Religion

[arkanis]

Atheist... I do not need Love to be impersonated. God is Love.

there can be love without believing in some devine crap. let;s be good. that's what I stand for.

[VonHelton]

I believe the word actually has Sanskrit roots

 

.....Yea, it just means a liar. As in a fit of rage, you call someone a Warlock (liar), whether they really are a liar or not.

 

Interesting. Well, if "liar" is the worse thing I'm ever called, I'm doing pretty good!

 

;)

 

 

[Soulreaper]

Mayhap.

 

"Norse" mythology is cool, but I'd prefer to call it Scandinavian mythology since Sweden, Norway and Denmark actually share all that - that somehow ended up as "Norse" :D :D

 

but that wasn't really in-topic...

[coolcat13]

1st off my deepest condolences Dunc it has been 1 year to the day since my Dad passed away and believe me it is something that changes your whole outlook on life .

 

2ndly talking about religion on a sci fi posting board is quite unique and some of your response were quite original.The thing is that I am a christian in my heart and though I may not agree with my fellow Christians I think it is important to steer them in the right direction at times \

 

Christianity is about love , forgivness , and honor when we discriminate in the name of Christ ,we do exactly what he taught us not to do .When we say that Christianity holds homosexuals to burn in Hell then we make the grave mistake of judging others for in Gods eyes we are all sinners .When we condemn the Muslims or Jews etc and say that our way is the only way again we defy what Jesus has taught us and that is to preach the word so that all may hear it not to be thier judges

 

its the sanctimonious attitude of Christianity which drives people away from it when it should be inclusive

 

my thoughts ....coolcat

[VonHelton]

Mayhap.

 

"Norse" mythology is cool, but I'd prefer to call it Scandinavian mythology since Sweden, Norway and Denmark actually share all that - that somehow ended up as "Norse" :D :D

 

but that wasn't really in-topic...

 

Most people just wonder how Norse & Christianity could possibly co-exist......LOL!

 

:)

 

 

[Soulreaper]

Well...it didn't.. Christianity more or less "killed" or consumed my beloved viking past

 

:D

[elderbear]

I believe the word actually has Sanskrit roots

 

.....Yea, it just means a liar. As in a fit of rage, you call someone a Warlock (liar), whether they really are a liar or not.

 

Interesting. Well, if "liar" is the worse thing I'm ever called, I'm doing pretty good!

 

;)

 

 

"Blessed are ye when men revile thee ..." etc, eh? FWIW, even though I think you're wrong from time to time (and I'm sure the converse applies, too), I also think you've got a ton of integrity. Hence my objection to calling you a "warlock." I think you've got more honor than that word implies to me.

[elderbear]

Well...it didn't.. Christianity more or less "killed" or consumed my beloved viking past

 

:D

 

But there were enough monks to write stories down that your/our (I'm half German, 1/4 Swedish, and 1/4 Armenian - I'll not be waxing dogmatic about Odin vs. Wotan (I'm more of a Frejr/Freja guy myself)) prechristian myths are still somewhat accessible - even though they may have been impacted by Christian redacting.

[daffydk]

Before I express my opinion on religion, I will just say to dunc that I know what you are going through.

And I hope you stay strong.

 

I was 12 when I my father passed away. It was quite an experience. I went through waves of emotions. First it was just pure sadness and the idea that something really drastic had happenned so I cried for an hour straight. Then I pulled myself together and I convinced myself that the father I knew was a good person and never hurt anyone or did anything bad. So whereever he is, it must be good. So that made me feel much much better. And I actualy even smiled when that happenned.

 

Later of course it hit me personaly becuase I was not ready for the world at that age and all of a sudden I was alone, without my mentor. The person who was going to get me through my teenage years and beyond. I was on my own.

But sometimes the more things that happen to you, the more trials and difficulties you go through, the more you grow as a person.

 

 

[NiteShdw]

I said that i was agnostic earlier' date=' i think i would like to change that now. I got a phone call tonight, my father had a heart attack and couldn't pull through. So now i'm praying that he is happy and, well, somewhere, be it another plain of exsitence, or what we call Heaven. I am shocked, so here i am on nites forum, not quite knowing what to do. I just hope there is somewhere for his soul, or whatever it is we have, to go. Sorry if i'm not quite making sense guys, but all of you, i hope you "Live long, and prosper"[/quote']

 

I am sorry for your loss. The fact that people have a built-in need or desire to know what comes after this life, to me, is evidence that there must be something. I am a firm believer in God and spirituality. When I think of the times in my life when I was the happiest, it was when I was helping others or doing something spiritual (my service as a missionary, for example). The times when I have felt more dispair are those times when I was being selfish or doing things that I knew were wrong.

 

I just want to say that I know there is a state of life after this one. I encourage you to take this opportunity to experiment, search to see if there is more to life than the matter we observe around us. As a missionary, we always taught people that if what we were teaching was true, that God would help them to feel it. We encouraged them to pray and find out for themselves.

[daffydk]

I am always surprised why athiests feel so strongly about rejecting God. Maybe its my failure of understanding their 'belief' if they have one at all becuase I just view them as people who believe in nothing or no after life or no God.

 

 

But I really feel that this stance does not follow logic. Here is my logic:

Lets suppose there was no God and we just all perished into nothing, no afterlife, no God to judge us, no one who created us in the beginning-therefore no one to be accountable to, Then logic would have it, that whether you believe in God or not, the outcome after you die will be the same.

Now lets so suppose there is a God. Then if you believed in God, you may be in a better standing than the one who rejected God.

 

You may argue that maybe God will not do Anything to the person who rejected. But it is likely or possible that God may not favoure that stance as it is related in Many religions.

 

So by logic, you stand to lose alot more if you reject the One that Created everything and may ultimately judge us. And if you do not reject God, then you stand to lose little more than just your contemplation on God at the very least, and of course you may have to then try to be Good and love people for the sake of love (and not becuase of greeed or selfish reasons), etc.

 

Of course you may find something to argue against this logic but I believe this is pretty reasonable.

 

 

 

as an athiest, You might say then, well then which God should we believe in, huh?

a simple answer would be, the above logic doesnt really tie you down to any one particular religion. For instance... all your life you can 'depend' on God, and 'pray' to God, or say 'God created the world' etc etc.. and not really have to give a name such as Jesus, Allah, etc.. After all, if you ever did stand before God, I dont think it would be JUST for God to punish you if you always said "God" instead of any of these worldly names. It would be a pretty tough sell for God to send you to hell just because you didnt use a particular name. So no need to go into specifics.. In fact you may drop all the names.. and just use what you have in your heart.. call him the creater of all things all the time... or love, or mercy, or just...anything that would identify God.

 

But to reject God all together is just not prudent..you are just setting yourself up for a surprise which you may not want.

 

 

 

Alot of people attack religions whether it is christianity or islam or budhism or whatever based on the behaviour of the people that claim to follow it.

Thats a shallow way to look at a complex issue. Its like identifying all americans based on Bush. Or identifying all of germans based on Hitler. Or identifying the italians based on moselini.... the list goes on..

And for those that doesnt get the parralels, here is direct examples of religions and its people.. dont identify christians with what they did in the spanish inquisitions where millions were killed, or waco texas or kkk.. Dont identify Islam based on what people are doing in the middle east & elsewhere becuase of political reasons or brainwashings, or just people who have a retarded understanding. Dont identify Hinduism by what they did last year in Gujarat.

 

Go to the sources such as the bible, quran, hindu scriptures, etc.. Debate the sources and what it teaches rather than the actions of the people.

 

If one of your family memebers goes throgh a red light or speeds, would it be fair if the police ticketed the whole family? You might laugh and say what kind of a world are we living in that I got blamed for what my sibling did...

 

But debate we must!!!!! becuase this is the only way we can be civilized and understand each other. Its easy to dehumanize those we dont understand..once you dehumanize them, its easy to go as far as sheding blood without feeling a slight guilt about it...

[daffydk]

I am going to start another post becuase the above post was getting just too much... I felt like i wanted to say something else to support my logic above

 

 

Before someone else says it, I will say it: ;)

 

Logic above is really for understanding purposes and not an absolute reason why you should accept God or reject God. By that I mean, it is selfish to only Accept God becuase you want to save yourself. Although it makes sense that one should do anything to save onself from any dire situation, in this particular case it seems to be impure way to do it. The logic pretty much is like cheating becuase it says that you should accept God becuase this act will save you.

 

But from what I understand, those that reject God (athiests), mostly lean towards the theory of the survival of the fittest anyway, i.e. do whatever that you may--- to advance your genes and survive. Therefore the above logic provides the ultimate example of this theory. And I say this becuase if ahtiests dont belive in God, then it only makes sense to say that we evolved from nothing, to atoms, to molecules to protiens, to single cells......and so on.. And that was solely based on the premise that thing that survives is the fittest, or the one with the best adaptation or strategy (with intellegence).

 

Aside from this, the logic above is really a way to understand the situation that it is worse not to accept God and not THE REASON to accept God. The reason should be based on sincerity. Being sincere and true to oneself is as important and crucial feature as goodness, love , being kind, having mercy, being just, etc etc.

 

Oh and last two things I want to say, & yes truely the last two things: ;)

 

 

 

 

First: I wanted to say that, I dont mean any disrespect to the athiests. As I said this is my logic and how I view the situation. I havent really had many debates with them to fully understand their perspective. And also I think it is good that one hears constructive criticism rather than using one word adjectives to describe someone or some religion.

 

Second: I only focused on accepting or rejecting God becuase to compare differences of religions would be an enourmous task. But I must say that everyone should sincerely take any oppertunity they get and go to the source of at least the major ones and make up their own mind. People should not base it based on what they were raised on, or reject a particular theory based on what they see happenning, or read a book/brochure/article/website that is written to discredit a particular creed/religion/belief. Pick up your own bible/quran/Torah/bahai/hindu/etc scriptures and read it.

And not necessarily read it to convert, but do it to understand people. The only way to understand most of the 1.3 billion christians is to read their source, bible. The only way to understand 1 billion muslims is to read their source, quran. And the same goes for nearly 1 billion hindus. and so on... At the very least you will have an intellegent conversation the next time you meet one of these people which should be often. And sadly, you may know more about their religion than they do.

 

[mcant]

Well...it didn't.. Christianity more or less "killed" or consumed my beloved viking past

 

:D

 

Its coming back though, I hear Denmark is now allowing Asatru marriages,

 

No word on funerals yet, but I suspect there's probably some polution or environmental rules against burning Longboats ;)

[Byakero]

Religion is the main reason why this world is in turmoil

every religion is saying that there religion is the the true religion

 

 

 

but all of them are after the money of their followers

 

 

[GeneralLee]

I've listened to a few radio programs on Art Bell about this topic. It was pretty interesting. Some say Jesus was not really poor' date=' and he travelled all over Asia / India looking into the different religions. You can find some of the MP3 of the shows on WinMx.[/quote']

 

I am a member of Streamlink (the service provided on the Art Bell/George Noory website), and have downloaded every radio show since Aug 2004. Also, I used to be a serious WinMx user, and downloaded hundreds if not thousands of shows off there. Several go back 3-4-5-6-or more years.

 

I still have all of the files here on one of my hardives, except for some that I had archived into ALBW format, and stored on another HD. I ruined that drive by accident about 6 months ago, so besides being on CDR, they are gone.

 

Anyhow, my point is, if you or anyone who sees this would like to hear any of the more recent shows, or even many of the older ones, give me a yell, and I'll see if I have it available. So far, I have uploaded 4 shows here on Nite's site in the recent past, and have noticed a few others have also uploaded a few shows as well.

 

[GeneralLee]

Anyone seen the modern research about who Jesus really was and who carries his blood line? Very interesting stuff!

There they claim Jesus was a cast out King or similie and that "Graal" could actually be "Gra-al" which appearantly means holy blood line or likewise, now I can't recall everything exactly but I'd advise people to check it out. I think there were some ties with Scionists as well if memory serves me correctly.

 

Andreas,

 

There have been several books written about this subject, one that comes to mind, is called "Holy Blood, Holy Grail."

 

Also, I do believe that the Davinci Code books and movies are more or less about this topic (haven't read the book, watched the video, or listened to the audiobooks yet), as was the movie "The Last Temptation of Christ" (more or less).

 

One guy who comes to mind who talks a great deal about this subject, is David Icke. For example;

 

1998-11-00 - Art Bell - David Icke - Bloodlines & New World Order - 1 of 2.mp3

 

http://www.davidicke.com/

 

I find subjects like these, fascinating.

[BorisP]

I always thought athiests did not believe in God because they were afraid.

 

If you believe in God, you have to accept that someone, somewhere, can make you do anything they want. They can totally control you and influence your life any way they choose.

 

Most people can't handle that. For good reason. It is a frightenening realization to accept.

 

Someone up above mentioned how they feel good helping people and doing other "holy" things. You don't necessarily have to believe in God for that to happen.

 

People have energy. Just like electricity has postive and negative, people have good and bad energy. When you help people, they are usually greatful. They put good energy on you. If you hurt people, they do not like you and put bad energy on you.

 

People that are holy? In a way you can say that they are full of good energy. They are healthy and live right so they are full of goodness. People who are not healthy, not eating right, abusing themselves in various ways, they have bouts where their energy is bad because the body is damaged.

 

So for athiest guys? You don't have to believe in God to gain the benefits of being a holy person. Think of it scientifically. Tell yourself you want good energy and you want people to give you good energy. Then you act in a way to reach those two goals. You will have the same feelings as the feelings people claim come from God.

 

[Oma]

I always thought athiests did not believe in God because they were afraid.

 

If you believe in God, you have to accept that someone, somewhere, can make you do anything they want. They can totally control you and influence your life any way they choose.

 

Most people can't handle that. For good reason. It is a frightenening realization to accept.

Haha - I always thought of people who believe in a god to be too scared to realize the truth, stand alone and being without a divine purpose!

So funny - both sides petty the other....:)

[elderbear]

Well...it didn't.. Christianity more or less "killed" or consumed my beloved viking past

 

:D

 

Its coming back though, I hear Denmark is now allowing Asatru marriages,

 

No word on funerals yet, but I suspect there's probably some polution or environmental rules against burning Longboats ;)

 

Wow! And I thought the USA was a social backwater. I personally know a numbe of Pagan and Wiccan priests and priestesses who have performed legal marriages according to their traditions, and I understand that there have been numerous Asatru marriages.

 

But lets not forget that before Nordic and Germanic people believed in the warrior Asir (root of Asatru) the worshipped the fertility Vanir. The book The Well of Rememberance does a an excellent and reasonably scholarly job of disentangling the two traditions from the existing texts preserved (ironically) by Christian monks.

[elderbear]

I always thought athiests did not believe in God because they were afraid.

 

If you believe in God, you have to accept that someone, somewhere, can make you do anything they want. They can totally control you and influence your life any way they choose.

 

Most people can't handle that. For good reason. It is a frightenening realization to accept.

Haha - I always thought of people who believe in a god to be too scared to realize the truth, stand alone and being without a divine purpose!

So funny - both sides petty the other....:)

 

And maybe, just maybe, HERE, where we are all bound together by a love of Trek and SF, we can laugh at how little we each know, and learn to respect the experiences and deep emotions that lie beneath each belief system.

 

If so, we've taken a small but important step towards reaching that UFP future.