Peary - short story 10 (At the Crossroads)
The smell, the weight, how it feels in the palm of your hand, the memories and feelings that come to you by just touching it are impossible to erase. When you lift a Bible from another faith how could it stand a chance in your hands. It is only just a book to you with words on pages, you can rip it apart in your mind without a shred of emotion.
To read the Koran without being held by a Muslim mother since birth, with out saying their daily prayers, without smelling their smells, eating their food, loving their family, friends and community, it is not fully possible. Religion must relate to us to have meaning to us. To imply that we are all religious free will is a lofty notion, but in reality our past binds us to the religious path we ultimately choose.
Look at Mitt Romney, he is a happy successful man with a loving family. I am sure his life is full of wonderful memories that are interwoven into his faith. He looked up to his father and wanted nothing more to be like him. Even though Mitt has the ability to give up his Mormon faith, do you think has past experience that have lead him to his present self will allow him to do so?
Why do I bother arguing with you? Well I was searching Adwords and thought I was going to get some information on Google. Instead I ended up on your website where there was a debate about religion. This brought back memories from my youth, were my friends and I would debate or beliefs, I found it stimulating. These good feeling from my past caused me to make a post on your blog and here we are engaged in a thought provoking discussion. If I lived my life all over and every situation was the same up into the point where I landed on your blog, I would do the same thing.
Why do I bother working? My past experiences have lead me to believe that money food and shelter are important to survive, I also have a family that I love and want to take care of, this is mostly instinct, the need to care for our children. I like the Celtics and even Catholics especially because of the way they embrace mystery so much more freely than Protestants do.
How could you conclude anything other than that MOST higher things are more mysterious to our experience than certain? And I can invite you to be a Christ follower which means you get to walk every day in un-earned favor and forgiveness. Perry, This may be hard for you to understand but I was raised with love but no religion, I have no need for in my life, my thermostat has been set.
I feel extremely lucky to be on this earth, even if only a short time, I was lucky to have friends from all different religious and ethnic backgrounds. I have always admired the community around their ethnicity, their diverse religions have always fascinated me. This has given me the ability to understand respect different points of view; I would not trade my experiences for anything. I feel I have as much right as anyone to feel awe at the Universe and the things around us and all of humanity.
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The error I would like correct from a few comments above is the suggestion that Mormon beliefs are intellectually lightweight. The point I am making is that education and learning of a religious and secular nature are a big part of the Mormon life. I suggest that an intellectually lightweight religion would not be attractive to an educated person. I think it could also serve as Exhibit C in the discussion of whether Mormons are asked to be blind in their faith and to set their intellect on a shelf, so to speak.
I would never suggest that Mormons are intellectual lightweights. What I am saying is that the Bible is a far more reliable historical and archaeological document than the book of Mormon. It is pretty easy to verify, for example, that many places and names mentioned in the book of Acts were real and accurately reported. The Old Testament talks about the Hittites and numerous other civilizations and we can verify yes in fact that was the case. The book of Mormon is far more problematic. For example, no Central or South American civilization is recognized by academia to correlate with the Nephites of the Book of Mormon.
I would agree that you did not say that Mormons as people are intellectually lightweight, but it seemed to me that you implied that their theology was. Also, I agree with the comparison you just made between the Bible and the Book of Mormon, and it is not a problem for me because as a spiritual text the Book of Mormon is excellent.
The Bible is, too. Also, for scholarly explanations of just about any objection that can be raised to Mormon teachings the Maxwell Institute http: Since that time, Elder Holland made the speech I referenced above, and I thought it had some good advice to these situations. I think the general principles or points he is making will make sense to other Christians and be of value. Thank you for your thoughtful article and comments, and may you and I and the other readers here be counted as happy for having endured James 5: Thus I do feel some hesitation about bringing some of this up.
Know that I come from a place of deeply respecting your family values and your commitment to faith. I believe that if someone comes along and says that Christianity has suffered from years of apostasy, and that they have received a revelation from God that dramatically alters the perspective of an entire belief system, they ought to at minimum be able to get their history and archaeology right.
One would never, ever infer from the Bible that Jesus and Lucifer are brothers, or that God was originally a man like you and I, or many other foundation-level Mormon beliefs. Mormon language has many of the same theological terms Christians use but in actuality they mean very different things. It means in some cases accepting significant apparent contradictions between church teachings and observable reality. Contrast this to Jesus responding to his critics in Luke In the New and Old Testaments, faith leads to experience which leads to more faith which leads to more experience.
Jesus offered empirical proof of his authority. I believe you have nothing to lose by reverting to the original Jesus. He is very much good enough. Again I do not intend personal disrespect to Mormons. In fact part of me respects you for believing in the face of difficulties, because that requires character. But I do see that the Bible does present a higher standard of proof than the book of Mormon. You should not need to lower your standards in order to accept a subsequent revelation.
Faith and the practice of faith need not be that hard. Any religion that tell you not to think, forces family and community members to cut off communication with those who decide to leave the faith is a cult. If you trace their origins back, you usually find a sex and power crazed pedophile with multiple wives servicing his every need.
It is just sad that they are allowed to continue with tax free status under the religious umbrella. Mormons are compelling proof that religion is simply a product of the environment you are in. So he declares himself a prophet, and pulls a religion own out of his rear end for all of us to whiteness. For outsiders the stuff he believes and teaches is level 10 crazy, like Quakers living on the moon.
He has over 30 wives, builds a city and dies. New prophets are allowed to change his teachings as they see fit. As you attest Perry, yes most Mormons are great people, as are people of any faith. There are good people of faith and there are bad people of faith, there are good atheists and there are bad ones. If you want to take a good person and make them do bad thing give them some religion. I do not believe for a second that people that strap bombs to themselves are all necessary bad people.
They were just fed a doctrine since they were young that if you want to be welcome into the kingdom of heaven, this is how you get there. This is crazy to us, but we were not fed this BS since birth, again they are victims of the environment they were raised in. Yes they could choose to not believe but this is easier said than done. It documents in excruciating detail the genocide of million people under mostly atheist regimes — in the 20th century alone. Is it merely a coincidence that more people were murdered by atheist governments in the 20th century alone, than by all religious wars in all centuries combined?
That is empirical fact, not just theory. Again I wish to remind you that I would not even dream of asking people to embrace Christianity if I could not show that it is historically, philosophically and morally coherent. Maybe the reason people yearn for God is… God is out there waiting to be embraced. Maybe at some point, God stops hiding. That has been my experience. I am not an advocate for the communist or even the atheist for that matter. I am all for freedom of thought and beliefs. The moment you place a megalomaniac dictator in charge of any belief system religious or not you get disastrous results.
No one was born believing they were a communist; they were taught they were a communist. If they disagreed or questioned this idea they were killed or persecuted. Again, your belief system is a direct product of your environment religious or not. What makes me angry is when a belief system crosses the line and becomes what I believe is a cult.
If you are persecuted or isolated for deciding not to believe, then it is a cult. If there are people following you around harassing you if you choose not to believe then it is a cult, not just a belief system. If there is a wall around your environment keeping you from leaving, it is a cult. If young girls not even legal are forced to marry older men, it is a cult. If you are not allowed to think or read anything other than what you are told to, it is a cult. There are cults flourishing in North America today, they have tax free religious status, this is wrong.
It sounds as if You believe that the Tea Party is a cult—however—it is a political organization and contributions to it are not tax deductible. Perry, can you tell me what the 10 commandments mean to a Christian and to you? Do you think these are the word of God? Just reading and I am very curious…. On it you shall not do any work, neither you, nor your son or daughter, nor your male or female servant, nor your animals, nor any foreigner residing in your towns. Therefore the Lord blessed the Sabbath day and made it holy.
Yep, this is a pretty good set of rules. I am no Deity or scholar and yet I can even envision a better menu! When I read these commandments I am looking for some sort of evidence in the writing that they derive from the God that has create the earth, people the universe, DNA everything.
I concieve that God would have a very different view then a man living in a desert at the time of the commandments.
God would see the future, God would see the entire world at the time. These commandments seem to be from a fearful man writing about his own environment, not a God. He was afraid of losing his possession wife included , being killed, robbed, falsely accused, his children not obeying him, his wife having sex with another man. Lets just look at them one at a time.. He creates everything, yet he is jealous of his own creations??? He will punish children up to the 4th generation that he himself place in these families by no fault of their own, God creates DNA yet God is not decisive enough to just say 4th generation, God just kinda says 3rd or 4th generation???
There goes God talking about God again! Would a God really do this? Honor your father and your mother, so that you may live long in the land the Lord your God is giving you. Did God really think about this one? What if my Mother and Father hate God? What if they abuse and rape me? Wow, it is about time he got one right, yep this would make the world a better place, I am with you on this one….
You shall not commit adultery You lost me again God. Yep adultery is not a good thing, but your placing it after murder, really. Swap it out for number one and you can put it in the list, too many important items were left out. Once again these are the words of a fearful man not a God or a woman or a child. OK, you are with me again, yes it should be on the list, but there are worse things that have been left out, why? Probably because they did not affect the selfish guy that wrote the commandments, he only cared about himself and what effected or could possibly impact his life.
It also sounds like this was a common problem at the time of the writing of the commandments. All people on the earth are equal, no one person or race shall be enslaved to another. Treat everyone as your equal, respect all, try to understand each other. This includes children sorry Catholic Church 3. Do not abuse power, physical, mental or financial.
Help others less fortunate than you, any way you can, serve others, not me. Honor your family, Parents honor and respect and never abuse your children, children honor and respect and never abuse your parents. Never condemn someone for things that are beyond their control. My unprofessional and un scholarly opinion is that these commandments are further evidence that man created the idea of God biblical and God did not create man! These commandments are primitive, repetitive, ignorant, and unintelligent, they are also missing some significant elements.
This is a relationship. What people worship profoundly influences their behavior and values. Nothing less than the true God is worthy of our worship. If we have any self respect then we honor that truth. However—Jesus did NOT marry. Oh, and I almost forgot one. Consuming mind altering substances. I assume you have watched the Ken Ham Bill Nye debate. I would not even call this a debate, I am glad Bill Nye was able to keep his composure debate this closed minded man.
Wish they would have spent the 27 million dollars on feeding starving children then building that fantasy land museum. Ken Ham is proof we need to keep religion out of schools, let adults decide what to believe in or you will end up in a Ken Ham world. Now, I have to admit there is a small part of me that respects a person for the guts that it must take to believe something that goes against everything you can see taste and touch and measure, out of faith.
There is a kind of strength of character in that. However the Bible never expects anyone to take anything on pure unadulterated blind faith. Ken Ham is doing enormous damage to the reputation of Christianity because people think that clinging to a narrow, excruciatingly literal and outdated interpretation of the Bible is what Christians do. I apologize to all for what he is doing. You are one of the few voices of rationalism in a sea of blind faith that heaps scorn upon the work of science. So how do you restore a rational belief to a church that seems bent on throwing out science?
People in my church think I have two heads because I accept many scientific conclusions over that of blind faith. But they understand that there are many views on this stuff, and that it is NOT a central tenet of faith. In any case you need to speak out and for a theologically oriented person you have to start with theology. There are all kinds of purely theological problems with young earth too.
I can see why you would have to have some respect for this, you have to have some of this blind faith as well just to accept that the Bible is the word of God. Tell me how you could ever prove that God decided to have the bible written through several different unknown writers over time.
God has already proven he could make tablets if you believe he created those fantastic, all inclusive, commandments. Why not make the bible in tablet form and deliver it, why not print it and bind it, this is God after all! No one ever questions these basic assumptions of the Bible, that God inspired 30 plus writers to create the Bible over time. Did the writers of the bible have some sort of special permission from God to write the Bible?
What were all of their names? Where did they live? Who did they work for? What were their beliefs? What were their motivations? What were their fears? You will never be able to answer any of these questions satisfactory without making bold assumptions, without blind faith. Blind faith is unacceptable, people crash planes into buildings, blow themselves up, and drink poison Koolaid because of blind faith.
Would documented events of blind people seeing, deaf people hearing and lame people walking similar to the Bible stories of Jesus count as proof that God is actively involved in the world today? Either the commandments were not written by God or God is a self centered male who only looks out for men and their possession. In ordered to accept that the bible is the word of God we have to believe that 30 plus separate writers had a direct communications link with God.
We cannot question this, we just have to accept this fact blindly with no substantial evidence that this could possibly be true. Can people heal themselves? Yes the mind is connected to all of our cells, there are many things we do not understand, but to come to the conclusion that the Bible is the word of God and God must exist because people have healed is a giant leap that makes no sense. Is it the law of commitment working here, are so committed to the faith that you do not bother to look at the obvious?
I will respond to your comments when I get time. You had a lot to say and I will respond appropriately. You flatly stated that there is no proof that any of the Biblical authors had any kind of connection to God. Well I can do even better than proving their prophecies came true and that they wrote their words before the events happened. I can show you modern day documented miracles and people who channel the power of God.
I can show you the results in peer reviewed scientific studies. You seem to have already made up your mind that no proof of this is possible. All I can point out is that you are being prejudiced and selective with your information. Those results definitively prove paranormal activity. Stanford University also did considerable research on similar topics for the US military, and the information was eventually declassified. Once again, paranormal activity was definitively demonstrated and documented.
He lost credibility with me a long time ago. This is the greatest and the first commandment. The second is like it: You shall love your neighbor as yourself. This to me is so obvious, almost elementary but so troubling for those buried into a belief. Everyone claims that their book only speaks the truth, life is not that simple or black and white.
Yes I want to shine some light into the alley you refuse to enter. Did some writers put together some tales that were inspired by their love of God and call it the Bible? Hey that would be a reasonable explanation for what the Bible really is, a collection of stories. If you are going to tell me that the Bible is the word of God then I am going to need some back ground information on the writers. Sorry to be so demanding and nosey, I think this matters!
Who paid their wages while they were writing, I think this matter allot! As for The Amazing Randy, why would you like this guy, he is tough on charlatans and scammers, the world is full of them. We need more people like James Randy to shine some light into the dark corners no one wants to look into. Jim Jones is not the only bad faith Healer, there are dozens of them operating right now, pointing this out may be childlike but it is necessary.
Is this child like of me, maybe but I feel it is also necessary that a light be shined in this dark corner. Did God write the commandments or were they written by someone who was inspired by their love of God? Is the Bible the word of God, or was it written by a few men who were inspired by their love of God? Can I add a chapter to the Bible if I feel inspired by God? Yes I know there are scammers. Yes Jim Jones is a scammer. But what you are doing is simply trading one scammer for another. That always happens, by the way, when we set ourselves up as some sort of ultimate judge of other people.
James Randi is a scammer. How do I know this? He rejects published, replicatable, peer reviewed, ivy league research that definitively proves the paranormal with exhaustive research techniques and statistics. James Randi is a flat-out liar. Not to mention the fact that I have personally witnessed all kinds of miracles and I an point to scientific studies verifying the effectiveness of healers etc. Nevertheless I do have scientists backing me up! Are you interested in hearing more about that, Erik?
I can give you lots of stuff to chew on. If you are interested. By the way, did I mention? James Randi is a liar. A purebred black and white fundamentalist if there ever was one. I am amazed at how people who HATE fundamentalists always end up becoming…. Mirror images of the people they so revile. Read a book for goodness sake.
Seriously, there are answers if you want them. You will find LOTS of answers. Anyway—As for some of Your earlier statements… RE: I will answer your question when you give me the simple yes or no answers I have been asking for weeks now. Did God write the Bible not pysically pen it, are those his or hers words?
Yes or No 2. Did God write the commandments? Yes there are some business are corrupt as are some institutions. We have departments and agencies that will go after bad business; owners will hopefully get caught and prosecuted. Word gets out and no one wants to do business with them anymore. When you hide behind the word of God there should be a higher standard than operating a business, there should be more checks and balances as people are more willing to suspend all rational thought when it comes to religion.
It is very easy to take advantage of believers in the name of God yet there are very few checks and balances. Religions and their institutions need to be called out, they need to questioned, they need to be held accountable. Not that long ago I would not be able to ask any of these questions, the church would burn me for my audacity to question their authority.
Christopher Hitchings is one of the very few men to hold the Catholic Church responsible for their actions. What a pompous, arrogant, deviant, corrupt institution that needs to constantly held responsible for their actions, they are not above the law. Even the pond scum that make pornography are held to a higher standard than the Church! Who else is going to stand up for these children if there were not people like Hitchens around calling them out. As for James Randy, all he wants is to control the environment before he will accept any proof. Handing him a paper from an Ivey league School is not acceptable proof.
Repeat the experiment in front of Randy with magicians present in a controlled environment; this is what he demands for proof. Ivey league student are not above trickery. The US government wanted to recruit gifted people who had the ability to read minds for their military and their intelligence. James Randi warned them that they need some magicians present in order to validate their findings, they ignored him. Why is it that there are no faith healings that involve anything substantial, like replacing a missing limb or separating conjoined twins, there seems to be a limit to the bag of tricks.
Despite what you think of Randy he actually hopes to one day be proven wrong and pay out his million dollars. If Randy was a scammer as you claim he would have taken his skills and claimed he was a prophet, or working through God. Randy could have built up a nice devout following and a tax free fortune over his lifetime! Also is God a male? You have no argument from me about the culpability of the Catholic church with abuse scandals etc. Just pointing out that the Catholic church is not where most of the problem actually lies.
James Randy HAS built up a nice devout following and a tax free fortune over his lifetime. He runs a multi-million dollar info marketing business with a cult following under the guise of a nonprofit. Books, tapes, seminars, newsletters, the whole nine yards. And dishonest as well. It is not my job to convince Randi. All I can do is cite published, publicly available research from multiple respected institutions that clearly contradicts his assertions. There are faith healings that are substantial and physical and definitive.
Deaf heal, blind see, lame walk. Would you consider those? If I could prove to you Christ is real would you follow him? The hoax became a scandal and demonstrated the shortcomings of many paranormal research projects at the university level. Even the men who made it cannot agree on what their prophets or redeemers or gurus actually said or did.
I will answer you shortly, I was wondering why you still have not posted my post regarding the commandments? I know you have not had time to answer the post but why hold it back? To each individual the manifestation of the Spirit is given for some benefit. As I have loved you, so you also should love one another. What do you mean by real? Did he ever walk the earth? This may be the only thing you may ever come close to offering proof of but why would I follow a dead man that once walked the earth? That he is the son of God? All of the proof you and many others have is based on faith not science, this is not proof.
I have sit here watching the insanity around the missing Malaysia and I see how desperately people need to hear something even if it is not the truth, they are looking for something. How many theories have people developed over the last 12 days? There are different camps forming and so called experts spouting their theories. This is what we do, this is the nature of the beast. What is more plausible, a magical man in the sky just decided one day to randomly impregnate a young Jewish woman, or that a Jewish woman is capable of lying?
By the way, what would Gods DNA look like? Mary you seem to think that I believe we came from nothing, this is not the case. I have seen things I could never explain, miracles if you like. I just do not believe we have a clue why or how we arrived here, we will continue to make up religions to explain ourselves. If you want to call all that we do not understand God, then I am with you.
No I would not follow Christ, you could never offer any substantial proof that he is real. And from now on, in order to participate in this conversation, you must use your full name. You have not adequately defined the term real, or what your expectations of following are. I have no skin in the game, yet for you there is a reward from what you were taught, a convert equals a win. I can tell you I could never prove to you that Christ is not real, to you he is real, I get that. To me he is not real, nor is God real.
I have seen some of your posts online regarding this debate; I find nothing there that would change my mind. Maybe you have some new ideas, I would enjoy seeing them. I am sure you have seen all of my arguments before, nothing is really new, it is an age old debate. I enjoyed your analogy of a faithful married and a God that demands worship. If you are going to compare God to a wife then we need to have a level playing field. The marriage would have been arranged since you were a child. When you were of age your parents tell you that you will never get to see your new wife, nor can you see an image of her.
As the years go on you would come to the conclusion your parents are lying to you, and that you should ignore them and find a new wife. Or you could continue with the marriage until you die. I would hope I would have enough sense to give up the invisible wife. If someone could prove to me that Jesus is not who he says he was, I would not follow him.
If you could prove for example that Jesus never rose from the dead, that would be sufficient. I think the case FOR Jesus having risen from the dead is quite robust. The rabbi asked his students: One of the students suggested: Until then it is night, and darkness is still with us. Perry, The idea of you searching around for the truth with no preconceived ideas or notions is a stretch.
Even though you think you can put your Christianity on the back burner to search for the truth, it will creep out and taint everything. What is the truth any way and who exactly has the right to it? The only possible evidence you are going to have for me a documents that were written thousands of years ago, do these documents hold the truth? What possible influence did the writers of these documents have? Who were they working for? What was in it for them? Are there eye whiteness accounts?
What possible influences could the whiteness be under? How could anyone one possibly have any documents about anyone that hold the complete truth when we distort facts about our own lives all the time? Again I ask you, if you could prove to me with actual physical evidence that Christ died then rose again how does this in any way prove that he is the son of God? When we are debating spiritual beliefs there is no truth and there is no proof, there are only beliefs and historical documents.
I would not follow your truth, I follow my own truth, we all do. Asking me to follow your beliefs or truths if you can prove something is a bizarre request and is irrelevant to the discussion. Why is this such an important expectation for you? Take a look at any history book that children have had in the classrooms of North America. Try telling this same history to an elderly First Nations person, they would have a very different version of the truth!
Historical documents are under the influence of multiple factors including the writers beliefs, power, money, control, religion and many others, the truth is not high on the list! In fact I will argue the truth is very boring and not always worth documenting. So show me the truth according to Perry…. This is a great discussion. You can demonstrate that there is a very rational and reasonable thread of argument for the existence of God. Perry, it feels like you are mixing these two arguments into one, as if believing in God and having faith in Jesus can be viewed as the same step.
These are two separate questions approached on very different levels. The very definition of faith demands that it be built on something different. Perhaps Erik might think that the subjective component of faith renders it useless. So what if faith has a subjective component? The truth of the matter is that the majority of human decisions are made with a subjective component as part of the equation. We are subjective beings; that is written into our wiring.
Perry Marshall
It can be part of the equation, but ultimately it is defined as an inner work of the Spirit. And Erik, before you get on your high horse about invisible spirit forces, science has done a great deal to reveal the invisible forces that govern the operation of the universe. Believing that there is an invisible force called God can be a perfectly rational conclusion. So can agnosticism or atheism depending on your individual life circumstances. I personally find the theory that there are forces guiding the complexity of this world into existence to be far more satisfying than the operation of blind chance.
Einstein believed in the existence of God. Actually, he stated it was one of the guiding principles of his thinking. I asked the question to find out if he is really seeking, or if he is just here to argue. Agnosticism is a perfectly understandable place for people to be in. But after 20 years of intensive conversations with atheists, and initially thinking that it might be a sensible position, I now know that Atheism is not rational. One must suspend belief in rationality and everything we know about cause and effect, just to attempt to explain why there is anything instead of nothing at all.
Atheism, despite initial appearances, is all based on circular reasoning. It cannot be defended with reason or logic. If Erik cannot even recognize the significance of someone rising from the dead — if he actually needs this to be explained to him — then I shake the dust off my feet and move on. Erik is wasting my time.
Just move on to the next prospect that appears to fall for all the sales tricks. Is this what you learn in church? Perry, although you have come to the scientific conclusion that if someone dies and then comes back to life again they are the Son of God, my simple mind cannot connect the dots! It maybe that I have a relative that was pronounced dead on the operating table for several minutes after the doctors gave up, he came back. He had an unexplainable out of body experience and witnessed some amazing thing during his time of death.
Since his experience he has connected with many others who have shared his experience. Unlike Christ, there were medical doctors present to witness their deaths. Not one of these people has ever claimed to be the son of God because of their experience, nor did they find Christ on their return, or during their absence. They did gain a strong sense of spirituality and that we are all more connected then we think. So tell me in simple man terms how are these two connected. The Virgin Birth Was Bloodless. You have a massive Leap to make to draw a link from being dead and rising again to being the son of God.
You are now going to impose a set of rules on this Gap as to the type of death and the length of time you are dead for? Where are you getting these rules from? Is 3 days the magic number? Is crucifiction the only way you can die in order to meet the criteria? You have made me have another look at this. I have been all around this great planet of ours, I have lived on a First Nations reserve in Northern Canada, I have been to Israel 11 times and I will go again.
I have talked about religion with people from all different backgrounds and despite what you think they all are interesting opinions and are worth listening to. I find religion a very mind stimulating topic of discussion, different opinions foster thought. You need some Muslims, Jews, atheists, first Nations, to make this discussion more interesting. I guess you could call me a seeker, the only conclusion I have come to after speaking to people of different religions is that there is a difference between spirituality and religion.
Although most people recognize that there is something greater than themselves religion seems to be a cultural way of describing this feeling. History, power, money,politics all seem to find a way of creeping into this description. As you can tell I am not a fan of religion, but I do think there is something greater than us, beyond that it is speculation. Aw, this was an incredibly good post.
The discouragement of rational, critical thought. Vilification of homosexuality, resulting in discrimination, parents disowning their children, murder, and suicide. Women treated like second-class citizens based on religious teachings. Tens of thousands tortured and killed as witches a practice which still continues today. People dying because they believe their faith makes them immune to snake venom, or other lethal aspects of reality. People dying — and letting their children die — because their religion forbids accepting medical help.
People choked, starved, poisoned, or beaten to death during exorcisms. Genital mutilation of babies endorsed by religious texts. Psychological and physiological conditions blamed on demons, preventing believers from seeking medical care for themselves and their children. People disowning family members for leaving their religion.
Friendships and romances severed or never started over religious differences. Women having septic abortions—or being forced to have unwanted children they resent—because religious organizations have gotten laws passed making abortion illegal or inaccessible.
Censorship often destructive of speech, art, books, music, films, poetry, songs and, if possible, thought. The demonization of other religions, e. Children spending the period of their lives when the brain is most receptive to learning new information reading, rereading, and even memorizing religious texts. People who believe the world is about to end neglect their education, are not financially responsible, and in extreme cases take part in mass suicides.
Wives told they will be tortured forever if they leave their abusive husbands and vice versa. Holy wars — followers of different faiths or even the same faith killing each other in the name of their benevolent, loving and merciful gods. Slavery condoned by religious texts. School boards having to spend time and money and resources on the fight to have evolution taught in the schools. Blue laws forcing other businesses to stay closed or limit sales, while churches can generate more revenue.
Abuse of power, authority and trust by religious leaders for financial gain or sexual abuse of followers and even children. People accepting visual and auditory hallucinations unquestioningly as divine, sometimes with fatal results. Discrimination against atheists, such as laws stating they may not hold public office or testify in court, or in half a dozen countries around the world, laws requiring their execution What have I done wrong? Human achievements—from skillful surgery to to emergency landings—attributed to gods instead of to the people actually responsible.
Mother Teresa, prolonging the agony of terminal patients and denying them pain relief, so she can offer their suffering as a gift to her god.
Standard Index of Short Stories,
Tens of billions annually in the US alone spent to build, maintain, and staff houses of worship. Grief and horror caused by the belief that dead friends and family members are tortured as punishment for disbelief. At the core of this issue is that there have come to all of us in very strong proclamations that God is on His Way. Over and over in these scriptures of the Torah and the New Testament one God with specific names has declared that He created the Universe and all life.
No other religion has any such comparable story or claim. No other religion claims such deity or power or authority. This is the horrible truth that will arrive for too many people: Within 10 minutes of that prayer, asking Jesus, Yeshua, to save me.. You do not have to give up ten-thousand pleasures and cherished beliefs and dogmas ahead of time.
Or to allow the possibility for this being we call God to prove Himself to you? And if you choose to allow Him to Prove Himself to you then you cannot dictate the terms. You have only one path to find out the Truth. I do love how you can accuse me of being arrogant and at the same time claim that there is no other religion as perfect as the one you believe in. God is on his way to clean up this mess and pluck up the Christians in to the heavens and let the billions of people who have been raised with other beliefs to suffer. Religion preys on fear, fear of loss.
What if I am forever gone from existence? If questioning mans ability to come up with explanations for his existence is arrogant then I am proudly arrogant! You want to talk about being honest, I honestly believe we have pulled explanations for our existence out of thin air ever since we could form words. You seem to want to call me something, an atheist so you can cast stones at your enemy. I am not an atheist, I am not a evolutionist, I do know one thing, I have no faith in religion for truthful answers to our existence.
Perry, I am curious, what kind of relationship does your family have with your brother? Can you put aside your spiritual beliefs for the sake of a relationship? One of the things I had to do when Bryan made his change of direction was I had to become comfortable in my own skin with people who believe very different from me. Sometimes we can have VERY productive conversations with people we greatly disagree with. My family is fine, we are all a bunch of lovable, crazy heathens. I just returned from Israel, no one gets along there.
Even people of the same faith are divided by their depth of belief. I just have to shake my head sometimes and wonder if there will ever be a solution. Also why would God leave his commandment for one race of people only and leave the rest of the world out? I asked you in an earlier post of God had written the Bible , and your answer was no.
I asked you if God had written the 10 commandments and your answer was yes. Since man has written the Bible do you not think that men are flawed, and it is possible the can make errors? The proof for the the 10 commandments being fingered by God comes from a book that God did not write.
Do you not think any of the writers could be under the influence of any other powers other than God? Forces like fear, money, fame, prejudice, revenge, family….. You cannot possibly believe that all of the writers were perfect humans who could not be shaped by external forces, can you? I am puzzled by this.. That, and the miracles and the prophecies.
The writers were NOT perfect humans. That is the whole point. The second part of my question is if God did write the 10 commandments why did he pick favourites and only give his rules to one race? He never felt the need? There were no planes, no mail, no internet, God had to know his commandments would never reach these other cultures. I am asking if God was a racist? I am asking why he picked favourites, does this question ever cross your mind? I am also wonder why God presented his commandments in a format that was the norm for the era, tablet, in the language and writing of the culture it appeared in?
If God wanted his message to reach the world why not deliver it in a universal form that would leave no questions as to where it originated from. I find it very puzzling that this is not something that would cause you or any one to at least ponder these questions. He entered a house and did not want anyone to know it; yet he could not keep his presence secret.
She begged Jesus to drive the demon out of her daughter. If you agree the writers of the Bible were influenced by other forces, do you agree the Bible is a book of fiction or do you quote it as fact? I wonder why you spend so much time reading and quoting a book that has to contain lies. Who can possibly pick the truth out of the Bible? If you want to have a serious discussion, leave your insulting attitude at the door. Here is the problem I have with your concept of God. Then sit with your arms folded pouting like a child when the rest of the world does not come beating your door down.
Why would China call his name? Why would first Nations in North America call his name? They had no concept of him, nor could they and he would have to know that if he was God. I can only come to two conclusions, God picked favorites or this was what man thought of God 2 thousand years ago. I am not arguing that there is no greater power, I am just arguing that this is a very poor interpretation of that power. I see that in every way you are very religious.
So you are ignorant of the very thing you worship—and this is what I am going to proclaim to you. Rather, he himself gives everyone life and breath and everything else. He has given proof of this to everyone by raising him from the dead. Among them was Dionysius, a member of the Areopagus, also a woman named Damaris, and a number of others. A day may come when humans can create a new race with the use of nanobots and DNA.
Lets just say that one day the create an intelligent being that can survive in the atmosphere of Mars. We send them there without letting them know about us, letting them evolve and adapt. Who is their creator, the one person in the lab that designed them? The team that worked in the lab? The entire human race? Will they have a soul?
When they die what will happen to them? Do we become God? Perry, I do want an answer, sorry for asking the question so poorly. When someone quotes me the bible it is important to know what their reference point is. Ken Ham he would quote the Bible as if it were the word of God. Others only quote the Bible like a reference to Shakespeare and then there people that believe some parts of the bible are stories and some parts are reference to historical events.
You were leading a round table, slowly people left as you spoke at a higher level then most could grasp. I was the only person left and I listened to every word you said. I understood clearly what you were talking about. I took what you told me back home with me and used it, I still use it to help other with their adwords accounts, I have respect for your knowledge.
When I ask a question that requires deep thought I get disappointed when you point to the Bible, I want to know what Perry thinks, what does your gut tell you. I hope that being Christian does not restrict you from thinking about our existence outside of the context of the Bible. Thinking about God and asking very tough questions without fear. I end up reading almost every day, irrespective of whether I am able to write something or not. Here are ten that I enjoyed the most, in random order:. Alice Munro is one of my favourites, and I loved this one about a grieving woman who goes to an institution to meet her husband.
Doree had to take three buses—one to Kincardine, where she waited for one to London, where she waited again, for the city bus out to the facility. She started the trip on a Sunday at nine in the morning. Because of the waiting times between buses, it took her until about two in the afternoon to travel the hundred-odd miles. All that sitting, either on buses or in the depots, was not a thing she should have minded.
Her daily work was not of the sitting-down kind. She was a chambermaid at the Comfort Inn. She scrubbed bathrooms and stripped and made beds and vacuumed rugs and wiped mirrors. She liked the work—it occupied her thoughts to a certain extent and tired her out so that she could sleep at night. She was seldom faced with a really bad mess, though some of the women she worked with could tell stories to make your hair curl. These women were older than her, and they all thought that she should try to work her way up. They told her that she should get trained for a job behind the desk, while she was still young and decent-looking.
But she was content to do what she did. Translated from Korean by Deborah Smith. How could I have failed to notice such deep bruises on the body of the only person I lived with? Then I told her to take off all her clothes. A red flush appeared along the line of her cheekbones, which her weight loss had left indecently sharp. She tried to remonstrate with me. I was over the moon when Kazuo Ishiguro won the Nobel Prize for literature in I love his books, especially The Remains of the Day and The Unconsoled , and this short story appeared in his short-story collection Nocturnes.
Back home, back in the communist days, it had been really hard to get records like that, but my mother had pretty much his whole collection. Once when I was a boy, I scratched one of those precious records. So I was playing this game jumping from our little sofa to the armchair, and one time I misjudged it and hit the record player. The needle went across the record with a zip—this was long before CDs—and my mother came in from the kitchen and began shouting at me.
And I knew that this one too would now have those popping noises going through it while he crooned those American songs. Years later, when I was working in Warsaw and I got to know about black-market records, I gave my mother replacements of all her worn-out Tony Gardner albums, including that one I scratched.
A story about a young man and a young woman who take part in proxy marriages for soldiers posted abroad. I wonder why it has not been filmed. William had no girlfriends in high school, and his mother once sat him down at the table in her spotless kitchen and asked if he was gay. She said it would be fine with her. She loved him unconditionally, and they would figure out a way to tell his father. He was just absurdly, painfully in love with Bridey Taylor, who leaned on the piano and sang while he played, and he had no way of telling her.
He was too shy to pursue other girls, even when the payoff seemed either likely or worth the agony. It was too humiliating. He just stammered an unconvincing denial. Pachinko is one the best-received books of and I need to buy it as soon as possible. The morning Henry Evans stopped by my office to tell me to go to Chicago, I was in the middle of my chapter-a-day habit: I did this at work because it was where I lived—fourteen hours a day, often six days a week.
Lovely title and a lovely short story. It just worked its way up and overwhelmed me. If you intend to read just one story from this list, then I suggest please make it this one.