Dealing With My Religious Family

That is not necessarily true the fear of going to hell a stronger motivator than obtaining heaven. I used to go to a church for some years and sometimes 3 times a week and I cannot recall the preacher mentioning the word Hell. Even in my bible studies group, I cannot recall that too. However, there was little discussion of heaven at church and bible studies group. A lot of people see themselves as Christian believe their loved ones are in heaven and they will join their loved ones there. It also gives them peace of mind of coping with the death of their loved one, even people who believe in a God but don't claim to be religious.

Sure you do not believe in God and have a different worldview than people that believe in God. Anyway as long as religious people are not hurting you, you do not have a problem, but if they have then you need to make changes to suit you.

 

I think you missed my point. Religion doesn’t deal with physical reality. It deals with what some deem are spiritual realities. Religion isn’t made to help explain science and science isn’t used to explain religion.

For some that’s true, especially if you’re Newtonian in your view of God, lol. The sad part, however, is that some people seem to be falling into opposit extreme of scientism.

 

If you want your parents to stop annoying you or you want to have some fun trolling them, they best way to do it is familiarizing yourself with the bible. I believe in God and I grew up in the church but sadly when it comes down to it, most Christians don't really live like Christians. I've been to predominantly black churches, white churches, baptist, methodist and most of the people I've encountered never even bothered to read the bible on their own. Most Christians are so mixed up, backwards and ignorant, they don't even realize that half of the traditions the keep and holidays they celebrate have pagan roots and are expressly forbidden by God. There are also many holidays that God mandated that all Christians observe that most churches don't. After a couple of quick google searches you can enjoy the look of confusion on their faces when you pull out a slew of bible verses that prove that they are living in direct violation of God's law and will be condemned to hell if they dont reform themselves. Sadly, you will have done more research on God then half of the people that go to church every, Sunday.

 

Yeah I would agree that there is a lot of "virtue signaling" among many Christians, that doesn't go much deeper than that. And I think a lot of it is about how good they can make themselves look in other peoples' eyes. So for example when my uncle calls me about his book, the cynical part of me thinks he's just saying "see, look how great I am". I haven't tried to read the Bible since I was a teenager probably!

 

You really do try hard to make everything about politics, don't you? It's probably an American thing, a result of the Cold War propaganda. Demonizing the Soviet Union was done on two fronts, economic and religious. Eisenhower and his successors hyped up religion by including God everywhere - the pledge of allegiance, money... And it worked. It's so funny to see victims of this brainwashing linking Satan to communism - not just because they're sheep but mainly because it shows that these self proclaimed Christians have absolutely no clue about Christian ideology.

Purity, obedience and modesty - the main Christian values - are in a strong conflict with the capitalist mindset. Che Guevara had thousand times more Jesus in him than Rockefeller. The US version of Christianity is a weird mutant composed of conflicting beliefs aka Supply Side Jesus. It's hilarious that I as a staunch antitheist have to explain this stuff to supposed believers.

 

I wasn't thinking that the virtue-signaling is just contained to left-wing Christians, I'm saying in general. I do think there is a similarity between some right-wing fundamentalist evangelicals and modern-day left-wing social-justice warriors. It's all virtue-signaling. But it does happen across all groups. It's the "look at me! look how good I am!" mentality.

 

I can't argue with your statement about the leftist because it's true but you can't excuse the right's use of selective morality either.

 

It's not that I don't like it, it's that you're profoundly confused.

No sentence could prove my point better.

How respectful to the sacred place. I imagine you take a dump on the altar as well.

 

What are you talking about?

 

Atheism and communism have nothing to do with each other.

 

I wouldn't say that. PRC and other communist regimes have state atheism and so did USSR.

But you can be religious communist or atheistic capitalist without contradicting yourself. It's hard to say what Marx really thought of religion, "opium of the people" can be interpreted both negatively and positively.

EDIT: My original point was that if you're going to slap a political affiliation on Jesus, it sure as hell isn't going to be a right wing one.

 

I see what you mean but what I meant was that atheism only has to do with lacking a belief in the existence of a God and nothing else... it doesn't and shouldn't have anything to do with a person's political preferences.

 

If that's the case then why are the more atheistic/less religious countries more economically well off than more religious countries like the US and Britain?