Sabine Grant

hello Buffman... maybe the balance in that final statement is that charitable giving for the christian is to be the product of his faith without any other ulterior motive. As James points in " but faith without works is dead". It is supposed to be a motivation to give, to promote reconciliation, to care for the needy, to show compassion to the "unlovable", to dispense productivity in our actions, to question oneself, to review our attitudes.... the whole process is supposed to transform an individual in an evergrowing pattern.
I have concluded that some folks need that motivation thru faith to experience that personal improvement. Others have more natural abilities to exhibit such qualities.
I am not so sure about the claim that a non believer who displayed such goodness will face eternal damnation....maybe to the mind of a christian who has restricted God to his own image and projection of his own limitations, God is to ignore the intent behind our actions or " works". The evangelistic giver who pertains to gain someone to Christ because of his giving places a condition right there... can he fool his God ? the non believer who gives out of pure empathy and pleasure to relieve someone else's misery.... how could God ignore that intent?
Christ commented about Peter " for love covers many sins".... the ability to conduct our actions with the right intent and motivation ( love) is what faith is to promote. No correct theology can ever replace that ability. No matter how many verses are memorized and doctrines are applied, faith has to be a transforming element to be validated by God.
Non believers are capable of having the right motivation as they dispense goodness onto others. I say... I entrust that God will validate their intent. But again I also believe that any act of goodness is God's presence in us. Whether we aknowledge Him or not.

FOR RAD : have you not ever experienced wisedom and what you would define as " Christlike" qualities in a non christian? I have. And more than twice. I can even assert that at times non christians have inspired me more than other christians have. And each time I was inspired, I recieved it as a gift from God. My thankfulness in not limited to whom it is coming from but the belief that the presence of God is within each act of goodness.

Buffman

Hi Sabine,

That was merely an "extract" I thought interesting because of its Christian origins. I would have to go back and read the entire article before offering any meaningful comment on your opinions in reference to it.

However, I think you may have surfaced some very basic human proclivities...selfishness and greed...and the techniques utilized to minimize their hold on each of us. Some folks break that hold by following the Golden Rule. Others require a rationalization that they are investing in their own future well being...in a promised after life. And some are merely socially shamed into sharing with the less fortunate...a guilt conditioned conscience. (The manner in which this so-called consience is conditioned seems to be the basis of your thoughts. But that's only my guess.) Thanks for the comments. I found your experieces and conclusions very appealing without the introduction of the supernatural God source.

Amos

Learning is equal to grounding data with reality and the data can come from books or teachers but can also be recollected from our soul wherein only things always were. Aways "was" has nothing to do history but only with our personal eternal mind wherein we are omniscient because of a Thousand Year history that is retained in our soul. Religious indoctrination can be tied to this thousand year reign if and only if it can find harmony there and upon this harmony we built our faith.

Your dinosaurs, gods and goddesses are just data and will be yours when you make them yours (good luck). For example, if you told me that dinosaurs existed for millions of years I would believe you if you told me they existed for billions of years I would also believe that. Both of these answers will remain data and will never be mine to experience.

I am not sure what you are driving at here but is the sientific method not an objective enterprise with the mechanics of logic to provide rigor in deducting the conclusion?

The supernatural allows us to extract from omniscience and add this to the natural world towards a better understanding of the natural world. Contemplative logic is a good alternative here but is not exactly a field for juniors.

It is to bad people get sick or insane but that was not part of my argument and I think your reply missed the mark. I suggested that humans are free agents as humans but because they are divided in their own mind that they are not free in their will to choose. In this divided mind are we both temporal and eternal and only an identity crisis is needed to annihilate our temporal mode of existence and only this will land us into eternal life which is the reality of the myth.

I can agree with that position and therefore claim that only one religion (besides Judaism) is even close to understanding the supernatural.

"At rest" does not have to be asleep and contemplation is not exactly the same as critical thinking. I actually think that they are opposite which should tell us something about the origen of inspired ideas.

Did you know that dreaming is only possible if we are divided in our mind and that dreaming is not possible in heaven where we have eternal life? If we are encouraged to "follow our dream" we are told to follow the leads given to us by our subconscious mind . . . wherein we are divided with our conscious mind (TOL opposite to TOK)Well I am sceptic when it comes to believing and especially when they want money on top of it. I deplore spreading the message of Jesus Christ because that is in fact the anti-christ and I can prove that to you in many different ways. Also, we should never ever make JC the reason for anything we do if, in fact, he is just my brother.

Buffman

Amos

Learning is equal to grounding data with reality and the data can come from books or teachers but can also be recollected from our soul wherein only things always were.

Exactly where do these "souls" originate? How many of them are there? An endless supply? Where are they before a human is born? Do other living things have "souls?" If not, why not? How is this "soul" taught? (How does it learn what it knows that it later imparts to the mind?) What verifiable evidence do you offer that a "soul" exists? Forgive me Amos, but I fear you are on a very slippery slope when you elect to introduce something for which you can provide no more than a verbal guess at a description. IMHO, a "soul" is little more than the ancient's best descriptive glorification of the human's life essence/force. I believe that I do understand your need to imbue this so-called "soul" with the knowledge of that which can not be proven/verified in any other manner. You need it to provide you with the easy answers to those specifics of the natural world about which you have little formal learning/knowledge. That is a very normal, and perhaps even necessary, crutch for the majority of humans. Why! Quite simply because humans are naturally curious yet fearful. In order to satisfy their curiosity they must create/manufacture some way to overcome their fears. Their fears of the unknown and death.

One of the great gifts of our reasoning ability is its creative/manufacturing capability. We can look at an empty room and fill it with furnishings...in our mind. We can look at an empty plain and fill it with wheat or a great metropolis...in our minds. We can look at the sky and fill it with gods, goddesses and bodiless spirits...in our mind. We can create "souls" from nothingness...in our minds. We can imbue those "souls" with every manner of personification...in our minds. We can convince ourselves that what we have created in our minds is as real as real can be. And why can, or do, we do this? Because we have been led to believe that whatever the human mind can conceive can be brought to material fruition if we merely believe it can with all that we are....and a ton of time and hard work. Unfortunately that belief is not based on a rational foundation of verified natural world constraints/limits. Therefore folks like yourself do the most obvious thing. You create a supernatural world ...in your mind...that does not adhere to any constraints/limitations.

Aways "was" has nothing to do history but only with our personal eternal mind wherein we are omniscient because of a Thousand Year history that is retained in our soul. Religious indoctrination can be tied to this thousand year reign if and only if it can find harmony there and upon this harmony we built our faith.

Why do you limit it to just a "Thousand Year" history? Natural world science estimates the universe is 12-15 billion years old. Our planet is estimated to be 4.5 billion years old. Life on earth has been estimated at 3.85 (+ or- .050 )billion years old....

http://news.nationalgeographic.com/n...523_rocks.html

....and that human life is estimated to have evolved only (?) 5.8 million years ago.

http://www.angelfire.com/il/adventureclub/know.html

http://home.apu.edu/~jsimons/

Ahhhh! There's the "Secret Word"....INDOCTRINATION. Humans "learn" by being taught from experience or indoctrination/education ...or a combination of all three.---(If faith is built on harmony, then religion has no place in faith.)



Your dinosaurs, gods and goddesses are just data and will be yours when you make them yours (good luck).

They aren't just "my" dinosaurs, gods and goddesses. The dinosaurs are everyone's. However, the various gods and goddesses are the creative figments of the human mind's desire for answers and are as ephemeral as the questions that have already been answered. The only reason that gods and goddesses continue to exist in the minds of humans is because not all the answers are available for all the questions. (That is one of the primary reasons why religious faith beliefs will not soon disappear...but why so many have already been piled on the ash heap of human history.)

For example, if you told me that dinosaurs existed for millions of years I would believe you if you told me they existed for billions of years I would also believe that. Both of these answers will remain data and will never be mine to experience.

Hmmmm? Are you now saying that a human can only learn from experience? It would seem so.
(Side note: Dinosaurs appeared on Earth nearly 250 Million years ago, early in a period of time geologists called Triassic. They grew in numbers and types during the Jurassic time period, and dominated Earth during the Cretaceous time period. Their feet shook the ground for nearly 200 million years - 40,000 times as long as recorded human history! But then suddenly they all mysteriously disappeared at the end of the Cretaceous Period about 65 million years ago.)

http://www.ugs.state.ut.us/utahgeo/d...il/dinoage.htm

I am not sure what you are driving at here but is the sientific method not an objective enterprise with the mechanics of logic to provide rigor in deducting the conclusion?

http://books.nap.edu/html/creationism/introduction.html

The supernatural allows us to extract from omniscience and add this to the natural world towards a better understanding of the natural world. Contemplative logic is a good alternative here but is not exactly a field for juniors.

Omniscience means having the total knowledge of everything. If one has the total knowledge of everything, then there are no more questions. No more unknowns to fear...though perhaps far more knowns to fear. There would be no requirement to better know the natural world since it would already be fully known. I fear that you are losing me in the sucking under whirlpool of religious mysticism. Is this the religious philosophy from which you obtain your belief in "contemplative logic?"

http://www.uppertriad.org/index.html

I am not sure what you mean by "not exactly a field for juniors." Care to elaborate rather than have me arrive at some sort of misinterpretation?

It is to bad people get sick or insane but that was not part of my argument and I think your reply missed the mark.

Quite possibly!

I suggested that humans are free agents as humans but because they are divided in their own mind that they are not free in their will to choose. In this divided mind are we both temporal and eternal and only an identity crisis is needed to annihilate our temporal mode of existence and only this will land us into eternal life which is the reality of the myth.

I'm sorry! I suspect that you are merely confusing the known with the unknown in an attempt to find the answers to your personal questions, fears and doubts. In my younger years, I helped to take care of a number of folks who had lost contact with the temporal portion of their mind and whom had escaped into the eternal portion...permanently. Many claimed that they were God, Jesus, or Napoleon. I was quite concerned about the one who sincerely and completely believed that he was Superman and could fly or break down thick, heavily bolted, doors with a single blow. --- Amos, I rather suspect that you are describing what I call the conscience for lack of a better description. You seem to believe that humans are born with a conscience. I have not found evidence to support that belief. I am inclined to view consciences as having been created, conditioned, and indoctrinated after birth. There is little reason or purpose for a lone individual to be ethical or moral. It is only within a social environment that ethics and morality can contribute to survival. (But that is a different topic. Here we are attempting to define your supernatural god belief.)

I can agree with that position and therefore claim that only one religion (besides Judaism) is even close to understanding the supernatural.

Fair enough! However, it appears that many others disagree with your understanding of the supernatural. (I know! I know! Their loss.)


"At rest" does not have to be asleep and contemplation is not exactly the same as critical thinking. I actually think that they are opposite which should tell us something about the origen of inspired ideas.

Agreed. Rest and sleep need not be identical, nor do contemplation and critical thinking have to be identical. I would have to contribute a great deal more time and effort to the issue before I could offer any meaningful thoughts to your contention that they are opposites. However, I feel quite certain that we hold very different views on the definition of "inspired."

Did you know that dreaming is only possible if we are divided in our mind and that dreaming is not possible in heaven where we have eternal life? If we are encouraged to "follow our dream" we are told to follow the leads given to us by our subconscious mind . . . wherein we are divided with our conscious mind (TOL opposite to TOK)

Oh my goodness! No! I have no idea what is or is not possible in "Heavenland"...nor do I care to hear.

http://psych.ucsc.edu/dreams/

http://spinner-soft.com/Rainbow/dreamresearch.shtml

http://www.dreammoods.com/dreaminfor...amresearch.htm


Well I am sceptic when it comes to believing and especially when they want money on top of it. I deplore spreading the message of Jesus Christ because that is in fact the anti-christ and I can prove that to you in many different ways. Also, we should never ever make JC the reason for anything we do if, in fact, he is just my brother.

Just your brother? When did you celebrate your "brit mila" religious butchering in the name of God? Oh! You probably mean your "spiritual" brother. It must be nice to have friends AND relatives in high places.

I think we have carried this discussion far enough to appreciate that it still comes back to faith versus fact. Thanks for hanging in there with me.

Amos

OK, OK Buffman, I'll make it short.

Your soul is that part of you which you do not know. That's a good answer isn't it?

Your soul is wherein you are your father's incarnate son (family traits etc.).

Your soul is the 80 % of your brain you use very little and try to penetrate when contemplating.

Your soul is the blueprint for your body where ageing is made possible.

All sentient beings have a soul or they could not have a conscious awareness.

In your soul you can be timeless omniscient and ultruistic.

Your soul keeps you alive when you are asleep or unconscious.

Your soul teaches you the art of language long before you go to school. etc.

The only difference here is that you were not part of that 4.5 billion years while you can be part of the thousand years is am refering to.

Of course, how else can faith find understanding. Religion deals with metaphysics and it foreshadows the physics of metamorphosis that we can encounter in life.

Religion will never go the way of the dinosaur because we are the continutiy of God while the dinosaur was just part of history.

We live 15 minutes from Dinosaur Park in Southern Alberta and I have spent some weekends on horseback in that area. We now have large oils and gas fields around there so I do not deny their existence but was just never interested enough to learn about them. Like I am more of a realist, you know?

Exactly.

That is just distinction from juniors to seniors in our response to philosophical discussions. To be seniors one must be able to interpret both the natural and the supernatural and present them together as one whole.

Indeed our conscience is not real but is a product of religion because when the supernatural blends with the natural there is no conscience left (Stoic conscience), except for our loyalty to the laws of nature.

I find your form of "eternal minded people" quite interesting (I have argued this many times). Superman, Napolean, Luther, Hitler and now it seems like we have another one with that same ambition. We actually call that condition "hell" because reason does not prevail while they do have the ability to speak and act with conviction and determination. A good description about them is given in Rev. 13:11-18.

Thanks, and anytime.

Buffman

Amos

OK, OK Buffman, I'll make it short.

You just fibbed.

Your soul is that part of you which you do not know. That's a good answer isn't it?

For those needing a supernatural belief system...you betcha! The rest of that list would cause me to write a tome. I have no desire to do that. Perhaps others will elect to respond.

The only difference here is that you were not part of that 4.5 billion years while you can be part of the thousand years is am refering to.

Au contraire! We are all part of that 4.5 billion years just as much as we are part of the last thousand.

(INDOCTRINATION )
Of course, how else can faith find understanding. Religion deals with metaphysics and it foreshadows the physics of metamorphosis that we can encounter in life.

Perhaps rational, critical, thinking might be preferable...especially if based on verifiable evidence. That it the way to reach out for accurate, lasting, understanding. Catipillars and tadpoles metamorphose. Humans are neither.

Religion will never go the way of the dinosaur because we are the continutiy of God while the dinosaur was just part of history.

Praise Zeus! I had no idea that that was the case. I'll ask Odin about it the very next time he visits. I thought that all living things were supposed to be part of God's creation and kingdom.

http://www.lowemuseum.org/ggml/index...enuOption=asia

http://www.vedamsbooks.com/no12781.htm

http://www.egypt-tehuti.org/articles...ties-gods.html

http://www.thetroth.org/ourfaith/gods.html

http://ancienthistory.about.com/cs/myth/

We live 15 minutes from Dinosaur Park in Southern Alberta and I have spent some weekends on horseback in that area. We now have large oils and gas fields around there so I do not deny their existence but was just never interested enough to learn about them. Like I am more of a realist, you know?

That does sound like a wonderful recreation and contemplating time for you. Glenrose, Texas was about 35 minutes north of the ranch where I spent some time. A ranch that had its own dinosaur tracks and fossils...some of which now in my living room.

That is just distinction from juniors to seniors in our response to philosophical discussions. To be seniors one must be able to interpret both the natural and the supernatural and present them together as one whole.

That is an unadulterated cop out and pure, steaming, meadow muffins.

Indeed our conscience is not real but is a product of religion because when the supernatural blends with the natural there is no conscience left (Stoic conscience), except for our loyalty to the laws of nature.

In the absence of critical reasoning and accurate knowledge, I agree. Conscience is very dependent on religious indoctrination/conditioning. That's why organized religions have become the bane to reason. They teach make-believe and the entire world suffers because of it. In your case, I am happy that you have found your conscience where you have. I wonder how people found a conscience before they had time to philosophize...before they even knew what philosophy was? You don't suppose that the laws of nature played any role, do you?

I find your form of "eternal minded people" quite interesting (I have argued this many times). Superman, Napolean, Luther, Hitler and now it seems like we have another one with that same ambition. We actually call that condition "hell" because reason does not prevail while they do have the ability to speak and act with conviction and determination. A good description about them is given in Rev. 13:11-18.

What alarms me is his blind faith in the supernatural. He is merely following his God's bidding...isn't he? Rid the world of the "Evil Doers." Many of us in these forums may find ourselves coming under his beatific, glassy eyed, stare. He has certainly made his definitions of real American and true Patriot clear. They are only those who believe as he does and agree with him. (I think it is way past time for Canada to become part of the United States. Beware. You have oil.)

Thanks, and anytime.

I suspect there will be others. I look forward to them.