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Is Faith a Fault?

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Gnostic Christian

Active Member
Is Faith a Fault?

Faith is a belief in something unseen, without evidence, proof, or facts.

Faith has many believing in a supernatural realm.

I think that damages their thinking.

Thoughts?

Regards
DL
 

Auraninja

Eh, ragazzo!
As an agnostic, I remember seeing a TED talk made by a Hindu woman saying "Why Doubting is Essential to Religious Faith", and I was like, "Finally, someone gets me." My point here is that personally, I feel like faith is best served with a seed of doubt.

Now, there are religious people who otherwise believe in scientific doctrine (i.e. Evolution), and they don't weaponize their religion against others.

So to sum it all off, religion is what you make of it. It can be as good as it can be bad.
 

nel3

Crimson Dragon
Not very religious but it has its ups and downs. It can give you the needed inspiration to keep going or better your life. It can also blind you to reality and lead into a rabbit hole. If you fall too far into those super churches where seed money is asked then it's a huge red flag. The political has also corrupted several pastors to spout BS about the political reality.

Any religion is ok but all bets are off once they ask for seed money or spout BS about demons influencing politics or proclaiming Jesus/god has chosen a given politician to be the one. Starting a church on paper is super easy and super easy to abuse.

Some priests have some ..... extracurricular activities and letting them escape justice isn't forgivable to say the least.
 

Gnostic Christian

Active Member
As an agnostic, I remember seeing a TED talk made by a Hindu woman saying "Why Doubting is Essential to Religious Faith", and I was like, "Finally, someone gets me." My point here is that personally, I feel like faith is best served with a seed of doubt.

Now, there are religious people who otherwise believe in scientific doctrine (i.e. Evolution), and they don't weaponize their religion against others.

So to sum it all off, religion is what you make of it. It can be as good as it can be bad.
Indeed.

Do you fight against it's evil right wing while praising the left?

Do you fight the homophobes and misogynists who have put sex above love and preach division, --- while our governments preach equality and love above gender and sex?

For evil to weaponize discrimination and grow and all that buddy.

Regards
DL
 

Gnostic Christian

Active Member
Not very religious but it has its ups and downs. It can give you the needed inspiration to keep going or better your life. It can also blind you to reality and lead into a rabbit hole. If you fall too far into those super churches where seed money is asked then it's a huge red flag. The political has also corrupted several pastors to spout BS about the political reality.

Any religion is ok but all bets are off once they ask for seed money or spout BS about demons influencing politics or proclaiming Jesus/god has chosen a given politician to be the one. Starting a church on paper is super easy and super easy to abuse.

Some priests have some ..... extracurricular activities and letting them escape justice isn't forgivable to say the least.
I think atheists should be more militant, given that statistically, atheism and agnosticism are more peace loving and law abiding than the religious.

They have begun by opening atheist churches.

The more the better.

Regards
DL
 

Gnostic Christian

Active Member
Triple Posting
Given your username, I'm actually curious on your perspective on the matter.
Faith closes the mind. It is pure idol worship.

Faith is a way to quit using, "God given" power of Reason and Logic, and cause the faithful to embrace doctrines that moral people reject.

The God of the OT says, “Come now, and let us reason together,” [Isaiah 1:18]

How can literalists reason on God when they must ignore reason and logic and discard them when turning into literalist?

Those who are literalists can only reply somewhat in the fashion that Martin Luther did.

“Faith must trample under foot all reason, sense, and understanding.”

“Reason is a whore, the greatest enemy that faith has.”

This attitude effectively kills all worthy communication that non-theists can have with theist. Faith closes the believers mind as it is pure idol worship.

Literalism is an evil practice that hides the true messages of myths. We cannot show our faith based friends that they are wrong through their faith colored glasses. Their faith also plugs their ears.

I do recognize that in our dualistic universe we are all born with a body soul view of reality, but faith should never outshine facts.

Our material dualism is in us to protect us, and we should not have it perverted by an actual belief in the supernatural.

Regards
DL
 

Auraninja

Eh, ragazzo!
They have begun by opening atheist churches.
Like in that one episode of Metalocalypse?

Also, there are annoying atheists too that like to look down upon others. This is especially true in an online presence, hence, "Internet Atheists".

The Amazing Atheist comes to mind.
 

nel3

Crimson Dragon
Like in that one episode of Metalocalypse?

Also, there are annoying atheists too that like to look down upon others. This is especially true in an online presence, hence, "Internet Atheists".

The Amazing Atheist comes to mind.
Metal is a valid religion in that series, they run the world economy. Atheist churches have no place there...
 

Divine Retribution

Conquistador de pan
Faith closes the mind. It is pure idol worship.

Faith is a way to quit using, "God given" power of Reason and Logic, and cause the faithful to embrace doctrines that moral people reject.

The God of the OT says, “Come now, and let us reason together,” [Isaiah 1:18]

How can literalists reason on God when they must ignore reason and logic and discard them when turning into literalist?

Those who are literalists can only reply somewhat in the fashion that Martin Luther did.

“Faith must trample under foot all reason, sense, and understanding.”

“Reason is a whore, the greatest enemy that faith has.”

This attitude effectively kills all worthy communication that non-theists can have with theist. Faith closes the believers mind as it is pure idol worship.

Literalism is an evil practice that hides the true messages of myths. We cannot show our faith based friends that they are wrong through their faith colored glasses. Their faith also plugs their ears.

I tend to agree with all of this, although from a different perspective than yours.
I do recognize that in our dualistic universe we are all born with a body soul view of reality, but faith should never outshine facts.

Our material dualism is in us to protect us, and we should not have it perverted by an actual belief in the supernatural.

Regards
DL

I don't really want to derail this topic and honestly my days of debating religion on the Internet are long over, but this sounds more like a deistic worldview than a theistic Christian one. How do you get from material dualism to a personal, comprehensible, all-powerful God who cares about and even occasionally intervenes in human affairs?


Anyways, faith comes in a variety of degrees. Some people are so entrenched in their respective faiths that they're willing to oppress and kill others who don't share that faith. That is most definitely a fault. Some people simply believe in higher powers they perhaps don't really have good reasons to believe in. While I wouldn't exactly call that a virtue, I think the world has bigger problems to worry about than whether or not some of the monkeys living on it believe in things without good reason if they aren't hurting anybody in the process.

This is part of the reason why I no longer associate with the general anti-theist/skeptic community, combined with the repugnant behaviors of many of its prominent members and the overall hijacking of the community in order to weaponize it against causes it was never supposed to be about. Every minute wasted debating religion with people who were never going to change their minds in the first place is a minute robbed from a cause that might actually make a difference.
 

Gnostic Christian

Active Member
Atheist churches have no place there...
A church is a tribe. You have a tribal nature. So do your children, and if atheists do not give their children a place to find fellowship, the purpose of any tribe, then those atheists are not taking care to not lose their children to the vile immoral mainstream homophobic and misogynous religions.

You show how little you have educated yourself on these issuers.

Regards
DL
 

Gnostic Christian

Active Member
How do you get from material dualism to a personal, comprehensible, all-powerful God who cares about and even occasionally intervenes in human affairs?
The Gnostic Christian God is not supernatural, and the supernatural God is shown to not be all powerful.

He needs a human woman to reproduce.

Modern Gnostic Christians name our god "I am", and yes, we do mean ourselves.

You are your controller. I am mine. You represent and present whatever mind picture you have of your God or ideal human, and so do I.

The name "I Am" you might see as meaning something like, --- I think I have grown up thanks to having forced my apotheosis through Gnosis and meditation and “I am”, represents the best rules and laws that we have found to live by.

In Gnostic Christianity, we follow the Christian tradition that Christians have forgotten that they are to do. That is, become brethren to Jesus.

That is why some say that the only good Christian is a Gnostic Christian.

Here is the real way to salvation that Jesus taught.

Matthew 6:22 The light of the body is the eye: if therefore thine eye be single, thy whole body shall be full of light.

John 14:23 Jesus answered and said unto him, If a man love me, he will keep my words: and my Father will love him, and we will come unto him, and make our abode with him.

Romans 8:29 For whom he did foreknow, he also did predestinate to be conformed to the image of his Son, that he might be the firstborn among many brethren.

The bible just plainly says to put away the things of children. The supernatural and literal reading of myths.

a minute robbed from a cause that might actually make a difference.
Name any one cause that has created more harm, over a longer period of time, ---- to gays and womern, --- half the worlds population, --- if not religion?

That aside, there are many good cause and I wish you luck.

I just hate to see decent apologists for sanity leave the fray.

Regards
DL
 

Auraninja

Eh, ragazzo!
There are all types with all sorts of agendas.

If you ae talking moral standards, atheists looking down on homophobes and the misogynists is the proper position. Right?

Regards
DL
I was talking about atheists that look down about Christians by virtue of their belief, which is wrong.
I'm not talking about disliking Christianity, that's totally fine, but Christians by and large.

It's like when the Amazing Atheist made some video saying, "I give Christians an F".
To be fair, I never seen the video, but do I really want to watch anymore Amazing Atheist content?
Speaking of which, the Amazing Atheist was never good at excepting other people, even outside of religious belief system.
He likes insulting feminists, non-binaries, and vegetarians from glimpses of his content.

Also, to be clear, I'm not opposed to atheists in general. It's just worth noting that there can be some that are jerks.
 

Gnostic Christian

Active Member
I was talking about atheists that look down about Christians by virtue of their belief, which is wrong.

I do look down on Christians when theistic beliefs go to stupid and immoral, like honoring a genocidal god and his homophobic and misogynous religions.

You seem to forget the vile place Christians are in and try to drag other, better and more moral people into.

Regards
DL
 

Auraninja

Eh, ragazzo!
Not all Christians believe what you seem to think they believe.

Some Christians are good people, and aren't homophobic nor misogynous.

There are 2.3 billion Christians in this world; I would have a hard time believing all of them are bad.
 

Gnostic Christian

Active Member
Not all Christians believe what you seem to think they believe.

Some Christians are good people, and aren't homophobic nor misogynous.

There are 2.3 billion Christians in this world; I would have a hard time believing all of them are bad.

We can basically split the right from the left with which side is homophobic and misogynous.

My main beef is against the right, but the left also honor a genocidal Yahweh and his Armageddon promising kid/self, Jesus.

The only good Christians will condemn Yahweh/Jesus to hell.

Try to get the evil right wing Christians to catch up to better moral thinking.

Regards
DL
 

Auraninja

Eh, ragazzo!
This is becoming problematic.

By no means do atheists have the moral high ground. In fact, there is a segment of atheism called "Internet Atheists" where atheists online think they have the moral high ground because they are aethists. There is plenty of hypocrisy there.

We also have the idea of biblical literalism, which if genes work the way they do, then God didn't tell Noah to make a ginormous zoo boat while he wipes away humanity. Some Christians don't believe in certain parts of the Bible, or think they were mere parable.

You can think whatever about the religion, but many Christians are good and logical people who lend their belief to do good things.
 

Orphalesion

Well-Known Member
I don't think you can make a general statement such as "faith is good" or "faith is bad"
It depends on what influence the faith has on the person, what they believe and how much control they give that faith over themselves.
Fanaticism is obviously a bad thing. Blind faith can become dangerous. But a moderate amount of faith that sees people through bad times and might even inspire them to be better people can be very good.

Not all Christians believe what you seem to think they believe.

Some Christians are good people, and aren't homophobic nor misogynous.

There are 2.3 billion Christians in this world; I would have a hard time believing all of them are bad.
^ I agree with this. I've even spoken to Christian ministers who are in favour of performing joining ceremonies for same sex couples.
 
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