A big one...
This is going to be a pretty big blog... In fact, you won't see his, but I'll probably add bits and pieces to it over the course of a day or two. This blog is about my atheism, because I'm tired of being asked about it. I'm going to choose to point out a thing or two about why I chose this position, and if anybody asks from here on out, they'll know where to look. First of all, the presence of evil clearly demonstrates the lack of a benevolent god. One example being Hell. Why punish nonbelievers so harshly for eternity? Why not send them to a neutral place or at best a nice place, but not as good as Heaven? The two eternal destinations are completely opposite each other, I believe, as a scare tactic. Now obviously, God created Hell in a sense by creating Satan. According to Christianity he's directly responsible for anything that's ever gone on in this universe. Speaking of the creation of the universe... What caused him to decide to create the universe 13.7 billion years ago? He's been around for an eternity... Why not 86.4 billion years ago? Or to add legitimacy to the creationist argument, why not 10 thousand years ago? It's a small catch, but an interesting one, nonetheless. Basically, I'm just beginning to really, really dislike fundamental Christianity. I don't even like capitalizing that word... Some friends and family just got back from a mission trip. I hate those things. They have pictures of children (who aren't old enough to consent to sex or vote) raising their hands to show they've accepted Jesus, hooray! Immediately following, they all got lunchboxes with free gifts and trinkets. And churches actually spend money on this!!! And people give money to churches!!! It's sickening! I'm sorry, I really can't type any more on this, I'm about to throw up. Feel free to comment.
posted by SoonerAristotle at
3:14 AM
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2 Comments:
That sounds like a brilliant idea, judge a God you don't believe in by his followers many of us choose to ignore.
This is Angela from Bible as Lit last fall. I found this from your facebook page (yes, I feel like a stalker!) and, though I should probably know better, I'm going to bite the hook. Consider this merely an attempt at generating friendly conversation from a neighbor on the other side of the fence.
First of all, evil. I've heard some claim that the presence of evil in the world is one of the greatest "proofs" of God's existence (that we recognize evil with a good deal of universal uniformity possibly indicates that there does exist some degree of objective moral truth). Also, I've heard several interesting explanations about the origin of evil in the world, not the least of which is Augustine's "ordo amoris" or the ordering of the affections, which explains evil as a product of our affections becoming disordered. This theory is opposed to that of a dualistic universe and also to God creating good and evil; rather, it explains how evil could result from a creation that was wholly good. Something to look at sometime maybe.
About Hell, there are many different views within Christendom about what this is and what it entails. The spectrum includes those who believe it is eternal conscious torture, to those who believe the terror of hell is the result of separation from God, to those who believe in annihilation, to those who believe in universalism. Again, a complicated topic that deserves more than just a glance.
About the propaganda and hypocrisy of Christians--it's certainly a fair claim, but let's be honest, it goes both ways. In fact, nothing inspires belief in me more than the cynicism and arrogance of Nietzsche, Dawkins, Cooke, Harris and the like.
Finally, I think we can PROVE neither God's existence nor his absence. In fact, certitude about anything, even the very fact that we exist, will always remain just beyond our grasp. Though I have met those who claim that their faith (or lack thereof) is purely a product of evidence, I've come to think that belief (or maybe faith is the more accurate term) has more than just an intellectual element--it contains a moral/emotional one as well.
Yes, I know, unoriginal answers---but unoriginal answers to unoriginal questions. I know because I struggle with them all myself (as does, I am discovering, almost every serious, thinking Christian that I have ever known).
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