Posted on 05/01/2011 7:24:18 AM PDT by Ethan Clive Osgoode
Precisely!
Besides, the truth is not a popularity contest. If the growth of superstition is validation of its “truth” then what do these geniuses have to say about Islam’s growth? Or for that matter, that of the Mormons? The latter superstition developed and grew in an age of reliable documentation, barely a century ago, not 2000+ years into antiquity!
Wow...just wow! You really have it bad along with others who attempt to destroy Christianity and belief in God.
I’ve seen this face before....and it is really nothing new at all. Who says one can’t believe without seeing? Words reflect a man quite remarkably,... and that the stuff he’s made of.
Post #3008 "He doesn't care about Bachmann anymore than he despises Palin. He's not a conservative because he's an agnostic/atheist, simple as that
This is called mind reading and it qualifies as ad hominem.
It also makes the post about the a FReeper, which is also considered an ad hominem. Just in case you missed it, and in case you plan on lecturing me more about proper behavior and ethics rules.
If it comes from "Christians" like this guy...
LOL, Silly hypocrite is blind to his own hypocrisy, just like the rest of the bunch.
Your opinion based upon - you opinion - and your empirical evidence is?????? You have no empirical evidence goml. Epic fail.
History records Jesus Christ - that he was a miracle worker, taught a new way of knowing God and that he was killed under Pilate. Historians, other religious teachers and others have noted that Jesus' moral teachings were astounding. History records that his followers promulgated his teachings throughout Europe and Asia within the first two centuries. During that period those believers were persecuted and killed for their beliefs. They refused to denounce that belief. History also records that he was considered God and worshiped.
Jesus' opponents have developed mythology to denounce and attack the historical message of his followers. By doing so, they validate what message was, because were it false, they wouldn't have given it second thought.
Now that your delusions of deity have passed (since you can't have absolute truth on the point unless you knew it all). You have one flaw - you acknowledge the existence of God. Now provide empirical evidence to support your bleat - your unsubstantiated opinions are worthless.
But, being a liberal troll would explain your style and your purpose here: to make Republicans appear as foulmoughted, intolerant, low-lives as they can be. Only a troll would wish the world would see the Conservative Republicans in the likes of you.
So, for the lurkers, disregard A's potty talk. He is here as a troll, to sabotage this Conservative forum, to give Republicans and conservatives a bad image in hopes that you will be turned off and go to the side that sent him here.
This "Agamemnon" "Tea Parier" here is like the name suggests, a myth, a fake, who is working for Obama and his election team, with a mission to smear the Conseratvie name and the Republican image.
I know all of this because this is what God told me. He tells me you follow an illusion. Prove me wrong. You can't.
You don't understand that a claim required proof. Doubt doesn't.
So many people ask how there can be a God when there's so much evil in the world, as if evil disproves the existence of God
That may be their argument but not mine, metmom.
Obviously you think "complexity" proves that God exists. That's about on the same level as those who say evil proves he doesn't.
Is that what you desire as well? A will to find out? Sincerely? There is a dilemma then, because when one finds out that what is required is faith - as in without it God says it is impossible to please him - then where are you? At some point we all must come to terms with the unknown or the unknowable and decide if what CAN be known is enough. As for dear Bertrand, the mystery is now solved but had he continued in his unbelief - because I can't know his heart - he was too late to respond correctly and for all eternity he will know unending regret and despair. It is NOT too late for you.
Short attention span. It's like pimples, eventually you outgrow it...
"What is wanted is not the will to believe, but the will to find out, which is the exact opposite."-- Bertrand Russell, Skeptical Essays (1928)
Seems to me that is an unwarranted conclusion.
Historically, Christ wasn't "there yet." That is, as an historical personality Who people of the time could recognize as such and relate to, in human terms. But that doesn't "prove" anything about whether or not Christ — fully God and fully Man — "existed" from the Beginning. Nor does anything you know disprove this either.
But I can be persuaded otherwise, provided you can adduce persuasive — note I do not say "certain" — evidence. That means you can't get away with providing a laundry list of ill-sorted, ill-qualified evidence. You have to do the work to conjure "sense" out of the evidence. And then find the language to express it, in a manner intelligible to others.
Contra your view, my understanding is that Christ is the Word of the Beginning, and Final Judge of the End. He is Son of God, Alpha and Omega. He is the foundation of Truth, from first to last — and all the "in-between." He is First and Final Cause — and Implicit Cause of all that evolves in between them.
I have to get off now: Hubby needs to communicate.
I'll be back soon.
1 - an agreed upon fact - the tomb was empty. But then were the disciples in any shape to 'steal' the body. No, they were hiding in fear of their lives. Would they willingly die for a testimony that Jesus had supernaturally risen? Hardly kosta because they knew it was a lie.
There was no motive for Jesus' enemies to remove the body. When the teaching of the resurrection began - they could have easily provided the body and killed the new church there and then.
2 - Yet eyewitness testimony cannot be written off so easily kosta - it is considered reliable in our courts today. But it doesn't stop there for you kosta, this same Jesus was observed and spoke to these disciples on numerous occasions and up to as many as 500 at one time. So the eyewitness testimony of the empty tomb must also be matched up with other events.
This is how myths and legends are created, G. In less than a century it can become a dogma.
I don't accept fatima as an actual event - it was most likely a group hysteria imho. But you are correct - 100 years for the development of a myth to dogma. But in the case of the NT kosta - even you know that 1 Corinthians is believed to have been written 50-60 AD, making it less than 30 years after Jesus. It refers extensively to living witnesses. A parallel would be if someone constructing the idea in the 1990's that Kennedy never really died after the Dallas shooting, but the whole thing had been faked by Hollywood. Too many eyewitnesses still living that could contradict it. Myths can't develop into dogma in that short of time under those conditions kosta.
As for "nothing else explains the phenomena of the Church", G, it was Emperor Constantine, not Jesus and not Paul, who is responsible for the phenomenon of the Church.
Old whipping horse time eh kosta. The phenomena of the church predates constantine kosta. Its first century expansion and development in the face of persecution and its maintenance throughout the second century persecutions and external attempts to co-opt and corrupt it. The Church would have continued to exist inspite of constantine.
The number of Christians, contrary to popular opinions, appear not to have been really very high before that.
And that is the phenomena kosta - it grew and prospered in-spite of that.
Again, neither of us are eyewitnesses, nor do we have any definitive evidence one way or another that God exists.
The definitive evidences have been cited - you choose to ignore or try to explain them away.
Especially considering this from a post of yours:
I'm not an atheist or an agnostic (I'm an Orthodox Christian) and I have to agree with my agnostic friend, kosta here. Vanders9 has offered up zero proof of any God, and without this proof, his preaching is not effectual.
I was once an atheist, and no amount of preaching without proof could have brought me to my faith. It has nothing to do with an agnostic or even an atheist having a closed mind. It has everything to do with the “preacher” not having a valid argument.
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/religion/2724676/posts?page=78#78
So at some point you had proof, and that proof lead you to Jesus Christ and the beauty of the Orthodox faith.
So did you prove yourself wrong?
Sorry, but what you said makes no sense at all. Are you trying to say that we have to live with uncertainty? That is very true, but it is very different from not knowing.
That's irrelevant, bb. It's the statement "without doubt (my deity) exists" that is questionable. If you told ancient Greeks that their God will be replaced, they would have probably chased you from their forum (the real one, not virtual!). Two thousand years from now, some believers may say the same thing about Christ that you said about Zeus "I don't thin many people say that nowadays...our God didn't exits then."
To us, a Christiain God is all we know, just as the Egyptians knew only their gods for just as long, and probably would told you their gods are eternal. But that's a false sense of reality. My older daughter is often amazed when we talk about the 60's and 70's. That's the kind of reality she can't relate to. Think 2,000 years from today.
Again, I will not, because I cannot, "prove that God exists." To subject Him to a "proof" is to misunderstand Who He Is a priori. Such a proof would then be worthless.
Proving that God exists wold not be worthless, bb! It would be the greatest discovery known to mankind.
I would say "Thank you very much. What took you so long? You were dragging it like Obama dragged his birth certificate..."
Even Thomas doubted.
cyc, I never said I believe God doesn't exist. I am an agnostic, neither affirming nor denying God's existence. That's why I said "prove it."
The rest is you pathetic spin.
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