Quote:
Originally Posted by Gerg
I'm probably going to get a lot of hate regarding this, but letting go of religion and any thoughts about the legitimacy of the supernatural was an amazing moment in my life.
It took a lot of time, and becoming an atheist/humanist was a process more than a single event... but learning to look at life with a skeptical eye, question everything, and only believe what there was sufficient evidence to believe has made me happier and more contented than I ever was when I still considered myself religious.
I try to live by a mantra that everyone is entitled to their own beliefs and that person deserves respect... but that doesn't mean that their beliefs deserve that same respect. Quite frankly, some beliefs are just stupid, especially if they are held in spite of hard evidence to the contrary by willful ignorance.
On the other side of this, it has also made me disgusted by the hatred and bigotry that are espoused by much of this country in the name of religion and their respective god. It's painful to watch these people continue to try to force their religious beliefs into the government and laws of this country.
Not trying to start a debate with this one. If anyone wants to discuss it further, we can start a new thread, or they can PM me.
Peace to all. Praises to the Flying Spaghetti Monster. May you all be touched by his noodly appendage.
|
So how do you not start a debate with what you have just stated?
So ... your and my comments will probably get this locked, or me banned, because religion seems to be a topic that should not be discussed here ... that said here I go ...
I am a Christian in the greatest sense of the word. I go to a Baptist church but their rules and philosophy do not rule me. Christ rules me. A foundation of the Christian faith. I found freedom in my faith. I say this because I also used to spend significant time in my life worrying about why people hate so much and do such heinous things in the name of their religion. It was when I found out that Jesus identified this issue, and that, as you say, people are entitled to make decisions in their life, that my eyes were opened and the greatest freedom realized. People, through faith and repentance, are forgiven their errors in judgment. At the core of Christianity is love. The two greatest commandments are love God and love your neighbor as yourself. Once we understand that people are the ones making decisions (free will), good or bad, then we can separate it from the vision presented by Jesus.
People are! Just because they choose to do something that does not seem to ring true with Christianity does not make Christianity or any faith bad. This is the same argument used for gun control. People make poor choices about how to use their firearms. Does that make guns bad? No, it makes the people who use guns to murder bad. Yet, as a Christian, I am called to love everyone. Does that mean there are no repercussions for the one who murders? By no means. Rather than hate the one who murders, pray for them, that they see the error of their ways and accept the repercussions.
Further discussion can be done through PM's if you like.