Zombies are real!

[Topper]

Now we just need to wrap SATAN up in satin. Would that make a4a the "Devil with the Blue Dress ?" Whatever happened to Mitch Ryder and the Detroit Wheels?

[a4a]

Now we just need to wrap SATAN up in satin. Would that make a4a the "Devil with the Blue Dress ?" Whatever happened to Mitch Ryder and the Detroit Wheels?

 

Satan likes silk...... I don't wear polyester frocks.

 

As for Mitch and Detroit W's- I don't know, but as for Detroit itself? I took control of that hell hole myself.

[Moai]

didn’t originally look at this thread because I thought it was a spoof post. And didn’t have the time needed to go through the posts. Not because I thought it was evil!

 

You weren't one of the people to whom I was referring, but it is nice to know you don't think that it is evil.

 

that explains many things about the thoroughness of your disbelief ...

 

Oh.

 

a believer thinks of it the other way around ... in the immortal words of Peggy Lee, they ask themselves “is that all there is?” when contemplating life, which they believe is not just limited to the here and now. Not sure why non-believers feel these folks are “giving up” something “precious” when they’ve identified the after-life as the one with greater value for them, or why some feel threatened by this ...

 

I don't know anyone who is threatened by the fact that other people believe in an afterlife per se, but I do know that such a belief can be dangerous.

 

I didn’t do this myself, though I nurture my body ... my parents’ role in this was to get their funk on so that I could exist on a cellular level, but the essence of me is solely due to God, because I am His beloved creation. It’s not a “need” to feel this way, but a recognition of what work he has done in me. What value do I assign myself if I don’t see myself as a child of God, and how do I value others if they are not my brothers and sisters in Him?

 

Well, if te only way that you can value other people is because of god-belief than please, keep believing in god. I value others because they are human beings just like me, and therefore must have all of the wants and needs and feelings I do. That being the case, they are just as valuable as I am.

 

lol, you make him sound like Big Brother, just waiting to pounce and steal my gubmint cheese from me because I’ve done something to displease him! It’s just as easy for me to relax and enjoy life understanding and maintaining a supernatural code of honor as it is for another to exist without it – it works for me and makes sense the way existing without God makes sense to a non-believer.

 

Perhaps you don't believe such things, but the Bible is pretty clear that if you don't believe in him you go to a place of eternal torment, and that you are inherently sinful and deserve it.

 

because we tend to be boneheads when we lose sight of the big picture, that there’s something more to life than just appeasing our base needs and desires. Which is pretty much what those believers who twist faith to fulfill their desires. However, they shouldn’t be confused with the bulk of believers, who feel that the best way to introduce God to others is to love them as He loves us.

 

Most people are moral and good regardless of the particulars of their god-belief. That fact remains that god-belief gets people ripped off, and makes others blow up buildings, and is yet another way to separate "us" from "them."

 

only for those who conscientiously decide that God and science are mutually exclusive ...

 

They are. Science works because it does not allow for supernatural explanations. God is supernatural, therefore not scientific. The answer "god did it" ends all inquiry. While it is true you don't have to be an atheist to do science, even believers cannot invoke god when doing science.

 

Hope in what? A material world, in the here and now? Hope should transcend even the here and now, it should look to the future, even past death, and rationalism is close-ended if it’s only based in the secular.

 

The material world, yes (because that is all there is). But not just the here and now. Vaccines works and prevent disease from future generations. Food production increases for all, and benefits future generations. If people think that Jesus is coming back in the next 50 years, why worry about the environment, or starvation in Africa, or corrupt government?

 

I think you’re trying to build a case of faith = irrational (and destructive) behavior, based on the actions of a small group of people in a body of believers. Faith defies logic, yes, but it doesn’t make it any less valid than logic.

 

Yes, it does make it less valid than logic. It gos beyond a small group of people as well. 54% of Americans is something like 180 million people. I have no idea how many fundamentalist Muslims there are, but there numbers grow every day. And in case you aren't keeping up with current events, they blow up buildings with aircraft and schoolbuses with bombs strapped to them because of god-belief.

 

as for the Matthew passage you originally posted: I’ve always thought that passage dealt with the spiritual aspect of the dead rather than the corporeal one.

 

So their ghosts got up out of the grave, then? Were the ghosts in the tombs the whole time, or did they leave heaven, go back into the tomb, and then walk out?