Pretty good huh? The way I used the word “some.” I’ve been taken to task lately about glomping all atheists together. I believe the term is generalising.
Anyhoo, some atheists have been perplexed by my seeming dislike of atheists in general. “How can you not like someone as nice as me?”
First of all, I don’t dislike atheists as people. On the other hand, do I enjoy and admire atheist beliefs and the fallout of those beliefs? Mmm, not so much. My blogger only allows comments up to 4,000 words so I’ll make this brief. You know how teenagers can hardly wait to get out into the world and try out their brand new bodies with each other? Of course you do. Most of us did. However, I actually find it embarrassing remember those days. Atheists, to me, SOME atheists, to me, seem to do the same thing regarding their minds. They are just so thrilled at their intellectual abilities that they can't resist flashing them to everyone who will look. Or, more accurately, flashing their intellect to ensure that people pay attention to them. Maybe that's what I don't like. It reminds me of my own teenage insecurities.
Now, don’t get me wrong here. I’m as impressed by the human mind as the next guy. It’s just that atheists seem to be, whoops, I mean SOME atheists seem to be like teens who are first discovering what the mind can do. It’s usually at its worst in first year college. Remember those days? When you’d sit around expounding on this and that in an effort to impress, not so much others, as yourself with how clever you were? Well, THAT’S the impression that I get when talking to some atheist bloggers. It's like they're caught in a time-warp, showing off to anyone who will listen just how clever they are. It makes me gag. I feel embarrassed - for them! To actually judge another person’s value and worth by that person's level of intelligence or intellectual abilities creates within me a level of disgust that is disturbing even to me. Maybe it’s because six of our seven children are learning disabled. I feel VERY protective of them. Even if they weren’t that way, I find that kind of shallowness or superficiality really, really unattractive. So I’m going to go and get an orange.
24 comments:
I don't hate athiests either
but I will spend spend everyday pushing back their stupidity.
They are wrong. I know it. They know it.
It's very flattering that you seem to think atheists are all rather intelligent, but i happen to know people who aren't exactly einstein who don't believe in god either.
Plenty of intelligent people believe in god. The only thing i'd say about that is that they are suspending certain thought processes within themselves. What i mean by that is they suspend the same rationale and critical thinking they apply to all other aspects of life. If they treated all matters like this in life, they would believe absolutely anything put forward to them - DESPITE LACK OF EVIDENCE.
At the end of the day, that is what it will always come back down to. If you can't support a claim as great as the claim of a god, yet continue to believe it none the less, then you are quite clearly deluded. Check out the definition of the word.
You know i thought about not asking this but im going for it.
We are all made in his image are we? Tell me, what went wrong with the 6 adpoted children you have that are disabled? Or any other diabled person in the world for that matter? Are they not worthy of being disability free? Are they being punished for something? Is god sometimes disabled? Did the infallable one make mistakes? Will he make them 'normal' when they go to heaven - making them different people? Will they go to hell if they are incapable of accepting jesus as their saviour due to their disabilities? If not, why? Why bother sending them to earth in the first place?
The list goes on. Why does your just and loving god do this?
Please, i'm not trying to offend, or suggest that your children are any less human than you or i - it's just what i ask on the tin. What kind of god would bring children into this world in a disabled state?
Rahab :-) How about if you answer my question on "Is God Insane" and I'll pick these questions up over there?
Oh, and I don't think all or even most atheists are intelligent. Notice that I said SOME atheists?
I think it was G.K. Chesterton who said something like, "most atheists are nothing more than brute beasts."
Is Zeus insane?
I don't believe in any gods Mak, so how can i answer your question? If he does exist however, judging by looking at my surrounding world and by looking at the bible - then there is definitely something wrong with him. No where near the most intelligent entity in the universe.
Also, you are lucky that atheists aren't brute beasts, as i believe the most powerful man on the planet at the moment is one of us. Sure, he can't admit to that given the ridiculous requirement of christianity to get anywhere in U.S. politics, he might even say things that suggest the contrary - but i see through it, the man doesn't believe in god, and i'm not the only person (atheist or otherwise) that thinks this.
"Will they go to hell if they are incapable of accepting jesus as their saviour due to their disabilities?"
I've answered this before in another post - right? We are accountable for what we do with what we know, not what we don't know.
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"Why bother sending them to earth in the first place?"
THAT is another really good question. I think that one of the reasons we have the disabled, besides our free will choice to turn away from God, is that the sick, the dying the outcast give us, the able-bodied, a chance to show them love.
Jesus said, "My servants will be where I am." And where was Jesus found? With the sick, the dying, the outcast. That is why Christians by far and away outnumber atheists in caring for the poor and the wretched. His love, Jesus' love enters us and compels us to reach out to those in need. My kids, not yet at least, don't know there's anything wrong with them or different about them. They know that they're loved and that's about all they need to know - for now. That thing about being a Christian Rabidab is that God takes what would normally destroy us, and He makes of more than conquerors. I like that.
So god sends them to earth merely as objects for people to love?
Never mind that they might not have a quality of life equal to that of someone who is able bodied/sound minded (i don't know in what manner your children are disabled), its ok because they will be loved.
Able-bodied/minded children receive the same love, Mak. Or at least in my world-view they do. So why would god make them disabled, other than to test us? Which is sick.
Rab, it you're going to allow the God of the Bible to exist for the sake of ragging on Him, then you need to also allow the story-line unfold as it is explained in the Bible.
"So god sends them to earth merely as objects for people to love?"
God did not send nor could / would He disallow the type of world that we chose. Sickness, death, disabilities, mutations etc. etc. are our fault. Those who love God love the disabled. Those who hate God push to euthanise the disabled.
Rab - two of our children were conceived as a result of rape.
As a good atheist, would you have had them killed?
Thanks, Makarios, for commenting (twice) on my blog (http://dispraxis.blogspot.com/2009/06/re-real-world-atheism-re-christians-are_7429.html?showComment=1245381064955#comment-c8239819918562825995) a while back. Sorry, I understand that you encountered the various security layers, including delayed posting (your comments were published), and I assure you that is their intention for use, i.e., security, as I've had a couple of blogs that suffered from spamming. I don't intend to censor any comment and publish all non-spam that I receive. Since I am so very, very famous (at least with spammers), having had blogs on blogspot since 2006, that means I've published all three I've ever received. :(
Thanks for your first comment that mentioned:
>"I hope he's not gay"
>You forgot, "Not that there's anything wrong with that."
Pointing this out, Makarios, you reminded me to put a disclaimer on the site, because really the blog is an experiment in creating a blog out of other types of posts (say, a wiki update), and forming the basis of new auto-posts to Twitter, etc., and although I am an atheist, I do write a real blog post or wiki article once in a while. The post you commented on was not by me, though, as it has the "sigs" of the real authors, but it was a rather strange one (or series) anyway from the "Real World Atheists" yahoo group.
As for the subject of your blog post that I'm replying to now, what can I say? I'm not like the other atheists. -John F. Felix
Mak,
As we share the same belief I have a thought for you. If you are an atheist does that not mean that you have to deny your own existence? Because in our belief God created us so with the absence of God would be the absence of me right? Just curious as to what you thought of that. Also regarding this post, I had a good friend a young boy recently die from Leukemia and his dad put it best. God allowed him to be birthed in order to teach him more about God and if asked if he would do it over again he whole heartedly do it again.
To Marcus Wellington
I don't hate Christians either
but I will spend spend everyday pushing back their stupidity.
They are wrong. I know it. They know it.
Hey David - Mmm, I'd have to think about that one for a bit.
I'd for sure say that atheists must of necessity deny their true selves. They must deny that we are spirit beings encased in a natural or physical body. And they must deny, as Dennett and Harris and Dawkins do, that the "I" is real. They must call, what they think of as "Myself" as an illusion.
"Those who hate God push to euthanise the disabled."
You ignorant jackass. Atheists don't hate what they don't believe exists. The fact you think i, and other like me want disabled people euthanised is just sickening.
It was i who had to remind you disabled children receive the same love as those not diabled. Two being conceived by a rape is completely irrelevant to my questioning.
All your doing is providing a classic religious bahaviour that demonstrates picking and choosing what their chosen god is responsible, and what he is not responsible for.
He's the grand creator - yet he doesn't create disabled people - we do/ our actions do. Get a grip.
Don't get me wrong here. I have no problem with saying that God ALLOWS people to be born disabled. That's only technically differently from causing it WHEN You have the power to make it not happen. And IF this was all there is to life, then I think that you'd have a case. However, this life is only a step, a very small step on the way to what we were really created for. This earthly existence is only a training ground for what is next to come.
Marcus said...
"I don't hate athiests either
"but I will spend spend everyday pushing back their stupidity.
"They are wrong. I know it. They know it."
Make up your mind, either we are stupid for failing to notice all the proof of God everywhere, or we are dishonest for not admitting it.
I only hate Christians who make such stupid generalizations in the face of evidence to the contrary.
I will spend time now and then mocking your beliefs, especially when you demand special treatment because of them.
You are almost certainly wrong about pretty much everything. I am reasonably sure of it. I wish you knew it.
"That is why Christians by far and away outnumber atheists in caring for the poor and the wretched."
Religion is a great organizer, I'll give you that. No doubt you are happy to count all people working for and donating to a Christian organization in the headcount for your team.
Atheists don't cluster in the same way, because we don't have a bunch of ritual and ceremony to hang on to. With us, it's like herding cats. Some people see that as a down side; personally I'm not bothered.
BTW I would certainly hope that Christians would be more charitable on average, since you brag about it all the time... it's really your only unambiguously positive attribute left.
What you aren't is more tolerant. Christians (and Muslims etc) are the ones who jump up and down trying to tell people what they can do with their junk. And telling people they are inferior if they don't believe as you do.
Atheists tolerate you a heck of a lot more than you tolerate us, and only now when atheists start speaking out, sick of being vilified as a matter of course, are we noticed at all, only to be characterized as LOUD and STRIDENT and SHRILL because we point out that you can't go around claiming something some ultimate moral authority if you have nothing to back it up with.
Perhaps the "perceived" intellectual freedom that some atheists have is due to the fact that religion, in general, doesn't encourage intellectualism. It encourages the worship of dogma, regardless of the facts.
Being free of religion is quite stimulating intellectually. This freedom may at times show itself to be adolescent but most of the time it grows up. (unlike many Christians who seem to think God said, I believe it ,that settles it is a "Deep" intellectual thought)
So if god is allowing handicapped children to be born, but isn't directly doing it - what/who is?
I've had enough of this crap - why do we have disabled people? Without going into detail - nature isn't perfect. Occasionally, things don't quite happen the way as desired at a molcecular level and as a result - creatures all over the planet (not just us) are born with impairments/disabilities.
If you think that our actions are the reason why these abnormalities sometimes occur, you are kidding yourself on. You will blame anything that saves you blaming your god - which of course you can't, because how could a perfect creator create something that doesn't always work? It would destroy his pristine infallibility.
Even still, you alluded to it yourself, admitting that he LETS disabled people be born - he could fix it all, but he doesn't.
Here i sit, tearing into him on a daily basis, arguing against his existence and refusing to believe in any religion of any sort - yet i have been 'blessed' with a body that works just as it should. i regularly play football (soccer) and have no disabilities. I have family and friends who love me and i love them. I have a wonderful girlfriend. I have just graduated with 1st class masters in chemistry - as well as receiving an award for being top of a particular field in my class -and i am about to go back and begin another 3 and a half years working towards my PhD in the same subject.
My life is fantastic - just as good as yours makarios.
Now, if i had been christian, just like you - you would no doubt believe that god has blessed me extremely well.
Basically, how do you account for the fact that a wicked atheist that laughs at the idea of a god has everything he desires in life - yet many devout christians get absolutely shat on.
It's all bullshit.
“Now, if i had been christian, just like you - you would no doubt believe that god has blessed me extremely well.”
It has nothing to do with you being or not being a Christian. God HAS blessed you. And by the way, congratulations. That's a significant accounplishment. I got my Masters when our first two kids were at home and it required a lot of patience on the part of my family. For a couple years it seems as though I was living at the library.
Anyhow, God has blessed you yet you ignore Him and deny His existence. God is love and He loves you.
Atheists are forever saying "How can He be a God of love when, blah, blah, blah!" They sound so enthralled with their logic. It’s even more weird how they’ll never demand an answer from God as to why He gave them hands that work perfectly, picking up, turning things off and on, fixing, adjusting, caressing, creating and exploring with exquisite dexterity. It’s mind-boggling to watch how they don’t demand an answer from God as to why He gave them mouths with the ability to sound out words, taste foods, sense temperature and texture with extraordinary sensitivity; mouths and vocal cords that can moan, cry and sing. They never seem to consider the contradiction in how they don’t demand an answer from God as to why He gave them eyes that can communicate emotion and explore the majestic beauty of Creation. They use the word creation without ever considering the Creator. They never seem to wonder why it is that they don’t demand an answer from God as to why He has allowed them to be born in an unimaginably huge and hostile universe on this little jewel of a planet. They don’t ever consider why they don’t demand an answer from God as to why He continues to allow them to take for granted the fact that they have more food than they can eat; as much money as they need, and a health care system that the majority of humanity cannot even conceive of. They don’t ever seem to wonder what kind of a person would take all of these gifts and still curse the God who gave it all to them. They don’t ever seem to think it odd that they don’t demand an answer from God as to why He is so good to them even when them hate Him, ignore Him, reject Him and hate those who love Him. Of course if a conversation goes in this direction, they will immediately yell "There is no God," since it doesn’t work so well to let God exist only when you want to blame Him for something.
We Christians don’t get crapped on. I don't consider that I got crapped on. Was life difficult? Absolutely. But the benefits have far, far outweighed any harm done.
We Christians get His presence in the midst of the suffering that comes to most people at one time or another. I can’t explain what it’s like but the “something” that happens to / with and for those of us to follow Jesus makes any difficulty or challenge well worth it. That’s why the apostle Paul says, “I rejoice in my infirmities, my weakness, my difficulties. For when I am weak (in myself) then I am strong (with God’s strength).”
How do I account for it? God Himself says, “I cause it to rain on the Godly and the ungodly.”
"They don't demand an answer from god.... etc. " - FULL STOP.
I don't demand answers from him, i demand answers fromy ou for believing in such bullshit. If he has blessed me then why? What have i done to merit such an easy life but your believing children are disabled?
Answer - he hasn't blessed me. I don't ignore him because he doesn't exist. I don't believe in what there is no evidence for.
You have unwittingly catch 22'd yourself. If he has blessed me with my intellect, then given his omniscience he would KNOW that i would use it to determine his existence just the same way i do when i'm trying to work out whether i have synthesised my target molecule. Free will or not, he would know everything, including how i think.
Your massive screed was utterly pointless. I am a product of evolution, just like you. We were once cavemen makarios - CAVEMEN. It wasn't like human beings appeared out of thin air (like according to your bible).
They way you talk about atheists, is as if they are well and truly aware of the big mans existence, yet STILL deny it. THIS. IS. NOT. THE. CASE.
Everything you attribute to god in that list, we attribute to other, more logical, more plausible things.
Also, i said many devout christians get shat on - and they do. I said it to make the comparison between them (who in your eyes as well as gods supposedly, should be worthy of such blessings more than i am).
Of course, i don't believe god is shitting on anyone at all, because he isn't there - i'm merely pointing out what an idiot your god would be if he existed.
“If he has blessed me then why?”
Me Me Me. Not everything has to do with you Rab. God blesses whom He chooses to the degree He chooses and in the manner He chooses. In terms of getting what I want out of life, my 46 years of arthritis have been the biggest asset possible. Do you deny God the right to do as He pleases with His creation?
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“Free will or not, he would know everything, including how i think.”
Exactly. If you have a Bible, set aside ten minute and read Romans chapter nine. If thirty-three verses are too much, just read verses twenty-two to twenty-four. That is why God has blessed and continues to bless someone who denies His very existence. Unless you change, you’re going to answer for that someday Rab.
"Me Me Me"
There you go again, all child-like. You know exactly what point i'm trying to make yet you choose to belittle me by making it out that everything must revolve around me.
Forget it.
I would suggest some passages for you to read, but i know you'll have some ridiculously stupid justification behind what they say.
And no, an all loving, supremely good god cannot just sit back and watch you being raped. I wouldn't do it, YOU wouldn't do it.
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