Will you make it to Heaven? Cont.

[VincitVeritas1]

Feel free to join me in a discussion about Heaven according to the Holy Bible/ Christianity in general.

The Catholic Church believes that being an atheist is a sin!!

@Parker231, you seem to be offended/shocked (denoted by the exclamation mark). Except sin simply means not acting in unity with God / not doing nor seeking to do what God wants you to do. Being an atheist - without God - does sort of suggest you won't be seeking unity with God or seeking to do His will. Although you might act according to His will unwittingly and you might also do a lot of good things and be a lovely person but its not part of being in unity with God or seeking to do His will. Because you don't have a God/god(s). And the Christian God does want to be recognised as God and worshipped and you don't do that either and I suspect you wouldn't want to. So hence the description sin is applied to atheism by the Catholic Church.

Sin isn't a thing

@pointythings, which makes sense from an atheist perspective. Since if you are without a G(g)od(s), don't believe in or worship any deity, there is no concept of acting against the will of any G(g)od(s). But as outlined in my previous post this is different from the Christian perspective.

And the Christian God does want to be recognised as God and worshipped

Why does he need to be worshipped?

Why would he create people to worship him?

What do you mean ‘you might act according to His will unwittingly’?

Not shocked at what the Catholic Church might think but shocked at why it would think it matters? The catholic religion has so many problems I’m surprised it thinks about atheists.

And the Christian God does want to be recognised as God and worshipped and you don't do that either and I suspect you wouldn't want to. So hence the description sin is applied to atheism

What? This God needs our praise and worship and calls us 'sinners' if we don't praise and worship him?

@redlavender sounds suspiciously like an abusive parent/spouse, doesn't it? But because it's a deity, we're expected to lap up the abuse. And that's why I'm an atheist - because I refuse to accept that such an entity exists, is responsible for creating the beautiful world we live in and yet behaves like that. We're always told that as parents, our love for our children should be unconditional - yet we don't hold our deity to the same standard as we do each other. It's madness.

It's not that He needs to be worshipped, but worship is the natural response to God. We're made to seek and worship God; this is human nature, as evidenced by millennia of religious practice and experience.

Where we go wrong is in making idols of, and 'worshipping' created things, celebrities, money etc. We're warned against that because it's harmful to us, not for God's benefit per se.

I think part of the problem here is 'hardcore' groups who claim to speak for Christians as a whole, when they absolutely don't. I'm not sure how the concept of sin controls people per se, maybe as part of certain organised religions it can be abused in that way. But there's nothing sinister about the notion of right and wrong, and trying to be more ethical and loving.

I have no problem with secular-based laws, as long as they have a good ethical basis. No wish to live in a theocracy.

@Mustardseed86 the problem with sin is that it doesn't map to right and wrong, at least for too many people. The moment you choose to be a Biblical literalist, you are taking your concepts of what right and wrong mean from the late Bronze Age. We don't live in that world any more, we can't live in that world any more. The same applies to rigidly literal interpretations of scriptures in faiths other than Christianity - they are not appropriate for the world we live in. The literalists and fundamentalists refuse to see that and their aim is always to drag us back kicking and screaming in time. I'm not here for that, it's the hill I will die on. I'm glad to hear you don't want to live in a theocracy either, but too many people seem to want just that. As the parent of three young people who are all gay, I will not tolerate the imposition of the rules of the past based on a deity I do not believe in.

It's not that He needs to be worshipped, but worship is the natural response to God. We're made to seek and worship God; this is human nature

It's not at all the 'natural' response and it's not human nature to 'seek and worship God'

Where we go wrong is in making idols of, and 'worshipping' created things, celebrities, money etc. We're warned against that because it's harmful to us, not for God's benefit per se.

Those things are definitely not worth worshiping! Why is God assuming this?

Fair enough, but you won't get everyone to agree even if you take religion out of the equation. Broad principles maybe, but there are people who disagree with eating meat for example, or people who think teenagers should be allowed to take puberty blockers. In any case, we live in a democracy (and aren't a very religiously inclined nation) so unless that changes I don't think you or anyone else is going to start imposing anything too scary.

It's not that He needs to be worshipped, but worship is the natural response to God. We're made to seek and worship God; this is human nature

Well, no. We're made to seek explanations for the things we fear or cannot explain. That's where religion comes from - nothing to do with any god, just scared people looking for answers.

Where we go wrong is in making idols of, and 'worshipping' created things, celebrities, money etc. We're warned against that because it's harmful to us, not for God's benefit per se.

This is the G.K Chesterton trope that when people stop believing in God, they do not believe nothing; they will believe anything. And it's patronising and offensive, typical of a blinkered believer. Believing in God is no less and no more woo than believing in healing crystals, and it is by no means the case that people who do not believe in God believe in all kinds of woo. It is also not the case that lack of faith in God means we all worship celebrities - it couldn't be farther from the truth for many atheists.

It's not at all the 'natural' response and it's not human nature to 'seek and worship God'

Clearly billions of people disagree with you on that, so you know...there might be something in it. Or do assume you're the norm, so nothing else should count as human nature?

Those things are definitely not worth worshiping! Why is God assuming this?

Because it's what happens. People idolising the latest correct opinions (no dissent allowed) or hero-worshipping Jeremy Corbyn or Andrew Tate, or centering their sense of self-worth around looking like a Kardashian. These are all examples of the way this plays out in the modern world.

Fair enough, but you won't get everyone to agree even if you take religion out of the equation. Broad principles maybe, but there are people who disagree with eating meat for example, or people who think teenagers should be allowed to take puberty blockers. In any case, we live in a democracy (and aren't a very religiously inclined nation) so unless that changes I don't think you or anyone else is going to start imposing anything too scary.

I actually agree with you here, but I wasn't thinking about the UK. My kids are dual nationals, and have US citizenship. And the US is a bloody scary place right now if you're gay, or female, or anything other than white, male and wealthy. Much of that is down to the misuse of religion. It's the same in many ISlamic countries and in many very Catholic countries - look at places like El Salvador, where woman are serving jail sentences for having miscarriages. The UK is reasonably safe and we have a largely secular base for making law. And in places like the UK, the law evolves not quite in lockstep with societal changes, which is a good thing. Issues like vegetarianism and transgender rights will always remain complex, but so they should be - we should not ever legislate without thinking things through. Too many people whose faith is of the literal or fundamentalist kind do not think any more, they just believe.

Well, no. We're made to seek explanations for the things we fear or cannot explain. That's where religion comes from - nothing to do with any god, just scared people looking for answers.

This is patronising and offensive. Typical of a blinkered atheist - it couldn't be further from the truth for many believers.

As for celebrity worship, that's just one example and yes it absolutely is a thing.

Of course celebrity worship is a thing. But saying that not having religious faith makes you prone to it is just nonsense.

And if God isn't a creation of the human mind, why does he possess so many human traits - across the entire spectrum of those we would aspire to, and also those we would want to avoid? He says himself that he is a jealous God - so maybe he should work on that. If it isn't acceptable for us to be jealous, is is also not acceptable for God.

Well, people do latch on to things, a cause or a movement or whatever it may be. There are plenty of 'religions' that aren't explicitly religious but work in similar ways and can be very destructive. Obviously religion can be abused in this way too. But it's really a way of saying that whatever we value most becomes a kind of 'god' to us, which is what Jesus meant by saying you can't serve two masters (God and money).

As for being a jealous God, that's really a different thing to human jealousy, by which we usually mean being envious of others or being overly possessive in a relationship. On the other hand, if someone is being cheated on they would have a right to feel jealous. So it's more akin to that. If you don't believe God is your creator then obviously you reject any claim He has on you and see that as abusive in some way. But anyway, God isn't forcing you to worship Him, it's up to you whether you believe or listen.

@Mustardseed86 I don't see the jealousy as different from human jealousy at all. It feels to me like someone who cannot accept when a relationship is over and will not let go. Someone who stops believing in the Christian God and converts to Islam, or Hinduism, or whatever, whould not be viewed as having done anything wrong. People grow, they develop, they change. If there is a God who is all loving then he should be able to accept that.

Why would worshiping a god make people any more or less inclined to idolise they
It favourite pop star or dream of winning the lottery?

Personally I value my family and meaningful relationships rather than worshiping any god or pop star. There's no need to worship anything or anyone imo

@pointythings

@redlavender

Honestly, since you both presumably think we're discussing a made-up sky fairy, it's not surprising we see things pretty differently. I'm not sure there's much point in going round in circles, but it's been good talking to you both.

Wishing you all the best and a Happy Christmas 🎄

I'm christened, I went to a Christian school and got married in a church. Sometimes I feel religious and sometimes I wander if religion was made up by our ancestors as a way to encourage tribes to follow their leaders etc.

I do a good job helping other vulnerable people, I'm kind to strangers and animals but because of the cost of living i sometimes (shamefully) shoplift. It'd be interesting to see what you think about this.

"Typical of a blinkered atheist" is also quite offensive.

Er, yes. I was repeating what the poster had said to me. Maybe read the previous posts properly?

Erm. It seems to have got a bit adversarial here. I don't really know what to do with that or how to comment particularly on it. But anyway Faith (Christian) gives me hope. If you've be been in a situation ( you might have been) when evidence and science doesn't look very favourable (I have had stage 3 cancer and a child with apparently severe and complex additional needs - now at university unsupported) Well, God is fantastic! But not everyone has the same experience. But I will help where I can.🥴
Don't try and bring me down. Because I won't have it. People have attempted this before. I run 10k a day now and talking to them I should be an invalid. But, for me, it's the same with faith. I enjoy it. It gives me hope. And with (many people) dying around me I won't forgo the opportunity to posses that.

So there!🤷‍♀️