The Essence Of Faith & Belief.

I agree. We dont want our authority to be distant. Being in communion with each other is an advantage and plan, in my belief.We also don't want a despot.

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Despot--noun
1.
a king or other ruler with absolute, unlimited power; autocrat.
2.
any tyrant or oppressor.
3.
History/Historical. an honorary title applied to a Byzantine emperor, afterward to members of his family, and later to Byzantine vassal rulers and governors.

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God ultimately has absolute and unlimited power, but in our lifetimes He has allowed us some room to question, challenge, and deny...should we so desire. I also don't see Him as an oppressor because the only thing He oppresses isn't good for me anyway.I have never felt that God oppresses my free will. At best, He pricks my conscience..

Why limit it to our lifetimes? If the afterlife is supposedly more important than the present life, why should the standards for it be lower?

And if the afterlife is so freaking wonderful why are all the christians wasting their time here?

What do you expect? Mass suicide?? There is a lot to do here. Besides, we dont hate life. We love it as much as any non religious people love it, with the possible exception that we don't see this life as all there is and that we don't just live for today(for tomorrow we die)

At least the Heaven's Gate cult was internally consistent. They actually acted on what they believed. Is life better than the afterlife?

Quite honestly I dont know. I believe that we are meant to experience both...and I believe that life is to an extent what you make it...but I also believe that in this life we will suffer some trials and tribulations. Our job...our reason for "sticking around" is to help others.

GOD, if GOD exists is in my opinion and belief concerned about humans. This, of course, is a human-centric perspective. I don't limit my study of GOD to whimsical ideas---A God who lies while the serpent tells the truth, etc. This totally confuses the idea and the ideal. I also believe that GOD is good. Not complete. Often, when I bring this up, I am told that I prefer fantasy over reality, that I have a "whats in it for me" approach to a relationship with God, and that I dont look at what other religions and human literature have to say on the subject.This brings us back to what the essence of faith and belief really are. Are they faith in a higher distant power? Faith in a human-centric personal higher power? Faith in humanity and what we as a people collectively do and inspire each other to become? These questions resurrect this topic.

I don't think a purely selfish motivation is at play.My own experience is that there is a difference in worldview. I can't speak for all atheists, but one of the major observations I have made is that atheists can make peace with the idea that the universe could care less about our existence. Ultimate, atheists are interested in what IS true, not what they HOPE is true.Theists, on the other hand, seem to have a need that something out there does care about them. I would call that a very human reaction, not really a selfish one. In the end, I would define the essence of faith and belief as hope. The interesting bits come when that hope butts heads with facts.

So would you say that theists are interested in hope and seek faith whereas atheists are interested in reality and seek evidence?(by and large)

One day perhaps people will realise that atheists aren't another species - all they are are people that don't believe that there is a god. The vast majority give it no more thought than than why they don't believe in dragons and have hopes just like everyone else - just not silly ones like an afterlife.The best I can say about this is that you're confusing a working scientist with an atheist.

The attempts unbelievers make to explain the motivations of believers are pretty bemusing to someone like me who was an atheist for about thirty years of my life, between the ages of fifteen and forty five. And before that I wasn't a very avid Christian, just went to church, believed in God in a vague sort of way, didn't understand the gospel. At fifteen I was among a bunch of teenagers who considered themselves sophisticated and enlightened, and we had a teacher who loved to debunk religion more than he loved to teach geometry, and the combination made an atheist of me. Because it seemed to be the truth, and truth was the important thing. I'd never had any idea that I needed God so I had no problem accepting that I was living in a world where such things were fairy tales and reality meant accepting a cold universe that didn't care about me. I really had no problem accepting that.Thirty years later I was surrounded by a bunch of New Agers who were driving me crazy with their "irrational" views which I looked at as destructive of reality and truth. They considered me "too analytical" and unspiritual. But one day I was reading a book by a well known guru who wrote of personally experiencing "God" and that sent me on the trail of understanding who God is. It took a couple years of reading a lot of different religions until I ended up a Christian.I didn't "need" it, but I was very happy to find it true. Yes, true. The whole point was that it's TRUE. And that's still the whole point to me. It's also beautiful, fulfilling, everything a person could have wanted. But I hadn't missed it all those years.It can very well be the love of truth that makes a person a believer in Christ.abe: You think science is the truth so you can't possibly appreciate what I'm saying. But once you know that the Biblical account is the truth, there are simply no other claims to truth that can compete. They're false whether it's possible to prove it or not. I feel sorry for people who grow up believers and never get it solidly established that it's the truth and lose it easily when confronted by "science," or by those sophisticated teenagers that persuaded me.Abe: The evidence? The many witnesses and their trustworthiness. "Ears to hear." The coherence of the whole historical panorama from Eden through Revelation. No other religion has anything remotely like these evidences. "Ears to hear."Edited by Faith, : No reason given.Edited by Faith, : No reason given.Edited by Faith, : No reason given.

How would one know that another is an atheist?If they were sharing love and compassion for others, the issue may well never come up...unless a Christian insisted that the person pray with him or whatever.As far as being another species....I thought of this scripture:

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1 Peter 2:9(KJV)But ye are a chosen generation, a royal priesthood, an holy nation, a peculiar people; that ye should shew forth the praises of him who hath called you out of darkness into his marvellous light:

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Believers often come across as peculiar and alien. Others might say delusional. We too are simply human, however. You may never know who we are if you meet some of those who are mature and can control their emotions and zeal.

You know, in most countries I've visited it's not a thing that ever crops up or ever crosses anybody's mind. It's only when I go to the US or Asia that religion becomes noticeable. The answer to your question is that you can't unless you ask and nobody asks because it's of no consequence. Phat, dear chap, an atheist in as likely to show love and compassion or not show love and compassion as a believer - they are exactly the same in all respects except they don't go to church on Sunday and don't obsess about sin or worry about the world ending.

I too would be happy to find it true - but it isn't.

No ears to hear I guess.