Atheist

[Penelope]

Dude. Dude. The Oxford Comma. My favorite piece of punctuation!

[Kaesekopf]

Dude. Dude. The Oxford Comma. My favorite piece of punctuation!

You spelled "interrobang" wrong.

[Kaesekopf]

So the atheist, in his bid to sow discord, actually created unity.   
God moves in mysterious ways.

Freaky, ain't it?

[Chestertonian]

I had fun on this thread.  It gave me a chance to be on the same side with some people I usually argue with.  It felt good.m.youtube.com/watch?v=3mXMtLmhQ74

Come on Jayne, we don't argue that much.

What's your position on the Oxford comma?

I support use of the Oxford Comma.  I cringe whenever I see a sentence that should have it but does not.

Then I guess we are buddies now.

You kids have fun at your extra punctuation marks for no reason club.  I'll throw, in, %some )extra+;;;;::::---useless punctuation.......,,,,, marks, in, my, sentence. in . . uour honor...,,?;;

[Sbyvl36]

It is not extra pronunciation; it is correct pronunciation.

[Arun]

a,m, i, d,o,i,n,g, i,t, r,i,g,h,t, ?,

[Daniel]

I hate it when people leave out that comma.  It makes no grammatical sense and sometimes it changes the most natural reading of the sentence.

[Chestertonian]

a,m, i, d,o,i,n,g, i,t, r,i,g,h,t, ?,

.,,,me,e,ds m,o,r,e vo.mm as,,,,,

[LaramieHirsch]

I've tried talking over there at TTA.  I've never made time to learn apologetics, really.  And no one over there seemed interested in anything I had to say.  It was hostile. 

I suppose I've concluded I don't really have much to say to atheists.

[Revixit]

I've tried talking over there at TTA.  I've never made time to learn apologetics, really.  And no one over there seemed interested in anything I had to say.  It was hostile. 

I suppose I've concluded I don't really have much to say to atheists.

It doesn't matter what you say to atheists because they don't listen.  They're angry.  Most of the time, they're still mad at their parents or (quite often) at Sister X or Father Y and want to tell you how Sister or Father was wrong -- ten, twenty, thirty, forty, fifty, or sixty years ago!  "The Church was just so black and white, never recognizing shades of grey."

They complain that Sister smacked their hands with a ruler, ignoring you when you say that corporal punishment was common in public schools, too.

Some atheists are highly intelligent and want proof.  If God won't appear to them personally, they want nothing to do with Him, and use His failure to do their bidding as evidence that there is no God.  There is no logic to that position but they can't see that they're being illogical.

In real life, they may realize there is something to Faith if it's demonstrated to them by acts.  Keeping the Faith and showing it by your acts is the best witness.

It's nice seeing you here, Laramie.  I don't know whether you've been away or if I've just missed your posts but I was glad to see this one.  How are your gardens, orchards, etc., doing this year?  Did the hard winter cause problems for you?

[Chestertonian]

I was atheist-ish or at least agnostic for awhile.  It didn't arise from being mad at my parents, or my orthodox Jewish upbringing... it was, "How can a loving God allow so much suffering in the world?"  My Jewish faith didn't adequately address that.  Sure, the book of Job explains that God allows suffering in order that we might prove our faithfulness to Him in good times and in bad.  But I had so much anger at a lot of things that were happening to me, and in the world. 

I don't think I really understood suffering until I became Christian.  Suffering is how our redemption happened.  God Himself suffered for us and "makes all things new" because of His sufferings.  I now see it as not just something God allows, but something God uses to sanctify us.

[LaramieHirsch]

It's nice seeing you here, Laramie.  I don't know whether you've been away or if I've just missed your posts but I was glad to see this one.  How are your gardens, orchards, etc., doing this year?  Did the hard winter cause problems for you?

I've tried to lay off the forums and blogging as best as I can.  I have a lot to do in real life that I just don't talk about on the forums, and so I'm kept pretty busy. 

In fact, I've been so busy that the gardens have been sort of neglected this year, though I have a really great patch of cantaloupe going.  Last Christmas, the neighbor's dog got out and slaughtered all of my chickens and a rabbit.  I'll replace them all next spring. 

And as for that hard winter you asked about...I was amazed.  I've been able to grow carrots, turnips, and spinach through our Oklahoma winters, but last year's winter killed off even the tops of the carrots.  I use those carrot tops to treat the rabbits.

Good times.

[LaramieHirsch]

It doesn't matter what you say to atheists because they don't listen.  They're angry.  Most of the time, they're still mad at their parents or (quite often) at Sister X or Father Y and want to tell you how Sister or Father was wrong -- ten, twenty, thirty, forty, fifty, or sixty years ago!  "The Church was just so black and white, never recognizing shades of grey."

...

...Some atheists are highly intelligent and want proof.  If God won't appear to them personally, they want nothing to do with Him, and use His failure to do their bidding as evidence that there is no God. 

Yes, the atheists I've tried talking to do not know how to objectively hold a conversation without insulting you or something you believe in.  It's very malicious and rude when a person does that in a conversation with you.  I think I blocked at least 4 or 5 people when I was at TTA.  All I ended up talking about over there was my interest in monarchy and a small inquiry of what people thought about the Ham/Nye debate. 

--------

I find that some people like   love to argue and debate that Person A is supposed to believe in Idea B.  That's apologetics for you. 

Myself, I'm not so hung up on trying to convince people to believe in Idea B, because I'm too busy trying to apply Idea B to my life.  I am busy trying to live within Idea B and incorporate the philosophy of that idea in my every day living.  I am not built for convincing people to join me in pursuing Idea B, nor do I have the interest or time. 

So, basically I just speak with other Catholics.  I'm happy to explain my beliefs to a non-believer if they ask or tell them why I believe what I believe, but typically no one is interested in asking those kinds of questions.  I often wonder how the first Christians talked to their pagan neighbors and what the reactions were like.  I imagine that since Christianity was new back then, there was not much objection to it.  Sort of how the Aztecs were willing to convert to the new religion that allowed them to end their sacrifices.  They sacrificed over 200,000 people a year in their rituals. 


TTA forum sometimes seems as though it is mostly powered by the idea of rejecting Christianity.  I have the impression that if Christianity was removed from the Earth for these people, that forum would have nothing to talk about.  And in that way, they are ironically sort of dependant on Christ.

[TPC]

I was atheist-ish or at least agnostic for awhile.  It didn't arise from being mad at my parents, or my orthodox Jewish upbringing... it was, "How can a loving God allow so much suffering in the world?"  My Jewish faith didn't adequately address that.  Sure, the book of Job explains that God allows suffering in order that we might prove our faithfulness to Him in good times and in bad.  But I had so much anger at a lot of things that were happening to me, and in the world. 

I don't think I really understood suffering until I became Christian.  Suffering is how our redemption happened.  God Himself suffered for us and "makes all things new" because of His sufferings.  I now see it as not just something God allows, but something God uses to sanctify us.

Insightful

[voxxpopulisuxx]

Evil I have found is a very good foundation to attack atheist world views. They recognise the concept of evil or "wrong" even if they think theism is its apex. Go after them to tell you by what metric they define something evil wrong or unjust....how do you know the salem witchtrials werent a good thing?  Why was it unjust what happened to Galileo?  Etc...youll have them stammering and backpeddeling in no time.