A Must Read!

[denuseri]

No, I'm not sure. That's why I said "I would venture to say", stating it as an opinion, or speculation.

Veiling the attack by any other name.


And just which "benevolent god" are we talking about here? I'm not familiar with too many.

If you only look for the negative in it, that is all you will find.


Oh certainly. It's atheists who kill those who convert to another religion, isn't it? No, wait. That's Islam:

No it is individuals who kill each other, not religions and the athiests hands are no more clean than anyone elses in that department, look at all the people killed enforcing mandatory state invoked athiesm in the Communist Countries just once.

Or maybe Christians:

though the Christian churches seem to have grown out of the practice.

Or perhaps Judaism:

They seem to have gotten over it, too.

Its not the religion, its the people of the time period.

I never heard of an atheist apostate, though there have been people who have gone back to religion after becoming atheists. I don't think any of them were condemned for it, though.


I never claimed it did. I said religions did. Spiritualism, and faith, developed out of individual searches for truth.

No religions didnt, the actions of individuals did.

You only wish to see the bad in religion, so much so thats all you want to see its all you will see. But if it wasn't for religion we wouldnt have civilization.

Again, you resort to painting everyone that doesnt share your faith with the same brush.

So there is no point in continueing, have fun with your rant.

Good day.

[TantricSoul]

I wonder about that, sometimes. I can't understand how someone could pass a critical thinking course, yet still fall under the spell of someone like Chopra.

I wouldn't say I've fallen under his spell ... I would say that what I have read of his work, which isn't a great amount, fits in with what I already believed.

I don't know if you're old enough to remember the 60's ...

No I was born just after the 60's ... I do remember the late 70's and the 80's quite well.

But I take nothing on faith, only with evidence...

I don't doubt this... nor do I doubt what I believe either.


... But if you want to try to force your beliefs onto others, to infiltrate the laws of the land with your beliefs, to hide behind those beliefs while committing foul crimes against others, then I will fight you. And I won't be alone. Atheists are organizing, growing more confident, and fighting back against the institutions which have terrorized and persecuted them throughout history.

It's not just the atheists that deplore the actions noted above ... many of the faithful / spiritual do as well. I have very personal, first hand knowledge, of those who "hide behind those beliefs while committing foul crimes against others" ... I denied everything religious and spiritual for the first 3.5 decades of my life because of how my stepfather, a Protestant minister, treated his family behind the closed doors of our parsonages. Also I completely understand that the "you" in your paragraph above is in the general sense not the personal, after all I haven't seen alot of "you must believe as I do or you are going to hell" kind of language on these boards.

... The fact that atheists can live good, moral lives.

Of course, they are humans same as the believers, both equally capable of actions that could, and often are, labeled as good or bad.

I don't need to show anyone else evidence about my opinions or beliefs, for the sole reason that they are mine, no one will interpret anything in this world exactly the same as me. And nobody values knowledge they do not first seek, then find reason to agree with, on their own. I do not seek to convince, cajole, or otherwise prove that I am right and another is wrong, whether the topic be religion, politics, or the hue of blue. This was hard to give up, but has made my life much less frustrating.