So, God gave humans free will so that humans could love Him, correct? So why does he WANT humans to love him, so much that he will send non-loving humans to suffer for eternity? If someone is in love with me, that's fine and dandy, but I don't have to love him back.
I have read very little of it personally, but I have read articles with specific citations on the Bible's contradictions. Explain them away if you like, of course, but if the Bible was written by a flawed human hand, then it can't be the true word of God (unlike Islam, which contends that God Himself wrote the Quran). Also, how do you reconcile God-as-Jesus who is loving/compassionate/etc. and God who asks his followers for human sacrifice as a "test"? Personally, if I were a deity, I wouldn't want followers fanatically enough to kill their children for me. And a deity who does, I would think bloodthirsty and selfish, certainly not just. (What happens to unbaptized children? Or baptized children who don't really worship God, just follow the motions? Or outright deconverted atheists who are nevertheless moral?)
Thanks for the Great Commission reference, which does explain evangelizing--but if you follow the Bible strictly, you're forced to be an intolerant bigot. There are also, I believe, many instances of sexism and racism. How is that reconciled with modern day?
The faithful do doubt, I'm sure. But that doubt is presented as bad, an obstacle to be overcome. Why is it bad to doubt? In science, great discoveries have occurred because someone doubted the conventional explanation and took it upon him/herself to find a better one. Doubt might be false, but it might equally be true--that is, there is an equal statistical chance of God existing or not existing, with the additional caveat that God may exist but in a different form, with different principles, than a religion may postulate.
Love and faith are both irrational, I agree. The physical world, however, is rational--and ID is not a rational theory, or even a theory outright by scientific definitions.
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regna
Re: christianity is faith
Date: 2008-09-20 06:45 pm (UTC)I have read very little of it personally, but I have read articles with specific citations on the Bible's contradictions. Explain them away if you like, of course, but if the Bible was written by a flawed human hand, then it can't be the true word of God (unlike Islam, which contends that God Himself wrote the Quran). Also, how do you reconcile God-as-Jesus who is loving/compassionate/etc. and God who asks his followers for human sacrifice as a "test"? Personally, if I were a deity, I wouldn't want followers fanatically enough to kill their children for me. And a deity who does, I would think bloodthirsty and selfish, certainly not just. (What happens to unbaptized children? Or baptized children who don't really worship God, just follow the motions? Or outright deconverted atheists who are nevertheless moral?)
Thanks for the Great Commission reference, which does explain evangelizing--but if you follow the Bible strictly, you're forced to be an intolerant bigot. There are also, I believe, many instances of sexism and racism. How is that reconciled with modern day?
The faithful do doubt, I'm sure. But that doubt is presented as bad, an obstacle to be overcome. Why is it bad to doubt? In science, great discoveries have occurred because someone doubted the conventional explanation and took it upon him/herself to find a better one. Doubt might be false, but it might equally be true--that is, there is an equal statistical chance of God existing or not existing, with the additional caveat that God may exist but in a different form, with different principles, than a religion may postulate.
Love and faith are both irrational, I agree. The physical world, however, is rational--and ID is not a rational theory, or even a theory outright by scientific definitions.