The Internet vs. Religion - Page 2

On March 05 2011 16:07 Karliath wrote:
I will always have a problem with people who 100% seriously believe that I will end up in Hell, in eternal suffering and despair, just because I am a non-believer. It doesn't mean I will act antagonistically towards Christians, but it definitely bothers me.

We don't have to talk about it, because if I know you're Christian, I know that that is what you are, or at least should be, thinking. It feels very condescending, you know what I mean? Not only because you are 'naturally forced' to believe you are better than me, but also because of the fact that I'm being judged by something I don't believe in.

Now, you may say, "No no, we're all God's children," but if you think about it, that's honestly a truly lame excuse.

If I am wrong about this, please correct me. If not, I would appreciate a reply.

1. Am I going to Hell if I'm not Christian?
2. If I am, why aren't you trying to convert me? Wouldn't that be the right thing to do?

See if I believed that you were going to endure eternal suffering, I would do whatever it takes to help you avoid that situation. If the only protection is to become Christian, then I would preach like crazy trying to convince you to convert. An eternity without suffering outweights whatever belief system you may hold to, so I wouldn't care if I offended you or whatnot to get you to convert.

But you don't do that. In fact, you say that you don't go around trying to preach to people. Ostensibly, that's a good thing. But from a different perspective, it's really just mean.

Say for example a bomb is going to explode in a small town. You know this, but the people are ignorant of it. Why would you think it's a good idea for them to stick to their ignorance? It's almost as if you're thinking, "Pfft okay, if they don't want to believe me, that's their problem."

You see how this goes back to my point of condescension?

Overall, while I appreciate that many Christians don't go around preaching in my face, and I definitely don't believe in the religion, I find that it is bad for Christians, if they really believe in their faith, not to preach.

On March 05 2011 16:04 Shai wrote:


Perhaps it would surprise you to know that I excel in the sciences (apart from Biology because I hate memorizing and it seems to me that's all it is, both in high school and university, from personal experience). Though Gravity is indeed unprovable using a mathematical approach to the idea of a "proof" it is obviously more tangeable and as such the arguments surrounding it are somewhat non existent (apart from some guy I read who claims gravity works the opposite way we assume and that the combined forces of gravity from the universe are pushing us onto earth. But he's crazy). The Big Bang theory I take as the same sort of thing; when I said it was unprovable I meant it in the scientific sense. Please to not assume my ignorance.

As for religion being ultimately fantastical ... that is not at all the point of this post. Please refrain from going down that path. My entire point was it is not religion that harms people, but people who harm people. The institute of Christianity is more broad than that; it is only certain denominations, preachers, and leaders who are, in fact, maniacal, egotistical, and power hungry. It is indeed unfortunate that there are Christians who cause a great deal of strife for a great deal of people, just as it is unfortunate that there are agnostics, atheists, etc who do the same for similar ideologies.

Regardless of all of this, my point is this: I am not harming anyone through my practice of faith, and it has driven me to spend a great deal of my time volunteering at secular organizations. I am not asking for praise, and on the same level, I am not asking for animosity. I have spent a great amount of time mulling over American foreign affairs, and how much I dislike the militant parts of them, and yet at the same time I do not resent America or American people.

In this same way, I wish that I didn't have to read generalizations about Christians and Christianity.

On March 05 2011 17:15 philly5man wrote:
If you're Christian and aren't trying to convert people, does that mean you're cool with the fact that those people are going to hell for all eternity? Even if they're close friends or family? To me, a Christian who doesn't try to convert his/her friends to Christianity is either not a devout Christian, or is just a horrible selfish person who doesn't care about others.

On March 05 2011 17:39 Gak2 wrote:
If you don't believe that, then what about babies who die before they get a chance to be baptized? do they go to hell too?

On March 05 2011 17:39 Gak2 wrote:

you can't say that all Christians believe all non-Christians are going to hell... like my belief for example, is that God shows mercy to all souls, Christian or not. If you don't believe that, then what about babies who die before they get a chance to be baptized? do they go to hell too? Blah blah I could argue this for hours but it would probably be tl;dr
I guess my real point is, you can't make all these assumptions about religion based on what you hear or see... what people believe is ultimately up to them.

On March 05 2011 20:33 Wolf wrote:
Atheists feel you're wasting your time worshiping something that doesn't even exist, of course. That's why they're Atheists. What would you think if a group of your friends were worshiping an old refrigerator in some basement somewhere ? You'd want to tell them they're nuts and to stop doing it, even if you weren't trying to convert them to Christianity. You might even poke fun at them for doing something so ridiculous-- Asking them why they go to that basement every Tuesday night for an hour or two, while someone there speaks about the refrigerator and all that it has done to keep foods fresh, and the stories of how it almost died but was repaired.

Most Atheists look at you the same way you would look at someone worshiping an object nonsensically. They want you to see the world from their view; in a sense, more objectively. They see what you're doing as a waste of time and silly, so of course they're going to let you know they think that.

On March 05 2011 16:04 Shai wrote:

My entire point was it is not religion that harms people, but people who harm people.

On March 05 2011 22:48 DongWang wrote:
Shai, question: are you an epic troll or just a giant retard? How the fuck can you believe in evolution and even begin to call your self a Christian? That is by far the biggest contradiction I have ever heard of.

On March 05 2011 16:31 Karliath wrote:


Agnostics don't believe that there's a 50% chance God exists. -_-
They (or we) believe that God's existence is unknown or unknowable. There's a big difference.

As far as atheists go, I don't think they measure the probability of God's existence either. I mean if you think about it reversely, no Christian would say, "Oh, I believe there's a 98% chance God exists."

Edit: I think you're actually trying to talk about how 'in-tune' people are to each of these 'beliefs,' but it's still strange to describe these feelings quantitatively.

On March 05 2011 22:59 Cloud wrote:
lol, the internet is filled with people who have really strong opinions and an equally strong urge to voice them, on subjects they don't know jack about. Religion is one of the easiest things to have an opinion against. You just have to say it goes against logic and science and yadayada. The anonymity granted by the internet, saves you from having others know just how full of shit you are because you're not a scientist or even able to think logically, yet you're going around, calling other people idiots. The perfect example is this gem: