I could never blame an atheist for being an atheist

Trailblazer · Oct 16, 2019

Aupmanyav said:
Why? Does he want a heart transplant? Must be getting old (after 6,000 years). I have only one and I do not want to part with it.

That was meant figuratively.

Aupmanyav said:
I have no problem about treading the path of righteousness, but why do I need to believe in a God and fear him for it? I can do that without believing in a God. What kind of funny arguments do you and Bahaullah propose!

I did not say you have to believe in God and fear Him. That is your choice.

Aupmanyav said:
Mystery, that means you cannot provide any proof for it. Just heresay, and you want us to believe that?

I never said I had proof of an afterlife, but there is a lot of evidence. Whether you consider it evidence or not is another matter.

Trailblazer · Oct 16, 2019

9-10ths_Penguin said:
Personally, I can't relate to the idea of a God that cares what humans think of him/her/it at all, whether that's expressed through wanting some people to know about him/her/it, wanting everyone to know about him/her/it, or hiding from people.

You are in the right ball park. God does not need anything from humans because God has no needs since God is fully self-sufficient and self-sustaining. Anything that God wants for us is for our own benefit, not for God's benefit. God can afford to dispense with all His Creatures. The only reason God does not do so is because He loves us.

9-10ths_Penguin · Oct 16, 2019

Trailblazer said:
You are in the right ball park. God does not need anything from humans because God has no needs since God is fully self-sufficient and self-sustaining. Anything that God wants for us is for our own benefit, not for God's benefit. God can afford to dispense with all His Creatures. The only reason God does not do so is because He loves us.

I also can't relate to the idea of a god loving humanity.

sealchan · Oct 16, 2019

Trailblazer said:
Yes that is true. There is a place for emotion. I tend to be a lot more analytical so I try to pump up my feelings with Christian music. According to Baha'i beliefs all God wants is our hearts:

“Cleanse from your hearts the love of worldly things, from your tongues every remembrance except His remembrance, from your entire being whatsoever may deter you from beholding His face, or may tempt you to follow the promptings of your evil and corrupt inclinations. Let God be your fear, O people, and be ye of them that tread the path of righteousness.......

Dispute not with any one concerning the things of this world and its affairs, for God hath abandoned them to such as have set their affection upon them. Out of the whole world He hath chosen for Himself the hearts of men—hearts which the hosts of revelation and of utterance can subdue. Thus hath it been ordained by the Fingers of Bahá, upon the Tablet of God’s irrevocable decree, by the behest of Him Who is the Supreme Ordainer, the All-Knowing.”
Gleanings From the Writings of Bahá’u’lláh, pp. 275, 279

I do try to love God but it is difficult because I have suffered so much and still do and I cannot help but connect it to God since I analyze it and determine that God made the world this way so He is responsible for the inadvertent suffering that is not caused by our own free will choices.

Worshipping by focusing on the love of someone is certainly a well known and respected way to gain spiritual truth. For me I too focus on the analytical but I find my love for story and perhaps certain characters depending on what I am studying.

Emotional responses whether positive or negative are natural. When they are disproportional negative responses and may be labeled 'maladaptive' then they are indications of ones personal spiritual needs IMO.

My very first encounter with God was through my blaming God for my depression brought on by circumstances beyond my control. I declared defiantly that the world He created wasn't good enough and from that moment forward I was able to escape that depression. Seeing God in a simple Judeo-Christian way made it hard not to blame God. Now i blame common Christian naivete (literalism) which left me with such a shallow notion of God. But in spite of that culture of naivete God and I found each other.

Aupmanyav · Oct 16, 2019

Trailblazer said:
I never said I had proof of an afterlife, but there is a lot of evidence. Whether you consider it evidence or not is another matter.

Yeah, like 72 houris with clear eyes, male and female, with an unlimited supply of booze and a divine garden to live in - You accept Quran as truth. I do not know what Bahaullah offers in the next life. I bet, it cannot be as good as what Islam offers.

Katzpur · Oct 16, 2019

lostwanderingsoul said:
I would never blame an atheist for not believing because the Bible teaches that God calls those who He wants. This implies that He does NOT call everyone. Atheists are those God has not called. It is not thier fault.

Wow. Your God is extremely discriminatory and you are extremely presumptuous to think that you're so special that He would want you but not somebody else.

MonkeyFire · Oct 16, 2019

It's not a good idea to willingly disbelieve, and if you disbelieve by nature it's worse. Skepticism is a terminal thing.

lostwanderingsoul · Oct 16, 2019

Katzpur said:
Wow. Your God is extremely discriminatory and you are extremely presumptuous to think that you're so special that He would want you but not somebody else.

These are NOT my ideas. As a Christian I would think you would believe the Bible. And the Bible says God calls who He will and none can come to Jesus except the Father draws him. Or do LDS not believe the Bible?

Trailblazer · Oct 16, 2019

HonestJoe said:
Isn’t Baha’i essentially based on one man presenting his own argument of what it all means?

Do you mean Baha’u’llah’s argument of what all of the Bible means? Yes, He explained a lot of what it means but He did not explain everything it means.

HonestJoe said:
Atheists don’t all say the same thing beyond the one and only thing which entirely defines the term. Anytime you want to say atheists do something, consider how it would sound to say theists do that thing. If it sounds ridiculously generalised with theists, it is ridiculously generalised with atheists too. There terms are direct opposites and both are rarely relevant or appropriate terms to defined specific groups of people.

You are correct, all atheists are different just as all believers are different. When I said “the atheists are right” I was referring to a subset of atheists I have posted to.

HonestJoe said:
Why do you assume atheists want or need to figure out which religion is true? Why do you assume atheists can’t already follow a religion they’d presumably already satisfied themselves of the truth of? Are you sure you’re really talking about atheists at all?

I do not assume that. Again, all atheists are different. I was only referring to atheists I have posted to who have told me that if they were looking to believe in a religion they would not know where to even start. They would not know which religions to look at because there are so many religions.

HonestJoe said:
I don’t claim to speak for anyone else but I don’t really care what is actually true and I certainly don’t expect any of us could or will ever know. I do care what people actually do and when they believe they’ve determined the one true religion, that can significantly impact what they do, often for the worse. The only truth I’d like to convince people of is our own ignorance. The problem is that is a scarier prospect than any god, demon of hell you might care to imagine.
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Unlike you, I think we can know what is true, but not everyone is going to know. Of course I believe my religion is a true religion but the other religions also have spiritual truth. They just do not have the updated truth for this new age, the new message of the unity of mankind or the new social teachings and laws.

Dell · Oct 16, 2019

Trailblazer said:
I probably should not post this today because I won’t have much time to answer posts after today, till the weekend, unless the posts are short. But I had a heartfelt feeling and I just had to share it.

These ideas for threads often come to me after a day in the trenches reading what people post and then it reaches critical mass when I see Christians arguing about *what the Bible means.* One Christian believes it means x, another one believes it means y, and another one believes it means z. These beliefs are contradictory so any logical person would know that either only one is right and all the others are wrong or they are all wrong.

Of course it usually takes an atheist to parse this out because those believers who *want to believe* something will find a way to interpret the Bible so they can believe what they want to believe. The atheists are right that most belief is emotional, and this pertains more to Christians than to other believers because they are emotionally attached to Jesus. They are also attached to the belief that Jesus is going to return, after which time they will be resurrected and go to heaven or live forever on earth in a Garden of Eden, depending upon which belief they have. All this comes with a guarantee, because they were saved by the blood of Jesus. Who would want to give all that up unless they had a *reason* to give it up?

I cannot comment on other religions because I am not very familiar with them, but most Christians and Jews do not understand that they believe what they do mostly because of religious traditions they came to believe without question. Moreover, human behavior is driven more by emotion than by reason, so unless one makes a concerted effort to think rationally and overcome emotion that will not happen.

Most people do not understand the emotional component of belief because most people do not have an in depth understanding of psychology. I just happen to have a lot of education in psychology and wore that hat much longer than any religion hat. I became a Baha’i based upon logic and reason, not emotion. It just made sense to me. I have no emotional attachment to Baha’u’llah or God. I should love God more but given all the suffering I see in the world that is difficult.

How the hell could any atheist ever figure out which religion is true, or if any religion is true? Just look at all the religions on this forum, and look at all the different beliefs within the same religion. Then there are believers who have no religion at all. How can any atheist be expected to parse this all out? If I was an atheist, I would probably just forget the whole thing, but then I was never very interested in God anyhow.

I do not expect any atheist to figure out which religion is true unless they are really enthusiastic about believing in God, because it would be a near impossible feat. Of course, I think that God would guide them if they were sincere and made the effort, because that is what I believe. That does not mean they would end up believing in the true religion, but it sure would help.

““Whoso maketh efforts for Us,” he shall enjoy the blessings conferred by the words: “In Our Ways shall We assuredly guide him.”” Gleanings From the Writings of Bahá’u’lláh, pp. 266-267

Now I want to post a passage that explains why people are so confused in this new age. Mind you, I do not fully understand what this passage means. For example I do not know why “This “oppression” is the essential feature of every Revelation” or why “the break of the morn of divine guidance must needs follow the darkness of the night of error.” Baha’u’llah’s Writings are often very deep and I am not very mystical, I am an analytical type of person.

“What “oppression” is greater than that which hath been recounted? What “oppression” is more grievous than that a soul seeking the truth, and wishing to attain unto the knowledge of God, should know not where to go for it and from whom to seek it? For opinions have sorely differed, and the ways unto the attainment of God have multiplied. This “oppression” is the essential feature of every Revelation. Unless it cometh to pass, the Sun of Truth will not be made manifest. For the break of the morn of divine guidance must needs follow the darkness of the night of error. For this reason, in all chronicles and traditions reference hath been made unto these things, namely that iniquity shall cover the surface of the earth and darkness shall envelop mankind. As the traditions referred to are well known, and as the purpose of this servant is to be brief, He will refrain from quoting the text of these traditions.” The Kitab-i-Iqan, pp. 31-32

"You do err"... an atheist believes it is impossible for a "God" to exist as defined by religious theology. An atheist is not looking for which religion is true. The person who is simply an unbeliever who doesn't know why he's an atheist is what your referring to.. .

Trailblazer · Oct 16, 2019

Windwalker said:
As I touched on in my previous post, all beliefs are subjectively held, be they beliefs in a theistic reality, or beliefs in a non-theistic reality. They are still both beliefs about reality, with a different colored sky is all. They are both held individually, which makes them subjective, regardless of the degree of corroborating support they have, anywhere from 0% to 100%.

Whereas that is true, reality is reality. Many beliefs can fit into reality but other beliefs contradict reality. The tricky part is that most believers believe they have the reality and everyone else is believing in a non-reality. There are exceptions to that if course, there are always exceptions. There are some believers who believe that more than one religion fit with reality and the Baha’i Faith is one of those religions. However, we believe that we have the update from God so we have more truth than the other religions have since Baha’u’llah revealed more truth. I know that sounds arrogant but I am not one to mince words. I mean logically speaking, if Baha’u’llah revealed additional Truth that was never revealed in the past, we have to have more Truth.

Windwalker said:
As subjective beliefs, they are all held with emotional investments to one degree or another. An individual cares about the return of what he believes in. None are absent of any emotional investment. As such, everything seen through that lens of belief, will be colorized by that emotional investment, be that theistic or atheistic in nature. They are not opposites in this regard, just different flavors of the same base ice cream recipe.

I agree there is emotional investment, there is always emotional investment I anything we do so why would belief be an exception? The point I was making is that I think some religious believers tend to have more emotion associated with their beliefs than others and that is because of what the religion teaches. For example, Christianity teaches that God is love and it teaches that Christians can have a very personal relationship with God through Jesus, so naturally that wild come with more emotion than a religion absent those beliefs.

Windwalker said:
Not all Christians believe all that is literally true. A great many understand them as metaphors for spiritual truths, not literal places, or literal blood sacrifices to appease a god's literal anger and such. Many understand those as spiritual truths spoken through the vehicle of cultural mythologies, that don't need to be taken literally.

That is true, there are many liberal Christians, I just not had the occasion to know very many. Most Christians I have known an posted to have been fundamentalists.

Windwalker said:
Most people, yourself included, do not thoroughly investigate everything they are told. We would get nowhere in life if we had to rationally dissect everything we were told as a truth. We all adopt the perspectives of the larger group, unless we have a need due to some conflict, to critically examine something.

No, we could never examine everything about any religion we have. There e is just too much. At some point we say “I believe” and for some people that point comes sooner than others. I tend not to adopt the perspectives of other Baha’is because I am a loner and I do my own thing, why I am called Trailblazer.

Windwalker said:
I would simplify that to say, most people are not motivated enough to do the hard work of developing self-awareness, to where we question reality as it has been programmed for us through culture. Very few see the man behind the curtain, as it were.

That is true that it is hard work and most people are not motivated to do it but I think it is also that psychology and psychological things are not that interesting to many people because of their personality type. That is also true of spiritual things, many people are more materially-oriented and they actually enjoy the material world and what it has to offer... I have little interest in it except for nature and animals, so I cannot relate to getting excited about material things. I only get excited about ideas and learning new things that I consider important, related to my purpose in life which I believe is to know and love God and follow His teachings and laws.

Windwalker said:
Most people choose to ignore it, and say, "good enough" and go on their way. Safety found in the mass-illusion, is preferable to being alone in a raft in the middle of an empty ocean, for most people.

I think that is related to what Jesus said in these verses, which are some of my favorites:

Matthew 7:13-14 “Enter through the narrow gate. For wide is the gate and broad is the road that leads to destruction, and many enter through it. But small is the gate and narrow the road that leads to life, and only a few find it.”

(Continued on next post)

Trailblazer · Oct 16, 2019

Windwalker said:
Nonsense. I do not believe this. I do not believe it either when an atheist says they followed logic and reason and that is what led them to reject religion. No. That is what it may "seem", if we ignore emotional motivations. However logically, let's' examine this.

I agree that my “becoming a Baha’i” was based upon emotion as well as logic and reason but the purpose of my OP was not to describe my own experience. I think emotion was more involved when I joined the Baha’i Faith than it is now. As you might recall from past conversations, , I have some “issues” with loving God and being close to God, so being emotional about God is difficult for me. When I became a Baha’i I was emotional about the teachings, not about God, since God was the furthest thing from my mind. I joined not knowing anything about God because I was not raised in a religious home. Even after I joined I had little interest in God and for all the years I was in 12 step programs, I could not even relate to a higher power.

Then about 17 years ago I went through about a 10 year period when I hated God. It was only about seven years ago that I finally decided I had better get my act together and do something about my feelings towards God and that was when I decided to start talking to Baha’is again and went to the Planet Baha’i forum. That helped me a lot but what really helped me most was reading Gleanings and coming to understand who and what God was, what little we can know. It was after that sunk in that I started to take all this God stuff very seriously and I even started my own forum which was very active for a while, went inactive when I left to post on another forum, but now it is a little more active again even though there is only an handful of posters.

Windwalker said:
If people are satisfied with their current beliefs, if they are bringing fulfillment and the sense of security that belief systems offer, then they are not going to deliberately choose to critically examine them and seek out flaws. That would introduce tension and conflict, which results in emotional distress.

That is probably true about most people but we are all different depending upon our personality type and life experiences. I do not have a religious belief for fulfillment and a sense of security although I admit I feel more secure now that I have some connection to God, even if only mostly in my head, only because I believe in my head that God is watching over me. However, conflict still exists because I often wish God did not even exist. Indeed, it is difficult for me to believe all of what Baha’u’llah wrote about the “loving and compassionate God” because of all the suffering I see in the world, including what I have endured. I know there is a reason for suffering but that is not always helpful. I only wish we could have a better glimpse into the spiritual world because I know that is the recompense.

Windwalker said:
Aside from a masochist who seeks out to inflict pain and displeasure for some sort of exciting stimulus, most everyone else seeks to avoid conflict and emotional pain. Challenging one's belief systems, is very much an emotionally disruptive experience. Losing one's faith, is a painful, and frightening thing to experience.

I wish you could come to my forum and explain some of this to a certain atheist poster who does not understand why the Baha’i Faith is not larger and thinks it has nothing to do with humans and their decision to stay in the religions they already have.

Windwalker said:
Here's what I see really happens. Everything they believe is "true" so long as it works for them in their situation. It's only when it is failing to do so, only when the emotional stress of that failure is sufficiently strong enough that it will lead them to "examine" the belief, in order to try to resolve it. They need to find a better system, that where they are at as a person can find a new ground of reality to "believe in".

That is kind of what happened to me. It had to get really bad for me before I made the decision to give God another chance. Maybe that is what it takes for people to turn to God and that could also apply to atheists. I mean as long as they are happy and getting along without God why would they be motivated to believe in God?

Windwalker said:
So no, logic and reason do not guide us into truth. It's emotions at the base that call upon them to help resolve an emotional conflict. Emotions are at the base of all of it. People do not question beliefs when they are happy with them.

Again, that would also apply to non-beliefs so as long as atheists are happy I see no reason why they would search for God, and this is indeed what they have told me.

Windwalker said:
Surely, you have some emotional reward for believing what you are. If not, then why bother?

In short, the reason I bother is because I believe that the Baha’i Faith is the Truth from God and I cannot shirk my duty to God. Even though I am not getting much for myself that is okay because I believe that the greatest prison is the prison of self, so I want to be as selfless as I can be.

There is some emotional reward in feeling “good” about what I am doing and in the hope for a better life after this one draws to a close, but there is also emotional pain, mostly because of all the sacrifices I have to make as a Baha’i. If I was a Christian and believed I did not have to do anything but believe in Jesus it would be a whole lot easier. Also, I spend all my time on forums and of course much of that time I am meeting with negativity and resistance to what I believe, and even if I am not bringing it up myself people ask me and I am compelled to answer. In many ways I think I would be happier as an atheist because then I would not have all this responsibility to God and the Baha’i Faith. It is not all Baha’is who relate to it that way but that is just my personality. I am overly responsible and feel guilty if I am not working all the time. That causes some resentment, especially towards my husband who does a lot less that I do, but since I understand myself I can deal with it.

Windwalker said:
By following their heart. And to make it clear, it is figuring out what it truth for them. There is no "true religion" objectively outside subjective emotional truth. To me, your religion fails to meet the need, so it is not "true" for me, or any others it doesn't speak truth to. It speaks truth to you in some way. From a purely logical argument, it does not stand the test of a dispassionate examination. No religion does. Nor does atheism either.

I do not think the way you do but I see no reason to argue over it. I believe there is a true religion but not everyone will discover it. Meanwhile everyone has to follow their own heart and what makes sense to them. It only makes sense to me that there is a true religion and it is the religion that has been revealed by Messengers of God throughout human history, the eternal religion of God. The Baha’i Faith just happens to be the latest chapter in the book, but there will be more chapters revealed in the future, throughout all time. The older chapters have all the same spiritual truths and those are just as valid as they ever were, but the social teachings and laws and the message from God for this age of human history is now different than in the past; it is that God is one, religion is one and mankind is one. This makes logical sense to me but it also appeals to me on an emotional level because it means that nobody is really wrong as long as they worship the one true God through a true religion or even without a religion, such as yourself and other believers I know. Everyone is okay as long as they do not believe in some false prophet like David Koresh.

Windwalker said:
If they are aware enough about the nature of truth and relativism. If they are, then they don't need to figure out which one is "right", because such criteria is an illusion to begin with.

I tend to agree with that because I believe all true religions are right, and people who follow those teachings even without a religion are also right. It is all about the way we live our lives, that we love God and our neighbor. Jesus was right about those two commandments. The Baha’i Faith has a higher standard than Christianity because we are enjoined to love our brother more than ourselves.

Windwalker said:
Which then begs the question, why did you join a religion? I think there are things about yourself you may not really be in touch with if you think you were not motivated by some need to believe in God. Unless, you're just in it purely for the aesthetics, and are effectively an atheist?

As I said above, I did not become a Baha’i because of God. I think why I joined in the first place is that I was taken with the teachings and the idea of having a religion, something to belong to. I was not searching for God or a religion; it was the furthest thing from my mind. I just stumbled upon it and believed it was the Truth. I really believe that God led me to it, that I was guided, but it has not been easy road to travel. I know I have been tested.

I am an intuitive feeling INFJ personality type which is rare, only 1% of the population. We tend to know what we want when we see it and after we find it we will do anything to work for a Cause. Unfortunately I was sidetracked shortly after I became a Baha’i because I had to deal with emotional issues from childhood that had been repressed, and I did not feel fit to be a Baha’i until I worked out those issues. During that time and after that I got married and I spent about 15 years in college and that was more important to me than God or religion. I have only been doing this Baha’i stuff for about seven years, mostly on forums, and I cannot even remember what my old life was like anymore.

Trailblazer · Oct 16, 2019

9-10ths_Penguin said:
I also can't relate to the idea of a god loving humanity.

I have to admit I have the same problem sometimes when emotion rules.

However, when logic rules I cannot imagine a God that did not love humanity; otherwise why would God create humanity? And no, it makes no sense to me the silly things some atheists say, that God created us because God likes watching humans suffer.

3: O SON OF MAN! Veiled in My immemorial being and in the ancient eternity of My essence, I knew My love for thee; therefore I created thee, have engraved on thee Mine image and revealed to thee My beauty.

4: O SON OF MAN! I loved thy creation, hence I created thee. Wherefore, do thou love Me, that I may name thy name and fill thy soul with the spirit of life.

The Hidden Words of Bahá’u’lláh, p. 4

Katzpur · Oct 16, 2019

lostwanderingsoul said:
These are NOT my ideas. As a Christian I would think you would believe the Bible. And the Bible says God calls who He will and none can come to Jesus except the Father draws him. Or do LDS not believe the Bible?

Sure we believe the Bible. We just have a better understanding of it than you do. God wants every one of His children to be reconciled to Him, not just some of them. Jesus Christ stands at the door each person's door, and says, "if any man hear my voice, and open the door, I will come in to him, and will sup with him, and he with me." Some don't heed the knock or hear the voice or open the door, but it's NOT because God doesn't want them. Good grief! What kind of a God would fail to offer salvation to all of us?

Trailblazer · Oct 16, 2019

sealchan said:
My very first encounter with God was through my blaming God for my depression brought on by circumstances beyond my control.

I also had a lot of depression in my life and still have a predisposition to it. This might sound silly but what I blamed God for was all my beloved cats that died, there were so many. It did not help that my older brother had told me God was punishing me and trying to make me realize the cats were not that important and I needed to be a better Baha'i. Well, needless to say, when I finally decided to turn to God through the Baha'i Faith I got on a Baha'i forum and talked to Baha'is who were aghast at what my brother had told me, saying that was a misinterpretation of the Baha'i Writings. It took a lot of undoing to realize that God was not deliberately punishing me, but rather I had a lot of Persian cats and they had serious genetic problems and when I bred them that was passed down unbeknownst to me.

Now we only have 10 cats and I think all of them who had genetic heart and kidney defects have passed on. But even when I think about it now, I am livid at God for all that suffering I have endured. I cannot seem to help connecting God with the suffering; even now when I lose a cat I rage at God and it takes a while before I am able to recover. But the recovery time is less now, and a part of me knows I am wrong so I do recover, unlike in the past when I was suicidal and ended up in urgent care. No counselors or drugs ever helped me but when I finally broke down and turned to God, things started to improve. I now just accept the fact that cats will get sick and die eventually but I do not have to like it.

Why did God have to create a world that is a storehouse of suffering, unevenly distributed suffering? Well, hopefully I will understand it better after I die and enter the World of Lights.

sealchan said:
I declared defiantly that the world He created wasn't good enough and from that moment forward I was able to escape that depression. Seeing God in a simple Judeo-Christian way made it hard not to blame God. Now i blame common Christian naivete (literalism) which left me with such a shallow notion of God. But in spite of that culture of naivete God and I found each other.

Well, it is good to meet a Christian who does not buy that Christian doctrine.

I was beginning to feel hopeless, like I would never meet one.

I am sure glad you and God found each other, I am still working on that.

9-10ths_Penguin · Oct 16, 2019

Trailblazer said:
I have to admit I have the same problem sometimes when emotion rules.

However, when logic rules I cannot imagine a God that did not love humanity; otherwise why would God create humanity? And no, it makes no sense to me the silly things some atheists say, that God created us because God likes watching humans suffer.

Why's that silly? It seems as plausible to me as God creating humans out of love.

I'm of two minds about relating to gods:

- I get that gods are humanity's attempt to put a relatable face on unrelatable and alien things, so we ought to be able to relate to God; that's the whole point. But this approach rejects the idea that god-concepts are rooted in fact as opposed to human needs.

- if we treat God as a factual claim instead, then this would make it unrelatable: an extraterrestrial god, the only one of its kind, alone for billions upon billions of years, should be less relatable to me than an octopus, which I can't relate to either.

If God were real, I think it would be ridiculous to assume that it would be anything like a social creature, pursuing interaction with other social creatures.

If it did want to communicate, why would we expect that it would be intelligible to - or interested in - us?

IMO, as soon as we start talking about God's emotions or will, we're talking about an anthropomorphism.

Trailblazer · Oct 16, 2019

Aupmanyav said:
Yeah, like 72 houris with clear eyes, male and female, with an unlimited supply of booze and a divine garden to live in - You accept Quran as truth. I do not know what Bahaullah offers in the next life. I bet, it cannot be as good as what Islam offers.

What Baha'u'llah offers is a lot better than what the Qur'an offers, but then I do not care about sex or alcohol.

9-10ths_Penguin · Oct 16, 2019

Katzpur said:
Some don't heed the knock or hear the voice or open the door, but it's NOT because God doesn't want them. Good grief! What kind of a God would fail to offer salvation to all of us?

The idea that God chooses people to be saved or not addresses a logical problem with universal salvation... or at least a problem with it in some theological constructs: if God really is trying to save everyone by convincing them to become Christian (or Christian of a particular denominatio), the sheer number of non-Christians in the world suggests that God is just bad at convincing people... like way worse than would be expected of a very powerful, very wise being, and irreconcilably worse than would be expected from a perfect being.

Trailblazer · Oct 16, 2019

Dell said:
"You do err"... an atheist believes it is impossible for a "God" to exist as defined by religious theology. An atheist is not looking for which religion is true. The person who is simply an unbeliever who doesn't know why he's an atheist is what your referring to.. .

Yes, that is what I was referring to. Good synopsis.

Trailblazer · Oct 16, 2019

9-10ths_Penguin said:
If God were real, I think it would be ridiculous to assume that it would be anything like a social creature, pursuing interaction with other social creatures.

God is not social and God doesn't pursue social interaction.

9-10ths_Penguin said:
If it did want to communicate, why would we expect that it would be intelligible to - or interested in - us?

I believe that since God is interested in us God did communicate through Messengers and that is very intelligible.

9-10ths_Penguin said:
IMO, as soon as we start talking about God's emotions or will, we're talking about an anthropomorphism.

As I said, I believe God created us out of love, but that does not mean God loves like a human would love.
God's love is beyond any human love.

I could never blame an atheist for being an atheist

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Be your own guru

Not your average Mormon

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Asteroid insurance?

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Not your average Mormon

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1/10 Subway Stalinist

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