1818 replies to this topic

[shadowhawk]

How is cosmology "evidence for Christianity"?

Christianity directly deals with cosmology. I will touch on it soon.

[platypus]

How is cosmology "evidence for Christianity"?

Christianity directly deals with cosmology. I will touch on it soon.

All religions deal with cosmology and creation as far as I can tell. Christianity got the origin of species and the great flood spectacularly wrong. The series of ice-ages in the last few hundred thousand years were not even mentioned. There seems to be no "divine" information in the bible, i.e. god-given facts that were unknown to people at that time but were later ascertained by scientific discovery.

Edited by platypus, 21 March 2014 - 07:27 AM.

[shadowhawk]

How is cosmology "evidence for Christianity"?

Christianity directly deals with cosmology. I will touch on it soon.

All religions deal with cosmology and creation as far as I can tell. Christianity got the origin of species and the great flood spectacularly wrong. The series of ice-ages in the last few hundred thousand years were not even mentioned. There seems to be no "divine" information in the bible, i.e. god-given facts that were unknown to people at that time but were later ascertained by scientific discovery.

All religions do deal with cosmology. That is my point. We are asking which ones fit the Big Bang, the dominant cosmology currently held. We can later discuss the flood and Adam and Eve but right now it is a derailment. I hope you are paying attention to what is actually being discussed.

[shadowhawk]

ATHEISM SHOULD BE INCLUDED IN “WHICH ONE”

We started off this section on “Which One” discussing the TAO.

1. The TAO is the law written on the human heart. http://www.longecity...600#entry648070
Atheists, and Theists agree, insist they can be moral and ethical. We discussed this at length. Some Atheists disagree http://www.longecity...510#entry648887 feeling Atheists have no basis for morality. There is no TAO. http://www.longecity...510#entry649141 Raw evolution is the basis for morality.

If Atheists have morality written on the heart so they act like the rest of us, then where does it come from? Many Atheists are moral (In a sense, like theists) and have evidence of the TAO.

2. ALL ROADS LEAD TO THE SAME PLACE. http://www.longecity...600#entry649126 In the Atheists case, all die because we are only physical and it leads to the worm. However, religions say the body is but one part of us and though it dies, the spirit is of a non physical nature and does not go to the worm. So all roads do not lead to the same place.

3. THE ELEPHANT AND BLIND MEN. http://www.longecity...600#entry649366
http://www.longecity...600#entry649451
For the Atheist there is no elephant. Nobody sees or feels anything. Only they can see exclusively there is nothing. Evidence of nothing for the Atheist, nothing. Do elephants exist? Truly blind men see nothing.

4. LIGHT http://www.longecity...600#entry649600
http://www.longecity...630#entry649626
Cold does not exist, it is the lack of heat. Blackness is not a color but a lack of light. Silence is not a sound but a lack of sound. Weightless is not a weight but a lack of weight. Stillness is not a speed but a lack of speed. All of these and many more are negatives. Atheists say there is no light in the allegory, only black. And they go to great lengths saying that you can’t prove a negative. http://www.longecity...570#entry650668
But you can prove negatives, we do it all the time. Light won’t work for the Atheist position.
5. THE BIG BANG.
http://www.longecity...630#entry650626
I spent the first section arguing for the Existence of God and much of it was based on arguments from nature. http://www.longecity...600#entry647448
As an example the KALAM evidence is based not only on philosophy but nature and the fact everything we know of came into existence at the Big Bang. The Father of the Big Bang cosmology was a Christian and it fit his religious cosmology as well as His practice of science.
http://www.longecity...630#entry650399
http://www.longecity...630#entry650621

The view of the Big Bang is getting stronger with the recent discovery of gravitational waves of the Big Bang itself. It is the dominant scientific view.
http://www.longecity...630#entry650685 http://www.longecity...630#entry650381

If you want to argue the Big Bang be sure to read the discussions so far, no use repeating them.

Atheism does not fit well with the above evidence and discussion. WHICH ONE? It is not atheism.
.

[theconomist]

You know this is very interesting, I've been seriously reading your posts for a few days now and there's a lot of interesting material to think about.
I would like to ask you a question tho which I might have missed: how did you go from denying atheism (which is philosophically very justifiable) to the veracity of christianity?
Again I'm not being sarcastic or anything, I'm very interested in your answer.

[shadowhawk]

You know this is very interesting, I've been seriously reading your posts for a few days now and there's a lot of interesting material to think about.
I would like to ask you a question tho which I might have missed: how did you go from denying atheism (which is philosophically very justifiable) to the veracity of christianity?
Again I'm not being sarcastic or anything, I'm very interested in your answer.

My parents were Atheists, hard core. My Grand father was a hard core Atheist as well. So, my family was very hostile to religion. When I was about eight years old I started thinking about god, largely because there was a wonderful little stream running behind my home full of all kinds of wildlife. Fantastic, I could explore to my hearts content.

I was an avid reader and I read the book, The Last of The Mohicans, by James Fenimore Cooper. As I wondered the world of the small stream, thinking of Indians I thought of the clan the Mohicans belonged to, the Turtle clan.



My little stream had Turtles in it! So I started catching turtles and put them in a special pond in the creek. During the summer I would sleep outside, close to the creek and look up inti the star filled sky and wonder and wonder. Thinking about turtles I asked my parents about God. Is the turtle, God and how did the sky get there? My parents freaked out! Our son is becoming a religious fanatic. Maybe he is mentally ill! So, at eight I got the cure. If there is a god, who made god? Can God make a rock he cannot lift? Why evil? Don’t you like girls? ... On and on it went.

I ended up not liking Theists. They were not rational or logical. They were dumb. They didn’t think. There were rules I did not like and they were old. What about sex?

So I grew up an Atheist. When I finished high school, I went into the military. I was the battalion party animal and over time went through a moral crisis. Why be moral? There was no reason for anything. If it can walk, can I have sex with it? Why?

I got put in a cubical with the only recognizable Christian in the battalion. So I started to work on him. I convinced him I would teach him to argue with atheists, if only he would argue with me. He agreed. After a couple of months he told me he could no longer believe in God because of our talks.

I felt like I had taken away a lollipop from a baby. It bothered me that I who believed in nothing, had broken the faith of this simple Christian. So, one evening as I road in the back of a bus going to the girls club in Providence Rhode Island, I again started thinking about God. It was raining very hard and the water made patterns on the window as we passed the lights. I decided to say a prayer, me an Atheist. So I did.

“God, if there is a God, and if there is, I don’t know how to believe in you...I have no faith. Perhaps only a very little, like a grain of sand, I put it in you. Help my unbelief.”

Nothing in my life has ever been the same. God meet me there.

A month later I told the Christian I had argued with, I had become a Christian. He re-concerted. Over 200 men in our battalion became Christians. My parents after a long struggle, became Christians. My brothers became Christians and I could go on and on.

It has been far from easy. Atheists now call me names! Sometimes even Christians do. I discovered my feet are made of clay and I am far from perfect. but I have meet and know God. I love Him because He first loved me.

Edited by shadowhawk, 22 March 2014 - 11:54 PM.

[shadowhawk]

From CRI
DOES THE BIG BANG FIT CHRISTIANITY???
The Big Bang postulates that billions of years ago the universe began as an infinitely dense point called a singularity and has been expanding ever since. Though the Big Bang is not taught in the Bible, the theory does lend scientific support to the scriptural teaching that God created the universe ex nihilo (out of nothing).
First, like the Bible, the Big Bang postulates that the universe had a beginning. As such, it stands in stark opposition to the scientifically silly suggestion that the universe eternally existed, not to the biblical account of origins.
Furthermore, if the universe had a beginning, it had to have a cause. Indeed, according to empirical science, whatever begins to exist must have a cause equal to or greater than itself. Thus, the Big Bang flies in the face of the philosophically preposterous proposition that the universe sprang from nothing apart from an uncaused First Cause.
Finally, though evolutionists hold to Big Bang cosmology, the Big Bang itself does not entail biological evolution. In other words, the Big Bang theory answers questions concerning the origin of the space–time universe, as opposed to questions concerning the origin of biological life on earth.
While we must not stake our faith on Big Bang cosmology, we can be absolutely confident that as human understanding of the universe progresses it will ultimately point to the One who spoke before the universe lept into existence.
For further study, see Paul Copan and William Lane Craig, Creation out of Nothing: A Biblical, Philosophical, and Scientific Exploration (Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2004): 17–19; see also J. P. Moreland, Scaling the Secular City:A Defense of Christianity (Grand Rapids: Baker Book House, 1987): 33–34, and Lee Strobel, The Case for a Creator (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 2004), especially chapter 5.

“The heavens declare the glory of God; the skies proclaim the work of his hands.”
Psalm 19:1

[Stella]

Nothing in my life has ever been the same. God meet me there.

As much as I hesitate to get involved in this kind of thing, I'm quite curious to know what it is that god did to you to convince you so thoroughly in that one instant.

[shadowhawk]

Nothing in my life has ever been the same. God meet me there.

As much as I hesitate to get involved in this kind of thing, I'm quite curious to know what it is that god did to you to convince you so thoroughly in that one instant.

I am married and I can easily remember the first time I saw my wife. At first I just felt she was just another woman like many other women I knew. We became friends and started spending time together. I liked her a lot but still didn’t see her as someone I would Marry. One day she asked me if I would be interested in taking our relationship farther. She first approached me and after thinking it over I said yes.

I didn’t know her and I knew little of her life story. She was and still is a mystery to me. Without faith I would never come to know the most wonderful person in the world. I said yes, by faith, and after a year of courtship, we were married.

What did God do for me? God loved me so much that He sought me and came into my world. He died for me, that I might live. He brought me life, light, joy and peace to name but a few ways He changed me and drew me close.

[shadowhawk]

THE BICEP COLLABORATION
http://www.longecity...630#entry650381

W.L.Craig on the BICEP.
“The recent news from the BICEP collaboration is reminiscent of the news last year concerning the discovery of the Higgs boson: the evidence confirmed what almost everyone already believed. The story is once again a wonderful illustration of the experimentalists’ discovering what the theorists had hypothesized. So there’s nothing revolutionary about this discovery (which is not to diminish in any way its significance!).

But once again, that hasn’t stopped some people from making irresponsible assertions. For example, I saw Lawrence Krauss respond to the discovery by repeating his tired, oft-refuted assertion that it shows how the universe could have come naturally into existence out of “nothing.” Never mind that the universe already existed prior to inflation! As we all know, Krauss is using the word “nothing” to refer to a physical state of the early universe out of which the universe evolved.

Read more: http://www.reasonabl...n#ixzz2wuQfJSwP

(I) Theology has no reason to deny that God may have created a wider reality than just our universe.

(ii) Inflationary models may be future-eternal (they will go on forever), but they cannot be past eternal (the multiverse itself had a beginning). Attempts to make the multiverse past-eternal (like Sean Carroll’s model) fail for a variety of reasons.

(iii) Multiverse scenarios face the troublesome Boltzmann brain problem. A finely-tuned universe like ours is incomprehensibly improbable on naturalism. The more you multiply worlds within the multiverse in order to make it likely that observers will appear somewhere in the multiverse of worlds, the more probable it becomes that we should be Boltzmann brains, isolated brains which have fluctuated into existence out of the quantum vacuum. For observable worlds like that are vastly more plenteous than worlds which are fine-tuned for embodied conscious agents. So if we were just random members of a multiverse of worlds, we ought to have observations like that. But we don’t; which disconfirms the multiverse hypothesis.

These points were all discussed in the recent Greer-Heard Forum on “The Existence of God in Light of Contemporary Cosmology.”“

Read more: http://www.reasonabl...n#ixzz2wuQCW6Wb

[Stella]

What did God do for me? God loved me so much that He sought me and came into my world.

Yes, yes, I'm familiar with the story of jesus christ, but the meat of my question is not how he came into THE world, but how he came into YOUR world. Of course, if the question is too personal you may decline to answer, but I know of jesus, what I don't know of is you, and your story. That, here, is what interests me the most.

[shadowhawk]

What did God do for me? God loved me so much that He sought me and came into my world.

Yes, yes, I'm familiar with the story of jesus christ, but the meat of my question is not how he came into THE world, but how he came into YOUR world. Of course, if the question is too personal you may decline to answer, but I know of jesus, what I don't know of is you, and your story. That, here, is what interests me the most.

When I became a Christian I was surprised by joy. Everything changed. Colors were more saturated, like after a rain, when the sum just comes out. I was in love with God and my heart was bursting with wonderment. My heart was excited and warm, I was in a love relationship with God. I didn’t have a clue of what it meant to be a Christian but I was afraid of what my friends would think, especially after the animal I had been. All my friends thought Christians were nuts. At first I could not tell anyone because of fear what they would think.

I thought Christians had to pray at their meals and I thought they got on their knees every night and said a little prayer. I was in a battalion of gnarley men. Well I stopped eating so I would not have to let anyone see me praying. I starved myself half to death. I was too afraid to get down on my knees before I turned in for the night. I didn’t expect God to answer my prayer and when He did, I was I a fix if I did anything about it.

To make a long story short, I started asking grace at my meals and I would pray every night. It created a huge reaction and many became Christians. When I got out of the military I went back to school.

God has been a mystery to me beyond words. How do you put into words your hearts deepest love. There are no words for it.

[shadowhawk]

BICEP 2 AND THE BIG BANG why it is an important part of which one.

https://www.youtube....=em-uploademail

http://www.longecity...630#entry650381
http://www.longecity...660#entry651649

Edited by shadowhawk, 26 March 2014 - 06:37 PM.

[shadowhawk]

WHICH ONE? Hindu creation




https://www.youtube....h?v=Y9yWwFWpbRo

Edited by shadowhawk, 26 March 2014 - 08:36 PM.

[Vardarac]

So if we were just random members of a multiverse of worlds, we ought to have observations like that. But we don’t; which disconfirms the multiverse hypothesis.

How do you know that we aren't a subset of Boltzmann brain observers, provided the other sort of observers proposed can actually exist? This argument is akin to saying that there are trillions of microbes, therefore it is unlikely to the point of impossibility that we should exist - because our state of existence is far more likely to be that of a microbe.

Edited by Vardarac, 26 March 2014 - 09:18 PM.

[shadowhawk]

WHICH ONE. Buddhism



Practically all versions of Buddhism (thousands of them) do not recognize a Creator!! In this aspect, Buddhism is considered a quest for the truth now rather than religions that are faith-based, which also focus on the past and future.. Let go the past, let go the future, and let go what is in between, transcending the things of time. So Buddhist tends to not think about the creation, but simply accepting it as the world is. They are trying to cope with pain and sufferings and hopefully be rid of all bad things Buddhism is more focused on horizontal relationships than vertical relationships with a God.

To ask, why there is something rather than nothing is not a Buddhist question. So since there tends to be no Buddhist view of creation, we can’t use the Big Bang, Creation or evolution to criticize it, unless this lack is the basis of our critique. If it is, then lack of creation becomes a problem.

Edited by shadowhawk, 26 March 2014 - 11:02 PM.

[shadowhawk]

So if we were just random members of a multiverse of worlds, we ought to have observations like that. But we don’t; which disconfirms the multiverse hypothesis.

How do you know that we aren't a subset of Boltzmann brain observers, provided the other sort of observers proposed can actually exist? This argument is akin to saying that there are trillions of microbes, therefore it is unlikely to the point of impossibility that we should exist - because our state of existence is far more likely to be that of a microbe.

Perhaps, but show me your evidence. How do you know? I think you are misstating what I said. Brain theory is not against the Big Bang. This is not a defeater for our topic, nor evidence for Atheism.

[Vardarac]

Perhaps, but show me your evidence. How do you know?

I don't know whether we are the only types of intelligence that exist or not. I do not have evidence for or against this idea.

I'm just pointing out that it's premature to conclude that no multiverses exist on the basis of Boltzmann brain existence/outnumbering, even if that idea is valid. (Odd how closely atheist and theist arguments mirror one another sometimes.)

Maybe I misunderstood your argument, though.

This is not a defeater for our topic, nor evidence for Atheism.

My statement was not intended to be either of those things, it was just to show that it is reasonably valid to disagree with the conclusion you drew.

Edited by Vardarac, 26 March 2014 - 11:42 PM.

[shadowhawk]

Perhaps, but show me your evidence. How do you know?

I don't know whether we are the only types of intelligence that exist or not. I do not have evidence for or against this idea.

I'm just pointing out that it's premature to conclude that no multiverses exist on the basis of Boltzmann brain existence/outnumbering, even if that idea is valid. (Odd how closely atheist and theist arguments mirror one another sometimes.)

Maybe I misunderstood your argument, though.

This is not a defeater for our topic, nor evidence for Atheism.

My statement was not intended to be either of those things, it was just to show that it is reasonably valid to disagree with the conclusion you drew.

What conclusions? What are you talking about? I was comparing the Bib Bang to various views. This was to see which position fit with the current standard view. There are hundreds of views but right now the Big Bang is the main one.

Nor' did I ignore the multi verse. I know you don't listen to videos but you need to follow the discussion.

Edited by shadowhawk, 27 March 2014 - 12:03 AM.

[Vardarac]

What conclusions? What are you talking about? I was comparing the Bib Bang to various views. This was to see which position fit with the current standard view. There are hundreds of views but right now the Big Bang is the main one.

Nor' did I ignore the multi verse. https://www.youtube....=em-uploademail I know you don't listen to videos but you need to follow the discussion.

This one:

(iii) Multiverse scenarios face the troublesome Boltzmann brain problem. A finely-tuned universe like ours is incomprehensibly improbable on naturalism. The more you multiply worlds within the multiverse in order to make it likely that observers will appear somewhere in the multiverse of worlds, the more probable it becomes that we should be Boltzmann brains, isolated brains which have fluctuated into existence out of the quantum vacuum. For observable worlds like that are vastly more plenteous than worlds which are fine-tuned for embodied conscious agents. So if we were just random members of a multiverse of worlds, we ought to have observations like that. But we don’t; which disconfirms the multiverse hypothesis.

Edited by Vardarac, 27 March 2014 - 12:06 AM.

[shadowhawk]

What conclusions? What are you talking about? I was comparing the Bib Bang to various views. This was to see which position fit with the current standard view. There are hundreds of views but right now the Big Bang is the main one.

Nor' did I ignore the multi verse. https://www.youtube....=em-uploademail I know you don't listen to videos but you need to follow the discussion.

This one:

(iii) Multiverse scenarios face the troublesome Boltzmann brain problem. A finely-tuned universe like ours is incomprehensibly improbable on naturalism. The more you multiply worlds within the multiverse in order to make it likely that observers will appear somewhere in the multiverse of worlds, the more probable it becomes that we should be Boltzmann brains, isolated brains which have fluctuated into existence out of the quantum vacuum. For observable worlds like that are vastly more plenteous than worlds which are fine-tuned for embodied conscious agents. So if we were just random members of a multiverse of worlds, we ought to have observations like that. But we don’t; which disconfirms the multiverse hypothesis.

So. I don't hold to the multiverse. Little evidence. Off topic.

[Bogomoletz II]

Is there a text version?

You appear to have confused Christianity, an entire religion, with theism, a mere position, a single premise. I hate it when these two are confused with each other.

[shadowhawk]

Is there a text version?

You appear to have confused Christianity, an entire religion, with theism, a mere position, a single premise. I hate it when these two are confused with each other.

Yes there is a text version rather long to post here.

Christianity is Theistic is it not? No confusion. What do you hate?

To put it simply, theism is a belief in the existence of at least one god. We are comparing various viewpoints with the dominant scientific cosmology (The Big Bang) to determine Which Ones fit. We are looking for a defeater to Determine which God is the most correct one. It is all in the text and you appear to have missed it.

I am sorry that there are more than one religion that are Theists and this has caused you to “hate.” However, this is the case.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Theism
http://www.merriam-w...ctionary/theism
http://dictionary.re...m/browse/theist
http://www.theopedia.com/Theism
http://www.leaderu.c...h/3truth09.html
http://www.amazon.co...e/dp/019824682X

Edited by shadowhawk, 27 March 2014 - 07:42 PM.

[shadowhawk]

WITCH ONE???
The Big Bang cosmology fits Christianity. Judaism, and Islam. All three share Genesis. If you read other creation stories they are from small regions and do not have an absolute beginning out of nothing..
http://www.bigmyth.c..._eng_myths.html
http://dept.cs.willi...yths/myths.html


If you are interested in studying this farther here are some suggestions:
1. China’s Cosmic Egg
2. The Blackfoot’s Colored Language Water
3. Yanomamo Sanema’s Moonblood
4. India: Create, Preserve, Destroy, Repeat
5. The Navajo’s Four Worlds
6. Scandinavia’s Fire Demons And Frost Giants
7. Japan: Chaos And A Very Painful Birth
8. The Aborigines’ Rainbow Serpent
9. Egypt’s Divine Semen
10. The Dogon’s Alien Egg

There are many more. You might want to study Carl Jung http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carl_Jung Archetypes. http://en.wikipedia....gian_archetypes
See also Joseph Campbell on myth as a mirror.

https://www.youtube....pbellfoundation

So there is in a Jungian sense truth in myth but we are looking for creation and to answer the question, why is there something rather than nothing. I am now briefly turning to the Bible to see if its cosmology stands up as evidence.

[DukeNukem]

What did God do for me? God loved me so much that He sought me and came into my world. He died for me, that I might live.

The story of Jesus dying for us is kinda the dumbest thing about Christianity. Think of how many soldiers have died for us, to help keep so many of our nations free in the world. Why is Jesus in any way special? It's just one life.

Also, it's not much of a sacrifice when you get to come back to life a few days later. lol Big fucking whoop! I wouldn't care much about dying either -- even painfully -- if I knew the reward was coming back essentially as a god three days later. Jesus didn't sacrifice himself at all. Hell, practically any of us would have signed on for that deal. His so-called sacrifice for us is the biggest non-sacrifice in the history of human fiction.

BTW, what about all the humans who died before Jesus died for us? For example, all the innocent babies god drowned during his Noah's Flood temper tantrum?

[platypus]

Also I find it odd that Jesus/Jahve had to sacrifice himself in order to save humanity from himself. After all, God invented sin and decided that it is such a terribly bad thing that he just has to torture people forever, just because he wants to.

[Bogomoletz II]

Christianity is Theistic is it not? No confusion. What do you hate?

Right, but people tend to speak of atheism as though it's the opposite of Christianity, even though almost everyone knows that's not the case. Christianity is a complex system of beliefs, values, symbols, works and pratices with its own history, communities and even governing bodies (ecclesiastical polities), whereas negative atheism, positive atheism and theism are each a mere position based entirely on a single proposition. The "-ism" suffix notwithstanding, it's not an ideology.

There are some atheists who partake in Christian rituals, follow Christian ethics, read Christian scripture, enjoy Christian art, think of the world in Christian terms, hang out mostly with Christians and go as far as to call themselves Christians. Even Richard Dawkings calls himself a "cultural Christian."

[shadowhawk]

DukeNukem: The story of Jesus dying for us is kinda the dumbest thing about Christianity. Think of how many soldiers have died for us, to help keep so many of our nations free in the world. Why is Jesus in any way special? It's just one life.

Also, it's not much of a sacrifice when you get to come back to life a few days later. lol Big fucking whoop! I wouldn't care much about dying either -- even painfully -- if I knew the reward was coming back essentially as a god three days later. Jesus didn't sacrifice himself at all. Hell, practically any of us would have signed on for that deal. His so-called sacrifice for us is the biggest non-sacrifice in the history of human fiction.

I was asked for and was talking about my personal experience. You can’t deny it. http://www.longecity...660#entry651230
http://www.longecity...660#entry651638

It may be dumb for you but it is what happened to me and by the way is personal evidence for Christianity. It changes people. We will discuss more conversion evidence also later. Being in the military I know solders can die for others. I would have done it myself had it been asked of me. It would have been a huge act of love. As you say, ‘Big fucking whoop!” But for me it would have been, whether you get it or not.

Difference, I am not God. You seem to believe he came back to life so it was no big deal. You would have done it! However, you can’t do big deals! When you die you will stay in the grave with the worm and it will be a big whoop deal.

I also believe Christ came back to life and it was a very big deal. We will discuss the resurrection later after, “WHICH ONE. “

[shadowhawk]

Christianity is Theistic is it not? No confusion. What do you hate?

Right, but people tend to speak of atheism as though it's the opposite of Christianity, even though almost everyone knows that's not the case. Christianity is a complex system of beliefs, values, symbols, works and pratices with its own history, communities and even governing bodies (ecclesiastical polities), whereas negative atheism, positive atheism and theism are each a mere position based entirely on a single proposition. The "-ism" suffix notwithstanding, it's not an ideology.

There are some atheists who partake in Christian rituals, follow Christian ethics, read Christian scripture, enjoy Christian art, think of the world in Christian terms, hang out mostly with Christians and go as far as to call themselves Christians. Even Richard Dawkings calls himself a "cultural Christian."
https://www.youtube....h?v=5_o997pxc1U

This is off topic. Atheism is a complex system of beliefs, values, works and has its own history, comminutes and societies. It is an ideology. https://www.google.com/#q=Ideology

This is also a red herring.
Red Herring
A Red Herring is a fallacy in which an irrelevant topic is presented in order to divert attention from the original issue. The basic idea is to "win" an argument by leading attention away from the argument and to another topic. This sort of "reasoning" has the following form:
Topic A is under discussion.
Topic B is introduced under the guise of being relevant to topic A (when topic B is actually not relevant to topic A).
Topic A is abandoned.
This sort of "reasoning" is fallacious because merely changing the topic of discussion hardly counts as an argument against a claim.
http://www.nizkor.or...ed-herring.html

Edited by shadowhawk, 28 March 2014 - 07:33 PM.

[shadowhawk]

Also I find it odd that Jesus/Jahve had to sacrifice himself in order to save humanity from himself. After all, God invented sin and decided that it is such a terribly bad thing that he just has to torture people forever, just because he wants to.

God did not invent sin. He invented choice. Hell is where you are alone because of your choice. You do not want to be with God, do you. Bad God as you say. OK. After death, You have only yourself to sin against at the same time knowing there is a God. That is torture.

Evil is the lack of the good, and like cold does not exist of its own. Hell is where you do not experience the presence of God because you don’t want to. Relax, no one is saying you have to be a Christian.

God does not want you to be separated from Him but you...?