Hi Rich. Welcome.

We don't hang people here unless they start preaching instead of listening and debating. Seems like you'll do fine!

In theory, it ought to be fine for anyone to believe anything they want, but the simple fact is that any belief that you hold that affects me personally goes beyond that theory.

Let me give you a short list of things that religion is working towards in America:

*Teaching that the world is 6000 years old. In schools.

*Ending research into stem cells, possibly the most exciting and promising area of medicine for 50 years.

*Discriminating against gays

*Actively encouraging "the end times" by invading Iran. (I'm not kidding about this. Former Attorney General John Ashcroft is, and has always been, an active member of a group who openly advocates this ludicrous idea!)

* Abstinence only sex-ed, which has been repeatedly demonstrated to be the worst possible sex-ed for preventing pregnancy, HIV, and other STDs.

*Ending a woman's right to an abortion

In Georgia, where I live, it is illegal to buy alcohol on Sundays. Any idea what was behind the original laws regarding prohibition? Yep. Religion. It's still around, and keeps me from opening my bar on Sundays.

That's just a short list. Trust me. I know it's hard for a lot of Christians to understand that their morality is not, in fact, unquestionably the best morality in the world. It's not, though. Not only is it not the best, it's one of the worst in a lot of ways. There have been very clear, peer reviewed, verified studies demonstrating that the most religious countries are in fact the most immoral, based on things like sexual crime, violent crime, murder, teen pregnancy, and STD rates.

Here's the next reason that religion affects me.

In a recent survey, 63% of respondents said they wouldn't vote for an atheist for president simply because he was an atheist. You think that doesn't sting for us?

In another study, atheists turned up as the most distrusted and hated group in America, beneath lawyers.

So, if god really is a fantasy, (which, of course, I believe) then your acceptance of the religion, and therefore, your tacit approval of all the things I mentioned above, contributes to me being part of the most reviled group of people in the country.

Yeah, it affects me.

thank you guys...I was just curious...In my own opinion it seems to me that alot of Christians have perverted what in my opinion began as a very good thing.  Christianity, in its purest form, is the same as any other religion or morality system...The basis of it is essentially just be nice to people...you know?  Don't steal, don't kill, don't cheat...basic principles of morality.  It seems that many Christians feel the need to judge others, whether their Muslims, Jews, Non believers, and I just feel like that is completely against the message they should be preaching which is judge that ye shall not be judged.  I feel like their Christianity is a major perversion of what it should be.

Spreading the ideals of "be nice to people" is great and I think more people should do it. These happy go lucky, mind their own business, respect the First Amendment, don't bomb abortion clinic, don't boycott poly businesses and ruin their lives...sort of Christians are always welcome. Granted, I still think they're worshiping their imaginary friends but who cares if they just keep it to themselves.

As hamby so painfully pointed out, it's the activist anti-civil liberty psychos that are the problem.  

Why would I not  believe that there is good at the heart of most religion?

One would guess never. Had Jesus existed, wouldn't the Gospel of Mark cause some serious issues?  In this gospel, Jesus gets pissed at a fig tree for not bearing fruit for him, even though figs were not in season.  You don't see a lot of turning the other cheek there.

I think religion was invented to explainable the unexplainable.  It was also used as an early guide to living.  People would die from trychonosis, for example, so making it a sin to eat pork makes sense. Damning a woman to hell (or stoning her alive) because she had premarital or extramarital sex assures her husband that the children she bears are indeed his.  After all, his lands and assets would be passed down to his heirs. 

Why does religion still exist?  Because it is so interwoven with society and culture.  Think about how different the Western culture is compared to the Middle East.  Now think how differently those religions really are.  The same goes for Eastern religions. 

I wouldn't say that, but we'd say it does more harm than good - I'd explain it is taking OxyContin for a mild headache.

If no one's said it yet I feel I should. No atheist makes claims for all atheists. Many are live and let live about religion, but there probably are not going to be many here that feel that way.

I think the heart of religion is myth and ritual, doesn't add too much good and the good that is added can be done in other ways. The problem is when it does bad even worse is when the followers think they are doing good or it doesn't matter. There is also the aspect of “you can't question this because I believe this.”

I don't care if you make the sign of the cross, pray, cast spells, do a rain dance or anything else, just as long as you don't try to make everyone else do it. You're free to follow your religion, just like everyone else who has a different one is free to follow theirs and people who have none at all are free to not adopt one. Treat your religion as if it were a private matter between you and the god you believe in, not a public spectacle.

We have a different definition of how one would go about questioning ones faith. To question faith one would need to step outside it and apply reason to the question. "Is there any reason to believe in God?" one my ask ... but how they try to attain the answer is where the real questioning comes in.

If my answer to the question comes from what I am told by my priest and by society at large then it is possible that I never actually tested my faith.

I believe that to question what one believes they must apply impartial logic to the question.

Absolutely. And if we are using our brains instead of responding to emotion we will think about the question rationally. We will come to the conclusion that there is and never has been any evidence that superpowers and zombies have ever existed. If we apply the same question to other mythological creatures like unicorns we come up with a reasonable answer ... "what if I'm wrong about unicorns? what if?"

What is the logical answer to that question?

For me the answer is no for the simple reason that there is nothing for me to wonder "Might I be wrong?" about. Most theists I have conversed with seem to have no understanding of the fact that I see absolutely no reason to question whether or not there is a god. There is no reason to ever think that such a 'whatever' is a possibility and therefor no reason to ever question such an existence. Personally, I amazed by the fact that people seem to believe in this thing when I can't even understand what it is they are talking about beyond calling anything which they don't understand 'god'. It is beyond my abilities to even begin to question whether or not I'm wrong when I can't even understand what I might be wrong about.

It confuses me when I go back and read it as well. Its this damned stream of consciousness thought process borderline insanity thing I do that often doesn't translate well, especially in text, but good to know you figured it out. You should be in there where that gets created. Its dark and crowded and, most often, really scarey. Anyway...

The standard atheist response is that you can't prove a negative. There is no burden of proof on the atheist.

My response is similar, but very possibly unnecessarily wordy. Proving that things don't exist is not the way one normally goes about determining what is reality and what is not. It is in fact impossible to prove that something does not exist and therefor not an effective method of determing what is and what is not. The only method that actually works is not believing in things for which there is no evidence, such as space beavers. Without evidence of existence to attempt to find evidence of non-existence is nothing short of non-sensical.

Sorry Hamby, I didn't purposely overlook it...i just thought that it was sort of rhetorical...anyway as far as that goes...I guess yes it's just sort of an assumption I have...however I've been brought up in the church and I am a firm believer in my faith...so yes your argument holds up...I don't have any real rational reason by your standards...but it's enough for me.  That's probably the answer that will get me hanged lol.  Sorry guys.

Not possible.  If you read the Genesis creation account carefully, no measure of time existed before Day Four.  This puts the possibility of a 24-hour day in the crapper.  I don't believe that the Earth is young, and honest theists shouldn't either.

The agreement/disagreement is when the soul enters the body.  Most, like myself, believe that it is at conception.  However, as I have been destroyed by more knowledgeable folks elsewhere in debate on this very issue, I have learned that they do not, as the religious right wants you to believe, farm these things for evil purposes.  They are usually the by-products of other things, and would be destroyed if not used for the stem cell research.  I'm not opposed to that, and I don't see why anyone else would be.

I'm a bit more progressive than other theists, I guess. 

Wrong, wrong, wrong, wrong.  Jesus ministered to the worst sinners of His time, and made them feel welcome.  I, for one, would like to make gays feel welcome at church.  They have every right in the world to hear the word of God.  Assuming that they're theists like me.

Don't ask me to expound on my beliefs further than that.  Trust me: you won't like them. 

I've heard that.  I'm not defending it.  The fact that it is completely wrong should be self-evident. 

Agreed.  It doesn't work.  Abstinence is a choice that must be made by each individual with the intent to honor God with their bodies.  However, most people don't make that choice today.  This means that other forms of birth control must be made available to stem the flow of disease and unwanted pregnancies. 

The best way I've seen this put was in the book Mere Discipleship by Lee Camp: What if abortion was a legal choice, but no one exercised the right?  Again, as I mentioned with abstince-only education above, and I will mention in response to another of Hamby's claims below, we choose to honor God on an individual basis with our choices.  Ending the legal right will not stop the abortions, but it will have a sharp increase in the back-alley or the coat-hanger variety.

I don't think either side wants to see that. 

Christianity hinges, as I've stated above, upon people making individual choices that honor God.  But all too often people don't know how to make those choices, nor do they even want to try to make the right decision.  Our sinful flesh leads us into the bondage of sin, and even though we may confess Jesus as our Lord on the surface, we don't believe it in our minds and do not live it out with our lives.

In other words, for any of this to work at all, we must be personally convicted and we must conciously endeavor to make the choices in our lives that Jesus would want us to make.  I know that that theory doesn't always translate into practice for me.  That is when the rest of the world sees me as a hypocrite, and perhaps that is an accurate label.

I can always ask for God's forgiveness and repent.  At the risk of learning something about myself, becoming a better person, and strengthing my walk with the Lord--assuming I'm willing to take that risk. 

But to enforce the Christian morality on someone who doesn't feel the personal conviction that I did when I first confessed Jesus is my Lord and Savior is a great recipe for disaster.  This is why making abortion illegal and preaching abstince-only education isn't going to work. 

I have no idea how I would vote.  It would depend quite a bit on the other candidate, and on each one's viewpoint on world events and what to do about current events that I see as defining their leadership.  If the atheist was a far more capable leader than the theist candidate, I would vote for the atheist.

A lack of belief in God doesn't affect someone's ability to lead. 

Which is strange, considering we as Christians are supposed to love our neighbors.  I have nothing more to say, except that I don't personally hate anyone, least of all you, and I am sorry to hear that Christian majority does.  It shows that John Shelby Spong is right in saying that Christianity must change or die, but not for the reasons that he puts in his book.  Christianity isn't an exclusive club and we should be reaching out to gays, women entering abortion clinics, and atheists rather than publicly deriding them.

Reaching out to them, discipling them, and teaching them on an indvidual basis how to make choices that honor God--what we were supposed to be doing all along but are currently failing miserably at. 

Whoops... meant to also say supporting the ban on gay marriage is discrimination and Christians are supporting it like lemmings.  Doesn't matter what you think the bible says.  The majority of your fellows think otherwise.

 Again.  It would be nice if you'd be an advocate for atheists in your church.  Seriously.  You seem pretty reasonable for a guy who believes that god got himself killed so that he could forgive us for being the way he made us.

One little note for hamby...it's fine if you find it hard to take my opinions seriously.  that doesn't bother me at all.  Not a single one of my posts was meant as a means to change anyone's mind.  More than anything I came across this whole site on the internet a few days ago and I've never REALLY spoken with an atheist so I took the opportunity to ask some questions.  I am well aware that I'm not going to change your opinion and I'm sure you're well aware you're not going to change mine, so for me to try to do so would be completely pointless.

My response is "you're right," just as I have no proof there isn't an invisible ostrich next to me, aside from the fact that there isn't one and I have no reason or desire to believe that there might be.