Deep Thought Of The Day: The Atheist's Dismissal VS. The Religious' Faith

I like to think myself to be an open-minded person - willing to hear and consider new ideas, even those that contradict my own. If you have read some of my past posts, you probably have in inkling that I am not religious though I do consider myself to be a Theist (I believe there is a God) and Spiritualist (I believe that life has subject and intangible qualities that are yet to be scientifically quantified). I am however, extremely anti-religion. I have the Paltalk Instant Messenger program and I love going into the "Atheists VS. Christians" chat rooms and listening to the debates. I have yet to hear a Christian intelligently defend their position or win a debate against an Atheist and that's because a debate is won by the one with well articulated, rational and verifiable positions. The very basis of religion is unreasonable and irrational as it requires "faith." For those of you who don't know what the word "faith" really means, at it's simplest, it means to BELIEVE (Accept something as true) without any evidence to support that belief. In other words, if I came to you with my fists closed and declared that I have a mountain concealed in my hand and that I would like you to believe me; it would be ignorant for you to accept that claim as truth without evidence and intelligent for you to reason that it is unlikely that there is a mountain in my hand. To accept my claim would make you a person of faith but it would also necessarily make you an ignorant person. To dismiss my claim would make you a person without faith but also a reasonable person. Why believe that there is a mountain in my fist if all of the observable evidence suggests that, that is an impossibility? First off, my hands are not of a size that is capable of concealing a mountain. All known evidence says that no person is strong enough to actually hold an entire mountain. Lastly, and probably more important is; if I have a mountain in my hand that I want you to believe is actually in my hand; why don't I just show it to you? You see the problem that religion has with debating a person who refuses to be ignorant or blindly follow something just because someone else says it is so? Religion says that there is a God who created all things and has a purpose for every creation. Religion goes further to claim that God's desire is that we all be "good" people and do "good" things and if we don't, he will punish us. Religion goes even further and lays out how God achieved creation, his rules for how we should live, the rewards & punishment for abiding by or breaking the rules, etc., etc. The cherry on the top of the religious argument is that God wants us to accept him via faith, not reason, not evidence, not common sense. So the question becomes; if God wants us to be faithful, he obviously doesn't provide evidence of his existence so where do the religious doctrines get off claiming to be the "word of God"? Religion wants it both ways; they want you to be faithful when they don't have the answers but 'use the "word"' where the answers are provided.

I dropped religion over twenty years ago when I decided to actually take it upon myself to study its origins and establishment. I was raised a Christian and it's ironic that I learned nothing about Christianity until I researched secular sources which had no vested interest in me believing one thing or the other. Imagine my surprise to realize that Christianity was fabricated of the books and concepts of various faiths and intellectual thinkers. Imagine my surprise when I realized that books of the Bible were arbitrarily added, removed or edited at will. Isn't this the word of God? How can you edit the word of God? Imagine my surprise when I realized that the person called Jesus might be a complete fabrication and in fact, if he did exist, he practiced Judaism and never claimed to be the literal "son of God". So if Jesus believed in Judaism, why create Christianity? Shouldn't we all become Jews if the Messiah himself taught from Jewish doctrine and followed the Jewish faith?

The fact is that every religious doctrine was conceived in the mind of a man, penned by the hand of a man and disseminated by the mouth of men. God had no part in creating religion. Men desire validation of their lofty ideas and they get that validation by convincing others to agree with what they believe. What better way to achieve agreement than to declare your ideas to not be your own but rather, the intellectual property of God. On the other side of the debate are the Atheist who say that they choose to not believe there is a God because there is no evidence of his existence. Atheists can argue, debate and demonstrate to no end, the evidence for the obvious but have no argument that actually disproves God's existence. Atheists have successfully disproved the validity of religion but invalidating religion doesn't necessarily invalidate the potential for there to be truth in the idea that there is a God. In other words; proving that it is impossible that the world was actually created in 7 days, only proves that the doctrine of the faith(s) which make that claim, are wrong - it doesn't mean that there wasn't a God who created the world. When I made the decision to believe that there is a God, after having considered a wide array of religious, spiritual and anti-religious/spiritual beliefs, the chief factor in me making that decision was that the logical conclusion to the Atheist logic is that there had to be an intelligence at some point to start the ball rolling, at the very least. Perhaps that intelligence or God is completed uninterested in us, perhaps we are a mere inevitable/by chance consequence of the universe taking form. Perhaps there is a God and he/she/it is completely undeserving of praise and worship. Perhaps a lot of things. When it's all said and done, the debate isn't what kind of God, God is, if he exists; the debate is whether or not he does. While I can make no claim to know God's intent or his place in the grand scheme of things (he might actually be just like us - trying to figure out what's going on), I believe it to be reasonable to believe, from a scientific perspective, that there was always an intelligence present and in all likelihood, is the ultimate causality of things.

My reasoning for my position begin with the logical notion that all existing or potential matter and energy, has always existed - things were not created from nothing. Though things evolve (change form) the base elements of the construct have always existed. Because I believe this, I have to also believe that the energy that we identify as "intelligence," has also always existed. There is no reasonable concept that says that everything has always been but intelligence. Then there is the scientific fact that all things within the universe seem to be traveling outward and way from a source of force. What that suggests to me is that there is an origin, a place from which all things are traveling, a state before being pushed outward. Were the universe chaotic and had no order to it, it would make sense to me to assume that there was no intelligent cause for the current state of things but that's not the case. The fact is that there was obviously a cause for things to go from the state and they were in to their current state. If you accept the notion that intelligence is an energy that has always existed along with everything else, it becomes just as reasonable, perhaps even more so, to believe that the cause was due to that intelligence, as opposed to an inexplicable act of nature.

What it comes down to for me is a choice between to brands of ignorance. Religion offers you unverifiable and often contradicting concepts based on you trusting that what their doctrine says was actually written/issued by God. Atheism offers you the comfort of believing in the absolute and obvious but dismisses the potential that there is a God. What I have decided is that science is that truth and God fits into scientific reasoning somehow, we just haven't yet figured out the details of what God is. What we do know is what is the truth that stares us in the face: whatever God is, he/she/it does not care to or have the ability to control the actions of man. If the religious concept of God were true, it would terrify me to think that the King of reality beckons us to be "good" yet sat back and observed as the bloody Holy Crusades took place, the American slave practices were conducted, the Holocaust occurred, the Darfur genocide was waged, etc., etc. Rather than believe that an all-powerful and all-good God was able to sit back and allow such things to happen, it makes more sense to me that either God is not all powerful or isn't all-good or isn't watching our every move. Life is our own responsibility and we can be as wicked or righteous as we choose to be and God will not prevent us from doing either.

So another question is inevitable and this is; why choose to believe that there is a God if one believes that God serves no real purpose to man's life? I answer that by saying that it really doesn't matter to me what God's purpose is - I don't pretend to know, but I can no more deny that I believe he/she/it does exist than I can deny that there are clouds surrounding this planet. To me, it is just a reality. I accept many things to be true that serve no benefit to me, simply because it makes sense. I believe that I will drown if I swim too deep in a body of water for too long. I have never drowned before but should I find myself swimming in a deep body of water, I'll be cautious not to go too deep or stay under for too long. Until the day comes that my belief about drowning in deep water becomes relevant to my life, it's just a belief. When/if the day comes that an understanding of God becomes relevant to my life, I will have one.

Gripe of the Day: CBN - 700 Club Scam

Do you ever watch Pat Robertson's CBN (Christian Broadcast Network) 700 show? Do you send your money to their organization? Do you place your hand on the television screen and "pray" along with the hosts of the show? Do you believe that God wants you to give your money to Pat Robertson in order that you be "rewarded" for your faith? Do you believe that your contributions to CBN are making a difference in the world? Do you believe that CBN offers non-skewed news from unbiased reporters and journalists?

If you answered yes to any of those questions; you're an idiot.

The 700 Club broadcast is nothing more than an Infomercial on steroids. The broadcast is set up to achieve nothing more than exploit your faith for the monetary gain of Pat Robertson and his organization. Pat Robertson also uses the broadcast as a soap-box for his political views. Pat has duped just enough people to follow him for his organization to be considered a constituency therefore; politicians listen to his opinions as ridiculous as some of them have been. With all of the pain, suffering and poverty in this world, you will NEVER convince me that it's God's plan that the leaders of his/her cause, live like kings/queens while there is mass suffering in the world. There is one who will reward you for taking advantage of those in need. There is one to whom it is perfectly acceptable that you have more than your share while millions have nothing. Guess who that "one" is. What ever name you know evil by, that is who controls these people. If there is a devil, I believe that he had achieved the greatest feat of misdirection ever! He has created a faith and convinced millions that it is God's when in actually, you are following him.

Let's look at the facts. The fact is that there are Christian churches in nearly every community of this country and what exactly is the result? Poor communities are falling down around the churches, crime in high-crime areas aren't affect at all by the presence of a church, the ministers, priests and pastors do nothing to repair the problems that surround them but they all seem to be doing so well. The fact is that religious organizations collect money and set-up satellites in 3rd world countries abroad and the suffering in those countries has only gotten worse in many cases. At some point, you have got to realize that these people are doing nothing for the "good" of the world. They are taking your money and living well off of it.

Some people are convinced that God responded to them when they were in need because of their acceptance of and association with organizations like CBN or Joyce Meyers. My question is; did you try to elicit the assistance of God before going through CBN? I'd be willing to bet that God would respond if you ask and you don't need to give money to CBN, you don't need to call yourself a Christian, you don't need to go through a middle-man. We have a long history of proselytes, zealots, ministries and missionaries who were proven to be frauds. At what point do we learn from this history? People keep volunteering their selves to be taken advantage of. Are they that desperate that they will surrender common sense for the hope of divine intervention? It's sad that these people are being victimized by these conscienceless predators who operate with impunity. One day we will learn to trust our own eyes and the truth stand directly in front us.

I hope my rantings made sense today. I'm multi-tasking today and hope I'm venting coherently. Anywho, I'm vented.

Gripe of the Day: Christian Proselytes!

I don't know about you but I am so irritated and offended by those Christian commercials. Although I don't have anything against any particular religion, me being a non-religious person and all, I can't help but to feel the agony of those non-Christian folk who have to deal with this crap. Imagine yourself as a good Christian person, trying to raise your children to be good Christian people, and every time you turn on your television or radio, there's this person, speaking with genuine passion - the kind that the innocent mind of a child is open to, and the voice says, "Satan loves you. Pray in his name and you will get REAL results. Satan fell from heaven for you because he believed in your right to have free-will." I imagine that for Muslims, Some Jews, Hindus, Buddhists, Atheists and a host of other non-Christian folk, this must be exactly what they feel. Then there's the constant Christian programming, especially on Sundays.

What's the deal with this commercialization of & relentless promotion and proselytizing by Christians on behalf of the Christian religion? Christians claim to be so tolerant and accepting but they constantly violate other people's faith and make conscious efforts to obstruct their practice and under-mind their beliefs. It's this lack of tolerance and the hostile stance the Christian religion has towards other people's beliefs that will be its downfall. What the Christian religion is practicing is a system of conversion that is antiquated and goes back to the bloody days of the Holly wars and British colonization. Why, if you believe that your God is the one, only and true God, would anyone feel the need to force-feed their beliefs down another person's throat? Let's think about this: THE God, creator of everything, all powerful entity, doesn't see fit to make everybody Christians, but the Christian faithful know better. I say, if you're right about your faith, then a person who wants to find God, will find their way to the truth - you don't need to be offensive towards every other faith to promote your beliefs if they are true.

I am impressed by the Dali Lama, a very wise and good person, but I never see him on TV telling me that I need to believe what he believes, yet millions find their way to him. These are new times and the world is way more diverse. There are hardly any pure race people remaining on this planet because our cultural integration has lead to our physical inter-breeding. In old times, religion was almost synonymous with race or ethnicity because every group of people lived in their own little corner of the world and had developed their own distinct beliefs and relationships with the "greater-power". As people left their little corners of the world and explored the planet at large, they found other people with other beliefs and they even looked different - alien even. Some people could accept the differences and some, out of fear, thought that they had to conquer and convert. They saw faith as some sort of competition wherein the correct faith would be determined by which one was left standing. The religious wars started and today, it seems that the only people still interested in fighting are the Christians. Everybody has pretty much realized that religion is very personal and people are going to believe what works for them within their culture. In fact, Christians have so many dominations of their faith because at some point, the conventional practice no longer worked for someone so they altered it.

No one proselytizes any more but the Christians. They seem to be the slowest and most obstinate when it comes to change and tolerance. They seem to still want to be the "winners" of a long ago fought war. They haven't even noticed that they're the only ones left on the battle field. That doesn't stop them from provoking everyone else, every chance they get. They insist that there be a fight. You MUST believe what they believe or they'll harass your congregations, under-mind your beliefs and if need be - kill you! Christianity sucks. Anywho, I'm vented.