Hair-Brained

I don't see atheists depicted as mentally-disturbed or fiends all that often, Reverend. I see a lot of stuff like this coming from atheists, however. It makes me think they aren't really atheists.

Okay, I'll bite…..why would me pointing out that the mythological tradition, rearing it's ugly head again presently in Islam, is actually a Christian, Jewish tradition based on some riveting sci-fi, testosterone driven, god-script……make you "think they aren't really atheists?"

You are obsessed, Reverend. Folks don't obsess about something they think only exists in other people's heads. You'll be back in the flock eventually.

Flock of old goats….maybe.

I agree with Larry, it's almost like atheists are overwhelmed by the task of proving their is no God. They seem to fight his or her existence when deep inside the spirit is working. Why fight it? Is it anger? Is it hatred? Was it because God didn't perform a miracle when it was needed most and therefore they feel as though God turned his back on them? Is it denial because man must feel he knows all of the secrets of the universe? Was it because some people in the church didn't act a certain way or treat the atheist fairly? (I can understand that one) Don't deny it the spirit is within us. Now in my defense of Revs point of view, modern and ancient Christendom seems to have taken on a judge and jury attitude similar to muslems which is as far from Christianity as you can get. Hypocrits or "non-understanders" (different than non-believers). I don't remember reading the red letters and seeing where Jesus lambasted a person for being a sinner. Or waited behind a tree to jump him and to beat him down because someone didn't agree with him, although he did have his rules which were to judge not and to love one another for who they are and to give of yourself. Once you can reach this level of Christianity you will be surprised at how freeing it really is.

You have to read and understand the Bible and understand the meanings and covenants God made with man. Also much of the Bible is based on word of mouth, which could be the reason for some of the "Babe the Blue Ox" types of stories. For me when I looked at the Bible as a book of covenants and the stories as symbols, instead of a literal work of literature, for me, it was easier to gain faith in it's words. Looking at the covenants and understanding the whole gist of it's plan instead of just it's parts was fruitless in my life. I think that many pastors and ministers are failing in their professions by not introducing the covenants and just telling the tales and buliding whole sermons on misquoted passages. (Also you have to perform the hermaneutics from greek or aramayic or hebrew into the english. Angels or giants being simply translated may have meant something different then than it does today.)
In my opinion, muslems, as do the jews and christians use the mosaic laws to control their people especially during the days of Moses. Our govt is doing the same. The Mosaic covenant was abolished and we are living in a new convenant that lifts those laws and turns man to trust in God through Gods grace and the sacrifice of his Son Jesus Christ. Todays muslems are still stuck in the days of Moses as are many of the religious heretics..

I think everyone finds and makes peace with God in their own way.

I have not heard much from atheists at all but many Christians feel a need to shove their religion on to everyone. So actually interesting to hear a atheists speak up – most keep quiet. I feel I am spiritual but not religious in the way many church goers are. When people put religion into the government that's when we have problems – so many wars are based on religion and our differences. We need to respect everyone's personal beliefs but keep them out of school and government.

Average, please prove to me that Zeus does not exist.

larry tells us…" Folks don't obsess about something they think only exists in other people's heads."

I thought it might be interesting for readers to read a blog post on how it is that modern day Muslims, Amish, nuns….still cover their hair, face and/or eyes,…..where the practice originated and why. Superstitious beliefs exist in people's heads. Those beliefs make themselves visible in actions…..ritual, practices, habits, etc. These practices often become destructive in society……like women covering their hair. Being constantly reminded that your gender makes you bad or inferior has led to much sorrow.

In short…..what gets our attention….gets us. In evangelical and radical Muslim circles, superstitious fables hold members in bondage. Those fables and their implications do not remain in the brain, as it were,….they manifest themselves in such evils as the mutilation of women in the middle east. They manifest themselves in a ridgid religious caste sytem, like in Catholicism, where males dominate and females are impure, segregated and unequal. They manifest themselves in national foreign policy where superstitious evangelicals lobby to restore Jerusalem and rebuild the temple so that Jesus can return…..or in Eric Prince of Blackwater and his crusade to kill Muslims for Jesus as a private military contractor.

This stuff that is in people's heads reveals itself……and like with the assassination of Dr. Tiller by a very religious Scott Roeder, whose head was filled with myth, lore and superstition…….when religious belief is manifested, it is often destructive and/or evil.

Lastly……when it comes to religion, I encourage people to find out for themselves what the truth is. It would seem to me, as it did when I was a younger man,….that if there is a god in charge who is ultimately responsible for my immortality…then understanding that god would be of the utmost importance. On the other hand…..if there is no god in charge, and immortality is simply wishful thinking…..it would seem to me that that would be important to understand also.

Most folks don't take it seriously anyway…and that's probably a good thing.

Rev,
Is it God, a higher power, that you don't believe in, or is it religion you don't believe in ? It sounds to me like it's religion you don't believe in.

I suppose there are some fundamentalist Christians who believe every word in the Bible is literally true, but I've never met one.

With a title like, "Hair Brained" I thought for sure this was going to be about Joe Biden.

That would have been "Hair-plug Brained," Roy.

Andrea are you kidding me? Atheists are running the country. Taking prayer out of school, unless you are a muslim or jehovahs witness. No public displays of Christian faith, but the menorah, kwanza, and muslim symbols are ok., Taking the word God out of everything. Please…

Jimmy James, why would I want to do that? If that is your belief system so be it? Put a little baby Zeus in a manger with wise men and sheep. That's your perogative. This is America not Russia like the Dems want to make it. How do we know that the greek gods don't exist? Is it because Christians and Muslims and scientists have told us so? We were programmed not to believe in them by other religions therefore they are just myths?

Now Rev where did you get this info? "Eric Prince of Blackwater and his crusade to kill Muslims for Jesus as a private military contractor." I am usually so close to agreeing with you, then you make that hard left turn into Conspiracyville.
As far as Roeder, he saw abortion as murder and decided the only way to stop it was to sacrifice his own life for the millions of babies killed. Babies that had no chance. In the future this will be known as a bigger Hollocaust than hitlers. Made legal by our govt. (Allowing the murder of it's own citizens, at the same time coddling and protecting the murders) Did we make him a saint or martyr or icon? No. A group comprised of people, probably some Christians sentenced him to life in prison. I know many including myself who would have voted death penalty but apparently the liberal psychologists want to study him and waste our money. Also this guy was never part of a pro-life organization and was condemned by the NRTL. So he wasn't a religious spokesperson in that sense, even though the left keeps repeating that he was.

Finally this "Lastly……when it comes to religion, I encourage people to find out for themselves what the truth is. It would seem to me, as it did when I was a younger man,….that if there is a god in charge who is ultimately responsible for my immortality…then understanding that god would be of the utmost importance. On the other hand…..if there is no god in charge, and immortality is simply wishful thinking…..it would seem to me that that would be important to understand also."
How do you know so much that you can interpret the "real" truth? Truth comes from the spirit and our past experieince. None of us know the truth about God or our afterlife. What if you are wrong? What if I am wrong? We won't know until that great day when we move to the next realm. To me how can there not be a higher power or creator of this vast perfect universe? How do we know that there isn't one God that considers many faiths, each based on their knowledge of the universe and it's principles? It's man that has, in our own arrogant way, decided which was the correct way. It seems as though you are calling people of faith foolish when science has no basis other than proving a predestined idea with a tested outcome. I heard a man on the radio today make a statement that was interesting. He was hocking nutrition supplements. Here is what he said: "it's no that our body is short of certain drugs, it is short of certain nutrients and physical activity". Science = cash. This is why the drug companies are rich and AMerican medicine is interested in controlling the disease not curing it. They can't even tell the truth about global warming without skewing and lying about the information and you are putting your faith in these men? These are the members of the scientific church, who feel because they think therefore they are. Is that different than Jesus claiming "therefore I am". No. The scientific church is just as hokey and schemish as Benny Hinn and as dangerous as the ayatollah because they live by no morals, principles, guidelines or truth. Their's like the whorish faux religions in America today get their truth from whoever gives them the most cash.

Appreciate you taking the time average…

I guess I see science and the scientific community a bit differently than you do. If there has been one institution that has benefitted mankind the most..it's the scientific community. Everything that enriches our lives today came from scientific research….everything that will enrich our lives in the future will come from scientific research that led to technological progress.

What has religion done? Advanced our lives? Made life easier?

I don't quite understand this mild anti-science criticism that I'm always hearing from the right. Sure, capitalists are exploiting science and scientific discovery, but that's what capitalists do. The science remains.

"….you are calling people of faith foolish when science has no basis other than proving a predestined idea with a tested outcome."

Now, average, I don't think you really meant that. Science is responsible for, like, electricity and computers. Stuff that makes a significant difference in our lives. Visible. Tangible. Science builds on itself, unlike religion. Science is the house bult on the rock and religion is the house built on sand.

I did not call people of faith, "foolish." I honestly thought the topic was interesting and because of the Afghan-burqa talk, timely. People attend church or are religious, for many reasons. I do not believe that people who attend church are foolish to do so.

However, the foundation of religion…..the doctrine and the hierarchy…..they will always be a target of my criticisms.

LOL, well played King.

My bible, New International Version, does not contain Jubilees or Enoch. I also checked the King James Version, and it does not have either book. I guess that explains why I was unfamiliar with this. But that seems to take the strangest stuff out of your arguments.

I guess that you can always point at people and find some fault with them.

I prefer to approach this from a different angle. I look at things that make it appear someone was in charge, directing things, the Eternal Engineer that I spoke of. Follow me logically, and point out any holes. My journey sounds a lot like yours.

If you believe in random evolution you believe that everything happens basically by accident. There are mutations that don't work and creatures die. And mutations that work and allow things to live longer and pass along the traits to the next generation.

They also believe in convergent evolution where species independently develop similar traits. Essentially similar mutations at the same time.

There are a couple of good examples of this. I will use predator and prey as examples. I use predator and prey because they are separate branches on the tree. They are not closely related and not just a few generations apart. That is, you do not have to worry about the new calf eating the family dog. You will also not find a great white shark with a vegan diet.

Remember the dinosaurs with the big bony sails on their backs? I guess we do not even know what this was for. Perhaps a method of controlling temperature, maybe it was brightly colored to attract a mate. No creature has one to this day, so we don't really know what it did. For the sake of argument, let's assume it regulated heat. So, if you follow evolutionists theory whatever it did must now have been replaced with a better solution i.e. sweating or panting. Both creatures came up with this bad interim solution at the same time. Or better yet if it was for attracting mates, what are the chances that your lady predators would be attracted to the same thing young lady prey would be? If it was defensive in nature, why is it found on a predator?

Development of eyes during the Cambrian Explosion. The fossil record shows us that an inordinate number of creatures got eyes are virtually the same time. What would have happened if the prey would have developed eyes first? The predators would have all gone hungry when the prey learned to avoid them. On the other hand if the predators developed eyes first? They would have decimated the prey population, this would not have worked either.

This stuff shows me that someone was in charge. I will call him God.

I can't speak for the right about science, I can only speak for myself. Here are my thoughts.

A real scientist, would never say that the science is settled. Any truth can stand up to a challenge.

The first law of motion was – objects seek rest. It is pretty easy to prove. Throw anything, it will come to rest. What if we artificially said that science was settled?

The sound barrier was thought to be just that, a barrier. People did the math, as you get closer to the speed of sound, drag approaches infinity. Chuck Yeager be damned!

It is when science is used as a club, that is when it meets resistance. The global warming debate for instance. Evolution is another.

One of my favorite things to think about it abiogenesis, literally life from non-life. Both scientists and people of faith believe that life just started. Logically both of them are kind of hard to believe. But it had to happen and on this they agree.

After reading you all over the last few months I am not able to tell where you are coming from or heading to, I don't mean hell, I mean what is the point?
Can anyone tell me why we are here on earth? What is our purpose? Does Jesus want us to stand up for him? If he does then, how do we stand up for him? Do we use guns and kill those people who are not following his teachings? Should we make laws so people will follow Jesus? Should the Catholics write the laws, or should the Protestants write them? Maybe the majority should rule, and then we should believe in whatever the majority tells us to believe in? If the majority where Musilums should they write the laws? I hear, from your conversations, that we, the people of the USA, are a God fearing people, and we should be following God's rules before he turns his back on us? If we don't get on the right track then he is going to get us? I hear people say we need to start standing up for the lord? I ask again why are we here on earth? Is God unable to defend himself? Does God need us to punish the wicked? Does God need us to stop others from sinning? What does it mean when Jesus said "Take up your cross and follow me"? Did he mean to bash someone with that cross? ,When Jesus said "Sell what you have and give it to the poor", what did he mean? What if we all sold all that we have, and then followed Jesus wouldn't we all die because we wouldn't have anything to eat? If we all sold all that we have and all died, then what? If we sold all that we have and then died, would we be in heaven? I mean only if we loved Jesus and believed that he died on the cross for our sins and we accepted his perfect life as the one and only life that could be a sacrifice for our sins? Why are we here on this earth? Is it to kill the wicked? How do we fight sin, with guns, with laws, so that, Rome can kill the wicked, Oh, I mean the USA, SORRY? Why are we here, why were we born???

bzzzp…..This was not really an evolution/creation post. It was primarily about the traditon of religions to instruct their female members to cover their hair, face and eyes. One small step at a time.

Enoch 1 and Jubilees are not in the approved scriptures, as I mentioned. Genesis is, however, approved scripture,….so is Jude and 1&2 Peter. Jude referenced the book of Enoch directly. Genesis speaks of angels "knowing" human women…..and also mentions the "giants." Approved scripture is all one needs to comprehend the science-fiction belief held by Bible writers that angels crossbred with human women……and THAT'S why she must cover up her hair.

At least 6 millenia later, THAT myth still causes problems for women…..and humanity in general.

To Little Jerry….of course there is no point…..to any of it. Because that is so…..all those questions you asked are irrelevent. We individually exist because of randomness. Being alive at all…..is like hitting the biggest cosmic lottery ever.

Religion developed as one of the first forms of human species control. Getting man to do what a very small group of other men wanted them to do…..is the purpose of religion.

I do have one answer for you. To this…

"Should the Catholics write the laws, or should the Protestants write them?"

Answer: Neither. I should write the laws. The Reverend should write the laws.

Rev says, "Science is the house bult on the rock."

Except our science didn't build the house (the universe). Something (or someone ?) else did. Science is the process of uncovering, explaining, and using what is already here. Science didn't put it here. Our science is driven by the curiosity and intellect of man. Science doesn't explain why we are curious, or why we have the intellect to make scientific inquiries, or why we sense a spiritual nature within ourselves along with the physical and mental.

To illustrate science – if a caveman somehow came upon a 20th century car engine that was transported back to his time, he'd be mystified as to what it was. If enough cavemen studied the engine for long enough, they would eventually figure out how to use it and duplicate it. That's science. But the cavemen would only have theories about how the engine got there in the first place. They wouldn't know for sure. Maybe they'd decide the Big Engine Bang created it randomly, and leave it at that, because, you know, it COULD have happened that way. Maybe the cavemen scientists would deride other cavemen who thought the engine was the product of, oh, say, some sort of intelligent design.

Now consider the earth and universe as an infinitely more complicated version of that engine, and we are the cavemen. There's too much we don't know. We only have opinions and theories. One of those theories is that creation implies a creator (God) of some kind, a higher power, because "random" is woefully inadequate to explain something as fascinatingly grandiose, complex, and interconnected as the universe. "Random" is woefully inadequate to explain our one little planet within that universe, or even one single human being on that one little planet. There's something more, there's a lot more, and just because we don't know exactly what it is doesn't preclude it's existence. That "something more" has been translated into God or gods by virtually every human culture. It's an acknowledgement of our own limitations, which are significant. We know we are only one tiny piece of the universal puzzle, no matter how arrogantly we want to pretend otherwise. In the universal sense, we are a flea on the back of a dog, a flea that doesn't even know there is a dog.

If yours was the prevailing religious explanation, it would all be fine. For fundamentalist Christian folks, taking creation seriously means taking a bunch of other divisive and bigoted "faith-based" teachings seriously. That's when the poison kicks in.

A lot of people were impressed by the teachings of Jesus, along with him turning water into wine, raising the dead, rising from the tomb, etc. Who are you to condemn them, when you don't have the first clue about the bigger truth I wrote about in my last comment ? To paraphrase Einstein, atheism isn't a belief. It's just the abscence of belief. It doesn't offer any explanations or demonstrable alternatives. In parlance you might relate to, atheists are "the party of no."

Reverend,
I'm sure the world would be a better place if you wrote the laws. Nor would it be a better place if the Catholics, Protestants, or any religious Organization wrote the laws. The world has already had enough of religious Organizations making laws for everyone to follow. As you can see I am a Christian but I am not so stupid as to be blind to the facts about religious Organizations making the rules for everyone to live by. I don't think Jesus needs us Christians to make rules for others to follow. Everyone should live the life that the lord would have them live. Christians, and not only Christians, want people to be killed for their sins. What does turn to other cheek mean anyway. If someone kills your loved one, isn't your loved one in a better place? So why be so mad? Aren't the streets in heaven golden? I ask my fellow Christians, why hate the Reverend? The Reverend has no power over the Lord. As for us Christians, let our eyes be focused on the saving grace of our Lord. Let the Lord be the judge. As Jesus said "Do good to them that despitefully use you". Believe it or not the Lord is in control, our job is to show love, and kindness, we will be rejected, despised, hated, and killed, Our duty to the Lord for such a gospel is to show love. God so loved the world that he gave his only son, that whosoever should believe in him should be saved from his wrath. Christians do not have any right showing wrath to anyone, because they can't save anyone, and therefore they have no right. Christians aren't any better then anyone else, they have never been better then anyone else ever. Christians are no better then murders, and child molesters, they are just forgiven, and shall be given a place heaven with their savior.

Rev,
Do you remember Aussiemale from the old forum ? Roysoldboy e-mailed me a communication he had with Aussie the other day, and the topic was Christianity. Aussiemale pointed out that the most advanced civilizations in the world, the ones that grant the most human rights to their citizens (Europe, USA, Canada, Australia), ALL grew out of Christian beliefs. That's no coincidence, and it would be a historical denial to say that it was. That doesn't mean all Christians are perfect people, however, as Jerry just pointed out. Fault can be found with everyone, and Christians and Christian nations are included, but when you look at the larger picture, Christianity has been a positive force, relatively speaking. If you look at atheist nations, such as the USSR, China, Cuba, and North Korea, a much darker side of humanity is revealed. So I take issue with your statement that religion poisons everything.

Fine. Take issue. The world would be a better place without religion. Christianity held the world in the Dark Ages for a long time…. superstition gained control of power. The secular Renaissance led the world to a place where secular social advances could be made. Christianity, for the most part has been on the wrong side of history on most social advances. That's still true today.

People who are religious are not who I'm calling poison. Supernaturalistic beliefs, guilt enslavement by religious authority figures, and a denial of full equal rights for all humans…are just some of the poison which exudes from the top down in religious groups.

I think any competent historian would tell you that the term "Dark Ages" is in many ways a misnomer, Reverend. And I think by "Renaissance" you probably mean the "Enlightenment."

What, pray tell, would you call the 1000 years when man made little, if any, progress?

No, I meant Renaissance. Enlightenment came later.

"the activity, spirit, or time of the great revival of art, literature, and learning in Europe beginning in the 14th century and extending to the 17th century, marking the transition from the medieval to the modern world."

The "medieval" part……is in reference to the, you know, Dark Ages.

You need to update that World Book set, Reverend.

At which point in the Rennaisance did Christianity go away, Rev ?