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  1. #85
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    Re: The Gay Thread cont.

    Quote Originally Posted by HoustonRaven View Post
    Threads like this make me feel even better about being a Deist.

    :D
    Feelings are all well and good but are you a Deist because you like the feeling or because it is the truth?





  2. #86
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    Re: The Gay Thread cont.

    Quote Originally Posted by Greg View Post
    Uh, yes, it does matter. Please note my post. If you don't take the whole thing as true and throw out what you don't like what does it matter?

    If you believe Jesus is who he said he was and you accept the offer of him to bear your sins you are a Christian. You don't have to take the Bible as literal to do that. I just wonder why people would believe that part and not the rest.

    You know, if you really study Christianity nothing it more freeing.

    1 Corinthians 10:23 - "Everything is permissible"--but not everything is beneficial. "Everything is permissible"--but not everything is constructive.

    Christians and only Christians are freed from the Law completely. But if you really accept Christ as your Lord and Savior these things, while legal, are not as attractive as they once were. And much of them become reprehensible.
    My guess would be the people who believe that part and not the rest, believe those things because there were witnesses of miracles Jesus performed, but the things people wrote saying their from God who is the witness other than the writer? (Again, just a guess)





  3. #87
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    Re: The Gay Thread cont.

    Quote Originally Posted by Greg View Post
    Feelings are all well and good but are you a Deist because you like the feeling or because it is the truth?
    I don't presume to know the "truth" nor do I base my faith on a "feeling". I do know and believe (read have faith in) a supreme being that got all of this started and kept it going for billions of years.

    There is nothing a finite being can do to prove the existence of the infinite. Proof is a finite concept.





  4. #88
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    Re: The Gay Thread cont.

    Quote Originally Posted by NCRAVEN View Post
    My guess would be the people who believe that part and not the rest, believe those things because there were witnesses of miracles Jesus performed, but the things people wrote saying their from God who is the witness other than the writer? (Again, just a guess)
    Jesus taught the Old Testament, all of it, was the Word of God. The NT was written almost exclusively by people who had miracles attributed to them. Much of those are in Acts, written by Luke, not an Apostle and no miracles are attributed to him (that I recall). But he was a first rate historian.





  5. #89
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    Re: The Gay Thread cont.

    Quote Originally Posted by HoustonRaven View Post
    I don't presume to know the "truth" nor do I base my faith on a "feeling". I do know and believe (read have faith in) a supreme being that got all of this started and kept it going for billions of years.

    There is nothing a finite being can do to prove the existence of the infinite. Proof is a finite concept.
    Nope, people can not prove God exists. But God can give quite good evidence in all manner and form. It is just a matter of sifting for truth.

    Do you believe this God would just create and have no interest after that?

    By the way, why are you a Deist if you don't presume that is the truth?





  6. #90
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    Re: The Gay Thread cont.

    Quote Originally Posted by Greg View Post
    Nope, people can not prove God exists. But God can give quite good evidence in all manner and form. It is just a matter of sifting for truth.
    Agreed.

    Quote Originally Posted by Greg View Post
    Do you believe this God would just create and have no interest after that?
    Just because we don't always see God's input does not necessarily mean God is disinterested. But your question supposes that time is the same for finite beings as it is for the infinite. A billion or so years for the man upstairs may be the time it takes for him to run to the fridge and grab a beer.





  7. #91
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    Re: The Gay Thread cont.

    Quote Originally Posted by HoustonRaven View Post
    Agreed.



    Just because we don't always see God's input does not necessarily mean God is disinterested. But your question supposes that time is the same for finite beings as it is for the infinite. A billion or so years for the man upstairs may be the time it takes for him to run to the fridge and grab a beer.
    That wasn't the point I was after. Generally, and this may not apply to how you define it, but generally a Deist believes in a Creator God who is NOT personal and does not have a personal relationship with his creatures while a Theist would believe God is personal and does want a relationship with his creatures.





  8. #92
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    Re: The Gay Thread cont.

    Quote Originally Posted by Greg View Post
    That wasn't the point I was after. Generally, and this may not apply to how you define it, but generally a Deist believes in a Creator God who is NOT personal and does not have a personal relationship with his creatures while a Theist would believe God is personal and does want a relationship with his creatures.
    That's my mistake.

    Theist is more an appropriate definition. I always confuse Theism for Agnosticism, to which I do not agree.

    Thanks for pointing that out.





  9. #93
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    Re: The Gay Thread cont.

    Quote Originally Posted by HoustonRaven View Post
    That's my mistake.

    Theist is more an appropriate definition. I always confuse Theism for Agnosticism, to which I do not agree.

    Thanks for pointing that out.
    That clarifies.

    This leaves you in one of 4 theistic groups. Judaism, Christianity, Islam, or a personal view not shared by a large group.

    All other belief systems are either pantheistic or atheistic (or agnostic if one can't decide).





  10. #94
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    A very simple yet profound explanation by renowned scientist Carl Sagan on how something seemingly "magical" has a very real scientific foundation. That is, how a God can interact with our universe despite transcending it.

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UnURElCzGc0
    “Great minds discuss ideas. Average minds discuss events. Small minds discuss people.”

    –Eleanor Roosevelt





  11. #95
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    Re: The Gay Thread cont.

    Quote Originally Posted by Greg View Post
    Jesus taught the Old Testament, all of it, was the Word of God. The NT was written almost exclusively by people who had miracles attributed to them. Much of those are in Acts, written by Luke, not an Apostle and no miracles are attributed to him (that I recall). But he was a first rate historian.
    You'll know this better than I. Did Jesus teach the Old Testament was the literal word of God or inspired by? (Again to me it doesn't matter)





  12. #96
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    Re: The Gay Thread cont.

    Quote Originally Posted by Sirdowski View Post
    A very simple yet profound explanation by renowned scientist Carl Sagan on how something seemingly "magical" has a very real scientific foundation. That is, how a God can interact with our universe despite transcending it.

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UnURElCzGc0
    Kudos for Sir for adding a slice of the cerebral to the conversation. You never disappoint as long as we can keep you away from the children.

    I do have a problem though...

    It seems heretical, even in the eyes of this infidel, to cast god as a histrionic apple who can't be recognized or perceived without the serendipitious questioning of one's sanity. (well, on second thought that sort of makes sense...scratch that)

    Futher troubling though is the suggestion that our skittish apple-god exists below a manifold of greater dimensions where he can only gather mere perceptual shadows of reality quite like Plato often opined about organic man. (you know, I just might be warming up to this idea as well...scratch it again)

    I think maybe I can believe in your god afterall. It might explain the not-so-hard-to-notice flaws in his design if all along he was just oscillating between the need to be noticed as true and his enchantment of watching the fluttering shadows above, all the time while trying to follow the directions on how to put the pieces together below. Surely this would hinder his architecture while explaining why he is so angry.

    The analogy beautifully combines the elements of insanity or let's just call it magical thinking involved as well as maybe why the creation is so horribly fucked up for what was once such a divine beginning.









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