K seriously, this isnt a troll.
Im considering becoming Lutheran (branch of christain) and i wanted to know can i still fap, browse porn, swear, listen to metal and dress however i want?
Keep the anti religion too, i dont care for it.
So far as I know Christianity forbids swearing and looking at porn. As for fapping, they'll probably say it's forbidden but I sincerely doubt most Christians completely swear off of it. Metal is fine, and I doubt there's dress restrictions as long as you don't run around in a leather thong or anything [aka keep it decent.]
No porn or fappage is going to take some getting used to.
K seriously, this isnt a troll.
Im considering becoming a Santa Claus Elf (branch of Coca Cola) and i wanted to know can if i can still enjoy myself?
Keep the Truth too, i dont care for it.
Dress nice for church, but unless you're in a really gossipy tight-knight church, what you wear the rest of the week shouldn't matter.
What kind of metal would you be listening to?
Fapping is a don't ask, don't tell thing. Pray for forgiveness once in awhile.
Swearing is good habit to break. Looking intelligent while cussing is even harder than looking intelligent while chewing gum or wearing a baseball cap. Naturally, the first expletives you stop using are "Jesus Fucking Christ" and "God Damnit".
>>1 Knowingly entering a religion as a hypocrite? What you're doing is essentially saying that the good path outlined for you by God isn't good enough for you, that you know better than God in the way a Human should live.
Why not just be an Atheist, you'd belong there.
No, he's asking if certain things are allowed or not. I got the impression that he is willing to give them up, but doesn't know if he has to yet.
Also, humans sin. Everybody does, even the pope. The point of Christianity is that you are forgiven for those transgressions: "It's human to err, divine to forgive" etc.
you could just believe in a god/gods however you want to perceive them. whatever the lutheran rules on swearing, wanking and metal are (i haven't looked into them myself) you can bet they were written by someone abusing his position of church authority to try and rid the world of stuff he didn't like, "in the name of the lord"
and i'm not slagging off religion as a concept here before anyone starts, just the idea that following some arbitrary rules written by some guy a thousand years ago to comply with the social norms of the time would get you on god's good side.
OP here,
>>4 lmao
>>6 True, ive always been a athiest and always strongly belived that religion was nothing but a load of shit but recently ive felt a presance and its helped me overcome something. I feel faith inside. You hear about why people become religious and alot of the time they say "One day i felt jesus", and its pretty much the same here (exept no jesus).
>>8 Thats what im thinknig about now. Do i have to actually become religious and follow set rules or is it enuth to simply belive in something. I think the only reason ive chosen Lutheran is because the person who helped me was Lutheran and the whole feeling faith bit.
My problem is i dont want to do something halfheartedly, i want to be in or out.
become unitarian universalist
they don't give a shit what you do
>>9
And you can't do that wholeheartedly if you're on your own? If that's the case then keep in mind it's not faith. Except if you have faith in the religion itself.
Do the means really defeat the purpose? Heh.
Why do they call everything a "sin" - to me nothing is a "sin" - do what you want, period. If you do something "bad," it'll come back to you, same with doing something "good." BTW, this is base on Buddism/Taoism/Zenism - but it is also the universal truth.
That's BS if browsing porn is a "sin." Nobody on Earth knows what happens after death - do you seriously think there is a "hell" where you burn forever - makes no sense because everything on earth seems to go "around in a circle." Anyway, why worry about the after-life when you cannot enjoy this life you are living.
Watch porn, listen to whatever you like. Look, no humans on Earth knows what will happen after we die - if they claim they do, it's a lie or they are crazy. God - whoever created us - keeps "what happens after death" a mystery for a reason. Tired of people claiming to know "God's words" - those people will get punished some way by God for being so arrogant. Nobody knows God's words and nobody living ever will period. You'll go crazy if you really think about it - who created our God, then who created the God who created our God, and so on into infinity. It's a mystery for a reason and nobody will ever be able to solve this mystery.
Two years ago I was in a similar position, except I chose Roman Catholicism.
I was considering joining a Protestant religion, because some of them really have no concrete beliefs other than if you give them money every year and you believe in Jesus, you'll be "saved."
If you're going to be serious about religion, don't join a watered down sect just because it has fewer rules. If you truly have faith in Christianity, you must accept it in its entirety, not just the rules that suit you. The reason I chose Roman Catholicism is, like you, I "felt Jesus" and though I thought about joining Protestant churches, I realized it made the most sense to join the Catholic Church since it's the one that Christ himself started. The rest were all started by mere men.
You will see people who call themselves Christian, but don't even follow the rules of the religion they claim to believe in. This is wrong and is exactly the way you should NOT act. That doesn't mean you can't sin ever, but if you do, you have to acknowledge it is wrong through confession and do your best not to sin again.
Ask yourself if you really believe in God and what He says. If you are not willing to accept Christianity as "the whole truth and nothing but the truth," you're better off holding off your conversion if you're not completely serious about it.
As for the questions in your first post, masturbation and pornography are sins. If you're going to become a Christian, those need to stop (though if you're committed to stopping and fall along the way, you can always go to confession).
Listening to metal is fine.
Dress has to be modest. If you're a guy, you probably won't run into problems here really, unless you walk around in your underwear all the time or something. Girls shouldn't wear things like miniskirts and tops that show lots of cleavage and things like that in their day to day life. Basically, try not to wear something that's specially designed to arouse someone.
If you want to read more about it, give the following link a try.
Easiest way to start a shitstorm ever. No matter what, there will always be people raging over religion or politics, simply because they are save behind the anonymity of the internet.
Dude, I'm a Christian and I look at porn.
We're only human and no one is perfect anyway.
Even the best preacher or saint is a sinner in some way.
And believing in God and deciding to follow a certain religion are two totally different things. I personally believe in God and I respect my European Protestant heritage, but I never go to church.
lol, if you fail confess. but generally, porn=no in christianity.
also- christian heavy metal? it can be good...
kay if we are going to talk Christianity there is one thing pretty esential to it and that is repentance.
sure everyone sins that is something we cant get way from, but the whole point of repetance is seeing that you are doing wrong and then getting away from it, as far as possible.
so it swearing wrong, yep, and is looking at porn wrong yep, do people do it anyway, yep. and that is waht forgiveness is for, but at the same time you if you are never really trying to stop in the first place then you arnt even really denying that it is wrong.
as for clothes and music i say whatever you want goes basically. i mean be careful if you know that it is going to cause someone to stumble then dont do it, but keeping it decent, aka no tube tops and miniskitrts kinda idea and you are fine. and for music try to stear clear of profane music, like music that uses alot of swears or talks about alot of really dirty or sinful stuff cause its hard to keep it out of your life if you keep pumping it into your head.
good luck and good searching
Search Agnosticism. I think you would like what you find.
Dos and donts for having a brain:
I create gods. I find it's easier to be superstitious about something which you constructed entirely yourself, and when it isn't doing what you expected you only have yourself to blame, and you can, of course, tear it down and create a new one. Quite convenient, really.
Seriously, do you actually know about this christianity-thing?
What have you heard of it, have you even read the bible yourself?
Christians do not even adhere to their own creed, they do not understand the values of their own religion. It has been this way generally, ever since christianity became the state religion of the roman empire, until this very day.
Not one of the christian denominations are on track. Go and read the bible and see for yourself, find out for yourself what you must do, if you truly want to find God.
>>Dos and donts for having a brain:
>>Do question things
>>Do become an atheist.
Lol @ atheist "logic".
>>15 Lol @ "Jesus started teh Catholic church"
Seriously, OP, you're not going to find a unified code of ethics in the bible, and what's allowed will depend from church to church. I don't mean from denomination to denomination, I mean from local group to local group. I don't have much experience with the Lutheran church, so I can't comment much on what their usual doctrines/dogmas are.
If you felt a presence and wanted to look at holy books to try to find it, then do so (and I'd advise looking up some biblical scholars to see what translations to read and what verses in the bible aren't in the early manuscripts if you're going to look at the bible, because the thing is a mess).
If your only motivation is to join church because someone there helped you, and it's thus more some odd kind of way to repay them, then you're probably only joining in name only. If you honestly want to try to conform to a religion because someone helped you, that just sounds stupid, honestly.
> * Do question things
> * Do discuss things
> * Do become an atheist.
I know this is a troll but whatever. If you question and discuss things, you can't possibly be an atheist. You're more likely to become agnostic. Atheism is in its own way a religion.
With the exception of the "be an atheist" this is not a bad plan for one thinking for his or her self.
BTW, I am an atheist and would personally spit in God's face and shit on his floor if there actually was one, but telling people to be an atheist does not let them think for themselves.
>>27 You seem to have a problem with understanding what atheism is. Agnostics are atheists by definition. The "a" in atheist is the same as the "a" in amoral. The agnostic is one who has no knowledge ("a"-gnosis) about something. An agnostic thus has no knowledge about the existence of god/whether it is reasonable to believe in one. If you are in a state of lack of knowledge, you are in a state of lack of belief. Therefore, the a-gnostic is an a-theist.
What is probably giving you trouble is the distinction between positive/strong atheism and negative/agnostic atheism. Positive/Strong includes the positive (hence the name) assertion that god does not exist. For the positive/strong atheist, god Cannot exist. A negative/agnostic (sometimes also called weak) atheist is just what we have stated, someone who lacks belief due to a lack of knowledge/convincing evidence. (Again, you can't believe in something that you aren't sure/don't know you can believe in.)
Now, one need not only lack sufficient evidence for god to be a negative atheist. Many, like myself, have things they point to as evidences for why it is plausible that god does not exist. However, we do not assert that god does not exist, because we are uncertain and are not willing ourselves to believe that a god does not exist.
This, I think, is where your "religion" part comes in. A strong atheist must believe that god does not exist without having definitive proof that it does not exist. Some would attempt to call this faith, and thus call atheism a religion. This is laughable. A will to believe (or higher order convincing evidentialism, depending on how you view the issue) is not a religious faith, it's a kind of faith no different from the same "faith" we use when we say something like "We haven't been visited by aliens." Some people believe we have, but a great amount of evidence points to the contrary, and all the evidence for it (that I know of) has been debunked.
Atheism is in no sense a religion.
>>29
That's why I put the "in its own way", but I agree it's not one. But again, a belief, whatever it is based on, stays a belief, and faith is independent from reason, they are two different thought process even if some may attempt to rationalize it. A-theism is the rejection of theism, or the affirmation of the nonexistence of god(s) and other "spiritual" things.
Agnosticism is in a way a form of atheism, but the "generic" sense of atheism when not defined as "strong" or "weak" is generally acknowledged to be "belief that god doesn't exist", and not "no belief that god exist".
And you also have many forms of agnosticism, the common part being the acceptation that the spiritual and mystical things are not known actually, be it because of a lack of positive or negative proof, or because of its inherent nature.
I really think this distinction should be kept - the affirmation of a nonexistence being really something else than the inability or unwillingness to make such an affirmation (or its opposite).
I think you are seriously wrong in your position. First off, the "a" in atheist is not the same "a" is amoral. Atheists can have morals and values. They just do not believe in a religious icon such as "god". I am an atheist and I not amoral. I understand the position of christianity and I reject it as an unbelievable fallacy. Until proof of their god surfaces, I reject it. You cannot prove a negative.
All religion is based on faith. Militant Christians put faith-based over reality-based and I think that is where this problem started. If you said the world was round in the 1500s, you got burned at the stake as a heretic.
It would be funny to point out when you die, you end up as maggot food rotting in the ground. But it is not since more people have been killed in the name of God than all diseases in the history of the human race.
>You cannot prove a negative.
You're totally right. Yet some atheists have faith (ie, something that can't be proven) in this negative. Which is why I like to keep them separated from the agnostics.
>>32
I call myself an atheist because i believe the chance of a god existing is about as slim as this world turning out to be the Matrix. it's not worth making myself sound unsure, and it's not like i couldn't change were a god to make itself apparent. i'm just betting with the odds, the way i see it.
if you'd like to call me an agnostic, though, that's fine; whatever works for you.
>>33
Hehe, yeah right, it's all a matter of labels after all.
You people claiming the idea of a god is just too unbelievable, how deep have you actually thought on this, how much do you actually know about how the world and universe works?
I'm not particularly religious, but to me, the idea of there not being a counscious force who've created and designed all of this is absurd at best, and honestly downright idiotic. For the world of me I can't see how anyone who've given this any deeper, honest thoughts without being plauged by personal bias and ideas about how they WANT things to be, could conclude that there's no "god", or call it what you will.
An intelligent designer, above of and outside of this existance is the only explanation. I've spent my whole life looking and searching, because there's nothing else that interests me. I care about nothing except truth, and I'm a very logic person. Now please tell me, how the fuck are you people reasoning?
Between the Earth and Mars there is a teapot revolving around the sun in an elliptical orbit, too small to be observed by our most powerful telescopes.
I'm no astronomer, but to me, the idea of there not being a teapot revolving around the sun is absurd at best, and honestly downright idiotic. For the world of me I can't see how anyone who've given this any deeper, honest thoughts without being plagued by personal bias and ideas about how they WANT things to be, could conclude that there's no "teapot", or call it what you will.
What do you think, >>35? Do you believe in the teapot?
>>36
No you got it wrong, that would be a perfect argument for me to use, since there's no reason for there to be a teapot in orbit around the sun unless some intelligent being had put it there. And that's exactly the problem with living beings in particular but generally speaking just anything at all.
I'm not suggesting the existance of a god due to something I cannot see, I'm doing it for what we indeed already know for certain, things that you yourself wouldn't deny. You know, scientific shit.
So instead of worrying so much about being a smartass that your arguments become hollow, explain to me in plain language why you cannot accept intelligent design? That's what I'm interested to find out.
This is one line of arguing I find holds up. All things follow certain patterns. If we look at the universe, everything from the smallest components to the largest act and interact after the same rules, arranging themselves in predefined ways. The difference between an atom and a solar system is merely one of scale, the difference between a solar system and a galaxy is the same thing.
Things break down into similar arrangements indefinately and in essence, everything is litterally the same thing.
You can break down the matter of a teapot into energy and rearrange it as a snicker-bar, one that is in fact a snicker-bar, with peanuts and chocolate and everything. But that's not my point even though it is interesting to note. My point is that, since it is natural for the universe to arrange itself like this, every phenomenon that it houses are predefined elements tracing their way back to its very foundation.
Due to the determined patterns of everything, from the movement of energy to human behaviour, a lot of scientists looking into the matter have concluded that life in itself is a basic property of the universe, inherent in its very structure. And since obviously, life and consciousness is inherent in life, this too is a basic property of existance. Since it does in fact exist, would any of you deny this?
So, technically speaking, there's life, intelligence and consciousness in the very universe itself. Which brings us to the subject of dark matter and dark energy; hypothesis that have been formed around the fact that there isn't "existing" matter and energy enough to explain the structure and behaviour of the universe; it is shapen and behaving in a way it shouldn't. In other words; the universe is behaving contrary to the calculable and observable forces working on it.
Just as you won't find cosciousness in the human brain, and people have testified to consioucness although clinically dead, you will not find your dark matter and energy either, because the universe are governed by things apart from the laws of nature. There is a reality beyond what can be seen and felt, and the very universe in itself testifies to this.
> since there's no reason for there to be a teapot in orbit around the sun unless some intelligent being had put it there.
Indeed, no reason. But who's to say that no reason isn't reason enough for a teapot to orbit around the sun, or for life to spontaneously arise?
David Hume took no issue with such: see Part III, Sect III of A Treatise on Human Nature http://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/etext03/trthn10.txt
A related hypothetical: What reason is there to be a god, unless some intelligent being had concieved of it?
> I'm not suggesting the existance of a god due to something I cannot see, I'm doing it for what we indeed already know for certain, things that you yourself wouldn't deny. You know, scientific shit.
"Creationism, intelligent design, and other claims of supernatural intervention in the origin of life or of species are not science because they are not testable by the methods of science. These claims subordinate observed data to statements based on authority, revelation, or religious belief. Documentation offered in support of these claims is typically limited to the special publications of their advocates. These publications do not offer hypotheses subject to change in light of new data, new interpretations, or demonstration of error. This contrasts with science, where any hypothesis or theory always remains subject to the possibility of rejection or modification in the light of new knowledge." - Science and Creationism: A View from the National Academy of Sciences, Second Edition, U.S. National Academy of Sciences
>>Indeed, no reason. But who's to say that no reason isn't reason enough for a teapot to orbit around the sun...
Because it's fucking stupid would be my spontanious answer. I'm sure you'd agree so let's not get into why.
>>A related hypothetical: What reason is there to be a god, unless some intelligent being had concieved of it?
Because the universe in itself claims a definate beginning and end, and is of a finite nature in itself, while the theory of a supreme being which I support is not of such a nature. Beginnings, ends, births and deaths are natural phenomenons only due to the way the universe works, but there was a before and there will be an after, I'm suggesting there's also a parallel and in all of this, there's something more than just the material world.
Even so, let's say there's an endless string of "gods" spawning eachother through eternity, just to indulge your counter-argument. What then?
Honestly I'd be more interested in hearing what you have to say about our universe, and what defense there is for it in itself and especially with life and everything, assuming there is no intelligent design to it. Have you thought about that, or do you just conclude that; because it is here, it's simply supposed to be here?
In quotation:
>>blablablabla
Who wrote that shit?
>>Creationism, intelligent design, and other claims of supernatural intervention in the origin of life or of species are not science because they are not testable by the methods of science.
The primary method of science is logical thinking, and with it piecing together observable evidence and forming theories out of this, encompassing things or entirely made up by, things that are not readily observable. More than half of what today is accepted as truth is of such a nature, not readily observable, but suggested through other observations known as fact.
People realized the earth was round millenia before anyone could prove it, because the nature of things they knew about suggested this was the case.
>>These claims subordinate observed data to statements based on authority, revelation, or religious belief.
lol
Is that a fact? He should probably check his data because I'm not convinced...
>>This contrasts with science...possibility of rejection or modification in the light of new knowledge.
For claiming to defend intelligent observation the author is unbelievably ignorant. He seems to be founding his arguments on the idea that all religious people just base their views on supposedly true recollections about personally unobserved events.
If that was an argument against anything to begin with, 99% of the human population should be called out as hypocrites for just accepting things before making practical experiements personally.
Most of the theists I know have revised their views based on personal experience, not what they've been told. And in lack of personal experience, I personally base my views not on some holy scriptures, but science itself, just as many other scientists who have been led to believe that there's an intelligent designer simply by diving deep into the world of science.
Seriously someone should fire that cunt...
And you, please, make me at least believe there's more to your atheistic standpoint than this hollow garbage
Part 1: Teapots
> Because it's fucking stupid would be my spontanious answer
Stupidity is subjective. A god existing for no reason, life existing for no reason and a teapot existing for no reason seem equally stupid to me, so we may as well discuss any of them. Since the teapot analogy is something that neither of us personally believe, it's more useful to illustrate fallacies with.
It's a well-known argument, by the way, created in its present form by a mister Bertrand Russell. You might look him up, he had a lot to say about god.
> Even so, let's say there's an endless string of "gods" spawning each other through eternity, just to indulge your counter-argument. What then?
Being capable of infinite regress proves that these gods are not subject to natural laws as we understand them, therefore you cannot say with certainty that anything is subject to natural laws as we understand them, because there are known exceptions. This demolishes your reason for believing in the existence of a god in the first place.
Russell addressed this too: "If everything must have a cause, then God must have a cause. If there can be anything without a cause, it may just as well be the world as God, so that there cannot be any validity in that argument. It is exactly of the same nature as the Hindu's view, that the world rested upon an elephant and the elephant rested upon a tortoise; and when they said, 'How about the tortoise?' the Indian said, 'Suppose we change the subject.'"
> Honestly I'd be more interested in hearing what you have to say about our universe, and what defense there is for it in itself and especially with life and everything, assuming there is no intelligent design to it.
My defense is that we don't know shit about the origins of our universe or of life. I'm a 'weak atheist' as discussed earlier in this thread; I don't contest that a god might exist. However, I find an unshakable belief in the existence of a god to be just as absurd as such a belief in a teapot in space. There is no evidence for either hypothesis, and neither one is testable; therefore they are not scientific and such a belief cannot be justified by scientific means.
Part 2: Science
> Who wrote that shit?
http://www.nap.edu/openbook.php?record_id=6024&page=R3
These folks, I think.
> The primary method of science is logical thinking, and with it piecing together observable evidence and forming theories out of this, encompassing things or entirely made up by, things that are not readily observable.
Congratulations, you've got a handle on what two-thirds of science is about: logic and observation. The other part is testability. If you cannot possibly design an experiment capable of testing a hypothesis, it is not scientific.
For instance-
Hypothesis: The Earth is round
Experiment: Try and circumnavigate it, or prove it using observational evidence like Aristotle did (specifically by observing that the shadow of the Earth during a lunar eclipse is circular, as well as some geometry involving constellations and the horizon)
Hypothesis: There is a teapot in space
Experiment: Wait for telescopes to improve enough that they can detect the teapot, or send an orbiter to find it
Hypothesis: A god exists
Experiment: ?????
Oops, Russell's analogy is flawed. It's potentially testable after all, though it might take a while. Now how about the theist's hypothesis?
I won't argue in defense of the the rest of what the NAS said, because my main point was the above. However, I suspect you and your acquaintances aren't representative of the majority of ID advocates. You seem more like deists to me.
>>Being capable of infinite regress proves that these gods are not subject to natural laws as we understand them
Not that I even think this is the case, there's nothing saying that a god or gods are even subject to the natural laws in the first place, because it is also known that the universe itself is already subject to laws apart from the natural ones.
You do know this right?
>>If you cannot possibly design an experiment capable of testing a hypothesis, it is not scientific.
lol
All the facts we'd have to disclaim...
>>observational evidence like Aristotle did (specifically by observing that the shadow of the Earth during a lunar eclipse is circular, as well as some geometry involving constellations and the horizon)
In the same way, observing that there's intelligence and consciousness in the universe, indicates that it's been spawned by the same with intent, just as it would take intelligence, design and intent to place a teapot in space. It's entirely in line with basic reasoning.
>>You seem more like deists to me.
You might want to observe that the natural laws by themselves cannot support the universe in its current form. It is something that has been observed at the greater scope, there isn't enough matter and energy to have arranged and maintain the universe as it is. The same holds true in detail, and keeps scientists from explaining the more complex formations of our existance, like life.
It's just so readily obvious in my mind, that there is intelligent design with a reason, interacting upon and shaping the universe to a form that couldn't have been shapen by the natural laws in themselves.
"if god is real than hes an evil motherfucker! hes watching his greatest creation die before his eyes, dead before his eyes" gotta love within the ruins