this post was submitted on 29 Oct 2023
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Atheism
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Okay I keep having to explain this, but if you are going to mock the theology you need to actually be familiar with what it says instead of trying to dunk on a pop culture over simplification.
Hell is not a place, this is a pop culture simplification, kind of like how no one actually believes that death is when a big skeleton takes you away.
It is believed that God is the source of all love and light and all the good shit in the universe, by tuning him out and severing your connection to God you become eternally damned, which is a state in which you don't feel God's love. This isn't because God decided that he was going to stop loving you, it's more that in a spiritual sense you just aren't taking his calls anymore, and allegedly this is painful.
To put it in simple terms, imagine you actually have a loving father who cares for and supports you, but for whatever reason you have decided that he is an asshole, and you'd much rather hang out with the cool kids. They keep getting you into trouble, and your dad who wants to help out keeps getting voicemail.
No I'm not saying that that's what I believe, I'm saying this is how theology typically sees the state of Eternal damnation, the Lake of Fire is just a pop culture oversimplification inspired by allegorical metaphors in the Bible.
Like I said another problem with you mocking religion, but understand what you are mocking.
It is for this reason why Christians in online circles often say to each other "Atheists do not disbelief what God is, but what they claim God to be"
I don’t disbelieve anything that god is or claim them to be. God isn’t a thing of this world beyond the minds of the imaginative and insane, their is nothing to believe about something that’s never existed. I could just as assuredly argue that Pokémon are real if I was imaginative or insane enough.
You misunderstand the quote, it isn't saying that you're making claims about what God is (Your claim is that God isn't, which makes sense given that there's no evidence for such a thing)
The quote is saying that your attempts to describe what Christians believe about God, is inaccurate to what the Church actually teaches, and therefore makes for a poor debunking.
I suppose I haven’t been in that situation, I never attempt to belittle anyone’s life comfort. Shit is hard, if having that belief and community helps then that’s great for them. My experience has mostly been small towns (like 1-20k population small). The most I’ve done is say that I don’t feel their personal beliefs are a valid reason to impede on anyone else’s personal beliefs or lack of. My grandma is the only person I ever felt uncomfortable around, she was so sweet otherwise but would say pretty hateful stuff about me, not because I was unkind, disrespectful, or anything wrong other than, I’m sorry grandma I’m just not into religion. With that said, you are correct in that I misunderstood the quote.
I'm going to level with you, I live in a small town and I don't think anyone actually believes in God around here. I think they try to tell themselves there might be one, because the idea that someone actually care, someone with a level of authority who can look at all this and say that this is wrong, and that we need better. Such a lovely fantasy that people turn to it in times of stress.
And I think that's why Donald Trump is such a cult of personality, that's not that he is anything special, it's that he represents the fantasy that there is someone with power out there who wants to lead us out of this Wasteland into something else, who can make our delusions of not grandeur, but mere adequacy a reality.
It is not because his character is Noble or that he's particularly intelligent or anything like that, but some people just want to live in the fantasy that someone up there is looking out for someone down here, and that it will eventually be okay
I think people who claim to be Christian but live in a big city, are more sincere in their belief.
I hope there's an afterlife, because, maybe that's when things will actually be okay
I never got a call and I'm not in "spiritual pain". He's altogether untraceable, unless you want to play the game of ascribing good things with perfectly worldly causes to the alleged, omnipotent "good things happen because of me"-guy. It makes no sense, especially since there's plenty of gods with similar properties on the market.
It being a place you're sent to is older than Christianity and plenty of Christian sects still believe that it is. Maybe try convincing them first, at least they agree on the there being a god at all.
Also what's libmbo/purgatory then? Another set of metaphors?
Atheists don't believe in any god period, that's kinda the whole concept.
Okay bro, take it up with the Christians, I'm not advocating for the gospel. I'm explaining what the faith is claimed to be by the most mainstream sects of Christianity. I am not here to convert anyone, I'm merely explaining these edgy memes fail because they require buying into popular misconceptions about Christianity, instead of mocking what those of the faith are actually claiming to be the case.
What are you doing is buying into and spreading misconceptions of what the faith is, and proving your poor grasp on reading comprehension in the process.
Btw, Wikipedia is not a credible source. Thought you learned that in Grade School.
Shouldn't have added that line, made it clear that you're just trolling.
Actually I'm not trolling, Wikipedia has become a circle jerk over the years, and people are very much encouraged to find sources outside if wikipedia. However by jumping to claim that someone is trolling simply because you disagree with them, you are participating in not only a bad faith argument but you are also trolling.
Whatever you may think about Wikipedia, it's right on many Christian sects thinking that hell is a real place that you go to for eternity. Heck, you know that that's true, right?
No I don't, because literal hell is a Southern Baptist / Evangelical position, more mainstream forms of Christianity such as Catholicism do not subscribe to it