first some background info: i was raised roman catholic, but i no longer consider myself so. it was my grandmother who taught me how to have a relationship with god and jesus. although there were a couple of bible things i never understood... first. cain and abel. as a child, i never understood why god didn't like cain's sacrifice. i remember thinking, "well, aren't fruits and vegetables good for you? why would god not like cain's offering? he worked just as hard." second. the golden calf story. this one puzzled me also. i thought, "is god going to smite india because of all the hindus there who worship other gods?" i wasn't without my doubts as a child, but i nevertheless had a normal, healthy relationship with God. until puberty. i remember as a little kid, i had crushes on girls, and then all of a sudden, i wanted to see naked guys. i prayed and prayed to god that he would "make me straight". nothing happened. in fact, things just got worse. i became incredibly depressed. no matter how much i prayed, things just always sucked. i started reading some contemporary writings. i learned about people who actually criticized christianity. i learned about atheism. made sense. after all, we have no evidence of god, so he may or may not exist. now i consider myself completely agnostic. at least for now, the question as to whether or not god exists is "unanswerable". i ask myself why, if there is a god, did he make me to suffer so much? this is not to say that i don't completely appreciate life. i do. life is the strangest, most mystifying thing that has ever happened to me. i'm just very confused. i try to keep my mind open to all possibilities. but i just can't see how a god could create me to suffer. and not just me, but so many other people in the world. and probably so many other creatures in the universe. have i just been unlucky? i mean, i fucking try so hard to appreciate life. and that is part of why i smoke weed. but there is so much suffering in the world, and some people never even get a taste of happiness before they decide to kill themselves. i'm open to all your opinions. i don't really know if i have a specific question, but your opinions on anything i've just said are welcome.
Atheists will agree, the concept of god in it's philosophical view truly is unanswerable, but probability is a huge role. Keep your mind open, continue to ponder, read philosophical books, explore doctrines and isms.
God isn't the one who's making you suffer, it's the norms of the society. That's what's making you suffer.
This. You were created wholly in the image of God, and as such are a part of God. How could something as essential to your being as sexuality be wrong when the Old and New Testament very clearly states what I just told you? Mainstream Christianity does not teach the Bible. It does not really teach about God. It teaches Christianity (and even that is debatable). Get your spiritual support from the scriptures (be they Christian or otherwise) and stop caring about what the church, or the religious people around you think.
This ^ and the fact it, people don't like gay people because the BIBLE say so! Religion is what is wrong with society. Also, I just thought of a theory... So before homosexuals were called Gay, gay was used to mean someone was happy. "Oh man, look at John, he's so gay right now." So did people start calling homosexuals gay, because they were always happy, and they were jealous of these homosexuals happiness? Seems logical to me.
But in the end, you'll find that it was actually you yourself, that was making you suffer, nobody else. Free it man... stop the suffering...
I don't think it was out of jealousy... They were just calling gay people gay. Just describing what they were seeing.
According to Professor Wiki Sexualization The word had started to acquire associations of immorality by 1637[1] and was used in the late 17th century with the meaning "addicted to pleasures and dissipations."[8] This was by extension from the primary meaning of "carefree": implying "uninhibited by moral constraints." A gay woman was a prostitute, a gay man a womanizer and a gay house a brothel.[1] The use of gay to mean "homosexual" was in origin merely an extension of the word's sexualised connotation of "carefree and uninhibited", which implied a willingness to disregard conventional or respectable sexual mores.
Hang in there.. [ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aEW0BtFuj5I&NR=1"]YouTube- PLAYING FOR CHANGE: PEACE THROUGH MUSIC | One Love | PBS[/ame] Sorry guys, I realize this isnt the music section but I'm not promoting a band..just a state of mind [ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yvayzIktTJ4&feature=channel"]YouTube- Playing For Change Band: A Change Is Gonna Come (live)[/ame] Point being, we can use a readily available medium of music to tie us together in a viewable manner, but we're all the same man. Love life, love the stranger next to you, and love yourself..we're one. Don't buy in to mans visions of separation because they don't exist. And I mean that completely, they don't exist. If you can't see it yet, you will....hang in there..
Able's sacrfice was more out of faith. He gave the best of his flock, it states it so. It says nothing about cain giving the best of his plants. Think of it as weed. Able gave god his biggest, dankest of nugs. Cain gave god his shake.
The God of the Bible had a lust for blood and anguish. The title of a lunatic would be fitting if he had existed.
Perhaps, but so did the gods that were eventually amalgamated into who the Israelites called YHWH. It's neat to look at the progression: the Sumerian gods who eventually became YHWH/El were all bloodthirsty. YHWH/El was less bloodthirsty, culminating in the God of Grace that Christians supposedly worship. Note that there are a ton of places in the Hebrew Bible which express God as loving and compassionate as well, however...so I don't think it's right to just outright declare Him to be a God with a "lust for blood and anguish." Such is an easily defeated position.
Personally I view the bible as the anachronistic, flawed amalgamation that is demonstrably is. That being said, I think that it if you're eclectic and exercise critical thought, you can still derive positive messages from it. I think Revelations is one of the best sci-fi novels I've ever read. It's brilliantly written, very skillful and artistic prose.
For sure. I don't believe for a second that the Bible is the "word of God." Is is the combined words of men of God (who were clearly fallible and subject to the same mortal follies as the rest of us). The Bible is the product of a political campaign by the Roman Catholic Church to stamp out so-called heresy beginning in 393AD at the Synod of Hippo (my year might be wrong...I'm going by memory. Forgive me if it is). There are hundreds of other books that the early Israelites, and the early Christians considered sacred, containing doctrines that show, quite starkly, that the early Christian church believed things that a Roman Catholic in the 4th century, and today, would claim were demonic. For this very reason alone I don't think it's a good idea to put too much stock into the Bible. Take from it those things which are edifying and praiseworthy, and throw the rest out. The same model should be used on all so-called "scriptures," no matter what faith tradition they may belong to. There is a great deal we can all learn about ourselves, the world, and God from the combined scriptures of all people.
i like what they said in hitchhikers guide to the galaxy about god. it's a universal paranoia thinking that you were created by a higher power. every culture has some sort of higher being, be it god buddha satan or whoever. me personally i don't believe in any of it, i was raised in a catholic house and i got tired of jesus being forced on me, and coming from a scientific mind i question everything, so to me jesus is as real as mickey mouse.
When you say YHWH/El, you should make a distinction between the two. They were separate gods before the jewish tradition adopted them, which later scribes put together. And, it is really funny how you say that the God of the bible does not say that he has a lust for blood and agony, when in fact, in Genesis 8:21 it says that this God figure loves the sweet smell of burning flesh. Religious ignorance at its finest...
My opinion is that the bible isnt exact.just because i see it like this if theirs 100 people in a line and you tell the first one ....if they would like to come to youre b-day party and to pass it down by the time it gets down to the 100th person they would say something like lets go to the gay party or something like that in other words it wont be exact......i hope you understand what iam saying and also i know you must have faith but no matter who i ask they can never answer me this question if god created us then who created god...????????huh
By pulling out what you think is right and ignoring or throwing out the rest shows that you already can distinguish, and, to a degree, know what can be judged as wrong and what can be judged as right. Within this framework, the knowledge for discernment already exists. There is no need for the bible as a moral guide. You also say that, "There is a great deal we can all learn about ourselves, the world, and God from the combined scriptures of all people." Mind telling me how you have access to this knowledge? How do you know that the combined scriptures of all people actually portray reality? If you base your reasoning on rational grounds, you do not need faith. Faith is a judgement made without adequate evidence, and in this respect, it is a blind assertion.
I used the / to show (at least in my mind), that they are separate (YHWH and El) yet were unified as one by the Israelites. I was high earlier, forgive me for not making such a distinction. It is clear from the Biblical text, however, that the early Semites were polytheistic, and is glaringly clear to anyone fluent in Hebrew, like myself. It's funny that you choose to ignore the thousands of passages that refer to God as compassionate and loving to prove your point that he has a "lust for blood and anguish." I'm well aware of what Gen 8:21 says. Seems like you aren't aware of what the rest of the Old Testament has to say about God. And there's no religious ignorance coming from my end. I'm just a Jew by birth and upbringing. I'm well aware of the limits and problems of the Judaic tradition. But there seems to be quite a bit of picking and choosing by you from certain places of the Bible to describe God in a way that the Biblical writers don't describe him...opposite from that way, in fact. All I'm simply trying to point out is that there are a great deal more verses in the Old Testament that express God as a loving Father, than there are of Him as a vicious dictator. But such is the method of those who stand with faulty reasoning.