Atheists At Catholic Forums

[SamCA]

dumspirospero:

Just in case I missed something in high school and college, please, please enlighten me as to where the founding Fathers defined separation of Church and State and as to where it can be found in either The Constitution, Bill of Rights, Declaration of Independence, etc…Going to be a hard task, because they never defined this modern day notion of Church and State…this is an invention that has been force fed, unconstitutionally I might add, down our throats and has become a tool of secular humanists, atheist, etc., to erode any moral and religious foundation we once had in this country.

"To messers Nehemiah Dodge, Ephraim Robbins, & Stephen S. Nelson a committee of the Danbury Baptist association in the state of Connecticut.

Gentlemen

The affectionate sentiments of esteem & approbation which you are so good as to express towards me, on behalf of the Danbury Baptist association, give me the highest satisfaction. My duties dictate a faithful & zealous pursuit of the interests of my constituents, and in proportion as they are persuaded of my fidelity to those duties, the discharge of them becomes more & more pleasing.

Believing with you that religion is a matter which lies solely between man & his god, that he owes account to none other for his faith or his worship, that the legitimate powers of government reach actions only, and not opinions, I contemplate with sovereign reverence that act of the whole American people which declared that their legislature should make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof, thus building a wall of separation between church and state. [Congress thus inhibited from acts respecting religion, and the Executive authorised only to execute their acts, I have refrained from presenting even occasional performances of devotion presented indeed legally where an Executive is the legal head of a national church, but subject here, as religious exercises only to the voluntary regulations and discipline of each respective sect.] Adhering to this expression of the supreme will of the nation in behalf of the rights of conscience, I shall see with sincere satisfaction the progress of those sentiments which tend to restore to man all his natural rights, convinced he has no natural right in opposition to his social duties.

I reciprocate your kind prayers for the protection and blessing of the common Father and creator of man, and tender you for yourselves and your religious association, assurances of my high respect & esteem.

(signed) Thomas Jefferson
Jan.1.1802."

 

[Atreyu]

Response for me Sam? I feel left out…

 

[Gilbert_Keith]

SAM

In America today, there is a concerted (primarily, but not entirely, Protestant) movement to make America into a “Christian nation.”
By the same token, there is a concerted movement to make the secular movement so powerful that any mention of God or Christ in public forums will be verboten.

 

[SamCA]

Atreyu:

Response for me Sam? I feel left out…

I missed one, didn’t I? I suck.

Indeed, and this was a major stumbling block for me when I was first coming back to Christianity. Yet there are several very important questions that Protestantism cannot answer. Protestantism basically flies in the face of history, but this is the topic for another thread. Therefore, if Jesus really was God, and He started a Church, there are only two (well, three) candidates left: the Roman Catholic Church, the Eastern Orthodox Church or the Oriental Orthodox Church.

I’m not really qualified to comment on the Protestant/Catholic thing; my problems go back a step further than that to your Big If there.

Imagine yourself as a magistrate, and you have four witnesses. These four witnesses are called Matthew, Mark, Luke and John (do you see where I’m going here? ) Now, in this strange courtroom of yours, you cross-examine these four witnesses regarding an event: the resurrection of Jesus. Funnily enough, these four witnesses don’t agree on everything that happened. For example, there is a particular order of events (I can’t remember what it is right now, sorry) that one witness claims to be different to another witness. But the event in question is not a really important one, it’s just one that both the witnesses happened to mention.

However, on the important events; the big events (such as Jesus being resurrected), all of the witnesses agree. If this event did not happen, then how could they have all reported the same events? Well obviously they must have colluded together! Well ok, but if they colluded together, then surely they wouldn’t have messed up with those other, minor events?! And the only other conclusion is that they actually did witness this event. In other words, the event (Jesus’ resurrection) actually occurred!

I have a number of problems with this reasoning. The first is that, put very simply, I wouldn’t believe someone came back from the dead on the strength of four eyewitness reports. My mom swears she saw a UFO, but I’m not willing to believe in aliens on the strength of that testimony alone. Eyewitness reports are notoriously unreliable, and for something as exceptional as ressurection from the dead, I’d need more independant verification than four guys who say they saw it.

Second, the accounts we have are not direct, eyewitness testimony. There is real question as to whether the gospels were actually written by the people they’re attributed to, and when exactly they were written in the first place. Eyewitness testimony is one thing; written testimony put to papers decades later by someone who totally swears that he knows the guy who saw this is something else again.

Now this is only a very brief starting point, but I hope you see that there is some promise in this evidence.

I have to admit that the testimony itself is of ambiguous enough provenance that I can’t place a lot of credence in it.

There is a whole lot of other evidence as well. For example, in the gospel of Matthew, the author (who I’m guessing was Matthew) discussed several prophecies that were made in the Old Testament, regarding Jesus. In his discussion, Matthew tells of how Jesus fulfills all of these prophecies. Again, this is not really hard evidence that proves the resurrection of Jesus, but it is some really good evidence. Again and again, Jesus fulfills the prophecies made about Him in the Old Testament.

Again, the problem is that I am unconvinced that the gospel itself can automatically be taken as true, so its accounts of fulfilled prophecies don’t provide any more evidence than its accounts of divinity or ressurection.

Also, remember that if you can prove absolutely the existence of God and so forth, then there isn’t really much point in having faith, is there?

As I mentioned to Neithan, I’m also unconvinced of the point of having faith.

If you want to look further into this stuff that I have (very very briefly) discussed, then you could Start here. Another thing that you could do is read the gospel of Matthew and see for yourself the prophecies that I’m talking about, although make sure you get a Bible with good footnotes so you can see the Old Testament passages Matthew is referring to. I’ve also heard that the book, The Case for Christ is a good one, but having not read it myself, I can’t really recommend it!

I’ve read Matthew. It’s excellent literature, but I’m not convinced that it’s by the Apostle Matthew or that the events that occured within actually occured, which makes using its contents for evidence problematic.

 

[SamCA]

Gilbert Keith:

By the same token, there is a concerted movement to make the secular movement so powerful that any mention of God or Christ in public forums will be verboten.

Even if that were true – and I see no evidence of that – the number of “secularists” in the USA is so infinitessimally small that the idea of them forcing anything on anyone is hard to swallow.

 

[Gilbert_Keith]

Even if that were true – and I see no evidence of that – the number of “secularists” in the USA is so infinitessimally small that the idea of them forcing anything on anyone is hard to swallow.

I define secularists as those who have no use for religion, or who nominally belong to a religion but never attend Church and have abandoned most of the Christian principles they were taught. There are many such people and they have an agenda. They have accomplished plenty in the last fifty years. For example, promoting and legitimizing pornography, abortion, sex without love, homosexual marriage, banning of religious images in public places, mocking of religious figures and institutions … etc. etc. None of this was possible fifty years ago. These secularists have had their way pretty much with the media and the educational establishment … which invariably presents their demands in a sympathetic or permissive light.

To say that the secular influence is infinitely small is to make me wonder whether you are playing head games with us or with yourself.

 

[Neithan]

SamCA:

I don’t even understand the mindset that leads to it.

You don’t understand hope? It’s not some complex alien ‘mindset’ here Sam; we’re people just like you, but our experiences have lead us to accept the reality of Revelation. I guess you could say a combination of the pursuit of truth and happiness have lead us to it.

Thomas got empirical evidence. When someone told him that his dear friend had come back from the dead, he had a perfectly rational response: Yeah, right. I’ll believe it when I see it. And Jesus didn’t condemn him or tell him he was cursed for his lack of faith or anything like that. He let him see the nail holes.

You’re absolutely right, and that’s an excellent point. But Jesus very next comments to the Apostle demonstrate the value which God places on faith, and I suppose that the Church and creation itself are the only solid empirical evidences we now have. I suppose that isn’t very satisfying for skeptics, and there is a doubting Thomas in each of us.

There are any number of ways an omnipotent being could, if it wanted, provide empirical evidence for its existence. Appearing and talking to people on a regular basis. Flaming letters forty miles high reading “Yes, I exist. No, seriously.” Carl Sagan had an interesting one – a coded message buried in the endless digits of Pi.

Again, this would undermine the virtue of faith. Free Will is crucially important in God’s plan and if He were to definitively reveal Himself as He is in Himself–there wouldn’t be a heck of a lot of free will to disbelieve.
Can you really disbelieve that something exists if it is fully and directly sensibly perceived? If you could (and some skeptics will go this route) then you can’t believe that anything *does *exist outside of your own mind, which brings us back to faith—even our own reasoning is based on certain belief in the unproven (existence outside of our own thoughts i.e. the reliability of our own thoughts).

• Any of the big flashy miracles the Isrealites were witness to would do the trick, too.*

I doubt that would do it for you Sam, if it didn’t even wholly convince all the witnesses! Anyway, those national revelations served a specific purpose (forming the nation of Israel) and in the age of the Church such public displays of God’s supernatural power are no longer necessary.

In America today, there is a concerted (primarily, but not entirely, Protestant) movement to make America into a “Christian nation.”

Oh, indeed… but there is an equally concerted (though necessarily more heterogenous) effort today to convert America, and the World, to Secular Relativism. Personally, of course, I think the latter is much more dangerous. At least with Christianity there is a united front–I don’t know what the hell kind of anarchy might result from competing militant atheist worldviews. 1984 comes to mind…

 

[Savonarola]

I am not an atheist although there was a period of my life when I was at least agnostic. I don’t consider myself Catholic or belonging to any other religion although I was raised Catholic. I would say that I do believe in God but the God I believe in is so radically different from the one believed in by most Christians that I hesitate to use the same word to describe him/her/it.

I find discussions among the Catholic forums very interesting because I have always had a fascination with why people gravitate towards religion in the first place. I was made to attend church as a child but never wanted to be there. I could not for the life of me understand why anybody else, my parents included, wanted to be there. Many years later I still find myself interested in this same question.

I have seen friends of mine who are or were “recovering Catholics” and I have seen first hand the damage many of the Catholic teachings can cause in a person’s life. It makes me wonder whether other Catholics don’t recognize the detrimental effects of the Catholic teachings, are too afraid to, don’t care, or whether it is something else altogether.

I am also quite amazed at the level to which Catholics (and believers in other religions) are willing to deny thier own happiness just becuase somebody told them to with miminal justification required. I am truly fascinated by all this and always value the opportunity to have an open discsussion with others on these subjects.

 

[Neithan]

Savonarola you are a model post-modernist: congrats! (?)
You’ve perfectly illustrated the trend of the times.

It’s interesting to observe that western society has not seen the degree of relativism prevalent today since the decline of the Roman Empire.

 

[Savonarola]

Neithan:

Savonarola you are a model post-modernist: congrats! (?)
You’ve perfectly illustrated the trend of the times.

It’s interesting to observe that western society has not seen the degree of relativism prevalent today since the decline of the Roman Empire.

Thanks for the welcome and I am happy to be part of a larger trend but I think the congrats may be a bit misplaced. As I understand it, post-modernists rebel against modern movements, usually by bringing back traditional elements. That is certainly not me in any way. My aim is not to rebel against anything.

Also, I don’t quite understand why you associate me with some percieved relativistic movement. I do believe that each individual has a unique experience in life requiring it’s own application of wisdom at any given point, but the wisdom itself is based in a truth that is absolute.

 

[Gilbert_Keith]

SAVONAROLA

I am also quite amazed at the level to which Catholics (and believers in other religions) are willing to deny thier own happiness just becuase somebody told them to with miminal justification required.

You’re getting in over your head here. Not being a Catholic, you have no idea whether Catholics are increasing their happiness or losing it. You can never know what being a good Catholic is like because, by your own admission, you have never been one. Moreover, you think that not being a Catholic opens the door to happiness? Look around you. I have. I know plenty of people whose lives without God are grim and painful and self destructive in the extreme.

Now show me a good Catholic who is destroying his own happiness.

You can’t do it.

 

[Liberian]

SamCA:

Don’t forget Buddhist Tibet, a godless regime that produced one of the most pacifistic and humanitarian cultures on Earth, until it was conquered by more warlike neighbors.

Sam,

It’s probably a matter of debate (at the very least) as to whether Buddhism is atheistic. Buddhists certainly worship something or someone outside themselves. I’m not an expert on the subject so I can’t speak of it for sure.

• Liberian

 

[Liberian]

dumspirospero:

Just in case I missed something in high school and college, please, please enlighten me as to where the founding Fathers defined separation of Church and State and as to where it can be found in either The Constitution, Bill of Rights, Declaration of Independence, etc…Going to be a hard task, because they never defined this modern day notion of Church and State…this is an invention that has been force fed, unconstitutionally I might add, down our throats and has become a tool of secular humanists, atheist, etc., to erode any moral and religious foundation we once had in this country.

Dum Spiro Spero,

The term “separation of Church and State” was, until very recently, applied to the amendment in the Bill of Rights that began something like “Congress shall make no law regarding the establishment of a religion or prohibiting the free exercise thereof.” The modern judicial redefinition of the term is, as you say, not found in any of the founding documents.

• Liberian

 

[Atreyu]

Did you read that article Sam?

I have seen friends of mine who are or were “recovering Catholics” and I have seen first hand the damage many of the Catholic teachings can cause in a person’s life. It makes me wonder whether other Catholics don’t recognize the detrimental effects of the Catholic teachings, are too afraid to, don’t care, or whether it is something else altogether.

Damage? What damage? As far as I can tell, the effect of me rejoining the Catholic Church about 9 months ago has only been good. The change in my lifestyle has not been dramatic, but I am a much happier person. I realise that not everyone’s experiences are the same, but I’m really interested to find out which Catholic teachings you think can cause damage.

 

[Savonarola]

Gilbert Keith:

SAVONAROLA

I am also quite amazed at the level to which Catholics (and believers in other religions) are willing to deny thier own happiness just becuase somebody told them to with miminal justification required.

You’re getting in over your head here. Not being a Catholic, you have no idea whether Catholics are increasing their happiness or losing it. You can never know what being a good Catholic is like because, by your own admission, you have never been one. Moreover, you think that not being a Catholic opens the door to happiness? Look around you. I have. I know plenty of people whose lives without God are grim and painful and self destructive in the extreme.

I didn’t mean to be offensive in any way by what I said. I am just relaying my experience with the church. And please don’t get me wrong. I am not saying that being outside the Catholic church is some guarantee of happiness or anything. You are right. There are many people with very messed up lives that are not Catholic.

I was raised Catholic and am aware of the teachings of the church and the effects of those teachings. In fact, when I was yourng I was a “good Catholic” by all accounts. I never said I wasn’t. I also know many people now that are or were “good Catholics”. I believe I know the Catholic experience quite well not only from the Catholic perspective but from the non-Catholic one as well…
Gilbert Keith:

Now show me a good Catholic who is destroying his own happiness.

You can’t do it.

I can give you examples of people denying their happiness. People limit their own happiness all the time without realizing it. And I don’t just mean Catholics or people of religious faith. Everybody does this at one time or another.

If you want an example of people doing this for religious reasons then consider the countless married and unmarried Catholics who are abstaining from having sex. Sex is a very joyous act and people are denying themselves of it every day. Studies have also shown that people who enjoy sex regularly tend to live healthier, happier lives whether they are married or not. This is a very simple example.

I could also give you the example of a friend of mine who is always feeling guilty about things even when there is nothing to feel guilty about. She was taught to feel so guilty about being a sinner and not honoring her father and mother and God knows what else that she is still trying to get past it very many years later.

Again, I don’t mean to say that people shouldn’t be religious or that there is anything wrong with any belief system. I am just relating my own experiences in hopes of better understanding them and the world around me.

 

[Savonarola]

Atreyu:

Damage? What damage? As far as I can tell, the effect of me rejoining the Catholic Church about 9 months ago has only been good. The change in my lifestyle has not been dramatic, but I am a much happier person. I realise that not everyone’s experiences are the same, but I’m really interested to find out which Catholic teachings you think can cause damage.

Atreyu, I appreciate your sincerity and am also interested in hearing more about your experience, why you returned, and the effects you have noticed in your life as a result. Why weren’t you happy before and what changed that?

As for how the teachings can cause damage… hmmm… where to start? Okay, I’m not sure how far into this you want me to go but perhaps we can take the idea that we are all born sinners and will always be, basically, unworthy sinners. This is such a powerful and detrimental idea in a person’s life. To go through life feeling worthless, bad, unlovable, unworthy. This is not the kind of self image that leads to a happy person. I know whenever I feel unlovable or unworthy it is not at all a happy feeling. It is actually downright miserable.

Of course there are many strategies that get put into play to try to make up for the unworthy feelings and a lot of these revolve around doing what the church and God want me to do to redeem myself. The church is more than willing to give you a whole list of things to do and not do in order for you to be worthy of God’s love. But it seems no matter what you do to atone there are always more things to feel guilty about later and the atonement never really ends.

Wouldn’t it be nice if the church taught you that you are perfect in every way and God loves you no matter what you do? That he doesn’t want you to change anything about yourself because you are just as he made you and he loves you just as you are? And wouldn’t it be nice to know that nothing could change that, ever?

I am just touching on one idea taught by the church here but it is one that has had a major impact on many people’s lives including my own. I think many people feel unworthy and unlovable and never really understand why. They never make the connection between the feeling that they dread and the fact that they were taught that they were an unworthy sinner since birth. I believe that when people did start making this connection and moved away from this way of thinking about themselves the term “recovering catholic” was born.

There are other teachings that cause distress in one’s life such as the idea that if you sin too much and don’t atone enough that you will be sent to experience the worst torture imaginable either in Hell or Purgatory. I think it is very difficult to be at peace with the universe when you are afraid that this is the fate that awaits you. And the rules for whether you go or not are not very well defined so you never really know. This idea alone keeps so many people from experiencing life out of fear that they might anger God and incur his wrath either now or in the afterlife.

I could write more about this and will if you like but hopefully this gives you a idea of what I am referring to.

 

[Savonarola]

Oh, I remembered another example to help illustrate what I have been saying. There is a thread in the Moral Theology forum called “How Can Any Christian Be Happy? (Need Help)”. Here is the quote from it:

Steven87:

How Can Any Christian Be Happy? (Need Help)
I have recently within the last few months rejoined my catholic faith, the only reason was the fear of hell, and I know how selfish that sounds but it is the truth. If I knew that no matter what I did and I would still get into heaven (like some protestants believe) I would have done just that. I would have sinned till I was blue in the face. I would have had a conscience,( so I would never have murdered someone or anything like that.)

The fact is that it has gotten so bad that I live in fear everyday that I will be going to hell, I have done some extremely horrible things that haunt me to this day and that i am still struggling with to this day. I just recently thought some very blasphemous thoughts that I will not talk about here because I don’t want anyone thinking the same thing.

I am miserable, I do nothing but fear hell. I honestly feel like I have backstabbed God so many times that he will not be able to forgive me. And that I feel I am not worthy of such forgiveness.

I cannot stop thinking about myself, I always put myself before God. When I sin I don’t think “I have offended God”, I think “Great, down the one way road to hell once again”. And I don’t know how to handle this. I am in constant fear to the point where I don’t enjoy some things that I used to because of this fear.

I am selfish and I really don’t think I am repenting because I love God but because I fear hell so much. and that seriously makes me want to break down right here and now.

How do I get over this? I ask God to give me more time to come to love him and for him to help me through these struggles, but I am really starting to think everything is pointless sometimes and that I will end up in hell anyways.

What is wrong with me? Can anyone help me or give me some kind of advice that will make me less of a mess? I really need help! BADLY…

 

[Gilbert_Keith]

Savonarola

You can always find people who are warped by their false idea of religion. The examples you give are typical. But these people really are the exceptions to the rule. You have suggested them as the rule. Most Catholics I know do not live in dread fear of hell that is so morbid it make them disfunctional. Rather, they live with a healthy fear of displeasing God because they love God … just as it would be healthy for any man to fear displeasing his wife because he loves her.

Yes, fear is an essential part of religion … and lack of fear is an essential part of the notion that one can sin and commit crimes with impunity and never get caught.

Not a smart move, as some dudes in jail will sometimes admit.

 

[CTenorman]

I’d like to try addressing two questions here, the first being the certainty of our knowledge of God. It’s a very good question why God has not blazoned his presence in the sky in giant letters, or proclaimed his existence in some irrefutable manner. However, there is also a very good answer for this question: he can’t. This would at first seem to deny the omnipotence of God, but it is actually the very heart of the Christian belief. God, above all, gave us free will. Were he to ever reveal himself to us, we would do the correct things in life out of fear of him, not out of a recognition that it is what’s best. Heaven would be filled with people who feel (and truly are) oppressed, repressed, and generally unhappy. That simply can’t work with the heaven where all people work together in pure love. The only way that we can truly follow the will of God is if we do it without certainty of his presence. That is how he designed this world (“blessed are those who have not seen and yet believe”). If a logical argument could prove his existence, then the very meaning of the scriptures would be lost; we would be constrained under the law as we were before. The only way that God can truly exist is if we never know it. We can have very strong suspicions, and this is good, but never can we ever prove him beyond doubt. His very proving should mean his disproving. And thus the more we seek, and the less we conclusively find, the more we should rejoice. We’ll find hundreds of hints everywhere, in the origin of the universe itself, the self refuting nature of materialism/naturalism, the beauty of nature, and the truth of the moral law in our own hearts, and many others. So, it should be exactly as we find it to be: hundreds of things that all seem to point to God, but nothing irrefutable, so that we can still follow him freely.

The second question I’d like to answer here is the nature of good, and denying ourselves pleasure. Our hearts and our head often desire different things. Sometimes my heart says “You know, sex would be nice before marriage”, and it seems that I’m denying myself pleasure. But, pleasure cannot be the benchmark by which we judge our happiness - happiness and pleasure, as seen by society, are a little different. However, I know that while I will temporarily be denying myself pleasure by not having sex, I am increasing my happiness, in the traditional sense of the word. If your heart and head desire different things, only listening to your head will give you happiness because the desires of your heart are distorted, and your head can still reason. So, down the road, you will receive true, lasting happiness by following your head, and denying that which our distorted appetites desire. I may be mistaken on this, but Catholics do not deny happiness or acts that lead to it - nuns, priests, and other people who live religious lives save all their drive and energy for God’s work, and by denying themselves for his sake (for his works), they become happy. I think Aquinas himself said the whole purpose of life is happiness. Continued in next message.

 

[CTenorman]

Finally, I saw a message there saying that it’s very hard to grow up thinking that we are worthless, unlovable, etc. If you’re an atheist, then all this is hogwash, and so you can see yourself as being however you wish. However, if you’re a Christian, then you have to realize that you aren’t unlovable, because God infinitely loves you. He killed himself on that cross just as much for you as for any other person on this planet. In fact, had there been no other people, he would still have done it just for you. He loves all that is good in us, and hates only the bad acts we do. However, since he can see that there is something wrong with us causing us to do things that do not bring us to good, to the greatest happiness, isn’t God doing the only thing he can by wanting to change us? If your dog gets a thorn in his foot, do you let him walk around in pain, or do you say “Come here Connor, this will hurt, and you’re not in the best of shape now, but if you just let me take this thorn out, you’ll be much happier after.” We do the latter because we love our dog, as God loves us. Thus true love can’t leave good enough alone, he has to perfect us because he can’t bear to see us in anything less than perfect happiness.

He loves us so much that he is willing to put up with close to a hundred years of terrible acts, acts that show we don’t always love him back, and then still turn us into saints if we only admit we made a mistake. He forgives, without reservation, every sin we do, so long as we are sorry for it, and ask his forgiveness. For someone to do that, we must have, deep down, some very loveable qualities. Whether we retain those loveable qualities over time is up to us, but so long as we admit we were wrong and ask his forgiveness, there will always be something infinitely loveable about us for God to infinitely love.