395
Ok then
(lemmings.world)
Do Good because it is good. That's it. Shit ain't hard.
Say what you will about CS Lewis, but Aslan's whole "it doesn't matter who you believe in, so long as you do good" deal is what a benevolent deity should be.
RIP Susan and the atheist dwarves though.
Fair point about Susan, but the dwarves literally chose not to step through the door into the light as the world was ending around them. It might be that they did have ideological reasons to reject Aslan, in the same way that an atheist at the gates of heaven might cite aspects of the abramic faiths as reason to not enter, but IIRC the narrative doesn't give any indication of that.
Fair
Let's assume the bible is true for a moment. In the new testament God sends his son, Jesus, to die for our sins on the cross which makes the old testament obsolete. It's also stated multiple times that their mercy is now beyond what we can imagine therefore everyone goes to heaven cleansed of their sins, regardless of who they were and what they did.
Hell and shit was just created to extort peasant in medieval times.
Jesus came to die for the sins of Man, not the sins of all men. The famous John 3:16 is "God so loved the world who sent His only Son, so that whomever may believe in Him shall not perish but have everlasting life."
The idea is that murders, rapists, and general good people can go to heaven so long as they believe that Jesus died for them.
Then again, here we are, debating semantics of a book that has been the cause of wars and famine.
Yeah, let's not put too much thought into it.
People do a lot of work with Matthew 5:17 to wave this away.
This is why religions are a scam. Most don't hold up the scrutiny to their own teachings.
I have a feeling your judgement of religion as a whole is solely based on abrahamism
Nope. Hinduism is the same in my experience.
Well, in hell we can hang out with the old Romans, the old Greeks, the Hindus, the indigenous tribes from all over...etc.
The Christian god knew in advance I was going to be this way, anyway, right? And if god willed it I would change my ways.
"Good" in christian terms not only means being nice and caring for your fellow humans but everything that makes God's creation work: accepting that he knows how it is supposed to work and doing what he says instead of trying to fix this world solely by ourselves. IMO reasonable from a believer's point of view.
doing what he says
Ever notice how "what he says" just so happens to coincide with the believers' wishes? Suspicious, that.
Also however it ends up was what he willed anyway. The whole thing goes tits up: well God is testing our faith, but we must continue to believe. Everything works perfectly: God has blessed us. It removes all personal responsibility from any decision.
Except he has the power to fix it all and doesn't anyway? Explain childhood cancer. Explain natural disasters. Explain why millions have to suffer because of the actions of others, regardless of whether those suffering are following God's actions.
Is it purposeful cruelty or does he just not care?
Did we ask him to fix it? Did we care about him in any way? Individuals may did but he wants to save more than just a 0.1%. And what is temporary death against eternal life in a "fixed" world? The suffering before is the much worse part. But even this can be quite a cure to many of us. We, seen statistically, don't become "good" from being rich and having a carefree life. And much less we ask for God to fix the world for the others that are suffering.
He is waiting for us to change our minds, admit that we were wrong, that we weren't able to fix it ourselves. Pretty selfish, you could think. Seeking for glory, letting people suffer until the come crawling back to you.
But then again, we brought this on us ourselves. We decided we were better off on our own, not made to serve God in a perfect world with no suffering. And also, tho whom would all the glory in the world belong if not to its creator? How could an almighty God be selfish only because he decided the purpose if his creation?
It's a cruel and demented mindset to justify children dying by claiming they deserve it, that they "brought it on themselves."
I'm not going to live for a being that causes so much suffering just because he wants some sort of glory. We'd put those people in prison if they were us, because it doesn't fit with our societal morals.
And this is what I was trying to tell you and so many people don't get: there is a distinction between God and human. People judge God as if he was human (or as if he was not God and only human more specifically) and as if he had not the right to give and take back what he gave.
And once more, HE didn't cause the suffering. If we did what we have been made for there wouldn't be any suffering, we would be infinitely happy. It was our choice all along, things like climate change only make it much more clear what has been true the whole time.
I get that not everybody wants to believe that. But I don't believe in a world with no purpose and no sense. A random occurence with no meaning. A universe which ends in singularity just to do the same thing over and over again.
Edit: Forgot the most important part on why pain and suffering is still a thing: We somehow need to make an informed decision on what we choose for eternity. Going our own ways and where it leads and going God's way. Gladly, it doesn't have to stay this way for very long, we will make the whole thing crash in just a few decades.
I've got a feeling your mind is already made up on the matter and no amount of explanation would change that.
And why wouldn't it be, it is literally one of the oldest issues with religion that was formulated by Epicurus roughly 2300 years ago and believers have never had a satisfactory answer to it.
Look this isn't fair.
Mysterious ways, all that...
Fun seeing all the Theists come out to an Atheist thread.
Everything is predetermined, if they were able to repent then they were a good person the whole time but had their faith tested
this post was submitted on 24 Oct 2023
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Atheism
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