100% Agree, But people have use science against people who believe in god.
Either way, I suggest people live their life as they see fit.
āas they see fitā?
But thatās not what religion does. A religion tells people how to live their lives. It dictates to them, on pain of punishment in this world and damnation in the next.
Now I happen to believe that the world is a better place for these rules, and that religious beliefs have been a massive civilising factor in human development. But let us not accept religious people saying they believe each individual is free to live their own life as they see fit. That would be an attempt at deception.
I donāt know what other people do, I just told you to live life as you see fit.
Hello.
Just got done reading this entire post, from start to finish.
Yep. Itās the same conversation that has been taking place for ā¦ letās just say ā¦ since mankind began.
I mean, of course it is.
There really isnāt a better question to ask.
Come on.
Does God really exist?
Everyone has their own respective opinion on the matter.
But being human, we all would like to be amongst a crowd who believeās the same.
And thatās probably why youāll have feelings hurt when others tell you that your opinion is not true, according to their beliefs.
I know.
Such the obvious comments. Right?
Well, Iāll come at this in a slightly different manner (cause itās kind of how it actually happened to me).
There came a time in my life when I wanted to know what is the truth.
ā Whatās truth?
ā Whatās really real?
ā Is God real?
I donāt care what others really think.
I donāt like following the crowd.
I think mankind can be deceived (wrong).
I think I can be deceived (wrong).
But, I want to know!
What is true!
In this life!
All I can say is that when I got to this point, honestly and truly, I found the answers.
I donāt need to prove to anyone, or need anyoneās acceptance to these matters.
God is real.
What my mother taught me growing up, is all true.
I live, walk and breath, a life with HIM.
Oh ā¦ thatās right ā¦ I guess I need to be a little more specific in here.
Jesus is real.
Jesus is God.
He came to this earth and proved it. And made a way for us to end up with HIM.
Now, whether mankind believes it or not is all up to them.
He doesnāt need anyoneās approval, to make all this true or not.
If I can summarize everything that I believe, it would be this loaded statement.
All things were created through Him and for Him. And He is before all things, and in Him all things consist.
Now In my mind, that is either true or false. It cannot be any other way. Someone is either lying or telling the truth.
But what I can say, and no one can dispute it, is what God has done inside of me when I did accept and believed this truth. Itās the truth of whatās in the Bible.
He gave me His Holy Spirit, inside of me, to understand all the things of the Bible.
See, thatās going to be the difference between those who understand and those who donāt understand.
Trust me. God doesnāt need mankindās acceptance, to be God.
But, we do need His Spirit in order to understand any kind of truth, about Him.
Look. I know this aināt gonna mean a hill of beans to those who do not believe.
Of course not. (Actually, itāll be enmity about Him)
But at least I discovered what the truth is.
And I do know that itās possible to come to know what the real truth is.
All you have to do is search for it with all your heart. You will find it. (Proverbs 2).
In the meantime, at least I can be free to live a life, in this world, with my Creator.
It is a wonderful life.
Each and every day.
Itās a real shame that most of humanity canāt believe it also.
My testimony.
Mike
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Great to see you back here again, Mike! 
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I think this depends a lot on which religion one is talking about. It is maybe worth remembering that Judaism and Christianity are actually separate strands of the same faith currently running parallel with one another.
In Judaism we have the 10 commandments which are pretty much how you describe above. Interestingly, most of those commandments are more concerned with what you should NOT do. Kind of gives the idea that if you just sit at home and do nothing you will pass the grilling at the gates!
But Christianity approaches the law from an entirely different direction. The bible tells us that none of the law has disappeared but it is now written in our hearts. In other words, it is not just an external set of rules that one just obeys because it is the law, it has become something that one wants to do because it is the right thing to do, and one wants to do the right thing.
Although that might sound easy, it is in fact a lot harder because it requires actual positive action rather than just avoiding negative actions.
This kind of clashes with the issue of free will. It is said that we have free will but it is not so apparent as it might appear. We do not have the ability to entirely comply with the law and avoid those things that faith describe as sin. If I may quote something from the bible then we find Paul struggling with this and writing about his frustration saying:
āI do not understand what I do. For what I want to do I do not do, but what I hate I do.ā
So the issue of punishment and damnation is more to do with a rejection of belief rather than insufficient or wrong acts, since acts will always let us down no matter how much we might try to focus on getting it right - a bit like trying to judge the next trend in the EURUSD, I guess! 
That is fine for the formation of stars and galaxies, but we are talking about life, and first life, single-celled organism is believed to have began 1.5 billion years after the earth had formed
Of course it is, it is our story, it is how we came to be. Do you think the Bible should start with āA long time ago in a galaxy far, far awayā¦ā That would make no sense. The Bible does not try to explain everything, but it does a excellet job of explaining what matters.
Sure, There is another being out there that looks like us.
And just who thinks this, there is nothing in my Bible that says life was only created on earth
I like to think that there is a level of higher intelligent life out there somewhere, and with God all things are possible. But if we are just a random accident then you must bring in the Drake equation which makes life ever reaching our level very very rare
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Isaac Arthur is one of my favorite channels and he does an excellent job of explaining just how rare our little blue dot might be
Without wishing to be uncharitable, Judaism and Christianity are a hair that has been split. All the more definitely so from my standpoint as an atheist.
I donāt see these religions as having laissez-faire attitudes towards me, wishing me to go on and live my life as I wish. Both teach that sooner or later I will be punished for my disbelief. Its no great personal or moral quality that the adherents of these two religions can claim by refraining from themselves physically punishing me, because they clearly believe that I should be punished, and I will be punished, and for eternity.
Its no consolation to me that I believe theyāre wrong, and that I will not be punished in the after-life because there isnāt one. The moral import is the same, and it is less than charming - that my life is of less value than theirs and my soul likewise.
I donāt think anyone is offended by your beliefs and nor should you be offended by others. 
I have the right to be offended by derogatory statements or positions towards me: I have the right to be offended by hypocrisy: I have the right to be offended by the dissembling of priests.
Yes indeed Judaism and Christianity are currently two strands of the same God and the same faith in that God. First there were the Jews the chosen race, then it opened up to allow in the gentiles via the Christ which the Jews denied, and then the two will be joined into one in the future - or so the bible goes if I understand it right.
But the issue of punishment and eternal damnation is, at least for me, a rather complex issue. I am an agnostic, I give room for both atheism and the existence of a deity, but am seated firmly on the fence between the two. My understanding of the bible is that faith is a gift from God, not the choice of the human. I have not been given that gift but that does not mean it does not exist. It just means I am on the outside looking in through the window!
But if faith is from God then it means that at some point in oneās life one will be faced with the opportunity to accept or decline it. And it is at that point that I think the judgement comes into play.
The bible recognises that before Christ even the gentiles recognised God in the world but they were not condemned to hell for not believing in that God and obeying him?
So I am pretty relaxed about that. At some point I may be faced with that decision and in the meantime the Bible offers incredible advice on how to live a good life - and that is all I (can) use it for. For example, Paul tells us:
āIf it is possible, as far as it depends on you, live at peace with everyone.ā
What incredible advice! Even recognising that it may not in all situations be possible, but whenever it is within oneās own control then do so! Wow! 
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Yes you most certainly do! But I think it is important to retain a distinction between what is actually the message from the God and what is other peopleās own interpretation of it.
No one has the right to bible bash or force regilious issues upon another. And, at least in Christianity, no one has the right to judge and condemn others. In fact to do so might backfire on those persons who so judge themselves.
As I understand it, the human role is nothing more than to worship God, look out for one another whenever and wherever possible, and help spread the word to those that have not heard it. It is not about condeming and judging others for where they might be on their spiritual journeyā¦as indeed the bible, again, advises: he who is last will be first! 
But I am drifting way beyond my position in these matters, so Iād better leave it here!
My last thoughts are just to say that if the Christian god is the real god then he is a god of love and forgiveness - but a lot of what I see in the world is so evil and so incompatible with that concept that I find it hard to accept at all. Afterall, the Christian god is, by definition, the creator of everything and therefore ultimately responsible for everything - and that includes evil and suffering and all that is wrong in humans. And I cannot equate that with love in any fashion whatsoeverā¦so I leave it here!
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If faith is a gift, am I not being punished by not being given it? Why? What have I done?
In any case, how is it possible to have respect for a god who does not require faith, just an acceptance of power? What would be the point in faith and worship? Surely it cannot be that I will get through the gates of heaven merely by signing in the āYesā box?
Most religious people would say that unless I repent at some stage and accept god into my heart, I will not get to heaven. They expect this to happen and as members of the religion in question they presumably approve of it. They are not driving the train that will run me over but they have paid for a ticket to sit in the coach and watch.
@tommor Itās how Religion worksā¦ Itās how itās always workedā¦ Fearā¦ A fear of the unknownā¦ A fear that ensured lifelong compliance of the flockā¦
I read back through some of these posts, with the weaving and dodging of reality based logic, science disputed, irrational concepts, modern learning questioned by a simple ancient bookā¦
Unfortunately, this thread has taken on a nonsensical toneā¦ We can not see it, we cannot touch it, we cannot smell itā¦we cannot prove what we say even existsā¦ Just take our word that it doesā¦
Itās a Cult like statusā¦ Very similar to the fear generated by global governments during a recent pandemicā¦ We cannot prove the lockdowns will work, we cannot prove these vaccines will workā¦
Just take our wordā¦ We know better than you!! And see how well that all worked out for the world at largeā¦
I think itās time for me to bow out of the conversation in this threadā¦
Science is wrongā¦ Archaeology is wrongā¦ Everyone who doesnāt believe in an unseen, unheard, unproveable, all powerful supernatural being is wrongā¦
I liken it to Father Christmas, the Easter Bunny or the Tooth Fairyā¦ As children we all believed in these unseen, unheard, magical gift toting beingsā¦
That is until we all grew up and and the magic was lost once we realised these characters and their existence were a physical impossibilityā¦
Some just donāt believe in magic, just a see able, smell able and touchable physical existenceā¦
Iām sure I am happy to leave people to believe whatever they want. I do not ally with any group or deity who will condemn them for it. But I think I can object when a religion negatively impacts on me, or when the believers of a religion hold beliefs logically opposing what their own religion professes.
Anyway, whatās the difference between a cult and a religion?
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Why not? Why should it require anything more?
(However, you might find that in ticking the āyesā box, things do start to changeā¦) As the church often says: āJust come as you areā - but I would add to that: ābut donāt expect to stay as you areā
Religion itself can offend some people
I donāt see it as being punished by not being given faith by any certain stage in oneās life. If there is such a god then we certainly know almost nothing of his plans and intentions or how much depends on other persons and their roles. The bible god appears to use people in all kinds of ways whether they are believers or not. It is actually an interesting issue since in one part of the bible it states that āknock and the door will be openedā but in another part it says God knocks on your door and you open it". Hmmm!
I sometimes feel that faith is a bit like driving using only the rear mirror. You only see its role in oneās life when looking back at past events. Again, frustrating to say the least!
Again, I donāt think that repentance is some kind of external ritual that one has to reluctantly undergo in order to earn the prize. Repentance is the same thing as guilt and remorse that we often naturally feel throughout our lives regardless of any religious connotation. It is a uniquely human thing.
I think in this situation, it is tied in with the issue of love. If one hurts someone that one loves (or comes to love) then we often feel a strong guilt and remorse about it later. I think the idea of repentence before god is the same thing. If true faith comes alive then I would guess that one must also feel an intense emotional sensation accompanying it. I am then sure that if that happens then one would feel regret for things one has done, and not done, in the light of this new enlightenment. I donāt know, I have never got to that stage!!! But I could imagine the embarrassment, not to mention the regrets, upon meeting a god who knows all my inner secrets!!!
I mean, one could say the same about falling in love with oneās partner. If I havenāt yet experienced it, then one could say why am I being punished for not having met a partner yet? What have I done wrong? the answer is nothing. It is just a question of the right person at the right time, thatās all!
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