* From the logic (?) Of my former lifelong faith *
As a true believer I find non-believers often just don't understand the message of the Gospel of Jesus Christ. All Christians know this as the Good News and once you understand it I know you will feel the Holy Spirit pulling your heart to Salvation! So, the simple truth of The Good News:
God created a perfect universe but humanity sinned and so God sent his Son to be brutally executed so that a small percentage of mankind will spend a perfect eternity in heaven while the rest will roast in flames forever! You see now? What good news! I bet you can't wait to worship my God!
So let's go into a few of the little details just in case Satan tries to cause doubt by enticing you to question anything about this Gospel. Always assume it is true or you are sinning and your uncertainty will land you in hell. It is important to question everything else, but never your core faith! Ever!
Here's some answers anyway:
"I know because I have felt God's presence" or the like is always a last ditch explanation for any line of questioning. Even though emotional states have been clearly linked to a host of poor decisions, from investing in scams to groups of people getting worked up into a feral condition until they collectively murder a helpless victim, this one instance is the exception because the bible says so. And we know the bible is really the ultimate authority on everything because God made it. We know He made it because we feel it.
In review:
Feelings = truth (Bible) >
Truth = Bible (God) >
Bible = God (feelings)
This is referred to as circular reasoning and in this case a perfect never ending circle. How divine!
I should also give a quick summery of what you need to know about the Bible. It is the perfect infallible authority on all things. Most of us have no clue as to the various origins of these many ancient texts, how they were collected and bundled, or whether or not they bear evidence of alteration or authorial authenticity. Don't let that fool you! We do believe God wrote it personally but all of this scholarly stuff takes too much time. Just like reading the whole Bible, it's really big. That's what preachers are for anyway. In fact, I've noticed that many self-appointed Bible readers tend to question God and are even lead astray by concerns for things like history or science. So sad. "Paul didn't write this book"? Silly back-slider, his name is printed on the top, what else could there be to know? Now stop studying outside of Sunday school or you'll burn in hell forever.
Let's speed this up (Q&A):
Conflicts in the Bible?
You are blind spiritually.
Stories from Bible found earlier in other ancient religions?
The devil told the stories before the bible to trick us!
Church atrocities in the name of God?
Those weren't real Christians.
Something unexplained that is pleasant?
God
Something unexplained that sucks?
Satan
Faith is simple:
Never question it
Do what you're told
Think what you're told
Feel what you're told
Believe you are dirty
Equate your sexuality to guilt
Let your desperation drive you back to church for approval
Be motivated by fear
Reduce doubt by pushing rules on other members
Smile, Jesus loves you!
Now you understand The Good news. It's not religion, it's a relationship. Like all good relationships just cling to hope while living in terror of brutal punishment for any perceived disobedience. Gospel truth!
Where has this Apostate dude gone?
Okay, I was gone for a few months but I'm not dead. Since my last post I have ramped up my efforts at really becoming familiar with the much expanding online Atheist, Humanist, Secularist, and Skeptic communities both online and tracking events in the real world. Not long before my first post I was not an open atheist. Back then only several trusted friends really knew and when I changed my status on Facebook one night everyone else began having different reactions. I was sometimes taken by surprise in happy or saddening ways especially as I utilised my social forums with no greater purchase than my religious acquaintances had. I am much less likely to be surprised at this point and understand more clearly what, in particular, drives me to write or speak out when so many others already do. So I am not the first to bluntly address religion but I believe I do bring my own unique view of the issues as they impact billions of lives around the world. My life is just one of countless that has felt the devastating hand of organised religion despite the fact that it was introduced and reinforced when I was young by my caring, loving parents. Let me be clear, my life has been a wonderful one and this is not to attack or lay blame at the feet of my family or larger community from my youth but to directly challenge the much larger cycle of harmful deceit that we have come to call faith.
The call for mutual respect is BULLSHIT, FYI
For generations now the various religious guilds have been going on about how everyone needs to be respectful of their beliefs and traditions. The message is a strong one often intoned on both ends of the political spectrum and carried aloft even in the modern day Sodom; Hollywood. As soon as someone speaks out about anything from the complete lack of evidence for the "historical" claims religious folk like to make, to the destructive hypocrisy carried out in the public sphere in the name of Spiritual Masters or gods, the devout scream "intolerance" and expect us to just shut our mouths.
How interesting. It may not be so insulting and pathetic a cry if at any point in history true believers had demonstrated even the occasion such respect once they crawled to power any place on the planet. Hell, they aren't even decent enough to do it now, as they cry discrimination and unfair against secular forces that are better known by the term "Constitutional Democracy".
Marriage Equality
Churches Promoting Political Candidates But Don't Pay Taxes
Prayer In School
Anti-Sex Education
Religion In Science Class
Anti-Women's Rights Over Her Body
you get the point, on and on...
To true, literal believers mutual respect is not possible. They are called by God Almighty, or Divine Truth to change this world and your contrary ideas do not fit into this calling. Surely you and I are blind and they are imparted with the magical goggles of truth- at best. Often, once they realise that you are not ignorant of their agenda, they switch immediately over into the incredibly nasty 'you are of the devil' mode. You haven't made clear your opposition to devotees until at least one of them has called you a liar, deceiver, under the devil's spell, or (a most disturbing one I can attest) that you are demon possessed. Hey, what happened to the mutual respect?
Oh yeah, I was making you look like an ignorant fundamentalist...
Here's just a small sample of the loving respect we can expect from those who love god so much they are willing to respectfully shove their undoubted truth straight into the secular classroom of science. And notice the serious minority position in the flock is the one guy who seems to have any real understanding of... say, SCIENCE
If it makes them happy... Happy?
Let me start into those atheists and agnostics who like to ignore the struggle for sanity and decency raging all around them while they relax and watch some good flicks or wander about thinking themselves above it all. A very prominent excuse that is given is the "happiness" card. You know the one, from the suit of bullshit and a value of zero. Yet, behold, it is played regularly and with assumed certainty. The question then becomes, what is happiness? If believing in fairy tales, responding to imagined voices, making important decisions based on a heap of bronze age stories, expecting muttered words to change the world, waiting on invisible messengers to heal serious sickness, etc etc etc is happiness to you than i agree, let the faithful stumble on without challenge to their individual and collective arrested development. But if that is how you really feel then why the hell are you dealing with the unpleasantries of the real world? The fact that those who toss this line are not currently suffering from having their head up religion's nasty ass only shows that these very delusions are inherently contrary to true happiness. We don't call the homeless guy talking to a dead bird he carries in his worn out pocket happy, we call him seriously ill. Especially if he starts getting too close and carrying on too loudly.
What's the harm?
So your religious buddy isn't likely to blow stuff up in the name of the most high, what harm is there in unsubstantiated extreme beliefs? Gotta love this one. This form of tolerance comes not from a place of enlightened understanding but of superiority and arrogance. Who, in good conscience, would allow their friend or family to believe in invisible goats that whisper cosmic truths into their chosen ears so that they could share this knowledge to save us all from the destruction drawing nigh for the Earth? Apparently many non-believers. There is this unbecoming underlying attitude that the religiously minded are simply... well, simple. The non-believer feels pity that anyone should be so diminished mentally or emotionally as to think in religious terms. There is rarely, you see, any good to come from attempting to reason with the pathetic follower. After all, do we expect monkeys to speak proper English and wear suits? Besides the ones we elect. Though I find this attitude offencive it is only fair to point out that it is usually adopted without malicious intent by people who have grown up without fundamentalism forced on them or have really never experienced what it is like to be surrounded by a sea of religiosity.
Having experienced both and having been a fundamentalist for the first twenty-some odd years of my life I can only urge people to educate themselves about the reality of the phenomenon. As a believer I had zero doubts that I and my church served and were led by God almighty and was often a part of conversations we would hold shamelessly in our meetings about how all opposed points of view from non-believers were hopelessly ignorant from the darkness of sin or the evil of Satan. Regardless of what we said about coexisting with other religions, traditions, or ideas we always intended to work actively to attain our God's will for ALL OF MANKIND. Don't have faith? You still can't teach your kids in school about evolution, safe sex, or that women have the right to have abortions. In fact, the very fact that you didn't share our religious ideology only made it more important that we try to use any trick in the book to convert your children, particularly at school. To hem in your godless ways in the workplace. To take over your government and reform it to God's plan and lock out all of the undesirables possible.
The faithful simply don't talk to outsiders about it. Not you, easy go lucky non-believer. To you it's smiles, dinner, or watching our kids play together.
There is no limit where eternity is concerned. Father is dying? We'd try to send someone in to convert them as they lay suffering. Stories of nurses or doctors talking religion and hell to the captive dying behind the family's back was met with affirming 'amen's. Child just died? We send in the converters to find the vulnerable grievers when they most want to believe in an after life and heaven. Or should you become diminished in your old age rest assured they will be making the rounds, particularly if you are lonely.
Keep assuming that religious delusion is harmless. But I can tell you from inside knowledge that they will come for you, they will come for your children, your family, your friends. It causes pain, division, and will always try to strip away the most important gains of modern free society.
Let's not be so naive. Religious thought is very dangerous and in a very real way.
