Are many "Christians" also atheists?

[crowonsnow]

crowonsnow

What good is loving your god in your heart if you are not practicing love of neighbor? This seems to be the point of Jesus’s words in Matthew.

If I understand Sheen’s point, based on Matthew, it is that you are not loving God in your heart if you are not loving your neighbor.

And if you are not loving God, you are without God, or a-theist. You could still mentally assent to the idea of God and call yourself a Christian, but you would only be fooling yourself, because if you really believed in God you would find God in others and love them too.

So is Sheen saying ‘if you’re not loving your neighbor you’re not loving god?’

If so, nice man that Sheen.

 

[Starwynd]

if there is no G-d than what differentiates any collection of atoms from any other collection of atoms?

why would a person be any different than a rock?

you can say they differ in level of functioning, but the rock might think the same thing,

so if there is no G-d than by necessity all collections of atoms are of equal value

so it follows that one can neither love nor hate anything at all

but i am sure you do, most people love their folks, or their dog or their wife or their kids

so either everyone on the planet is delusional, or something is differentiating the value of various collections of atoms

since in the absence of the supernatural we have that equality of substance, than no collection of atoms is capable of assigning more value to one thing or another.

alternatively there is no General to say this soldier is a Lt. or this soldier is Sgt., or this one is infantry

rather everyone would simply be a soldier

so the fact that most people assign value to various collections of atoms means that they are tacitly in agreement that there is a supernatural

otherwise one could neither love nor hate

I’m not an atheist so you’re barking up the wrong tree there.

As far as your other questions goes, it’s called human sentience. That’s what makes us different that all those other things.

But we do share many materials in common in that we are made out of star dust, as is every single living tree or animal or mineral.

 

[warpspeedpetey]

oh sorry

but the story still goes, to a rock i am sure that we dont seem sntient at all, but that whole argument is a work in progress

 

[Charlemagne_II]

crowonsnow

So is Sheen saying ‘if you’re not loving your neighbor you’re not loving god?’

So it would seem. “If you do these things for the least of your brethren, you do them for me.” Matthew 25

 

[notsmart]

crowonsnow

So is Sheen saying ‘if you’re not loving your neighbor you’re not loving god?’

So it would seem. “If you do these things for the least of your brethren, you do them for me.” Matthew 25

Yes, this is how I understand it, and even as an atheist I did feel this strong intention to do what was best not just for myself but for all. And, with high maybe unrealistic hopes, it would help someway, somehow.
Now that I am taking the plunge, I see it is really the same thing I am doing, I have always done, but a bit different in direction now.
Now I try to take all my reason and logic, and hope ,
and investigate how it can be compatible to the catholic church, and how it is not.
So far, all I do not like at this point are some minor things.

 

[Gottle_of_Geer]

There are two kinds of “atheism”: the atheism of the right, which professes to love God and ignore neighbors; and the atheism of the left, which professes to love neighbor and ignores God.
Bishop Fulton Sheen

It would seem, from Sheen’s remark, that there are many more atheists in the world than we thought.

Any comment?

I think all men are atheists - all Christians, certainly. If we were not disbelievers & God-deniers, I don’t think we would need faith.​

 

[cranster]

Borrowing from Einstein we might aphorize that humanism without Christianity is lame, but that Christianity without humanism is blind. Perhaps this is what the good bishop meant.

.

Einsteins actual quote was, “science without religion is lame, religion without science is blind” I don’t think your premise follows what Einstein was saying at all.

I think the good bishop is simply saying that Christianity is both love of god and love of neighbor, and that neither comes first. He must also have a particular definition of atheism that I’m not familiar with.

I don’t think the Bishop would put love of God below any other love. Love of God always comes first, and makes true love of neighbor possible.

 

[crowonsnow]

I don’t think the Bishop would put love of God below any other love. Love of God always comes first, and makes true love of neighbor possible.

The Bishop is obviously a smart man, and understands that love of god without love of neighbor is not love of god.