How do religious people account for the existence of atheism/atheists? If we are all made in the image of God, why is it that so many people are completely unable to perceive the divine? Why does God go to such lengths to hide himself from so many?I'm hoping for some serious answers.
>>18762570God gives you freedom to turn away from Him because God is not a tyrant. Atheists exist because they either fail to outgrow the edgy phase or because they don't live a life that challenges them to actually search for truth (which inevitably leads to God)
>>18762667Someone would still have the freedom to turn away from God even if he revealed himself. Free will doesn't really enter into this scenario.>which inevitably leads to GodIt doesn't. People genuinely search for the truth and come to all manner of different conclusions, including the conclusion that there is no reason to assume gods exist.
>>18762689Then they're willingly mistaken. There's literally no way to arrive to atheism if you think about it rationally for 5 minutes.
>>18762667>actually search for truthThis is called science, and the civilization-killing vile nuisance christrasites have literal multibillion dollar industries whose explicit purpose is to undermine it.
>>18762689And to elaborate. There is of course no proof that God doesn't exist. The only argument here is Russell's teapot, but it fails because the teapot indeed has 0 testimonies about it. Whereas existence of God has plenty of evidence and testimonies. Atheists will usually demand "scientific" evidence or discount testimonies. Which is stupid and uneducated, because history of science is rife with examples when people claiming "no evidence/scientific explanation = testimonies are fake" failed.For example, Ignaz Semmelweis noted that the maternity ward staffed by doctors (who routinely came straight from performing autopsies) had a maternal death rate from childbed fever several times higher than the ward run by midwives. He ordered doctors to wash their hands in chlorinated lime, and mortality dropped to 1-2%. The medical establishment largely rejected him. Germ theory didn't exist yet, and doctors found the idea that they were the cause of death of patients insulting. Semmelweis lost his position and was committed to an asylum, where he died. A less dramatic example is that indigenous people of the north as well as explorers noted that northern lights made sounds - crackling or hissing. Scientists dismissed that and claimed it's impossible/lies/hallucinations, until in 2012 clear sounds were recorded during auroral display. It turned out the source wasn't the aurora but electric charges accumulating during temperature inversion. Regardless, a "scientifically impossible" thing was proven to exist. Same for halos, ball lightning, etc. So, the testimony about God indeed points God or something similar existing. Whether it's a Christian God, or a Buddha, or Apollo, or something else, is not known; but SOMETHING is there, and discounting it is about as smart as rejecting ball lightning.
>>18762703>>18762703>Human Genome Project was run by an Evangelical>Big bang, genetics, discovered by Catholics>Gravity discovered by protestants>Evangelical universities have donor (Evangelical) funded labs>Notre Dame, Georgetown, Boston College, KU Leuven, the Catholic University of Louvain, Universidad de Navarra funded by RCC>Jesuit astronomy>RCC as general patron of science in Europe historicallyNOOO THAT SCIENCE DOESNT COUNT SCIENCE HAS TO SUPPORT ABORTIONS OR ITS NOT REAL SCIENCE
>>18762570I'm atheist. I'm also a druid. What now?
>>18762736That only makes it more tragic.
>>18762753The only tragic thing is you being conditioned to hold a self-destructive position as gospel.
>>18762570> How do religious people account for the existence of atheism/atheists?Sweet ain’t as sweet without the sour
>>18762692>rationallyI don't think you know what that word means.
>>18762736>No one ever had the idea of dropping things and see if they fall before protestantsHoly shit christcucks are so fucking retarded.
>>18762689Truth is truth there is no guess work. Either Gods exist or don't exist. The problem with Athiesm is it's a position that's only reason for existing is the premise of an idea of god/gods exist in the first place. The position of Athiesm becomes a position based on faith that God/gods don't exist. If you want a simple answer to your question it's based on faith in their deity/deities. Why would they have concern about matters that are not of their concern? if they truly have faith based in a divine being with knowledge and power beyond human comprehension then that's all that's needed.
>>18762692You are both arrogant and delusional if you think no one can honestly arrive at any position save your own. You should probably spend less time in echo-chambers and actually interact with people who have different beliefs (in real life, not some online shit-hole like this board.)>>18762734>So, the testimony about God indeed points God or something similar existing.Going from "scientific consensus has failed to account for observed phenomena in the past and had to be amended" to "god(s) must exist" is quite a leap in logic. By that same reasoning, it seems we must conclude that aliens, bigfoot, ghosts, the Loch Ness monster, etc. all exist because numerous people have testified about their existence. I'm not saying that personal testimonies "don't count": they can be counted as evidence and absolutely merit consideration, but claiming that they are actually proof of anything is a stretch.The concept of those personal testimonies also leaves the question in the OP open. If you assume at least some of them are true, why is the divine revealing itself to some people and hiding from others?
>>18762570Demonic entities or hosts. No other explanation.
>>18762570God is not hidden from them, He is not far from any one of us. Quite the opposite, in their heart of hearts they know full well God exists, but in unrighteousness they suppress the truth in order to justify their sin in their own sight. Calvin explained this in greater detail in the first chapters of the Institutes, see also Romans 1:18-32https://www.biblestudytools.com/history/calvin-institutes-christianity/book1/chapter-1.html
>>18762734>So, the testimony about God indeed points God or something similar existing.Not necessarily. You gave examples of people hypothesizing about things and later they turned out to be correct, but people make all kinds of claims that are never proven to be correct or are proven to be false all the time. There are men in Africa who believes black cats are shapeshifters who sneak into their rooms at night to steal their penises. Maybe some day penis-snatching shapeshifters will be discovered through investigation.I was raised in an atheist household and briefly met Christopher Hitchens one time. Now if I was raised in a Christian or Islamic household then maybe I'd be a Christian or a Muslim but then it likely wouldn't have been something I reached independently but because I went to church or a mosque at a very young age and was socialized into it by my family, relatives, etc. Essentially religion is a man-made proposition.>>18763096>The problem with Athiesm is it's a position that's only reason for existing is the premise of an idea of god/gods exist in the first place. I mean it's a descriptive term for not believing in God. In that sense it's a negative thing (-) defined by its disbelief in something. But often atheists will be interesting in other things like some kind of philosophy.>The position of Athiesm becomes a position based on faith that God/gods don't exist.Maybe some act that way, but I don't think it requires faith. Like to have faith means you're absolutely certain. So for me I'm more of an agnostic-atheist because I haven't seen anything to convince me there's a God or gods, so I don't see a reason to believe in any. But I'm not ruling it out. I'm okay with some degree of uncertainty about things.
>>18763671>I was raised in an atheist household and briefly met Christopher Hitchens one time. Now if I was raised in a Christian or Islamic household then maybe I'd be a Christian or a Muslim but then it likely wouldn't have been something I reached independently but because I went to church or a mosque at a very young age and was socialized into it by my family, relatives, etc. Essentially religion is a man-made proposition.You yourself were raised in an atheist home, yet you stupidly do not apply this fallacious argument to yourself.
>>18763672Yes I do. You have no reason to automatically accept atheism as self-evidently true because I say so. I'm just holding up religion to the same standard.
>>18763674But nobody reasons that Christianity must be true because they say so. Which worldview is correct is the very question of the debate, there is no reason to re-state it like this, let alone to try and present as some kind of rhetorical point. The only reason to bring up upbringings, and normally the explicit reason, is to reason that the faith must therefore be false or dubious. But this is an argumentum ad hominem (an actual one, not like “somebody else said something about me that I dislike”, which is not ad hominem, despite what terminally online imbeciles think). If you were born in India, you might have grown up believing the earth is flat. Why someone believes something or how they came to believe it is totally irrelevant to whether it is true.t. convert that was not raised in the faith
>>18763687>The only reason to bring up upbringings, and normally the explicit reason, is to reason that the faith must therefore be false or dubious.Not necessarily "false," but man-made. It's socially constructed by people. I'm a Feurbachian sort of atheist in that way. It's the same reason why going to church or praying at a temple and doing the ritual together in groups is so important.>If you were born in India, you might have grown up believing the earth is flat. Why someone believes something or how they came to believe it is totally irrelevant to whether it is true.Or believing in Hinduism. Or Islam, Jainism, Buddhism or Christianity to lesser extents. But Islam and Christianity arrived from the outside.
>>18763694>Not necessarily "false," but man-made1. In the case of Christianity these are one and the same 2. It does not follow. That Christian faith typically passes from parent to child should be understood as the faithfulness of God and the fulfillment of their baptism, but there is no reason to conclude the faith did not come from God. Even many who are raised in the Church burn in hell, and to be raised in the Church is of no effect to a person unless God also sends His Spirit to infuse faith in them.>Or believing in Hinduism. Or Islam, Jainism, Buddhism or Christianity to lesser extents. But Islam and Christianity arrived from the outside.Completely over your head, Anon. *Woosh*
>>18763697If Christians stopped going to church, then there would probably still be Christians, but fewer of them. So the social practice of Christianity is very important to its reproduction. Primarily it reproduces itself because of what people do because people are the ones who created it.
>>18763707If Christians stopped going to Church they would not be Christians. Now, Christianity is itself a school of philosophy. The Epicurean lives out his philosophy when he seeks the best pleasures. But when we observe the holy Sabbath day, when we pray to the Lord, when we attend to the means of grace, and when we obey the law of God, this is how we live out our philosophy.
>>18763707>Primarily it reproduces itself because of what people do because people are the ones who created it.Non sequitur. God created it, people live it; they do these things because originally God gave it to them.
>>18763712I think God is a projection of human qualities. Love, for example. Goodness. Community (like how the church is one in the body of Christ). These are all human activities and capacities. But people can also feel disenchanted with the world (a sort of blegh) or are just going through the motions throughout their week, but they gather in church on Sundays and feel connected and sing worship songs together and that feels good. They don't feel so alone because there's a guy named Jesus who is looking out for them. But it really works because other people in the community of believers are looking out for them. And then they go outside and the sky feels a bit brighter and the leaves on the trees seem like they shimmer. Then they go to work on Monday and the feeling wears off, and then they come back and do it again.I'm not saying these feelings are wrong or are "false" even. Those feelings are real, where we disagree (and we're not going to settle this) is where those feelings come from. Christians say it comes from God and I say it comes from the people who are actually doing the thing. It's also possible that religions can go into decline and be replaced by other forms of social activities that generate the same feelings. Religion has also changed a lot over thousands of years. Some have gone exinct and others have risen up.
>>18762667Weird he didn’t give Moses any freedom when it came to cutting off his kids smekel
>>18763370>>18763671Yes, true, people make all kinds of claims.I'm not saying believing in Christian or any other specific God is the only rational position. I'm saying that the amount/quality of testimony shows that there's SOMETHING, and discounting it because we perhaps don't have a proper framework to study/detect it confidently is like discounting Semmelweis or Auroral sounds - so the only rational position is accepting that there is SOMETHING instead of just "vast, uncaring universe" or what have you. Then one can use/try multiple approaches/"hedge frameworks"/traditions/whatever to make that something part of one's life, test them, and deal with that something rationally like one deals with, I don't know, being aware of nutrition's effect on health. >>18763370I do not spend time on Christian sites at all. And my parish is white collar, highly educated, liberal. So 0 echo chamber. I grew up reading Hitchens and Dawkins and was quoting them and sneering at religioustards all the way to like 25. >>18763671I was raised in an atheist household and ended up converting. Part of it was seeing an older physicist I knew convert. He was also raised atheist. I'm going on a tangent here, but atheism is not actionable - it could be 100% correct, but it does not improve decision making. Atheism is also "turtles all the way down", and at some point that stops being enough. Not in an abstract way, but in a "I can do X or I can do Y and I have no idea which option is better and no way to tell".
>>18763044Oh? There was a mathematical proven formula for the rate gravity pulls on objects in freefall previous to Newton?
>>18763805Dude I hate going to Mass, I don't want to participate in the community (I still do cause it's an obligation), I hate ritual, I feel nothing during confession. And yet a couple times it happened that I was participating in a ritual, bored, mind wandering, counting seconds till I can go home, then BAM, utter bliss/love/safety out of nowhere. Then I experiment on that, I try to make it go away, it doesn't. It just stays there, inside me. Then it goes away but leaves a feeling of euphoria/elation. My wife who LOVES community and all that got that like once. My priest NEVER experienced it. My hypothesis is because I was raised atheist, God just nuked it with me that one time when I reached out to Him experimentally as a mercy - like, the priest is locked in, so he doesn't need it; whereas this atheist retard trying out religion will fail without this, and maybe throw him a bone a couple more times so he doesn't revert to his old ways. Consider me schizo if you want to, or a victim of wishful thinking - but this is a repeated experience that happens to people in Christian contexts, different people across nations, different upbringings, and I learned that after I experienced it. Now even if it's just chemicals, why?
>>18764765>There was a mathematical proven formula for the rate gravity pulls on objects in freefall previous to Newton?It's called Galileo's Law of Falling Bodies for a reason.
>>18763370>You are both arrogant and delusional if you think no one can honestly arrive at any position save your ownThis is exactly what flat earthers sayYour post is cope because other anon's trvth nvke has triggered you
An atheist is just a person who doesn't seek the truth and doesn't seek God. If they did, they would not be atheists. If you get mad by me saying this, then that just proves the point. The truth is the truth, if you actually love truth then there should be nothing to get mad and passive aggressive about.
>>18762689>People genuinely search for the truth and come to all manner of different conclusions, including the conclusion that there is no reason to assume gods exist.I believe whole heartedly that this is false. I don't believe it would be possible for someone to genuinely search for the truth and not come to the conclusion that God exists. In order to search for the truth, you need to open up the possibility that Christianity might be true. Atheists fail the first step. How do I know that? Because they're always hateful and bitter towards Christians. A truly neutral person would not be that way.
>>18762570Hitchens was a moron.https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u2MMFaz9Gyg
You have people who pretend like atheism is just an absence of religion and absence of religious type of identity or beliefs, pretend to be like neutral people who don't really know what to believe or think about anything, and then those same people will have steam coming out of their nostrils every time someone even mentions anything that has to do with God or the Bible. They have an obsessive need to debate religion on Reddit and elsewhere so much that they probably have blood pressure problems. Their blood pressure rises every time they smell a fundamentalist in the vicinity. You really think I don't have a clue what's going on?
>>18764945You really need to stop basing your worldviews on online shit-posters. If I judged Christians based purely on what I saw on /his/, I would assume they are the most arrogant, bitter, ignorant, and spiteful people in existence, when in reality most Christians are good people and easy to get along with.>>18764901>I can't defend my position, but I will hallucinate an image of you being angry and claim victory>>18764910If you think the truth on this particular issue is simple and easily perceived, then you haven't put any actual thought or research in to it.>>18764748> I grew up reading Hitchens and Dawkins and was quoting them and sneering at religioustards all the way to like 25So you went from being a smug, judgmental asshole who thinks everyone else is dumb on one side of the fence to being one on the other side. Quite the growth in character. I'm sorry, but it's hard to take you seriously if you're actually going to try to defend this "no one could arrive at any position other than mine if they actually thought about it" absurdity on one of the most hotly debated topics in human history.>I'm saying that the amount/quality of testimony shows that there's SOMETHINGI don't agree with that assertion. The testimony exists for a reason, yes, but that could just as easily be something to do with how the human mind processes information than for it to be an accurate depiction of reality. Given how contradictory much of it is, I don't really think that's a stretch, either. I certainly wouldn't feel comfortable making any big assumptions based off of it in any case, just as all the supposed ghost and alien sightings aren't compelling proof of their existence to me. >it could be 100% correct, but it does not improve decision making. Atheism is a stance on one very specific question, nothing more or less. It is not a dogma, lifestyle, or moral code. If you're expecting or needing it to be something it isn't, that's on you.
>>18762570Connection to the divine is privilege reserved for only the few. Paul explains this in Romans 9, if I am not mistaken.
>>18762570If we are all made in God’s image is that true that God creates images?
>>18765102>Atheism is a stance on one very specific question, nothing more or less. It is not a dogma, lifestyle, or moral code.All of what you said are derivatives of the answer to that one very specific question.
>>18762689>People genuinely search for the truth and come to all manner of different conclusions,No, they don't. The reason you reject Jesus and the King James Bible is because he shines light on your sins, probably some sort of anal perversion. It doesn't make you feel good that someone is calling you out for your wickedness, so you have to pretend that he doesn't exist. When you're writhing around in the burn pit, it's going to be harder to ignore that. Maybe that's why Dennett tried so hard to convince himself consciousness isn't real; In the back of his mind he knew he was going to burn forever.
>>18765311Why intimidate him? Christ did not intimidate somebody else to join him. Everybody has a choice, if they want to join or not. For some it is better that they're atheists and, if they were forced to be religious, it would only depress them and foster resentment and anger, which is neither good for them nor for the flock of the believers.
>>18765274>Connection to the divine is privilege reserved for only the few.True. We call them schizophrenics.
>>18762570Free Willnext
>>18765328>we
>>18764769That's nice but that doesn't prove anything. At the end of the day it's just a feeling you had, everything else is an elaboration that came after.
>>18765102You claim atheists can search for the truth. Okay, so how does searching for truth lead to atheism if atheism is not a position to begin with? If you believe that your position is the truth, that position must exist in the first place.
>>18765319>For some it is better that they're atheists and,It's not better for anyone to be atheist as opposed to Baptist. A bus could kill them at any moment and they'll wake up SCREAMING in the pits of Hell. Most likely you'll join them one day. CS Lewis is an idiot, by the way, and almost certainly burning at this very moment, right next to JRR Tolkien. Try again?
Its another "christians argue Deism ...andtherefore Yahweh" episode kek
>>18765599
>>18765596He never said that, though?Atheism is a position on the existance of God or not. That you need ti to be more is no one's problem but your's.
>>18765629All atheists breathe air. That is a true statement despite your definitions.
>>18762570First point: Adam loses the image and everyone born after Adam is born with his image (Adam’s) not God’s – cf. these verses - Gen 1v26 And God said, Let us make man in our image, after our likeness: Gen 1v27 So God created man in his own image, in the image of God created he him; male and female created he them. Gen 5v1 This is the book of the generations of Adam. In the day that God created man, in the likeness of God made he him; Gen 5v3 And Adam lived an hundred and thirty years, and begat a son in his own likeness, after his image; and called his name Seth: Note the ‘son’ is not made in the likeness of God but in the likeness of Adam (i.e. man). He had a dead spirit. No man is made in the image of God until he is born-again. When a man is born-again, the Bible says that he is… Col 3v10 And have put on the new man, which is renewed in knowledge after the image of him that created him.Second point (the reason why people are completely unable to perceive the divine):2 Thessalonians 2:10-12. The passage merely states that God gives what a man demands and asks for. If he wants a lie, he gets it. If he will not take light (John 11:10), then light becomes lightning (Matt. 24:27). If he will not accept the truth of God, then he is exposed to a power that God has permitted to exist for the purpose of putting across a lie (John 8:44). If you don't want to believe in God, you are not forced to. However, salvation is a free gift if you are willing to receive it.Jesus Christ is The Lord God in the flesh. He came to Earth in human form, willingly died on the cross as a sinless sacrifice for all the sins of the whole world to save you from eternal hell, the punishment for your sins. He was buried, then rose again from the dead. He now offers complete and permanent spiritual cleansing and eternal life to anyone who trusts Him enough to ask Him for it, instead of trusting their own works to be saved.www.youtube.com/watch?v=_VRT2FFXntc
>>18765102>>I can't defend my position blah blah blahYour cope projection doesn't change the fact all you can do is squawk in generic non rebuttalsLiterally the next line you wrote was:>If you think the truth on this particular issue is simple and easily perceived, then you haven't put any actual thought or research in to it....is so generic and low IQ it's like like you read it off a fortune cookie. ie it's just another mindless non rebuttal. it's clearly a pattern with you
