Challenging Religion!

[farri]

Retired priest: ‘Hell’ was invented by the church to control people with fear

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LkaH3hEmV3M

 

 

 

[old man emu]

Actually, he's quite correct. Until the message of Jesus was worked on in the early Christian era, nearly every human society from Early Man to the present, believed that after death, a man's spirit went to a place where the cares and woes of earthly existence did not exist. In most cases, this afterlife place was in the sky, as going to the sky for mortal man was not possible. However, some societies went to the underworld for their afterlife (Greeks, Vikings). Some societies had a stop-over place where a person could atone for their misdeeds, but they did not stay there for eternity.

 

It was only the Christians who developed the idea of a place of eternal damnation. They called it Hell. Hell is viewed by most Abrahamic traditions Judaism, Christian, Islam) as a place of or a form of punishment. The modern English word hell is derived from Old English hel, helle (about 725 AD to refer to a nether world of the dead). Subsequently, the word was used to transfer a pagan concept to Christian theology and its vocabulary[1] (however, for the Judeo-Christian origin of the concept see Gehenna). In the Hebrew Bible, Gehenna was initially where some of the kings of Judah sacrificed their children by fire.[1] Thereafter it was deemed to be cursed (Jer. 7:31, 19:2-6).[2] In Jewish Rabbinic literature, and Christian and Islamic scripture, Gehenna is a destination of the wicked.[3] This is different from the more neutral Sheol/Hades, the abode of the dead, although the King James Version of the Bible usually translates both with the Anglo-Saxon word Hell.

 

OME

 

 

[bexrbetter]

HOLD THE FRONT DOOR!

 

You're telling me a Religion has invented a story that's not actually true?

 

I'm shattered.

 

 

[Old Koreelah]

I couldn't find a category suted to this, so I'll slip it in here:

 

At last, a move to combine science and religion (and just a bit of money raising too...).

 

Bad Karma: Community Objects to “Opportunism” of Buddhism on the Blockchain — Bitcoin Magazine

 

 

[Marty_d]

...or, we just die and that's it. I didn't experience anything before my brain got to a certain level of development in the womb, and I'm pretty sure I won't experience anything after I die.

 

Pretty simple really. No need to invent gods, afterlife of any sort, or any other superstitious rubbish. It's only our gigantic egos which would invent an afterlife for one species out of the millions which have inhabited this planet.

 

 

[nomadpete]

Oh, Marty.

 

Did you HAVE to?

 

 

[Marty_d]

What the hell... we haven't had a decent atheist-vs-christian bash since Gnarly Gnu started keeping a low profile!

 

 

 

[willedoo]

Marty, I think it would be great to have a paradise like afterlife. I'm sure if there was a heaven, I'd have unlimited beer, and finally find KM-14,17,18,24 and 36 oxygen masks, also a ZSh-1, ZSh-2 and ShLO-50 helmet. And I guess a VKK-1 partial pressure suit. That would top it off for me. I'm not interested in harps.

 

But I suspect it's like every time I've been anaesthetized for an op. One minute they give you the needle, next thing they are wheeling you out. An hour might have gone by but it seems like an instant. No dreams, just a big blank. I'm tipping that's what it's like to be dead, but if I'm right, I'll never know I'm right.

 

 

[nomadpete]

Now you've done it. Now he'll never come back.

 

 

[facthunter]

One of the main reasons I gave up on it is the caliber of some of the people who think they are going there. They are not ALL bad but on average.... er how dose one say it. "Looking after themselves" and let's say I prefer more open minded company. when I get in deep discussion.. Anyhow there's literally a ton of different religions many of whom would kill me for not believing as they do. .That strikes me as a bit unfriendly and uncivilized..Nev

 

 

[willedoo]

There's a few things I could never figure out about it. For a start, God created the Universe and everything we know in the space of a week. That's an enormous power, more powerful than anything. But his power must be limited or he could have just snapped his fingers and created it instantaneously.

 

It took him a few days, so whether that was the logistics of pumping out a certain quota of galaxies per day, or the fact that it took him a week to decide on a final format, we'll never know.

 

Either way, he had the power to build the universe. If he had the power to do that, logic tells us mere mortals that he would have the power to stop his earthly representatives from molesting children. Also, in theory, he should be able to stop wars, disease, and change a world where the animal inhabitants kill and eat each other. After all, that should be a walk in the park for someone who can make everything.

 

So here's some theories:

 

A. He was so worn out after making the universe that he had a heart attack and died, thus having no power or influence over what happened later.

 

B. He made all this stuff, and then was just over it and couldn't give a rats about what we did with it.

 

C. He didn't make anything at all, and in fact doesn't exist.

 

 

[octave]

So according to my Christian friends God, who is perfect, made everything but somehow it became imperfect and the only option he had (because causing hideous suffering by drowning everything on earth) was to allow his son to be tortured and killed, so that HE could forgive the very people HE created seems pretty irrational to me. I would love a Christian, and I have asked many, to explain this to me and I have never had a reasonable explanation. I consider myself a good Dad a NOTHING would make me become so perverted and bloodthirsty as to allow any harm to happen to him. Sorry but god is the worst father ever.

 

 

[Marty_d]

And what about the devil? Where'd he come from? Oh... fallen angel. So... did god create him knowingly flawed (which therefore means the fault lies with god) or did he create him perfect and he became evil all by himself (in which case god is not omnipotent)?

 

Sorry, but when I read a book I want it to have a good plot and believable characters.

 

 

[Marty_d]

So according to my Christian friends God, who is perfect, made everything but somehow it became imperfect and the only option he had (because causing hideous suffering by drowning everything on earth) was to allow his son to be tortured and killed, so that HE could forgive the very people HE created seems pretty irrational to me. I would love a Christian, and I have asked many, to explain this to me and I have never had a reasonable explanation. I consider myself a good Dad a NOTHING would make me become so perverted and bloodthirsty as to allow any harm to happen to him. Sorry but god is the worst father ever.

Don't forget, he's got form - he wanted Abraham to kill his son too. And he killed all the firstborn children of the Egyptians.

 

 

[facthunter]

The Christians blamed the Jews for killing the son of God (JC). if God sent his only son (JC) to die on the cross and atone for all of our (collective) sins then this was all preplanned so the jews cannot be responsible.. JC was obviously not convinced of the way this was supposed to work because, as one could understand, being up there on the cross with a couple of ordinary bad guys beside him with a crown of thorns and vinegar for refreshment wasn't fun at all and, accused GOD of forsaking him. and asked why he had done that.. Nev

 

 

[willedoo]

It's understandable. If my dad did that to me, I'd want an explanation as well.

 

 

[Bruce]

I reckon we all know what its like to be dead, because that's what we were for a few billion years before we were born.

 

Here's what is interesting though... Do you do somebody a favour by getting them born? Or is that a mean thing to do, on account of how they were asleep and could have continued to be so.

 

When I think of lives in their entirety, for those who I knew really well, I doubt that I would recommend an unborn to live that life instead of sleeping it out. Sure they had some good bits, but they also had bad bits especially near the end.

 

 

[facthunter]

Atoms and molecules aren't sleeping unless they are at minus 273 degrees. At other times they are bouncing around ready to combine with others. .Your genes ORGANISE matter to form an orderly, functioning and extremely complex YOU under a process that took so much time you can't comprehend it so THAT explains the complexity pretty easily . To stay alive is always a big fight. It's a miracle anyone is actually alive for long or get alive in the first place... There's plenty of ways to get DEAD. There's always something wanting to eat it or absorb it. Easy to injure,burn, freeze, starve, drown. . Viruses and microbes. Poisonous materials. Look at the defence processes your immune system has evolved, and it's still evolving.. The strong will to live in most forms of life.. Nev

 

 

[Yenn]

Given that facthunter is probably correct it is amazing that we survive, considering one of humanitys traits is trying to get rid of humanity. The big pity is that we are killing off other forms of life as fast as we can go.

 

 

[facthunter]

Yeah, I better have a glass of fizzy tonight. I had to get rid of a small Huntsman in my bedroom yesterday. It was quick and it wouldn't have suffered. Outside a bird would have got it. My daughter still got "into" me about it. I guess that's what daughters are for. I taught her to drive too. Sheesh, that was a big deal..I thought Dog allbitey was testing me. (That was when I believed. ) See..... I did get back to topic. Nev

 

 

[red750]

As Rowan Atkinson put it, Hell has no toilets - eternal damnation without relief.

 

 

[facthunter]

And Dave Allen. to" there will be weeping and wailing and gnashing of teeth" and someone said I haven't got any teeth. "Teeth will be provided". very irreverent man. May he RIP. Nev

 

 

[Bruce]

Nev, there is a serious argument that JC was not a real person. When I was a kid, they thought that the dead sea scrolls would undermine religion.

 

Why? Because the Jesus parables predated the Jesus character by 400 years. And because there are no cross-references to validate Jesus. No tax records or court records.

 

AND there was a local Jerusalem guy who kept a diary through those times who never mentions Jesus.

 

 

[Old Koreelah]

... The big pity is that we are killing off other forms of life as fast as we can go.

Yenn I have a nebulous theory that the total biomass on our planet stays roughly constant, as humans breed and spread, displacing natural systems with our crops and livestock. We are approaching 8 billion people, but the numbers of wild animals and plants is crashing. The rate of extinction is accelerating.

 

I fear the great Chief Seattle may be proved right, that we will die from a great loneliness of spirit.

 

CHIEF SEATTLE'S LETTER

 

 

[Bruce]

Old K, you might like the Gaia theory which says the earth acts a bit like an organism itself. Thus global warming is like a fever which will cause the parasites causing problems to die off.