Discussions

Is religion or lack or religion, to believe or to not believe about choice and individual freedom to choose.  
 
So you choose to not believe or you choose to believe. Why do we push our choice either way on another or to have to convince the other my way is right. This has gone on for thousands of years.  
 
The science crowd are not all scientists and have accepted that belief, or someone else's science argument. the other side has accepted the faith argument.  
 
it seems like both are pushing their own belief rather than just accept the other exists and it is right for them. I don't have to accept your situation but nor do I have to argue it. IT is right for you and mine is right for me.  
 
It is not always the faith side pushing as this was started by the non faith approach pushing their belief. both are adding their own argument to something that has no "right" answer other that it is an individually accepted choice.  
 
It works for me because I chose to believe or not. Ask me after death who is right..... would we care at that point? if not why make such a big issue of this............  
 
Edited by eph2-8, 2020-01-22 09:21:22

Just wanted to clarify that Atheism is in no way, shape or form a religion and is not classified as such by any reasonable standards.

EPH-2, I want to respond to your comments about how you feel as though both the religious and atheistic sides are pushing their beliefs on others.  
 
I have to disagree with you in believing that talking on a public forum is somehow inappropriate. If people don't know about the arguments for either side, then how can they make a reasonably informed decision on what to believe? If you read my post on 'Lying wonders, stranger things' I think that you will find that there is probably a lot of miracles in Christianity out there that you aren't aware of, and further, there is a lot of strange phenomenon out there that can only be explained in light of Christian beliefs.  
 
I think many of us though disagree with your assertion that there is "no right answer, just an individually accepted choice". That sort of belief leads to a lot of problems, for in our society we have to live as a community, and as a result we are not all an island, and neither can we live like that.  
 
When we live as if we are an island then it shows that we do not really care about each other. Living as an island will most often lead to a very selfish life. For if we truly care about others, we would want to help them to know the truth and to become the best version of themselves. This world is continually attempting to keep us from knowing the truth, and even I dare say an attempt to shut down conversation on the meaning and purpose of life and all existence can be an example of that.  
 
Then there is the whole problem of what happens when we abdicate our responsibilities, society slowly starts to fall apart. For you see EPH2-8, our society has been incredibly blessed to be based on numerous hundreds of years of Christian development and morals, and that has created the incredibly free, successful and safe society that we live in today. If you look at the societies that have not been led by Christian values, most of us would not want to live in most of those societies.  
 
Further, there is the problem of how do we organize society and in particular our laws, our education system, our health care system, and what rights and obligations people have? A society that is 'live and let live' at least to the extreme, falls apart. The funny thing too about moral relativists is that they ordinarily are out to get the religious, for most often they don't want to hear religious arguments when it comes to organizing our society or our laws and institutions. They argue that we should all live and let live until it comes to our laws and institutions, at which point they often want to shut down any Christian beliefs or advocates.  
 
Some of our families EPH2-8 came from areas where Christianity was heavily persecuted and Christians who stood up for their faith murdered on mass, and some in areas where Jews, God's chosen people were exterminated. If we don't stand up against the rising tide of secularism who knows what tomorrow has in store?

To weigh in to the originating post, my biggest issue with the OP comment is this one  
 
"Perhaps science has over taken religious beliefs, but the leaders of these religions will not accept science as it doesn't benefit their cause... or power. Just a thought. "  
 
Like I have told you before in a previous discussion, science and religion are not mutually exclusive.  
 
It was the Catholic Church which developed the scientific method, it was a Catholic priest who gave you the big bang theory, it was a Catholic monk who was the founder of genetics, and all throughout history the Catholic Church has been spearheading scientific developments that the rest of the world would not touch and why? Because it was Christianity which saw the universe as ordered because it was created with a purpose, and therein lies our modern understanding of science.  
 
As I have said before, the true pure atheist is the only real unscientific one, because he puts his belief in a stubborn conclusion that there is no God, something which absolutely cannot be proven. The theist says everything in the universe proves the scientific method, whose basis is that everything has a reason, and if everything else has a reason, therefore so must we.  
 
Boom, if you can understand that, you might consider that to be a mike drop moment. This argument demonstrates the scientific basis behind the theists beliefs, and the unscientific basis behind the true pure atheists belief.

That's the biggest load of horse sh*t I've read in my life.

Atheism is simply a lack of belief in dieties.  
 
Period.  
 
It makes no positive claims about reality.  
 
It is a response to a single question, that being “do you believe in a god?”.  
 
It does not say no god exists. It does not say a god can’t exist. It is a statement of belief.  
 
Just like if someone asked you if you collected stamps. You answering in the negative does not then mean you believe stamps don’t exist.  
 
No matter how many qualifiers you add to the word, will not make it mean anything different. It’s a tactic to shift the burden of proof off of the deist and onto the atheist. It’s saying “well we’re in the same boat because you have to prove god doesn’t exist just like I have to prove he does. No. It doesn’t work this way, stop repeating this illogical nonsense.