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M*W: That was your experience, not mine. There is a difference between trying to destroy another's faith and expressing the truth. What is truth for you may not be truth for anybody else. We must arrive at what we consider to be the truth for each of us. Atheism is the truth for me. It is clear to me that I will no longer believe in the mythology of christianity (nor any other religion). Once you come to that understanding, there is no going backward. Some say they had been atheists and then wen't back to a particular religion. I believe these people are laden with fear as well as in denial. The reason I ask the questions I do is because I really want to know what other people think and believe. I already know what I believe (or not believe) and for me, that will not change. I have faith in my choice to embrace atheism. IOW, I trust the knowledge I have gained regarding religions and myths, and although I want to learn why others make the choices they do, I won't be digressing into any religion or dogma. What I particularly expected from this thread was to hear the explanations of why people believe in the existence of their respective deities. If I were subconsciously yearning to return to christianity or any other religion, I'd be reading protheistic peer-reviewed texts written by biblical (or other) scholars.
What surprises me (or doesn't) is that no theist has yet replied with anything logical, rational or believable about his/her dogma and deity. I do not plan to argue or contradict them, (but I cannot stop anyone else from refuting them). I just want to know who, what, when, where, why and how, they believe what they believe and why they believe it. It seems to me that if theists present their pro-theological position, that should reinforce the beliefs of the other theists. I hope to receive some good pro-theological arguments from the believers. That's all. No ulterior motives intended.
I respect that, I just notice that you always focus on religion even if you oppose it your main focus fixates on it to this day.
maybe you focus on the written texts regarding religion too much instead of seperating the stories from the essence of gods meaning. for example like myself I don't hold the holy books in factual regard, but I do hold god in its true meaning in high regard as a possibility. for me to take sections of the bible and try to argue them as truth would not prove efective in a debate about truth.
But I would argue in these terms, for example an entity or being such as god not only created the universe but is infact the universe itself. something cannot come from nothing, 0+0 will always equal 0. Therefore the universe has alwys existed in some way shape or form. God is the unseen essence of everything, wave your hand infront of your face, your hand is moving through "empty space" which has no physical attributes energy or mass, therefore physicaly does not exist, but it does exist which allows mass to pass through the unseen structure or foundation of the universe. All of the particles in space float and move through this unseen fabric of existence. if a solid block of lead is placed on a table, that space where the block resides is still there unchanged, when you remove the block of lead it is again a relatively empty space. that emptyness is still physical in a non physical way.
What I am getting at is that the emptyness is basicaly nothing, I might be wrong but as far as I can tell it would be impossble for that empty space to be created by anything therefore always existed. that could be called god.
the deitys you speak of are caught up in mythology and stories, it would take faith alone to believe in such things. but in other terms it could be possible that our very own faith creates that god through our consciousness, ie if you believe you will go to heaven your consciousness might be sent there when you die on this earth. or if you truley have faith in eternal nothingness after you die everything will cease to exist to you. each of us might cause our own fate.
Im not religious as you know but things just seem too perfect to be coincidence and chance. Im starting to lean towards believing in god as a conscious being. The universe and existence itself from our position is too magnificent to explain by ourselves. I dont think it is too far fetched for an eternal god to exist. for example consciousness is all that exists, gods conscious mind. that mind is millions of times more potent than our minds, where our imagination and thoughts conjour up things, maybe gods conscious mind can actualy create independant beings, worlds, solar systems. intricate complex life forms that are all within this mind of his. we could all be manifestations of gods consciousness which is so powerful that he even creted thought forms that dont even belive in him.
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peace.
