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What is your take on the existence of a higher being? And please state why you believe the way you do.

I grew up being told to believe it exists and believed it myself for a time. Now I believe it could exist or it may not but if so he is quite the tyrant and makes Hitler look like a saint.

I believe in a higher existence and as we are living in an infinite universe with infinite possibilities. I truly believe that every sentient being are gods have a physical experience.

Nope, I don't believe in any higher, divine or God-like being of any sort. Mainly because I have watched many people I know and love suffer horrible things that they did not deserve. Also, what about all the horrible things happening in the world? Wars, famines, evil dictators...

It would not be like this is there was a God.

Not necessarily, see humans seem to naturally just picture the loving christian God, and this idea that God actually does like his creation and that this isn't a sick experiment just to see what he can get us to do, its like the where you give a donkey a carrot on a stick but it can never reach it you just keep the lure in front and you tell everyone that its for their own good and that yes you do love them and that you have to follow the insane restrictions whether it goes along with your nature or not or else you go to hell, and that god can't interfere in wars and such because that would be taking away from free will, did anyone ever stop and say what if that was just the PR line?

I believe in the interdependence of all living/spiritual things. I believe every living thing has an energy and/or spirit that identifies it, makes it unique.

I think there could be something greater out there, I'm not about to say there isn't.

I don't believe in the theory that there's a head honcho up there pulling the strings, creating stuff, ending stuff, and ruling everything.

I was raised in an atheist household, where the only real things that existed were the tangible. Everything could be explained with rules, science, and math. (And damn was it boring ! lol)

Its too long to explain how I've come to believe what I do but its come on a road of spiritual searching, one that is no where near being done.

man is his own god. you do what you want but with respect to things around you. if you do things irrespective of your environment then you must be the devil.

I believe there is a greater being watching over us. That being one God or many Gods. I believe that after we die we go to what we believe to be heaven. It will be in our image of what it looks like and what things and what poeple are there

I was raised Roman Catholic...........BUT............I started to question things LONG ago. After becoming aware of other religions. It began to dawn on me , religion in general is nothing more than a man made ritual to ease the idea of mortality . Believing you have some where to go when you die , eases the tension a little of the inevitable

After pondering that thought for a time I began to imagine all the innocent blood shed in the decades past and even to this day IN the name of a god or a particular religion. So sad really, and such a waste. I would never want to follow a god that condones war brother against brother . Primitive really when you think about it.

Mankind in general believes in at least one higher power.......but the road there has many paths and know one seems to agree.

Some say our life here is a test of faith, well how many of us are really passing? Especially now?

I myself am an agnostic, but I do believe energy is real, and I believe in positive and negative energies. Matter and anti matter.

I believe in the end we all will be absorbed into the big picture, consumed , spent , and recycled. If one thinks this way of infinity there are so many walls to climb , but will our conscious be conscious...will we know anything? Time will tell.

If someone actually knew this for certain there would be no discussion.

I think that if you are going to take a scientific approach the the big bang and or God in general you have to look at all the facts. Some times those facts are not alway right in your face and the truth can be hidden from you if you don't dig deep enough.

I have found that science can just as easily lead you towards the belief in a higher power. all one has to do is apply the science we know.
For example:
The creation of the universe was so finely balanced that the math alone causes one to question the likely hood for it to have occurred by chance.
If the expansion rate of the early universe was just a trillionth of 1% higher than it was, the universe would have expanded too rapidly for solid matter to form. If the expansion rate had been just a trillionth of a percent less than it was, the universe would have collapsed back in on itself very quickly. In either case there would be no stars, no planets and no life.
But supposing it did result purely by chance, it certainly wouldn’t have been spot on the first time, in which case we can assume that the universe kept trying again and again until it reached perfect balance. Here we have a situation whereby trillions and trillions of attempts would have needed to get it right. Unless the universe could some how learn from its mistakes – then it would be able to achieve success much more quickly and easily. This scenario suggests that the universe must either be self-consciousness or have been designed by some intelligence that exists beyond the universe.

The eminent mathematical physicist Sir Roger Penrose calculated the chances of a life-supporting universe happening by chance to be 1 in 1010^123.
Now let me try to put that number into perspective for you:
1010^3 is a 1 followed by a thousand zeros,
1010^6 is a 1 followed by a million zeros and
1010^9 is a 1 followed by billion zeros.
These numbers are practically impossible to imagine, but 1010^123 is so big that it is almost inconceivable to the human mind. So with odds of only 1 in 1010^123 it can be said with absolute certainty that a life-supporting universe could never have happen by chance. But to realize that the universe is not the product of coincidence we don’t really need calculations at all. We just need to look around and reflect on the perfection inherent in life, the universe and everything in it.
We are all here to serve a purpose, just because you don't realize what that purpose is doesn't make it any less a part of your exsistance.

are you saying that believing that things that aren't likely to have randomly occurred is any less valid than believing in a magical god who has an inscrutable mind that we cant comprehend and who condemns certain acts except when he or his servants do them?

I believe in a Higher Power. There is no proof, one way or another. Logicaly I think that the Higher Power is a part of everything, rather than something sepererate. it is nature, the earth, all that is. Perfect, imperfect, cruel and kind. Just my own feeling. But who knows for certin?

I personally am an atheist, yet I accept there are some things I cant explain by science. One of those in particular being the Big Bang. Another of those being the existence of a God/s. Both of those raise questions in my mind.

Anyways, here is a secular blog. I like the logic of this post.

http://secularoutpost.infidels.org/2009/05/disproof-of-god.html

I'm pagan, and whether you believe there's something out there is a matter of reasoning. I believe there are many beings out there, although I take it by faith. I realise that's kinda lame, but my pagan deities will never send you to hell for not believing in them.

~I'd like to think so, but what "power" that supposedly "created" us would let child abuse, animal abuse, senseless murder, disease and cancer plague us so terribly? I believe in Darwin!~

Over the years, I have had the opportunity/necessity to ask many people about their internal representations of "God."

The really frightening one is that of God as some big old man who is constantly angry.

That's just madness.

Any *thing* that managed to create a diatom, a mountain, or a single ant has got to be a bit more than that. Or should I say, has god to be MORE than anything even remotely human or humanid.

And I bet my incarnation *it* doesn't have testicles, either ;->

Still, it's good to go beyond the word of god and into what a person actually does with that.

AS a pagan, I see Goddesses and Gods in both spirit and nature. Women are representatives of Goddesses. Men represent the Gods. In all the forest, deserts oceans and mountains I see and envision their presence

Yes i believe in god for we are our own gods and for that our soul should be our place of worship each man and women can all make miracles happen for e.g birth,love,kindness,and even death.

I used to be a traditional roman catholic, even was ordained and consecrated in a small denomination. Left all that behind me.

At best would call myself a spiritual atheist. My views on life changed over the years, due to ongoing study in science, the occult & psychology, especially Carl Gustav Jung.

I believe the universe is filled with energy, that connects us all & which can be used in what we call magick, in a wide meaning of the word.

Further I work with the Archetypes and strive towards self-deification, as we are all our own gods or goddesses.

At least that is my point of view.

I find it more awesome to ponder that we are a result of a cosmic scale happening, then to ponder some shallow concept of deity.

I limited myself for so long clinging to the trappings of religion, and all along I thought it was to answer questions, when in actually it only raised more questions.

Oh yea I was stuck there as well and have come to the conclusion that religion doesn't equate to spirituality

The idea of a God is (to me at least) utterly absurd.

Its just my opinion but when one dies and stands before Him, one will believe.

there is a higher being. whether it is good or bad in essence, is very debatable.

And can you prove said existence?

The goddesses and gods I worship do have a detailed history but as the present physical evidence no faith or path can prove it beyond doubt

it cannot be proven that there is and neither can it be proven that there is none.

I believe there is a genderless creative force. A young pastor in Palm Desert hired a mathematician to do the numbers and as Severus has stated it is astronomical in the direction of something not necessarily divine having a hand in creation. I think man started the principle of an anthropomorphic being, but beyond what we can conceive is behind everything. Since everything was created I am not so sure it is interested or it is merely not a personal being and has moved on. I am not sure it is anything we can exactly understand. I also think this could be seen as science in some ways even if there was something setting everything into motion.

I believe all the others we call gods or goddesses were either made up or were actual humans that got raised in the minds of various cultures to the level of what they thought a god/goddess represented. I don't think they were in some far flung heaven except after they died, they were believed to be. You can see this if you read mythology or the beginnings of most religions so to say I believe in God I would have to question and say which one and what evidence beyond faith is there that any one mentioned in any writings actually exists or existed. Perhaps it is just a lot of smoke screens. You can see when they talk of certain gods that have had children, many times they are described as animals, but it may be a certain type of warrior clan they are speaking about. Therefore the children are representative of that. Literally born into those clans and eventually will be ruling by class.

Part of what has led me down this path is angels and the fact that there is no host, it is actually armies. Heavenly armies...that makes me wonder why would something stated to be a spirit need armies? So I think all of this is misunderstood and most likely referring to something that is of the past and long gone. Whether they are immortal remains to be seen because there appear to be ways to kill just about anything. If you stop believing in something it goes into obscurity. Then there is magick and thought forms. Man creates a lot of what they believe by numbers so therefore part and parcel for why I don't believe in personal "gods." of any kind really, but often I find the individuals interesting and worth study and veneration at times.

I don't know if there is an ever after but I have read enough NDE's and other writings that I have high hopes.

God or Goddess are mysteries which exist in our existence from the beginning of our life. The concept of a higher being, created to reduced the fear of death, is something unimaginable, because there is absolutely no prof of existence. Do they exist? may be yes, or may be no. All books on the subject were created with the idea to infiltrate a different approach into the unknown (the After death). So, my opinion, I don't have one, but, I do respect other because they also have been influenced by this concept called God or Goddess; heaven or hell.

As an atheist I accept that I can not disprove the existence of a higher being, because it is not something that can be tested by science.

I do not disrespect people per se, however I am a bit anti-religious.

There are many things in our world that cannot be explained, yet the only "God" I see, is the one in the mirror. I alone control my world and the lives of those around me. I possess the keys of life and death by choice, not divine will.

well i believe in the God not gods and He is a joulus God becasue all others come from the devil and lies how do i know this well i came close to death my self several times and i know some ppl say thats just fate but i dont believe in fate i believe we have i kind loving God that gives us just what we need not want and the devil lies to us and tells us God who is he you can be your own god . and we have have prove that devil is real by magic killing sex all over with anyone any time. this is all of the devil and then on top of it all we say no its man .well i tell you man has no powers of his own its given by God or Devil . we are fighting a war but its not one we can see with our eyes . that is unless you are given that gift and i would not want it . its sacary enough to see the bad stuff going on . i dont need to see demons and imps and witches and all that other stuff . You see i see it this way we lie to our self and say God is not real becasue then we dont have to feel the pain . Becasue if God is real then we all hurt and are in pain for all the wrong we do every day. God gave us all a choose to follow him or the devil there is no do it my way stuff . that is just a big lie of the devil . there is no good magic . becasue magic means we take what God gives us and make it something it was never ment to be . i have gifts and or you might call them powers but they are not mine to give or take or use as my will wants but his and the most important one is to love all as equels that means no matter what i say if i say i love you then i do but i cant say that i can say i will try and be a good friend but i cant say the words i love you the only one i love is God .

That sounds rather biased especially for an environment such as VR, If you desire to believe in One deity, that's your right, but your post comes off as rather preachy, and resounding.

well i am not nor is God we do not push people into believeing and i dont mean to talk so much its just me just need someone to tell me to close me mouth some times but thanks for that tho just by you saying that you clam that there is a God and i dont know why that should upset so many but it dose

God, devil , heaven & hell are make up idea's from human minds, especially the montheistic religions, to control others & gain power over them.

Nothing is more used by religions of all kinds, then the supposed afterlife.

My point of view is simple, dead is dead. Outside the collective unconsiousness, I see no afterlife.

There is only energy in the universe, which we can understand and near through the Archetypes. As such I am my own god and devil.

I once saw a commercial for a new 3g network which attempted to show the evolution of the cell phone. The phone was time lapsed in a way so it looked like a phone was assembled from he rocks and minerals around it and slowly evolved from the large brick like phones of the 80's to a modern cell phone. Someone then picks up the phone and uses it... end of commercial.

This got me thinking and I asked myself, If someone had come across a phone just sitting on the beach or even a park bench they wouldn't believe that it was naturally created -aka- evolved from the materials in the ground they would have assumed someone dropped it... Right!!

So if a phone has a designer and maker why do we assume that we couldn't be from a higher power??
Human beings are infinitely more complex than the most advanced cell phone yet we believe we came from natural makings... why??

That's about the time which the proof brigade comes marching out. lol
People always ask for proof of something... or it's just not scientific. Well I would hate to point this out but Science has a pretty shitty track record. There was scientific minds who had proof that the world was flat, that the earth was the center of the universe. There was science that said the breaking of the sound barrier would cause our ozone to be strip away. It took science almost 30 years to admit that dinosaurs once walked the earth and that was with massive skeletons staring them in the face.
I'm not saying God / Religion has anymore answers than evolutionists do, I'm just saying when something makes sense you should at least have the conviction (Men of science clam to have) and the courage to look at the information for what it is.
The simple fact is that the scientific, mathematical equations support creationism of some kind... Numbers don't lie.

if there is no higher being and man is his own god then none would have passed away and all will be immortal...

well i will agree with that ^^^^^ what said . its right science is worng about almost everything and they will not admit it becasue if they did then you would have mad men walking around saying that satin or God made me do it. So things were made not evloved . Some say man made man but how can you say that at such a young age as cromagnam man withch by the way i believe is monkeys and not man at all we never lived in the diansore age man was made long after the diansore man was made after animal. not before so who said man was alive at the time of diansour . Man came from dust and dust we will return .

Ok - But don't misread what I wrote either.
I'm not saying I support a all mighty father,dressed in white, sitting atop a cloud. I said that the math logically supports conscious creation verses random natural events... that intervention doesn't directly translate into a deity like figure(s).

all i said was just that, i said that evolution is a lie that all.

i agree evolution is a lie. man from apes? we have a lot of apes but as of now none have evolved into a man. or the single-celled organisms that grows legs or furs or whatever to adapt to their environment. none have been documented and many scientists focus on them yet there are still no proven findings.

Evolution in the end is a very slow proces, which takes not 1 or two generations to complete, but 10.000 or more generations to bring about the changes.

The past 200 years enough material have been found, to at least support the evolution, and even more comes up every day.

Just to put one thing right. Darwin never said that men came forth from apes, but that we have a common ancestor. Dna research proved the link, more then once. The ape story was invented by those who opposed Darwin in the early years.

That men & animals can't life for ever, is a very simple reason, each time a cell copy's itself, the copy is weaker, till in the end it can't function anymore, as such organs start to fail. That is basic order in nature, has nothing to do with any god, imaginary or not.

Now I would like to see the proof or support religion or creationism offers, have seen none there.

The discussion between evolution & a creator god has gone on for a long while, and will continue as such.

Let everyone their own tought & feeling to follow. And above all let's respect each other in it. But it's always great we can discuss our own insights.

i beg to disagree. those materials being found are separate species or animals in the same species and not proof of evolution. they may have similar traits and characteristics only because they belong to the same specie but not an evolved form of the other.
^_^

Golgotha, listen. Darwin NEVER, and I do mean NEVER, once, EVER stated that MAN came from APES.

With that being said, I just wanted to put that behind us.

Now onto other things.

I don't see evolution as defined by Darwin as random. Just like Gravity, it is at the point of becoming an accepted fact. I brought out Gravity to say that Gravity is a natural law and isn't random, there's an order to it. The same holds true for Evolution. It has an order to it.

I do believe God exists and the other Gods in other religions existance aswell. It's just a feeling that you know something high and divine is out there its too much of a spiritual thing to describe. I do not believe that one God runs everything there has to be more and more spiritual worlds aswell, there may be good Gods and there may be bad Gods in the other realms. There has to be a balance to the realms existance including ours itself.

I think we can all agree to believe what we choose to, explain what our beliefs are, and just leave it at that.

Mel, you're dead on. That's all, all of us could do.

When it comes to relgion, Albert Einstein put it best (and this may be a bit of a paraphrase) "You can't reason someone out of what they've not reasoned themselves into"

What chaffs me though is when believers become offended by people that simple except the universe as a godless place.

The very same people that beg people to .. "See things from my perspective." are very much unwilling to waiver their faith, and just imagine that this is what it is, and there is no helms man.

This is also why I tend toward eastern philosophies, rather then the iron enforced western beliefs.

I believe in a higher being, i just dont know if its a bearded guy, a fat dude, a woman, or whatever.
The reason why i think like that is beacause if there was no higher being, what is keeping humanity from doing whatever they want when they want? so ... i feel deep inside of me that there is someone or something higher than us.

Dabbler you make a good point. I remember when the DaVinci Code came out, in Cinema. There was a man handing out pamphlets. I asked him if his faith was so secure, why was he so threatened by a film, made for entertainment purposes only?

The links between creation and pure mathematics are fascinating, all the rules set in stone and defined by Newtonian physics.
However, when one looks at the tiny quantom level ,all the rules go out of the window, tiny particles come into existence for a flash and then just vanish, or leap elsewhere.
The relationship between music and maths is also rock solid, notes that rhyme and construct cords vibrate at 1/2 a 1/4 or a 1/3 of the original note...

These vibrations are the inter-twined to construct something greater than the some of its parts. Amazingly these mathematical vibrations are recognised and understood by the brain ..different patterns producing different emotional energies...if a note is 3% out of the mathematical pattern the listener expects, the spell is broken, the construct falls to the ground.
Do you think the maths leading to a crescendo is by chance?
The maths in these notes is a key to emotion and perhaps much more.

A few articles on the resemblance between human and chimp Dna

Chimps, Humans 96 Percent the Same, Gene Study Finds

http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2005/08/0831_050831_chimp_genes.html

Greater Than 98% Chimp/Human DNA Similarity? Not Any More.

http://www.answersingenesis.org/articles/tj/v17/n1/dna

Chimp, human DNA comparison finds vast similarities, key differences

http://www.seattlepi.com/local/article/Chimp-human-DNA-comparison-finds-vast-1181942.php#ixzz1XIZvpcwn

I do agree with you, Severus, that science still has not any conclusive answers, but there are many pointers, that we can't lay aside, without looking closer at it.

Will science make the bridge and proof evolution? Even if I accept it as being correct, big gaps will remain in the theory, some maybe never will be answered.

But there are also big gaps in the mainstream theology of the monotheistic religions, which influence our society the most.

In the end, it will be a personal matter of each individual, to decide, accept, what they find correct in their own view.

But I think it's more important, that we can talk about those differences in an open and correct manner. That for sure is the big difference that divides us from any animal or creature.

Just as an extra note, I studied general sciences in my first years of college, afterwards changed over to the paranormal/ occult world, because science just left to many questions unanswered.

Later on I was drawn into the traditional catholic direction, and while studying theology, I found the same problem, to many unanswered questions and huge gaps, but could bridge those with what I have learned during the previous years.

When finally taking up practice on the Left hand Path, I can only say, that none in it's own lead to answers, but only a combining of the different lines (Science, occult, religion) can aid us further and in this each will need to yield somewhere.

So there is still a lot of work to do, and interesting points to discuss. Just hope we can respect each others point of view, and work from there.

I respect everyones point of view, but when facts are staring me in the face, I find it a bit hard to keep quiet.

Sorry... I care about the truth. Thats all ^_^

Want to argue about DNA? Watch the video below.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dK3O6KYPmEw&feature=related

Want to use that old fundamentalist argument of "A clock in a field not coming without a designer from the parts around it?" (or in Severus's case here, a cell phone) Watch the video below this.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rW_2lLG9EZM&feature=related

Annnnd.... I digress.

I grew up being told there was a Santa Clause too, and Easter bunny.

Yeah. I'm meeting them all three at the bar on Saturday.

I do like viewing everyones point of view about the existance of a higher and divine being, and I do agree that most of us have different opinions and feelings about what we do feel spiritually, so all us individuals can do is just to listen and learn from one another instead of taking everything as disrespect or questioning someone elses faith. However it is good and natural to debate but no sense into making it a big deal no one at all will know the overall truth for a very long time.

Very true Kenji, it's good that we share our views and debate it, but let us not turn it into a fight, that has no use.

I do respect other views, even if I don't share them, still find it interesting to hear what others think and why.

However, I can't stand blind faith. An acceptance of religion without questioning or study and then taking up a preacher role to spread the so called thruth, which you need to accept or be wiped out as vermin.

Luckily the last don't seem to be present on VR, the discussion maybe is sharp here and there, but I think we are all adult enough to leave some breathing space and respect for each other.

As such, it's great to debate our mutual and different points, even if in the end we remain with our own views. The goal is not to change each other, but to extend our knowledge and insights.

Perhaps maybe whatever our own individual faith is and our belief is what will come out of our lives after death, Would anyone believe that could probably be partially the case?

Good question, Kenji.

Personally as a spiritual atheist, I don't really believe in an afterlife, but do accept that energy doesn't stop at the biological death, but continues, in maybe another form.

Carl Gustav Jung and the collective unconciousness are the red wire for me there. If this is a mindless state or any conciousness remains, is an open question, which only time can answer.

I see well blacklodge if you do not believe in an afterlife what do you think is going to happen when you die? Do you just believe that your basically done and do not exist in another realm or something just curious on your beliefs?

I don't believe in an afterlife, as most religions bring forward. Even in my traditional catholic days, doubted that.

My point of view has been somewhat the same over the years, that at our death, energy remains. Some will call this spirit, soul, our essence and that this continues in a way.

Is this mindless energy or a being with thoughts and feelings? Don't know. Probably will only find out when crossing the line.

In the collective unconciousness it will continue for sure, and maybe by reaching a kind of archetype state, it does keep going on with a certain conciousness.

As most of us, it does interest me, what maybe exist past the border of death, but I find life much more interesting.

I believe in the christian God for many reasons. Not gonna name them though.

Some people don't like to believe in God because they cant understand why he lets people suffer and stuff. But if you read the bible you'd understand him/her better.

Also I dont think anyone will completely understand God as he's beyond our experience.

God dosent interfer in human business anymore, its called free will, he gave it to us to use as we like, for good or bad and so if he were to intervene and stop suffering then that be taking away free will.

Anyway, a time will come when he'll step in again and stop all the bullshit that happens down here, its in the bible.


Anyway I think people can believe whatever they want, at the end of the day all that matters is that you got through another day in this crazy messed up world!

Blacklodge,
I want you to know that I am not targeting you I am just going to quote you to make a point.

A.) You said:

"Will science make the bridge and proof evolution? Even if I accept it as being correct, big gaps will remain in the theory, some maybe never will be answered.

So my question is, why is it that people of the scientific community are allowed to make a "leap of faith" to bridge the gaps in what they believe but someone who holds to the idea of a higher power must have a standard of proof you don't apply to yourselves??

and B.)

But there are also big gaps in the mainstream theology of the monotheistic religions, which influence our society the most.

Are you attempting to say that science doesn't influence the way we think, act, and live our lives in a major way??

From the types of chemicals that are allowed in our food supply to the Florid in our tap water. Science is in everything we do on a daily basis.

Agent Orange, DDT, Thalidomide, and a thousand other little gems which men of science would love you to forget and that is just from chemistry.

not to get to far off of the subject but i do believe that no one can prove a thing .
and as for one side or other side felling so strong about what they believe in is better i feel that not believeing in anything .
We cant prove or dis prove God no matter how hard you try . nor can you disprove devil or no devil for both sides are two sides of a coin .
but if you say that we just poof and there we are . well that is a believe that i am not willing to stake my life in .

That is very true, we really can not prove this like you said all we can do is share our feelings, experiences and also our Perceptions. Everything is still debatable until the whole truth just all of the sudden reveals itself.

I believe what most call God is the avatar of existence and we are each apart of existence. Kind'a like God's DNA.

You have a point Severus, but I think there is still a difference.

While science, and as you correctly write chemistry, touches us in many ways, this is rather unknown to many, or better said they don't pay attention to it, because if they would and wanted to change it, they will need to change their way of life, and I don't believe most people in the industrialised countries are willing to do so.

Religion, mainly the monotheistic ones, touches our life daily, lesser for example here in Europe, where the churches have seen their flock diminishing year after year, but the influence is still there. The influence of religion is felt whole through society, in how we need to behave, what we can think, how we need to vote, etc...

It is losing it's grip very fast, as more and more people do question their religious organisations, and break away from them, they start thinking for themselves, and don't accept anything, just because it is told to them. A good example is the growth of house churches, people who gather in their own house, in small groups, to celebrate their faith.

We are a quickly changing society, and with further growing apart, giving more attention to the individual then before, it will influence also how we live and think.

A god in one way or another will always be there, always have, but people are forming their own images or ideas, through what they read or study.

Factually it's a very interesting time, but very difficult to predict what it is going to bring. Society has been changing so fast over the past 50, 60 years, that people didn't have the time to catch up, but they are doing so slowly.

And this will have it's effect on how we see religion, science, our entiry culture. At least that is my view.

Any case, this has already been a great discussion, where we all have been able to bring forward our thoughts and ideas, and I think that is the idea of the forum.

We don't want to change anyone, but it's great to express what we think and do and at the same time respect the other person in their views.

Blacklodge I'd like to agree that organised religions are lodsng their control. however, that's not what I see in the communities of colour. people in these communities, that are in evangelical religions proportionally do not have college degrees, and not very sophisticated. Their critical thinking skills are very minimal at best. This has been my experience, and I am a person of colour on my father's side.

Indeed a correct remark. Not only in the communities you describe, but also in those where people have low or no degrees, little change on work or under very bad conditions, the adherence remains larger, something we also notice in West-Europe.

Lets keep up to date, some of the information posted is out of date. The science-
Whilst it is true the Dna of a human and a chimp are very different this is not surprising.
Dna is altered over generations by our environment, so as our food and habitat changed so did our Dna.

The best example of this is the frogs of the roman Tin mines in S.West England.
The mines left the entire area saturated in arsenic, a deadly poison and by product processing the ore.
Most of the wildlife died but the frogs mutated over the last 2000 years to be able to deal with the arsenic poison.
A study of this new frog shows its Dna is now so wierd we humans have more in common with normal everyday frogs than the new species does.
Despite the massive changes in its Dna it is STILL a frog.
Mitochondrial DNa passed on from mother to mother is not altered and so this Dna can also be tracked back through the
last 100, 000 years. Only poorly read computer scientists cling onto creationist type theories. I do not know of any serious biologist, mathematician, chemist or geologist who believes the earth is less than a billion years old. Put simply, if you do not read the right articles you will be fed out of date dogma by those with ulteria motives.

KnightofLight, I feel the urge to respond to your post.

YES indeed stuff can be proven.

I can hand you a repeatable experiment that will yield the same results every time, and thus that produces a fact. Your acceptance or denial of these facts alters them in no way.

the physical universe is created by a logical mind as its so precisely desgned.an american mathmatician calls it intelligent design theory.things just dont create themselves by accident.a clock dose not make itself and neither dose anything else.
human beings, being sentient have the power to effect their own environment.so we have the world we all deserve.

god is as god does, is it possible to exist without existing?

I find it a waste of time to try to rationalize, conjure, scientifically prove, imagine or speculate when the evidence comes to those who open their mind to the possibility that there is something bigger than all of us at play in the universe. Let go of barriers that may block the touch of the light in their lives and just have faith, or act as if they have faith.

In all religious or spiritual concepts there is one ultimate keystone that keeps them perpetuating the cycle of belief and faith, that there is a force outside of human understanding that drives the universe forward through time.

I cant see it but i know it is there, i cant touch it but i feel the grace bestowed upon me, i cant taste it but its flavor is wholesome and refreshing, i cant hear it but i know it speaks to me, i cant smell it but its scent is like flowers in springtime.

I believe there is no answer and yet all answers are true, as long as we believe in something. Open the door, open your mind and take a step, a chance, an experiment to see if maybe, just maybe there is a little god in all of us.

And may he/she come in the form that will appease your desire for knowledge.

May the Great Wolf keep you safe.

Visidin,

You speak as though everyone continues to believe once they reach that point. However this is clearly not the case so with that factor being entered into the equation I see religion as just another trend to occupy the masses. Some stick to it, some get wise, and turn against it.

religion vs spirituality... absolutely, an interesting debate and not one i enter into often.

Religion is a ruleset, indoctrinated through literature generally to teach of that particular religions ideals of faith. Often taken to a zealous, i will not believe anything outside this scripture.

Whereas spirituality is the ideal that a higher power exists and coming to rely on that power for sustainability and comfort through ones life. without the rules and regulations religion offers.

A belief in God does not equate to religion, but to spirituality.

Hey quick query if we needed a designer to exist then who designed god?

hehe i am by no means a follower of any religion but i believe the answer is in the bible... at least the best answer i have found

"I am he who is called I am"

Well you do see the dilemma? You guys determined things don't just exist on their own.

please elaborate on that last comment, i need to rest and will be back later

I was mainly referring to two positions that were taken one was by catseye about how a clock needs a designer and a human because it is so much more complex has to have a designer and its not a bad argument, however it has one fatal flaw. The designer of humanity is even more complex and according to the train of logic needs a designer to exist which brings us to your observation about how things don't just pop into existence.

When christian try to tell me the world was created in 7 days I challenge them as to how long those days were, since the bible dies not state they were 24 hour days. They I really catch them on that one.

in alot of references 7 days in the bible for God equated to 7000 earth days.

Yet when saying "But I *felt* god!", Dawkins replied to this as best as I have ever heard it answered. He said "The human mind is very sucipteble to hallucnation"

dear poetic heart ,
yes there is a God
and there is a Satan adn he will do ANYTHING to make you think there isnt a God ( thats why there are so many other strange religions out there)
i know there is a God for he speaks to me -sometimes in my heart- other times when im reading devotionals or my Bible i can also feel God in the nature around me
one time my parents got in a cult and i was turtored every night by demons i would have hullucinations and things would touch me and i would see black mists
thsi happened for a while and it was only when i finally uttered the name of Jesus that they went away
there is also alot more that happened but this is part of the reason i KNOW there's a God
i hope you discover him as i have
For if the Son sets you free you shall be free indeed
John something something lol (its from the Bible :)

My question is what if your both wrong??

What if there is no God and their is no real evolutionary process either??

There are many who believe that the reincarnation of the soul and our consciousnesses desire to experience this plain of a multi-universe is the cause of this physical existence.

Mind you 70% of the worlds religions believe in some form of karma and reincarnation.

Personaly I have strong doubts about the validity of the bible, as we know it now. To many people got involved in putting it together, and that can't be good.

Christianity as an exoteric religion has no more meaning for me, only on an esoteric/ gnostic base, it could have meant something for me personaly. As such one can even find a Left Hand Path in christianity.

But I was drawn into other directions and feel myself good, which I find more important then following rules, written by men, to control others.

But as stated, this is my own view, which I don't want to impose on anyone. All are free to follow their own insights.

Severus somebody has to be at least partly right. Even the earth crusts is aged at least 51 million years old, so something had to come into play here

Could it be that Christianity is the most blinded religion because of course there were plenty of other religions before Christianity was even brought up?

Every religion, borrowed from earlier ones, combining this into something new.

In christianity, as it is known now, are elements of Egyptian, Roman and Persian thoughts and beliefs.

And most of it's feasts are from pre-christian origin.

Syncretism as it is called, wasn't anything new, it is always done, so even the early church did it and borrowed elements of other beliefs, combining it into a what they recognized as a christian tradition.

Question remains, if the line of the Jerusalem church which ended in 70 CE, maybe stood much closer to the person of Jesus, and was more esoteric of nature.

It is and probably will remain an open question, as the historical sources are to thin, to give us a clear answer.

MasterMel... I think you may have mistyped that last entry.
The generally accepted age for the Earth is around 4.1 to 4.2 billion years.
As for Christianity - We already know that they had the dates wrong, there's no possible chance with what we know today that the Earth and all life on it could be only 4 to 6 thousand years old.
The problem with dogmatic, biblical dates is the time systems have changed. We assume that ancient peoples from the Mayans all the way back to the Egyptians used a form of lunar or other stellar tracking system to mark the passage of time. Since the forced introduction of our current calendar system by Pope Gregory the 13th (in 1582) we have been unable to make a good time comparison because space is always moving and expanding. The way the stars were laid out in the sky is not the same as it is today and the differences between the systems makes matching up dates for any specific period in time almost impossible.
Computers are able to calculate mathematically where a particular star or heavenly body should have been thousands of years ago but that is the best we can do at this time.
You start asking questions like what a day or a year is in God's time frame verses ours and you have really gone out of your way to muddy the water.

Only the human mind can discern space and time.

As far as being right, I never make that claim, I only present evidence.

I personally do not believe in God, or whatever he, she, or it is referred to. The Bible is supposeldly a cronicle of Jesus's life and what happened during that time. Thes's no proof that it is valid. I also do not believe that one person can be three at one time. I also look at all the horrible things that have happened and are happening right now. If there is a God, what is earth, an ant farm put there for his, her, or its entertainment? I know that some of you will argue what I have written. Thats fine. I stand firm in my belief.

I am the only "GOD" that chooses the path my life follows.

Also Tzaddi (hope I spelled it right) do you realize how many wars have been fought in the name of "God" or religion?

Yes I do! It's sad isn't it? A lot of brainwashed people...

Well when you think your God will reward you, wouldnt you though? But thats a whooollle other thread.

But I did just realize I never answered Severus's question of "What if you're wrong?" Well you see thats a common question for any atheist to expect, and its really quite simple to reply to.

Anybody could be wrong. What if you're wrong about the flying spagetthi monster or the flying teapot?

i don't believe in God....or even in Goddesses any longer.

i believe in mankind..... i just wish they'd believe in themselves.

This thread has been automatically closed for length.