|
Post by Hemingway on Dec 17, 2009 20:19:12 GMT
Hemingway, Your Catechism was extremely poor as any Catholic knows that protestantism and any other form claimed to be Christian is opposed to all Catholic Doctrine so you representation that the USA is Christian is flawed in two areas, one is that as you copied and pasted the USA is only 23.9% Catholic which does not represent the largest population. Is that really your response? Its so weak I really don’t feel the need to answer it. All I’ll state (for the second time) is that the USA is 78.5% Christian and 23.9% are Catholic. They are the facts. Just because it undermines your argument doesn’t mean you can ignore it. Your lack of honesty on this is incredible. The second flaw you point to yourself is that separation of church and state in your own words does not allow religion to affect state decisions so the violence you claim America is so guilty then would have to be perpetrated by the state and not religion according to your definition of religion. The violence is both perpetrated by the state and the people living in it…… 78.5% of whom consider themselves Christians. And its NOT MY DEFINITION OF RELIGION by the way. I haven’t defined religion at all. Why on earth would you make such an obviously false and erroneous comment? Without religion the state is then atheist according to your definition so the violence would have to spring from atheism according to your own definition of church and state. The people living in the states are 78.5% Christian. They drive the taxis, work in the factories, wash the dishes AND run the government. I simply stated that separation of church and state is in effect in the USA. Also, once again you allude to me making a definition of an “Atheist State”. Where did I do this? Pleas quote!!!! I think you’ll find I DIDN’T. This makes you a fabricator of lies. My bible facts recall is a bit rusty but I’m sure it says in there somewhere that telling lies is bad…… In America atheism was declared a religion also as contested by prisoners serving time for crimes petition the Supreme Court to allow atheists the right to hold "Church" meetings. Atheism is a non-belief in theism or gods. To state it is a religion is incorrect. The US supreme court DID NOT rule atheism a religion per se but actually only stated that atheism was equivalent to a religion for 1st amendment purposes. All that means is people without religion have the same rights as people with religion. You either didn’t understand this legal concept or you deliberately misrepresented the issue in your post. This link may help clear the issue for you: atheism.about.com/od/definitionofatheism/a/whatisatheism.htmThe religious live life by a defined set of rules giving praise to a deity. Does atheism have anything approaching "clearly defined rules?" Not in the least. There is only one "rule," and that is the rule of the definition of "atheism" - not having any belief in any gods. Other than that, atheists are free to do whatever they want and still be called atheists. An atheist can do and believe absolutely anything beyond gods and still fit the definition. Quite the opposite of how "rules" are treated in a religion. This is one area where a misunderstanding of what atheism is probably comes into play As you frequently refer to the Bible as an Iron Age book let me remind you atheism is not new, it was practiced during the Iron Age. The bible IS an Iron Age book. There is no disputing that. Are you suggesting it isn’t? The point you make about the age of Atheism and the length its been around is irrelevant as it doesn’t make supernatural claims that are unverifiable in the same way that religion does. I have never been removed from this forum, I am a new member in good standing per Michael G. Apparantly your confusion about me is related to your confusion about Catholicism as well when you purport your education was completed and yet you do not know the difference between a Catholic and protestant which I find also contradictory as someone who pretends to know a lot about the Catholic faith when all of your information is identifying people that are not Catholic as Catholic. Sir…. I put it to you that you are an outright LIAR. Your prose style, Americanised spelling of words such as “center”, Traveler” and “Color”, your continued misuse of the quote function and the fact that you continually leave bizarre, erroneous and irrelevant responses to other posters would leave me in no doubt that you ARE the person who has been removed from this site FOUR times and the Atheist Ireland site once. Plus your IP address is the same….. BUSTED….. as you Americans so like to say when one is caught in the act of wrong doing. On the second point you made I would like to state that I DO KNOW the difference between a catholic and a protestant. Just because you say I do not doest make it so. I however feel that all religions (including the aforementioned) are in error in their belief in a supreme being. That is all. And why are you not aware atheism is defined as a religion having a set of beliefs and that one of the beliefs is that there is no God?. Because its not. This is a misunderstanding (one of many) on your part. See the above answer number four…….. The word "religion" does not include in it's definition belief in God it merely means having a defined set of beliefs which atheists do. No they don’t. Quite the opposite in fact. See the above answer number four…….. Further atheists claim that they do not believe in God yet the leadership posts in the atheist forum: The case against God: www.jmooneyham.com/the-case-against-god.html which defines certain crimes that an alleged God is guilty of and further defining those power which God is not capable of exercising. This atheist contradiction in defining it's own set of beliefs opposes most of it's own primary premise that God does not exist . God is guilty of crimes when he doesn't exist, God cannot exercise power when he does not exist? Where is the logic in that? Stating that god does not exist is not a defined set of beliefs. It’s a rejection of theism. Its as simple as that. There is no contradiction. Plus you are paraphrasing out of context here. It’s a flawed attempt on your part to try and elevate atheism to a religion. It isn’t, never has been and never will be. Religion is your belief system. You are free to believe what you want. Just do not go around stating that what you BELIEVE is actually FACT. When you do this (claim something is a fact) you must provide testable evidence to reinforce your factual claim. If you cannot provide this evidence but still claim it is fact, well then other have every right to dismiss your claim.
|
|
|
Post by Hemingway on Dec 18, 2009 13:48:07 GMT
Hemingway, What you state is an absurdly incorrect premise. Everything you believe must proceed from the belief that there is no god. Also absurd is your repeated assertion that you have no beliefs, you do believe there is no god. Incorrect. You are making a sweeping generalisation about atheists and my belief system in particular. Its NOT a belief system to reject theism. I have no belief system in the sense you propose. It appears you have made TWO logical fallacies here. The first is the “Hasty Generalisation Fallacy”. An example of this would be: (1) My atheist neighbour is a real grouch. Therefore: (2) Atheists are grouches This argument takes an individual case of an atheist, and draws a general rule from it, assuming that all atheists are like the neighbour. Atheists are in fact very different and do not conforms to specific sets of rules in stark contrast to religious people. The second logical fallacy you have made is that of “Arguing from Ignorance”. Another example would be: (1) No one has been able to disprove the existence of God. Therefore: (2) God exists. This argument is fallacious because the non-existence of God is perfectly consistent with no one having been able to prove God’s non-existence. How do you propose we proof the non-existence of something? Should I spend my time going around proving the non-existence of pink unicorns and green goblins too? You CANNOT believe in the non-existence of something. Its a double negative and therefore a logical fallacy. Surely even you can see this? The person making the claim that something is a fact has the burden of proof on them. This is the way it is in ALL walks of life and it should be no different for religion. It is up to YOU to prove your claim. Its not up to me to disprove it, especially as you have provided NO evidence for your claim. Can you imagine such a scenario in a court of law? "Your honour, we know Joe Bloggs carried out the crime. We have no evidence but we really, really believe that Mr Bloggs carried out the crime. Please accept what we say and lock him up...... because we really really believe he done it."Catholic do not need to prove there is a God to an atheist. We only may give you that charity should we decide it is worth the effort. Unfortunately your denial of the wonderful reality of heaven prevents you from enlightenment. Well if you have no proof thats fine. I reserve the right to my claim that if you have no evidence for heaven, I will continue in my present stance that it does not exist. Carl Sagan once said the "Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence." People of faith make extraordinary claims about the afterlife, the creator, our eternal soul etc but provide ZERO evidence. Therefore I reserve the right to reject these claims out of hand. What you call "enlightenment" in your comment above, I would call delusion. Thats all I can say. You and I are different and as far as a belief in a higher power is concerned, ner the twain shall meet on this issue. I accept your position and wish you well but I still hold my own position and have not been swayed one iota by any of your comments as regards the existence of a creator, higher power or of a god.
|
|
|
Post by hibernicus on Dec 18, 2009 18:14:24 GMT
Reluctant as I am to seem to be on the same side as Hemingway, I notice one of his statements which seems slightly odd. He says atheism does not make supernatural claims which are unverifiable in the same way that religion does. Surely the statement "God does not exist" or "the supernatural does not exist" (these are not necessarily coterminous, as there have been atheists who believe in a supernatural world, and pantheists presumably do not believe in a separate supernatural realm but do not call themselves atheists) or "the transcendent, if it exists, never intervenes in the material universe" (the classical Epicurean definition of atheism) are themselves claims about the supernatural? How can it be said that these claims are any more or less verifiable than those atheists reject? They are not self-evident, since thinkers have been arguing over them for centuries.
|
|
|
Post by Hemingway on Dec 18, 2009 19:42:19 GMT
Reluctant as I am to seem to be on the same side as Hemingway, I notice one of his statements which seems slightly odd. He says atheism does not make supernatural claims which are unverifiable in the same way that religion does. Surely the statement "God does not exist" or "the supernatural does not exist" (these are not necessarily coterminous, as there have been atheists who believe in a supernatural world, and pantheists presumably do not believe in a separate supernatural realm but do not call themselves atheists) or "the transcendent, if it exists, never intervenes in the material universe" (the classical Epicurean definition of atheism) are themselves claims about the supernatural? How can it be said that these claims are any more or less verifiable than those atheists reject? They are not self-evident, since thinkers have been arguing over them for centuries. A couple of points........ 1. In my experience very few atheists accept the existence of anything supernatural. I for instance do not accept the existance of ghosts, spirits, souls, Dracula, Warewolfs, Unicorns, Goblins, Faries etc..... 2. If an athiest did claim that there was a supernatural relm, I would require the very same standard of evidence for the existance of the supernatural from them as I require from people of faith for their god. 3. I can never say with 100% certanty that god does not exist. However, the same goes for faries and goblins. But then again I am not in the position of claiming they do exist so the burden of proof is not on me. 4. The lack of evidence presented for the existence of gods, goblins & Unicons leads me to believe they are very unlikely to exist. Its simple logic.
|
|
eccles
New Member
My Old Horse Chester
Posts: 25
|
Post by eccles on Dec 30, 2009 11:17:04 GMT
Considering the poor success rate of "cures" at Lourdes, would it not have been better for those people seeking cures to go to a Benny Hinn "healing service. He claims to have a much better success rate. Of course he is a charaltan and a crook. It won't be long before "Uncle Sam" catches up with him. He won't be the first 'faith healer" in the slammer.
|
|
|
Post by Harris on Jan 2, 2010 17:16:50 GMT
Considering the poor success rate of "cures" at Lourdes, would it not have been better for those people seeking cures to go to a Benny Hinn "healing service. He claims to have a much better success rate. Of course he is a charaltan and a crook. It won't be long before "Uncle Sam" catches up with him. He won't be the first 'faith healer" in the slammer. Indeed. Benny Hinn is a charlatan of the highest order.
|
|
|
Post by hibernicus on Jan 4, 2010 20:30:27 GMT
Indeed. Benny Hinn, for those who have the good fortune never to have encountered him, is a Pentecostalist in the USA who teaches thaat if you have faith in God (shown e.g. by donating to Benny Hinn) you will be rewarded with material prosperity. This is fairly widespread amongst Pentecostalists; its a combination of the more simplistic Old Testament equation of blessing with material prosperity and the american religion of optimism and willpower. (I might add by the way that its appeal for thsoe like many Latino immigrants who are one or two generations removed from peasant passivity and fatalism should not be underestimated). Eccles slightly misses th epoint about Lourdes - it is not supposed to be that God will cure you every time, but that he may cure you for His own reasons and the point is to accept His will whatever it is.
|
|
|
Post by Hemingway on Jan 15, 2010 19:40:28 GMT
Eccles slightly misses th epoint about Lourdes - it is not supposed to be that God will cure you every time, but that he may cure you for His own reasons and the point is to accept His will whatever it is. With all due respect Hib, seeing as the success rate for miracles is 0.00055% god doesn’t seem to be handing out the old miracles all that often at Lourdes (See the second post by myself in this thread for clarification of the above). You can understand, therefore, why secular people are a tad bit sceptical.
|
|
|
Post by hibernicus on Jan 18, 2010 10:50:40 GMT
First of all, the point I made above still stands - God is not OBLIGED to cure anyone and presumably has His own reasons for doing so (or not). Secondly, if your percentage rate only refers to the numbers certified by the Medical Bureau, the real cure rate might be slightly higher than you mention (allowing for unreported cures, those not sufficiently clear-cut to be accepted by the Bureau, etc).
|
|
|
Post by hibernicus on Jan 19, 2010 12:00:07 GMT
Since this thread has become a full-scale atheist v.Catholic debate I have moved it to the Open Forum. All posts by Ezigboututu and michael have been deleted, as have several referring to their presence (except where these make substantive points.)
|
|
|
Post by Harris on Jun 30, 2010 13:12:20 GMT
Pity this thread ended. It was quite stimulating!
|
|
|
Post by flynncreek on Apr 26, 2011 3:47:52 GMT
It's back again! Because this is my favorite topic! This is how I found the board. I was searching for Lourdes stuff and I found this thread. So, why don't I tell you all how I feel about the entire Lourdes thing... Well, I'm Catholic and I am very spiritual. So, naturally, I believe in the healings. 1. People say "There are only 67 miracles! That makes it not real" Ok, remember that these claims have to meet an endless amount of criteria to be able to make it to "miracle" status. It can't be potentially disproven in any possible way. NO Leukemia healings will make it to "miracle" status (I've read) because there is some "possible" way to be magically cured of the disease. Now, just because there could be a known medical explanation doesn't mean that there necessarily is one. Also know that most people don't care to go through all the testing after being cured, or if they do, they drop out because they get tired of it. Honestly, if you were cured, would you want to spend years trying to prove it? 2. Why do we have to prove anything? Lourdes was meant to be a place to gain faith. How are you gaining faith when you have to prove something? Do you notice that the people who are cured are also the ones who seem to have the most faith? Is it placebo effect? Well, maybe sometimes...but all the time? If you were God, wouldn't it make more sense to cure the people who believed? Those who don't believe wouldn't believe even if they were cured. They'd have some medical explanation for it. Plus, the reason for curing people is to give them faith. They gain faith before the healing, as they are believing and as their friends and family are believing and praying. 3. Lourdes is not what St. Bernadette wanted it to be. She said "build a small chapel". Well, it's a huge one. She wanted it to be a place of prayer, NOT a tourist attraction. There are too many hotels, salesmen and commercial business involved there. God Bless those who make a pilgrimage to Lourdes and do not let materialism get in the way! 4. Who says the water really isn't curing people? Go back in time and explain that the world is round. What will people say? "You're crazy!" Well, look what we have discovered since then! If you research different testimonials, you will see some common experiences. Cancer seems to never be cured immediately, but when the person gets home, the tumors shrink and eventually go away. Paralysis seems to always be instantly cured, along with other neurological disorders. When in contact with the water, people tend to either feel an intense pain or a warmth before being cured. Afterward, it is common to feel very hungry. What if there really is something there that can be explained...you never know. Ok, now that I've resurrected this thread, you may continue posting
|
|
|
Post by hibernicus on Apr 29, 2011 17:45:52 GMT
This post seems to me a bit confused. What does "really spiritual" mean in practice? (1) Fair enough point - there may be and probably are many miracles which have not gone through the formal authentication process. (2) Seeing the whole thing as a matter of "proof" is misguided, but so is Fideism - the idea that we should take everything on faith and not bother with the intellect. If people and honestly really ask for proof they are entitled to have their questions addressed; if they are in good faith unconvinced so be it, if they start out from the assumption that nothing can ever convince them so much the worse for them but it is still worth addressing their statements to show how unreasonable these are... (3) Indeed, Lourdes is heavily commercialised and this irritates many believers and attracts unbelievers' scorn. Similar complaints are made about Knock. This is part of fallen humanity - God's intervention does not turn us into angels overnight, and expecting this will lead to disappointment. (4) I presume you mean that God cures people through the water or whatever means He pleases, not that the water has some undiscovered natural power which works the cures.
|
|
|
Post by flynncreek on May 3, 2011 6:35:25 GMT
I aint confused, buddy...I think you might be #2. I think you thought I meant that we should never try and answer the questions of those who want proof. Well, I do think that if someone has a question, it needs to be answered. Sure, I'll explain something to someone who doesn't believe. But that's as far as it can go. It won't make him believe. Only Jesus coming into someone's heart can make him believe. Maybe I can give him a boost by explaining, but that's it. What I meant in my other post is that we shouldn't be so focused on making sure that these really are miracles. Instead we need to rely more on faith. It bugs me that these cures have to go through such a long process before they can be labeled as a miracle. God wants us to have faith and going through that process kills the faith-gaining. I think it's simple, not confusing! #4. Yes and no. Just because something is natural doesn't mean it's not from God. Everything on Earth was created by God. So if there is something in the water, God put it there to cure people...and God controlls it. You don't understand what I meant when I said "very spiritual"? No offense, but how could you not understand what I meant? There's no deep meaning to it, it is what it is. I am very spiritual. I love God, I talk to him. I see him in all his creations. I sing to him. I think of him when I see beautiful sunsets. I cry when I'm in church because I feel his presence...that's what I mean by spiritual.
|
|
|
Post by hibernicus on May 5, 2011 19:24:39 GMT
The reasons for having a "quality control" process before a miracle is officially declared to be such include desire to preserve people from being swindled by hoaxers (don't think it doesn't happen) or leading themselves and others astray through hysterical delusion. These are very serious considerations, and the idea that we should just accept any miracle that someone chooses to proclaim as such can lead and has led to disaster many times in the past. About the water; your argument amounts to saying that everything is a miracle, which amounts to saying nothing is a miracle. There is a difference between spirituality and emotionalism or sentimentalism. It's important tot make the distinction clear - I'm not saying that you are the second/third rather than the first, but anti-intellectualism is dangerous.
|
|