Print

Please login or register.
1 Hour 1 Day 1 Week 1 Month Forever
Login with username, password and session length

[Keridwen]

Yak's topic seems to have died... however, it shall RISE FROM THE ASHES TO A MORE GLORIFIED FORM AND IDIOTS THE WORLD OVER SHALL PRAISE IT'S KINDEY, MEDULLA AND BRAIN CONVOLUTIONS FOR ALL ETERNITY...

... or whatever else it is the nutjobs go for.

Now, it so happened one day that I ventured forth into Christalk. I did this to gain knowledge, you know, the reason we're all secretly busting to attend Mass on Sundays - know thine enemy. Ok, fine, I did it to shitstir (haha, not reeeeally....) Anyway, upon entering I find the expected:

PRAISE be to God because I am nothing without him...
His blood boils eternal....
His face is annoying....
Ooooh he is so big... so absolutely huge... gosh, we're all really impressed down here, I can tell you...

You know. Crap. But it was still beyond what I expected. I expected to engage these people in a gentle debate, hoping to gain a higher knowledge of exactly what it is that is so disturbing our society. This is among one of the responses I got, to some gently 'faith seeking'. I went in there as 'katz' the former agnostic-cum-christian bandwagoner who 'just wanted to know the Lord'. I thought I did well, obviously they didn't think so:

Father we thank you that you have brought katz here today we thank you for katz Father we know you love katz and we know you have a perfect plan for katz life Father we pray that you would remove the veil from katz eyes we pray that you would flood katz mind with the light of the glorious gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ Father we pray in the name of Jesus that you would give katz the same gift of faith you have given us in Jesus name

Anyway, I was surprised and probably jolted just a little out of the character I gave to myself. So I became more clearly "agnostic" asking questions and questions - all I got, clearly, was Michael 2315263424252:3646577378373: The Lord Unto You Eth And Stuff. No actual, debatable arguments. I was at least expecting an attempt at a debate, even just them gently explaining things to me, blah blah. But nope, because I couldn't quote the 57million pages of the bible, I was shit on the ground. Oh, they loved me, they prayed for me, they even were so kind as to warn me away from independant thought lest I find myself in the firey clutches of Satan himself!!!!111!

Then I got banned. Honestly, I didn't even say anything inflammatory at all. As much as I wanted to scream and shout at them in sheer frustration, I held my tongue and merely stationed myself as a questioning n00b to the faith. Nope, not good enough.

I shall leave this post with a wonderful quote from the late Douglas Adams: "Is it not enough to see that a garden is beautiful without having to believe there are fairies at the bottom too?"

[a passing lunatic]

Why not try to go to mass on Sundays, rather than stupid internet sites? We already know there are plenty of those.

[Keridwen]

Hmmmmm, audible prayers offered by dickheads or slightly less annoying visual prayers...

I think I'll take the website.

[Pinball Neil]

So are you winning keridwen? 

[Keridwen]

  Ha, no, I think it is a war that can't be won.

Did you know George Bush Snr doesn't even think American atheists should be considered citizens?

[depreciative jones]

The mistake you made, my dear, was in assuming that faith and rational debate can coexist in the same space.

It's like that part in Back to the Future when Marty is warned not to touch his future self. They will cancel each other out, and everything will explode in a shocking (but lovely) display of fireworks; or in this case, a glassy-eyed glare from the webmaster and a banning.

That said, I have actually had some very interesting and logically sound conversations with a Jehovah's Witness. When we took out the 'faith' element (ie, I granted her a few initial concessions for the sake of the argument: that there is some kind of higher power and s/he/it* has enough humanesque qualities to want to interact with people) she was actually both extremely well versed in the Bible and in rationalisation for why the Bible might be true.

In the end I pointed out that since the Bible** was written by people, which means people can be divine vessels for Sheit's truthiness, and therefore I might be able to write just as divine a document myself; and since I have higher faith in my own abilities to pen a document that resonates more powerfully with me than the Bible***, I should simply continue to live a reasonably good life and wait for divine inspiration to strike. I can hardly wait!

She got a little tight-lipped about that, and we agreed to disagree.

Ultimately she demonstrated a few trends I've observed in humans**** for a while now: we love getting together and agreeing about things; we'd largely like to think that this life isn't all there is; we shape our experience of reality through language, and therefore inspire and teach one another with the aid of stories; and most of us are a bit too lazy to find our own, perfect truth, so we'll happily take an off the shelf model as long as it's mostly right. Or as long as most of our friends and/or family think it's mostly right.

Edit (this part dropped off the original post for some reason): To end on a note more specifically relating to what you originally said, JW's will probably provide some of the most insightful understanding of and arguments for the Bible, but they - like everyone who has it - will ultimately rely on faith to prove the truth of their beliefs. 

*he he. sheit. Childish moment over.

**And is, as far as holy documents go, pretty bloody derivative.

***Incidentally, I've already written shopping lists that resonate a more powerful sense of truth than the Bible.

****Did I just give away the fact that I'm an alien?

[Keridwen]

What you say is right. And isn't it so interesting to argue with those of a religious persuasion - to a certain extent. When they start claiming that you're eternally damned and they alone can pray for your saviour, it starts to get offensive.

They just don't understand how WE can be offended by it.

***Incidentally, I've already written shopping lists that resonate a more powerful sense of truth than the Bible.

 

[Thaluikhain]

Well, what you have to realise is that the Old Testament has lots of poetry in it.  The order in which god created things is such because it sounds nice when said in the original Hebrew.  Likewise, Adam, is a joke name...he comes from dust, and the word used for that is "adama".

The New Testament includes alot of letters to people about current issues.  "In view of the current situation, I personally (not the Lord) would advise that..." crops up a bit.

[a passing lunatic]

Stop getting all superior, it's half the problem.


Them getting all superior, of course, is the other half.


I contend that anyone who claims to be 'rational' is full of shit.

[Crux]

Religion is a very important part of our society.

You do realise that without an imaginary bogeyman up in the clouds threatening to smite people that we'd find it very hard to keep the mindless uneducated rabble that makes up most of the population under control, don't you?

[Erubadhriel]

welcome back skexis

[a passing lunatic]

IP, or just a guess? It sounds familiar.



anyway, please elaborate (max/skex), because what you are saying (that the majority of the population are mindless, uneducated and rabble, and that they are uncontrollable without religion) sounds implausible.

[Crux]

I trust that you were questioning religion's importance in control, rather than the majority of the populace being mindless and uneducated.

Religion and the state are hardly seperable.  Why do you think it is that both sides of politics are quick to claim to be good christians?  We are not likely to have a practitioner of any other religion or an atheist as Prime Minister any time soon.

Despite a trend away from it in recent decades, religion still remains an important cohesive factor in our society.  Though we may claim to be multi-cultural, as everyone is obliged to claim, we remain a predominantly Christian nation.

[hammer]

I keep telling you, I exsist!

It's just that most of the stuff written in the bible about me is mis-translated, over blown, or just plain made up!

[WithTheDawn]

As fucked up as it may be, I do find the psychological condition that is religion quite amazing. Sounds like a nice experiment, seeing if they can engage in rational arguments. Some of them can, of course, but most of the fundamental ones simply fall back on "teh bible", as though that thing has more than vague airs of accuracy. I'd trust Herodotus more.