It is the truth that for every being there exists a corresponding nonbeing and something beyond the being and nonbeing itself.

- Deepak "Wulfhere" Chopra

You cant practice Scientology and Catholicism at the same time since they are mutually exclusive, nice bait thread though

Also Wulfhere how can you say that statement is the truth apart from the fact it makes you sound smart?

Edited 4/27/2018 04:05:27

@90

Christians do not claim to know who goes to heaven or hell. From a christian point of view, of course it is bad the baby is murdered because murder is a sin.

@90

Christians do not claim to know who goes to heaven or hell. From a christian point of view, of course it is bad the baby is murdered because murder is a sin.

How is my thread bait?

Because you wouldnt be saying "I want to combine scientology and catholocism" if you werent baiting

combine scientology and catholocism

Nicole Kidman and Tom Cruise gave that a go.

@Thessalos -- you dodged the quesiton. A philosophy must assign "true" or "false" to it's points.. but here is your problem:

Case 1: If the baby goes to heaven, then it is desirable to kill babies, since you are doing them a favor.. so you cannot agree with this. (If you agreed with this then Christianity would be pro-abortion for example, and also be in favor murdering babies when they are born)

Case 2: If the baby does not go to heaven, then clearly it is undesirable for the baby to be born in that mother. So that baby is clearly disadvantaged over other babies since this baby had no chance to go to heaven whereas others did.. so you admit that (1) some "disadvantages" ("disabilities") are worse than others (2) God created an unjust system.

It is a lose lose situation. I hope you can see now the reason why I said that Christianity has several self-contradictions

Saying that "Christians dont claim to know who goes to heaven and who does not" is trying to dodge the question.

90

Edited 4/27/2018 12:06:39

this is impressive discussion

Also Wulfhere how can you say that statement is the truth apart from the fact it makes you sound smart?

It must be true if you have a grasp on logic.

There is everything and nothing. All the books on the bookshelf or none of the books on the bookshelf. All physical matter or no physical matter. But there is always something beyond everything and nothing, no matter what you're talking about. The outside world is beyond the collection of books on the bookshelf; there is an outside world to the physical world and even that would have something beyond it so long as it was something that existed.

To exist means there is something beyond.

So, it must be true that there is an absolute starting point, but the starting point can't be said to exist exactly: to say that the starting point is or is not is to invoke something even beyond it. It is a paradox rather than a thing, but everything and nothing is governed by it.

If you think I'm just trying to sound smart then you can refute me without accusations. The accusations just lead to needless drama and everyone abandons the discussion to defend their ego. Plebs like Ox are hopeless and you have to attack them to preserve your platform but there is hope for some people. Maybe you.

What I'm talking about is pretty basic metaphysics. It only sounds smart or seems like an attempt to sound smart if you haven't read into metaphysics, which you should and can do. I don't mean to sound special; I just summarize what I read and apply those concepts to discussions.

Okay, so I'm a little bit behind in this discussion. I'll try catch-up.

First. @90, I will acknowledge I don't really know a lot about Buddhism, however, I'll try point out some of the things I think are wrong with it. When I went to a Buddhist monastery as part of a school excursion, the people who showed us around did several things (of which I'll give a couple of examples) which greatly decreased my opinion of Buddhism as a legitimate religion.
1. When asked questions, the majority of the time they did not answer the question, or beat around the bush and said other random stuff that did not actually answer the question. For example, one student asked "How do you know if you've reached Enlightenment?" The answer: "When you do something nice for someone, you get a happy feeling in you and it makes you want to keep doing those things for other people, even if you don't particularly like doing it." ???
2. For a very, very, facts, science-based person like me, Buddhism has nothing to offer in the way of evidence to support their claims. They say there are 4 levels (or something like it), they say this, they say that; but there is no evidence whatsoever (that I am aware of) to support any of their claims.
However, I would welcome someone to enlighten me (pun intended) on this subject.

very, very, facts, science-based person like me, Buddhism has nothing to offer in the way of evidence to support their claims

hmmm reacts only

Again, I don't claim I know a lot about Buddhism (the ladies that took us around the monastery taught us next to nothing), and frankly, I admit I'm not really equipped to argue about Buddhism, before (the comment to buffalo) was simply my opinion.

Now. @90, your second point about science and Christianity. I will get this out of me first; the Catholics screwed up big-time, around that time period. (I mean, selling tickets to heaven??? That's why Protestantism became a thing ;).
Right. Now I can properly address the question. The Galileo issue was stupid, I agree. The Catholics misinterpreted the Bible and made a mistake. But check out this sermon my pastor gave on Sunday that's actually really interesting on this topic. Mentions Galileo too, if I remember correctly. (and you may notice that some of the stuff I've been saying were inspired by this): https://vimeo.com/266028029
So, I accept Christians have made mistakes, are making mistakes, and will make mistakes. But if you think about it, everyone does. For example, the Nazis used the evolution-inspired principle of eugenics to justify the Holocaust.
And when I mentioned contradictions in Buddhism, I was meaning the contradictions within it's own theology (although, with no god it probably shouldn't be called theology), not so much contradictions between behaviour and theology, because there has been such contradictions, is, and always will be. Again, no-one's perfect.

are there any christian denominations that support or at least tolerate flat earth theory?

@ 90 Thessalos has answered your question re: disability reasonably well, but I will add my perspective (He is orthodox, I'm protestant. Different perspectives are helpful.)
According to Christianity, the reason for suffering in this world is humans. Adam and Eve, were given free will by God, for a reason best explained by this metaphor: You want something to love you, worship you. You could create a robot that will permanently do this, because it is programmed to do so. But it would mean a whole lot more if it was another person freely choosing to do so, would it not?
God gave people free will for the same reason. Unfortunately, Adam and Eve abused that free will and thus doomed humanity to suffering, disease and disability. So because they screwed up, everyone else's lives are screwed up, to varying levels.
But since God is merciful, kind and fair, he provided a way for us to be relieved of that suffering. However, we have the same choice as Adam and Eve: God, or ourselves. If we choose God, eternal relief from suffering in heaven. Choose ourselves, eternal suffering in hell.
Hope that answers that question.

About the dead baby, it is my personal opinion that babies/infants that have never been able to get the choice to follow God do go to heaven, but as Thess said, it doesn't say in the Bible, so we don't really know and will only find out when we get to heaven, I suppose. As to adults that have never been exposed to the Gospel, I think (again, my personal opinion) is that they will be judged on their actions according to their conscience. Everybody has an innate feeling of right or right, and (I think) the will be judged according to that. But no-one really knows, and it's not a cop-out to say that. It's just like atheists say "we don't actually know where the first cell came from", because they don't. It's not a cop-out. it's simply stating the truth.

And about your lose-lose situation thing:
Case 1. No, it is not desirable to kill babies, for the reason that we don't know whether they go to heaven or not. Also, God meant for everyone to have the choice to choose him, so killing them would (in my opinion) be a sin.
Case 2. Um, we're talking about babies in general last I checked... I don't know what all that stuff about "disadvantage" was about, because we were talking about babies in general. If you want to talk about a particular baby, then sure. But please, don't start talking about one particular one which is disadvantaged in some way you didn't define (or I didn't understand).

Buffalo, I'm not sure, but the Mormons are weird... maybe them? ;)

@Cata, give me an example of science not fitting with the Christian worldview, and I'll debate it, or admit that I'm not informed enough to debate it with you, or admit that it doesn't fit with the Christian worldview. Probably one of the first two. ;)

Actually, here's an article I just found regarding both the Galileo saga and flat earth. https://creation.com/the-flat-earth-myth-and-creationism
I haven't read the entire thing, but it seemed to give another perspective to the issue so I thought I'd put it here.

And @Wulfhere, I am not sufficiently versed in philosophy as to debate you on that (after all, I am only in high school), but don't you think that part of the point of God is that He is beyond the laws of physics, logic and philosophy? He fits within them, because He created them, but He is also beyond them and not defined by them, because He is a being beyond all else. If He fit the rules of being and non-being you mentioned before, don't you think that would take away the whole significance of God? He would just be a slightly greater power than ourselves, but wouldn't be anything special.
I guess what I'm saying is, you can't try to use these rules/laws to prove God doesn't exist/or is nothing better than ourselves, because if God did exist those laws would not apply to Him, otherwise he's not a god.

And Re: Jesus, if that's what you think, I highly recommend you read The Case for Christ. It doesn't prove anything, because in my opinion (and in true science) nothing can be proven; you can only give evidence for or against something, and if the evidence is strong enough then it is accepted as a fact until the evidence strongly suggests otherwise. However, this book gives a lot of strong evidence that Jesus was a miracle worker and even rose from the dead. Strong enough to convince an atheist who really, really didn't want it to be true.