If you believe in god, if you are so stricken, rent the movie "The Invention of Lying"

I may have to watch it again tonight.

Even if you can't eat shellfish.

Curiouser and curiouser.

Or maybe you don't follow Mosaic Law because certain evangelists who had already so completely failed to convert mainline Jews to their upstart religion realized they'd never, EVER recruit gentiles in significant numbers if severed foreskins remained the cost of entry.

Curious indeed - to which "certain evangelists" are you referring?

Doesn't sound like a post hoc rationalization at all. Not in the slightest. Nope, not one bit.

the others been dead and gone for millennia. What is often frustrating however, is that these same "mind-readers" expect everyone one else to be able read their minds.

Sorry, can't do it...

What's more fascinating to me is that given 1) Christians exempted themselves from Mosaic Law because adherence would be a hard sell to the newly converted gentiles, or 2) a God no one in the history of mankind has demonstrated to exist rescinded a long list of patently absurd rules, regulations, and restrictions painstakingly recorded through not one, not two, but three books of the Old Testament, so now it is totes OK to play football, eat shellfish, take a shit on the sabbath, beat your slaves, make your daughter marry her rapist, kill your disobedient children, or live in the same house with a menstruating woman, you'd go with the "God changed his mind" bit.

Yet I'm the one making a leap here. Now, that is fascinating.

as a pointer.

The object? The One who said that he did not come to abolish, but rather to fulfill the law...

It's not any more convincing the second. But if you wanna go for a third, knock yourself out.

Saying that "some" non-believers are denying your god to "escape accountability."

Now that's fascinating indeed.

“Do not think that I have come to abolish the Law or the Prophets; I have not come to abolish them but to fulfill them."

So, Jesus does not have a problem with the Old Testament law and all its cruelties, absurdities and contradictions. You can have slaves, and kill your disobedient children and all that stuff.

If they don't like something in the Old Testament, well just declare that was the stuff that Jesus negated. But if it's something they do like, well that's the part that he came to fulfill.

Wouldn't have survived so long if it wasn't such a fluid, open-to-any-interpretation, good for the powerful, good for the oppressed, religion.

Wouldn't you agree, trotsky?

for Jewish community and religious life. The main purpose of the law however, was to act as pointer to Christ - Matt 5:17.

So what does it mean that the law is fulfilled in Christ? I would argue that this means that the law is no longer our primary focus - but rather the teaching of Christ as espoused in the new testament.

And as far as slavery goes, this article does a fine job in describing the tension between the present and the ideal...
http://www.chabad.org/library/article_cdo/aid/305549/jewish/Torah-Slavery-and-the-Jews.htm

Regarding disobedient children? Here is a well written article:
https://answersingenesis.org/bible-questions/doesnt-bible-condone-killing-ones-rebellious-child/

Holy shit. Get a load of this crap:

How do you think we got to our current contemporary (egalitarian) society? It didn't happen in a vacuum.

Derp indeed...

The comparison is between the purported moral ideal that believers think their god has, and the morals that he/she/it has communicated to us.

How do you think we got to our current contemporary (egalitarian) society?

With religion fighting every step of the way, even at this very moment.

Mosaic Law reflects the normative social values of the 5th - 3rd centuries BCE. These rules were written by men, and fell out of favor as social norms progressed. That is exactly what I've been saying this whole fucking time.

You have not been saying this the whole time. You've been saying God made these rules. If God is timeless, you don't get to hide behind historical relativism. Sorry.

And if your God is also omnipotent, you don't get to say "God can't do x because y".

.. of the Old Testament god? Who often said his laws were eternal?

If we "deny" a god to "escape accountability," that must mean that secretly we KNOW there is a god, and we don't want to acknowledge that in order to do unholy things.

That means you think we must be stupid, because how would we escape god's punishment if we know he exists? What good would it do us to simply deny it?

That also means you think we must be evil, because we are so desperate to "escape accountability" for our bad deeds.

How neat. Care to clarify?

And I would suggest that one doesn't have to be stupid to attempt to escape accountability. Everyone from the kid who steals from his mom to the guy running from the cops; they know that eventually they're going to get caught - and yet they still try to run & hide. Why is that? Seems to me it is simply human nature...

So yeah, you think non-believers are basically ignorant children who are trying to get away with being bad. That's a special kind of twisted.

I don't deny your god, I simply don't believe it exists. I'm not trying to avoid accountability. Do you believe me?

If you reread my post you will notice that there is an implied range of ages.

It's insulting and demeaning. It perpetuates bigotry against non-believers as a group. It's a particularly stubborn and nauseating aspect of traditional Christian theology.

- or is it your position that non-believers are immune from presenting arguments that are "insulting and demeaning, and perpetuate bigotry" - against believers?

Because I have noticed particularly stubborn and nauseating comments against Christian theology.

Don't turn this around on others - deal with your own behavior first.

Amazing.

1) How does denying gods remove accountability if they actually exist? If they don't exist, there is no divine accountability. If they do, disbelieving in them only makes it worse. Disbelieving in gods and caring one way or another about any accountability to them is as silly as a scientific materialist being scared of ghosts.
2) Accountability is plenty available in the real world. I know prisons exist.
3) Faith in Christianity is the best way to deny accountability, because repentance is always an option. Presidential pardons are a bit less freely available. If accouintability to gods worried us, we'd convert.
4) Any putative deity levying infinite punishment for finite sin is far more accountable to humanity than we ever could be to him. If such a deity did exist, they would be the vilest most wicked entity imaginable no more worthy of worship than infant cancer.

1) How many people run from cops who they cannot see, cannot hear, cannot touch and cannot detect? Cops who are not immanent in the natural world even? The cop analogy is silly because, unlike gods, we know they exist and they only affect concerns for accountability when we know they are in a position to arrest or punish. Running from the accountability of God for nonbelievers would be like running from an otherwise empty crime scene because we saw the movie Robocop and think it's going to burst through the wall. I think believers just can't quite internalize what disbelief is. There is absolutely no difference to me between the threat of hell and the threat of a stocking full of coal from Santa if I'm a naughty boy, or the threat of being reincarnated as a slug in my next samsara stage. They are exactly, 100% analogous to me. I know they are not to you and it may even be an unsettling or offensive thought to consider, but it's the truth. How much do Hindu concerns for a negative reincarnation affect your ethical choices? That's exactly (unless you are a rather unusual believer) how much concern I give to accountability to God.

2) Not sure of the point here. Even for those who are not caught, the accountability of the judicial system is a genuine concern. They know they can be caught and convicted. That's why they try not to be. This is the inverse of the above point. We know cops exist. We certainly don't run in panicked flight from cops who are not there and cannot see us, but neither do we shoot people in crowded places wearing a nametag then sit down in front of a CCTV camera holding up "you can't take me pigs" signs until they arrive. Well, sanity and desire to live as a given. Cops and prisons are a systemic deterrent to antisocial behasvior, but they are so only because we have real world data and experience, hopefully at second hand, of arrests, convictions, and punishments. Divine accountability is not a concern to nonbelievers. Judicial accountability is.

3) I may need to clarify. IF you have any concern for accountability to the Xian god, then you would rationally choose Christianity regardless of your sins, because Christianity offers a path to repentance thence salvation. Nonbelievers have no concern for repentance because, by definition, we don't believe there's anybody there to repent to, or to save, or indeed barring a few Buddhist atheists, anything to be saved from. Deathbed conversions of well known atheists are common glurge but nigh universal lies. it does however have an interesting corollary to point....

4) Without trying to cause offense, this idea has always flabbergaasted me. Correct if you could my understanding..

God, all knowing and all powerful, created a species he knew would fall from grace, and could have created them differently, even retaining free will. He created, obviously with no duress or imposed necessity as who can force God, the means of temptation to that fall and an eternal punishment to apply to that fall. He imposed that penalty on descendents of those who fell in perpetuity regardless of their own personal virtue or failings, and who were never given the choice to fall from grace or not initially. He then waited for many hundreds of generations before giving people a chance to be saved, by believing that he incarnated himself as a sacrificial atonement to himself, essentially "killing" only the human incarnation of a homoousian omnipotent being in a way which, while certainly painful to humans at least, hardly approaches the fate of Robert-Francois Damiens who lacked the consolation of being the divine creator at the time of his demise. And if we, another hundred or so generations away, do not accept this despite many competing claims about eternal verities and with zero empirical evidence to choose between them, then we are condemned to eternal infinite punishment?

That's not the way believers like to put it, but is there any incorrect statement there (and do note I'm not at this point using belittling and dismissive cultural analogs tempting though that is)? If there isn't, exactly how terrible was the fall, how culpable was created mankind, how unforgivable should it be for those who never fell, how awesome was the attempted remedy on God's part and how reasonable is the case that we should accept that remedy from evidence limited to fairly typical Near Eastern mythology? And much more germane, how reasonable is the punishment which is infinite and irrevocable? This is worse than Kafka. God is not just withholding evidence of the charges to Joseph K, he is withholding evidence that there's even a judge and a court to try him, and then saying that once he is dragged into court, there is no chance to seek mitigation or clemency (that corollary BTW - I would surely seek repentance were I given credible empirical evidence that there was anybody to repent to and be saved from. The idea of being a martyr for atheism at the Pearly Gates would be insane).

That's what makes God as Christians typically describe him a vicious loathsome monster. He made us designed to fall when he could have designed us to choose grace in the first place, placed temptation in our path knowing we would succumb, built a hell he did not need to build to punish every human for the fall of some (but he loves us), went millennia before giving us hope and then hid that hope in humdrum syncretic folk tales with no real evidence (for anybody not alive in 1st Century CE Judea), and then sends us to that infinite eternal punishment for not guessing right which religious claims to follow in a few scant decades on Earth, giving no second chances once his very existence is proven to us.

Again how am I wrong here? Again how is that not monstrous evil? If you really want to posit an admirable, let alone worshipful, God, you have to suggest a God who offers universal salvation after appropriate contrition when contrition is proven applicable. A very few believers go this route but most don't because that only makes Christians special for a short blink of eternity.

ETA final reminder - my complaints about hell are complaints against the fictional construct of a loving god offering infinite punishment. I have not the slightest twinkle of belief that either exists in reality and live my life entirely as if they did not.

then you have no real morals.

Truly ethical personal accountability happens when nobody is looking and you have only yourself to rely on to do the right thing.

intelligence, I'll simply point out that one of the foundational tenets of Christianity is that no one is moral, no one is righteous - only God.

To drive home this point, scripture goes even further to say that good works performed in an effort to "be moral" (or righteous) are like "filthy rags" when presented to God (e.g. "look at me I'm a good person!&quot .

So there is a rift - an uncrossable chasm. Man cannot "work" his way to God's approval or presence. And worse, according to scripture, our sin requires the penalty of death. Pretty grim for mankind.

God's solution: his son will come to earth, and present himself as a substitute - he will pay the death penalty for the sins of mankind. And to prove his worth - his mastery over death, he overcomes death, and is raised back to life.

Ok, how can this possibly help the problem of our supposed lack of morality? Answer: by accepting this offered gift - in faith - that Christ's sacrifice is sufficient to pay the death penalty that was due us. And through this faith we acknowledge that it is not our good works - not our morality that mends the rift between us & God, but rather it is Christ's morality in which we put our faith and hope.

So everything is fixed? What is the problem then? Answer: PRIDE. Very few people like the idea that their goodness, their efforts to be moral don't mean squat - when compared to Christ. It takes humility to accept this truth.

So you accept this "gift" - why do any good things at all if it doesn't make us "moral" in God's eyes. Simple answer: we have been forgiven a huge debt, and in gratitude we should live a life worthy of that forgiveness.

Christ explains this attitude here:
https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Matthew+18:21-35&version=CEV

It doesn't matter if we assume the benign version of Christian moral philosophy as you describe it or the far more commonly expressed version of Christian morality that we must obey to avoid eternal hellfire and gain heaven, both rely on measuring up to externally imposed expectations to gain, or respond to, the mercy of an external arbiter. If people do good works in an acknowledged vain attempt to live up to the impossible standards of Christ's morality as an acknowledgement of his grace and mercy already given to them, or if they do good works to avoid his condemnation to the fiery pit, they still do good works because somebody else is setting the expectation.

That is the morality of a dog. Whether a dog fears the rolled up newspaper or simply wants to please a beloved master by not peeing in the house, the dog is still cleaving to the external deontology of the master. He doesn't think that peeing in the house is a negative act in and of itself. He doesn't understand the work to clean the carpet and think "ah that's a harm caused by my action of peeing. I will avoid that harm by peeing outside."

Far superior is the morality of an autonomous ethical agent. I, surely no moral paragon, need neither divine grace nor the fear of divine wrath to see that killing or raping or robbery cause great harm, and therefore to avoid doing so even when it would likely be with impunity. It is a human, societal morality whereby independent agents know that if A does not cheat B and B does not steal from C then C will not kill A. The vast majority of us live like this, religious or not. Rousseau was a bit of a primitivist, but he had that part right. I've asked religious people quite a few times if they think they personally would go Natural Born Killer if they lost their faith. Every one said no. Every one also acknowledged that atheists of their acquaintance also avoided doing so. That's because absent sociopaths, everybody works this way faith or not. Morality is a human construct for group cohesion. We need laws and authorities of some kind because sociopaths exist. We however don't need gods to make those laws, only human moral agency, which is all that we rely on now really.

God makes rules that condemn us for limits that he created us with. When we break the rules (as we were bound to), we deserve eternal punishment. First off, I don't remember signing up to play this game. Where's my informed consent?

But then we're supposed to be grateful that he set up a special way to avoid the punishment that he assigned because we broke rules that he designed us to be unable to follow?

That's a special kind of f'ed up right there.

I do have to give you some credit though - most liberal believers don't publicly acknowledge this foundation of Christian belief, but here you are proclaiming it proudly. Thank you for being honest and straightforward, I guess.

the incredibly vast majority of religious followers hold fast to a very simple theology.

Right?

at the moment.

go to heaven.

From the day he allegedly lived till now, how many BILLIONS of people lived and died who never heard about him, or were not witnessed to, what happens to them?

amirite?

Your reading of the bible has more in common with literalists that the CCC, which does not make the point you were hoping for.

Not that I really have to tell you this.

The poster made an excellent point that pretty much the whole of Christianity has been wrestling with for almost 2,000 years and is still evidently evolving on, but rather than address that or even acknowledge what that point was you make some half-fast snark about literalism and snake charming. So let's just not pretend who is and isn't on point, because such things are obviously childish, but if you want to continue with such nonsense be my guest. You'll just have to look for another playmate.

The poster inadvertently stumbled upon the notion of extra ccclesiam nulla salus which I unkindly insinuated was literalism (most notably espoused by the Feeneyites).

You proceeded to ignore the literalism problem and ineptly linked to the CCC which clearly rejects that literalist view.

Alas,

The only difference from what they have been preaching for almost 2,000 years is they have redefined 'inside the church' to include those who believe and act the same as them. All of this comes from their literal reading of the gospels, as does the mainstream protestant position which is slightly less inclusive.

A la Feeney.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Feeneyism

Assming you're not engaging in playtime, read Lumen Gentium.

http://www.vatican.va/archive/hist_councils/ii_vatican_council/documents/vat-ii_const_19641121_lumen-gentium_en.html

At least this part, paragrah 16 of Chapter 2:

Unsurprising you consider it representative of RCC doctrine. Never mind it's not in communion with Rome, for good reason. Anything to advance the narrative, no matter how factually wrong.

BTW, the link you gave was to the Catechism not to the Vatican 2 document. I notice you've shied away from the plain language of Lumen Gentium.

How many things can you get wrong in one thread?

You should have known then how wrong post 6 was (assuming you read the right paragraph in the first place) rather than rushing to defend it.

So if you're going to post a lengthy document and direct me to read it, you probably should have first at least browsed through the relevant sections of the one I posted to find the exact same thing, or at least had enough sense to figure out an approved papal decree written over 50 years ago would have been enshrined in the catechism if it actually was the official RCC position. Instead you decide to blame your own fuckups on me. Very telling that.

Post 6 wasn't wrong. As I said, it just isn't that far off from the official RCC position and most certainly is the exact position of mainstream protestant ideology. The other part you fucked up is this:

The difference is I read it before posting it.

BTW, repeating the same words does not cure your literalism problem.

Go back and read what I told you to read.

Your abject deflection and denial is becoming embarrassing to read.

And proceeded to give me a reading list after I had already paraphrased it for you and which you have yet to contradict. So if you want anything softer than that, I'll have to shit in your hand.

You started out with your usual deflection and only got back on track after I called you out for it. Unlike you I stand by my assertions.

If you are so embarrassed, don't read it. Whining incessantly doesn't help your case. I've yet to see you offer anything useful on the subject.

I notice you've shied away from the plain language of the Catechism of the Catholic Church. I suspect you'll also do your usual run away and deflection from the real reason behind the Lumen Gentium, which was to deflect charges of anti-semitism on behalf of Catholicism.

I understand some would rather be regarded a fool than wrong.

Start with this:

The reason for the contradiction is the RCC has to both simultaneously support some 18 or 19 centuries of solid exclusionism while simultaneously trying to deflect the reality of how anti-Semitic that ideology is not to mention all the other bigotry with every other competing religion.

Meanwhile you've yet to explain how someone who has never heard about anything of a divine nature is supposed to "sincerely seek God and moved by grace". I suppose we must assume the holy poltergeist whispered in their ear like St. Paul, right?

So yeah, it is getting ludicrous at this point and I'm pretty sure you have everything to do with that.

Greater minds than yours have tried and have been discredited. Read the rest of Lumen Gentium

First of all 'literalism' in the context of Christianity means biblical literalism, which to those north of a room temperature IQ doesn't even concern the Catechism.

As if that alone wasn't the silliest shit imaginable, you compound it with the suggestion that we can't take the first statement from the Catechism literally, but we MUST take the second one literally!



Meanwhile you've yet to offer anything remotely approaching evidence as to why post #6 is wrong, other than your own personal assurance that it is. Deflection noted.

Anyone familiar with words knows the pitfalls of literalism, be it in constitutional law, psychology, or scripture.

Anyone adept at words can see the latter statement does not contradict, but amplifies, the original statement.

Sorry, I can't find a smiley that adequately demonstrates stunning stupidity.

I absolutely love it when you are reduced to waffling, and now your insistence that biblical literalism is no longer the issue after you made it so. Just WTF were you literally talking about in post #7? I'd LOVE to hear your answer on that, purely for the comedic value.

Here's a smiley that fits pretty well. Enjoy.

Many biblical scholars have gone round and round on this and written tomes of writing about the subjects, but theuly don't take any of it literally, not one. They don't even claim God exists!

And Jesus never really, actually, literally existed?

Before you ask the next usual question, "How do we know which is literal and which isnot?!" - excuse me while I stifle a yawn - read. It's more productive than trolling.

.. then it has to be called a "spiritual metaphor."

What do you make, by the way, of the Polish bishop who recently declared there was literal heart tissue in a host?

Meanwhile, still no Jesus it seems.

As to the host (which I'm glad you acknowledge is by the way and irrelevant to this subject) the Bishop did not declare that. The Department of Forensic Medicine of the Pomeranian Medical University in Szczecin did. Technically, their opinion is there is present striated muscle consistent with heart tissue. On that basis the Bishop made the announcement.

As to my opinion, I'm dubious. Mainly for three reasons; first, the sample was studied at the request of the diocese; second, the announcement is timed to coincide with the anniversary of the introduction of Christianity to Poland; third, i haven't seen the report and I've seen no mention online of anyone who has seen it.

As to your implicit question, "Why not because it's preposterous on its face?", the answer is that if there is a God who created all, this would be a simple thing. However, I doubt God has need of parlor tricks.

Are you seriously alleging there's historical proof for the literal Jesus?

And yes, regarding that topic, the weight of scholarship on the existence of Jesus, versus his nonexistence, is as lopsided as the weight of scholarship on climate change versus climate change deniers.. There are always cranks with an agenda.

Let me remind you...

Have fun plying with yoiurself.

If you're talking about this subthread, you're as obtuse on the subject as he is.

It is claimed that Jesus literally, actually, physically existed.

This is a common claim in the Church.

So, many Catholics are often literalists.

It is incredibly arrogant or irrational to claim otherwise.

Jesus, or rather Yeshua was a very common name at the time, and seeing as how the Romans crucified people wholesale at the time it's no surprise someone by that name was put on the cross.

That is the limit to the historical evidence of Jesus. Evidence for the literal Jesus of the bible is far more suspect. The evidence is 3rd or 4th person at best and even that is a stretch.

No actual written evidence that he lived. He is a composite syncretic figure much like Mithra, Apollo, Horus or Osiris.

Born on December 25th of a virgin, walked on water, performed miracles, raised the dead, yada yada?

The existence of Jesus is taken literally. especially.

So it seems that literalism us often found in Catholicism. And is only wrong, or irrelevant, when Rug says it is.

Expanding on this? Not all Catholics are entirely agreed on when things are literal, and when they are not. As when one Bishop area at once finds literal human body parts in a host, but others don't.

Do Catholics do it? Often they do.

Does that mean they often embrace silly things? Yes it does.

Related to this: is their whole faith silly? Likely it is.

Talking snakes, walking on water. All belief in literal miracles is silly.

of other believers they think are naive while they themselves believe in literal nonsense like zombie god-men.

Without that, their claim to derisive intellectual superiority collapses in a pile of straw.

Many take most biblical miracles literally, for instance. Walking on water, say.

So the criticism of such religions for believing in false things, is appropriate.

For that matter, as it turns out, the spiritual or metaphorical reading of such things has problems too.

Followed by the feigned, "How can you tell which is literal and which is not?"

... as many Catholics take many - then our believers are open to criticism from Science.

Spirituality also has problems. Including the spirit of "hate"ing your family. As required by Jesus.

BTW, I thought your schtick was, attack the belief, not the believer. The flip side of hate the sin, love the sinner.

So here it's necessary to mention people: your modern Catholicism is not embraced by all or traditional Catholics. Many of whom still defend miracles.

You feel that the old belief is today a straw man, and that new Catholicism is more defensible. But first: the new came out of the old. And still shares some responsibility to, and subtle liabilities from, miraculous Catholicism.

except for a few christian-atheists they all believe in the absurd zombie-man-god thing. As I said, they just try to gloss over that nonsense while trumpeting their allegedly sophisticated hermeneutics that supposedly explain all the other loopy nonsense.

Props for using "hermeneutics" as if it redeems the post.

Works for me.

The Cajun take on Catholicism really reveals the very primitive, magical, animistic origins of most Catholic and Christian beliefs.

It's illegal to test God's existence with an experiment. The Bible says so.

When the snake handlers get bitten and die from the venom.