Politics Do you believe in god?

[Tanja87]

:lol:

[post="1009475"]<{POST_SNAPBACK}>[/post]​

This Image reminds me of christmas!! ^_^

 

[Aliasfan13]

I believe in God.

 

[alias:88]

I believe in the God of the Bible. Yes, I am a Christian. I am very surprised that so may of you are atheists. I know you want there to be scientific evidence and all that before you will believe i a "higher power" but at some point you have to take things on faith...
but what i find the most interesting is how alot of you believe in reincarnation, evolution and 'karma' and unpersonal godlike forces- it just doesnt make sense to me. There's no evidence for any of this (although some people claim theres "evidence" for evolution). I believe that Chris is a personal God who made the universe and came to earth to save us from our sins. I also believe that going to church and reading the Bible is essential to the Christian life.

 

[Natalia]

There IS evidence of evolution, which is a big part of the problem people have with believing in God in this day and age.

Even people like me, who like to believe there is some sort of higher power out there, have trouble believing a huge chunk of the Bible. So many of the things at the core of Christianity have been proved wrong by science. If we lived our lives by the Bible, many of us women would be living in slavery, most of us would be burned at the stake, and we would still believe things like, 'the Earth is flat and at the centre of the universe'.

So, while I like to believe there is some sort of God, I believe it is important to recognise that a lot of Christian beliefs are completely irrelevant to modern-day life.

 

[AliasALIAS]

I'm Catholic and believe in evolution.

Even people like me, who like to believe there is some sort of higher power out there, have trouble believing a huge chunk of the Bible. So many of the things at the core of Christianity have been proved wrong by science. If we lived our lives by the Bible, many of us women would be living in slavery, most of us would be burned at the stake, and we would still believe things like, 'the Earth is flat and at the centre of the universe'.  I believe it is important to recognise that a lot of Christian beliefs are completely irrelevant to modern-day life.

[post="1010312"]<{POST_SNAPBACK}>[/post]​

Those aren't the core Christian beliefs

There may be some great being that create the world/universe, but I don't think that it is watching over the world/universe, and if it is, it's either evil or doing a really bad job

That's interesting, I've never thought about it that way (God doing a bad job).


My current religion teacher sorta believes that all the different religions in the world are God's ways of extending to different people. While I don't completely believe it, it's an interesting theory to explain different religious experiences that are often told but not really proven (seeing the light but escaping death, reincarnation/memories of past lives, enlightenment).

 

[mystery_chick]

I dont' believe in God, never had, and probably never will. I don't believe in reincarnation or karma but evolution is not a belief to me. It's more solid and scientific than "god" I dunno if you guys ever heard of the story, I think it might just be an old Chinese folklore, but it went like this. A long, long time ago, the giraffes had short neck and they ate grass and plants that lived off the ground but then when the grass was depleted the only food that they can get was from the trees, but their neck was too short to reach the leaves so they streched their neck over and over again until it grew longer (a childhood version of "evolution" ) and they finally reached the tree leaves. So ya, I guess you can say I dont' believe in God because i was never brought up to believe in him/her/whatever the for that it is in. But now that i have more of a mind of my own, I still dont' believe in God.
--mandy

 

[S/V Forever]

and we would still believe things like, 'the Earth is flat and at the centre of the universe'.

So, while I like to believe there is some sort of God, I believe it is important to recognise that a lot of Christian beliefs are completely irrelevant to modern-day life.

[post="1010312"]<{POST_SNAPBACK}>[/post]​

Actually the Bible says that the earth is a sphere. Also while the Bible is not a science book every thing it says concerning science is accurate.

 

[Natalia]

I think you kind of missed my point. My point is that I am Christian, and yet I don't think people will go to hell for having pre-marital sex, or that we should follow everything the Bible says, as it was written before science as we know it existed. Now there IS proof of evolution. And in the Middle Ages people were burned at the stake for having 'heretical' ideas such as that the Earth was round, and not at the centre of the universe.

The thing that annoys me about people who are extremist Christians is that they are quite happy to believe in certain parts of science, and certain social developments (the parts that make their life comfortable), and yet they are also quite happy to condemn me for things I do in my life that aren't unlawful, and don't harm anybody, as well as things I believe in.

I'm not talking about people in this thread, but on another message board, I have had people telling me I am going to rot in hell because I think pre-marital sex is okay, and because I believe that a woman should be equal to a man (and other things like that).

Religion needs to evolve with science and society.

 

[truthtakestime47]

I believe in God and am a pretty religious Roman Catholic.

 

[jems]

erm I never reply or post in here really but am bored tonight and thought I would post cos I saw this thread on the board front page and it was a question I thought I could answer with a simple - "no"

but i am interested to hear you talk of religion and evolution - how can you believe in god if you believe in evolution since the two ideas contradict each other or did i read wrong?

 

[German Muse]

I believe in something but I would´nt call it "god" actually!
I think there is something somewhere, but I don´t need any institution or book to believe in anything!
Actually it´s hard to believe in anything which were established in an ancient time with (for me) no proof to believe in it!
I mean it´s the 21 century so much had changed (equal rights, women rights, etc.)!
People in the past fought so hard to keep religions and politics separated!
But (in my opinion) now they blended once again!

Muse

 

[AliasALIAS]

but i am interested to hear you talk of religion and evolution - how can you believe in god if you believe in evolution since the two ideas contradict each other  or did i read wrong?

[post="1013056"]<{POST_SNAPBACK}>[/post]​

Science and religion don't necessarily contradict each other.

In 1996, Pope John Paul II stated that the conclusions reached by scientific disciplines cannot be in contradiction with divine Revelation, then proceeded to accept the scientific conclusion that evolution is a well-established theory.

The Pope went on to point out that science deals with material reality, while questions of "moral conscience, freedom, or … of aesthetic and religious experience, fall within the competence of philosophical analysis and reflection, while theology brings out [their] ultimate meaning according to the Creator's plans."

--from http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/evolution/religion...atement_01.html

There are lots of theories that merge evolution with Christian beliefs. I haven't studied any specific ones, but in general, I believe that God is the sole Creator of the world and the guiding force in evolution. Not that God necessarily "controls" everything, but without God, evolution nor life would be possible.

 

[Azhria Lilu]

As Tim O'Brien says, "it doesn't have to have happened for it to be true".

There are also many kinds of truths. There is the physical truth of what actually physically happened, and then there is the emotional truth that conveys the emotion, the experience, and the message much better than the physical truth ever could.

 

[Victoria King]

I have been raised as a Christian and fully believe in the Bible and in Jesus' teachings and that He is the Savior. To me, there is proof in the nature! how can all of this just appear with all the complexity.

If anyone wants to talk about it, you can pm me! Im not on often but I am willing to talk to you about this being how important it is.

 

[Alias_Addict47]

To me, there is proof in the nature! how can all of this just appear with all the complexity.

[post="1013289"]<{POST_SNAPBACK}>[/post]​

I find it more confusing to think that a God created this Earth and this universe and I believe it would be more confusing as to why only people are on Earth and not somewhere else.

What did he try to make places and mess up many times so it was inhabitable...for all we know we coulda ended up on Pluto and wondering what Earth is. To think a god did it all seems, off. And I don't believe what any scientists say either...No one can really explain how the planets came to be, unless you sat with God or watched the planets become created. hoever that may be.

I find Evolution and Religion VERY different. Evolution is science, fact based things...though it is funny to have people say we descended from apes :lol:
Evolution is the process of which things change, religion is christianity is more believing on how things began. If Evolution bothers people so much so should other religions. Evolution is science, mostly based upon facts, God is a belief, mostly on unknown stories that no can prove were true. You can usually never prove one to be true over the other, but somethings are ludacris, just thinking there is a god seems out there...but so does the ape theory :lol: still funny!

 

[xinli11]

I find it more confusing to think that a God created this Earth and this universe and I believe it would be more confusing as to why only people are on Earth and not somewhere else.

What did he try to make places and mess up many times so it was inhabitable...for all we know we coulda ended up on Pluto and wondering what Earth is. To think a god did it all seems, off. And I don't believe what any scientists say either...No one can really explain how the planets came to be, unless you sat with God or watched the planets become created. hoever that may be.

I find Evolution and Religion VERY different. Evolution is science, fact based things...though it is funny to have people say we descended from apes  :lol:
Evolution is the process of which things change, religion is christianity is more believing on how things began. If Evolution bothers people so much so should other religions. Evolution is science, mostly based upon facts, God is a belief, mostly on unknown stories that no can prove were true. You can usually never prove one to be true over the other, but somethings are ludacris, just thinking there is a god seems out there...but so does the ape theory  :lol: still funny!

[post="1013356"]<{POST_SNAPBACK}>[/post]​

Well, science and truth are not necessarily the same thing. Science is not a concept, or an idea. Science is just a process by which we use to explore and to understand. Often times science leads us down the wrong path. Case in point, the earth is flat. Case in point, we are the center of the universe. But because the process is ongoing , we continually revise our understanding of the universe. Over the last 3 centuries, we've gone through so many paradigm shifts, from newtonian physics, to Einsteinian relativity, to quantum mechanism, and now to the relatively new field of string theory. Despite all these advances, we are barely scratching the surface, and we still have no idea if we are on the right track, and that's OK. Science is not truth, it's the continual search for truth.

There can actually be quite a bit of faith involved in science. Try your hands at a little string theory, and you'll see just how far fetched some of these proposals are. And why do we think string theory is right? Well a part of it is that it feels right, that it's mathematically beautiful and elegant. Some string theorists would say that a theory this beautiful cannot possibly be wrong. Granted, not all of string theory is hand waving. The mathematics is actually very complicated. And that's the problem. The mathematics of string theory is so advanced that we do not yet have the tools necessary to fully understand it. So on the one hand, we lack the tools to prove to conclusively whether it's true or not. But on the other hand, even with our limited unerstanding, we see the inherent elegance in the theory, and we are also able to see indirect evidence of the theory in the unexplainable phenomenon we've observed in our current study of physics. These two things together give us faith to move forward, even though we are not sure of our steps. Sounds a bit like faith doesn't it?

Just something that I've thought about over the years in my studies.

Xin Li

 

[jems]

thanks guys for your thoughts on science versus religion - although an atheist, I am very interested in all kinds of religion and how people are drawn into religion and have "faith" - my interest is particularly cos i have travelled quite a lot and been to countries eg. thailand where religion is so important and you have to respect certain ways to respect the country you are visiting.

my non beliefs come from the simple facts in the bible (and other books suck as the koran etc) which to me are plainly stories - stories about a man who yes obviously touched a lot of peoples lives - jesus was a prophet and a highly respected man who did live, that I believe, but I do not believe he was not human - I think he was the son of mary and joseph - mary being no virgin - and that he lived a life where he affected people - particularly on a spritual level. He clearly gave people faith and lived on in stories past his years, eventually becoming the lead character in the bible. But i firmly believe the bible is simply a 'chinese whispers' of stories - told over the generation and made great by the storytellers. A book which clearly some people need to believe, since many on this earth rely on faith to answer questions and get through tough times. This is fair enough if it helps people but sadly it leads me to the side of religion I dispise. And this comes from the terrorism and wars going on today. Almost every war in history has been started due to a religious dispute or clash or religious groups - and this is where I think that 'faith' can be a bad thing. People seem to be lead by their 'faith' rather than by common sense and their own thoughts - since their own thoughts are altered by what they are 'taught' by their religion. This, to me, takes away a persons individuality - as it removes decision from their hands - putting it into gods. This is something I could never believe in since I am completely unwilling to accept that my fate is not my own! I do not want to belileve thagt my life is mapped out for me and that choices I make will have no effect - I want things I do and say to change life for me so I can make it my own. Also this deep belief in religions seems to be when wars begin - and war is something I dispise. In addition, the fact there are so many relilgions and gods in the world is enough for me to see that they are all stories from different parts of the world which people have been brought up listening to - but when people's beliefs are so deeply embedded that they cannot live around people of other beliefs - and fighting begins - I find it very difficult to understand how religion is a thing to be loved.

Please do not be offended by my words if you are a religious person as I fully respect peoples life choices, there thoughts are simply my own and are not meant to offend anyone - my sister in law is a devout christian and I am always interested to hear her stories of faith - but she understands my non belief just as a understand her belief - and we co-exist happily together. As I believe all religions should.

 

[SecretAgentMan]

Yes but I think he hates me.

 

[Alias_Addict47]

I understand with Science being an ongoing search for the truth (sounds like the X-Files :lol: ) But I believe though you have to have faith in Science, there is a difference between religion and science as in faith. That's what I was saying ^_^

 

[Aliasfan13]

Yes but I think he hates me. 

[post="1013778"]<{POST_SNAPBACK}>[/post]​

God doesn't hate! He forgives all your sins. That's why he died on the cross - to save us.