Posted on 12/28/2009 11:26:45 AM PST by urroner
For the sake of a discussion, let's assume that I am a brand new neighbor of yours. We have only met each other in passing. You play the part of the Christian and I will play the part of the agnostic. (BTW, none of the below is true about me. Upfront, I am Mormon, but I have tried to get into this discussion on this forum for some time, but haven't been able to do so.)
(I also realize that there are some of you who are more than eager to post anti-Mormon material on this thread and I request that you don't do so. I don't even want Mormonism mentioned in this thread beyond this point.)
Let's assume that I'm out trimming the hedges between your house and mine and that you are working in a garden close to the hedges.
My wife and three kids, ages 3, 8, and 13, are all out with me. My wife keeps telling me I need to paint the house before it gets colder, my younger children are throwing little rocks at me to get my attention and laughing and giggling, and the oldest is pestering me about buying her a cellphone and about the promise I made a year ago about letting her pierce her ears for earrings.
In a calm moment, my wife and I get into a neighborly chat, well would be my wife, I'm a science/math teacher at the local community college and it's very hard for me to just sit down and chitchat and you tell us you are Christian.
My wife tells you she is a Christian also, but doesn't go to any denomination and hasn't been to church in several years, since marrying me, but that I am always peppering her with questions that she doesn't know the answers to. She says that one of the reasons she has stopped going to church is because she likes to spend Sundays with me since we don't get a lot of lone time together. I spend a lot of time helping students at the college and when I'm home, I have to spend a lot of time with the kids. We do have a date night every week, but that's just not enough.
She also says that she is also tired of seeing so much hypocrisy among the church members and the preacher is always asking for money, that she had decided to stop going. She says that her preacher, when she was little, told her she was saved as did her parents, so her salvation was guaranteed.
You see me roll my eyes when my wife says that.
I tell you that I really don't go to any denomination, but I have read the Bible, the Koran, the Tao Te Ching, the Gleanings from the Writings of Baha'u'llah, some of the writings of Marx, and some New Age books. I tell you that I don't know what the right way is or even if there is a right way?
I tell you that I tend toward Uniterianism, but Buddhism has some attraction to me also, but it's a little too esoteric for me. I tell you that I also have some problems with life after death, reincarnation, or any supernatural miracles.
I tell you my parents were Catholics before they died, but they died when I was very young and I have been to church only a couple of times since their funeral, but the people who adopted me were strong agnostics and never directed me to follow any particular path. I'm thinking about going back to the RCC, but haven't made any decision yet.
You realize that I am fairly knowledgeable of the Bible when it comes to knowing where what is, but you realize that I don't interpret them at all as you do. In fact, I have a very shallow understanding of them. I think the Bible is good literature and can help a person do a lot of good in this life, but I don't know anything about being saved and what that means.
I ask you what you believe and how I can find the happiness and joy you have in your life.
What are you going to say or do?
“An agnostic isn’t simply somebody who rejects everything unless there is solid proof.”
But that is not what I said. I said specifically, “unwilling to accept,” not “reject.” If you do not understand the difference, your little search for truth is a waste of time. First go learn a little logic—and English.
Think it through. Don’t just repeat what you’ve been taught. That’s exactly what an agnostic is, someone who says, “I don’t know, (from the Greek a [not] gnoster [know] —transliterating here), because none of the evidence and none of the arguments convince him one way or the other.
If you truly believed in evolution, you would not be an agnostic, you would be “believer,” someone whose credulity allows him to accept something is true based solely on authority, academic propaganda (like global warming), and nearly non-existent evidence that is greatly manipulated.
Hank
We all have to find our own path, Grasshopper.
Naw...you answered exactly how I would expect.
Sorry I should have included you...urroner.
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/news/2399870/posts?page=41#40
Have you ever sat down with an agnostic or an atheist and discuss religion/philosophy with them. It’s very hard since there is not a lot of common ground between the two of you.
If you say down with somebody who believes in Christ, then it’s easier, maybe not easy, but easier to agree on certain points.
If the person is an agnostic, what good does it do to pull out the Bible and say “Look, it says it right here.” He’ll probably just say, “Fine, it does say it right there, but I don’t believe the Bible is the world of God. Dang, I don’t even know if there is a God or not or if there is a God, what that God is.”
And more often than not, this agnostic would continue to ask me why questions, one after another. I don’t have a problem with that. Should somebody else believe something is true simply because I believe it or because I said so.
If a Muslim came up to you and said that you had to believe something simply because it was in their scriptures, the Quran, why would you agree with him? You don’t believe the Quran is equivalent to the Bible. Why would an agnostic/atheist believe anything simple because it was in the Bible.
What I started this thread for is to learn from traditional Christians how they would respond to the questions of agnostics. It wasn’t about Mormonism or Judaism, or even whether there is a God or not, or even if the sun would rise tomorrow, it was about how traditional Christians would treat the sincere questions of an agnostic.
In this thread, I tried to say to the responses of traditional Christian why I couldn’t accept their response as the truth, I never said it wasn’t the truth, just that I couldn’t accept it and then I tried to ask more questions to see if an acceptable answer could be found.
For most people, including you hopefully, it’s not about finding an answer, the answer could be totally wrong, but an answer that is believable and acceptable.
Finally somebody said that there really is no ultimate answer except faith, plain and simple faith. That is a very acceptable and very believable answer to me.
It’s not about me showing you that I’m right or you showing me that you’re right. You can’t show me, the pretend agnostic, that you are right, especially from the Bible. I first have to accept the Bible as the word of God and that is a total matter of faith.
The person whose answer I like said that he would talk to me about his faith, show me his faith through his actions, and encourage me to read the Bible and to pray to God. Until I, as an agnostic, do the last two things, it will be very hard for me to find faith and if the Christian does the four things mentioned, there is a lot better chance of me, as the agnostic, to want to do those latter two things then if that person had yelled and lectured me for not having faith and being an unbeliever and for asking too many questions.
So, it’s not about what I believe, it’s more about how I get treated by those who want me to believe like them. Why would I ever want to listen to anybody who uses inciting language while yelling and screaming at me the whole time.
If I were an agnostic and I was treated this way, why would I even listen.
The more I learn the more I realize it isn't yours..........
I say that this thread wasn’t about what I did or didn’t believe. It wasn’t even about what is or isn’t the truth. It was about how traditional Christians would treat the questions of an agnostic. I have said that over and over again, but some people just didn’t see that.
OO could have thrown scriptures at me all day long and warned me of hellfire and damnation, but as an agnostic, I would simply respond “I don’t believe it. Why should I believe it?”
Maybe the premise of the thread was too difficult for some to understand or maybe they just haven’t ever had to deal with agnostic/atheists before.
You can say what you will....
You've little credibility among many here FRiend....
OO and reaganaut said:
<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<
“You’ve read more scripture than any Christian”? Something like that....
I can find the exact post...if you like.
- - - - - -
I would like to see that post, because I am willing to bet he hasn’t. :)
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
I never said that, but I did say something that had most of the words in it, but it meant something very different.
After you find it, you’ll realize that what you said I might have said and what I said are two different things.
But if you’re really nice to me and ask me politely what I said, I’ll tell you what I said.
So OO, this is what you said you thought I said “You’ve read more scripture than any Christian”
And this what I really said:
“Throwing scriptures at me doesn’t do any good either. I have read all those scriptures before, probably more than most born-again Christians ever have.”
OO, can you reconcile the two statements to be equivalent or even close?
why have an intramural belief amongst each other or in the confines of their temple and another separate expressed belief to the world. Does that not demonstrate a lie, a falsehood, a man given childness of airs and superiority?
I was not aware we were called gracers. Too bad in a way, in another I accept the term but not on their definition.
One thing always drives me batty and no one has given me an answer that is sufficiently tolerable is that no one can enter a temple without a recommend. Why? It is God’s house? If it is then why doesn’t God leave the front door unlocked for his children to come home?
How would I come to worship God in fellowship without first testing the leader and congregation for compatibility?
If I were not redeemed, through Christ, why shouldn’t one be allowed to enter so they might hear the word of God? How would I come to know God if the Mormon Church were the only church for miles around? Would I have to wait patiently in my home in order to receive God and Joseph Smith as the savior and prophet respectively?
Why should I have to wait anywhere, anytime or get a man’s permission to learn more in that home were I might find it without first giving the proper handshake or presenting a temporary pass?
Will heaven be like this? Is there a chaste society in heaven for “Heavens Have and the Heathens have nots”?
Where can I find this God, this Almighty Creator that is Omnipresent, Omnipotent, Omniscience, Omnibenevolence?
If God is everwhere then shouldn’t a temple or church provide a place where I can see that demonstrated and shouldn’t he be readily accessible, if he is indeed everywhere? What if I have an emergency of spirit and need quidance, who should I look to while in that present state for guidance and where would I feel comfortable? In God’s house?
If God is Omnipotent then would he know if I am calling on him or reaching out in despair to someone who can guide me? If he is indeed all knowing and I show up on the door step of a Mormon Temple will God be available or will I be required to obtain permission to enter God’s house as a non-believer and learn more? (
I know of no other Christian faith that has this requirement but I await God’s answer. For it is I the prodigal son who wishes to return to my Father’s arms and be led by his Omniscient and Divine Wisdom. Will I be told to take a number and God will get to me soon as there a rush to see him and the lines long, due to the Christmas Season?
If God is Omnibenevolent, then how could he leave me in the cold waiting for warmth in fellowship and to learn what his plan is for my life? Would it not be easier to say to the spiritual wanderer “We welcome all and all are welcome”?
This post is rhetorical and mostly me wondering outloud. I am getting tired of this seperatness instituted among men by men for the sake of validation of superiority at others expense.
If Mormons really do believe they are superior and blessed by a superior, haven’t they instituted further seperation from God in their institution?
Wish there was some news on to rant about.
You are an idiot...aren't you.....And you of the "I have read all those scriptures before, probably more than most born-again Christians ever have."
You really DO NOT know the bible....now do you.
BTW, where did the word Mormon come from and what does it mean?
My view, which some may call simplistic, is that a member of a faith that recognizes Jesus Christ as our Savior is a Christian, hence my question to urroner.
I don’t pretend to dissect the details of each Christian faith and determine who really are and who really aren’t Christians.
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I hate to get Clintonian on you, but it depends on the definition of what “savior” is!
Salvation in Mormon doctrine is resurrection; they believe that everyone will be resurrected, or ‘saved.’ What we believe in as salvation (heaven instead of hell) they call “exaltation.” That comes from our own efforts, not Christ’s death on the cross. Christ is just a good example to Mormons - not a Savior, as Lutherans, Pentecostals, Baptists, and Catholics understand Him.
BTW, Jehovah’s Witnesses teach that Jesus was not God, but rather God’s first creation. Jesus existed in pre-human form as God’s agent of creation and God’s chief spokesman (the Word), took on human form as the man Jesus by means of a virgin birth, and became King in Heaven in 1914.
But Quoting the Bible to a mormon is like...
a cross and/or garlic to a vampire...
ands it is the mormon you that i was addressing...
Mormonism is not Christianity...
Does...”Something like that”....confuse you?
Was it you who earlier said I wasn’t funny, but are laughing now or was that somebody else.
Are you attempting to say.....something like the difference between mormons..and jack mormons?
This is soooooooo funny. You remind me of my five year old grandson who announced on his fifth birthday that he now knew everything there was to know, he was five ya’know.
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