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Re: God's Defense Strategy
[Re: PHeMoX]
#105046
01/13/07 17:07
01/13/07 17:07
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Joined: Mar 2003
Posts: 3,010
analysis paralysis
NITRO777
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Quote:
Or does this infact proof that having (unconditional) faith in a religion is often the result of fear?
I wont disagree with that at all. There is a lot to be afraid of in this world. Whenever I hear someone talk about how brave they are I instantly know that they are lying. It is the priveledged few sitting in their coffeehouses behind the safety of comfort and four walls which claim that they are brave.
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Re: God's Defense Strategy
[Re: PHeMoX]
#105047
01/13/07 17:07
01/13/07 17:07
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jcl
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Quote:
I think the Christians you are describing are probably Catholic diests
I was describing Protestants, but I suppose the disbelief in a literal-biblical God is shared by most Catholics as well. I also agree that thinking about the religious implications of death and suffering might naturally lead to moving away from such a God. Some have already finished those thought processes, others are a little slower.
However this is unrelated to the ICC trial of the fundamentalist God, which begins to look quite bad for Him.
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Re: God's Defense Strategy
[Re: jcl]
#105048
01/13/07 18:55
01/13/07 18:55
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AlbertoT
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Quote:
The usual Christian god, as believed by the majority of Christians, has not inflicted death upon Adam nor allowed the earth quake of Lisboa. He has not directly created man and has no direct influence on earth, so he's not responsible for natural death and disasters.
However the God before the ICC is the US-fundamentalist God. As I've learned, fundamentalists believe their God has inflicted death and suffering as a revenge for Adam's disobedience, called the original "sin".
In my opinion there is not such alternative
Either God exist or He doesn't
In this thread we assume that it exists, well in this case we must also assume that He is the US - fundamentalist God
It is out of discussion that suffering are supposed to be a consequence of the original sin
You might be horrified about such claim ( same as me ) but you can not call yourself a Christian ( either Catholic or protestant) if you dont' beleive in it
It is clearly written in the bible and in the Gospel
The only reasonable God's defense is the following
If you put me on trial for Lisboa's earthquake why not also for Cancer and other terrible and painful deseases ?
You committed the original sin so you must pay for it in a way or an other
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Re: God's Defense Strategy
[Re: AlbertoT]
#105049
01/14/07 11:10
01/14/07 11:10
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Joined: Jul 2000
Posts: 27,986
Frankfurt
jcl
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I do not agree to the opinion that either the US fundamentalist God exists, or no God exists. As only few people still believe in the US fundamentalist God, this would exclude almost all other Gods from existence.
Christianity is split into 4 main churches and about 34,000 sects or free churches. US fundamentalism is just one (or in fact, some) of them. All 34,000 believe in more or less different versions of God. For instance, most of them do not believe that God created the earth in 6 days, or that God killed more than 2 million people as described in the Old Testament. Most Christians in my country would consider it a blasphemy to take the bible literally and believe that God is a killer.
They rather believe that those bible stories are to be interpreted in their context, as a sort of historical war propaganda, and not as literal descriptions of God's acts. The killings described in the bible didn't really happen in that extent. Nations allegedly completely wiped out by God or God's accomplices just reappear in one of the next bible stories. Sometimes God had to wipe them out several times before He finally accomplished a successful holocaust. This does not sound like a true story.
So if you talk about God you need to define which God you mean. Only some of those Gods appear to be criminals who can be put on trial for their killings.
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Re: God's Defense Strategy
[Re: jcl]
#105050
01/14/07 11:29
01/14/07 11:29
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Joined: Oct 2006
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AlbertoT
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Quote:
Most Christians in my country would consider it a blasphemy to take the bible literally and believe that God is a killer.
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In my opinion people can acceopt Bible or refuse it but they are not allowed to twist Bible to match their own taste
You can not deny that our sufferings depend on the original sin
This is clearly written in the bible it is not definitly a matter of interpretation
Obviously the story of the "Apple" must not be understood literaly
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Re: God's Defense Strategy
[Re: jcl]
#105051
01/14/07 13:48
01/14/07 13:48
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Joined: Mar 2003
Posts: 3,010
analysis paralysis
NITRO777
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Quote:
Most Christians in my country would consider it a blasphemy to take the bible literally and believe that God is a killer.
From what I read about Germany, the main percentage of Protestants are Lutherans:
Quote:
But the facts, apart from surveys, tell a different story. By far most people belong to a religious organization. In 1989, the year before the unification with East Germany, 82.77 percent of the West German population belonged either to the Catholic or the Lutheran Church, 3 percent were Muslim, and a few percent where members of other groups. By far most people still have their children baptized, marry religiously, and pay their church taxes. The main difference between German and American religiosity seems to be that for Germans religiosity is more of a private matter, something that is not shown or spoken about publicly. Some people I have spoken with even deny that they are religious, even though they go sometimes to church and pay their church tax.
source of previous quote
Its important to understand that both the Catholic church AND the German Protestant Churches(Lutherans) are mere shells of the denominations they began as. Martin Luther would turn over in his grave if he were to witness the degradation of his belief system which is evidenced in today's Lutheran churches. Both of these European churches did definitely believe in a literal interpretation of the Bible when they were founded whereas the American churches have preserved the original teachings of the Bible which have lasted since the Protestant reformation.
In one blurb from the Wikipedia on the Evangelical Church in Germany most Protestant Churches in Germany are either Lutheran or United(Which is a Lutheran derivative). I was amazed at the statement that Quote:
The vast majority of German Protestants nevertheless belong to a member church of the EKD, about 32% of the overall German population
So I guess I was wrong about Germany being a cold, religionless place. There is certainly is a lot of religious people there. However, from my initial observations, the main Protestant doctrines there are far removed from their original foundational doctrines. I also would add that listing off a group of numbers and statistics for the purposes of debate is almost inhuman. There are undoubtedly a lot of good, wonderful people in Germany, as their are in America, Iraq, Russia, China or anywhere else. Of course, being good, and nice and friendly and polite are not in themselves reasons for enterance to heaven.
The interesting point about these protestants in Germany(as well as the same kind of Protestants in US or elsewhere) is that they are mostly good people, as are Catholics very good people. And they seem to hold on to a faith in God, however nebulous and impersonal of a God it seems to be. Likewise they seem to believe in a vague concept of heaven, of which it seems that enterance thereof can be attained by just doing good and helping your fellow man.
It is easy to see that, in the context of such a sketchy and half-hearted belief system, why the youth of Europe seem so ready to reject the entire concept of God. This concept of God, "the liberal God" which Irish_Farmer calls it seems completely irrelevant to real life, and the hardships which face us daily.
I would say that this "liberal God" would fare even worsely at your ICC trial because He had the power to stop suffering also, in that He was still all powerful, but instead He watched it like some type of sick voyeur or cold scientist using us as guinea pigs or rats in a maze.
At least the Biblical God, the God upon which all European protestant churches are based upon, was a personal God who set into motion a real plan of salvation from the disasters.
I am no expert of German religion though, I would very much like to speak to a German minister of both denominations, one Baptist and one Lutheran to really get a feel for whats going on there. But I suppose I can learn bits and peices by reading articles and listening to the people on here.
Last edited by NITRO; 01/14/07 14:10.
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Re: God's Defense Strategy
[Re: NITRO777]
#105052
01/14/07 15:35
01/14/07 15:35
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Joined: Jul 2000
Posts: 27,986
Frankfurt
jcl
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As far as I know, the above quotes and percentages are correct. It is certainly also correct that at the time of Martin Luther, both the Catholic and Protestant churches literally believed in the bible. The change happened mostly in the last 50 years, going along with better education and the scientific discoveries.
Yet literal bible belief still exists in Germany, two of my neighbors are literal bible believers. About 11% of the German population take the bible literally (5 years ago it was 13%). Interestingly, only 2% of the protestant ministers take the bible literally. The same goes for most of the European continent, with a slightly different situation in countries with a Catholic tradition, like Italy or Spain. No doubt, this trend will also continue in the US, with a delay of maybe 20 years behind Europe.
So far to the European religious statistics. But still, no one has come forward yet with a good defense strategy for the struggling fundamentalist God.
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Re: God's Defense Strategy
[Re: jcl]
#105053
01/14/07 16:18
01/14/07 16:18
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Joined: Mar 2003
Posts: 3,010
analysis paralysis
NITRO777
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Quote:
But still, no one has come forward yet with a good defense strategy for the struggling fundamentalist God.
Well this defense lawyer must rest my case, I think the jury is too tough. 
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Re: God's Defense Strategy
[Re: AlbertoT]
#105054
01/14/07 16:46
01/14/07 16:46
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Joined: Sep 2002
Posts: 8,177
Netherlands
PHeMoX
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Quote:
In my opinion people can acceopt Bible or refuse it but they are not allowed to twist Bible to match their own taste
You can not deny that our sufferings depend on the original sin
This is clearly written in the bible it is not definitly a matter of interpretation
Obviously the story of the "Apple" must not be understood literaly
Uhm, aren't you doing exacly that now? It's not obvious that the 'apple' story must not be understood literally, eventhough most people will understand that there's more to the story. Many stories in the bible are open to a lot of different interpretations even when you don't wish to twist things around in favor of one certain view.
Still, I think the Jury will have a hard time judging a God.
Cheers
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