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Hastrman
Guest
Ooh, ooh, I change my answer!
Now it’s, “No, because non-existent things don’t go to Heaven!”
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Now it’s, “No, because non-existent things don’t go to Heaven!”
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Sixtus
Guest
I suggest they go to neither Heaven of Hell, seeings the term is mutually exclusive and therefore no such person exists!!
A Christian by definition is someone who believes that Jesus Christ is the uncreated Son of God, the second person of the Blessed Trinity. That He was crucified and rose. That He will come again on the last day.
An aethiest by definition is someone who does not believe in God period.
How can someone who does not believe in God, believe that a Diety who does not exist, had a Son who became flesh incarnate?
Sorry, but either I or someone else appears to have lost the plot
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Syele
Guest
Well there are people claiming they are “Christian Athiests”. I think that is part of the point.
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Everyman
Guest
Thank you. You’ve clearly understood my point.
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ribozyme
Guest
Would anyone consider Motl or Fallaci “Christians”?
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Everyman
Guest
This is a great question! Because this gets to a root issue: most would not consider them Christian because the institution of Christianity has taught us that a Christian is thus and such. But if the definition of Christian is simply a follower of Christ, then why can they not carry that title?
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SedesDomi
Guest
For me, a “Christian” is someone who acts like Christ. They can believe in a variety of things – whatever gets them through the night, as the prophetic The Beatles sang not so long ago. We don’t have as much control as we would like to think, over what we believe. We have a lot of control over what we do. If believing that Jesus is God, makes you love like Jesus loves, more power to you. If believing that Jesus was a prophet, makes you love like Jesus loves, Halleluyah!
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lak611
Guest
Everybody will end up in either Heaven or Hell (even if they have a stay in Purgatory, they will still be in Heaven eventually). So it’s either/or. There is no other place.
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ribozyme
Guest
So what do you think about Limbo then?
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RobedWithLight
Guest
But on the contrary, Christian teaching requires belief in God in order to go there.
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Catholic29
Guest
How can a Christian be an Atheist? Isn’t the concept of theism the basis of Christianity?
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lak611
Guest
I don’t. It is not an official teaching of the Catholic Church and is not even mentioned in the Catechism.
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RobedWithLight
Guest
What precisely do you mean by the phrase “follower of Christ”? A true follower is one who believes in and carries out the teachings of the one he or she follows.
Christianity and Atheism are such diametric opposites that they cannot really be mixed without smothering Christianity beyond recognition.
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Montalban
Guest
As Syele pointed out they respect Christian ethics and recognise the importance of Christianity on Western Civilization.
The late Oriana Fallaci was an Italian journalist, author and critic of Islam (see The Rage and The Pride and The Force of Reason)
She was one who believed that in effect an atheist or any other person was better off under Christianity than under Islam.
There is no such thing as a Christian Atheist.
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ribozyme
Guest
Do you recommend Fallaci’s work for me to read?
So she thinks Christianity is better than Islam. So that means she isn’t a Christian and she only likes Christianity because it is better than Islam. By that standard, most of you agree she rejected Christ, right?
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Montalban
Guest
I have not read her works, but a Catholic friend recommended them to me. That is all I can say with regards her books.
That’s my understanding. She recognises that Christianity provided the basis of modern western society complete with the freedoms we cherish. Islam which had a technological superiority in the middle ages stagnated because of the Islamic concept of knowledge that is from outside Islam.
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Sixtus
Guest
Do Christian aetheists go to heaven?
Likewise does God exist in that place which does not exist?
I hae a friend. Well actually, he does not exist. But he is still a very good friend to me. I often speak to him and I owe him a lot. A problem is I don’t know how to thank him. I would like to buy him a little something but how can I know what he wants or how to make sure he receives it if he does not exist?
Anyhow, my friend and I are very close. We speak every day and I make a point of spending time in his company every morning, noon, evening and I say ‘good night’ before I go to sleep. I know he does not exist but I still love him dearly.
Either I am very dillusional or perhaps I am a Christian athiest
Likewise does God exist in that place which does not exist?
I hae a friend. Well actually, he does not exist. But he is still a very good friend to me. I often speak to him and I owe him a lot. A problem is I don’t know how to thank him. I would like to buy him a little something but how can I know what he wants or how to make sure he receives it if he does not exist?
Anyhow, my friend and I are very close. We speak every day and I make a point of spending time in his company every morning, noon, evening and I say ‘good night’ before I go to sleep. I know he does not exist but I still love him dearly.
Either I am very dillusional or perhaps I am a Christian athiest
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ribozyme
Guest
How is your belief in the Christian God different from the scenario described above? Why Christians aren’t delusional when compared to “Christian atheists”. Why is your belief in the Christian God not a delusion?
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Hastrman
Guest
Well, I don’t have any imaginary friends (that I know of; it is conceivable that I’m delusional).
The Christian belief in the Christian God is a matter of faith–that is, of “choosing to treat a proposition as true despite not having it fully logically proven, generally on the basis of trust in the source”.
Your belief (and my belief, of course) in most of the truths of science is actually on faith, too–unless you’ve sat down and experimentally proved everything from Copernicus to Hawking and Hippocrates to Watson and Crick? Even if you say you have seen their experimental evidence, aren’t you trusting that they aren’t lying to you? Watson and Crick might never have performed the (I believe) polarized light experiment that revealed the dual-helix structure of the DNA molecule.
In the same way, I accept the Christian faith as a true account of truths revealed by God, because (on the basis of a thousand things, some rational and some not), it does not seem to me to be a lie.
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artist3189
Guest
There is no such thing as a Christian atheist. That term has no meaning and contradicts itself, which shouldn’t surprise anyone here, given the level of contradiction in modern society. A ‘Christian’ is someone who follows Christ and his teachings, all of them, not just the ones that seem to fit your life or way of thinking. That means, belief in God, and not just ‘A’ God, but the one true God. Simply by agreeing with a few things Jesus taught, a few things you like, doesn’t make you a Christian. I agree with some of the things Buddha taught, but that doesn’t make me a Buddhist. If you have no belief in God, and deny him, as Christ said, he can deny you. It would seem then, that you put yourself completely on the hope of Gods Mercy for any chance of salvation.I do not know what this term means, but Oriana Fallaci and Luboš Motl are Christian atheists.
For example, Oriana Fallaci writes (phibetacons.nationalreview.com/post/?q=MGY5ZDJkZWQ2MzRjMmNmNzcwNzg5MjQ5NDgyYmU2YWE=):
In addition to call herself a “Christian”, Oriana Fallaci is also an atheist too; she does not believe in God.
Luboš Motl writes (motls.blogspot.com/2006/09/oriana-fallaci-force-of-reason.html):
So do “Christian atheists” have the gift of eternal life, and do they go to heaven? How can one be a Christian and an atheist. If one has to believe that Jesus is God to be a Christian, how can an atheist also be “Christian” since they do not believe in any God, much less the notion that Christ is God.
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