Why Would Christians Worship a God Who Clearly Wouldn't Lift A Finger For Them?

[ppp]

Sorry. Maybe I’m missing the point. So I’m ready to be enlightened.

I have no idea what you are asking. Or even if you are asking anything.

 

[1213]

Then why should we pray to Yahweh?

I don’t say anyone should pray. But, if person wants to pray Yahweh, to get answer from him, then it would be quite reasonable to pray him. If you are not interested, you are free to not do so. But, if you pray some other god, don’t expect Yahweh to answer to that.

 

[SeekingAllTruth]

I do not think that the Baha'i Faith will have the same problem as the older religions because it appeals to the highly educated. Compared to adherents to older religions, Baha'is are much more educated on average, many holding advanced degrees. The problem it will have is that it is a religion, and most agnostics and atheists employ the fallacy of hasty generalization and assume all religions are the same. That shows that they are not as smart as they think they are.

I don't think it's the same thing. It's not an issue of which religion has the edge because it's newer. It's a question of people just not being interested in anything the involves a god. Lots of agnostics and atheists follow Buddhist practices because Buddhism doesn't involve a god. It's more a lifestyle and a mode of thinking. Richard Gere is a Buddhist but I'm pretty sure he's an atheist too.

 

[Trailblazer]

I don't think it's the same thing. It's not an issue of which religion has the edge because it's newer. It's a question of people just not being interested in anything the involves a god. Lots of agnostics and atheists follow Buddhist practices because Buddhism doesn't involve a god. It's more a lifestyle and a mode of thinking. Richard Gere is a Buddhist but I'm pretty sure he's an atheist too.

I agree, because agnostics and atheists do not think in terms of whether a religion is new or old. Most of them (unless they are true seekers) are not interested in anything that involves God.

But that makes me wonder why at least half of RF members are atheists and agnostics. Why are they on a religious forum if they have no interest in religion or God? If I was not a believer and I was not a seeker, I would be off sunning myself on a beach somewhere, not on a religious forum.

 

[SeekingAllTruth]

I agree, because agnostics and atheists do not think in terms of whether a religion is new or old. Most of them (unless they are true seekers) are not interested in anything that involves God.

But that makes me wonder why at least half of RF members are atheists and agnostics. Why are they on a religious forum if they have no interest in religion or God? If I was not a believer and I was not a seeker, I would be off sunning myself on a beach somewhere, not on a religious forum.

I'd be willing to bet that nearly all RF people were once sincere practicing Christians like I was and come onto religious forums to talk about their experiences with a failed God and religion and to discuss with members what things they have learned that may make a difference in a person who is thinking about walking away from a particular religion.

 

[Trailblazer]

I'd be willing to bet that nearly all RF people were once sincere practicing Christians like I was and come onto religious forums to talk about their experiences with a failed God and religion and to discuss with members what things they have learned that may make a difference in a person who is thinking about walking away from a particular religion.

I have been on this forum for a little over three years and I have to agree with what you said. Dollars to donuts most atheists and agnostics were formerly Christians although there are a few exceptions. I know this because when I first came to RF and a long time after that I posted almost exclusively to agnostics and atheists. Now I post to whoever posts to me, and it is more of a mix, but I still prefer posting to agnostics and atheists.

If you don't believe me just look at my Profile and you will see the threads I have started leaning towards agnostics and atheists, in an effort to understand their position about God and Messengers, not to convert them. Below are some of my older threads. Once I learned the positions of most of agnostics and atheists on this forum, there was no need to keep covering the same arguments so eventually I moved on to other topics.

Featured Threads by Trailblazer

Featured Threads by Trailblazer

Not only that, but for five years before I started posting in this forum, I was posting on Delphi Forums, and for most of that time I posted almost exclusively to agnostics and atheists, so I know as much or more about how they feel as I know about how religious believers feel, about God and religion.

 

[SeekingAllTruth]

I have been on this forum for a little over three years and I have to agree with what you said. Dollars to donuts most atheists and agnostics were formerly Christians although there are a few exceptions. I know this because when I first came to RF and a long time after that I posted almost exclusively to agnostics and atheists. Now I post to whoever posts to me, and it is more of a mix, but I still prefer posting to agnostics and atheists.

If you don't believe me just look at my Profile and you will see the threads I have started leaning towards agnostics and atheists, in an effort to understand their position about God and Messengers, not to convert them. Below are some of my older threads. Once I learned the positions of most of agnostics and atheists on this forum, there was no need to keep covering the same arguments so eventually I moved on to other topics.

Featured Threads by Trailblazer

Featured Threads by Trailblazer

Not only that, but for five years before I started posting in this forum, I was posting on Delphi Forums, and for most of that time I posted almost exclusively to agnostics and atheists, so I know as much or more about how they feel as I know about how religious believers feel, about God and religion.

This is a kind of new experience for me. I've been an agnostic deist for maybe 8 years after researching the origins of Christianity for nearly a year. I watched all the YouTube debates of Bart Ehrman, Dan Barker, Richard Carrier, Michael Shermer and a bunch of others on mainly the topic of Jesus' Resurrection and I always find the evidence against the resurrection more compelling than the argument for--notice I said "argument" not "evidence" because in my humble opinion the pro-resurrectionists never put forth anything substantial which could be classified as evidence. Everything is out of the Bible.

 

[ppp]

This is a kind of new experience for me. I've been an agnostic deist for maybe 8 years after researching the origins of Christianity for nearly a year. I watched all the YouTube debates of Bart Ehrman, Dan Barker, Richard Carrier, Michael Shermer and a bunch of others on mainly the topic of Jesus' Resurrection and I always find the evidence against the resurrection more compelling than the argument for--notice I said "argument" not "evidence" because in my humble opinion the pro-resurrectionists never put forth anything substantial which could be classified as evidence. Everything is out of the Bible.

Are you unconvinced of the resurrection? I ask this because you say that you don't see any evidence for it. I agree. If that is your position, and a lack of evidence is the basis for it, then why do you believe that there is a intelligent agent that created the universe. Do you think there's evidence for such a thing? I'm assuming that you're using deist in the classic sense. Apologies if I'm mistaken about that.

 

[Trailblazer]

This is a kind of new experience for me. I've been an agnostic deist for maybe 8 years after researching the origins of Christianity for nearly a year. I watched all the YouTube debates of Bart Ehrman, Dan Barker, Richard Carrier, Michael Shermer and a bunch of others on mainly the topic of Jesus' Resurrection and I always find the evidence against the resurrection more compelling than the argument for--notice I said "argument" not "evidence" because in my humble opinion the pro-resurrectionists never put forth anything substantial which could be classified as evidence. Everything is out of the Bible.

I believe that an agnostic deist is a respectable position and a rational one. That is not to say I do not respect Christians, but I could never be a Christian because it is too exclusive to say Jesus is the Only Way. I cannot believe any religion is the only true religion because it makes no sense that God would have only one true religion.

Anyhow, you might not be aware of this, but there are liberal Christians who do not believe that Jesus rose from the dead, so it is possible to be a Christian and not believe that, or that a lot of the other stories in the Bible as literally true. This is the position of the Baha'i Faith, that many of the Bible stories are symbolic.

What many liberal theologians believe about Jesus' death

Many liberal and some mainline Christian leaders believe that Jesus died during the crucifixion, did not resurrect himself, and was not bodily resurrected by God. At his death, his mind ceased to function and his body started the decomposition process. Returning to life a day and a half later would have been quite impossible. The story of having been wrapped in linen and anointed with myrrh seems to have been copied from the story of the death of Osiris -- the Egyptian God of the earth, vegetation and grain. The legend that he visited the underworld between his death and resurrection was simply copied from common Pagan themes of surrounding cultures. One example again was Osiris. "With his original association to agriculture, his death and resurrection were seen as symbolic of the annual death and re-growth of the crops and the yearly flooding of the Nile." 1

They also believe that Paul regarded the resurrection to be an act of God in which Jesus was a passive recipient of God's power. Paul did not mention the empty tomb, the visit by a woman or women, the stone, the angel/angels/man/men at the tomb, and reunion of Jesus with his followers in his resuscitated body. Rather, he believed that Jesus was taken up into heaven in a spirit body. It was only later, from about 70 to 110 CE when the four canonic Gospels were written, that the Christians believed that Jesus rose from the grave in his original body, and by his own power.

Later, perhaps after Paul's death, there was great disappointment within the Christian communities because Jesus had not returned as expected. They diverted their focus of attention away from Jesus' second coming. They studied his life and death more intensely. Legends without a historical basis were created by the early church; these included the empty tomb and described Jesus returning in his original body to eat and talk with his followers.

In previous centuries, almost all Christians believed in miracles as described in the Hebrew Scriptures (Old Testament). These included creation, the story of Adam and Eve, a talking serpent, the great flood of Noah, the drying up of the Red/Reed sea, a prophet riding on a talking ***, the sun stopping in the sky, etc. From the Christian Scriptures (New Testament), they believed in the virgin birth, the Christmas star, angels appearing to the shepherds, Jesus healing the sick, etc. Many, perhaps most, liberal Christians now believe that these stories are not to be interpreted literally as real events. Their faith has not been damaged by losing faith in the reality of these events. A growing number of liberals are now taking the final step by interpreting the stories of Jesus' resurrection and his appearances to his followers and to Paul as other than real events. Retired bishop John Shelby Spong commented:

"I do admit that for Christians to enter this subject honestly is to invite great anxiety. It is to walk the razor's edge, to run the risk of cutting the final cord still binding many to the faith of their mothers and fathers. But the price for refusing to enter this consideration is for me even higher. The inability to question reveals that one has no confidence that one's belief system will survive such an inquiry. That is a tacit recognition that on unconscious levels, one's faith has already died. If one seeks to protect God from truth or new insights, then God has surely already died." 3

 

[SeekingAllTruth]

Are you unconvinced of the resurrection? I ask this because you say that you don't see any evidence for it. I agree. If that is your position, and a lack of evidence is the basis for it, then why do you believe that there is a intelligent agent that created the universe. Do you think there's evidence for such a thing? I'm assuming that you're using deist in the classic sense. Apologies if I'm mistaken about that.

I am unconvinced because there is no evidence outside what the Bible says that any such thing happened. I see Christians rationalize this by saying Jesus didn't want his resurrection to be known to the word (Why on earth why??????) so he appeared only to a select few. Certainly at his ascension if more than 500 people were present someone would have written an account. But nothing appears in the historic record. To me the ascension is more astonishing than the resurrection. Nobody ever talks about the ascension, but to see some dude lift up into the sky surrounded by angels and clouds????? Com'on, somebody would have written about that in the secular record. The only thing that convinces me of a higher intelligence is that incredible order of the plant and animal kingdoms along with the complexity of DNA and the fact that one strand of DNA contains more info than the entire Encyclopedia Britannica. That blows my mind. The odds of that happening are on a par with a tornado blowing through a junkyard and leaving behind a fully built fully functioning aircraft carrier. I do not and cannot subscribe to the belief that billions of years of evolution could accomplish what we see in the world today and that our earliest ancestors could have even survived long enough to multiply to a substantial number. There had to be help. But somewhere along the way when we were pretty high in numbers and spread around this intelligence went AWOL and left us on our own because we see nothing supernatural happening in the world. Everything that looks like a miracle can be explained by natural causes. For example there hasn't been a single ghost sighting out of millions of stories that has been scientifically proved to be a real ghost.

 

[ppp]

I am unconvinced because there is no evidence outside what the Bible says that any such thing happened. I see Christians rationalize this by saying Jesus didn't want his resurrection to be known to the word (Why on earth why??????) so he appeared only to a select few. Certainly at his ascension if more than 500 people were present someone would have written an account. But nothing appears in the historic record. To me the ascension is more astonishing than the resurrection. Nobody ever talks about the ascension, but to see some dude lift up into the sky surrounded by angels and clouds????? Com'on, somebody would have written about that in the secular record.

Absolutely. Or at least reported on the hoards of undead marching on Jerusalem.

"At that moment the curtain of the temple was torn in two from top to bottom. The earth shook, the rocks split and the tombs broke open. The bodies of many holy people who had died were raised to life. They came out of the tombs after Jesus’ resurrection and went into the holy city and appeared to many people." Matthew 27:51-53​

But what does it for me is the lack of any evidence that those things do or can occur. After all ancient texts are chock full of similar "magical" accounts.

The only thing that convinces me of a higher intelligence is that incredible order of the plant and animal kingdoms along with the complexity of DNA and the fact that one strand of DNA contains more info than the entire Encyclopedia Britannica. That blows my mind. The odds of that happening are on a par with a tornado blowing through a junkyard and leaving behind a fully built fully functioning aircraft carrier.

People say that, and yet no one produces the math to support that claim. No one. It's a emotional claim something on the order of kerjillion, or ginormous. Full of feeling, but short on mathematics. I get it. People get overwhelmed by very large and very small numbers to the point that one huge number feels the same as another huge number. But that is just a feeling. After all, there are known and observed mechanisms for genetic change, and no known mechanisms for an airplane to be assembled by a tornado. Not even an airplane landing strut.

 

[SeekingAllTruth]

I believe that an agnostic deist is a respectable position and a rational one. That is not to say I do not respect Christians, but I could never be a Christian because it is too exclusive to say Jesus is the Only Way. I cannot believe any religion is the only true religion because it makes no sense that God would have only one true religion.

Anyhow, you might not be aware of this, but there are liberal Christians who do not believe that Jesus rose from the dead, so it is possible to be a Christian and not believe that, or that a lot of the other stories in the Bible as literally true. This is the position of the Baha'i Faith, that many of the Bible stories are symbolic.

It's a good position. The mistake Christians make I think is that they interpret everything in the Bible as being literal--often without even knowing why. My cousin is a gung-ho Christian who really believes the earth is only 6,000 years old and that God created Adam et al in 7 literal days. I cannot have a conversation with her because of all the crazy excuses she makes to support commonsense objections to this position.

What many liberal theologians believe about Jesus' death

Many liberal and some mainline Christian leaders believe that Jesus died during the crucifixion, did not resurrect himself, and was not bodily resurrected by God. At his death, his mind ceased to function and his body started the decomposition process. Returning to life a day and a half later would have been quite impossible. The story of having been wrapped in linen and anointed with myrrh seems to have been copied from the story of the death of Osiris -- the Egyptian God of the earth, vegetation and grain. The legend that he visited the underworld between his death and resurrection was simply copied from common Pagan themes of surrounding cultures. One example again was Osiris. "With his original association to agriculture, his death and resurrection were seen as symbolic of the annual death and re-growth of the crops and the yearly flooding of the Nile." 1

They also believe that Paul regarded the resurrection to be an act of God in which Jesus was a passive recipient of God's power. Paul did not mention the empty tomb, the visit by a woman or women, the stone, the angel/angels/man/men at the tomb, and reunion of Jesus with his followers in his resuscitated body. Rather, he believed that Jesus was taken up into heaven in a spirit body. It was only later, from about 70 to 110 CE when the four canonic Gospels were written, that the Christians believed that Jesus rose from the grave in his original body, and by his own power.

I think these liberal Christians are the only ones who can save Christianity from going extinct. In this world of information such beliefs the Christians insist on holding on to are what is driving people away from the religion. Christianity is the fastest declining religion in America. thousands of churches hutter their doors each year, more so because of the pandemic. My brother is a gung-ho Christian too and the little church's population he used to go to has gone from about 250 members to about 50. I have no idea how much longer they can survive. Paul would have known if Jesus had rose bodily because supposedly he was there when all this was happening. The fact he believes it was a spiritual resurrection tells me that he either wasn't there or there wasn't a bodily resurrection. I don't believe Paul was real anyway because there simply is no mention of him or his journeys anywhere in the secular record. That would have been impossible given how much he interacted with thousands of people. It's likely some anonymous writer composed the genuine epistles and attached the name Paul to them, maybe Marcion. The rest of the details were filled in by Luke a century or two later.

Later, perhaps after Paul's death, there was great disappointment within the Christian communities because Jesus had not returned as expected. They diverted their focus of attention away from Jesus' second coming. They studied his life and death more intensely. Legends without a historical basis were created by the early church; these included the empty tomb and described Jesus returning in his original body to eat and talk with his followers.

In previous centuries, almost all Christians believed in miracles as described in the Hebrew Scriptures (Old Testament). These included creation, the story of Adam and Eve, a talking serpent, the great flood of Noah, the drying up of the Red/Reed sea, a prophet riding on a talking ***, the sun stopping in the sky, etc. From the Christian Scriptures (New Testament), they believed in the virgin birth, the Christmas star, angels appearing to the shepherds, Jesus healing the sick, etc. Many, perhaps most, liberal Christians now believe that these stories are not to be interpreted literally as real events. Their faith has not been damaged by losing faith in the reality of these events. A growing number of liberals are now taking the final step by interpreting the stories of Jesus' resurrection and his appearances to his followers and to Paul as other than real events. Retired bishop John Shelby Spong commented:

"I do admit that for Christians to enter this subject honestly is to invite great anxiety. It is to walk the razor's edge, to run the risk of cutting the final cord still binding many to the faith of their mothers and fathers. But the price for refusing to enter this consideration is for me even higher. The inability to question reveals that one has no confidence that one's belief system will survive such an inquiry. That is a tacit recognition that on unconscious levels, one's faith has already died. If one seeks to protect God from truth or new insights, then God has surely already died." 3

Just the fact that Jesus supposedly said he would return at least three times in the gospels and he didn't should tell the Christians something about the veracity of the gospels. That and the fact that as the gospels are written over a span of 40 years or so they grow longer and more and more embellished with regards to details. Mark is bare-bones and portrays Jesus as a great prophet. Matthew and Luke portray Jesus as a demi-god and it isn't until we get John 9written by several scholars according to the experts) that we get Jesus as fully God equal with the Father. This is a common characteristic of growing religions as the way they want to interpret their god-figure evolves over time.