Philosophical Vegan Forum

While the subject statement says it all I must truly admit that this isn't true to all people who
call themselves Christians it only speaks to the vast number of zealots.

1. The Ultimate Hypocrisy: Christians believe in an ultimate punishment for committing sins here on Earth
and an ultimate reward of heaven for being good little bees.
So, in short like when training a dog you use negative and positive reinforcements for the dog to exhibit the
behavior you wish it to. ( i.e, blowing a whistle then giving it a treat for sitting on command and yelling no and
spraying it with a water bottle for digging throw the trash.) Christians claim that this is the moral compass which
guides all beings on earth, however as many of you know, this statement really means is that they only behave
themselves out of fear of punishment or hopes of reward.
The one thing I never see anyone point out is how Christians are able to justify any crime such as pedophilia,
rape, and murder with asking for forgiveness.
In a stupid Christian comments video ( I believe number 9) someone commented that atheism was the ultimate
sin. Not rape, not murder, not mass murder ( you know Hitler may have killed 7 million people but he was a devout
catholic so he's alright.) not child molestation it's atheism.
In this guy's mind as long as you ask the lord for forgiveness
and live as a Christian you can do whatever you want because you will be forgiven, unless you're an atheist because
you don't believe in right and wrong and you have no morals.

2. The God is on my side delusion: When a Christian fully believes that god is on his/her side they can justify any
action they take to be the right action because the ultimate creator favors them over non Christians.
case in point below

http://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2015 ... 016-ballot

Living in the USA this lawyer is afforded protection as freedom of religion and right to free speech.
Basically the USA government is more concerned about not violating the rights of this man than protecting
the gay community so far.
I see this kind of behavior from Christians and only Christians here in the USA they hide behind their rights
to religion and free speech so much that people ultimately forget what IS RIGHT.

Christopher Hitchens said it well when he spoke of the evil that is vicarious redemption.

Most Christians have a very convoluted and wicked view on morality that derives from that essential point of metaphysics. The idea that you can do something bad, and somebody else can pay for that and relieve you of any responsibility.

Most of the problems specific to Christianity come down to that. The rest are largely out of date social practices and deontological views, which Christians share with other religions (also problems, but common to most religions).

brimstoneSalad wrote:Christopher Hitchens said it well when he spoke of the evil that is vicarious redemption.

Most Christians have a very convoluted and wicked view on morality that derives from that essential point of metaphysics. The idea that you can do something bad, and somebody else can pay for that and relieve you of any responsibility.

Most of the problems specific to Christianity come down to that. The rest are largely out of date social practices and deontological views, which Christians share with other religions (also problems, but common to most religions).

I just stumbled across a recent article about a woman in Afghanistan named Farkhunda. She was accused of burning a Quran and was viciously murdered by a mob. She was pushed from a roof then run over by a car beaten dragged by the car then set on fire. All the while the mob was yelling ALLAH AKBAR. (God is great.) The woman of course was innocent of this crime.

The problem is greater than people are willing to admit. This wasn't extremist this wasn't ISIS this wasn't Al'qaeda this was your every day normal supposedly peaceful muslims. This goes to show that it's not a minority of muslims who freak the heck out over the tiniest of things and go into mass murder mode, but the majority of them do. This is a horrific religion it's absolutely disgusting the things they do.
I'd like to see these muslim apologists try to justify this crime. This is exactly like the Charlie Hebdo shootings except now that it's happened to a fellow muslim people of islam are trying to put there best crocodile tears forward and act like it's a bad thing.

wfatheist wrote: 1. The Ultimate Hypocrisy: Christians believe in an ultimate punishment for committing sins here on Earth
and an ultimate reward of heaven for being good little bees.

As someone raised in a very conservative Christian environment, I would point out that the latter portion of this statement isn't entirely correct for most Christians. While there are a few sects of Christianity that believe in "salvation by works", but vast majority don't put any value in "being good" as a way to heaven. They believe that man is a sinful creature and there is nothing we can do to earn salvation. They will explain - "that's why the sacrifice Christ made was necessary. If we could earn it ourselves, there would be no need for a savior.".

Christians claim that this is the moral compass which guides all beings on earth, however as many of you know, this statement really means is that they only behave themselves out of fear of punishment or hopes of reward.

I won't disagree that a lot of Christian's have a faith based on Pascal's Wager. They have no clue what that is or what it means, but it's the basis of their belief. Anyone that asks, "but what if you're wrong", is firmly rooted in Pascal's line of thinking.

The one thing I never see anyone point out is how Christians are able to justify any crime such as pedophilia, rape, and murder with asking for forgiveness.

I don't know that I would call asking for forgiveness "justifiying" a crime. The people I grew up with would tell you that being a Christian means you should want to be a good person and want to follow what Christ taught, which means you don't want to do those things. Granted, that's a bunch of hooey, but it sounds nice!

...and live as a Christian you can do whatever you want because you will be forgiven

I'm sure there are some out there, but I don't know any Christian's that think this way. There is supposed to be a "change" when you become a Christian; you no longer want to do bad/evil things. Salvation isn't a 'get out of jail free' card to the Christian's I know. Again, I'm sure that isn't the case with all of them.

2. The God is on my side delusion: When a Christian fully believes that god is on his/her side they can justify any
action they take to be the right action because the ultimate creator favors them over non Christians.

This is one of my current struggles... out of all the religions out there, how does anyone know that "this one" is right?

BC

Another issue of xtianity is also common with many other religions especially abrahamic ones. its the story of abraham itself thats the perfect example.

its sold like its all wonderful and a great moral teaching except most people dont even realize what they just pulled. basically the deity asks the follower to kill his own son without providing any justification for it as a test. the guy actually goes ahead with it unquestioningly and is stopped at the last moment as a question apparently of trust/faith! people think this is a wonderful thing.

However this could have gone the polar opposite way! the deity should have chastised him for blindly obeying an order that could have lead to someone being killed, that would infact be the moral thing to do. instead it actually expects him to go through with it.

and thats the whole problem with all such religions. all it comes down to is blindly obeying authoritarian rules irrespective if those rules make any sense. in fact that is apparently the only thing fundie religious folks are concerned with when judging whether they should carry out an action/decision, ie does it go by the rules - rational or otherwise - in this one book.

the problem is that even if the rules said something horrible should be done, you d have to do it.

and for that matter if a deity said do not kill someone, you would have to not do that - this would be the moral imperative. if the next day it said you must kill that same person, that would now become the moral imperative. and since deities speak through books or religious heads then the most heinous thhings can easily be justified simply by saying "God commanded us to do this". Thats the whole problem with autoritarian rule based morality like Divine Command Morality http://www.skeptic.ca/Biblical_Ethics.htm
by contrast if decisions/actions were based on reasoning metrics eg amount of suffering caused due to an action, it makes way more sense. eg homosexuality - no suffering caused to anyone, homophobia causes a lot of suffering and increases mortality rates of people:
http://www.msnbc.com/msnbc/can-homophobia-kill-you
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Suicide_among_LGBT_youth

yet the ass backwards irrational rule obeying approach of religion means some blind faith religious fundies want the opposite thing to be done thereby increasing net suffering. as is the case so much of the time.