Figuring Out Religion

[curlew]

That's an interesting theological concept that "We" were warned before the fall and made a choice to do it any way. As I believe I said to Mountaineer a few posts ago, I wasn't there and neither were you, unless you believe in the pre-existence of souls. What kind of justice is it for the wrath of God to abide on all of humanity for all of eternity because two people named Adam and Eve were tempted by a snake and disobeyed God?

Having just posted to MachineGhost's thread about the irrationality of Alcoholics Anonymous, I'm left wondering if maybe this isn't the mother of all irrational beliefs.

That event was the cause of sinfulness entering humanity. We all inherited it. And look around! Aren't we turned in on ourselves? Don't we want to be, and think of ourselves, as God?

If I thought of myself as God I would be sleeping in tomorrow instead of getting up and reporting to my cubicle to await further orders from the powers that be (I AM planning on being that kind of god next year).

[curlew]

“Adam was but human—this explains it all. He did not want the apple for the apple's sake, he wanted it only because it was forbidden. The mistake was in not forbidding the serpent; then he would have eaten the serpent.”

Mark Twain had some great writings on religion.

In heaven nobody will desire to do that which is forbidden any more? What a boring place that will be!

[MachineGhost]

That's an interesting theological concept that "We" were warned before the fall and made a choice to do it any way. As I believe I said to Mountaineer a few posts ago, I wasn't there and neither were you, unless you believe in the pre-existence of souls. What kind of justice is it for the wrath of God to abide on all of humanity for all of eternity because two people named Adam and Eve were tempted by a snake and disobeyed God?

It's only interesting in an academic-intellectual way because there isn't a shred of evidence the afterlife works that way. So what does that tell you about religious believers that dogmatically persist in believing fiction despite actual evidence the contrary?

Having just posted to MachineGhost's thread about the irrationality of Alcoholics Anonymous, I'm left wondering if maybe this isn't the mother of all irrational beliefs.

Well, given the alternative of an uncaring, nasty, brutish, sadistic, indifferent stark state of nature aka objective physical reality, people have to fill in the internal horror with mystical religious fictions. They will twist themselves into endless pretzels justifying whatever it is they want to believe in and endlessly distract themselves with "theology" as if it had any real meaning, such as this thread evidences.

[Mountaineer]

Congratulations, Rev. Dr. Wilfred L. Karsten!

“Though All Our Life Is Like a Scroll” Rev. Dr. Wilfred L. Karsten - Hymn Competition Winner. This beautiful hymn truly embodies the theme of the Reformation 2017 celebration, “It’s Still All About Jesus.” Rev. Karsten focused especially on the word still. As he wrote in his entry, “Half a millennium later, the truths of the Reformation continue to apply.” Rev. Karsten is the pastor at Holy Cross Lutheran Church in Moline, Illinois.

http://lutheranreformation.org/get-invo ... mpetition/

THOUGH ALL OUR LIFE IS LIKE A SCROLL

Though all our life is like a scroll
Unrolled with blemished pages;
Though sin has shredded what was whole
And death is now our wages;
Yet here we stand in confidence,
With Jesus as our sole defense,
For He alone still saves us.

Though pompously we try to dress
In costumes of our making;
Though fig leaves of self-righteousness
Are futile and heartbreaking;
Yet filthy rags Christ gladly wore
So we would perish nevermore.
His grace alone still clothes us.

Though earth’s deep waters foam and roar
As surging waves are rolling;
Though all the nations rage with war
While bells of doom are tolling;
Yet God gives peaceful fortitude,
He nurtures us with Heaven’s food.
True faith alone still anchors.

Though critics cut out Scripture’s claims
And treat them with derision;
Though they conduct their hostile aims
With scalpels of suspicion;
Yet how the living, two-edged sword
Proclaims the dead and risen Lord!
God’s Word alone: still truthful.

Now sing a high doxology
To God who gives salvation.
Both here and in eternity
Let this be our vocation.
To Father, Son, and Spirit raise
A symphony of grateful praise,
For He alone is worthy.

[curlew]

I once was blind but now I see.
It wasn't an epiphany.
I used my head.
I thought instead.
What good is this religion?

Prayers unheard.
Read the word.
Pretend it really matters.

Sing the songs.
Right your wrongs.
Listen while the preacher blathers.

The Bible is a very big book.
Completely full of gobbledygook.
I learned it well.
Enough to tell.
It's a human composition.

Curlew

[Mountaineer]

NYT blows it ..... again!

http://thefederalist.com/2016/06/17/new ... n-of-gays/

... Mountaineer

[Mountaineer]

WHAT COLOR ARE YOU? Vibrant with the vivid hues of red, orange, yellow, blue, green? Faded pastel pink, blue, grey? No color at all? Being a Christian means being different. Believers stand out from a crowd because Christ dwells within them. His blood purges our sin and recolors our soul. His perfect mercy colors our actions. And you can be certain that Christ’s holy hue will not leave you a soft pastel easily overlooked by others. The world loves Christians. That is as long as Christians soften their beliefs to a soft pastel, conform to the culture, and keep quiet about Jesus. People begin to look suspiciously at Christians when there is a whiff of cultural disobedience:
* Nobody else is praying over the food at a restaurant. Why are you making us uncomfortable like that?
* We all go golfing on Sunday mornings. Are you passing judgement when you refuse to join us?
* It is weird when the conversation turns to gossip. Why are you so awkward when it comes to talking about others?
* We all complain about our wives. Why can’t you just be one of the guys?
The world loves Christians as long as they act like everyone else.

The early part of the twentieth century witnessed many church bodies softening their beliefs. Liberal theology swept through Protestant churches turning every belief into ecumenical ecru, metaphorical mauve, or a plain soft grey. Lutherans held to their true colors. When the culture asks you to just be like everyone else, what are you going to do? Share the Gospel or be lukewarm, pastel, and disappear into the cracks thereby committing societal suicide by ditching the whole Christian thing and thus discarding an eternal life of no pain, no worries, a renewed body, and being with your loved ones who believe forever? Be bold, be vibrant, be a Christian, be a friend, love others, tell others the good news. Be VIBRANT!

... Mountaineer

[curlew]

[MachineGhost]

If you call, do you get hooked up with Scientology?

[Mountaineer]

Suppose that Christ was not raised from death to life. What if Jesus was just a great teacher that simply lived and died? What if we were left to save ourselves? What would still matter if Christ were dead in the ground? Nothing. Nothing else matters if Christ is not risen. Without the hope of God in Jesus Christ, there is nothing of lasting worth. Without his resurrection, there is only despair, decay, and death. There is only the bane, blight, and brokenness of Sin. Humanity would have to save itself from death and brokenness. If God were dead and in the tomb, then our lives would be a steady march toward the vacuous pit of death. This is what human existence would look like if the stone never rolled away from Christ’s grave:

Death: life ends in death. That is it. Meaningless molecules came together to form life, and soon they will come apart in the grave. Do not try to find meaning in life because there is no lasting meaning to be found. Happiness, joy, and laughter are clipped by the vast nothingness of mortality. Brokenness abounds, death is inevitable, and suffering is inescapable. Every possible remedy to overcome death is impotent. We toil to extend our lives by mere minutes on the face of eternity in which we don't exist.

Medicine: the medical arts have no cure for death. Cancer multiplies faster than researchers can develop new treatments. And even if doctors cure cancer, death will surely come from some other source. Viruses spread as fast as a contaminated plane can fly. Perennial medical problems – infertility, miscarriages, and the common cold – still haunt humanity. Researchers promise a brighter future by locating every gene in the human body, yet countless children are concerned with locating an absentee father. Why squeak out a few more years of life if it is but a drop of water in the vast sea of death?

Technology: technological progress is equally hopeless. New technology promises a new life of happiness and peace. Yet, these advancements in technology only reflect and magnify our human brokenness. Smartphones boast of perfect connectivity; yet, all they really do is promote distracted driving. The greatest technological achievement of the 20th century was the atomic bomb. The greatest technological achievement of this century will likely be just a better bomb.

Racism: bigotry has no permanent remedy in education, activism, or public service announcements. Any progress made of these efforts is quickly erased by one protest, one bullet, or one bomb. Slavery is not an entry into a history book; entire tribes and nationalities continue to work against their will for others. Terrorism utilizes everyday technology – planes, computers, and social media – to create a World Wide Web of violence. All a person needs is a few hundred dollars and some household items to inflict unimaginable brutality. Why toil to make social progress if the next-generation is going to undo it all anyway?

Wealth: economic progress claims to create a better world for all people. Yet, the only apparent progress is precariously stacking the financial house of cards higher and higher and higher. A lifetime of savings depends on a menagerie of circumstances including the price of oil, the direction of the wind, bloviating from the White House, and the current turmoil in some Eastern European or Western Asia country ending in "stan". The economy climbs and debt deepens. The American dream is paying off student loans before you default in death. Why scrimp and save for a lifetime when death is just going to take it all away?

If Christ is not risen, then nothing else matters. Sin abounds. Brokenness brings more brokenness. Bummer ……. right? Wrong! Here's the good news: God is not dead. Christ is risen. And everything else orbits around the gravity of the empty tomb. The truth is we cannot save ourselves. Every attempt at our own salvation, every human effort to stop death, comes up wanting. Rescue from the brokenness of life can only come from outside of us. God comes into our midst with the remedy. Salvation is from beyond us. Jesus Christ makes all things new.

The truth confounds the false teachers. God entered his creation, took on human flesh for all eternity, and made all things new through Jesus Christ. Jesus did not just make some things new. He did not just make human things new. He made all things new. Jesus Christ is the harbinger of the new creation. Thus all of God's creation - humans, angels, animals, heavens, and mountains – rejoiced at Christ's arrival. He was born amid a symphony of bleating barnyard animals. Mary draped rags woven from organic matter around the newborn Jesus' body. The sky above proclaimed God's handiwork as a star announced the birth of the newborn Christ child. Shepherds and angels, human and nonhuman creatures, rejoiced at the news of Jesus's birth. The mountains quaked and the sky darkened when creation thought Jesus had died forever.

Jesus heals broken bodies and heals your brokenness and mine. He forgives your sin and mine, he shines truth into your darkness and mine, and makes you and me a new creation. New life came to the whole creation through Jesus. And new life comes to you and me through faith in Jesus. The disease of sin is made well by grace through faith in Christ. The weight of sin is removed by calling upon the name of Jesus in faith. God counts Christ's righteousness as our righteousness. Broken people are justified by grace, receive the forgiveness of sins, and take hold of eternal salvation through faith in Jesus Christ.

... Mountaineer

Credits to "Being Lutheran" by Trevor Sutton

[Pointedstick]

Mountaineer, you're hurting your own cause more than you're helping. Yammering on about Jesus isn't going to convert intelligent, skeptical people. It isn't even going to "plant a seed." If anything it's erecting a tent over the garden and making it barren. Intelligent skeptical people don't come to Christianity through Jesus, but rather through something that's more subtle and mystical, and then they get on board with Jesus later because he's kind of a big deal to Christians. Jesus is how you convert or plant the seed in dolts, not thoughtful people.

[MachineGhost]

Mountaineer, you're hurting your own cause more than you're helping. Yammering on about Jesus isn't going to convert intelligent, skeptical people. It isn't even going to "plant a seed." If anything it's erecting a tent over the garden and making it barren. Intelligent skeptical people don't come to Christianity through Jesus, but rather through something that's more subtle and mystical, and then they get on board with Jesus later because he's kind of a big deal to Christians. Jesus is how you convert or plant the seed in dolts, not thoughtful people.

[curlew]

deleted

[MachineGhost]

I'm reposting this here since new threads get very little traffic nowadays. The forum seems to be dying.


Very creepy! I guess we have to expect this kind of bizarre religious cult in our scifi mediastream future, right? They're gonna pray on the isolationism and lack of community due to a consumerist society. I feel ill.

Hollywood may never be the same again now that the Church of Scientology has opened its new movie studios, which they claim has bigger and better facilities than Paramount.

Leader David Miscavige announced to the world that this will be an 'uncorrupted communications line to the billions', as Scientology promises to reach 'virtually every person on Earth'.

The colossal studio complex on Sunset Boulevard in Los Angeles was finally unveiled after five years of renovations at a cost of at least $50 million on May 28.

The new studio will also be used to make polished propaganda movies to recruit more followers while it's most famous recruit, Tom Cruise, is set to film his Hollywood blockbusters at the glittering base, which has bigger studios and sound stages than Paramount, the church claims.

...

Miscavige said: 'The average young adult spends ten hours of every day on the internet, and someone searches for 'the meaning of life' every five seconds, while someone else searches for answers about 'spirituality' six times per second.

'SMP will harness the power of every social media outlet imaginable to provide those answers.

'So for the 95 per cent of the world's population that listens to the radio every day and the average viewer who spends some 40 hours glued to a TV every week, the obvious answer was: our own radio station, our own TV channel, and our own broadcasting facilities.'

Full Story & Photos: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article ... Earth.html

[curlew]

Thanks for the vivid description of the dark black hole of despair you would be looking into if you were to stop believing what YOU believe. Only 32% of the world is Christian so 68% of the world's population doesn't feel the same way. Good luck convincing them otherwise.

Suppose that Christ was not raised from death to life. What if Jesus was just a great teacher that simply lived and died? What if we were left to save ourselves? What would still matter if Christ were dead in the ground? Nothing. Nothing else matters if Christ is not risen. Without the hope of God in Jesus Christ, there is nothing of lasting worth. Without his resurrection, there is only despair, decay, and death. There is only the bane, blight, and brokenness of Sin. Humanity would have to save itself from death and brokenness. If God were dead and in the tomb, then our lives would be a steady march toward the vacuous pit of death. This is what human existence would look like if the stone never rolled away from Christ’s grave:

Death: life ends in death. That is it. Meaningless molecules came together to form life, and soon they will come apart in the grave. Do not try to find meaning in life because there is no lasting meaning to be found. Happiness, joy, and laughter are clipped by the vast nothingness of mortality. Brokenness abounds, death is inevitable, and suffering is inescapable. Every possible remedy to overcome death is impotent. We toil to extend our lives by mere minutes on the face of eternity in which we don't exist.

Medicine: the medical arts have no cure for death. Cancer multiplies faster than researchers can develop new treatments. And even if doctors cure cancer, death will surely come from some other source. Viruses spread as fast as a contaminated plane can fly. Perennial medical problems – infertility, miscarriages, and the common cold – still haunt humanity. Researchers promise a brighter future by locating every gene in the human body, yet countless children are concerned with locating an absentee father. Why squeak out a few more years of life if it is but a drop of water in the vast sea of death?

Technology: technological progress is equally hopeless. New technology promises a new life of happiness and peace. Yet, these advancements in technology only reflect and magnify our human brokenness. Smartphones boast of perfect connectivity; yet, all they really do is promote distracted driving. The greatest technological achievement of the 20th century was the atomic bomb. The greatest technological achievement of this century will likely be just a better bomb.

Racism: bigotry has no permanent remedy in education, activism, or public service announcements. Any progress made of these efforts is quickly erased by one protest, one bullet, or one bomb. Slavery is not an entry into a history book; entire tribes and nationalities continue to work against their will for others. Terrorism utilizes everyday technology – planes, computers, and social media – to create a World Wide Web of violence. All a person needs is a few hundred dollars and some household items to inflict unimaginable brutality. Why toil to make social progress if the next-generation is going to undo it all anyway?

Wealth: economic progress claims to create a better world for all people. Yet, the only apparent progress is precariously stacking the financial house of cards higher and higher and higher. A lifetime of savings depends on a menagerie of circumstances including the price of oil, the direction of the wind, bloviating from the White House, and the current turmoil in some Eastern European or Western Asia country ending in "stan". The economy climbs and debt deepens. The American dream is paying off student loans before you default in death. Why scrimp and save for a lifetime when death is just going to take it all away?

If Christ is not risen, then nothing else matters. Sin abounds. Brokenness brings more brokenness. Bummer ……. right? Wrong! Here's the good news: God is not dead. Christ is risen. And everything else orbits around the gravity of the empty tomb. The truth is we cannot save ourselves. Every attempt at our own salvation, every human effort to stop death, comes up wanting. Rescue from the brokenness of life can only come from outside of us. God comes into our midst with the remedy. Salvation is from beyond us. Jesus Christ makes all things new.

The truth confounds the false teachers. God entered his creation, took on human flesh for all eternity, and made all things new through Jesus Christ. Jesus did not just make some things new. He did not just make human things new. He made all things new. Jesus Christ is the harbinger of the new creation. Thus all of God's creation - humans, angels, animals, heavens, and mountains – rejoiced at Christ's arrival. He was born amid a symphony of bleating barnyard animals. Mary draped rags woven from organic matter around the newborn Jesus' body. The sky above proclaimed God's handiwork as a star announced the birth of the newborn Christ child. Shepherds and angels, human and nonhuman creatures, rejoiced at the news of Jesus's birth. The mountains quaked and the sky darkened when creation thought Jesus had died forever.

Jesus heals broken bodies and heals your brokenness and mine. He forgives your sin and mine, he shines truth into your darkness and mine, and makes you and me a new creation. New life came to the whole creation through Jesus. And new life comes to you and me through faith in Jesus. The disease of sin is made well by grace through faith in Christ. The weight of sin is removed by calling upon the name of Jesus in faith. God counts Christ's righteousness as our righteousness. Broken people are justified by grace, receive the forgiveness of sins, and take hold of eternal salvation through faith in Jesus Christ.

... Mountaineer

Credits to "Being Lutheran" by Trevor Sutton

[MachineGhost]

Thanks for describing the dark, black hole of despair you would be looking into if you were to stop believing what YOU believe. Only 32% of the world is Christian so 68% of the world's population doesn't feel the same way. Good luck convincing them otherwise.

That's funny. I don't believe what he does, but I sure as hell ain't looking into "the dark, black hole of despair"???

In some kind of twisted perverse way, I do think Christianity mostly conveys the message that compassion is the only thing that makes sense about being a human being on this unholy planet of hell. But the more you get caught up with theology and correctness or the more you're lost to all the fun gospel singing and dancing, the more you'll miss that point.

[curlew]

Thanks for describing the dark, black hole of despair you would be looking into if you were to stop believing what YOU believe. Only 32% of the world is Christian so 68% of the world's population doesn't feel the same way. Good luck convincing them otherwise.

That's funny. I don't believe what he does, but I sure as hell ain't looking into "the dark, black hole of despair"???

I was talking about what Mountaineer would be contending with if he were to cast aside his beliefs. I know because I've been there. He is describing very well the bottomless pit that those who de-convert from Christianity find themselves staring into as they struggle to reconcile their beliefs with reason. He is so deeply entrenched in the certainty of his theological position that if he were to cast it aside, his life would become completely meaningless. Just read his last post. He makes it sound like he's talking about you but he is talking about himself and makes it very clear that his life would be completely meaningless without his religious beliefs.

In some kind of twisted perverse way, I do think Christianity mostly conveys the message that compassion is the only thing that makes sense about being a human being on this unholy planet of hell. But the more you get caught up with theology and correctness or the more you're lost to all the fun gospel singing and dancing, the more you'll miss that point.

If you could throw away the bad and only take the good of Christianity this would probably be a good thing. But there are always the "people of the Book" standing in the way and if you've read the book, it ain't all it's cracked up to be by Christians.

[Mountaineer]

Those up for a bit of humor, check out the Babylon Bee ... satire on many topics. For example:

http://babylonbee.com/news/heathen-driv ... h-repents/

... Mountaineer

HARRISONBURG, VA—Local atheist Nick Boyette was converted to Christianity Wednesday while sitting at a stoplight, sources confirmed. The miracle occurred when Boyette, 38, noticed a startling bumper sticker on the car in front of him.

“Ever since freshman philosophy class I’ve believed God is a fiction and humans are the product of natural selection, an accidental collocation of atoms,” Boyette recounted to reporters. “Then I spotted that car decal and heard the sound of crumbling. It was my worldview. I saw that Jesus Christ could eat Charles Darwin for lunch, just as the Jesus fish bearing the word ‘truth’ was swallowing up the smaller, weaker Darwin fish.’”

The evangelistic driver, Steve Emadi, has sported the decal for 10 years. “I’ve always hoped some heathen would see the quality of my driving and then learn the reason for the hope within me. I never expected to snag a real live atheist!”

Boyette’s newfound joy can scarcely be contained. “Before coming face to face with the defeat of that Darwin fish, I thought Christianity was a joke. Not anymore. If Jesus can gobble up Darwinism, then he definitely can rise from the grave.”

The new believer is excited to become a fisher of men himself. “God doesn’t call us to check our witness at the car door,” he explained. “I’ve narrowed my bumper sticker choice to either ‘THE BIG BANG THEORY: GOD SPOKE AND BANG, IT HAPPENED’ or ‘DO YOU FOLLOW JESUS THIS CLOSELY?’ Whichever I go with, I trust God will use it to save others who are driving toward destruction like I was.”

[Xan]

Mountaineer, you're hurting your own cause more than you're helping. Yammering on about Jesus isn't going to convert intelligent, skeptical people. It isn't even going to "plant a seed." If anything it's erecting a tent over the garden and making it barren. Intelligent skeptical people don't come to Christianity through Jesus, but rather through something that's more subtle and mystical, and then they get on board with Jesus later because he's kind of a big deal to Christians. Jesus is how you convert or plant the seed in dolts, not thoughtful people.

I'm not sure what "subtle and mystical" thing you're talking about. If you're converting someone to a religion based on its subtle and mystical qualities, then that's something other than Christianity. If you're converting someone based on the incarnate, dying, and living Christ, then that's Christianity.

[MachineGhost]

I'm not sure what "subtle and mystical" thing you're talking about. If you're converting someone to a religion based on its subtle and mystical qualities, then that's something other than Christianity. If you're converting someone based on the incarnate, dying, and living Christ, then that's Christianity.

I think he was referring to a paranormal experience. Most people that would have that kind of thing conflate it with their culture's dominant religion, i.e. Christianity. OTOH, some do believe they've literally communicated with or seen "God" or "Jesus", so it would be hard to argue with them otherwise. A lot of what transpires in the paranormal depends on pre-existing belief memes since those are the filters that all of reallity is perceived through. For instance, all those creepy demonic entity possession documentaries seem to overwhelmingly only happen to Catholics, whether practicing or not.

[Mountaineer]

A god is that which we look for all good and in which we find refuge in every time of need. To have a god is nothing else than to trust and believe him with our whole heart. The question is not whether you have faith or not; the question is if you believe in the right thing. You can have all the sincerely held beliefs you want, but are they true? You can have the ‘strongest’ faith a person could possibly have, but if the thing you believe in is uncertain at best or false at worse, then your faith is worthless. It is not faith that saves, but faith in Christ. Knowing the object of our faith makes us bold to say with the psalmist, “What can man do to me?” (Psalm 56:11) and with the apostles, “We must obey God rather than men.” (Acts 5:29) Under the banner of Sola Fide (Faith Alone), you can stand in the midst of persecutions and threats, sufferings and disease, you can even face death, for it is not the strength of your faith that saves you, it is the object of your faith. And the object of your faith has destroyed death and hell by dying and rising again for you. Just as nothing can now conquer Christ, so nothing can conquer you, for you are connected to Christ by faith.

... Mountaineer

[curlew]

The question is not whether you have faith or not; the question is if you believe in the right thing. You can have all the sincerely held beliefs you want, but are they true? You can have the ‘strongest’ faith a person could possibly have, but if the thing you believe in is uncertain at best or false at worse, then your faith is worthless.

Beautifully put. Sounded almost like the Apostle Paul in Corinthians 13. You were doing good up to that point in your post but I chose to skim over and mostly ignore the rest of it.

[Pointedstick]

I'm not sure what "subtle and mystical" thing you're talking about. If you're converting someone to a religion based on its subtle and mystical qualities, then that's something other than Christianity. If you're converting someone based on the incarnate, dying, and living Christ, then that's Christianity.

I think he was referring to a paranormal experience. Most people that would have that kind of thing conflate it with their culture's dominant religion, i.e. Christianity. OTOH, some do believe they've literally communicated with or seen "God" or "Jesus", so it would be hard to argue with them otherwise. A lot of what transpires in the paranormal depends on pre-existing belief memes since those are the filters that all of reallity is perceived through. For instance, all those creepy demonic entity possession documentaries seem to overwhelmingly only happen to Catholics, whether practicing or not.

No, I was referring to what I'm going through right now. http://hommelscitadel.com/spiritual-gui ... em-stupid/

[curlew]

I'm not sure what "subtle and mystical" thing you're talking about. If you're converting someone to a religion based on its subtle and mystical qualities, then that's something other than Christianity. If you're converting someone based on the incarnate, dying, and living Christ, then that's Christianity.

I think he was referring to a paranormal experience. Most people that would have that kind of thing conflate it with their culture's dominant religion, i.e. Christianity. OTOH, some do believe they've literally communicated with or seen "God" or "Jesus", so it would be hard to argue with them otherwise. A lot of what transpires in the paranormal depends on pre-existing belief memes since those are the filters that all of reallity is perceived through. For instance, all those creepy demonic entity possession documentaries seem to overwhelmingly only happen to Catholics, whether practicing or not.

No, I was referring to what I'm going through right now. http://hommelscitadel.com/spiritual-gui ... em-stupid/

Looks to me like you might be close to becoming a Christian. Having been there and done that I say go for it. In the grand scheme of things it might be a necessary step, just as it was for me.

Just please don't post anything telling me I'm going to hell because I don''t believe what you believe.

[MachineGhost]

No, I was referring to what I'm going through right now. http://hommelscitadel.com/spiritual-gui ... em-stupid/

OIC. You're just going through the normal crisis of spirituality that we all do. It's at this stage you're going to be most vulnerable to religious hucksters and religious mysticism. Because an emotional need to believe in something -- anything -- is not exactly a rational process or decision unless you have a very strong pre-frontal cortex.

This seems to happen to a lot of people during their late twenties or early thirties. They look back and realize they’ve been doing something in particular for a long time because they thought it would bring meaning to their lives: making as much money as possible; sleeping with as many women as possible; traveling to as many countries as possible; or whatever. You are trying to maximize something.

That sounds like Trump!

Mainline Christianity does not seem to be giving people access to God, to the soul, or to the joy and freedom promised in the Scriptures

Translation: You have to first be deluded to be able to believe that would feel those attributes (which is always the unspoken assumption of proselythizers). A similar process happens when you fall in love, i.e. you can't feel or understand love until it happens. It's all a self-delusion process. Until you can sucessfully self-delude yourself, you can't believe in a faith that has no intuitive, rational, empirical, objective, factual support for its existence nor receive the emotional benefits therefor. And just because something is complete bullshit as a belief doesn't mean it is not emotionally valid as billions of people will attest.

We each create our own reality with our beliefs. That is the fundamental rule of physical existence (human anyway, I'm not too sure about animals). So choose wisely and when you do, know that you may have chosen for emotional reasons rather than evidentiary.