Life got you down? - Christianity

[sanddbox]

Well whether or not being an ape is undesirable or not is questionable, but I see what your saying.

Well, look at it this way. Apes are smart, but, unlike us, they're not smart enough to have an entire civilization.

By the way, to clear up a common misconception - we didn't evolve from monkeys. We evolved from ancestors related to monkeys, if I remember correctly.

[sniper15]

ok so i know im coming into this a but late and the quote im about to use is a few months old but as i was going through the thread i just couldn't resist this post.

...
Even if religion was false, it helps people to better themselves. It brings a lot of peace and order to the world that would otherwise be chaos, wars, etc.

i love that last bit. the bit about religion not starting or causing any wars. it apparently also repels chaos,i wish someone would have explained that to the guys trying to blow me up in Iraq. and yes i know they are not catholic, so lets look at this.

how many wars have been started because of religion? how many people have died due to religious beliefs?

would you like me to start chronologically or alphabetically?
how about one event that caused not only chaos but a religious feud that continues today???
anyone here ever hear of the crusades? possibly one of the bloodiest wars ever fought, its hard to get accurate numbers on how many died because of it, but whole towns and cities were wiped out by the crusaders. they damn near committed genocide.

in your precious bible in the gospels it talks about one of the most disturbing mass murders known to man. king Herod in his attempt to snuff Jesus killed every baby he and his soldiers could find. yeah that's real peaceful.

so when you said religion has brought peace and order to the world i had to laugh at your ignorance. religion has caused more wars than any other cause. period.

that being said to clear up the evolution problem, we did evolve from "the ancestors of monkeys" they have a name but i doubt anyone is interested in the scientific name. the point is evolution can take multiple routes. for example in Darwin's studies he found many different types of swallows ones with long, short, stubby, curved, etc. beaks different length wings, and on and on. that doesn't mean they didn't evolve from the same place, it just means they evolved differently from a similar place. it also means that the place they evolved from was stable enough that they didn't branch out to become a new species. this is the same with humans. we and apes (there are like 50 different species of "apes" fyi) evolved from a similar place both our genes were favorable thus we both survived and continued reproducing. and since humans didn't prey on apes exclusively they had a pretty good chance of survival.

it seems you think somewhere along the following. -ants need longer necks to eat (for whatever reason its an example go with it.) so one day the queen gives birth to a whole bunch of eggs that hatch and have ants with longer necks, then magically all the ants without longer necks die and the ones with long necks are all that's left.-
as you can see that makes little to no sense at all. the ones with shorter necks might continue surviving by moving to a place where having shorter necks is favorable, leaving the long necked ants to survive where they left them. when thinking about evolution you have to take everything into account, location, food, weather, water, predators, etc. everything matters.

hopefully that helps you understand a little.

[ChippZanuff]

it seems you think somewhere along the following. -ants need longer necks to eat (for whatever reason its an example go with it.) so one day the queen gives birth to a whole bunch of eggs that hatch and have ants with longer necks, then magically all the ants without longer necks die and the ones with long necks are all that's left.-
as you can see that makes little to no sense at all. the ones with shorter necks might continue surviving by moving to a place where having shorter necks is favorable, leaving the long necked ants to survive where they left them. when thinking about evolution you have to take everything into account, location, food, weather, water, predators, etc. everything matters.

hopefully that helps you understand a little.

Why would the queen give birth to one set of evolved eggs and then stop? I mean all of the short neck ants wouldn't instantly die but when no more were born they would all be dead. Because if the queen had the ability to make long neck ants, which is more desirable, why keep making short neck ones?

By the way, to clear up a common misconception - we didn't evolve from monkeys. We evolved from ancestors related to monkeys, if I remember correctly.

Apes, monkeys, whatever. Its all the same to me. I don't discriminate.

and p.s. If so called christians actually followed what the bible said then they wouldn't cause wars. But I don't personally believe that anyone who resorts to violence because of their religion is a christian. If they were christians then the people they offended (and they most definitely would) would kill them all or be destroyed by some divine intervention, which these days apparently isn't nearly as popular as it was back then for some reason.

[insomaniacal]

and p.s. If so called christians actually followed what the bible said then they wouldn't cause wars. But I don't personally believe that anyone who resorts to violence because of their religion is a christian. If they were christians then the people they offended (and they most definitely would) would kill them all or be destroyed by some divine intervention, which these days apparently isn't nearly as popular as it was back then for some reason.

I think that 90% of the time, Religion was used as an excuse to rally the troops to war, rather than an honest belief that the religious war was justified.

[sanddbox]

For people that don't understand: Evolution is not an intentional process. You don't say "oh, it's more desirable for my baby to have blue eyes, so I'm going to have a baby with blue eyes". A spider doesn't choose to have better babies - it just so happens that babies that are better will survive more and thus pass on their genes.

[Vulpine]

we did evolve from "the ancestors of monkeys" they have a name but i doubt anyone is interested in the scientific name.

Anthropologists haven't actually found this one yet. Ardipithecus ramidus (Ardi) is the oldest human ancestor that we've found, to date, and it was descended from whatever common ancestor is shared by humans and the rest of the hominid species. Interestingly, Ardi is also the only bipedal creature discovered that also has grasping feet with opposable thumbs.

[orwell84]

For people that don't understand: Evolution is not an intentional process. You don't say "oh, it's more desirable for my baby to have blue eyes, so I'm going to have a baby with blue eyes". A spider doesn't choose to have better babies - it just so happens that babies that are better will survive more and thus pass on their genes.

To add to this, it's also helpful to know that one species does not have to die for another to evolve. We did not evolve from modern-day monkeys. Rather, according to the Theory of Evolution, both species evolved from an ancient, common ancestor, and simply took different evolutionary paths.

[FlyingWatermelon]

My bit on God,

God cannot be proven. There is no way to confirm OR deny the existence of God. A personal revelation or conversation with God is not a logical argument for proving his existence. It may make you believe it is true. That doesn't mean it is. A lot of religions teach that faith is key to overcoming this obstacle. If God revealed himself everyone would have to believe his existence. The way it is now there are clues but not enough evidence to prove or disprove his existence.

There are also a lot of things I don't understand about the Bible/God/Jesus. I have enough faith right now to believe its true, but I'll never stop being puzzled by scientific theorys, logical arguments from others, or even the questionable parts of the Bible itself. However, I'll keep searching for answers.

My bit on Christianity,

In the Bible, the Old testament had a lot of rules. Killing people, No Homos, etc. There were a LOT of rules. Because God is holy and we couldn't be with him unless we kept all those rules. In fact, we would be as far from him as possible unless we kept all those rules. The New Testament is a different story. Jesus came bringing a way around keeping all those rules. He came teaching that following all those rules was no longer important because of his sacrifice. He taught love and forgiveness as a way to bring the "kingdom of heaven",a utopia on earth. He took the punishment for breaking all those rules on himself so that we could be with God. That was what his death brought.

True Christians should follow/mimic Jesus' teachings. The 4 gospels are basically about Jesus teachings to love and care for others. He states the 2 greatest commandments as "Love the Lord your God, and Love your neighbor as yourself." He teaches love for enemies. He teaches living in community, servant hood, caring for the needs of others before the needs of yourself. Jesus mainly taught socialism not capitalism. He taught to serve others as this would bring the "kingdom of God" utopia to the earth.

Most Christians do not follow Jesus' teaching. Most Christians do not understand the Bible. It was given to us in parables so that "he who has ears" would hear and understand.Christianity should be about giving up everything and devoting your life to help others, and spread the good news of Salvation(paragraph 2) to others. Christians should live in communities and care for the needs of everyone they can. They should lower there standard of living to the lowest of the low, in order that they may bless others. The earth is finite. Nothing we achieve here matters next to eternity. This is a hard teaching. The reason why most Christians do not believe/follow/understand it. They care about themselves here and want the best life they can have here.

This is hard teaching. The story of the rich man asking what he can do to get into heaven is explained away but Jesus says to "sell everything you have and give the money to the poor". He also says "It is harder for a camel to get through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of heaven." Yeah it's hard. That's why it's explained away to mean other things.

I think it's hard. I wanna do it but how hard is it to give up everything I've worked for and help the scum of the earth to live. I'm stuck. I wanna do it but literally think of how hard that would be to sacrifice everything now, but also the typical "American dream" life. So I give myself the excuses that most Christians have. "that's not really what the Bible means" or "God wants us to have everything we can".


There are also a lot of things I don't understand about the Bible/God/Jesus. I have enough faith right now to believe its true, but I'll never stop being puzzled by scientific theorys, logical arguments from others, or even the questionable parts of the Bible itself. However, I'll keep searching for answers.



TL DR: My thoughts on God, Christianity
Jesus was a homeless, socialist who cared for others above himself.
Christians should be loving and work to give everything away to others in need.
Not like they are.
Read everything above even though its super long.
Also, I didn't check for errors/typos above, sorry.

[sanddbox]

FlyingWatermelon - if more Christians were like that the world would be a better place. I'm okay with that kind of faith.

[fashizzlepop]

Go on YouTube and look up Abraham Hicks. That's my kind of faith. If you are happy then your happy.