevolent, no matter how many times they say he is. Actions speak louder than words.

[TD1]

God combines vast power with supposedly infinite goodness (though there have been challenges to that last). That he expects me to worship him before he gives me my treat, even if he were to exist, would make a rebel of me.

See, I would hesitate to say I 'worship' God in this sense. I have immense respect for Him, but most of what might be called worship from me is just things like thanking Him for something that I would say He did (although I'm sure you'd disagree on that point...). I'm sure that if you met a being three times as powerful as you that was generally benevolent, you wouldn't object to respecting it. And if you would, that seems really childish to me, I guess.

It is the expectation I have issue with. If I don't, he punishes me. If I do, he rewards me. The value he/those beings place on respect/worship is in itself something most emphatically not to respect.

Out of curiosity, who do you 'thank' when things don't go well? Where is the cut off between what he did/ordained and what some other force/being did/ordained (presumably humanity/satan.)

[Kot]

If God really existed the way many conservative/fundamentalist Christians portray him, I'd be an anarchist anti-God rebel, channeling Nietzsche as I lead the assault on God. God is dead, and I should know because I just killed him. NO GODS NO MASTERS

Don't cut yourself on all that edge you have there.

Christians are usually really good and cool people.
God is not.

[Shadowlord]

The ones in my family voted for Trump...

[TD1]

Oh, hey, Stephen Fry just said exactly what I would say only more eloquently.

Edit: Except the last bit about banishing him making your life purer. I don't think it would, necessarily, but it would certainly seem more true to reality.

[Kot]

The ones in my family voted for Trump...

/usually/

[TD1]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1SJ6AV31MxA

This one's interesting. Basically "Stephen Fry Vs. Catholic Church."

[Descan]

If God really existed the way many conservative/fundamentalist Christians portray him, I'd be an anarchist anti-God rebel, channeling Nietzsche as I lead the assault on God. God is dead, and I should know because I just killed him. NO GODS NO MASTERS

Don't cut yourself on all that edge you have there.

Christians are usually really good and cool people.
God is not.

I like the interviewers face at points in that. It's like ":I! okay just let him talk"

[Silverthrone]

If God really existed the way many conservative/fundamentalist Christians portray him, I'd be an anarchist anti-God rebel, channeling Nietzsche as I lead the assault on God. God is dead, and I should know because I just killed him. NO GODS NO MASTERS

I do consider myself as playing on Team Jesus (Well, to a degree, evolution clearly happens, and I doubt proc-gen is somehow beyond God's grasp), and I would probably be on the same page, too, if that were the case. That particular brand of God is one that it would be quite easy to live without.

[TD1]

Team Jesus is a much better perspective, yea. Still, he does refer to at least one person as a "Canaanite bitch" or something like that, if I recall. Plus, some of his arguments if you look at them closely aren't the best - the way I saw this was through the lens of Philip Pullman's the Good Man Jesus and the Scoundrel Christ.

[Silverthrone]

Well, true. He was, after all, (mostly) a man who lived two thousand years ago. Religion has an awful tendency to attract, and end up led by, letter-followers, but I doubt good old Christ would be very happy with every word and statement of his during his time on earth followed to the letter now, in a very different time and place. I believe one ought to follow Christ with both eyes open, rather than tread in the footprints like a sleep-walker and leave it all to Him. What was a very pleasant footpath in Jesus' time might very well be a horrible desert strewn with landmines and razor wire in in ours.

Of course, if one even wants to. I believe there are many roads to heaven (or what else that destination might be called), which is probably another reason as to why I do feel like a natural enemy to the letter-followers.

[Rolan7]

Team Jesus instead of Team God? Sounds like Catharism! I love Catharism  (:
Jesus in the NT is usually pretty cool. I'd understand people writing off his darker moments as errors (though literally canon )
I don't get how people even try, for OT God. Cathars decided he was literally Satan and Jesus would save them... Most internally consistent explanation I've heard.

I'm only in season 5 of Supernatural though so who knows, it might win out. So far very promising!

[Kot]

Jesus once flipped the shit out and flipped tables and chased people with a whip or something.
I think that's one of his better moments though.