No.306451
I read up on religious cults and pretty much every founder is a delusional narcissist rulebreaker. Aleph in Japan had its prophet and founder be a literal school bully that'd beat on other children. Joseph Smith is a recent example where there's actual court records of him fleecing people with seer stones. But modern cults like the moonies (which is now a religion) have made the transition to the organized religion phase and just coast. Typically after the charismatic syncretic leader dies, if they manage to land on a tempered administrator, they transition to a religion. Jesus Christ/Paul, Mohammad/Abu Bakr, Joseph Smith/Brigham Young follow this pattern.
Reading the bible I just don't see Jesus as any different than your typical Pentecostal faith healer that's fleecing his congregation. He comes across arrogant and vague, and purposely hid his lessons from the public with parables. It's only after he died and Paul came along that the religion was codified and organized into something workable.
Organized religions in the modern era are basically rent seeking corporations. They arise as cults early on in a spur of charisma, amass followers, grift their congregation, and then dump that money into property and investments. Decades pass, the founder dies, new recruits dry up, and most of the money comes from investments rather than tithes. At that point the leadership is content to let the church decline and start redirecting church money to other sectors, such as media or real estate. That's what's happening to Jehovah's Witnesses, they literally redesigned their kingdom halls in a pattern that allows for an easy transition to commercial businesses.
I don't know, I'm a cynical guy. I actually think organized religions are good because they provide structure and guidance, but every organized religion comes from a seedy origin. And the modern era with its pluralism has just allowed the most exploitative and Machiavellian cults to outcompete organized religions.
No.306452
>>306451organized religions are for npcs and gnosticism is for real human beings
No.306461
I'm religious and believe in God. I can only say there are tremendous differences with different religions, cults, beliefs. Like you have these Indians worshipping demons like Ganesh, calling them gods. Which is really the worship of lesser supernatural beings if it isn't idolatry (worship of empty statues). Hinduism is polytheistic.
This is very different from Christianity (claims Christ is God) or Islam (God is not here but there are "prophets")
No.306466
>>306449My current perspective on this one is;
"Evil is not actually a problem, it's just unpleasant"
In the same way that, say, being rained on without a coat or getting blasted in the face by sunshine on a hot day.
As in, it's an environmental attribute, not any transcendental element of any great importance.
The far more interesting question, then, is what utility does Evil serve?
Answer that question and you have the answer to yours I think.
I read a while ago in jest a pretty convincing argument that it's part of some kind of life cycle, and the correct perspective on human existence is that of *crops*.
No.306467
>>306452>gnosticism Still centers around a feeds power to the jewish delusion.
No.306468
>>306467even though the premise of it is that the God of the Bible (YHWH, God of Israel, God of Abraham Isaac and Jacob) is evil
No.306472
>>306468Alright I'll admit I'm just some retard vomiting my opinions here.
I simply dislike it because at the end of the day you just established an opposition still mostly within their framework.
No.306474
Was reading a thread about gnosis on 4chan a while ago and apparently it's mostly a religion that rewards arrogance and know-it-all kind of people as in 'I know it all better than you and my take on things is the truth because I just… I just know it'. There's a lot of sophism and rhetorics. And either it's just a secular behavioural therapy kind of thinking or a mystical religious kind of thinking, whatever fits your frame better in the moment.
No.306475
>>306474It feels like a religion for Christians that didn't want to go the atheist route and are full of arrogance as you describe.
No.306477
>>306474Gnosticism is very similar to Buddhism and other syncretic eastern religions, and Buddhism is filled with grifting charismatic leaders and hypocrisy more than westerners imagine. When Christian missionaries first went to that part of the world they found it to be a barbaric and borderline demonic faith.
Honestly the mainstream organized religions and denominations are filled with the nicest people. The smaller and more contrarian it is, the more it clusters around dysfunction. Catholic Monks in monasteries are wizzie tier.
The other one is the internet completely tanking the nice person reputation of Mormons. When they're free to post without oversight you see they're the most arrogant and judgemental pieces of shit ever.
I just don't have a high opinion on any religion. I think historically it was typically not that powerful a force either and it's normal for people to just be somewhat vaguely spiritualist.
No.306480
You've already got your answer, why do you doubt yourself? Most religion's conceptions of a god make no logical sense and it's not possible for them to exist in the first place.
No.306494
>>306477Buddhism, if it was a truly good and satisfying religion, would've improved ancient china and southeast asia. It didn't. It instead, perpetuated or even caused more problems. Christianity is the same way, but one thing I have in defense of christianity is that it's associated with the most successful civilizations in human history.
No.306499
The god delusion is so widespread in the western world, people literally believe an invisible omnibenevolent omnipotent omnipresennt omniscient entity is around them, loves them and most of all speaks to them. Needless to say that nobody ever recorded god's voice, or that the very attributes of god contradict each other. How can you believe in free will while adoring an omniscient entity? How can you believe suffering is justified when god could have created a world without suffering? If a creator exists he literally ignores us and doesn't care about us and actually tortures us if he created the human body. But there is no entity of this kind, there is no deity, there is no creator, we just exist because of unintelligent evolution, we're literally apes with less hairs walking upright. Our existence is a burden to ourselves and to the planet, billions of animals are killed because we deem inferior, endless wars are conducted in god's name, we have leaders of the most powerful nations literally believing fairy tales and enforcing laws against dissidents. We do not deserve this yet our world is dominated by stupidity, arrogance and insanity.
No.306500
>>3064991. I don't believe in free will; it's a key tenet of reformed protestantism
2. Because suffering is not actually a problem, you just don't like it
3. I've never spoken to you, because I hold you in contempt - why should God be any different.
4. Consider the worse possibility, there *is* an omniscient, omnipotent being, and He just doesn't care about you personally, but prefers other people based on criteria you will never know or qualify for.
We deserve _nothing_ if your supposition holds. Hairless apes killing and eating to survive, procreate and amuse themselves have no claim to anything higher. Furthermore, it's dubious that there *is* anything of higher complexity than, kill, eat, reproduce in the face of the heat death of the universe and that itself is laughably pointless.
So if there is no higher order, if there is no higher purpose;
1. whatever the egoist chooses to do and enforces on others is the highest order.
2. There is no scheme of assessment that is valid outside of that, except a stronger egoist with more power.
Therefore, the fact that you are ruled by creeds and faiths which you hold in contempt indicates you are so weak that your opinion cannot be enforced.
And thus what you have to say doesn't matter surely.
Wagies, preachers, believers, whatever you want to call the participants in the system of faith (because the creed that $7.50 is worth an hour of life is based, ultimately, on faith in the unseen and the consequences of that belief) are stronger than you - because they are using the system that they cannot defeat to at least satiate the desire to eat, kill, reproduce.
No.306501
>>306463I indeed think that monotheistic religion is superior to polytheistic religion.
No.306502
>>306500>1. I don't believe in free will; it's a key tenet of reformed protestantismWithout free will there is no point in religion or faith or whatever you wanna call it.
>2. Because suffering is not actually a problem, you just don't like itSuffering is a problem for those who endure it, religions claim that god is good while living beings have to endure torture.
>3. I've never spoken to you, because I hold you in contempt - why should God be any different. Religions claim that god wants to save humanity, we're not debating your personal god.
>4. Consider the worse possibility, there *is* an omniscient, omnipotent being, and He just doesn't care about you personally, but prefers other people based on criteria you will never know or qualify for. If he doesn't care about us then why we should believe in him, I'm glad I'm an atheist as I don't have to mush this nonsense.
>We deserve _nothing_ if your supposition holds.>it's dubious that there *is* anything of higher complexity than, kill, eat, reproduceWe deserve better leaders to enforce freedom and general wellbeing, instead we have literal apes ruling the world. Humans conceived civilizations to step out of tribalism.
>So if there is no higher order, if there is no higher purpose; >1. whatever the egoist chooses to do and enforces on others is the highest order.>2. There is no scheme of assessment that is valid outside of that, except a stronger egoist with more power. You just described religion! Which is the dictatorship of the stronger(god).
>Therefore, the fact that you are ruled by creeds and faiths which you hold in contempt indicates you are so weak that your opinion cannot be enforced. Yeah, I agree, I am not someone that can change things and I do not wish to become one, but at least I don't have a Stockholm syndrome. I hold my libertarian antinatalist atheistic view of life as long as I will be able to hold it without getting murdered.
No.306503
> 2. Because suffering is not actually a problem, you just don't like itReligious people are actually insane. Thanks for proving this. The only reason why people say this is because they want to feel superiore. They suggest being able to endure more suffering and learning from it which is a evolutionary exclamation surviving of the fittest. Guess what a life full of bullying starving torture being hated and molested by parents and so on and real trouble doesn't make you a better person and God is just laughing in face when you still deem him as omnibenevolent.
>>306450 is what God's humour hits hard, he had a great time watching this.
No.306511
>>306503>is what God's humour hits hard, he had a great time watching this.Jesus could appear to Paul, the pharisee, but he didn't stop that young succubus who loved him from being raped and murdered. Many such cases.
No.306515
It's cope + low iq all the way down.
I HATE seeing religious "wizards" because i associate wizardry with intelligence. not that im that smart (im sure you can tell easily) but i think you guys are smart.
No.306517
>>306515>I HATE seeing religious "wizards" because i associate wizardry with intelligence. nFunny that you say that because I associate late-life religious conversion with intelligence. It's not that being religious is inherently high iq, nor low iq, it's more that from my perspective being mostly non-religious has been the status quo for a long time so that is the default stance for most people currently alive. So to wake up one day and entirely rearrange your worldview, to me says that person is big brained.
But on second thought I kind of do agree with you on it being low iq. The world and life have too many variables and fast changing scenarios for a neat book to be able to effectively compile an explanation plus advice plus meaning of life. Applying rules and views devised by someone else thousands of years ago under vastly different yet admittedly similat at times circumstances just doesn't sound like a good idea (unrelated to the religious topic, it is how I've been feeling about most media these days, escapism absolutely doesn't do it for me anymore). Going back to what I said about being able to one day wake up and adapt your worldview, you also have a similarly opposite phenomenon of sunk-cost fallacy and Maslows Hammer for religious extremists….
No.306518
>>306517>to me says that person is big brainednot really. religion is a massive cope but i will admit the psychological part of it isn't fraud. self-reflect more
No.306541
>>306536Do you even know who that is.
No.306542
Religions are like fireflies. They require darkness in order to shine. Arthur Schopenhauer.
Religious people usually have a hard life, I don't want to tell you believe in Jesus and all your problems will disappear, or being an atheist and you will be free, not work in that way, religion is not the answer for all people, at least not for me, really respect Christianity, but is not for me, you need to build your own way when you don't feet in religion, is really hard but is what you have, read or research about philosophy and religions is your only clue.
No.306559
>>306449I like Western Esoterism, Thelema and Discordianism philosophy beliefs and practices and rituals.
Its just like Tao and dont give a shit, everything have no meaning and is personal and absurd.
Find your will, do wathever you want and love, dont be a asshole to others.
>AlsoI do larp as a magician sometimes doing rituals, i dont have hardcore belief in magical think but magick is like just hypnosis (like every religion)
That's it to me, maybe is another thing for others.
No.306567
>>306559>do wathever you want and love>and lovethis is a wrong site
No.306569
>>306449something wizards forged sometimes is that local christian communities (or other sects, but they're usually smaller) are the only accessible way to connect with other people. they help people process their emotions and suggest them their religious system of values. since the world is governed by nihilism, it doesn't really matter which system of values you adopt, but going along with your religious community gives you the benefit of having a community at no cost.
on the other side of the spectrum they will likely have you (or try to) volunteer for them. they don't actually demand you to believe, you can just larp and they'll take it well, but what you might be forgetting is that over the years larp becomes truth simply by the force of habit.
so joining a religious movement is the same as joining a gang, you get the benefits of a community backing you, but you have to sacrifice your own agency and serve that community.
what bugs me about these communities is that they're basically selling access to other human beings who might be able to help you. it's literally a business where instead of commodities, they produce and sell "help". naturally, actually helping you means they lose a customer, so they end up doing literally what big pharma is doing right now. they purposefully push your vulnerabilities to a status quo they can maintain for many years, probably forever.
i understand sometimes you can't escape the machine, but people, and especially wizards, who truly believe this shit is for their own good are plainly just low iq faggots who on the peak of our civilization couldn't figure out the most basic principles of business.
No.306576
>>306569Yeah there's a reason eastern religions emphasize fatalism and subservience more, because in old India you often had to grovel and be humiliated to survive. Accepting your low position and just engaging in mindless sycophancy is the way forward, and their religion promotes it. People make out Buddhism and Hindu faiths to be wholesome and good, but those born into a low station are implied heavily to have a more tainted soul.
I feel like very few succubi in these churches believe. Going by testimonies, they're more there for the sense of community, and old ladies fill the booths just to have someone to talk to. It's men that keep the faith more even if the community falls apart.
No.306580
>>306576I want all of the denizens of the churches to be assimilated because people who choose to be absorbed into the christ consciousness are life unworthy of life
You are life unworthy of life!
No.306588
>>306576and christianity is different?
No.306590
>>306576>It's men that keep the faith more even if the community falls apart.subhumans who keep faith in christianity are not men. they are fucking devils. they consciously seek to destroy others.
No.306599
>>306580>>306580Chick tracts are fantastic. I want to buy some and leave them around places just to see people’s reaction.
No.306604
>>306449There is really nothing to it. It's a bunch of feel good platitudes and it's a life narrative that people adhere to en masse, even if it's absolute nonsense, we've agreed that some of that nonsense can be socially tolerable and accepted because it might give life some order.
That said, there's some religions that are more applicable to day to day life than others. See what's useful beyond the mysticism and that moves that spiritual part of your brain with a coherent enough narrative for life to be tolerable, and, who knows, even slightly enjoyable.
You probably will not find that in Abrahamic religion though, Islam does turn people into a bunch of animals though, giving them moral permission for it. As bad as it sounds, Islam is likely the best of the bunch because it gives people a purpose and permission to be retarded
No.306608
>>306576>Accepting your low position and just engaging in mindless sycophancy is the way forward, and their religion promotes it. People make out Buddhism and Hindu faiths to be wholesome and good, but those born into a low station are implied heavily to have a more tainted soul. Actually this is one of the core things the Buddha disagreed with the "hindus" on. His teaching was in a sense a reaction to this hierarchical caste-based tyranny of the brahmins at the time. He taught that there is no permanent self or soul, so nothing to justify the brahmins getting to be top dog. A lot of the other crap is just later additions and warpings.
No.306609
>>306608“What the Buddha says appears reasonable. Sir, there are these four classes: aristocrats, brahmins, peasants, and workers. If they had these five factors that support meditation, and if they practiced rightly, would there be any difference between them?”
“In that case, I say that there is no difference between the freedom of one and the freedom of the other. Suppose a person took dry teak wood and lit a fire and produced heat. Then another person did the same using sāl wood, another used mango wood, while another used wood of the cluster fig. What do you think, great king? Would there be any difference between the fires produced by these different kinds of wood, that is, in the flame, color, or light?”
“No, sir.”
“In the same way, when fire has been kindled by energy and produced by effort, I say that there is no difference between the freedom of one and the freedom of the other.”
Sutta MN 90
No.306627
>>306449I’ve made a post on this before but I’ll bring it up again. I fucking wish I was religious but I’m just not able to. Sure, I could live life taking teachings from religious text and call myself religious but I still wouldn’t actually believe it. This isn’t even coming from a place of “I’m too smart/rational to believe in god” (I’m neither of those things). I’m totally open to arguments but essentially they all boil down to faith which I simply do not have.
It’s a real shame that the “debate” is so infected with either smug atheists or religious people incapable of truly converting others.
No.306630
>>306627>I fucking wish I was religiousMay I ask why?
No.306631
>>306630He wants the man in the sky to save his soul.
No.306639
>>306630>>306631It’s not that I want to be one of ”the saved ones” looking down on the rest of society, have some devine moral guidance or community. But just imagine genuinely thinking that everything will work out in the end. That there’s always hope. That the forces of good will triumph. How nice wouldn’t that feel? Just imagine real genuine hope and faith. So what if it isn’t real?
No.306640
>>306639I am a Christian and I can tell you from my perspective that this is my reality in Christ.
You may still have suffering but you can have a continual, real hope and purpose throughout your life unto eternity if you accept Him into your heart.
No.306641
I'm not Christian anymore, but for what I've read and thought, their point is actually that God is not only creator, but the source of existence itself. And evil is just the lack of good, so God has to be maximally good, because good exists, while evil doesn't. Like cold is just not-warm, chaos is just lack of order, etc.
So God, in theory, can't allow evil at all. He's basically unable to. Unless a lesser evil is necessary for a greater good. And, of course, he allows a lot of evil in the world, but we can't understand exactly why. It's not just "God is good I swear please believe me", it's that it actually makes more sense to believe the very principle of existence is good and only allows evil because it's necessary (for his reasons beyond our reason) than to believe he's amoral
Idk if it really makes all that sense, but it does a bit I think
No.306642
>>306641btw free will doesn't really exists, you can only be saved if he decides to save you, so if you end up burning in hell it's because he just didn't want to save you and that's it fuck you lol
I don't know how christians can understand that (those who do and aren't just emotional npcs) and then say it's your fault for sinning or rejecting God's love our whatever.
But, again, it somewhat makes sense to believe he does that because it's (somehow) necessary to achieve a greater good that we can't understand.
No.306648
>>306641>but we can't understand exactly whythis is why your christianity or any religion for that matter is a lot of pretentious crap. in all practicality it doesn't even fucking matter whatever your god is. what matter is my life and my circumstances and my fucked up head. god or no god.
No.306651
>>306641>>306642I don't believe you are an ex-christian. Free will and that human souls tend to seek one of 2 extremes of good or evil in this life is one of the central doctrines of our faith. You sound like an atheist false-flagging.
>>306640Good for you, my brother in Christ. To be honest I never paid any serious attention to the after-death aspects of our faith. I just seek understanding of my existence and this world. I found the ultimate answer in some of the writings of St Augustine.
No.306661
>>306651It depends on what free will means. As I understood of what I read, we are free to follow our will, but our will is not free from God's influence. Ultimately, we don't have free will, but in practicality we do.
I hope I can understand that better and maybe return to the Church someday.
No.306662
>>306661If god knows everything he knows every choice you will make
No.306666
>>306651>I just seek understanding of my existence and this worldugh… i don't suppose you're capable of phrasing any coherent elaboration? something about "unenlightened retards like me" not being capable of glimpsing the unfathomable depths of your religious insight?
No.306669
>>306651>I don't believe you are an ex-christianOf course you don't
>le you were never really saved No.306674
>>306669i nearly choked on the redpill when i realized that some people genuinely believe in rebirth and salvation.
No.306692
>>306674It's a mind virus. The issue is feeling like you need to be "saved" at all. No one is born feeling that way. they have to be told by religious people. Pure evil
No.306693
>>306662Common sense, but it breaks their minds. They will say anything to justify their belief no matter how nonsensical
No.306694
>>306692>No one is born feeling that waynot quite. they usually catch people when they are experiencing some significant hardships and somehow failure induces feelings of guilt and insecurity. the demons abuse it to convinces those poor people that they need to be saved by some dude who in all likelihood never even existed.
No.306736
>>306666>I don't understand why some people seek religion to comprehend their existenceyou said you were retarded, not me
No.306739
>>306736incredibly smart response thanks
No.306745
>>306449When I was watching Time Bandits, I like the ending where god justifies why he made evil. It was out of the need to give man free will, a power even angels envy man has. It raises a lot of ethical and philosophical questions what free will means. I wish the Matrix movies talked more about why humanity willing rejected a paradise. Of course everything has this judeo-christian tinge and mythology to it that makes it easy to discuss. But when it comes to things like executions out of crime or necessity, man will resort to drawing straws or some game of chance, as if the power of choosing who lives are who dies is a universal cultural taboo.
Of course, my beef with religion is the belief the world is 10000 years old because some ancient men say so, despite god literally creating evidence around you challenging this.
Anyway I find the "why did god allow the holocaust" justification for why he doesn't exist kind of a weak moral argument. It ignores the fact the universe could perfectly function without any self awareness for billions of years, it didn't require a magic sentient genie to wish things into existence.
But I am interested in religion's notion of the devil. It's like they think the devil is like a sentient entropy and does give some life lessons on why you need to steer away from hedonism and why getting your hearts desire may not only be without cost, but can bring about an even worse hell than you had before.
No.306765
>>306745>despite god literally creating evidence around you challenging this.>despite god literally creating evidence around you challenging this.Maybe he's a liar and not good. have you considered that?
No.306766
>>306765>>306745didn't mean to quote you twice sorry
No.306777
>>306669The Christian religion affirms the existence of evil, and a strong rejection of evil is a core part of it. His argument sounds a lot like the atheist "God isn't real and if he was real he can't exist because evil exists". If he really is an ex-christian he followed a very strange doctrine.
No.306836
>>306777>The Christian religion affirms the existence of evilThen it cannot claim that the god behind creation is "all good"
No.306841
>If God real and good, why bad thing happen?
No.306842
>>306841I don’t think it’s fair reducing the discussion here to that.
No.306843
>>306841>christians still cannot answer this question without appealing to divine mystery or "free will", as if an omnipotent god would be restrained by what we know as logicThey are too stupid to understand that if there is a supreme god who is truly supreme, the god would be the one who defines logic. There is no exterior logic or limitations he would be beholden to.
No.306844
>>306841Most of us are past that sort of angst criticism (which is still legitimate) and are talking about it practically.
What I don't get is the hostility my parents had towards religion for being "controlling". They spent my entire childhood slandering it and mocking Christians, and seethed hard when my friend took me to church. They made out like some nun or pastor holding people to moral standards in their youth was some massive moral affront. I found photo albums from their youth and they were just hedonistic degenerates sleeping around and partying all through their teens and twenties. You commonly see that with boomers, their whole reason for leaving the church was hedonism. There wasn't some deep philosophy behind it or rational criticisms of its precepts, it's just "I wanna do drugs, live in a hippie van, sleep around, dress like a bum and do what I want". But to retroactively justify it to themselves, they had to make out the church was just evil and oppressive.
I just don't think religion is that bad. It gives a sense of community, it gives social support, it gives routine, and importantly, it holds people to some standards. And because it's holding people to standards, people who can't meet those standards often throw a little tantrum and say it's "controlling". No, you're just behaving like a fucking loser, and when you're part of a collective, people rightly do judge you for your behavior. Yes it sucks, but shame is part of what keeps society healthy.
And despite the smugness of atheists, Christians who actually do regularly go to church are happier, better educated and healthier. There's so much evidence that our social capital has degraded as secularization has set it.
But no, I don't think religion serves as an answer to all one's problems, but on a societal level it's a useful lubricant. People network through church, marry through church, have support networks through church, have a routine through church. Even just going to cracker barrel or whatever with the congregation after a Sunday sermon is healthy. It's better that than sitting in front of the TV or on the computer atomized and alone.
No.306845
>>306843>They are too stupid to understand that if there is a supreme god who is truly supremeBut that's irrelevant because Christianity doesn't teach that God is supreme and all-powerful as you tourists immediately assume. He is in fact canonically the least infallible deity of all major religions.
No.306847
>>306845Christians can't even admit God may not be tri omni.
No.306853
>>306845>But that's irrelevant because Christianity doesn't teach that God is supreme and all-powerfulWhat exactly do you think the world almighty means
No.306854
>>306844>better educatedlol
No.306856
>>306661I remember at some point in time 100 % being convinced God is real, like this belief would never stop for the rest of my life and it hasn't. Leaving the Christian faith because you disagree with what some random guy wrote about free will is stupid. Atheism is so boring.
No.306857
>>306844>I just don't think religion is that bad. It gives a sense of community, it gives social support, it gives routine, and importantly, it holds people to some standards. And because it's holding people to standards, people who can't meet those standards often throw a little tantrum and say it's "controlling". No, you're just behaving like a fucking loser, and when you're part of a collective, people rightly do judge you for your behavior. Yes it sucks, but shame is part of what keeps society healthy. Wtf are you talking about, the god christians worship literally said do not judge or you will be judged (Matthew 7:1-6).
No.306858
>>306854It's actually true. The stats that show atheists doing better than religious people always include spiritual and Christians who don't actually go to church.
When you limit it to those who actually go to church every week, religious people are consistently healthier, more educated and earn more.
I remember at school religious people were heavily pressured to keep their faith to themselves and most kids sniggered at them. Around the 2000s where I lived the culture was pretty heavily anti-religious. It was bizarrely hypocritical in retrospect, because the culture heavily promoted a superficial tolerance.
>>306855Just because I'm a wizzie doesn't mean I don't see the benefits in the normie life. We are a tribal species after all, all this talk of atomized living is for the most part a cope.
Yes, normies historically had it right. If anything, normies themselves are failing at being normies by not going to church or having a proper collective social structure.
No.306860
>>306857>For in the same way you judge others, you will be judged, and with the measure you use, it will be measured to you.Read the very next passage, it's clearly talking about hypocrisy. And the following passages hammer that point home.
>Why do you look at the speck of sawdust in your brother’s eye and pay no attention to the plank in your own eye? 4 How can you say to your brother, ‘Let me take the speck out of your eye,’ when all the time there is a plank in your own eye? 5 You hypocrite, first take the plank out of your own eye, and then you will see clearly to remove the speck from your brother’s eye.And regardless of the teachings. A church is an organizational structure with a hierarchy and group instincts come into play. People will conform to the group, you'll be pressured through social pressures to be on the same page. If you don't meet the standards, you'll be at the bottom of the hierarchy and seen with contempt. But the good thing is for the church this is behavior based. They're not asking you to be a chad, super intelligent, good looking or wealthy. They just want you to dress nicely, be polite, contribute a little and use your manners.
The boomer generation left the church en masse not because of some theological principle. But because they got sick of being judged. Their theology just became selfish hedonism. They're pretty open about this, and I think the church pastors at the time were absolutely right to judge them. Can we really say society has gotten better since the 1960s? I watch old videos of Boston or Melbourne with the pristine streets, well dressed people, happy white faces and optimism and just think what fools we were to give that up.
No.306861
>>306860Throughout middle ages christianity was almost a gnostic religion, they would reject the world and materialism to embrace spirituality, it never encouraged reproduction or societal norms, cathars knew it better than everyone else. Only later, with the creation of bourgeois society, christianity became a wicked evil religion with nosense prolife bullshit and stranded bigotry. Therefore people abandoned the church because it holds no value anymore, science debunked everything and it is impossible to be spiritual in a society that wants everyone slave of money. So yeah my point is that "christians" today don't even know their own religion and just larp as self-righteous socialists. I hope we can get rid of every religion one day and live truly free.
No.306862
>>306858>>306860If you want to be a normie so bad then what are you even doing here?
No.306863
>>306862I'm severely mentally ill but I feel like normies get too much hatred on here.
>>306861In the middle ages most people were borderline pagan and it was typically only the educated clergy, the nobility and white collar professionals that had a well enough understanding of the bible to have some semblance of Orthodoxy. You go into the countryside (where 90% of people lived) and you had people believing in Elves, Goblins, Fairies, having patron saints that are stand-ins for old pagan gods.
>it never encouraged reproduction or societal normsIt never had to, the world was operating at the Malthusian limit back then. Hell, back in those days one brother or sister often had to be voluntarily celibate to support their elder siblings. The pro-natalist stance absolutely is to counteract the sterility of modernity.
>I hope we can get rid of every religion one day and live truly free.People just turn politics into a religion, it's impossible to really escape this instinct for the masses. You had Marxism Leninsim function as a political religion, with orthodoxy and spiritual faith in the form of class consciousness. National Socialism later filled the same niche. Even the woke intersectional nonsense you seen with George Floyd a few years ago had the trappings of a religion. Racism as original sin, atonement through reparations, praying and kneeling to niggies as if they're some reverent class of people.
I'm not even defending Christianity as the best or saying it's perfect. I'm just saying it does a pretty good job, there's lots of benefits, and the world has gotten noticeably worse since its decline. Western civilization is literally failing to reproduce itself and being replaced by more traditional, virile and dogmatic cultures due to the sterility of secularism.
No.306864
>>306861>prolife bullshit and stranded bigotry.Being pro-life is good and bigotry is healthy.
>they just larpYeah, yeah, we get it. Everyone you don't like is just larping and coping. I'm seething even.
No.306865
>>306863>I'm severely mentally ill but I feel like normies get too much hatred on here.My grandpa often told me that up to 1940s, if the priest did not like you, you could be sent to mental asylums forever. At least secularism abolished institutionalization.
>In the middle ages most people were borderline pagan and it was typically only the educated clergy, the nobility and white collar professionals that had a well enough understanding of the bible to have some semblance of Orthodoxy.People had a more spiritual understanding of life, they were not inherently pagan, it's just that life was really hard so they coped this way. Today it doesn't make sense to go to church, you would get nothing out of it, the clergy doesn't even believe in afterlife anymore, and frankly it is ridiculous to even consider it, the poor and the ill receive more assistance from the state than the church unless you live in some rural american county with no welfare whatsoever.
>The pro-natalist stance absolutely is to counteract the sterility of modernity. Jesus is thought to be the only son of god and he did not reproduce, assuming he really existed his teachings were very wizardly he did not speak like some jordan peterson but more like a buddhist, unlike muhammad which raped every single succubus he could get his hands on.
>People just turn politics into a religion, it's impossible to really escape this instinct for the massesThis is why we need secularism and separation of church and state.
>Western civilization is literally failing to reproduce itself and being replaced by more traditional, virile and dogmatic cultures due to the sterility of secularism.The orange ape isn't enough right.
>>306864>Being pro-life is good and bigotry is healthy.Ok demiurge.
No.306866
>>306865>My grandpa often told me that up to 1940s, if the priest did not like you, you could be sent to mental asylums forever. At least secularism abolished institutionalization.The 1950s were the golden age of lobotomies, driven by a secular "trust the science bro" mentality where you were considered a backwards neanderthal for speaking out against it. And its consistently been Christians speaking out against psychiatry, both back then and today.
The State Atheist nations of the Eastern Bloc actually had institutionalized abuse of psychiatry, and you were carted off to a psyche ward and given meds to the point you couldn't function if you dared speak out against Communism. You were said to have "delusions of reform". I doubt the validity of what your Grandpa says because we've had religious pluralism in the west since the 19th century and the Christian churches have been on the defensive for a very long time.
>The orange ape isn't enough right.The Orange retard is exactly my point. People want religion and community, even if the taste of secular hedonism is delicious, they'll find themselves turning to shit like Qanon. Turning politics into a religion, like I said. I prefer the long established and codified traditions, with guardrails and well worked dogma to the new charismatic charlatans promising to overthrow the system.
Back in the 1990s you were considered to be a weirdo for even talking or caring about politics socially. It's not a coincidence politics obsession in our culture has coincided with the decline of organized religion.
No.306867
>>306844>angst criticismchristianity affirms that evil cannot exist because god forgave everyone. so if there's no evil why evil things happen? oh no no it's just angst criticism
>and they were just hedonistic degeneratesyou're massively delusional and probably really severely mentally ill if you think 'hedonistic degenerates' are anyhow in opposition to church.
>I just don't think religion is that badand somebody thinks nazis weren't that bad either.
>It gives a sense of community, it gives social support, it gives routine, and importantly, it holds people to some standardsso basically indistinguishable from wageslavery
>shame is part of what keeps society healthy. why not guilt, though? why not fear? why shame, specifically?
>And despite the smugness of atheists, Christians who actually do regularly go to church are happier, better educated and healthier.there's going to be a proof?
>on a societal level it's a useful lubricantin which way, exactly?
>People network through church, marry through church, have support networks through church, have a routine through churchthey do so through wageslavery too. oh no actually if you look at it, they do so through basically any life circumstance. some people even do so through drinking pubs.
>Even just going to cracker barrel or whatever with the congregation after a Sunday sermon is healthy.going to a gym with your chad friends is healthy too.
>>306856>Atheism is so boring.this is a massive juvenile cope. what is boring about atheism? what is boring in questioning the existence, but not resorting to some bullshit about a dude in the sky le creating everything? say rather that atheism is too deep for you.
>>306860>well dressed people, happy white faces and optimismkek literally every everyone is doing that. america, europe, sovient union, china, everyone. and yet travel anywhere and the REAL life is just the same shit as everywhere else. you're a faggot.
>>306863>People just turn politics into a religionbecause church is politics by definition
>I prefer the long established and codified traditions, with guardrails and well worked dogmawhat dogma? literally just a load of inconsistent crap and jew worship
No.306868
>>306866The first lobotomy was conducted in the land of the free (united states) and performed by a christian methodist, it is true that secularism did not automatically abolished psychiatric institutions but at least pushed for more civil rights.
Russia never had a chance at this because their society is backwards of 200 years on the timeline.
No.306873
>>306836Obviously I don't agree with this. That is precisely what it claims. I don't see how a world without evil is possible if you grant humans personal agency and basic freedom. There is something more fundamentally wrong with this argument anyway, you implicitly claim to know what the greatest good is. According to your argument something without evil, the closest thing in real life is the animal kingdom, which are dumb creatures barely aware of their existence. I don't want to be a dumb animal. You would then probably change the goalposts to include all suffering which leaves us only with very simple organisms like molds, invertebrates, parasites, worms and such which barely have consciousness.
While I don't like evil, I like basic freedom and don't see any contradiction with God being good.
No.306876
>>306873>I don't want to be a dumb animaltough luck
No.306884
I hate how every argument about religion boils down to whether it’s good or not, the logical conclusion to its modern state in the culture war. People wanting to be religious simply because it might be “Trad”. People picking and choosing religions based on their merits. How the hell do you CHOOSE what to BELIEVE in? It’s not some political ideology you can just subscribe to, I mean genuine belief. For as cringe as the “Atheist disproves Christianity”-phase is at least that’s something that can actually be argued about.
No.306886
>this is a massive juvenile cope. what is boring about atheism? what is boring in questioning the existence, but not resorting to some bullshit about a dude in the sky le creating everything? say rather that atheism is too deep for you.
I legitimaly find atheism intensely boring and unstimulating. I spent a lot of time wondering about my existence. When I looked into it basically their beliefs are almost always one of the following three:
-evolution is God
-randomness, or information or physics or some other system is God
-we can't know nothing and nothing matters (yet this principle is sacred)
It is simply not true, everything simply starts making sense once you realise there is a personal intelligence ruling the universe. Aristotle called it the demiurge. I like reality is this way, it is mysterious and exciting.
Atheism isn't deep, it's just another shitty ideology for the normies to subscribe to.
No.306889
>>306886>evolution is godNo, idiot, you are god.
No.306890
>>306886>evolution is GodNo one who understands what either of those things are thinks this. It’s not some all-powerful force, it literally just boils down to the fact that you inherit traits from your parents and more successful traits more often get passed on.
>randomness, or information or physics or some other system is GodDepends what you mean by god. If you’re talking about something intelligent which it looks like you are then no, physics isn’t god either. But physics is almost certainly how the world began.
>we can't know nothing and nothing matters (yet this principle is sacred)We can know some things. Other things we can just be confident about to various degrees. Things mattering depends on who you mean they matter to. If there is no almighty force then no, nothing ”objectively” matters other than that they might affect other things or people at the end of the day . But seeing as we are people things might matter to us.
I guess technically I would be agnostic in that I think it can’t be proven if god exists or not but I’ve yet to see anything indicate he/it is real. If it was probable through reason then you wouldn’t need the faith which I do not have.
No.306896
>>306876I think he meant God should have made a world without evil or something. The only thing I can think of are creatures stripped of all intelligence but still with conciousness. Animals just eat, sleep, shit, rest, fuck, etc. There is no good and evil.
I doubt he really wishes to live as some animal in nature struggling to find his next meal instead of his current life, but these atheists are never serious anyway
No.306902
>>306896>Animals just eat, sleep, shit, rest, fuck, etc.so do you
No.306903
>>306884you can believe in whatever the heck you want, it makes no difference. arguments can only be made about the actual proposed values system, which in turn can only be viewed in terms of good and bad it offers.
No.306916
>>306889I'm sorry, I am not God.
No.306920
>>306916why not? just gotta magic shit up
No.306926
>>306902I meant they do it exclusively as they do nothing else. I don't see cows and pigs watching anime, owning and using smartphones, having discussions on wizardchan, contemplating their own existence, doing calculus, having complex emotions and so on. This is probably what a world without good and evil would look like, a bunch of creatures only concerned with maintaining their bodies having no higher intelligence or freedom.
No.306927
>>306903> arguments can only be made about the actual proposed values system, which in turn can only be viewed in terms of good and bad it offers.This is precisely what I disagree with. I of course don’t think there’s anything wrong with discussing the benefits/drawbacks of various religions on their own merits but I don’t think that’s all that can be discussed. Isn’t a core part of religion faith? Not just following the system of values but rather a genuine belief that god / the god in question is real? I could easily choose the religion I think would be “best” for me and live according to its rules and values but I can’t choose what to believe in. The google searches for how to obtain faith either return nonsense or tells me to talk to a priest . But I’m not exactly keen on showing up trying to “disprove” him and arguing against his arguments (if he actually has any based on logic like “everything must come from something” and whatnot) but otherwise I can’t see how I could ever possibly be convinced.
No.306928
>>306890The typical atheist believes he is his nervous system, which is governed by impulses and instincts fashioned through evolution, so you are lying he indeed believes evolution has made him and governs his life as an all-powerful force. I used the word God there as as in an impersonal God.
I already stop taking atheism seriously there, as I don't believe you are your physical body. Atheists typically believe everything is governed by the laws of physics, which means it is their impersonal God. I think it is obvious what kind of nihilism I was referring to and you responded with something else entirely. I don't like agnosticism either.
No.306929
>>306927>I can’t choose what to believe inbrain automatically believes whatever has the least perceived contradictions.
No.306930
>>306928>I don't believe you are your physical bodytry touching your chinchin
No.306933
>>306449US, born Protty. got interested in Buddhism (Zen) as a teen but never actually became a full-fledged practitioner, got back into some weird fundamentalist bible-only version of Protestantism in my mid-twenties. Got baptized/chrismated into Eastern Orthodox Christianity in my early thirties but can't deal with the constant self-imposed mental anguish of having to fret over every single thought and beg "God" to tell me what I need to tell a priest I've done wrong this week so I can get "absolved" Still early thirties, but now I think I largely agree with certain tenets of Zen. Namely what happens, or rather doesn't, when we shed this mortal coil. just like the wave is water, and the water is the wave, one wave manifests and crashes, then another wave manifests. I may not subscribe to the religiosity of Buddhism insofar as the tales about the Pure Lands, but rather like what they aspire to-but I can appreciate the practice of mindfulness
No.306935
>>306886"Atheism" isn't an idealogy, it's literally just not being Theist- the more I learn the more I understand Theists who are not being purposefully disingenuous about what Atheism is and isn't are really just brainwashed and ignorant.
No.306937
>>306935It's obvious what I meant. The word "atheism" can refer to this "denomination" which commonly includes evolution, a couple of specific arguments which get repeated over and over again and certain figures like Richard Dawkins. So basically you are full of shit
No.306940
>>306937no, it's not obvious. you're applying your particular belief set to atheism. Richard Dawkins is not the pope if atheists, not are his beliefs dogmatic ideals that all atheists share. stop treating atheism like a religion, it's not.