do athiests and agnostics go to heaven

Akrasia wrote: »

I'm afraid I missed that audio book.

I thought the holy spirit was supposed to guide people's hearts?

Yes He does, but God is still rejected. The Holy Spirit is attempting to guide your heart at this moment, yet you follow your own desires and reject God.

Depeche_Mode wrote: »

The Holy Spirit is attempting to guide us yet the majority of people on Earth do not believe in him and even those who do believe in him are confused as to what he wants? What you are saying is that God is failing in a task he has set himself. This God of infinite power and wisdom has been shown up time and again to be incapable of guiding his own creation on the right path. .

It is a task that He has given man to accomplish. He is not incapable at all, man is unwilling.

Depeche_Mode wrote: »

This just doesn't make any sense, surely Christians believe that God doesn't do half measures and cannot fail in anything he does, if God wills something then it will be done absolutely , there can be no hindrance to him achieving his aims. Either God does guide humans, in which case there can be no deviation from his path (which obviously is not the case) or else he does not guide at all.

You are right, if God wills it, it will happen. But, God has given each individual a will as well.

You choose not to follow His path which is laid out in the Bible. You make this choice for your own reasons, yet at the same time you are rejecting God and His call on your life.

BrianCalgary wrote: »

It is a task that He has given man to accomplish. He is not incapable at all, man is unwilling.



You are right, if God wills it, it will happen. But, God has given each individual a will as well.

You choose not to follow His path which is laid out in the Bible. You make this choice for your own reasons, yet at the same time you are rejecting God and His call on your life.

But it still isn't clear as to how, if you are correct and God really is guiding peoples hearts in such matters, there could possibly be any confusion whatsoever. If God is perfect then anything coming from him must also be perfect, the supposed guidance humans get is obviously very, very imprefect as no-one is certain who is right and who is wrong. By no stretch of the definition could it be claimed that humans recieve "perfect" guidance therefore if we do get guidance it cannot come from a perfect God. To me this says that either (a) there is no God whatsoever or (b) there is a God but it does not intervene or guide humanity at all. I don't think free will has anything to do with it.

Soul Winner wrote: »

To suggest that religous people are just kids who can never seem let go of a belief in God like a baby giving up his comforter when they should have is too simplistic an approach to take and is very demeaning and a real cop out if you ask me. If that's how you really see religious people then there is no point in continuing discussions in matters of faith with you.

Well I won't deny that I do indeed see religion as playing the role of a comforter to adults among other reasons, you may not wish to continue a discussion if this is my opinion but I should point out that it isn't just my opinion. Sigmund Freud proposed this very same thing in the 1930s, claiming that religion offered comfort in misfortune, hope for life after death and a strong father figure who would look over his children and protect and care for them. As Freud pointed out, the feature among the vast majority of religions that the superior diety tends almost always to be male or at least hold human male attributes such as quick tempered, jealous and aggressive is unlikely to be coincidence. You may find this viewpoint demeaning but this does not rule out the possibility that it may be true.

Of course I accept religion also fulfills other roles such as providing answers to the meaning of life and why we are here (albiet rather basic and easy answers) and a sense of group or tribal unity which has always been important in human evolution. But as well as this I do agree with the view proposed by Freud that religion does have aspects similar to immaturity, however your obvious indignation at this belief does nothing to counter this claim and if anything it supports it. If you have reasons for pointing out how Freundian psychoanalysis of belief was flawed and how the conclusions he reached are obviously wrong i would genuinely like to hear it as it is a very interesting subject. I know that Freud has been discredit on some areas but on this I think he may have been onto something.

Bduffman wrote: »

This is an interesting question & its easy to understand why most christians run from it. However I have a problem with whatever answer is given. If unbaptised babies go to heaven then isn't that unfair on the rest of us who have to live through life & the temptations that life brings? If the opposite is true & they are damned, then isn't that a bit unfair on them for not getting the chance to live a good life?

Is this question being ignored because its unanswerable? Does it make people uncomfortable to address it?

interestinguser wrote: »

I don't view atheism as a position where one says one absolutely does not allow for the possibility of their being a god (whatever type of entity that may be). It is merely the non-belief in a god.

Thats it though, I understood that an atheist doesn't believe in god (and they are sure of that belief), an agnostic doesn't know (sits on the fence as it were), and naturally a religious person believes.

Bduffman wrote: »

I don't think its a great idea to get hung up on labels.

Who's getting hung up. I'm trying to get understanding

Sorry bad choice of words perhaps. Let me clarify:
Atheist does not believe in god.
Believe (naturally) does.
Agnostic isn't sure either way.

Saying dealing in absolutes is a religious thing isn't very fair. They believe, just as atheists do.

As for you being wrong - the key is do you "believe" you are wrong. An athiest wouldn't believe they are wrong. An agnostic wouldn't be sure.

Anyhow - this is all very ot now. Sorry for hi-jacking folks, will start another thread.

Can we carry on that discussion here please: clicky


...just not to be hijacking the OT

Depeche_Mode wrote: »

Well I won't deny that I do indeed see religion as playing the role of a comforter to adults among other reasons, you may not wish to continue a discussion if this is my opinion but I should point out that it isn't just my opinion. Sigmund Freud proposed this very same thing in the 1930s, claiming that religion offered comfort in misfortune, hope for life after death and a strong father figure who would look over his children and protect and care for them. As Freud pointed out, the feature among the vast majority of religions that the superior diety tends almost always to be male or at least hold human male attributes such as quick tempered, jealous and aggressive is unlikely to be coincidence. You may find this viewpoint demeaning but this does not rule out the possibility that it may be true.

Of course I accept religion also fulfills other roles such as providing answers to the meaning of life and why we are here (albiet rather basic and easy answers) and a sense of group or tribal unity which has always been important in human evolution. But as well as this I do agree with the view proposed by Freud that religion does have aspects similar to immaturity, however your obvious indignation at this belief does nothing to counter this claim and if anything it supports it. If you have reasons for pointing out how Freundian psychoanalysis of belief was flawed and how the conclusions he reached are obviously wrong i would genuinely like to hear it as it is a very interesting subject. I know that Freud has been discredit on some areas but on this I think he may have been onto something.

If we accept that evolution is fact and that the process of natural selection is true and that at every stage of the evolutionary process natural selection selects what is the most beneficial and rejects what is not. And if humans evolved into social animals and as part of that process of becoming social animals they evolved the religious urge which natural selection must have allowed as somehow advantageous, then why do most of those who are the main proponents of this fact reject the religious urge as being a useless one? Do they see the next stage of human evolution as being one where natural selection rejects the religious urge? If so then why do so many people still have it? Are we all but evolutionary has-beens in that once those of us with the religious urge still intact from a previous random mutation die out natural selection will take what is left and work with that? Is that how you see the next step in human evolution?


Re Freud. If you study the Old Testament you will find that the God revealed therein likens Himself more to a mother type figure than to a father like figure; “As one whom mother comforts so shall I comfort you.” Isa 66:13. And one of God’s names in the Old Testament is “El Shadi” which means “God the breasted one.” So how would Freud reconcile this with his assertions that all deities are male and father like in nature? It is only when you come to the New Testament that we are told to refer to God as our Father. But forgetting about all that, you could psychoanalyse anything and make it come out whatever way you like when you don’t accept it on its merits in the first place as Freud didn’t. If you don’t accept it then you have to explain it someway. People believe in God. I don’t believe in God. I’m right. So people who believe in God must do it for some reason other than because there is a God. Because there is no God, because I don’t believe in God and I’m right so what is the reason people believe in God? Ok I’ve found it. They need comforting and that’s why they do it. It would be like a religious person trying to understand why the scientist cannot just accept that God exists and then adjudge the scientist as heretical because he can’t just accept that fact without testing all possible alternatives. Once your questions are answered like Thomas in the New Testament who saw Jesus die and wouldn’t believe that He had risen until he touch His wounds then it is only assumed that God does not exist it is not known. The likes of Freud was brilliant in his field of expertise but his bias would get in the way on this one because He didn’t believe in God in the first place so the reason why people do has to gel with his conclusions. That’s why they use non partisan referees to referee football mates as much as possible so as not to tip the balance in favour of either team. I’m sorry but Freud is not a good starting point in determining whether God is real or not even if such a thing could be determined by mere psychoanalyses.

Soul Winner wrote:

If we accept that evolution is fact and that the process of natural selection is true and that at every stage of the evolutionary process natural selection selects what is the most beneficial and rejects what is not. And if humans evolved into social animals and as part of that process of becoming social animals they evolved the religious urge which natural selection must have allowed as somehow advantageous, then why do most of those who are the main proponents of this fact reject the religious urge as being a useless one?

Human culture has developed at a far, far faster rate than the human brain. We have still got a brain wired for survival on the African Savannah so what we found advantageous 100,000 years ago we will still more or less believe it to be advantageous today. It is possible to overcome these urges such as religious belief but the first step in doing so is to recognise it for what it is, an inbuilt desire to feel safe - religion providing both supernatural protection and also a sense of safety in numbers.

Do they see the next stage of human evolution as being one where natural selection rejects the religious urge? If so then why do so many people still have it? Are we all but evolutionary has-beens in that once those of us with the religious urge still intact from a previous random mutation die out natural selection will take what is left and work with that? Is that how you see the next step in human evolution?

I don't believe the next step in human evolution will see religion dying out, it has shown itself to be remarkably persistant and the genius behind it is that it is immune to rational arguments. Science has provided an elegant explanation for the workings of the universe and the human body which had demoted God to an optional extra yet still the vast majority of people on earth choose to go with this unneccessary add-on. It would take some monumental discovery by science to begin to kill the religious impulse in humans, and I can't really concieve of where that could come from as another amazing feature of religion is its malleability. It can seem set in stone one minute but as soon as evidence proves its position wrong it immediately ammends itself to fit with the new paradigm. Religion evolves itself on the back of science and does so incredibly succesfully.

You say Freud "didn’t believe in God in the first place", this isn't entirely true as he was Jewish prior to coming to his conclusions on religion. In other words he came to his own decision on religion first before working on the greater question of psychoanalysing religion. In being a non-believer you make it seem like he was biased, I would suggest that being a skeptic is the only stance someone can take in order to achieve an anyway unbiased result. It is more or less impossible for a believer to come to a rational answer when they freely admit to accepting something on faith alone.

As for God claiming to be a mother figure, I am pretty sure of you listed all of God's feminine attributes with all of his masculine attributes in the Old Testament it would be pretty obvious which side of the transgender choice he favours.

PDN wrote: »

I agree. That is why the decision we make whether to accept Christ or not is the most important decision we can make in life. .

Sorry - off the topic but thats not a hard decision if you believe he doesn't exist.

PDN wrote: »

In giving us the capacity to make free moral choices and to choose to love, He also allowed the possibility of great evil.

And this is the other argument I have a problem with - free will. How can someone who dies in infancy have free will? If there was a just god, surely everyone would have that free will?

PDN wrote: »

If, by 'just', you mean giving everybody precisely the same set of opportunities and circumstances, then that would be true. However, free will is a gift to us. .

So why does he give a gift to some & not to others?

PDN wrote: »

Think of it this way, if there are ten beggars on the street and I choose to give ten euro notes to half of them, and then give twenty euro notes to the other half. Am I being unjust? After all, I was under no obligation to give any of them anything, neither had any of them a right to expect even one euro from me. They all got more than they deserved. Injustice? No, simply varying degrees of expressing mercy and compassion. .

Again - why distinguish between some & others?

PDN wrote: »

If God had not given anyone free will but created us and took us to heaven as unthinking obedient robots then that would be OK. None of us deserved to be given free will. That God chose to make us free moral agents is a wonderful thing, but the fact that some never grow to experience this is certainly not injustice on God's part.

It certainly sounds like it to me. To decide that some go straight to heaven without being tested seems unjust to me. After all, if somebody died at infancy, they weren't given the choice either way - no free will. But according to you, they are given eternal life? Sounds like a no-brainer to me (if a choice was available of course).

It's almost as if heaven-belivers are only good because they want a reward and go to heaven. So the question is do they deserve to go to heaven, as it's not their free will to be good.

Would it not make more sense that no-one knows about heaven, and if you live a good and just life then you get in.

instead of dangling biscuit above a dog