How is faith in God attained?
- Thread starter nds1
- Start date
Its different for different people.
C S Lewis for example was an atheist who set out to disprove God and accidently converted himself.
Francis Collins was an agnostic atheist who came to science and felt only a creator could explain the inexplicable efficiency of mathematics and the fine tuning of physical constants in the universe.
The same wait faith in the non existence of God is attained. Everything that proves there is not a God also proves there is a God.
Another interesting question is: "How do atheists come to their point of view?" Few, if any atheists were raised in the absence of attempts to make them believers.
Most atheists I have known were well educated and raised by families who were theists.
Most atheists I have known were well educated and raised by families who were theists.
What is an agnostic athiest? That's like a thiest athiest.
Someone who is anxious to avoid arguments that prove atheism is a dogma entirely based on proving a negative.
Yes i am an atheist and i was raised catholic. I went to church, prayed, and earnestly tried to live my life with jesus. I tried i honestly did. I did not want to be an atheist. as the creeping suspicion started coming along as i became a teenager, started to notice the lack of evidence, the frequent contradictions and nonsensical explanations religion was giving me. I tried to suppress that doubt, i felt guilty for not believing as earnestly as others. I pleaded to god for him not to lose me, i wanted so badly to feel his presence in my life. I begged him to enter into my life as he had apparently for others, i could forget the flaws i had discovered in christianity if only god would reassure me. After years of this constant longing for god to enter my life, i realized it was all in vain. I denounced god, and after not being struck down by a bolt of lightning, i concluded that i was right. Nothing has changed in my life since then, no disease, bad luck, revelations, nothing. Now I have actually looked more into teh religion topic, and every day i become more confident that god does not exist. It sucks to be an atheist, i am always afraid to express my opinions, people look at me like i am satanic and going to hell, they will not listen to my reasoning. But i can not force myself to live in delusion. I am just so glad i found sciforums where i know there are others like me. so that is my personal story of how i adopted the atheistic belief.
Rom 12:3-4
3 For I say, through the grace given to me, to everyone who is among you, not to think of himself more highly than he ought to think, but to think soberly, as God has dealt to each one a measure of faith.
NKJV
James 2:5
5 Listen, my beloved brethren: Has God not chosen the poor of this world to be rich in faith and heirs of the kingdom which He promised to those who love Him?
NKJV
These verses seem to suggest that God somehow "gives" faith to certain people. He gives people differing amounts of faith. If he has chosen the poor to be rich in faith, then is that unfair for people born into wealth? Can wealthy people be equally as faithful?
3 For I say, through the grace given to me, to everyone who is among you, not to think of himself more highly than he ought to think, but to think soberly, as God has dealt to each one a measure of faith.
NKJV
James 2:5
5 Listen, my beloved brethren: Has God not chosen the poor of this world to be rich in faith and heirs of the kingdom which He promised to those who love Him?
NKJV
These verses seem to suggest that God somehow "gives" faith to certain people. He gives people differing amounts of faith. If he has chosen the poor to be rich in faith, then is that unfair for people born into wealth? Can wealthy people be equally as faithful?
Mosheh Thezion
Registered Senior Member
PEOPLE... are going to believe in something.
in todays world... people have found secular science and theory.
atheists... gling to it.... they hug it... embrace it.
what they dont know..... is any of the real science.
-MT
in todays world... people have found secular science and theory.
atheists... gling to it.... they hug it... embrace it.
what they dont know..... is any of the real science.
-MT
Furthermore Dan Barker a former preacher became an atheist:
http://www.antichrist.net/dan.html
http://www2.ljworld.com/news/2004/nov/13/former_preacher_deconverts/
And even wrote a book about it!
http://ffrf.org/books/lfif/
Also dully noted Ali Sina left Islam for atheism:
http://www.faithfreedom.org/Articles/sina/why_i_left_islam.htm
Hey MT, can you write an argument without preaching please like you are receiving some kind of revelation?
It gets......very annoying.....when you
talk..........as if you are being divinely inspired
and you.......have some grandiose message....to share with all
and you wonder why nobody takes you seriosly? get off your pulpit and stop ranting and trying to make profound statements
It gets......very annoying.....when you
talk..........as if you are being divinely inspired
and you.......have some grandiose message....to share with all
and you wonder why nobody takes you seriosly? get off your pulpit and stop ranting and trying to make profound statements
Mosheh Thezion
Registered Senior Member
...i....can....t...t....try....
absolute rubbish, as superluminal said "Faith is the willing abandonment of the need for reason. Why would any person with a shred of intellectual integrity subscribe to such a position?" and Jeff 152 put it thus "the suspension of logic and reason"
I say nobody go's from the logical to the illogical, the rational to the irrational.
unless they have suffered a head injury.
You can read Lewis' Mere Christianity for his views and Francis Collins who is the present Director of the Human Genome Project, a chemist, medical specialist and geneticist, discusses his faith in the "Language of God"
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An Agnostic atheist is... well... an atheist who is... right... also an agnostic.
The atheist has no belief in God.
The agnostic holds that absolute or certain knowledge of God is unobtainable, or that if it is obtainable, they themselves do not have that knowledge.
Usually (well, in my case certainly) agnosticism is the grounds for their atheism - the "why have belief in something for which there is no evidence".
Since I also do not have absolute or certain evidence for God's non-existence, I do not go as far as to have a belief in his non-existence.
Thus you get the agnostic atheist.
Those who think that agnosticism is merely the middle ground do not understand the term agnosticism - and a healthy dose of Googling should cure that ailment.
Does anyone else find this really funny?
I just have a mental image of CS Lewis walking down the street looking for his "disapproval of God", and accidentally treads in a lump of Conversion.
"Doh! That's torn it! Now I've gone and converted myself!" he says as he tries to use a stick to wipe the smelly conversion off his shoe.
"Doh! That's torn it! Now I've gone and converted myself!" he says as he tries to use a stick to wipe the smelly conversion off his shoe.
He did fight against it for several years, as he had been an atheist since the age of 13.
Sarkus said:
And to disprove is not the infinitive of disapproval.
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If Thomas, an apostle who had witnessed up close and personal the thousands of truly law defying, unbelievable miracles of Jesus, could not believe that Jesus rose from the dead, then how the hell is anyone else supposed to believe that?
When told that Jesus rose from the dead, Thomas said, "Unless I see in His hands the print of the nails, and put my finger into the print of the nails, and put my hand into His side, I will not believe."
This is an apostle talking here. Not a skeptical atheist. Not a scientist. An apostle, in this case, wanted hard evidence and proof that Jesus was really who he said he was.
Of course, Thomas' request for proof was answered, and he did in fact see the risen body of Jesus up close and got the evidence he was looking for. Unfortunately, the other billions of people in the world don't have that luxury. Instead of seeing thousands of law defying miracles of Jesus up close, we simply have to take the word of, sometimes "zombie" like Christians who claim a book called the Bible is actually true, 2,000 years after the fact.
So I don't consider anyone who witnessed a miracle of Jesus, or multiple miracles, to have true "faith." Those people believed in something which they saw visibly with their eyes, and which they had clear and undoubtable proof of. Yet we, on the other hand, must believe in a book supposedly written 2000 years ago and which has no evidence or any sources supporting it. Does anyone else think this unfair?
If I was blind, and a man came up to me, touched my eyes, and made me see again, there is no doubt I would believe and have faith that that man is who he says he is. Of course, this wouldn't be true faith, would it? At what point does faith become knowledge?
When told that Jesus rose from the dead, Thomas said, "Unless I see in His hands the print of the nails, and put my finger into the print of the nails, and put my hand into His side, I will not believe."
This is an apostle talking here. Not a skeptical atheist. Not a scientist. An apostle, in this case, wanted hard evidence and proof that Jesus was really who he said he was.
Of course, Thomas' request for proof was answered, and he did in fact see the risen body of Jesus up close and got the evidence he was looking for. Unfortunately, the other billions of people in the world don't have that luxury. Instead of seeing thousands of law defying miracles of Jesus up close, we simply have to take the word of, sometimes "zombie" like Christians who claim a book called the Bible is actually true, 2,000 years after the fact.
So I don't consider anyone who witnessed a miracle of Jesus, or multiple miracles, to have true "faith." Those people believed in something which they saw visibly with their eyes, and which they had clear and undoubtable proof of. Yet we, on the other hand, must believe in a book supposedly written 2000 years ago and which has no evidence or any sources supporting it. Does anyone else think this unfair?
If I was blind, and a man came up to me, touched my eyes, and made me see again, there is no doubt I would believe and have faith that that man is who he says he is. Of course, this wouldn't be true faith, would it? At what point does faith become knowledge?