Originally Posted By plpeters70 "To me and many other Christians, the heart of Christianity is fellowship with Jesus Christ." I'm really curious about this statement - can some of you "true believers" elaborate on this relationship you feel with Jesus? What do you really mean when you make statements like this? Do you mean you really feel a true love for this person you've never met? Or is it more of a devotion to his teachings? I ask because I grew up Catholic, and for a very long time I was quite devout, but I never felt that way about Jesus the person. I felt in-tune and connected to the whole Church - Jesus was just a part of the whole. But when I hear evangelicals talking, it's always about this relationship with Jesus. Why the emphasis?
Originally Posted By Elderp "I was going to answer pretty much what RoadTrip answered. If I die, and there is nothing after, well, then, I guess I'd change my mind. But I'd be dead, so couldn't change my mind." I guess I am a ditto on this one. I am betting my whole eternity on my belief. The good thing is if I lose, so what?! I didn't lose anything. I really find it hard to understand why someone wouldn't believe in God. I mean the very concept of being alive is enough to make me believe. Science has let man down over and over again. How many times have you heard in the news "new discovery" and for some reason academia tells us we have to believe only in science. I am not saying science is irrelevant, I am just saying it isn't everything either.
Originally Posted By WritingDork 1) Not really speaking for myself but I know many believe that aliens are actually demons and will come to earth as "Satan's vanguard" making these claims I am doubtful of this... deconverting, if you will, many people. Personally I don't think this would cause me to re-examine my faith. 2) Isn't this illegal in some way? I think this may cause me to doubt my faith in some way... However I doubt it would rock many people's. Many people believe that fossils are placed by Satan so I feel that many people will find this another trick by Satan. Personally I kinda maybe agree. Also, I'm sure some would argue, myself included believe the Hell is nothingness so if one were to Hell they would be proving that their is no afterlife, if that makes sense. Moreover, who is there to say that one would remember the afterlife... hm... let me just say this... I think this is a bit more... questionable.. has more... variables, I guess you could say, making it invalid to some... Hm... but what could make me really question my faith? I'm not quite sure... personally I'm in a state of... uncertainty in my faith currently but I don't know... Hm... I guess when I really can prove to myself and others that altruism really is dead... or nonexistant...
Originally Posted By mele You believe that Satan placed fossils in the Earth? Many people believe this? See, I never would have known that people believe that if it wasn't for these type threads. I've learned a lot about what people believe about Noah's Ark, too. Things that never would have occurred to me, like tiny dinosaurs being aboard. Very interesting ideas!
Originally Posted By Mr X ***>>that THEY in fact wrote all the words in the bible (koran, bagdava-gita etc...) some 200,000 years ago and planted the documents in an effort to examine the effects of religion on a society.<< So these aliens purposely planted conflicting holy books? They don’t sound very nice to me.*** Actually, no. I didn't write that well, sorry. What I was thinking when I wrote it was "the bible (OR the koran, OR the bagdava-gita etc...). I was just sort of trying to indicate that I wasn't singling out the bible per se).
Originally Posted By Mr X ***If non-believers were truly confident in their choice, would they need to talk about it so much? Just wondering... It seems most religious threads here are initiated by the non-believers.*** RoadTrip, I don't consider myself a "non-believer" in the strictest sense, and it is me starting a lot of these topics out of genuine curiosity. Sorry it bothers you. I don't know if you noticed, but I also started a "mirror thread" for non-believers on this very same issue.
Originally Posted By mrkthompsn Read Ezekiel Chapter 1 (starting at verse 4) and tell me that Ezekiel wasn't visited by aliens in a spaceship (appearing as wheels intersecting with wheels)...verses 16- 18. <a href="http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?book_id=33&chapter=1&version=31" target="_blank">http://www.biblegateway.com/pa...rsion=31</a>
Originally Posted By Mr X RC, thanks for writing back with a lot of thought behind it. I get the impression that, given a compelling enough set of circumstances, you would be willing to change religions (the god/jesus example) but you aren't willing to accept that there could not be ANY religions. Interesting. For those who wrote "I'd never change my mind under any circumstances", is there any sort of proof you could think of that would cause you to believe that one particular church was right (yours, or another), such as god coming down from on high and saying so? If God came down and said "it's the Buddists who are closest to the truth", would you immediately become a Buddist and reject your church?
Originally Posted By DyGDisney Mark, Ezekial said the heavens were opened and he saw visions of God. So you think it was really aliens visiting him? That's an interesting thought on those verses that I've never heard.
Originally Posted By DyGDisney I've never heard the idea that fossils were planted by Satan. What religion believes that?? My whole problem with carbon dating is and has always been this: Who ORIGINALLY came up with the dates that we base carbon dating on. I mean, how do we know that something is carbon dated 2 million years? Sometime in history there had to have been a timetable created for carbon dating. But what was it based on??
Originally Posted By RoadTrip I've never heard about the fossil thing either. Must be some Pat Roberson thing.
Originally Posted By imadisneygal Carbon dating is based on the half-life of a particular type of carbon. The half life is exceedingly long so based on the amount of the isotope remaining in an object they are able to date it. It's not to the millions of years, though. Carbon dating does not go back that far. Dinosaurs aren't carbon dated, they're dated with other radiometric dating similar to the dating used on the earth itself. And also with geology based on the layers of the earth in which their fossils are found.
Originally Posted By plpeters70 For anyone interested, here's a pretty good explanation of the accuracy of the fossil record: <a href="http://www.actionbioscience.org/evolution/benton.html" target="_blank">http://www.actionbioscience.or...ton.html</a>
Originally Posted By WritingDork >>I've never heard the idea that fossils were planted by Satan. What religion believes that??<< >>You believe that Satan placed fossils in the Earth? Many people believe this?<< Well I don't personally believe this idea. I'm not sure many do, but some kids at my school do and you can surely find videos on youtube about it I think. Fundy Christians mostly believe this, I'd assume... its a way of Satan luring people away from God to science or something... Fundy's believe the earth was created 6008 ago years exactly, or so... since they're Fundamentalists they believe the bible word for word... as a side note, in the"Apocrypha", which is mostly only found in Catholic bibles, there is "The Book of Job" which many believe has a reference to a dinosaur... Job 40: 15-24: "15 Behold now behemoth, which I made with thee; he eateth grass as an ox. 16 Lo now, his strength [is] in his loins, and his force [is] in the navel of his belly. 17 He moveth his tail like a cedar: the sinews of his stones are wrapped together. 18 His bones [are as] strong pieces of brass; his bones [are] like bars of iron. 19 He [is] the chief of the ways of God: he that made him can make his sword to approach [unto him]. 20 Surely the mountains bring him forth food, where all the beasts of the field play. 21 He lieth under the shady trees, in the covert of the reed, and fens. 22 The shady trees cover him [with] their shadow; the willows of the brook compass him about. 23 Behold, he drinketh up a river, [and] hasteth not: he trusteth that he can draw up Jordan into his mouth. 24 He taketh it with his eyes: [his] nose pierceth through snares." hm.. yes since the Fundy's look at Genesis and see no "and then God created the dinosaurs" they believe the dinoaurs never existed, moreover, science tells us that these dinosaurs lived more than 6000 years ago and therefore go against their beliefs.
Originally Posted By DyGDisney I went to Christian Elementary School and was told Dinosaurs never existed! However, my church elders and pastor do believe the earth is around 6000 years old and take the Bible at it's word, but also believe Dinosaurs did exist and have never mentioned fossils being from Satan. I'm not sure what I believe about the age of the earth, haven't decided, but I know dinosaurs existed, and it's ridiculous to teach kids otherwise. All that does is confuse them.
Originally Posted By RoadTrip The early guys just didn't have this time thing figured out very well. Genesis also says that Noah was 950 years old, and we all know that didn't happen. The Bible is figuratively correct but not literally correct.
Originally Posted By utahjosh There are several reasons why Noah could have lived to 950. I'm not going to go into it here, cuz I'm tired and stressed, but I don't know if 950 is figurative or not.
Originally Posted By DyGDisney Yeah, Adam also lived over 900 years. Maybe, maybe not. Guess we'll know "someday"!
Originally Posted By Mr X WritingDork, you are correct. In fact there's an entire SERIES on YouTube called "Satan Invented Evolution". ***There are several reasons why Noah could have lived to 950.*** There are no provable reasons that anyone could live some 10 times longer than the oldest human ever to live in modern times. None. Nada. It's ridiculous.
