leibowde84
Veteran Member
Well put.
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The Rapid Decline of Christianity in the USA
- Thread starter Skwim
- Start date
Shadow Wolf
Certified People sTabber
Pretty much everybody does. And too much extra strength/regular strength Tylenol won't mess with your brain, but it is hell on your liver and often enough times fatal.
The marriage of church and state was never advocated by Jesus Christ. (John 17:14-16; John 18:36; James 4:4)
Meddling in politics is not something Christians were ever told to do. It just creates divisions, which destroys unity and leads to a complete breakdown in human relationships.
Brotherly love is supposed to be the glue that holds Christians together. It is lost in political squabbling.
Again failure to follow the guidelines set out in the Bible for keeping families together has resulted in fragmentation and much heartache. In today's 'throw-away' society, everything is disposable....partnerships are dissolved and new ones formed with little regard for the children of such breakdowns and how it affects society as a whole. The powerful Roman Empire fell because it did not notice that its decadent and self indulgent ways were destroying families....the backbone of any society. Here we are again.
Selfishness has created a "me-first" attitude among the populace that was never going to lead to anything healthy...either physically, emotionally or spiritually. Rampant consumerism caters to our selfishness and the sacrifices made on its alter are having a very negative impact on succeeding generations. Role modelling has changed dramatically as new models of morality are adopted and children lose their sense of what a family is supposed to be.
MJFlores
Well-Known Member
Should we really care if these "Christian churches" close shop?
What would the Lord Jesus Christ say about that?
Matthew 15:13-14
He replied, “Every plant that my heavenly Father has not planted will be pulled up by the roots. Leave them; they are blind guides. If the blind lead the blind, both will fall into a pit.”
That is a couple of blind guides off the board. That is how the heavenly Father pulls them up by the roots. So should I show compassion for them?
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The Holy Bottom Burp
Active Member
Some of the posts I've read on this thread make me feel depressed, dumb religious regurgitation of doctrine, homophobia, New Age waffle. Give me some hope America!
Some of the posts I've read on this thread make me feel depressed, dumb religious regurgitation of doctrine, homophobia, New Age waffle. Give me some hope America!
Hope for what? Humans did this to themselves. Dumb humans! You plant turnips, you don't get tomatoes.
TheloniousX
Master of None, Student of All...
Charts and Statistics carry less validity when you consider both sides being those who claim to being Christian, but do not attend church services or those who attend who are not necessarily religious.
On another note, it wasn't until 10 years ago did I drive by this sign in San Diego, CA in disbelief that the religious world view has really started to change and had a public voice...
On another note, it wasn't until 10 years ago did I drive by this sign in San Diego, CA in disbelief that the religious world view has really started to change and had a public voice...
The Holy Bottom Burp
Active Member
I see, but you think a deity did the original 'planting' correct? Did the deity plant turnips and expect turnips, or did it expect the tomatoes we turned out to be?Hope for what? Humans did this to themselves. Dumb humans! You plant turnips, you don't get tomatoes.
He gave humans free will and the best possible start in the best possible surroundings......there was only one rule and the freedom to do whatever they deemed to be appropriate, as long as that one rule was not broken.....then he left the planting to them. They chose to plant the turnips, but expected to reap the tomatoes.
We also plant what we want to plant, but fool ourselves about what we will reap. It is selfish human nature to want freedom, but not to experience the natural consequences of bad or selfish choices.
There is a lesson attached to this life....who has learned it?
Skwim
Veteran Member
With an omniscient god well aware of it all before he even created A & E. Nice guy. It's like purposely mating two dogs with objective of keeping all the pups confined to sensory deprivation boxes for the rest of their lives.Hope for what? Humans did this to themselves. Dumb humans! You plant turnips, you don't get tomatoes.
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If you really believe that no wonder you are lost in the world of "I dunno".
God's omniscience does not cancel out our free will. If we choose the course...we choose the consequences. Good or bad.
Have you ever investigated the whole story to see what God's first purpose was....why things went wrong.....and what God did and is doing about it? Its not a futile exercise if you have the right attitude and you really want to understand. Do you?
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HOW ARe You using those Smilies.?
Free Smileys, Emoticons, Emojis, to use in forums, websites / weblogs and mobile apps | Page 1 There's 15 pages of them....
You just select the image you want then copy and paste...simple.
If you really believe that no wonder you are lost in the world of "I dunno".
"Lost in the world of I dunno"? Is that what you get from @Skwim 's posts? I sure don't.
That does not make any logical sense. "Free" will as you describe it ican't be meaningfully possible without omniscience, which humans do not have.
Were there an omnisciente God, he would in effect have to choose between commitment (which would make human free will very much a liability were it possible) or amoral neglect.
I don't know about Skwim.
I do not have any need for such tales, personally. Every time I learned of them I found them useless at best.
Frankly, that is a very weird conception of deity, and not a very healthy one at all.
The Holy Bottom Burp
Active Member
He gave humans free will and the best possible start in the best possible surroundings......there was only one rule and the freedom to do whatever they deemed to be appropriate, as long as that one rule was not broken.....then he left the planting to them. They chose to plant the turnips, but expected to reap the tomatoes.
We also plant what we want to plant, but fool ourselves about what we will reap. It is selfish human nature to want freedom, but not to experience the natural consequences of bad or selfish choices.
There is a lesson attached to this life....who has learned it?
Dude, that post reeked so strongly of religious guilt, I hope you have some fun in life outside that permitted by the Watchtower organisation (without being eaten up by guilt afterwards).
There is a reason why the biblical deity is portrayed as such an unforgiving and hateful character, it is because life was very hard for the Bronze Age and Iron Age people who invented it. Infant mortality was horrendous in those days (death of women in labour was high enough to ensure the male population always exceeded the female population), a simple infection could kill you, famine and disease were a constant threat. Therefore to them the deity who is pulling the strings must be angry and intolerant of humans right? I'm not saying the people were stupid then, but they were literally ignorant, they had only a fraction of the collective knowledge, the science, the medicine, the technology that makes life so much easier for us today. When you think about it, it was really quite logical that they came up with an odious deity to explain their hard (and brief) lives. However, we have moved on from that ancient reasoning except, in seems, in the area of religion. Time to move on friend!
Drink a lot of water when using that stuff.
Skwim
Veteran Member
Free will or not is not the point. The point is that before he even created humanity god knew what a sorry state they'd end up in.
"I'm going to create beings that will suffer, but I don't care. If I did care I wouldn't do such a barbaric and heartless thing."
Hardly matters does it, because he knew his puppies would be suffering in sensory deprivation boxes before they were ever placed on earth. Face it, your god is a cruel god, and any kind of tap dancing around this fact deserves to be booed off the stage..
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I certainly agree, and so does the Bible, that many professing to be "Christian" have produced "worthless fruit." (Matthew 7:15-20) However, I believe true Christianity produces something secular humanism has never achieved; a global brotherhood of love and peace. (John 13:34,35) While we may be satisfied to reject the evidence that God exists and that we are accountable to him, IMO,this will not change God's purposes nor prevent him from accomplishing his will. (Romans 1:19,20)
joe1776
Well-Known Member
As to the gods of religion, I'm an atheist. But, as to the possibility of a Creator, I'm agnostic.
I think free will is the point. Obviously, we humans are both good and bad. And it's the bad side of our nature that causes much of the suffering. So, if we are here to learn to be good, by the exercise of free will, how can we learn unless we have the bad to overcome?
Yes, there are natural disasters, birth defects and other causes of suffering. But, isn't the fact that we are learning to cooperate and help each other when these things happen great?
Skwim
Veteran Member
It can certainly be A point, but not in this issue. The issue being that god created humanity knowing what a sorry state it would end up as.
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