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Now to look at Constantine, he was not a non Christian using Christianity as a cohesion toll, instead he was a Christian who was concerned with stopping Christian persecution.

Wrong. Constantine did indeed legalize Christianity in an attempt to keep his empire in one piece. He was never baptized until he was on his deathbed. While he was Christian in name before that, he still carried on doing what Roman emperors did: kill people, wage war, engage in decidedly non-Christian activities. Constantine was not really a Christian before a few weeks before he died, and even that's not certain. Read up on him before you make such claims.

Karl Marx once said that Christianity is the opiate of the masses and I think that this is one of the points that Speed is trying to make, that Christianity was created to numb and control people.

However the analysis that speed provided was inaccurate and left a lot out. If we go to the beginning of Christianity we will see a far different picture.

The Roman Empire banned Christianity, and launched a campaign to end the religion. Some of the punishments included were adding Christians to the show at the coliseums, where Christians were feed to the animals, beheaded, and used as human torches. It was not until later under the rule of Constantine that the mass persecution of Christians was relived.

Now to look at Constantine, he was not a non Christian using Christianity as a cohesion toll, instead he was a Christian who was concerned with stopping Christian persecution.

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I Share nothing what so ever with religion, and I beleive that the moral guidelines of a society shouldn't have a religious origin.

If you don’t have moral standards society will descend into anarchy, because of this moral standards are necessary and as you stated the moral standards for the west are based on Judeo- Christian foundations.
So because you don’t think we should use the moral standers that we currently have what moral standards do you suggest we use?

I am going to lurk too...I am to stupid to try now.

Your argument that God does not exist. This is a Philosophical statement. Your argument that God commands "good or else" is a Theological one. SoI stand by my statement.

Also before I continue on your idea of subjectivity being, 'ok' so long as the subject in question is acknowledged as being opinion, and therefore not fact, only goes to prove my statement that subjectivity is unarguable and therefore false.

Now back tracking, to say Christians are bound by goodness as coercion from God, for fear of punishment is also false. In order to do Good, you'd have argue the relativity of Good, or else your whole argument is arbitrary. So if you are arguing that Christians are Coerced to doing Good, you'd have to acknowledge that either Goodness does exist, and prove that coercion is real.

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I was referring to the past, in the present there is no active persecution of atheists, and that is precisely because a point was reached where the church was forced to modernize and abandon it's more primitive customs to retain adepts.

So then any statement made of this issue is therefore not relative.

You both sound very smart. I'm going to stay out of this, but I'm lurking!

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Speed, your theology needs a little work.

For starters referring to my previous post as theology denotes your unwilingness to accept the possibility that there isn't a god. Theology is only a debatable subject if you are a believer, which you know I am not.
Furthermore, you missed the point on the goodness issue. If I had wanted to debate the relativity of good and evil I would of done so, instead what I was tryin to bring to your attention was that religious doctrine is cohercive by nature.

Going back on that though, I did forget to mention something. Western culture is entirely based on a series of moral principles adopted from the judeo-christian tradition. I Share nothing what so ever with religion, and I beleive that the moral guidelines of a society shouldn't have a religious origin.

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On the issue of Christian persecution of "Heretics" as evidence of flawed doctrine, and fear of loss of control, or further establishment of that authority, is without constitution. First, whatever persecution you maybe referencing is not mainstream, as I know several non-Christian who are not being persecuted as such.

I was referring to the past, in the present there is no active persecution of atheists, and that is precisely because a point was reached where the church was forced to modernize and abandon it's more primitive customs to retain adepts.

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You characterizing of the church hierarchy is also subjective and again therefore false.

Your characterization of subjectivity as automatically false is subjective and therefore false. Subjectivity,is only ok when the one being subjective is the individual who apply's judgement. That equates to saying that Stephen Hawking's point of view on theoretical physics is false because it is his, thus it is subjective.

Speed, your theology needs a little work.

First of all, your statement on, "be good because it is good." Leaves a few unanswered questions. First of them being, "What is good?" In order to establish, 'Good', you would need some kind of precedence for good, or universally understood definition for 'Good'. If the first horn is true, then the precedence for 'Good' would had to have been defined as so by someone who knows 'Good'. If the second is true, then 'Good' is embedded in the nature of all human beings. The Second cannot be true as 'Good' is typically a topic of relevance. What is true for Mr.X isn't true for Mr.Y. So if good is relative, then it therefore is not real. If the first is true, then the only authority to know good, would be someone whose very nature is good. Having established that goodness is not in the nature of mankind, but a relative term used to describe something that does not exist. Thus, God. So if God is goodness, then what God commands is good.

So having established what is good, lets look at what exactly God does command (according to the Christian religion). If God simply commanded "Goodness" in the nature that everyone do good, then your second statement about, "Do good or else" is also true. Giving that if God said to be Christian, then to be Christian MUST be good. So for God to say, "Do good because it is good." then you'd have to become Christian, because to be Christian is good. The two commands are one in the same.

On the issue of Christian persecution of "Heretics" as evidence of flawed doctrine, and fear of loss of control, or further establishment of that authority, is without constitution. First, whatever persecution you maybe referencing is not mainstream, as I know several non-Christian who are not being persecuted as such. Nor have I heard anything on this persecution having on a large scale. I would also like to say that this idea is a swinging door, as one could argue that Atheist who are out spoken against religions (not unlike yourself) are afraid of truth. I think you and I both know that isn't true. So on the issue of Christians who fall from grace, the same is for an Atheist who finds faith... this is subjective and unarguable. So I would say it is completely false, such as it is.

You characterizing of the church hierarchy is also subjective and again therefore false. Perhaps if you were not so general you would have an argument. But such as it is, not all of the church embraces any type of hierarchy no more or less then atheist organizing rallies is a recognized hierarchy.

Your entire closing statement is in assumption that all your previous statements are in fact true, and if they were then you would be right. However your over generalizing and subjective reasoning has made this difficult to accept as fact. But giving the benefit of doubt, if it were true, by those standards you couldn't be atheist either.

Perhaps you could be more specific?

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Speed... are you always this presumptuous? Or do you know every single believer, and therefore know all this for a fact?

No I do not know every single believer and I'm thankfull for it, there are way to many people I don't want to have anything to do with.

Like I've said many times, faith is irrational and ilogical, there are to many different factors involved that make christianity(and all other religions for that matter) completely incoherent.
The first is their cohercive nature. Notice that in the Judeo-Christian western religions every action one is supposed to carry out or supress is justified through a positive/negative retribution factor. The bible does not state be good because it's good, the Bible states Be good or else. Now considering the bible was written by human beings, and christian doctrine was significantly manipulated during the council of Nicaea, which was organized by the roman emperor Constantine, it is difficult to believe that political interests didn't prime. Futhermore, Constantine converted to christianity when he became aware that it would soon assume the role of dominant religion in his empire, and that it was pointless to try to supress it. That is why there are so many pagan remnants in christianity, it was originally adopted for political reasons, and it was necessary to introduce some modifications so the general populace would accept it. For example, using sunday as the weekly day of rest derived from the pagan cult of the sun, thus sunday, or in latin dies Solis.
What this comes to prove is that Christian faith was originally a political instrument used to achieve cohesion throughout the roman empire.

The second point I'd like to make is religion's supressive nature. In the judeo christian tradition there have been many historic precedents of punishment for those who deviated from the commonly accepted path towards god, either be it atheism, paganism, or others. A significant part of the church's efforts in past centurys where dedicated to punishing those who for variuos reasons where considered heretics. Aside from the obviously totalitarian nature of religious doctrine, there is a clear lack of confidence in the truthfullness of said doctrine. Human beings have a psychological disposition to aggresiveness when they feel threatened by something, especially if they feel it endangers that which they deem absolute and important. Thus, the violent supression that was carried out towards anything non christians in the past is nothing but a reflection of lack of true confidence in christian doctrine itself, otherwise why should christians feel theatened by those that profess different beleif's? Obviously, those that carried out doctrinal cleansing couldn't admit to this, not even to themselves.
When this is looked at objectively, and I believe myself capable of doing so, it is difficult not to appreciate the generally established trend, western religion is not self confident, and self confidence is absolutely essential when one proclaims absolute truth regarding an issue, especially one that is intangible and tied only to the spiritual world.
Furthemore proving this point, we all know how religion has been institutionalized, and the church has become the only vehicle to heaven. This is also contradictory with christian ideals, as god supposedly made us all equal, but to achieve him we must surrender to those who situate themselves above us in religious hierarchy, and are therefore closer to god than us.
For the most part these control mecanisms aren't conscious, but that doesn't mean they don't accomplish their function, maintaining a monopoly on spiritual life in the western hemisphere.

Essentially, I believe that religion as a whole responds to a dictatorial and totalitarian nature that doesn't correspond with it's associated doctrine, thus I beleive that it is ultimately fake, and that the various cohersion methods of which I have spoken are necessary to retain respect and influence in human society. It is like a hive mind, on an individual level people are not conscious of this, but as a whole, the system has adopted a functional way of maintaining it's position through syncronous behaviour of it's composing individuals.

That is why I believe religion is a hoax, if you call that being presumtuous then I urge you to provide justification.

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Missions accomplish helping others and evangelism in the same act.

Okay. I was not attempting to say that missions were not necessary, I was simply trying to clarify the idea that evangelism, and the message of eternal life in heaven are important.

I believe you should reread everything I said. Missions accomplish helping others and evangelism in the same act.

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Sometimes people need to see more than one side to an issue. It's important to be able to see and understand every opinion, and every outlook. Besides, if I just argued my opinion, it would be boring, as I can usually see every side. I just choose to play devil's advocate occasionally. Being chaotic isn't a bad thing.

Okay, thanks for clarifying.

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So why do you say it?

Sometimes people need to see more than one side to an issue. It's important to be able to see and understand every opinion, and every outlook. Besides, if I just argued my opinion, it would be boring, as I can usually see every side. I just choose to play devil's advocate occasionally. Being chaotic isn't a bad thing.

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No one said salvation isn't the message. I am just saying there is far more ways of preaching that message than standard 3.

I believe that you said helping people was the most important mission of Christianity.

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Note that what I say on the boards is rarely what I actually believe to be true..

So why do you say it?

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Make up you mind do you support missions related work or not.

I've had my mind made up the whole time. I can argue without stating my feelings in every post. I can be withdrawn from the issue. Note that what I say on the boards is rarely what I actually believe to be true..unless I draw it from a personal experience.

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Nephiliem, You have a nice touch at putting words in peoples mouths

I'm glad I wasn't the only one who noticed it.

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The only reason any of you have any faith in god is because you are coerced into it while you are young.

Oh yeah? Wow... thanks for telling me that... This whole time I was sure I was raised atheist until my late teens... Thanks for the news flash

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If you believe in Christian precepts, then faith is not a choice one is free to make, but a requisite.
Faith by imposition is not faith, it is fear.

Says who?

Speed... are you always this presumptuous? Or do you know every single believer, and therefore know all this for a fact?

Nephiliem, You have a nice touch at putting words in peoples mouths.

No one said salvation isn't the message. I am just saying there is far more ways of preaching that message than standard 3.

Perhaps you could stand to be less aggressive when it comes to your beliefs. No one is asking for a new inquisition.

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Being a Christian isn't a business transaction.

Oh, but yes, it is. The only reason any of you have any faith in god is because you are coerced into it while you are young.
It's contradictory to god's supposed nature to demand faith in him to not go to hell.
If you believe in Christian precepts, then faith is not a choice one is free to make, but a requisite.
Faith by imposition is not faith, it is fear.

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But in all things considered it isn't the most important ones.

Yes salvation is the most important message.

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Nephilim, if you can't show people that you care about them in this world, how are you going to show them you care about their souls?

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Nephilim: When people did that to me, I felt as though they thought I owed them something. "I helped you, now you should do something for me."

Make up you mind do you support missions related work or not.

DrummerLady: Yes. Why wouldn't we?

Nephilim: When people did that to me, I felt as though they thought I owed them something. "I helped you, now you should do something for me."

LDG, if anyone who considers themselves a Christian and answers that question with a "no", should seriously consider their motives. If their only incentive for being a follower of Christ is because they get something out of it. ..
Being a Christian isn't a business transaction. We are asked to follow a very long difficult road, because it is what God wants for us. Not because of what we stand to gain from it all. Other wise we'd we a group of self-righteous and self serving people...


Nephilem, No one is saying that Heaven, Hell, and the second coming are taboo topics. But in all things considered it isn't the most important ones. There are so many Christians who stay so focused on these things, that they miss the whole message and point altogether. It is like standing in front of a masterpiece painting, but so close they only see a small piece, and miss the bigger picture.

Jesus' ministry was about the coming of the Kingdom of God. That message was focusing on the metaphysical aspects of everyday life. Love, Charity, self sacrifice... etc. THAT is the body of Christ. As the body we are his hands and feet. By our example, they will see by who and why we do what we do. That isn't to say evangelism isn't important, however evangelism alone will not get the job done.