Why the heck not?! I can see all of the arguments against Religion (opiate of the masses) and preaching (annoying as hell) but what's worng with one individual having absolute faith in their Higher Power, who-whatever it may be? People in this forum have even gone so far as to compare such a concept to the concept of the Tooth Fairy. Name one thing in our world that is man-mad ethat imagintation is not responsible for. People like that, in my opinion, are sadly bereft of any true happiness. Well, the last part was an attack, excuse me for that, but I want to see the response to all of this.

You do not get it do you???

no, apparently not, explain.

god, back in my smarter days i addressed some other tard on this point. and it was a good post, but ive done alot of drugs since then.
it comes down to values and integrity. i value truth and integrity both. so faith is a deservice to truth, and faith in a god that values truth, is both a diservice to truth itself and a mockery of it's own principles. wich in turn is very lacking in integrity. i hope you understand what im saying.

what ever you claim to know about the general concept of divinity does not apply here. I'm talking about each individual's own concept of their personal Higher Power.

I, personally, haven't seen anyone bashing on faith.. that's one of the strongholds of most religions. So.. going with Dyshade here... you don't really get it.. do you?

then it would still be an immorral thing to do if one values truth. expecially if one values truth as intently as i do. and i don't see why the general outlook on divinity wouldn't apply. because generally most human concepts of divinity also value honesty. so believing in them would be a mockery in itself. it is a very wierd paradox that exist in human culture. almost comical.

that is assuming that religion and faith are the same thing.

no im reffering soley to faith when i speak of disservice to truth. and faith in a righteous higher power when referring to the mockery and lack of integrity. but both stem from religion at times.

Once again.... you just do not get it... try a theology class or go back and read up on it...

Religion and faith are absolutely not the same things. Though the two words are often associated, they have very different meanings. You can have "faith" without being religious. You can have "faith" in a person, an idea, anything. Faith simply means that you believe in something even though you don't have physical solid evidence to prove it. Religion, since it's so diverse and made up of so many ideas that have evolved throughout time, is almost completely based on faith, since most religious beliefs can't be unquestionably proven.

alright, here's where I'm coming from; The way I see it, Reality as you can see and tocuh (etc) in the literal sense is an illusion and a falsification reated by the feeble conciousness of the human mind in order to interpret the truth of God. The Universe, as it exists, stems from three basic (half-full half-empty) views of the same thing. The first is oneness, in which everythign is the same; past, present, future, and every place and object are all part of the same organci whole. The second is everythingness in which all is going on in a random, chaotic pull-push system of time and space. The third is nothingness, in which everything we see is not only an illusion, it is not even a metaphor towards the truth. God, as I see it, is the force that keeps the organic whole running, that randomly decides which things and events are takign place and nothingess, respectively.

i won't make fun of that. that is theory and i like theories that strive to make sense of existence. however i would make fun of you if you had full blown faith in this theory. i have alot of theories, and some are very similar to this one. but i don't believe them, i just contemplate them and apply them in situations when i can. the only thing i truly believe in is determinism, but with a denial of absolute truth. so i guess im not truly believing in that either. its a scary place to be, but i think it is the most honest. and like i said i value truth with intensity.

Absolute faith is blind to other possiblites.

This is the problem I have with that:

it's like one big fucking cop-out. By saying God randomly controls all, you forfeit any responsibility for your choices and actions. If God KNOWS ahead of time, you don't have a say in it. And that is NOT what the Christian religion says.. (though I'm not coherently sure what religion specifically you're referring to). I'm not an educated theologist by no means, but I do believe the Christian religion firmly believes you have a choice. You choose, you pay the price. God simply is THERE and presents opportunities to prove your loyalty to Him, or to fail. He has the power to intervene, but doesn't. If He decided to intervene, we would have no need for faith.. which, once again, is the basis of most religion. It all comes full circle in time.. but we have a choice. And it's up to God (if there is one) to just make the right circumstances available. But then.. God is all-knowing apparently.. is He not? And if He knows what we're going to do.. how is it we could possibly have a free choice? Something would always happen to get us back to where God says we're going to be. It feels like a giant contradiction, and to me, it makes little sense.

for having a bit of a fatalistic approach to things. But i think if there is a possibility that somethign COULD go wrong, it WILL. If it doesn't, that means that whatever it was was never meant to happen. I think that we have no control over our actions, but that we are meant to act of though and believe as though we do, otherwise, as you said, it becomes a cop-out. We'd lack both guilt and the ability to take pleasure from what we do, but my God simply loves me for being, all i have to do is act in the way in whichI do, and my God will always love and forgive me, even when i cannot forgive myself.

Well, if God controls all of our actions, I could go out and murder someone right now, and the law would not be able to TECHNICALLY peg me with murder, because I'm not in control of my actions; God is. So, if God controls EVERYTHING; he's not only an all-knowing power, he's also a murderer, rapist, child molestor, kidnapper, bank robber, mass murderer, and anything else you can think of. If God exists, Satan must exist.. there has to be dark for everything light, if you will. But God came before Satan. God created Satan, and therefore created evil.. so if God is the good he created, he must also be the evil he created.. in which case, there's no true justice.

You COULD go out and just start killing people, couldn't you? but would you?

What does that have to do with the point magnus made?

My point is that I do not believe there is REAL good, or for that matter, REAL evil, it is perceptions of what's going on. In other words, the higher up you go in your perceptions of things, the greater you appreciate them, the more you'll see that it is not good or evil, it is simply action. Actions that are part of the never-ending stream of predetermined actions.