If you’re bound for Hellfire, as all Christians, Jews and Muslims believe many or most of us are, the Biblical god has always known this, for all time, way before it created you. It created you in the sure and certain knowledge that you would end up being thrown into the fiery lake of Hellfire.
How then is this god any different to a man whose hobby is breeding kittens to throw them into a fire, or to pour petrol (gasoline) on them and throw a match onto them? If you knew of such a man in your street, what would be your opinion of him?
Would you tell your children to look to him for moral guidance? Would you feel safe in his presence? Would you build wonderful buildings to meet with other admirers and sing songs in his praise? Would you constantly praise him and tell him what a wonderful person he is?
Or would you notify the authorities, try to put a stop to his sick, sadistic activities and warn your children not to go near him or any of his friends or associates?
It would be astonishing if even the primitive Bronze Age tribal nomads whose traditional creation myths were eventually written in the earliest versions of the Bible, believed such a sadistic monster could be a source of morality. In all probability, they were not writing about a loving, moral god, but an object of fear which needed to be controlled with the protective spells, incantations and rituals which operant conditioning had convinced them were the only way to control this capricious, unpredictable, dangerous monster who was about as controllable, predictable, and loving as any other volcano.
Ten Reasons To Lose Faith: And Why You Are Better Off Without It
This book explains why faith is a fallacy and serves no useful purpose other than providing an excuse for pretending to know things that are unknown. It also explains how losing faith liberates former sufferers from fear, delusion and the control of others, freeing them to see the world in a different light, to recognise the injustices that religions cause and to accept people for who they are, not which group they happened to be born in. A society based on atheist, Humanist principles would be a less divided, more inclusive, more peaceful society and one more appreciative of the one opportunity that life gives us to enjoy and wonder at the world we live in.
Available in Hardcover, Paperback or ebook for Kindle
This is my favorite one. I linked this post to a Christian friend and she just logged out of Gtalk and has been ignoring me ever since. Religion = escapism = ignorance = self-deception.
ReplyDeleteThe main problem with God as omniscient, is that he has also given humans free will. If you believe you have free will, than you cannot believe that God is all knowing, because he can't know your next action. If you believe God is omniscient then you don't believe you have free will, and everything in your life is determined. So, either God is omniscient OR we have free will, can't have both.
ReplyDeleteSo much fallacy, shame about God's creators not having sense.
Excellent
ReplyDeleteRosebud. Preaching again to the unconverted with the breath that God himself graciously gave you. Bless you. Jesus is waiting for you. There is still time to turn rather than burn.
ReplyDeleteThank you for your smugly bigoted sanctimonious condescension. I hope it helped you feel better about yourself; it's just a pity that you need to try to do it at the expense of others but I understand that's a fundamentalist Christian trait.
DeleteIs there any sign of you finding the courage and integrity to answer those simple questions I put to you all those months ago yet? They can be found here: Questions Christians Struggle (Or Refuse) To Answer.
I'll take that as a no, then.
DeleteIt gets worse. The bible says that God has created the wicked for the express reason of promoting HIS glory through THEIR destruction. I quit christianity because I cannot love a monster. I tried to walk the walk for 30 years but I can't do it any more. I believe the MAIN REASON people stay in christianity after they actually READ the bible is because they are too afraid of the extra-horrendous punishment that awaits apostates after they leave their faith behind. I wish I'd never even heard of Jesus because his father is nothing like what I was told he was like in the beginning. It's buyers remorse of the worst kind.
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ReplyDeleteOr you could post it on your blog and just provide a link...
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ReplyDeleteNice looking blog.
DeleteI mean about the thoughts and content. I hope it made sense it did to me. Sorry it's my first attempt in questioning my whole life's belief system.
DeleteIt's good to question. I suppose the real question to ask is how do we really know. I'd be willing to bet that most religious people never really ask themselves how they really know anything about their favourite god. They've been brought up to believe things and just assume that someone somewhere at some time did the work of actually finding out, or they've fallen for the notion that 'faith' is a virtue; that somehow believing without reason or evidence is good.
DeleteIt's not, of course. It's simply cultural arrogance and a device to stop you questioning the things you are told to believe without reason or evidence. No sane person could live a life outside religion based on the assumption that whatever they guess must be right without evidence. No one could possibly live a normal life like that. If you could, you wouldn't need your senses and faculties of reason.
GOD created flu virus, tuberculosis bacteria and cancer etc FOR US. All HAIL GOD!
ReplyDeleteThat is only a teeny weeny part of all god has determined for all of us. In his infinite cruelty, he has reserved more for us, culminating in a never-to-be-extinguished hell fire. Such a loving god! "... capricious, unpredictable, dangerous monster who was about as controllable, predictable, and loving as any other volcano." You couldn't have put it better! I like it.
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ReplyDeleteOne thing I have come to realise, because I saw it in myself, is that misotheism essentially has its roots in self-hatred.
ReplyDeleteIt's horrible enough that rampant Natural evil and rampant human evil abounds in the world, and its horrible enough that suffering, death, and extinctions continue with no end in sight, the fact that Hell as a place of eternal torture for billions of people is taught by religion makes the possibility of a loving, merciful God impossible.
ReplyDeleteYes humans are sinful and evil, but we did not create and we did not cause our evil sinful nature. And no one has total free will to do either evil or good. No one has total control of their nature and their behavior. Nature, nurture, genes, hormones, DNA, brain chemistry, body chemistry, and environmental conditions all dictate and determine a person's behavior whether good or evil.
Plus, there are more merciful, humane, and more intelligent and more constructive ways to punish human sin which are open to a God of love and mercy than burning them forever. It's also very unfair that Adam and Eve's sin has to spread to every future unborn human.
As if being burned in fire forever wasn't horrific enough there are other forms of torture in hell as well according to Fundamentalist Christians. There's also worms which bite, a sewer like stench, demonic monsters which assault and manhandle their victims, suffocation or inability to breathe, and according to the demented preacher David J. Stewart, victims in hell will be buried alive inside a claustrophobic, coffin like structure as they burn in fire at the same time. See David J. Stewart's disgusting site Buried Alive in Hell. Imagine being buried alive forever inside a closed coffin and burning in fire forever at the same time. Claustrophobia forever, suffocation forever, and incineration forever. This is infinitely worse than any horror movie. Monstrously cruel, inhumane, inhuman, disgusting, diabolical, sadistic cruelty. Immeasurable unimaginable cruelty and horror. This is so unbelievably horrifyingly cruel the human mind cannot even begin to grasp it. This God chooses the worst forms of torture possible. It's as if this monstrous deity is aiming for the maximum amount of torture possible. Pure dyed in the wool sadist. And its not just very evil people who are doomed to this horrifying fate but also just ordinary sinners and even decent people and even many Christians who are doomed to end up in this eternal torture chamber. If one didn't interpret the Bible correctly and didn't believe the entire Bible then it's hell. Even if one was a Christian if one didn't put God and Jesus first in their life then it's hell. If one chose the wrong church then it's hell. Billions of people are going to end up in hell according to Fundamentalist Christians for one reason or another.
A God who would torture billions of people forever is a cruel, sadistic, psychopathic monster with no heart and no conscience whatsoever. Just look at the numerous paintings depicting Hell such as Heironymus Bosch's paintings of hell, Far Angelico's paintings of hell, and Jan Van Eyck's The Last Judgment, depicting all manner of cruel, sadistic, vile, disgusting horrors. It takes a sick disgusting mind to come up with such punishments. And we should remember that according to Christianity there's no forgiveness and no second chances after death. Why? So God's forgiveness and mercy has an expiration date that ends at death. That's not a God of love and mercy. This God is an inhumane, inhuman monster without an iota of a conscience.