that's just a plain ingornant statement. By reading that I wonder how you were even able to type the letters yourself... come on admit it, mommie typed for you didn't she...Originally Posted by b@d @pple
of course you can't "prove" it that's why it's called "faith" not science. I guess gravity dosen't exsist. we're all being held down by all of the air above you I guess.
85% of people in this country celebrate "christmas" and/or christians. 42% of people elected Bill Clinton president so why can't 85% call it christmas? also, why do we have Santa Clause, when everyone knows he has nothing to do with the birth of christ "biblically". I think this might help explain things, since "most of us white folk have ancestors from the region.
I had to look this up. It's isn't the American Santa Claus story by far...
In the fourth century a.d. St. Nicholas (in dutch called "Sinterklaas" or "Sint Nicolaas"; in german called "Sankt Nikolaus") was the bishop of Myra, which is now situated in Turkey. According to the legend, he saved his town from starvation. He is also said to have revived three dead children, and to have offered gifts of dowries to poor girls. Some sources say that he died on the sixth of December in 343. In 1087 his relics were taken to Bari in Italy. It is unclear why, according to the Dutch tradition, he comes from Spain. Possibly it has something to do with the fact that St. Nicholas was the patron of sailors. In the 17th century Holland was famous for its navigation. Maybe by contact with Spanish sailors this myth began. It could also explain why St. Nicholas has "zwarte (black) pieten" to help him because the Moors dominated Spain for several hundreds of years. (Another [more popular] explanation for "zwarte piet" being black is that he has come down the chimneys so often [see below] that he can't wash the dirt off.)
His legendary gifts of dowries to poor girls led to the custom of giving gifts to children on the eve of his feast day, 6 December. The companions of St. Nicholas (in Germany and Austria they are called "Knecht Ruprecht" or "Krampus") show the victory over evil. Together with his "pieten" he visits children to punish the evil ones and to reward the good ones. The worst punishment is to be taken to Spain in "zwarte piet's" bag out of which the good children get the sweets (called "pepernoten", "taai-taai", or "schuimpjes") and presents. A less radical punishment is to get the "roede" (rod) instead of presents. Nowadays there are not much evil children any more...
A few weeks before his feastday St. Nicholas comes to Holland (and Belgium) on his steamer with all his "pieten" and the presents which they prepared in Spain during the year. This event can be seen on Dutch television. From his arrival in Holland till his feastday the children can put their shoes in front of the fireplace. During the night St. Nicholas visits all the houses by travelling over the roofs on his horse, traditionally a white/grey (called "Schimmel" in dutch), and "zwarte piet" enters the houses through the chimney to put little presents in the children's shoes. Sometimes the children put straw, carrots and water near the shoe for the horse.
On the eve of his feast day St. Nicholas visits all children. After knocking on the door he gives them a bag full of presents (if they were good children). Early in the morning of 6 December, when he has visited everyone, he leaves and goes back silently to Spain, to come back next year.
More at...
http://www-astro.physics.ox.ac.uk/%7...sint/sint.html
now I rant... it;s a christmas tree! not a holiday tree, not a manora(spelling) tree or a kwanza(which is completly made up) tree! take christmas completely out of everything there is no TREE! this wouldn't happen anywhere else in the world. imagine you're in Thailand or any Buhddist country and you go to the local court house and you got to the local court house and tell the judge that you want to sue the gov't for having a giant golden buddah in public desplay or you live in india you tell someone that the cow in front of your building is offensive because of it's religous implications. you'll probally get bitch slapped. btw comparing "pagan rituals" to christian or anyother religous form of worship is just a backhanded way to belittle said religon by equating it to a bunch of savages dancing around a fire sacrificing a goat to the harvest god. so stuff that. I don't feeling like quoting parts of peoples posts and all that crap so I'll just say that those of you whom said, "no where in the bible does it say we should worship the birth of christ" you are correct. Does it say in the declairation of indepedence that we should "celebrate" the 4th of July? no it does not. the birth of christ is kinda of a big deal to christians. so they chose to celebrate it by giving gifts like the 3 wise men did and getting the family together, blah, blah.
if you didn't want to read all the crap I've posted above that's fine I understand, I'll just say this, "if you don't want to call it a christmas tree and call dec. 25th christmas. feel free toounch the time clock and go to work. so you won't be forced to "celebrate" it by the horriable christians.
hah ignorant because its not what you believe,once again another typical statement......i undertsnad why it cal ed faith,the belief in something that cannot be proven,also known as a crutch..i think its entertaining for you to challenge my intelligence due to my beliefs,all of you are doing the work of "god"..judging non believers one by one!..so while this topic is always fun to debate...i have more important things to do..so enjoy
apparently you don't ^"undertsnad why it cal ed faith..." it's obvious that you can't read cause you couldn't read what you had written previously. I'm not challenging your beliefs or "judging" anyone. I'm challenging your ability to form a coherient thought. it is evident that you're not doing a good job of convincing anyone that you can. all I can hope is that you don't find some way to a voting station.
now I would like everyone reading this to take a few minutes and look at this. notice how he(the person whom I am quoting) does not address any of the points made in my post. All he(I'm assumin it's a he) does is revert back to the "typical statement" defense; it is similar to the "liar liar pants on fire" political stragety used by politicians and columinists today.
well if we are gonna debate ..then here we go.
To prove the non-existence of god we first need to define the word "god". When christians talk about god they mean an almighty being. This, I think, is the only god that holds, since it is the only god that can be logically justified.
I think it makes most sense if god is female, because only women can give life. Something that even people in the Stone Age understood. Later when wars affected the cultural evolution, and men took control of society, god became male, but the female god still lives on in the expression "Mother earth". It should also be pointed out that an omnipotent god must be either androgyne or sexless. However, in most religions god is male so I will refer to god as 'he', 'him' etc.
Some people (Einstein for instance) believe in a god who is not a personal god, but a Spinozan kind of god. I claim that this god is not a god! To say that god is universe - by getting knowledge of the universe we get knowledge of god - is to redefine the meaning of the word god. This has nothing to do with the word god as it was defined by the "primitive" cultures which preceded our present civilization. He can be excluded with Occam's razor, and most important: Such a god does not hear prayers.
If god is not omnipotent there is nothing that prevents him from being a product of the universe. If that is the case, what makes god divine? Then god would only be an alien, a being of matter; probably containing flesh, blood and DNA like all life we know of. Everything god is able to do would be things that human beings also will be able to do, all his knowledge would be knowledge we will also achieve. In fact humans would be gods, which should lead to some strange kind of humanism!
Many people justify their faith with god as an explanation. What is the meaning of life? Where does time and space come from? Who created the physical constants? et cetera. Because we lack knowledge of these things - and maybe never will, since they are questions like "what is the color of a second?" or "how does sound taste?" - god is there as an explanation.
Let's say that god is the meaning of life, what then is the meaning of god? If god has a nature, who created that nature? If god created time and space, how can god exist without it? Since creation is an event in time, how could god create time? and who created god? To answer these questions god must be almighty, or else you can't explain them. In fact you can if you say god stands above time and space and so on (which he indeed does if he is almighty), but to be able to prevent god from being tied to future phenomena, you must give him the quality of omnipotence so he can stand above everything.
Last edited by b@d @pple; 12-15-2005 at 07:20 PM.
lets keep going shall we..
these are the qualities of an omnipotent god
If god is almighty there are several qualities he must have. They are as follows:
* He must know everything. Everything that is, everything that has been and everything that will be. To be able to know everything that will be he must know every position and every momentum of every particle in cosmos (Laplace's "World Spirit").
* He must be worth our worship. A being that is not worth worshipping is no god.
* He must be able to do anything. If there are things that god can't do, he certainly is not omnipotent.
* He must be above time. Something that even St. Augustine deduced. But not only that, god must stand above all possible dimensions.
* He cannot be 'good' or 'evil' or, indeed, have any subjective characteristica. If god is all good, he cannot do evil things and cannot be almighty. Most people would object and say that good can do evil but chooses not to do it. Well, if god is all good he can't choose to do evil things, can he?
and this is the theodice problem
We also have the theodice problem, stated by David Hume:
If the evil in the world is intended by god he is not good. If it violates his intentions he is not almighty. God can't be both almighty and good. There are many objections to this, but none that holds since god is ultimately responsible for the existence of evil. Besides, if only god can create he must have created evil. If somebody else (the devil) created evil, how can one know that god, and not Satan created the universe?
god is void
If everything must have been created, then god must have been created as well. If god is not created, then everything mustn't have a creator, so why should life or cosmos have one?
Besides this argument has another leap. If everything has a source and god is that source, then god must have existed without it before he created it. So if god created time and space, he must live outside of time and space. Thus he is non-existent. If all life must come from something and that is god, god is not alive and hence non-existent. If moral must come from god, god lacks moral. If logic comes from god, god is illogic. If nature comes from god, god is unnatural. If existence comes from god, god is non-existent. If god is the cause of everything, god is void
As explained above, evil in this world is not intended by God. It is created by our own absence of goodwill and his grace. Devil did not create evil. God created everything, even the devil. Therefore, God created evil.
Let's put it even further. It is generally agreed that God has both a good side and a "bad" side IN OUR EYES. The "bad" side is known by his wrath. The good is known by his creations and blessings.
God has the ability to create and kill. He can create universes and end them. Create the earth and destroy it.
And again, God is not mortal. Do not think of God as a man with white beard as much as you can think of the devil as a half-goat with horns.
I got free clear tails with my ride.....
Indeed. Those would be the characteristics of God.
Good is good and evil is evil. Good can not do evil as much as water can be fire. What is your definition of evil? There is a wonderful example of this online somewhere that I have once read.
Let us put it like this. What is light? Light is the sun to you, right? Can you see light? Yes you can. You see it during the day. You can see its prism and its spectrum. You can see that true light is comprised of several layers of colors on various wavelengths and radio wave, yada yada yada. In fact, you can probably give me 1000' of analysis and proof of light.
Now what is darkness? Can you define it? The first thought that would come into your mind is "well, darkness is, dark... black... ". Yes, yes.. but Darkness is not a color, now is it? Can you see darkness? "wel yea," you would argue "if you walk into a room with no light, you can't see anything. Everything is black" BINGO. Jump all up and down, but the conclusion that you must come up with is that darkness is the ABSENCE of light. Take a look around. The sun sets, it becomes dark. Where there are no stars, it is dark. When you flick the lightswitch to off, it becomes dark. Therefore, Darkness is the absence of light. If there is light, darnkess fades.
The same can be applied to Evil. Evil is the absence of Good. God is almighty, and is all good. It can not be evil. It can create it though, and HE DID, to prove that he is almighty. Ladies and gentlemen, I give you the Devil.
Let's us take it a step further. Where does light come from? Light has a source. A lamp. The sun. The stars. All emit light. Light is created.
Can you create dark? Wel, can you? Can you darken a room that has light in it? the answer is "Only by removing the source of light". You can not come into a room with sunlight, and flick on a switch and make it dark. You have to close the drapes etc. Darkness is NOT created out of a source. Darkness is ONLY CREATED by removing the source of light !!
This is a perfect example about the paradox about good and evil. It is therefore not a coincidence that God is often referred as the source of light, and the Devil is referred as the prince of darkness.
Think about it. God is the lightbulb. He does not create darkness (evil) as a SOURCE. WE create Darkness by REMOVING the LIGHTSOURCE (God), out of our lives. The Devil can NOT create darkness (evil) as a source. He IS darkness (evil).
But ultimately the darkness (Evil) remains dependable and related to light (God). And while the light (God), is ultimately responsible for both, as a SOURCE, it can not BE both.
Last edited by ISAtlanta300; 12-16-2005 at 06:37 PM.
I got free clear tails with my ride.....
Wrong. God is an almighty entity. Beings are mortal.
Ain't that the truth. Someone mentioned somewhere before that belief is beyond logic and based on faith. Therefore, this holds true.
Most people assume the "image" of God being an old man with a big, white beard sitting on a trone. While this image may have been immortalized in paintings to give us something to identify with, this is not the true image of God. That image is that of a man, and God is not mortal.
I already know what is coming "God created people in His image". Yes indeed. But what is our "true" image? This shell of decaying flesh? Or is our image truly what is inside of us? If the latter is true, and you can conceptualize it, you are on the first step of understanding the true nature of God.
Therefore, God IS omnipotent.
Have you ever thought about God as the "originator" of everything? Again, that type of thought you formulated (or Googled) is tied to God as a human being bound to earthly physics and laws. God is not of this earth. Therefore, you can not explain Him with earthly logic.
I got free clear tails with my ride.....
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