there is no innocense.

we as a species have evolved into consensus building social contracts to marginalize conscience.

These contracts affords excuses for culpability but not for guilt.

One is about society.

The other is about truth.

We all have a conscience and we all know that we are not innocent and blameless in truth.

Yet, such social contracts has become an acceptably tacit approval that we are not to judge one another's soul.

But the soul is the chief battleground and conscience is inherent to all and searing the conscience to feel no remorse or ignore inherent fallablity is merely an intentional excuse very conveniently acknowledged as part and parcel to the avoidance of truth.

Enedeavoring to be blameless, personally, is a costly endeavor.




Finding incredibly creative ways to dance around the difficulties inherent on such a noble personal effort is an impossible task seeking patent.





Proclamations of conscionable innocense cannot be mastered because there will always be individuals that seek truth and find it, despite the efforts to the contrary that seek to excuse truth being irrelevant through social judgements.

Christian challenges are long and endurable and never a dull moment due and payable

"sin" means "To miss the mark". A sin is falling short of a moral code. An atheist who believes in being faithful, but one time cheats has just sinned. Morals and sins are not limited to religion.

Hi Jeannie, thanks.
But your last is an example of what I am talking about. Your understanding is off just a little in a lot of different areas and its like the trajectory of a spaceship going to the moon. Tiny increments off take it thousands of miles in the other direction missing it completely.

Its not a "crucified god" , It's God in human form, perfect but feeling and had to deal with the same garbage we face all the time in our lives. And the scrifice is not to Satan but for the law that was put in place from the beginning, like a physics law or the laws of a newly created town. That's why He is referred to as THE LAW GIVER. "For without the shedding of blood there is no remission for sins." For Him to break the laws or bend the rules would make Him an UNJUST God. If you want scientifc proof for this , you won't find it obviously , but His word does say that "He is a rewarder of those who dilligently seek him", so that is either a lie or a truth. I have found the latter, even with a very analytical, skeptical mind. Faith is not beyond the realm of the intelligent as some think.



This is in the Word as well, have you looked for the answer? If not, how can you reason unless you first look at it. Once you find it you have the choice to reject it. The answer to this is in the Bible.



You are getting so warm you are almost hot!!!
The pieces are there but you haven't found them yet is how I would phrase that. Because the more pieces I find, the more fit perfectly, and the more perfect the picture of sin, sacrifice, and redemption becomes.



You are past getting answers from Christians who don't know their Bible very well imo, you need to confront a theologian and give him your hardest qustions.

Otherwise , if you want to play stump the Christian here at "religion lite" you can do that too.



You search, good for you. Many people have been where you are at. I was there once. Kerry Livgren was there once, C.S. Lewis was there once. Finding it is the fun part though.

Your entire point seems to be some sort of guilt trip.

"Everyone is guilty." is what you proclaim. Why?

Your own knowledge of good and evil, guilt or innocence, according to you, was acquired from the "disobedience" of Adam and Eve who supposedly would have remained ignorant of good and evil had they not disobeyed their creator.

Animals don't have any concept of good or evil. They just live and procreate.

Is this what God originally had in mind for Adam and Eve? To be ignorant animals procreating children for some unknown purpose?

Please don't ignore my questions, try to answer them.

Would you have preferred to be ignorant (and innocent, like an animal) or be given conscience and consciousness?

And what would be the point of an ignorant race of human clones living and procreating like animals? Are they nothing more than livestock for some alien race of so-called gods?

For what purpose should a man and woman be made to live like an ignorant animal or an unconscious clone unaware of "good and evil?"

Everyone is guilty, you insist. This you must drive home first in order to continue with the rest of this illogical proposition.

But there are questions that need to be answered first.

What really happened in the Garden of Eden to cause Adam and Eve to cover their sexual organs in shame? Certainly not the eating of any real fruit.

Some say it was the sexual seduction of Eve by the Naga (snake person) and some say that he is the father of Cain.
Is this not a possibility?

This begins to make sense and explains the problems with the bloodlines of the inhabitants of earth being contaminated with other than Adam's seed, now all mixed with each other.

It also explains why the creator God of Adam and Even would have a "chosen people." It also explains the obsession with bloodlines, royalty, arranged marriages, rules about who or who not you should marry.

It explains genocide of so-called "impure races." It explains the attempt to create a "master race."

Too many questions unanswered.

JB

On the contrary I have spoken in depth with Christians who know the Bible inside and out, in several different languages on this club and other places.

Unlike Christians, I evaluate all information, not just the Bible. I consult Bible experts to save time and to get their perspectives.

JB

Anyone (atheist or not) who agrees to be faithful to a spouse, but one time cheats, has failed himself and has made a mistake. These are bad choices if they do not net the results he wants.

Particularly if he does not want to hurt or loose his spouse. Then they are considered mistakes, or bad decisions.

Mistakes and wrong decisions are sometimes made. One cannot learn anything except by making mistakes. If you learn from your mistakes, you can stop making them. If you don't learn from your mistakes, you will continue to repeat them.

It is only the religious community who label these mistakes with the word "sin." It is only the religious establishment who dictate what is moral and amoral according to what they view as "sin."

A non-judgmental society with no religious establishment might look upon these things as simply being poor judgment or wrong decisions or mistakes.

Try to think outside of the box of religion and imagine a society without it.


JB

Yes and we'll all live in gingerbread houses and the sky will be filled with gum drop rainbows! We will sail our shortbread boats on chocolate rivers, while unicorns and fairys frolic in the candycane forest.

The truth is that everybody judges, even you. You have judged that Christians only read the Bible and posted so just recently in another thread. You judge that Christians judge. You judge that using the word "sin" is wrong. You judge.

I make judgments. Everybody does. I do not judge as in telling people they are "sinners."

People make mistakes. They are not "sining." Any person who lives in error and choses wrong thinking and hurtful action is self destructive. They destroy themselves and others. They are dysfunctional.

The law of Action and reaction will reap them their rotten fruits. They will reap what they sew and hopefully learn from it.

To judge them is to call them sinners.

If they see the error of their ways and are sincerely sorry, they will forgive themselves and change their ways and no longer live in error. That is learning from their mistakes.

Then their lives will transform as they chose to live in love, and adopt thinking that does not harm themselves or others.

This is not a fairy tale. This is how life can be without religion.

JB

Sin isn't a bad word. I'm a sinner. The only non-sinner by Christian understanding, is Jesus. But even so, how many people have been called "sinner" by the Christians here? The only person I've called a sinner is myself. Paranoia ia not healthy.

I never said that "sin" was a "bad" word. I said that it is meaningless outside of religious doctrine.

To me it simply means "crime" or "mistake."

But to Christians, it is attached to all people, even new born infants and need to be forgiven by the sacrifice of Jesus.

Therefore it is attached to religious doctrine and becomes meaningless to non-religious people or non-Christains.

I am not paranoid about Christians calling me a sinner or in their mistaken idea of people all being sinners. That is their idea, not mine.

I have made a lot of mistakes in my life. I have learned from my mistakes. I thank God for them and for letting me learn from them. I don't claim to be "innocent" of mistakes.

But I have done nothing that would have put me on "death row" or that might require a blood sacrifice to pay for.

JB