Did you ever notice?

Quote: Nareed

You should browse skepticism blogs and learn different.

It's in good company with homeopathy...,

There are some homeopathic remedy's that are helpful.

edit; Just as there are Allopathic treatments that make people worse.

Quote: Nareed

You should browse skepticism blogs and learn different.

It's in good company with homeopathy, astrology, numerology, phrenology, and any and all beliefs in paranormal phenomena and any and all superstitions.

Yeah, I understand your point, except you don't get a whole slew of politicians weighing in on numerology, astrology or phrenology issues and we make big decisions around issues of religion. So it's given a whole lot more of reverence than these other things and power in the human spectrum.

Things said in the name of religions just get more respect. I and probably you too would argue that it probably doesn't deserve any more than many of these.

(I guess individual areas of the globe give more weight to some other things, so I won't generalize too much here)

Quote: FrGamble

Really?!? Is this all coming from an internet search you did on the Jesus Seminar? Keep reading other scholars.

If you think nothing was added to what
Jesus said over the years, and then written
down as fact, you really are naive. You think
the Jesus seminar people were stupid, you
think they were kidding around? Even if
they were wrong on half of it, that means
a lot of what you base your religion on is
made up nonsense. And I was very aware
of the Jesus Seminar when it was happening
in 1985, it was big news, just like the new
translation of the NT was in the early 70's.

Quote: boymimbo

The same problem is true with all ancient history.

Yes. But.

Quote:

No one was there, and there were no reliable reproductive implements so if a library got destroyed or decayed the information with it went to ruin.

There were often many copies of important documents, some of them carved in stone. We know what some priests wrote about one of the Ptolemaic kings, because it was carved in Greek and two Egyptian scripts on the famous Rosetta stone. Egypt is littered with such things, called stelae BTW.

In some cases there is archaeological evidence to corroborate accounts of battles, for example, or conditions here or there. We'd know Vesuvius blew even without the surviving accounts from Roman officials.

Quote:

The Bible and its contents were kept however through all of the years which is why we can say that Jesus did exist

That's very likely.

Quote:

and was a special person of interest (to say the least).

That's highly debatable. Not to mention that "special" does not equal "good," or "moral."

Question: is an action moral because a god does it? Or is a god moral because he always chooses good actions?

I think theists all too often take the first choice as the right one.

Quote: Evenbob

Even if
they were wrong on half of it, that means
a lot of what you base your religion on is
made up nonsense.

That doesn't follow.

Quote: FrGamble

That doesn't follow.

No doubt..

Quote: boymimbo

Everyone but Jesus is sinful.

Now, see, this is what gets me thinking about 1984.

Regardless, and without debating the notion of "original sin," overall sins are acts. But what happens when a beneficial act is labeled sinful? Or the mere existence of a person is regarded as sinful? Not for anything they do, but for what they are. What if the path of virtue prescribes unending spiritual and psychological pain, and offers nothing but nebulous promises of "salvation" after decades of life?

Sins are not acts, they can be thoughts as well.

Believe in Christ, then follow Him and learn about Him, and therefore, desire to become more like Him, and sin less as a result. You keep getting locked into the act of "sin" and it being "bad". No. Sin is inevitable. I don't feel guilt or badness around some of my sin. If I sin and it turns out to be a "beneficial act", I'll shrug and let God decide.

The story of Job tells of a very prosperous and "righteous" man with a strong belief in God. Satan approaches God and God allows Satan to test Job's faith. First Satan takes away all of Job's prosperity and kills his children. Then Satan, after a second request to God, makes Job very ill. Three of Job's friends arrive and there comes a very long conversation in which Job pleads for his relationship to God to be restored. He never breaks. God finally reappears, tells Job where his thinking goes wrong and restores Job's prosperity. Point is that we don't know why we suffer.

Some people's lives are filled with pain. Some people will make the choice to live virtuously while enduring pain, for the sake of an afterlife. The disciples did that for sure, and most were put to death. Most will make a compromise to live as close with virtue as possible yet live with the constant sin inside them, justify it, and let God's judgment at death figure it out.

I dunno, Nareed. I think that, in terms of sexuality, that people are indeed "born that way" and that there should be an allowance for the seven or so verses in the bible that talk about homosexuality being a sin. Some churches have made that allowance. If you were interested in a relationship with God, I would find a denomination that openly accepts the LGB community. God will judge in the end.

I think today's churches should be focusing on the much greater problems of inequality, war, poverty, and socialism (and the issues of capitalism gone amok). Jesus and the church focused a great deal on giving to the poor and on spreading the message of love and peace. Now from an atheist standpoint all of this spiritual stuff is pure malarkey. I get that. When I read what I wrote it sounds stupid and certainly doesn't reflect my background in the sciences.

From my point of view, I will be dead in 0 - 60 years and my grandchildren will remember me. My great-grandchild will know me as a name, while my great-great grandchildren will not know me at all. My monetary treasures, my home, everything will be gone by then.

Life is short. I think there are two ways to live it. If you don't believe in an afterlife or a God, then live every day to its fullest and with purpose as possible, ignoring morals and ethics for your own ego, wants, and needs and the gain of your family. Your happiness and the people you care about are the most important things and everything else doesn't matter. If you believe in God, then you try to live every day with a greater purpose then yourself and your family. You try to help people you don't know. You try to be charitable. You try to be selfless. Your character matters.

Quote: boymimbo

desire to become more like Him, and sin less as a result.

Give it up, you can't even prove sin exists,
much less a need to be 'saved' from it.

Have you ever actually thought about all
this religious dogma you're so hung up on?
Listen to Nareed, as a member of the LGBT
community, he's experienced the love and
understanding of Jesus followers first hand.