I actually don't know anybody who screams the word "Christian." Do you?
I was born and raised a christian until I was about 22. Saved, baptised, the works. I was a true believer back then. Lost my faith permanently though. But I hear "Once saved, always saved", so I guess I'm covered regardless.
How many posters here, other than myself, are blood-washed, born-again, God-loving Christians?
Mind if I ask what caused you to lose your faith?
RabidAlpaca said:- If god were omnipotent, he has the power to destroy hell and make the punishment for sin far less severe than eternal hellfire. There is no reason that the punishment be that severe. That would be the actions of a sadistic and unforgiving god, which I simply can't believe he is. It is far more likely that hell was invented by man to coerce people into believing. Why was hell never mentioned in the old testament? You'd think that would be pretty important. The only thing that is mentioned is the Hebrew word "sheol", which has no negative connotations, just means afterlife.
- Why is there no tangible evidence of any kind? The only 'evidence' we have is the bible itself. Why would god entrust such important information only to ONE person at a time? We can not verify anything that was said. Our eternal souls are hanging in the balance, and he only gives us a single book that only verifies itself?
- Why is the bible so insanely ambiguous? There are a dozens and dozens of sects within christianity, some with very fundamental disagreements. You'd think god would have made his intentions far more clear.
- If god made me in his image and I'm rational, logical, and compassionate. Why is he not?
- Evolution and historical evidence does not match with the biblical timeline.
- Why would god allow his own chosen people, the Jews, to be slaughtered like cattle by the millions? That's not free-will, that's just horrible.
I am an Orthodox Christian. Christian, plain and simple, should only imply Orthodox, Catholic or Protestant. Everything else should come with a tag "evangelical christian", "born again Christian" and called them simply "christian" is not quite right.
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Yeah, no problem. Since I was about 12 I kept having questions about christianity that had no real answers. I kept seeing major contradictions. I just pushed this down and kept going, telling myself I still believed. I was terrified of even questioning my faith because I didn't want to go to hell. Later after seeing a lot of the world and maturing a lot, I had even more questions. I contacted my old pastors, talked to new ones, on and on, but I always got the same ambiguous answers. At one point I just decided I need to do some exploring of my own. I started reading a lot of books, and I found some that really, really resonated with what I had been thinking since I was 12. The biggest book that shaped that was "Why I Believed", which was written by a former missionary turned atheist. The book is directed at people like me that grew up christians. He goes through and logically refutes most of what I was taught growing up.
I'm not necessarily trying to start a debate about these topics here, but a few of the questions that bothered me so much that I had to leave were:
It all comes down to the fact that I'm a man of science, and I believe in the burden of proof. If I were to tell you there's a flying spaghetti monster, you wouldn't believe me until you saw evidence. This doesn't change simply because I was raised to be christian. I am an atheist, but if I discover any evidence that proves that assumption wrong, I will shift accordingly.
Yeah, no problem. Since I was about 12 I kept having questions about christianity that had no real answers. I kept seeing major contradictions. I just pushed this down and kept going, telling myself I still believed. I was terrified of even questioning my faith because I didn't want to go to hell. Later after seeing a lot of the world and maturing a lot, I had even more questions. I contacted my old pastors, talked to new ones, on and on, but I always got the same ambiguous answers. At one point I just decided I need to do some exploring of my own. I started reading a lot of books, and I found some that really, really resonated with what I had been thinking since I was 12. The biggest book that shaped that was "Why I Believed", which was written by a former missionary turned atheist. The book is directed at people like me that grew up christians. He goes through and logically refutes most of what I was taught growing up.
I'm not necessarily trying to start a debate about these topics here, but a few of the questions that bothered me so much that I had to leave were:
It all comes down to the fact that I'm a man of science, and I believe in the burden of proof. If I were to tell you there's a flying spaghetti monster, you wouldn't believe me until you saw evidence. This doesn't change simply because I was raised to be christian. I am an atheist, but if I discover any evidence that proves that assumption wrong, I will shift accordingly.
How many posters here, other than myself, are blood-washed, born-again, God-loving Christians?
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