Atheist Roll Call

[MizMotown]

It sounds like our being the creation of some aliens from another planet is more comforting to you than our being alone in the universe. Why is that? Do you expect the aliens to come back and save us from ourselves? Do you watch for UFOs?

Your funny. I don't need comfort in anything first of all. It is what it is. I do have a wild imagination though, it keeps things from getting extremely boring. Believe everything! is my motto. Do I think the aliens will save us from ourselves? I highly doubt it. According to his article in another post we need to stay away from the aliens, their intentions may not be friendly. No I don't watch for UFO's but I do believe in spirits. Ghostly ones as well as ones in glasses on the rocks.

[maxx]

MisMoTown: If somebody could honestly convice there is NOT a higher intelligence I would come to the other side, but only if you have cookies!

Jesus didn't promise cookies in heaven. Does the Course?

recently scripture has added and enriched my experience of ACIM because I'm seeing a very significant connection in both teachings.

I'm guessing that you were brought up in a church. You appear to have an inclination to just accept religious ideas without critical thinking.

38% of natural scientists said they do not believe in God - That means 62% do believe in God .

I'd like a link to this poll. Most info I have seen on this subject says the direct opposite.

31% of the social scientists do not believe - That means 69% do believe in God.

And at one time 100% of the world believed that the sun went around the world. And they were all wrong. That is called the argument from numbers, i.e., the idea that millions of people can't be wrong. It's a logical fallacy.
The definition of a miracle usually involves the supernatural, something that cannot be explained by natural means. A change of one's opinions or beliefs would hardly qualify except to someone who needs to see miracles of that nature, someone who is selling a Course on Miracles, for instance.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Miracle

There are lots of words that are used so often under so many circumstances, they are losing their true meaning. Words like truth, hero, and miracle. It reminds me of the song "A Hundred Thousand Miracles" from the musical "Flower Drum Song". It was the ideas of an uneducated peasant girl.

Without going completely into it here because, there is plenty of information on the internet about ACIM let me give you the definition of a miracle according to Jesus of ACIM.

I think it takes a lot of gall to put new words into the mouth of Jesus or to create a new messiah with the same name as the person in the gospels. Do you just accept that Jesus said the things the Course says he said? Or is this a different Jesus? If the latter, why would this Jesus's words be as important as the words of the first century Jesus who supposedly performed real miracles?

Miracles are maximal expressions of love.

This sounds like the "miracle of birth".

There is only one problem, therefore there is only one solution. [[in what we call the world.) The one problem is guilt, separation, or holding grievances, and the one solution is a miracle, forgiveness, or joining.

Joining what? That sounds vaguely sexual given the miracle of birth reference.

Reality is a transcendental domain of limitless, formless, unified spirit, without time, space, bodies or change..It is the ultimate perfection, a realm of boundless love, infinite bliss and eternal peace, void of any trace of sacrifice, suffering or death..etc..

So what is this world? An illusion? If you hit your hand with a hammer, the pain is hard to put aside as delusion. I see that the Course relies on the old 18-carat carrot of heaven. Of course, once one is dead there will be eternal rest and peace for that person, heaven or not. And how does one attain heaven according to the Course? And do they believe in a hell?

[maxx]

Your funny. I don't need comfort in anything first of all.

Most people are fearful of their own mortality. That is why they believe in a heaven of some kind. You appear to believe in a heaven.

It is what it is. I do have a wild imagination though, it keeps things from getting extremely boring.

With all the new information we are getting everyday about the world and the universe, how could life possibly be boring if you can read? We are living in a remarkable age when many of the questions that have plagued mankind for millenia are being answered.

No I don't watch for UFO's but I do believe in spirits. Ghostly ones as well as ones in glasses on the rocks.

I presume the spirits you believe in are all helpful and friendly?

If you believe in everything, then you don't really believe in anything seriously. You can't truly believe in christianity and pagan gods at the same time. You can't believe Sarah Palin and Barak Obama at the same time.

[rb336]

38% of natural scientists said they do not believe in God - That means 62% do believe in God

63 % of those who attend church regularly say they believe in god. That means 37% do not.

Before I bought either of those statements, I would want to know who did the survey and how it was conducted. [[mine comes from some study by the anglican church in england in an article about "social christians." I don't recall the exact %s they gave, but it is in that 60/40 ballpark)

It is also important to understand what they mean by "god." heck, if you merely consider "god" as the creative expression of the universe, the self-organizing nature of chaos/complexity models, then even I could be said to believe in "god." That, by the way, is the god of Spinoza that Einstein referenced, the "god" that does not play dice with the universe. If the question is phrased as god explicitly being an actual thinking, purposeful being, I bet the % of "believing scientists" drops tremendously

[Big Dog]

I was one.

[stipes]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7auzYgVosJA

Iggy Pop, Kanye West, Chris Martin,
Kris Kristofferson, Patti Smith, Terrence Howard, Flea, Q-Tip, Adam
Levine, Chris Rock, Justin Timberlake, Kate Moss, Sir Peter Blake,
Sheryl Crow, Dennis Hopper, Woody Harrelson, Amy Lee, Tommy Lee, The
Dixie Chicks, Mick Jones, Sharon Stone, Bono, Shelby Lynne, Anthony
Kiedis, Travis Barker, Lisa Marie Presley, Kid Rock, Jay Z, Keith
Richards, Billy Gibbons, Corinne Bailey Rae, Johnny Depp, Graham Nash,
Brian Wilson, Rick Rubin and Owen Wilson.

[MizMotown]

Most people are fearful of their own mortality. That is why they believe in a heaven of some kind. You appear to believe in a heaven.


With all the new information we are getting everyday about the world and the universe, how could life possibly be boring if you can read? We are living in a remarkable age when many of the questions that have plagued mankind for millenia are being answered.


I presume the spirits you believe in are all helpful and friendly?

If you believe in everything, then you don't really believe in anything seriously. You can't truly believe in christianity and pagan gods at the same time. You can't believe Sarah Palin and Barak Obama at the same time.

You don't have an understanding of what I believe in and why I believe in it. And that is all good.
I do not fear my own morality. The fear of death is a stupid waste of time while we are here. It's going to happen whether people fear it or not.
So what if these questions are being answered? For what? Where are we heading? and why? Than I can tell you if it's interesting to me or not.
I don't encounter these spirits everyday. And the ones I have encountered did not seem to have bad intentions. Just to make their presence known. One was my ex of 8 years in his mother's house in which he passed.

Anything else you want to know?

[MizMotown]

The true sign of intelligence is not knowledge but imagination.
-Albert Einstein

Faith is a knowledge within the heart, beyond the reach of proof.
-Kahlil Gilbran

Women...are wiser than men because they know less and understand more.
Author: James Stephens :-)


Think freedom, think choice, think for yourself...


Your true god is within you.

[Wingnatic]

When science finally answers the question of was there really a god , so far I only see that there was a prophet . Well there's been a few of those through the ages .
You want to know why I know for a fact there were dinosaurs ? Scientists have been digging up a hell of alot of bones that's evidence they existed . The only thing I ask that if people with religious fanaticism don't bother me as I don't bother them . But apparently Jehovah Witnesses [[door to door god salespeople) don't get the message unless I hang a Playboy centerfold on the inside of my front door when I see them casing the neighborhood .

[MizMotown]

Jesus didn't promise cookies in heaven. Does the Course? Not at all. But it promises peace. Does it deliver? Yes.

I'm guessing that you were brought up in a church. You appear to have an inclination to just accept religious ideas without critical thinking. Not at all. First time I actually started attending church on any type of a regular basis I was 31 years old.

think it takes a lot of gall to put new words into the mouth of Jesus or to create a new messiah with the same name as the person in the gospels. Do you just accept that Jesus said the things the Course says he said? Or is this a different Jesus? If the latter, why would this Jesus's words be as important as the words of the first century Jesus who supposedly performed real miracles?
LOL... read the Course and how it came to be and you'll have your answer.

And how does one attain heaven according to the Course? And do they believe in a hell?
See Above.

[MizMotown]

This is a course in miracles. It is a required course. Only the time you take is voluntary. Free will does not mean that you can establish the curriculum. It means only that you can elect what you want to take at a given time. The course does not aim at teaching the meaning of love, for that is beyond what can be taught. It does aim, however, at removing the blocks to the awareness of love’s presence, which is your natural inheritance. The opposite of love is fear, but what is all-encompassing can have no opposite. 2 This course can therefore be summed up very simply in this way:

Nothing real can be threatened.
Nothing unreal exists.

Herein lies the peace of God.

[maxx]

MizMotown:
My last two questions were pretty straightforward and wouldn't require a lot of explanation, so why can't you answer them? I have no intentions of wasting my time reading that big tome. It strikes me that the Course in Miracles operates the same way as Scientology. You are expected to invest money and time into it because the people selling it know that the more one invests in something, the less likely you are to admit that you were taken.

I'm curious to know why the Course gives you peace that another religion wouldn't. Maybe because you feel impowered by the teaching that you can perform their version of "miracles"?

[MizMotown]

Maxx:
Comparison of teachings on forgiveness, brotherly love, and the 'fatherhood' of God

Most theologians agree that some of the most radical spiritual principles first introduced by the historical Jesus include:

Jesus' teaching about radical forgiveness.
Jesus' radical reformulation of the old Jewish law to highlight the need for 'brotherly love' to mean neighbor-as-self.
Jesus' teaching regarding the parental relationship between all men and "God the Father". Despite these three radical departures made in Jesus? teachings from all prior religions, many Christians have noted that the Bible provides precious few details about what exactly was meant by the teaching of these three new spiritual principles. Some passages in the Bible regarding these principles appear to be slightly inconsistent with other Biblical passages regarding these same principles. For example: Jesus, teaching in the 'Lord's Prayer' about forgiveness says, "God forgives our trespasses just as we forgive [[the trespasses of) those who trespass against us." This seems to be slightly inconsistent with other Biblical passages describing how we are forgiven only through "Christ's blood, even the forgiveness of sins".

For some, the teachings of ACIM are believed to clarify many of these types of apparent Biblical inconsistencies and shortcomings. Teachings regarding the exact mechanics of the spiritual principle of forgiveness are central to the ACIM teachings. Regarding forgiveness, ACIM goes into far greater detail, providing far more instruction regarding the logic of, the purpose for, and the practical application of this principle, than does the Christian Bible. Many students of ACIM who are [[or have been) involved in traditional Christian churches, and who have faithfully studied ACIM for a significant length of time, report their sense that the teachings of ACIM on forgiveness have finally clarified for them, in very practical ways, how forgiveness can now be fully realized in their daily lives.

The Course tells us clearly that God does know we're here [[see T-4.VII.6 and T-6.V.1). It tells us that the Holy Spirit is a "creation of the one Creator" [[C-6.1:2), created in loving response to the separation to show us the way back home. It portrays Jesus as a real Son of God [[like the rest of us) who has awakened completely to God, yet who still "has remained with [us] " [[M-23.5:9) in order "to lead [us] from the hell [we] made to God" [[C-5.5:4). Both the Holy Spirit and Jesus are thus real beings who actively help us return to God. They not only give us the mental content of healed perception, but also "answer every specific problem" [[T-11.VIII.5:5) we have, and give us all the specific forms we need to fulfill our function in God's plan for salvation: "In time, [the Holy Spirit] gives you all the things that you need have, and will renew them as long as you have need of them"

Either you’re totally joyous with a healed mind and body knowing who you are – OR – you’re still trapped in the illusion with momentary fleeting glimpses of light. That’s the range. You’re either in Heaven or hell.

Hell or Heaven is here or now at this moment. It's your choice!

I don't feel it's like scientology at all. ACIM does not believe Jesus is from another planet either or is a space alien. COPIES OF ACIM


http://www.spiritus-temporis.com/a-c...f-systems.html

[MizMotown]

copies of ACIM are freely available on the internet. Just like the bible you are more than welcome to go buy a copy from the bookstore. There is nothing else that you are required to purchase.

[MizMotown]

For some, the teachings of ACIM are believed to clarify many of these types of apparent Biblical inconsistencies and shortcomings. Teachings regarding the exact mechanics of the spiritual principle of forgiveness are central to the ACIM teachings. Regarding forgiveness, ACIM goes into far greater detail, providing far more instruction regarding the logic of, the purpose for, and the practical application of this principle, than does the Christian Bible. Many students of ACIM who are [[or have been) involved in traditional Christian churches, and who have faithfully studied ACIM for a significant length of time, report their sense that the teachings of ACIM on forgiveness have finally clarified for them, in very practical ways, how forgiveness can now be fully realized in their daily lives.

[MizMotown]

ACIM is actually a very brillantly written book whether or not you use it for spiritual purposes, psychological purposes, or both. It's not not evil. It's not the satan in disguise. It's very practical and for those of us who are spiritual and/or interested in the psychology it's very logical.

Have a fantabulous day Mr. Maxx.

appreciate your comments as always brother!

[maxx]

Jesus didn't say anything new.

Lev. [17] Thou shalt not hate thy brother in thine heart: thou shalt in any wise rebuke thy neighbour, and not suffer sin upon him.
[18] Thou shalt not avenge, nor bear any grudge against the children of thy people, but thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself: I am the LORD.

For example: Jesus, teaching in the 'Lord's Prayer' about forgiveness says, "God forgives our trespasses just as we forgive [[the trespasses of) those who trespass against us." This seems to be slightly inconsistent with other Biblical passages describing how we are forgiven only through "Christ's blood, even the forgiveness of sins."

And how does the Course reconcile this inconsistency?

For some, the teachings of ACIM are believed to clarify many of these types of apparent Biblical inconsistencies and shortcomings. Teachings regarding the exact mechanics of the spiritual principle of forgiveness are central to the ACIM teachings. Regarding forgiveness, ACIM goes into far greater detail, providing far more instruction regarding the logic of, the purpose for, and the practical application of this principle, than does the Christian Bible. Many students of ACIM who are [[or have been) involved in traditional Christian churches, and who have faithfully studied ACIM for a significant length of time, report their sense that the teachings of ACIM on forgiveness have finally clarified for them, in very practical ways, how forgiveness can now be fully realized in their daily lives.

This sounds like an ad for the Course.

The Course tells us clearly that God does know we're here [[see T-4.VII.6 and T-6.V.1). It tells us that the Holy Spirit is a "creation of the one Creator" [[C-6.1:2), created in loving response to the separation to show us the way back home. It portrays Jesus as a real Son of God [[like the rest of us) who has awakened completely to God, yet who still "has remained with [us] " [[M-23.5:9) in order "to lead [us] from the hell [we] made to God" [[C-5.5:4). Both the Holy Spirit and Jesus are thus real beings who actively help us return to God. They not only give us the mental content of healed perception, but also "answer every specific problem"...

So if you feel forgiven, then you are?

Either you’re totally joyous with a healed mind and body knowing who you are – OR – you’re still trapped in the illusion with momentary fleeting glimpses of light. That’s the range. You’re either in Heaven or hell.

So if you feel joyous, then you are forgiven? And hell is just discontent? That's a far cry from the weeping and the gnashing of teeth in the NT. So it seems that the Course tries to address some of the contradictions in the Bible and the biggest problem most people have with Biblical teachings.
And they don't deal with the Pauline teachings of salvation through the death of Christ at all?

How is the Course practical?

I found this interesting:
"... Over the next thirteen months, Wapnick and Schucman edited the manuscript again, substantially rearranging and deleting material, altering chapter and section headings, and correcting various inconsistencies in paragraph structure, punctuation, and capitalization. This editing process was completed in approximately February 1975..."[wiki]
This is the manuscript supposedly dictated by Jesus that they are rearranging and deleting from.

The true sign of intelligence is not knowledge but imagination.
-Albert Einstein
maxx: I think Einstein may have been referring to the kind of imagination he used in his thought experiments that was based in reality.

[MizMotown]

Personal material — meant only for Helen and Bill — was part of what she had written down, and it was her very specific guidance that this was not to be included in the published version. This personal material also included many references to psychologists and various psychological issues and subjects, which were also not meant for the public, but rather were to help Helen and Bill make the bridge between their psychological understanding and that of the Course. The Workbook part of The Course contains very little editing.

[[okay, i'm done with the ACIM debate.. lol... I've been interested in the The Course since 1998. It is a part of my life. I am not coercised by ACIM cult members in any way, shape, or form. lololol.... it works for me. Just like the bible works for others, and science works for others... etc...)

[MizMotown]

A Course [[which is still very unique in it's thought system) can be likened to Advaita Vendanta in the belief that their is no duality.

"When I see I am nothing, that is wisdom. When I see I am everything, that is love. My life is a movement between these two." -Nisargadatta Maharaj [[I Am That)

Peace :-)

[maxx]

Regardless of what we believe the problem is, all our problems can be solved the exact same way, merely by changing our minds about them. [ACIM]

'Expect the best and get it' Fearful creatures that we are, we tend to expect the worst. But an expectation of the best has a way of organising forces in your favour. You are less likely to keep anything in reserve. The subconscious, which regulates much of our actions, merely reflects your beliefs. Alter the belief about an outcome, and your actions will seem to be shaped in order to achieve it. Peale's phrase is: 'Doubt closes the power flow. Faith opens it.' [The Power of Positive Thinking, Norman Vincent Peale]http://www.butler-bowdon.com/powerpositivethinking
When life gives you lemons, make lemonade. [N.V. Peale]

[MizMotown]

and? lol... your point is....
acim is psychology... psychology is nothing new. positive thinking is nothing. the bible is a book full of affirmations.
i would hope you would expect the best... alot of people really don't. why? they don't believe they deserve it. they've been told from childhood they are not good enough or worthy enough, or sinners, or whatever.

have a spectacular evening Maxx.... peace out :-)

[rb336]

interesting how a thread specifically for atheists turned into a thread proselytizing mystical mumbo jumbo

[MizMotown]

interesting how a thread specifically for atheists turned into a thread proselytizing mystical mumbo jumbo lol don't worry rb [[i.e. posting police) i'm done with this discussion.

This one is for you Maxx....

Jesus placed science and the gathering of knowledge about nature in context with God’s design and authorship. Matthew 6:28-30.

[rb336]

Jesus placed science and the gathering of knowledge about nature in context with God’s design and authorship. Matthew 6:28-30.

how do you get that statement out of this:

"28"And why are you worried about clothing? Observe how the lilies of the field grow; they do not toil nor do they spin,

29yet I say to you that not even Solomon in all his glory clothed himself like one of these. 30"But if God so clothes the grass of the field, which is alive today and tomorrow is thrown into the furnace, will He not much more clothe you? You of little faith! "?

Where does that talk about gathering knowledge? it's about god taking care of you.

[kryptonite]

Atheists rule in my opinion. They are apex thinkers. Atheists are liberated from the involved argument of the existence of a supreme being/s.

much discussion on this thread centers on Jesus. If a person does not believe in a god, why would Jesus' teachings necessarily be of any importance to them?

Believe in whatever you want, but in my opinion Atheists have at least asked questions and given some thought to difficult questions, they have not just fallen into belief because they were raised in any particular religion.