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Quote :On the same vein, all major religions have the exact same core teachings of humanity, which existed long before organized religion ever did.

Yes, the stories of Abraham. Christianity, Judaism, and Islam are all the "Children of Abraham" and are bastardisations of the same original stories. That's right all you war mongers out there, you really are killing your fellow disciples because that's what God told you to do...

Of course if you read the bible than Abraham only had one son (Genesis 22:2, Hebrews 11:17) or was it two sons? (Galatians 4:22), or was it half a dozen? (Genesis: 25: 1 through 2) but don't be confused by the bible please, i'm talking about history.
Quote from Kdovi :I don't want to say that's ok. On the other hand, I was taught Darwin's theory as a fact by my parents and school. I was taken to basic school where I was taught it as a fact. I was never asked if I wanted to be atheist... all other theories were just wrong answers in tests, nothing more.

How on "Gods Earth" did you manage to leap from Darwinism, a devout Christian himself, to aethiesm? The two are unrelated.

Except of course some believe that the King James translation of Genesis is literal. As mentioned earlier in this thread it is "In A Beginning" not "In The Beginning". You can believe in Christianity and Genesis perfectly fine, and you can believe in evolution perfectly fine, they are not mutually exclusive.

Please be rational, evolution is proven (1 in 45,000 genes mutate randomly and are not inheritted), creationism is based upon faith (a Human derived concept predating evidence). The entire context of Genesis is not literal. And the two are not mutually exclusive..
Replying to 'em in order they were posted ...

Quote from samjh :and the US Bill of Rights was inspired by Christian teachings.

First part of the Bill of Rights - the first amendment.

Quote from First amendment to the US constitution :Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion

That would defeat it's own purpose, surely.

Surely if it was based on Christian teachings it would include stoning gays at halftime in the football.

The founding fathers were primarily deists or atheists, BTW.

Quote :The thing is, a lot of people are brought up in Christian families, and are not Christian anyway. No one is forcing anyone to keep being a Christian after they turn 18 years of age. The days of the Spanish Inquisition are long gone.

By the time they are eighteen they will quite possibly be sufficiently brainwashed.

Quote :One of the reasons why religion exists, is to establish a framework of moral conduct. Some religions have become dominant over some others. Personally, I'm glad that the society I'm living in doesn't have men from each tribe slaughtering another tribe to steal their women, or sacrificing infants in volcanic craters.

Human morality is practically universal. A group of scientists asked a number of people in the US questions such as

Quote from example question :Denise is standing by a railway line. A runaway train is heading down the track and the track splits in two. It is currently set to a route where it would hit five people. There is one person on the other one. Should she change the points so that the train hits one person as opposed to five?

They then asked questions to members of a tribe in the Amazon (modified to replace runaway trains with crocodiles and canoes and so-on) with no organized religion and little contact with the outside world. They got similar results. Aside from the fact that in the US, upon entry to prison, there are (relative to the population at large in the US) christians than atheists.

Quote from Mackie The Staggie :Relgion does'nt cause wars, war is normally casued by complete ****s who use relgion to validate their hate of another race/nation/person. And at the end of the day, the reason for most wars is either an ego trip for a power hunger dictator of money.

Crusades, Spanish inquisition, current situation in South-west Asia (my god tells me that I can have your house) and the list goes on.

Quote from Becky Rose :I hold equal abhoration for all the children of Abraham.

Quote from samjh :Are you saying you abhor all people of Middle Eastern descent?

Probably a foot in mouthism for not liking Abrahamic religions.

Quote from samjh :Homosexual Christians reconcile themselves with Christianity quite alright. Some are actually high-ranking clergy.

Like many roman catholics priests thenthen. Due to celibacy they went for the altar boys instead - and Ratzinger (The first German since the 40s to have his own private army, many devoted and brainwashed followers and a penchant for public speaking from balconies) protects 'em.

Quote from samjh :Homosexual Christians reconcile themselves with Christianity quite alright. ... If a Christian truly believes in God and in Jesus Christ, then it would be wrong to treat anyone with hatred or indifference - least of all for their sexual orientation.

Reconcile these then :P

Quote from The bible :Genesis (I never really liked Phil Collins, but the video for Jesus He Knows me is amusing) 18:22 - Thou shalt not lie with mankind, as with womankind: it is abomination
Leviticus 18:22 - Thou shalt not lie with mankind, as with womankind: it is abomination.
Leviticus 20:13 - If a man also lie with mankind, as he lieth with a woman, both of them have committed an abomination: they shall surely be put to death; their blood shall be upon them.
1 Timothy 1:10 (Yes, the new testament) - For whoremongers, for them that defile themselves with mankind, for menstealers, for liars, for perjured persons, and if there be any other thing that is contrary to sound doctrine;

Quote from Dennis93 :They cheek kiss eachother in some places i think, french politicans is gay then? i dont think so.

No, with their secretaries they keep Durex running. and the original post was humour anyway

I hope the mods won't stone me for the length of this post ...
Quote from DevilDare :OK, i need help answering this question "You dont need to go to church to be a good christian" it is part of my RE Coursework (I go to Catholic School) and i am really stuck on it.
I thought i would ask the great "philosophical" LFS Community to help me out

If you could write your oppinions regarding this question on "Agree" and "Disagree" it would be very nice, it would give me ideas and help to type up the damn 1000 words

Religion matters have nothing to do with philosophical opinions.
Your teacher asked you to write about that in order to prove you, regardless your opinion, that “You need to go to church to be a good christian”
Quote from kaynd :Religion matters have nothing to do with philosophical opinions.
Your teacher asked you to write about that in order to prove you, regardless your opinion, that “You need to go to church to be a good christian”

Oh god, everyone who has posted a comment like that... Are you going to a school situated in the year 1932?
I went to a Catholic school, the teacher was Catholic, but she NEVER had a problem with someone saying God doesn't exist. She was very positive about being able to have a conversation about the existence of God and the meaning for different people and she respected it.

I think it's a shame people think a Catholic school forces Christianity, hell, my school almost had more Muslim students than Christian
Quote : Surely if it was based on Christian teachings it would include stoning gays at halftime in the football.

Right after all the non-virgin brides are stoned (Deuteronomy 22:13 through 21).

Quote : Leviticus 18:22 - Thou shalt not lie with mankind, as with womankind: it is abomination.
Leviticus 20:13 - If a man also lie with mankind, as he lieth with a woman, both of them have committed an abomination: they shall surely be put to death; their blood shall be upon them.

Leviticus is a holiness code (it does not apply to worshippers only to Priests). Otherwise we would also be banned from round haircuts, tattoos, working on the Sabbath, wearing composite textiles, eating pork or shellfish, getting ours fortune tolds, and even playing with the skin of a pig.

The priests holiness code has been updated many times internally within most denominations yet Leviticus is still published in the bible? I wont pretend to be equipped to answer this contradiction any more than I can answer some of the bibles other contradictions.

Quote :1 Timothy 1:10 (Yes, the new testament) - For whoremongers, for them that defile themselves with mankind, for menstealers, for liars, for perjured persons, and if there be any other thing that is contrary to sound doctrine;

This was a mistranslation, and one made as recently as 1958. In the Greek text it was translated from Timothy said God condemned "malokois" and "arsenokoitai".

Malaokois has evolved in modern Greek to meen "male prostitutes" but it is believed that the word originally meant "effeminate young male call boys". In either case it is not specifically homosexual behaviour being referred too.

Arsenokoitai is an unknown word and nobody really has any idea what it means, it's usually attributed to the customers of the malaokois. Again, it does not reffer to homosexual behaviour.

Thank you *deep bow*
Quote from Becky Rose :<mistranslation issue>

There were many mistranslations, I used the King James Version as that was the closest to hand (on the Interwebs).
Quote from Becky Rose :...

Sorry, my post wasn't really clear. I meant it more like it's always bad when they're trying to make you believe in something different than you do (of course except for things like 'killing people is bad'). No matter if it's like Jak said or as I said. It was reaction on Jack's post, not anything like "evolution doesn't exist! burn in hell!"
Quote :(of course except for things like 'killing people is bad')

I do not agree that killing people is bad.

Seriously.

If anyone here has had the misfortune of being in a situation where they had to kill or be killed then I have no problem with that person, if anything, they have my sympathy for having to come to terms with what they've had to do.

Now religion might say that killing people is bad (unless its stoning a gay of course), and so might the law (although self defence is accepted as just provided it is within "reasonable force"), but I dont see why you would say "of course except for".

Personally I draw the line at rape as my "of course", but only because I cannot imagine a situation where a rape is just. If somebody can justify it though then i'm willing to listen.
Quote from Kdovi :Sorry, my post wasn't really clear. I meant it more like it's always bad when they're trying to make you believe in something different than you do

but science doesnt ask you to believe in anything... in fact it does the complete opposite
Someone somewhere must have a bumper sticker that reads:
"You don't need to go to church to be a good Christian..... ....but it helps".

I think the Church would say that you should go to church if you can, but then they would. I doubt they would cast you into hell if you were unable to go, or if you were somewhere that didn't have a single church, like the moon. You could still adhere to Christianity and believe what you believe without your sunday visit.
Quote from sgt.flippy :Oh god, everyone who has posted a comment like that... Are you going to a school situated in the year 1932?
I went to a Catholic school, the teacher was Catholic, but she NEVER had a problem with someone saying God doesn't exist. She was very positive about being able to have a conversation about the existence of God and the meaning for different people and she respected it.

Lucky you.

I went to a Catholic High School, and we also had a high number of students of other (or no) faiths. My tenth grade religion teacher made an honest attempt to fail me, simply because I do not share her views on God and/or religion. That is not an exaggeration, either, she literally tried to make me fail. We argued in front of the class on many, many occasions, as well. On the flip side, my 11th and 12th grade religion teachers were pretty cool - but those classes weren't based on the bible. 11th grade was based around other world religions, and 12th grade was based more on philosophy and philosophical matters as they pertain to religion.

Coincidence that the teacher of the Christian religion class was the odd one out? I doubt it.
This thread derailed...not that it wasnt expected when talking about this matter.

I beleive to be a good Christian you don't need to go to church. There is nothing in stone I know of that says you have to.
I'm too stupid to explain it properly, but what if a really advanced species had the ability to create solar systems, galaxy's and even a universe in the same way plants are grown from seeds. Would that be Creationism? Could evolution work alongside creationism if something was created to evolve?
Quote from ATC Quicksilver :what if a really advanced species had the ability to create solar systems, galaxy's and even a universe in the same way plants are grown from seeds. Would that be Creationism? Could evolution work alongside creationism if something was created to evolve?

Well yeah, that's a fairly self explanatory question, so you've kinda answered yourself already.

And it is essentially what the modern day churches are preaching. "God created all living organisms and programmed into their genetic code the ability to micro-evolve". And then go on to claim macro-evolution is a pile of pants simply because it doesn't fit within a biblical timeframe.
#66 - CSU1
Quote from DevilDare :OK, i need help answering this question "You dont need to go to church to be a good christian"

Agree, because of what android said.

Quote from Dajmin :No merciful God in the universe is going to punish you eternally for being a good person and making one little mistake

?.but if there was no devil, everybody would have nothin to fear and all hell would break loose. so, really, if you believe in a God you must believe in Ahura Mazda too.

Quote from Becky Rose :The Christian church is as bad and evil as most other religions

I agree, but the good of the few outweigh the bad of the many.

Quote from ATC Quicksilver :I'm too stoned to explain it properly, but what if a really advanced species had the ability to create solar systems, galaxy's and even a universe in the same way plants are grown from seeds. Would that be Creationism? Could evolution work alongside creationism if something was created to evolve?

me too. Imo. in a nutshell, religion was designed as a kind of mental-health handbook, nothing more. Religions simply become the result of their surroundings, so we should not frown on them for their differences that we see as unacceptable or untrue.

anyway

All that happened was some smart guy/gal(edit lol.oooops) a couple of thousands of years ago realized there was money to be made in the mental health profession telling storys, media and local government drove it down everyone's necks and whalla!

If you think God is real, well then so too is the tooth fairy
saying you don't need to go to church to be a good christian is like saying you don't need to kill someone to be a good murderer

and no, I'm not religious. I've got better things to do than waste my time worshipping some non-existant entity in the sky
it doesn't matter being a good christian,good muslim or whatever you are. The matter is being a good person , the problem is choice. The God wants only the one thing ''being a good person and believe to him''.
One of my favourite quotes...

"Question with boldness even the existence of a God; because, if there be one, he must more approve of the homage of reason, than that of blind-folded fear."

Thomas Jefferson
Quote from DevilDare :OK, i need help answering this question "You dont need to go to church to be a good christian"

The sentence is true for some definitions of "good christian". It is false for some (other) definitions. If you are a person who frets about the answer to that question, then in your case the answer is probably "false".
Quote :it is part of my RE Coursework (I go to Catholic School)

If you are a person who is required, by some authority, to give an answer to that question, then the answer is probably "false", too.
Quote from ATC Quicksilver :I'm too stupid to explain it properly, but what if a really advanced species had the ability to create solar systems, galaxy's and even a universe in the same way plants are grown from seeds.

Your advanced species could never create a universe, because it is itself part of the universe.

(Unless, that is, you define that species to be outside our universe. In that case you have postulated a supernatural being. Or, to put it differently, you have just started a new religion. )

But suppose there existed, within the universe, a species that could create galaxies. (Um, that is a bit far-fetched, right? OK, let's say that they could produce small solar systems. :tilt Then the question still remains how this species came into existence. If the species evolved in Darwinian style, then this is not Creationism.
Creating a solar system is not far fetched, but I won't get into all of that, just that it does not require god like powers to do it.

This universe is quite crude, everything has a beginning and an end, eventually everything dies. What if the universe is just a creation, and beyond it is a place that is timeless, where things just exist and continue to progress without coming to an end, that means it is the true platform for everything we know, it was not created, it won't die. Then there could be a species there so advanced that they could create universes, ones contained enough so that species could never reach a level where they would discover who or what created their universe.

Then universes would be their machines for gathering information and resources, they plant the seed and let them grow, program them to evolve so that they didn't need to keep making Universe Alpha Patch X Y Z..etc, then collect all the data and energy from them. I guess in a Christian sense this timeless place would be heaven and god would be the creator of the universes, although I like to think of that role more like a programmer or a gardener.

But what I am trying to get across is the reason I became Agnostic instead of Atheist, if you ignore religious stories, you can come up with a theory of creation that makes more sense to you than Christianity or any other kind of religion. I went to a Church of England school, we were taught a balanced view of most things, but we were always taught Christianity as if it were fact, instead of just stories. So as a kid I thought Jesus was a dude that actually came back to life and walked on water, and that he would turn up one day and save all mankind from evil stuff. When I got older I was angry that I was taught Christianity that way, and just rejected all religion and the idea of creation. Then I got a little bit older and got into Sci-Fi novels, and started reading up on the ideas and things mentioned in them, and sort of realised that its silly to ignore the theory of creation when its perfectly possible to manipulate or create planets and solar systems, obviously not with technology we have now, but given the rate of progress we are making then it could be a matter of a few hundred years until we start to terraform other planets to meet our needs.

At the end of the day, I think believing that Manbearpigs created our universe so they had something to do at the weekend is less crazy than claiming 100% truth about something we don't really understand yet.
A good Christian. Is that opinionated, or is there a standard to what is considered "Good"?

Church is just the organized part of the religion, I believe one could still be spiritual without it. But it's either the religion sets the standards, or you do it. (Im tired, sorry for some weird wording.)

Mind you, I'm not Catholic anymore, even though legally I might be considered so.
I dread the coming of the great white handkerchief.
i seem to remember that you only had 2 arms in those pics
now im not sure if sitting for hours in a tight space driving to the meeting with you is a good idea... a third one might actually be useful for driving without those sissy flappy paddles though

FGED GREDG RDFGDR GSFDG