Like George Carlin, I believe in Joe Pesci. He looks like a guy who can get things done.

Yes I do believe in God but I am not a fan of organized religion which is actually pretty unorganized.

Nice to see this thread bumped, i remember this being quite a controversial thread..

I don't believe in atheists. Everyone, on some level, knows there is a God. When you get to the root of those who claim to not believe in God, it invariably is based more on emotion than what they often cite as their basis, i.e. reason, science, etc.

I know people who are Atheist and have been for decades but they believe in the afterlife, reincarnation, various different types of religions or spirituality, and other things but they claim not to believe in a God/Gods.

I have a friend from a country that was once a part of the USSR and he is technically Jewish but he and his entire family do not actually practice Judaism at all any of it, and are Atheists since that's how they were raised for generations in their original country. One time I was riding in a car with him and we saw a church that was for people from his original country and he laughed saying how he had never seen any sort of churches, synagogues/temples, or anything like that in his former country as it was and still is primarily Atheist as that's what most people were when they were a part of the USSR.

Well not me, i'm just not a believer. You shouldn't speak for everyone Ivy..

You say that but I'm sure you've heard the old saying, "There are no atheists in fox holes."

I imagine if you were in a life threatening situation or some sort of life crisis, you couldn't help but have your thoughts turn to something higher than yourself or what might wait for you after death. Every self-professed atheist has or will face this, if only at the closing moments of their life.

That is simply inaccurate, and quite honestly one of the dumbest things I think you have ever posted.

I agree. There is no evidence of a God. In his books The Case for a Creator and The Case for Christ, Lee Strobel does not present any evidence of a God. Instead, he simply criticizes evolution and the Big Bang, and those who advocate them, but presents no science to support creationism. That's true of the wide array of books I've read that advocate a creator. Their content is criticism, but not evidence.

Of course there is evidence for God. How the universe exists, the planets and how they move in their rotation, the perfect environment to sustain life here on Earth, the intricacies of the human body, etc. all testify to the reality of a Creator. Blind evolution and other explanations secularist scientists have come up with to explain away a higher power is what is weak and hardly convincing.

In any event, like I said, none of this is the real reason why people claim not to believe in God. Few will admit it but the real reasons are inevitably emotional. They are angry, they've been hurt, they see the evil in the world and can't reconcile it with there being a God, etc.

And some people adopt Atheism to help pass themselves off as "intellectual."

If people want to be Atheist or Agnostic that's their choice as they are not going to change their mind even if I or other people tell them things contrary to their beliefs. I am just not a fan of militant/hardcore Atheists/Agnostics who claim they really dislike Christians, Muslims, Jews, Hindus, or anyone of any religion/spirituality; but then are big into proselytizing their own Atheism/Agnosticism by saying things like "If you believe in a God/creator/etc. you're an idiot." or "The world would be better off if everyone was Atheist/Agnostic".

My friends that are Atheist or Agnostic are OK if other people want to believe in God or they follow a religion or spirituality, or have had religious/spiritual experiences where they felt the presence of God or a higher power, only they themselves just do not believe in the existence of a God, or have at one point or still do question if there is a God, and they don't proselytize their Atheism or Agnosticism the way people like Richard Dawkins do.

I saw this question in the poll: The Christian God? The muslim Allah? The Jewish JHW? They are all the same "God" but just have different names.

I have seen people online who claimed that they were pagan or something like that and worshiped the Egyptian or Ancient Greek gods but these people were not Egyptian/Egyptian-American, or Greek/Greek-American so I was rather puzzled by that or how it worked for them.

There are also people I have encountered online who claim to be Satanists but some of them are actually really Atheists but just doing this to "rebel" against Christianity or for shock value, and they read stuff by Anton LaVey. As for the others I asked a friend of mine about it and he told me how there is stuff out there you do not want to mess with or invite into your life.

While there is absolutely no basis for what Ivy is claiming regarding why people become atheists, PB's theory does prove to be true in some cases. Many atheists believer they are intellectually superior to EVERYBODY, but they're really nothing more than jerks.

As for how I became an atheist? I was a Christian for basically my whole life up until about 7 or 8 years ago (give or take). But like anything I have a keen interest in, I always want to know as much as possible about my interests. I'm a nerd, and I like to research the things that I like and matter to me.

In my research on faith and Christianity, it started becoming more and more obvious to me that it is nothing more than a sham. None of it makes sense when you truly sit down and think about it, and while I considered myself a person of faith for a long time, I've also always been scientifically minded. There were a lot of things regarding my faith that I simply ignored because I followed God blindly. I guess that is the basis of faith anyway, and eventually, after years of studying and research, blind faith just didn't work for me anymore.

For me, it was completely unemotional. I looked at the evidence and I went down the path that made more sense for me. I respect people's right to believe whatever they want. Sometimes I wish I could take that leap of faith and just believe again. But I can't, because I have absolutely no doubt that this life is all there is. I have had a handful of near death experiences since my conversion to atheism, and never once did I jump to thoughts of God or eternal damnation.

Could there be a God? Sure. Could there be an afterlife? Absolutely. But the odds are STRONGLY against it. The simple truth is that it is far more likely that there is no God or afterlife.

Anyway, that's my two cents. Do with it what you will!

Thanks, buddy .

And many of these Atheists become so overzealous in their belief (or non-belief), that they become as fanatical as some fundamentalist religious types. And in that case, their Atheism almost becomes a religion in itself. And that kinda defeats the whole purpose of abandoning religion in the first place.

Just live and let live. I'm a Catholic. I have a strong respect for Judaism. But Jews and Catholics don't proselytize. The idea of standing on a corner and handing out flyers, or ringing doorbells, is ridiculous to me.

If you're a believer, pray to your God and shut up about it. If you're an Atheist, you're entitled to your beliefs (or non-beliefs) as well. But when you start protesting every time a Deity is mentioned in a school play, or the Pledge of Allegiance gets you foaming at the mouth, then you're a fanatic in you're own right.

Like I said, just live and let live.

Old saying I subscribe to: I would rather believe in God and be right than not believe and be wrong.

I agree with everything here.
While there are religious fanatics, many atheists are intolerant towards people who "dare" to disagree with them in the same manner. I once discussed about religion with somebody on another forum (not about organized crime) and on a certain point asked a simple question:

"have you ever though that, if I may be wrong about something, you may be as well?" (in this case it was about the existence or non-existence of God).

You can't even imagine how rabid this guy turned after this question. Even a Crips/Bloods member who catches somebody dealing drugs on his turf would be more reasonable than that individual became after I implied that his "rational logic" may sometimes be too self-serving.

Of course, any reasonable person would never be so pompous that he believes there is no chance that he is wrong. Maybe I am. But the problem with people such as, say, IvyLeague, is that they take that "maybe" and equate it to an underlying, unadmitted belief in a higher power. I may be wrong, but that doesn't mean that I subconsciously believe in God. I don't. But I would like to think that if such a higher power did exist, that I would be deserving of eternal paradise based on my living a morally good and decent life, and that he wouldn't be so petty as to say "You have not worshipped at my feet for quite some time, so buh-bye!"

I'd hate to believe that God is the Soup Nazi!

I agree, in fact I think St.Paul said the most important thing is to live a moral life, even if you are of a different religion or an atheist, if you are a good person you won't be treated like a sinner, since everyone has their own way to reach the Truth.
The problem in my opinion is that some atheists are so horrified by the cruelties of the Old Testament (I am too, to be honest, if it were to be considered by itself), that they dismiss the New Testament and the rest of the Bible with its new morals which contain more humanity. In my opinion conflicts concerning religions often arise even in cases in can be dealt with reasonably and peacefully.

I think if one of your children die you want to believe it does not end for them when they die. It could help the parent move on in his life, and maybe even see them again when they die.

On living a good life. In some religions you can lead a bad life. Then just before you die you can repent and go to heaven. It's like getting a get out of jail free card in monopoly. You just have to believe it. I think I can definately get myself to believe before I pass away. Religion is cool in that regard.

My daughter graduated from an Ivy league school. She was relatively normal out of High School. She is like a communist now. But a communist that loves money.

Not only are you fabricating facts for an argument, but you are fabricating an argument that contradicts your premise. You suggest that a belief in a higher being will most readily surface in times of great peril or crisis when one is less likely to rely on one's rationality, intellect or sense, and that the mysteries of God are revealedin the face of impending demise or a sudden crisis where one's best judgment is clouded by the anxiety of the moment. Moreover, the foxhole bit is just a line. Where some agnostics might suddenly hope for the miracle of everlasting life when his life is suddenly in danger, it doesn't mean he actually would believe it. Don't confuse hope with belief.

The existence of God or lack there of is not a function of one's belief in God or not.

In fact, one could use the same reasoning and say that if a person of faith ever doubts the existence of a higher power, even for just a moment, then they are secretly an atheist.

And that would be equally fallacious as what Ivy is claiming.

Again, God's existence or lack thereof is independent of anyone's belief in God or lack thereof.

You're preaching to the choir, my friend (pun intended).

And there is another problem I've noticed with just about every atheist. They claim their "research" in religion has led them to discard it. The problem inevitably is, however, they really haven't done much research at all. And what they have done has been woefully inadequate. I don't think I've ever come across an atheist in person, or online, where their ignorance of religion, the scriptures, etc. wasn't apparent the more they tried to justify their position. Unfortunately, some of that does have to be put at the feet of many mainstream Christians today who don't really understand the scriptures themselves and who's ignorance provides many talking points for atheists.



There's no contradiction. The natural turning to a higher power happens shortly before or during the time of the crisis. The turning away happens afterward when they've become bitter and hardened their heart. Or when they see the wrongs of the world from afar that they aren't personally involved in.

Another reason I neglected to mention, why people claim not to believe in God, is they don't like the thought of having to answer or be beholden to anyone but themselves. So, by claiming God doesn't exist, they mistakenly believe they and their will is all that matters. And that they can go through life making up their own rules, their own morality, and so on.

It's clear to me that no matter what I or any other atheist says, it'll sound like nothing but BS to you, and that's fine. This is a topic in which we will never agree on, so, for the sake of my own sanity, we agree to disagree.

Not only that but these evangelical atheists, as I call them, undercut their own position by devoting so much time and energy against something they claim doesn't even exist. It's rather ironic when you think about it. It's why I can't take them seriously and why I'm pretty sure a guy like Christopher Hitchens was more than a little nervous as he approached death, despite whatever public claims he might have made. I would have loved to see his face after he passed to the other side.

There is no empirical way to even begin to provide evidence of a God. For one, there is no one definition of God (Jefferson and Franklin, Jerry Falwell and James Dobson are testimony to that). As I stated in an above post, religious people like Lee Strobel have already reached their terminus: i.e., there is a God who manifest certain attributes and intervenes in human lives (I like the Catholic terminus: "I believe in God, the father almighty, creator of heaven and earth. I believe in Jesus Christ, his only Son, our Lord.")

Creationism, irreducible complexity, and unerring biblical content as the word of God are their bedrocks, none of which is truly subject to empirical examination.

Blah blah blah.

"Faith is to believe what you do not see; the reward of this faith is to see what you believe." ----- Saint Augustine

Good luck when you get to the other side, Oli .

I have no problem with people who believe in God. I have no problem with people who don't believe in God. I have no problem with people who do good. I have no problem with people who do bad.

But what I do have a problem with is people who have to stick their noses into those other people's business who they don't agree with.