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A man who dares to waste one hour of time has not discovered the value of life.
CHARLES DARWIN
When I was an atheist, the thing that distinguished me from my peers was that I wasted no time trolling believers on their blogs or their websites or drawing them into debate in the offline world. The first and most basic reason for this distinction of mine was that atheism is a fundamentally boring topic. You are not arguing for a something but for a nothing. It is easy to be passionate for a positive but not so much for a negative.
The second reason is that it struck me as a waste of time. When you consider the existential dimension of atheism, what do you gain from disabusing people of their fairy tales? If life is nothing more than a blip in a sea of infinite nothing, why should I care if you find some comfort in a lie? Atheists humor people in more damaging fictions like those of the transgendered who mutilate themselves in some vain effort to resolve the conflict between their biology and their delusions. In fact, I know from personal experience that atheists will tolerate virtually anything you care to believe so long as it is not the Christian religion. This is how my club of fellow atheists turned from people devoted to science and reason into a society tolerant of polyamory and Wicca.
Despite having a short life with the expectation of eternal nothingness awaiting at the end of it all, many atheists prefer to spend their precious time in this finite existence arguing endlessly in Christian forums and comboxes against the thing they do not believe in. Bishop Robert Barron noticed this same phenomenon of atheists trolling the CNN Belief Blog and being passionately interested in the thing they claim to be a delusion and a waste of time. I can honestly say that I spend no similar amount of time in flat earth forums attempting to disabuse those people of their nuttiness. I have a friend who is a flat earther, and I can say that the flat earth delusion does no practical harm to him whatsoever. This might be different if he was a travel agent.
The atheist troll will make the claim that debunking religion is a good cause done out of charity and goodwill in order to make the world a better place. Look at how great Chinese society is as a consequence of their efforts to stamp out all things religious. It is an awesome thing to be able to think anything the government allows you to think. Yet, this charitable desire of atheists to stamp out ignorance does not seem to extend to the Musloid fanatics with a penchant for beheading their critics and flying passenger airliners into tall buildings. The Freedom From Religion Foundation focuses on the truly harmful religious practices of coaches praying with their teams before football games or swearing on Bibles before taking office. The world would be a truly better place without those superstitious practices. Plus, those Christians don’t tend to swing scimitars, chop off the heads of your menfolk, and force your women and children into bondage and sexual servitude.
The ire, vitriol, and combox hijinks of atheist trolls comes down to the desperate desire to convince people like me that my belief in God is incorrect. They have it right, and I have it wrong. For some reason, convincing me of my wrongness is worth the third of their meaningless lives they waste trying to badger me into unbelief. Then, they discover that I was already an atheist and for a very long time. Now, I am not an atheist. That troubling fact causes even more desperation and distress for the atheist troll. One of their own defected from the ranks of unbelief to embrace the myths again.
The reality is that atheist trolls waste their time because they do not need to convince others of the truth of atheism. They need to convince themselves. Despite having an arsenal of scientific facts and logical arguments at their disposal, they are not convincing to the atheist trolls because people like me still stubbornly believe in God. Somehow, the assurance of God’s non-existence does not reach 100% until some believer becomes an unbeliever. I find this bizarre because my flat earth friend causes no similar distress in my round earth worldview.
The fact is that forever is a long time, and it is certainly made longer when it is eternal damnation. That potentiality would certainly make wasting a large portion of your meaningless life a worthwhile endeavor. I can afford to be wrong as a Christian because I have nothing to lose from believing except the love and adoration of atheist trolls. If God does not exist, I will never even know that I was wrong. And the atheist will never know that he was right. Knowledge requires consciousness which atheists claim is extinguished at death. But if God does exist, the atheist will have to contemplate his error forever. That possibility is a great motivator to make sure you got it right.
I will now render some charity to those atheist trolls and help them a bit in their desperation. If I became an unbeliever again, would it make you feel more confident in your unbelief and assurance of annihilation at death? Would it end all of your doubts in doubt? Would it make one damn bit of difference? Of course, it wouldn’t. Countless Christians apostasize and lose their faith in God. In fact, the entire world could become atheist, and this still would do nothing to alleviate the desperation of these atheists. The suspicion that God exists and the desire to know Him are itches that remain even after the scratching has stopped. If you doubt this, contemplate the phenomenon of the atheist church or the semi-religious practices of the atheist Sam Harris who attempts to gain the benefits of religion through meditation practice while retaining a prophylactic of unbelief.
The atheist must contend with the fact that if man is an animal then he is a religious animal. The material universe produced material beings with desires for non-material things. This makes no sense. Yet, religious belief and superstition is ubiquitous, and human beings have expended great amounts of material, manpower, and resources over the centuries to serve these needs and desires for the non-material. Humanity desires the divine. The desperation of atheist trolls is merely a symptom of religious frustration stemming from a denial of this desire for the divine.
All Along the Watchtower 
Is one permitted to ask what you get from indoctrinating children with lies?
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That might be better answered by you? Charlie asks you a question that you never answer: why waste your time. Do you troll flat earthers? Or is is simply the fact that Western European Culture is based upon morality and set limits in laws and polite society that you find too restrictive apparently since the secularists (atheists) have pretty much disassembled what was left of a country that embraced a common Christian and Jewish ethos; namely the 10 Commandments. I would suspect that you find borders an intrusion to your quest for unbridled freedom as well.
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You’re a smart fellow I think my statement is clear.
Why don’t you have any interest in flat-earthers and why do you spend so much time trying to debunk something that will make no difference to you in the end?
And you say you do not attempt to indoctrinate? I suppose that attempting to debunk faith you are trying to backhandedly win people to the side of unbelief. Again, for what gain or what reason? It makes no sense because it is digital. They are right and you are wrong or you are right and they are wrong. So what? You’re free to believe in nothing just as I am free to believe in something more than the materialistic universe. It will make no difference to me in the end that you don’t believe and should make no difference to you that I believe . . . but that is not the case for some unbeknownst reason. Seems like a colossal waste of you finite life . . . shouldn’t you be about living your life and making it fun and/or a prosperous endeavor?
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Thank you for saying this.
Because, unlike religious people, flat earthers do not pose any serious threat to the stability of humanity.
The answer in the previous reply will suffice.
I have a fun and prosperous life, but thanks for your concern.
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A serious threat? Really? Mankind has thrived in Western Europe as has the arts, rights, freedoms etc. since the advent of Christianity. Never have more people prospered in this world. That destabilizes humanity?
Why waste your time here when you might make your life even better if you spent more time living it rather than wasting it on a meaningless and fruitless endeavor?
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Evidence does not bear that out at all. Their societies are beginning to crumble, their economies are declining, rapes and murders are on a steep increase . . . why don’t you go to a Muslim site and tell them how depraved they are? No??? Because peaceful Christians (what is left of them after the secularization of the West) are not a threat to you. You can get away with it.
I’m not wasting my time when I speak to other Christians about the Faith. I’m speaking of something rather than nothing as Charlie made clear in his post. Not only am I speaking of something, to a Christians point of view, we were made for God and our hearts are restless until we rest in Him.
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Really? And which democratic secular humanist societies would these be?
Please provide a short list and the evidence to support.
Do you think I was referring solely to Christian societies? Muslims are also religious or do you think they fall outside of such beliefs?
Perhaps not, but you also seem to spend an inordinate amount of blog space denigrating atheism and atheists.
Why not sip,y focus on your religion and ignore atheists and atheism?
Surely your god will look after his own?
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I would be happy to ban you if that is what you want. I never even wrote a post about atheism before. It is your appearance here that has spawned the conversations and thus the rebuttal which shows how fruitless an enterprise you are engaged in. It can quit as quickly as it began . . . simply don’t come here and we will be back to discussing issues of faith and instead of annihilation theories, non-faith, or anti-faith.
Why don’t you go troll the Muslim blogs then? You think it’s a religion and I think it is an ideology. So it makes sense that you would do that . . . so do you troll them as well?
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Sorry, did you miss the request for the list of democratic secular humanist countries that are collapsing?
Please can you supply at least a few names. Thanks.
Perhaps not you, but the site has reacted to atheism/atheists almost from the beginning, even before I began blogging on WordPress.
Consider the post Biblical Illiteracy of 2012.
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And there were no atheists here when that was written. So what? I’m surprised that you would search for a post about atheists among the thousands that are preserved at this site. Why should it matter to you? If you’re right then we both lose. If I’m right then I win and you lose. I like the second choice better.
You want a list. It is easy. ALL Western Society has been secularized and the effects are devastating: children don’t know what sex they are, think they can be any sex they want, men think it is natural to make love to other men and the same goes for women. Sexuality has eclipsed true femininity and masculinity in culture. Never has there been such clear divisiveness politically or socially about issues that were long ago decided. We are rethinking all of our heritage and society itself and the picture is not pretty. Almost half of our folks want the government to tell everyone what is right and wrong and enforce it as long as the left wingers get their way. Borders are non existent so that we can add tension to this clash of cultures. Europeans are contracting themselves into extinction and you have given over the world to those embrace totalitarianism. Free speech is almost dead and people in Britain cannot even speak of the Body and Blood of Christ without being fined or imprisoned. This is the brave new world that is so much better than what we had before. I’m sure that I could go on and on about this slide down the slippery slope but I won’t bore you death.
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I didn’t. I merely clicked on the very first post and scrolled through a couple – and there it was. Having a go at atheism.
The point made, I didn’t bother with any more after that.
Take it up with the person who wrote the post.
*Shrug*
Lose? It just shows that your were mistaken or dishonest.
In my experience many religious people tend to be the latter.
So what you are mostly upset about are all the issues pertaining to sex?
Really? Who has been fined and imprisoned for speaking of the ”Blood of Christ?”
Not bored at all … please continue.
What exactly does this mean?
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Last . . . was supposed to be contracepting which spell check turned into contracting.
Body and Blood of Christ: https://www.jihadwatch.org/2019/11/the-blood-of-christ-is-now-offensive-in-the-uk
Sex is only one of the primary breakdowns in society because it strikes at the heart of civilization itself; the family. When the family is destroyed then civilization goes with it.
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Family breakdowns are as much and sometimes more within Christian families and especially evangelical/highly fundamentalist unions.
Evidence bears this out. (Google it)
Here’s an interesting article.
https://www.rand.org/pubs/research_briefs/RB9126.html
Re: The Body and Blood of Christ.
In principle I agree – what’s good for the goose should be good for the gander.
But this also shows what’s vile about religion – there is no agreement and each sect will ”have a go” at the other.
History is replete with similar examples across all religions. Internecine strife within Christianity is no exception.
Perhaps the solution is the sooner we give up on all untenable supernatural faith-based beliefs the better for all of us?
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And isn’t this what we’ve been saying as we have become more secularized in our churches over the years. Check the birthrates before the Lambeth Conference of the Anglicans in 1930 which was the first Christian church to OK contraception.
Family breakdowns occur when people don’t see marriage as a lifelong covenant and when the purpose of marriage is other than raising families.
And disagreements were always in Europe things that could be argued. People can’t argue anymore they only forbid and legislate things into what can and cannot be said. It is a loss of freedom of speech. Kids today cannot even listen to something that does not echo the beliefs that they were brainwashed with in this propaganda onslaught by the left. They need their safe space and something cuddly and warm and fuzzy or they will be damaged psychologically. They’re all on anxiety meds and don’t know spit about how the government has money to give them all the goodies they think they deserve by simply being born. So they sell their votes to whoever is going to give them somebody else’s money. Great change in society, huh?
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Instead of ranting, it would be better if you addressed the issue.
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I did. It isn’t a rant it is what is happening or are you paying attention to the news?
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Even by your own warped philosophy, you don’t “know” our beliefs are even erroneous. The best you can manage is to argue that they are not sufficiently probable to count as “reasonable belief”. But then you don’t believe in reason, since we’re all just a bunch of atoms floating about. So that’s all a stupid game anyway. You don’t have any way of demonstrating that there is no God.
Secondly, a lie is a statement contrary to the known truth. You have only your own perverse inclination as a basis for believing that Christians would lie (=state deliberate falsehood) to their children. I tell you the truth; I have lied to myself plenty of times, to my wife even, once, I am ashamed to admit. Never to my son. He would see right through me if I tried.
So your own statement is in fact a lie. I believe in God; I pray, and He answers my prayer. His angel keeps me from harm, both from others and (more frequently) from the evil inclinations of my own heart. What’s more, beyond these subjective reasons, which God in His goodness gives me because of the weakness of my flesh, I think there are very solid objective reasons for believing that He exists. You disagree.
According to you, I am deluded. If I am deluded, I do not lie; and I will die happier than I would if I believed that my life was meaningless, which is the alternative I have lived through as an atheist. I hated that life. It made me ill and bad company for myself. I tell you the Truth. None of my Atheist friends was able to tell me “Chin up, it’s not so bad”; when I spoke to them about the abyss I was looking at, they could only agree with me, and flatter me for the sophistication of my thought – because this is what they all believe. Firm unyielding despair. Yup. Atheism is the creed of a suicide.
If you want any decent person to stop being religious and start being irreligious, you have to start showing that atheism actually does some good to people. Atheists have only the standards of “integrity” given to them by Christianity. Those standards themselves are ceasing to have any relevance in a post-Christian society. Nobody cares about truth any more; all they care about is “feeling good”. That is why we have the transgender nonsense.
Among “good” Atheists are mockers, drug abusers, criminals, hateful individuals, tyrants, vainglorious persons. There is nothing in Atheism to say that these things are wrong. Christianity condemns these things, and Atheism pillories Christianity for it.
Atheists have wrecked western music, western art, western architecture. They have idolised the state instead of God and created horrendous tyrannies. They have made nothing original and beautiful.
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If what you indoctrinate into kids is flatly refuted by scientific evidence and you know this to be true then yes, you are lying.
I have no doubt you believe in your god. This does not make it real.
And no, your god does not answer prayers and so this is either willful ignorance or if you are being brutally honest , a lie.
Scroll down thread and read Jim’s list of notable christian leaders and then go research their history.
I do not have a philosophy let alone a warped one. And yes, we do know that many of your beliefs are erroneous.
Would you like a list?
What a ridiculous thing to write.
Here are a few atheist musicians across several genres ,
Bizet( composer of Carmen)
Billy Joel
Geddy Lee
John Lydon
Sir Peter Maxwell Davies
Randy Newman
Charlie Parker
Sir Micheal Toppert (regarded as one of the greatest composers of the 20th century.)
Roger Waters (Pink Floyd)
Frank Zappa.
Now, stop behaving like a giant Arsehat, for the gods’ sake!
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I did not say that all atheists were bad at composition or bad musicians. I maintain atheism has corroded Western culture, and left “high art” high and dry – conceited, self-absorbed, self-referential, and ultimately pointless. The infection has spread to so-called Christian music as well. Some of the worst music there is is sung from ghastly modernist hymn books in so-called “Catholic” churches.
Nothing I believe or teach to my children is refuted by any scientific evidence whatsoever. Empirical science does not even look at spiritual substances. If empiricists are blind to the many relevant intellectual proofs of the existence of these, that is their wilful ignorance, not mine.
God does answer my prayers. How can you possibly deny it? All you can do is disbelieve and mock – but you cannot refute.
My prayers will be answered, and the just desires of my heart will be satisfied. Justice will be done, and Christ’s kingdom will be made manifest.
I’ll bet when you think of your own children, you don’t really believe they are just a bunch of cells. That’s what your materialism teaches; but it’s not what you really believe. It is a kind of noble hypocrisy on your part, perhaps, that you treat other human beings with a dignity not sustainable within your philosophy.
And yes, you do have a philosophy.
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Aah … so, let’s get this straight. The good atheists are the composers and musicians, but the bad atheists who have ”….wrecked western music.” are those such as atheist DJays who play the music of atheists and those atheists that listen to music composed and performed by atheists.
By this measure I am a good atheist (as I play guitar) and also a bad atheist as I listen to atheist musicians.
Would this sort of average out and make me somewhat of an agnostic in this regard?
Yes …. coming from someone who believes a 2000 year old rabbi rose from the dead I can see that this makes a lot of sense.
Creation (Adam and Eve and original sin) Global flood (Noah and his ark).
Would you like a more detailed list?
Because of the claim your god is omnipotent. My mother is a devout Christian and he … oh, I am so sorry …He … has never answered any of her prayers. (So I’m told) and no former Christian has ever admitted to their prayers being answered either. Then again perhaps you are so special that your god has a special place in his … darn it … His metaphorical heart just for you and answers your prayers when you most need them … such as finding lost keys, showing you an empty parking space and making the leg of that amputee beggar grow back.
True, I regard them as evolved human beings and devout Liverpool supporters. What more could a parent wish for?
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You resent the fact that we have children and insinuate that we do wrong by them by raising them in the Faith. In fact, many atheists resent any human beings procreating at all… because “the planet”… which they worship as a god. Though I would guess you’re personally smarter than that.
Not only do Christians not resent if atheists / Muslims / Hindus / Jews &c. have children, we believe it is their right to be raised and educated by their parents because this is God’s manifest will, which transcends every human law.
Every human being is loved by God. This is de Fide.
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I resent the fact that religious people indoctrinate their children with unsubstantiated supernatural claims, especially as these come with the proviso that if they do not believe they will spend eternity in Hell (whichever form of this vile doctrine you subscribe to)
Do you truly believe if it were not for such indoctrination children would ever become religious?
Stop indoctrinating kids with religion for one generation and see what happens!
Not me … I have two children.
Healthy, happy and successful. Oh … and not religious at all.
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I’m a convert. My parents are both atheists. No-one indoctrinated me – I just educated myself about my faith.
Ditto all the pagans who have converted and continue to convert to Christianity.
To anyone who does not believe in Hell, I recommend they should meditate on the mental state of a suicide. But it should be enough, to any decent human being, to desire to avoid the dishonour and shame of committing wilful sin.
Rational creatures know what’s right and what’s wrong. But human beings routinely do what they know is wrong. Including you.
But shame? Nah – that’s for religious nuts. Or maybe you do believe in shame?
An eternity of unremitting shame is Hell enough for anyone. Woe to the man who feels no shame for his misdeeds in this life.
The intense physical pain the damned suffer in Hell is afforded to them by God as a merciful distraction from the anguish occasioned by the knowledge that they are separated from God for ever.
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Yep … this comment perfectly illustrates that you are indoctrinated.
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P.S.
I thought you were too intelligent to resent procreation. I congratulate you on your God-given fertility.
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And which god do you think bestowed upon moi such fertility?
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I guess I’d ask why waste time writing posts on atheists and atheism? That sounds like trolling as well. Just saying
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Not if you are speaking to a Christian audience. It is more like a vaccination against the infiltration of trolls into our midst. So why are you wasting your time? Will it matter? What is the upside. The downside is a huge waste of your time and energy to even engage in the subject.
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Sorry, not an atheist. Just a former Christian.
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No need to be sorry.
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To more directly answer he question of the post… Why atheists care that you believe what you do, enough to comment on your posts?
Basically what ark said. Spiritual beliefs, true or not, have real world consequences. Some good and beneficial… Others very dangerous and even deadly. It’s not trolling. It’s trying to get thru the cognitive dissonance and confirmation bias that causes you to shut out info and opinions that you disagree with it disagree with you.
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Those ideas are what’s driving the entire collapse of free democratic societies, shared moral ethos etc. which creates a coherent and functional culture. Warp these, or destroy these and you may get the devil that you did not intend. Totalitarianism is not the answer nor is attacking the belief structure that built Western culture.
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You certainly sound as though you have no faith at all that Jesus knows what he’s doing. Trump is your god ordained leader and Obama before that. Funny how Christians are so actually faithless. You think you could fight a gods battle for him? Seriously. Evidence the right does not trust god at all.
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God is the one that told us that trials were coming and that when He came again asked them if He would indeed find Faith. So that is bogus. The prophets and the seers have told us about our present time and Charlie has a new one on my website that I will post here tomorrow that starts with the prophecy of Jeremiah.
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Yes. Those Bible prophecies get fulfilled regularly. But the big one the early church was sure of..and he never came back. No signs follow them that believe, and fear is rampant in the churches. Still a best seller.
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So because they misunderstood when the return would occur then it will not occur? That’s wild. Many prophecies of the saints were fulfilled and people also misunderstood them at the time. That is not uncommon. But their prophecies did unfold in time and understood in time. You don’t lose faith in Christ because some people got what He said wrong.
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The entire religion is a well played misunderstanding. Still nobody gets it. Amusing really.
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Plenty get and more got it before the confusion that came out of Vatican II. Our traditional parishes are growing at unprecedented rates and producing many priests. Our Novus Ordo parishes in English are losing parishioners or gaining parishioners by closing other parishes down and producing few priests. So a lot of people get it. Your average Joe Six Pack may not but any Catholic who has been serious about his faith certainly does.
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So point to the beliefs of Catholic Christianity that have deadly consequences please.
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You can’t possibly be that ignorant of the history of the Catholic Church. If you are, please do your own research.
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Answer my question and be specific. Which beliefs are you talking about? And deadly for whom? No Catholic belief is deadly to Catholics, unless that Catholic has the misfortune to live under the tyranny of an atheist or a devil worshipper.
So what are you talking about? What acts of deadly violence are you trying to smear orthodox Catholics with?
The Church accepts that the State can apply the death penalty for serious crimes. The choice to do so in any particular case is a question of prudential judgement for the state at that time, taking into account the circumstances in play. Do you have a problem with that?
Killing in self-defence, and the defence of others, is also permissible. Do you have a problem with that?
Forced conversion is condemned in the Church, as is aggressive war. Were you going to try to lay these at our door?
Catholic (and Protestant) states executed those judged heretics because of the threat they posed to public order. Once this situation ceased and a compromise was achieved, toleration (which had been the norm in principle for Jews since the time of St Augustine – a position lamentably deviated from by Christian monarchs and mobs at various times) became possible. It is notable also that e.g. burning heretics was not a feature of pre-Medieval Christianity; neither is at a feature of post-medieval Christianity.
Some so-called “Christian” atrocities were genuine atrocities committed by men acting in defiance of the Christian faith (e.g. the deplorable sack of Constantinople by “crusaders”).
Other events in this category were not atrocities but just acts, including – for example – the numerous defensive wars fought against the aggressively expansionist Islamic Caliphate.
No atrocity or evil deed is mandated by the Christian faith.
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And yet history is replete with such atrocities mandated by the Christian faith.
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Alternatives to Christianity and Islam are actually quite interesting, unlike Christianity where we sit back and hope our lives away on the pinnacle of belief. Certainly the hebetude is more than any mortal can bear. At least when the mass was in Latin it was unintelligible.
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Who sits back? . . . a lukewarm Christian? Should have learned Latin then. I didn’t understand a word of it at my first Mass and had no problem following and knowing exactly what was going on. I wasn’t bored, I was moved to tears.
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So the church has progressed from Latin to the local language. Improvement? Maybe the secular values you fear will be the same as Vat 2. No big deal
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The first thing you do if you want to destroy a culture is confuse the language. Case in point, the Tower of Babel.
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We will be one language again someday, and like the Tower of Babel, god said he saw that we were about to accomplish the thing we set out to do and nothing could be restrained. It’s my favorite scripture showing what we can do.
Interestingly this took place before beliefs were so out of control. We traded practical utility for faith. Been nothing but a monotheistic stall, bickering over belief. Crazy
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Yeah that is crazy since nobody will ever be able to build a tower to the heavens. Your reading of that incident is rather crude and you do not reach God by your own effort and lay hold of Him. He is the Creator. You cannot even have a good thought if it were not by His grace. This is the beginning of humility and without it nobody has a chance of progressing in the spiritual life,
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That is not what the scripture says at all Scoop “6- And the Lord said, Behold, the people is one, and they have all one language; and this they begin to do: and now nothing will be restrained from them, which they have imagined to do.
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Yes a culture is first held together by language, then customs and a common ethic. Sorry you don’t understand the point of the story. See why folks misunderstand prophecy? They even take snippets of history and twist it ways that were never intended,
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Wow. That’s pretty arrogant. I’m not missing any context at all. God is simply not who you think he is, but those in power that use(d) superstition as a tool.
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So God was afraid of His creatures is how you read the text??? Now who’s arrogant?
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God said he saw they we about to accomplish what they’d set out to do. I never mentioned fear. Your problem is you assume the story actually happened.
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Oh I am sure they would have completed the tower but the fallacy was in their hubris. They would have built a huge tower into the sky and claimed that reached into heaven. Would that be true? God is not part of the material world and people who have limited knowledge of Christianity would most likely know that. So why would you, and intelligent person, put forward this response as meaning that the tower would have taken them to into Heaven? Come on Jim, get real.
Anyway, thanks for your comments but I’ve got to get some sleep.
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Ah, who thinks heaven is in the sky? There were some interesting technologies many years ago as evidenced by the megalithic structures. Heaven in the sky is a fable in itself. The universe is smarter than your story here Scoop. Always looking at life through the lens of the monarchial boss.
The idea is by working together We can do anything. But we’re hamstringed by belief mode. It’s actually silly belief is respected at all. All it does is lead to bickering, even among yourselves. Neat trick to keep stupidity occupied
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Never gave me a moments worry or thought. Even as a kid the story was like a parable explaining things much more at the heart of Christianity than pagan ideas. I don’t see any Christians misunderstanding this episode so why do you think we are amusing ourselves and bickering about these things. We aren’t. Just a silly remark Jim. But enough already. I’m putting it up for the night.
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Fantastic. Put it up. I’m not addressing bickering about the story of Babel. Bickering and sidetracked by beliefs, that all. Well never get anywhere beachside your belief gives you the “god given piety to condemn others. You must angry-read or something. Having trouble connecting the dots?
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You read anger? A bit emotional are we Jim?
I hate nobody and condemn no one and want all to receive the beatific vision including you and every other atheist. The whole point was why do you atheist come here to vex Christians when you have nothing to gain and yet everything to lose? You waste your time here where you could be doing something useful. You will change no minds or hearts and we understand that we will not change your’s either. Its a fruitless pursuit. Praying for you and the rest is about all we can do. God will have to find a way into your life for nobody can argue their way into belief. That’s silly. What would you gain if I fell from belief? Sadly, it might be the most important thing of any man’s life although you will never buy it. So conversations go nowhere because you have no purpose here and I am not some evangelist to the atheists of the world. I believe that if you are prevented from belief by invincible ignorance you still have a slim chance but that is a completely different subject. So we can leave at the point where a) you waste your time and b) you and your friends waste our time as well. So it is a lose – lose. It makes no sense, so I don’t know why you do it. As Charlie said; when he was an atheist he never wasted any time on this. That sounds like a logical use of his time and intellect for he had nothing to gain by wasting peoples time in such conversations.
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Yes, you sound angry and often hateful. Especially when bantering backside chats with others who write here. I’ve read it all. This is the normal tone when surrounded with belief—an excerpt from you…
“ The people who are pushing this rot and destroying the lives of our children should be rotting in jail before they rot in hell which is probably their final destination—Scoop
How much love can beliefs like this are in the faith.
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Without context or link how can I remember 1 of over 18,000 comments I’ve said here. So it is useless unless I can read the context.
Like most kids today you worry too much about tone and too little on content. If you want to elicit the tone of anger why don’t you pull this trolling bit over at a muslim site? I’d be interested in the tone you receive. Please let me know how it goes.
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I visit Muslim sites too. The context is from a post you wrote Scoop on your blog. There are plenty of others. It’s not your tone that bothers me. It’s your tone that shows you’re bothered. I didn’t troll you scoop. You are the one that tagged atheism and misrepresented it with nonsense. Nonessential, careless crap and you’re being corrected.
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So you visited Muslim sites, hmm. Well did you tell them that their belief if Allah was bunk and that they would be better off to quit believing this garbage? If so, what was their response; a fatwa?
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They are typically quite calm and reasonable in the beginning. But that is the way of proselytizing. Most of the Muslims I’ve encountered are genuine and thoughtful, but it still requires belief, and if you don’t believe it becomes trouble. In Abrahamic circles it is more respectable to believe the wrong thing than to not believe in anything. That’s the irony of belief. Belief is a special club where belief of any kind is respected and protected by law, where unbelief is demonized. It’s important for beliefs to carry such ambiguous authority. That’s how the trick perpetuates. And it’s in the rank and file too. Any group that will embrace you over belief will abandon over unbelief. It has a lot to do with the hormones and our evolution, but is now hijacked where belief supplanted practical spirituality and utility. Now believing is the gold standard.
It’s interesting, back in the day you go to the shaman and he prepares some plants and herbs, present some ritual cleansing and would heal his subject by entering the spirit world to access a solution. They were very effective and surpassed the European physicians of the time. In Christianity the priest says a few words over you into outer space, quotes you some verse you already know, and you remain troubled or sick. There are no signs in Christianity. No miracles. Just words that dissipate into the stratosphere. Completely out of touch with the earth and it’s healing properties.
Now you could say god prepared those things for man and that would be fair enough, but today’s preachers can’t tell a thistle from a chicken foot. All they have is words.
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Sounds like you’re a Mother Earth worshipper.
Funny how mankind ‘evolved’ and is the highest form of life on the planet and the only ones who seem hardwired for supernatural belief. Wonder why that is, Jim?
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It hasn’t always been about belief. That’s the funny part. After your religion famously exterminated nearly every other way of being in the world, now we are saddled with belief. We used to have utility. I’m sure you can see even in your own lifetime how there is less utility or usefulness and more opinion.
No, I am not a Mother Earth worshipper. Simply observant.
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Exterminated? We merely fought for our very lives. The Abrahamic religions all around. Most of the pagans converted due to the hard work and exemplary lives of missionaries. But there are plenty of pagans left; especially Hindi and Buddhists.
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That is about the most biased, rose-colored, whitewash I have ever read. Total nonsense. Christianity bullied its way around the world and left destruction everywhere it planted its flag.I saw exactly what the noble Christian missionaries did to the Indians in my region. Hard work through force and coercion. Really just bullies
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Seems to me that is was Christians being fed to the lions and that the first 50 Popes were murdered. It also seems to me that the Christian faith managed to survive underground in Japan for 700 years until they could come out of hiding. That doesn’t sound like bullying it sounds like deep belief that the people were loathe to give up even if persecuted by the state. Same thing happened in Russia/USSR.
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The stranglehold of faith causes decent man to do horrible things. Locally, right here at Fort Spokane, they rounded up the Colville Indian children for compulsory Catholic education. The ones that escaped were captured and put in solitary confinement and punished. I have toured the tiny jail cells they kept the children, and they took their shoes away from them. It’s just the way of the Catholic Church. Take a beautifully free person and confine them over belief. Really it’s sadistic
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You just have it in for faith it seems.
Indians tribes scalped and raped each other routinely before a Christian ever set foot in America. In fact, tribes from every part of the globe were fighting not because of religion but because of culture. Christianity is simply in those terms another culture that was formed from disparate cultures around the world. I happens to be forged in religion which makes sense because ethics is one of the best glues for a culture than anything else. Along with that is language, traditions, music and practices. If all these things are held in common then you have a cohesive society. How and why do you think that nation states evolve; for survival. Cultural peoples have been fighting their neighbors for territory and a place where they can expect that there culture is shared by those within their borders. If you combine cultures you are looking for bloodshed. So your pretty rosy Indians weren’t the noble savages you paint them. They are like everybody else, killing or being killed until an equilibrium is found and borders protect them from their enemies. That’s life. Religion has been the only thing that has been able to take otherwise disparate cultures and make of them a singe culture and a more peaceful world. Conflicts per 100,000 citizens have been dripping every century since the end of colonializm. We are now are at the lowest level of wars and conflicts that the world has ever seen; hovering between 1 to 3 homicides per 100.000 when all are factored in. You just don’t like the science.
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So which is it Scoop, the wicked end of the world, or are we in the most peaceful time? Funny how these peaceful times are also the most secular that we’ve ever known as well.
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And really the real miracle is how the Kogi managed to evade the Catholics for 500 years in the mountains of Columbia. Now that’s a miracle
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Nobody chase them but it might have been a good idea. Those tribes killed one another all the time and still do. Canibalism reigned as they though eating their enemies would give them strength over their enemies. Your precious Indians displayed the scalps of the conquests over their enemies in their tents celebrating their murders. Man is man and you need to man up to that fact (no pun
intended).
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You’ve fallen prey to the best propaganda trick in the book. Demonize the enemy to justify your own atrocities. It’s really quite remarkable that through faith you yourself, would have done to the “savages” what no regular person would do. There are many first hand accounts of early encounters with the Native American. Settlers were intimidated by the apparent physical and superior ethics and honesty of the native. It puzzled them that they had more integrity but had not known Jesus. Really quite fascinating. You should try to read Bartolo de las Casas accounts in the Caribbean with Columbus. I know it’s a first hand account from a catholic priest, but his descriptions of the natives is remarkable. They knew not violence nor defended themselves as the Christians cut up their babies and de-breasted their women alive. They burned the men alive 13 at a time on a gibbet in honor Christ their lord and the 12 apostles.
“They knew no violence and it appeared they had no gods..they would make fine slaves”. You’re attempt to defend your faith is pure ignorance spawned by belief.
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I’d rather deal with the growth of moral standards that has occurred it is documented. You don’t think the SA Indians did not offer human sacrifices and cut the hearts from their victims while they were still alive. Give me a break. How are the Chinese treating those who don’t buy into their culture? You can say the sam of everyone who lives in direct contact with different cultures. Christians never tried to commit genocide of a people . . . others did. Slavery ended by Christians primarily when they got enough power to combat the secular forces at play. It is simply reality. Men of different cultures can differ dramatically; some are savages and others would rather keep their own even if they have to hide in the mountains of Columbia. But hatred between men and their cultures have always existed will until this world comes to an end.
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Of course, but your doctrine that is said to know better, has been of the worst offenders. “By their fruit he shall know them” Your stories do nothing to cover the brutalities caused by belief..in the Bible
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The dead over our entire history was eclipsed with the bombings of Dresden, Tokyo and Nagasaki. You just hate religion because you don’t have one and therefore hate the fact that others do.
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I just see the errant outcomes of faith. I don’t hate anything at all, but I do see things and their outcomes. Christianity has never produced the promised results. Ever!
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It already has; over and over again. They created the first hospitals, orphanages and soup kitchens for the poor that flourished. But aside from that it produced a list of saints that would overwhelm the number of people over your list of people sent to me. Again, you need to face your own prejudice which is not founded on facts but on your dislike. Maybe you have a deep seated scar that has driven your prejudice or maybe you just sense that you don’t want to live for that end for which you were made; God Himself. That’s your call.
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Also, it seems that you have little faith in the upward trajectory of evolution. You prefer to return to the Stone Age in seems.
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Religious belief has stalled human progress. I totally trust evolution, but the monotheistic stall of belief has the world on a hamster wheel. There is no utility to it. Just belief. Words. Really just words. That’s all Christianity has to offer. Far cry from the shaman of old
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No utility? We live longer and happier lives than any civilized group in history. Less stress and anxiety and far more peaceful. What will upset the apple cart is when the WMD’s are unleashed by the secular leaders of this world. Then death rates and everything else will be destroyed in record time. You won’t be able to blame the Christians for this. Look to your atheist scientists.
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Longevity is not necessarily success. Happier? Hahaha. Wow
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https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2019/01/31/are-religious-people-happier-healthier-our-new-global-study-explores-this-question/
https://www.independent.co.uk/life-style/religion-happy-atheism-psychology-faith-belief-emotion-mental-health-christianity-a8766376.html
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Have you ever considered atheist struggle because they are hated and despised for a mere thought? I live in a highly religious area and would be burned out of my house with all the right wing Christian 90% trump voting supremacist in my area. Especially being married to a person of color. I hear first hand their true thoughts as they assume I am one of them. Your religion is a phony front housing massive abuse, cover up and hatred. That’s what I don’t like about it.
I don’t like the fact that my wife won’t get helped at the store by religious nuts that pretend they don’t see her.
I’ve been privy to the talk behind the scenes. Not just here, but everywhere “two or three meet together in my name”.
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No because I don’t think of them at all. The only time I see them they are acting like illegal aliens trying to destroy the culture that they invade; atheist trolling of Catholic sites. Otherwise they go completely unnoticed.
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You tagged atheism in the post then misrepresented it. Your spreading belief. It’s what belief does—divide. Over and over.
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Belief doesn’t divide in unites. And are you telling me that Charlie’s post wasn’t about his being an atheist? Where is your integrity in such an observation.
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Matthew 10: 34 Think not that I am come to send peace on earth: I came not to send peace, but a sword.
35 For I am come to set a man at variance against his father, and the daughter against her mother, and the daughter in law against her mother in law.
36 And a man’s foes shall be they of his own household. That’s your doctrine, not mine. It seems to work across borders as well.
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Indeed, and we have hated by the world from the start and yet from 12 we are now at 1.3 billion souls. Go figure. That people oppose you and you are at a distinct minority does not mean that what is best will not rise to the top in time and with God’s grace. This is the mystery and miracle. From a persecuted band of mostly illiterate men we grew at an unprecedented pace and still teach the same good news: Christ suffered and died for our personal sins. If you reject the gift then you reject God and you will (in your mind) face nothingness from which you sprang. I am hopeful that there is hope for everyone until you die. This gift leaves no one out. It is inclusive to use the new buzz word of the politicians.
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Yes! Exactly. Your faith was adopted by the state and forced conversion at the point of a sword for over 1000 years. It’s a miracle! See, faith is so wonderful even conquistador can spread it.
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There is a lot of shoddy historical scholarship on that point. Had we done so it seems to me as we gained presence in the world we would all be Christians now; no Jews, no Buddhists, not Muslims etc. We had to fight the Muslims who are everyone’s worst enemy. If you want to look at forced conversions look no further than Islam.
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Sure. It’s all about peace until you merely don’t believe it. Religion sort of unites as long as everyone believes the same. But a group that will embrace you over belief, will betray you over unbelief.
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Not my experience. I had lots of neighbors, co-workers, family members etc. that weren’t believers. They didn’t attack those who believe and nobody attacked those who didn’t. I think you have a chip on your shoulder, Jim.
That link disqualifies itself in its first paragraph. A true Christian isn’t sitting around in a boring wait. There is advancement in spirituality and in the service that Churches do for their communities. Next Thursday parishes will feed untold numbers of the poor and put their own holiday on hold until they see these people taken care of, The same happens every Christmas and we are all involved in groups of churches that do such work every day of the year. If that is ruining your life somehow then I don’t know what to say to you.
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Besides, who has developed the mass weapons of mass destruction; Christians?? its your enlightened scientists and enslavement with an eye on the conquest of all mankind is what we all are facing along with a complete loss of privacy and freedom. Borders and important and mixing cultures is a disaster waiting to happen. Religion is the best chance for men to live together in peace not Communism, socialism or Marxism. The family is the secret and when they finish destroying our families then we have lost. Best keep your powder dry.
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Would you like to see the list of Christian murderous dictators? Please be realistic.
Adolf Hitler
Benito Mussolini
Franco
Napoleon
Oliver Cromwell
Maximilien Robespierre
Miguel Primo de Rivera
Vlad III
Kaiser Wilhelm II
Nicholas II
Leopold II
Romuald Traugutt
Slobodan Milošević
José Mendes Cabeçadas
Lord John Russell
To name just a few.
And the many African, Central and South American Christian dictators like Simón Bolívar, Pinochet, Agustín de Iturbide, Antonio López de Santa Anna, Porfirio Díaz, Rafael Carrera, Efrain Rios Montt, Maximiliano Hernández Martínez, Jorge Ubico, Daniel Ortega, Manuel Noriega, José Gaspar Rodríguez de Francia y Velasco, Carlos Ibáñez del Campo, Getúlio Vargas, Juan Vicente Gómez…mostly catholic, used to brutality by nature
And let’s not forget the Christian (Baptist) Théodore Sindikubwabo
who ordered the Rwandan genocide.
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O please. You begin with a man who left religion and embraced the old gods and traditions for political reasons. Will I have to write a book to cover every name you are digging up. I could give you names of equal length from every background or for those who had no faith at all: Mao, Stalin and other atheistic totalitarians. You skip the Christeros of Mexico or Vendee in France. Why so?
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Certainly, but Christians are supposed to know better. Faith is worthless words of belief in a system that fails every time. Everywhere it planted its flag was followed by oppression. Not just a masochist or two, but virtually every town and hamlet. This is the safest time in history to be alive. The world is less religious, not more. Even you have said that. Put two and two together for a change
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The faith is not worthless. People who ape that they are Christians use religion to their own detriment whilst smearing the teachings which if read them will find out quite simply that the our dogmas on faith and morals are unparalleled in fairness. Non=followers is not the way to judge a faith; its teachings do.
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You’ll get your moment of clarity. Hopefully your faith will mature into integrity.
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How did you get to be so smart as to read a man’s mind, heart and soul. At 73 I think I know the value of integrity. If integrity is bullying believers then I’m a monkey’s uncle.
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What you lack in integrity you make up for with excuses for the most corrupt organization in the history of the world.
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I don’t excuse the abusers of Christianity. I simply state that they are not Catholic if they do not only believe but live the teachings of the faith. So the faith can’t be judged on these men of no integrity. A country can’t be judged by those who violate the law. It is on the merit of the law and the justice of its enforcement. You don’t judge the country by a few people who don’t thrive in our country but by how many people our country brought out of poverty. You seem to despair of things out of your control and I find ways to forgive, forget, render justice where applicable and embrace the gifts and blessings that have graced my life.
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Of course you do …. you are a Christian.
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You have to excuse my friend good brother scoop , he defends his beloved catholic church come rain or come shine. To him, it can do no wrong. He and other mary worshipers claim that the peoples they mercilessly tortured and killed and exterminated had it coming. They claim the Albegensis people deserved to all be killed and babies heads smashed against brick walls.
Ive said it befor, people assume christianity is the catholic church, because it has the biggest mouth and worldly presence.
Good sister ark accuses good brother scoop of being a christian. Hes far from christian. Hes catholic and they will admit it.
The born again are christians. Even the biggest evangelists and well know preachers and prayerful people the born again consider them not christians.People claiming to be christians and their idiot religions have given belief in god a black eye.
I agree that indoctrinating kids with religion is a crime. The prot philosophy is from the bible….no us against them. But the catholic religion is a crime. It tells little kids they will burn in hell forever if they miss a catholic church service. may god damn the catholic church….and he will. Ill tell you who will wake up in hell….those monsters that scared those little kids half to death.The CC stamps out any hope for the child to grow up and seek the risen lord and be saved. The child grows up and believes the lies they were taught. I run into those kind every day. They hate any message of the good news that jesus stands at their door and knocks. They hate the idea of being saved. And dont make fun of their graven images, or you are the devil come in the flesh.
Its the catholic religion that good sister ark and good brother jim rebel against. They rightfully see it as the worst evil on the planet. But their mistake and their small mindedness is costing them salvation. They feel comfortable thinking there is no god. They actually like it. Imagine theres no heaven and no hell below. Good brother John Lennon, the mouthpiece of god haters, knows the truth now. Hes sitting up there on some burning sulfur next to Hitchens. The only ones they have to blame is themselves. The thing is, when one is sent to hell, they know exactly why and know that it is their just reward.
I helped my died in the wool god hating best friend move to his new house two yrs ago. He bought a whole town, with post office and general store, all deserted and dried up, because it was made in 1850. But, when it got dark, the heavens showed up. Me being from LA and still i live in a large area near LA, ive never seen the night sky in its entirety. My friend moved out to nowheresville in Lake Isabella. Ive never seen the stars like that. I was scared. It looked like we, the earth, was going to fall out into space.I could see that the earth was floating in space and space was giant and terrible. I felt helpless. These towering intellects called atheists can look at creation and shake their fists at their maker and say…”you didnt make me. you had nothing to do with the vast and might universe. You didnt give us this lifeboat called earth to ride in on the sea of the vast expanse of this vacuum called space.”
What arrogance. yet you can have children by having fun and say that you made them. You had nothing to do with creating a human. God fashioned them in the womb. You just water it and watch it grow. Stupid human.
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If what you say is true, God has made a very poor job of things for the last 2,000 years.
I presume you believe in the Great Apostasy.
Well – when it comes, there won’t be anything Great about it, since according to you there’s virtually nobody on earth faithful in the first place. The Damp Squib apostasy would better describe it.
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@ Bozo /Bosco the clown
Does you sect of Christianity have a thing against the lowly apostrophe?
Your friend died in the wool? That must have been one helluva jersey.
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Its all a matter of choice. One chooses to follow Christ and having made the decision the believer discovers that he has been chosen by our Lord.
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G K Chesterton said – or words to the effect – “Christianity has not been tried and found wanting. It has been found difficult and not tried.”
No one is strong enough to make the choice you refer to, without God’s grace.
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Of course, But it is the grace of God that enables us to make the choice in the first place.
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