What a brilliant game; to create a God after your own imagination to suit yourself....a God you're more comfortable with. :)

I enjoyed the discourse even though we disagree. Enjoy the forum!

-H

Oh, it's no game, I assure you of that.

If God isn't at least as nice as me then I want no parts of him.

Therefore it would be utterly senseless for me to imagine a God who isn't even as nice as I am.

So if it's your intent to make God out to be some kind of big bad bully you'll have to find someone far more naïve than me to sell that idea to.

God is a loving God. He cares for us and is why he gives us anything we want. Ask and ye shall receive. Most people get discouraged on this though and be like well God didn't answer my prayers he must not be true. But God answers prayers in his time, maybe not so much when we think it should be done.

I believe that. This is why I'm sure she's quite pleased with my choice to not be a sinner.

According to the Bible it is an unforgivable sin to not believe that it is the word of God. Well, the TRUTH is that I don't believe it. Therefore according to that book I have already commited an 'unforgivable' sin, (i.e. a sin that cannot be forgiven)

So according to that mythology my 'sin' can never be forgiven, not even by Jesus Christ himself. For in order for Jesus to forgive me he would need to go against the very word of the Holy Spirit.

Also, since it is indeed the TRUTH that I do not believe that the Bible represents the word of God, nor do I believe that Jesus was the only begotten son of God, for me to claim that I do believe it would be a LIE.

Are you suggesting that I should LIE to God in order to appease him?

I thought lying was supposed to be a sin too?

Yet you would have me lie to God to appease him.

If I can't come to your God in TRUTH, that what good is he?

A God who shuns TRUTH is no God at all.

And the TRUTH is that I don't believe that the Hebrews who wrote those horrible stupid stories in the Bible spoke for God. And it is also TRUE that I don't believe that Jesus was the son of Yahweh. Even as I read the gospels I am completely convinced that Jesus actually renounced the ways of Yahweh and taught the ways of Buddha.

So for me to pretend otherwise would be a LIE.

I cannot not lie to God. It is my HONEST and TRUTHFUL opinion that the Biblical mythology cannot possibly be the "word" of any all-wise supreme being, because the stories simply aren't even close to being 'wise' at all, IMHO.

So there's no way that I can "accept" Jesus as the only begotten son of Yahweh since I don't even believe that Yahweh represents "god" and I don't see where Jesus even supported the teachings of Yahweh anyway.

So even to God I must be TRUTHFUL and confess that I personally feel that the Biblical mythology is far too stupid to be representative of any all-wise supreme being.

And that's just the TRUTH.

Is TRUTH good enough for God?

I certainly hope so. I would be grossly dispointed if our creator perfers lies over the TRUTH.

I took an anthropology course about a year ago and a philosophy course on ethics the following semester. Anthropology covers quite a bit on how gender, sexuality, and beliefs influence cultures and the social accord within them. Having that information before I took the ethics course was very helpful, because (of course) ethics deals with the human condition of which (religious) beliefs play a big role.

I was very surprised to learn that desire to the point of ‘lust’, as we are used to interpreting the word, is a cultural condition most closely aligned with the Judeo-Christian religions.

Prior to the opening of vast trade routes, most cultures were tribal, even in Europe. Tribal in the sense that villages were small and every village had their beliefs and the nomads, while wanderers, were often thought to be lustful, but in fact, they simply increased the gene pool by choosing (procuring) women while in their wondering.

Life was tough and men and women come together for security, to have lots of children, in hopes that a few would survive and help tend the land. Families stayed together and had no time for those ‘lustful’ affairs, and given the sanitary conditions of the times, it was likely that desire was often squelched when in close proximity. Or more likely, sex was a chore and not the kind of long, languishing affair we affiliate with lust. So while desire existed it was under control, for the most part.

Another type of tribe, are those we relate the word to today (as in African tribal communities) many of which are still in existence, though globalization will surely put an end to them soon. In many of those tribes there is actually little sex and monogamy rules. In one such tribe, after the birth of a child the woman is not fit for sex for five years and she and her child usually move to the Woman’s quarters for the duration. Of course all the women raise the children and all the men share in that responsibility. Every adult is father or mother.

The men in these tribes do not consider the lack of sex a burden, nor do they have a relevant or similar word for lust.

One thing relevant to the tribes who practice long abstinences, is that the birth rate is kept relatively low which accomplishes two very important things. One, lower birth rate means the tribe never exceeds it’s carrying capacity and two, the survival rate of children is very high.

So the idea of lust, as affiliated with sin, in religious beliefs, is most likely in keeping with the ‘past’ success of the ‘tribe’ prior to European expansion. In that regard, lust and how we think of it, is just one more thing that was incorporated into religious beliefs because it has the values I just described. Because of the value inherent in the tribal cultures, religions ascribed ‘sin’ to acts of ‘lust’ and the industrial revolution that gave us more time and more luxuries allowed us to make the ‘sin’ a really big deal.

It’s always amazing to me, to find the little cultural nuances in history that explain how beliefs evolved in religion. While there are often elements of truth to the claims that beliefs are thousands of years old, those elements are not often considered by believers to have been incorporated into religion for cultural values which are no longer remembered. Instead these beliefs are ingrained as ‘sin’ the reasoning for which has long been forgotten.

By way, those who promote marriage as the only sacred and valid setting for sex – history has a big lesson for you. Marriage as we know it is a very new institution – even in the early history of America you will find a severe lack of documented marriage and it was only through taxation and inheritance that the law was ultimately established to recognize ‘common law’ marriage. Most, who became recognized as married under common law, were rarely ever married in the way most Christians consider marriage today.

Lust did exist then, but as long as taxes were collected, children had a 'legitamate' last name, and inheritance could be duly & legally passed on, no one cared about the lust or the illegitimate children conceived through it. My what a devoutly Christian nation we were....