Do I need to be born again?

[itsjustdave1988]

continued …

**Dr. Colin Patterson, Senior Paleontologist, British Museum of Natural History, London: **

“One of the reasons I started taking this anti-evolutionary view, was … it struck me that I had been working on this stuff for twenty years and there was not one thing I knew about it. That’s quite a shock to learn that one can be so misled so long. …so for the last few weeks I’ve tried putting a simple question to various people and groups of people. Question is: Can you tell me anything you know about evolution, any one thing that is true? I tried that question on the geology staff at the Field Museum of Natural History and the only answer I got was silence. I tried it on the members of the Evolutionary Morphology Seminar in the University of Chicago, a very prestigious body of evolutionists, and all I got there was silence for a long time and eventually one person said, ‘I do know one thing – it ought not to be taught in high school’.” (Keynote address at the American Museum of Natural History, New York City, 5 November, 1981)

One last quote that you ought to consider…

“A little science estranges a man from God; a lot of science brings him back.”

– Sir Francis Bacon

 

[pipoluojo]

Dear Atheist-699,
Your contribution to this thread started by me simply emphasises what I was trying to p(name removed by moderator)oint: that non-catholics do not mean the same thing as catholics when they talk about being born again. I was saying that going by the non-catholic interpretation, catholics should rather claim to be “more than born again”.
Your initial response shows you did not really understand what was being discussed. You merely jumped at the title and ended up showing me in particular how wrong an atheist could be. If your understanding of what constitutes ‘fun’ happens to be the majority view, I’d rather look for another word because you and I cannot be talking about the same thing when we talk about having fun. To you, to have fun is to do what you like when you like it and how you like it.To me, it shall ever mean to do what I like as, and how, God my Father likes it.(I wouldn’t expect you to block your ears at this truth; you asked me for it). Why do you, in proving mathematical theorems get to a point where you can only continue by supposing that what is not is, and use that supposition ( e.g. supposing x = 1) to arrive at the answer? Why make x = 1 and not 7)? If science is an end unto itself, why the so common admission of assumptions?
By the way, I’d be interested in your (QED, without any assumptions) answer to the questions you were asked.
By coming this way I appreciate you and love you. I’d ask you to continue to seek objectively. And may your soul never rest until it finds Him.

 

[Riley259]

Atheist-669:

I just said there ARE evidence that supports this theory, that’s what makes it different from all the other theories. Evidence: ANTI-MATTER EXISTS, and there must per definiton be just as much anti-matter as “normal” matter. Or else the universe wouldn’t be circular, and we already know it is, because it WILL collapse within a “couple” billion years.I’ve already asked you not to take me, but the case. What I am and what I mean is irrelevant for the case itself.Big Bang didn’t happen. The anti-matter theory proves it wrong. And just what do you suggest this “transcendent force” outside four dimensions is? I’d like to see it. Time is not a dimension, since it is only controlled by wheter atoms are spinning or not. (When no atom spins, time just isn’t. If the anti-matter theory is correct, then time is “reset” every time the two universes collapses).

Big Bang didn’t happen, huh - tell that to 99+% of the other scientists and cosmologists who are almost certain that it did. String theory suggests that there are at least 6 or 7 other dimensions besides that 4 that we experience. You make it sound like your previously mentioned anti-matter/matter plate theory is a verifiable fact - it’s not and you know it. It’s just a theory. Even if it were true it still doesn’t explain where the matter and anti-matter and quantum particles came from. The latest science indicates that the universe will expand forever (due to dark energy) not collapse. That transcendent force is Existence itself , the One who possesses the fullness of existence all at once - God.

 

[Atheist-669]

I’m sorry all,

I have spent way to much time on these questions right now, and everytime I (in my opinion) answer one, two more pops up.

In a few hours there are 9 more posts here that I am supposed to reply to, and I just don’t have the time to do it.

I am sorry for all the time you spent writing these last posts because I will not answer any more posts. I did not intend to be discussing with …what is it now … 12 - 14 (?) persons.

I am leaving this forum right now, and I will probably not return, I just can’t spend my time on this anymore, and neither should any of you spend your time discussing with me. We obviously have two entirely different ground views on life. Actually, it might be three different views, while some of you are quite a bit different too, but who agrees on everything?

To Pipoluojo:
I did not intend to waste your thread by bringing all these other discussions along. Hope you found answers in posts that arrived before I got here

To Riley:
If anti-matter exists, the Big Bang theory is way to unlikely to have found place, and the only reason many scientists still believe in the BB theory is because no other theory has been explored to that extent, yet.

To Dave:
That’s a nice lot of quotes you got there, but I thought you had guessed by now that nothing but your own words will impress me. (hehehe and so on → that’s ok )

To Robert:
I will ask you to think less about the “we are only atoms anyway” quote. It will eventually blind you from the fact that I have realized in here, “we are only humans anyway” . That does NOT mean I am no longer an Atheist (I will always be, promised), but I will no longer be as hard on that subject because I don’t want to ruin other person’s positive view of life. Please respect your fellow friends and humans, not for society’s sake, but for me and and your friends and family.

To the rest:
Thank you all for an interesting discussion. Best of luck, fare well!

 

[RNRobert]

itsjustdave1988:

Some quotes from other scientists you ought to consider …

Nobel prize winning Chemist, Harold Urey:

All of us who study the origin of life find that the more we look into it , the more we feel that it is too complex to have evolved anywhere.

We all believe, as an article of faith, that life evolved from dead matter on this planet. It’s just that its complexity is so great, that its hard for us to imagine that it did" (Christian Science Monitor, Jan 4, 1962, p.4, emphasis added)

I came across another quote that is apropos. It is by a D.M.S. Watson, in a 1943 issue of Nineteenth Century, that I found in C.S. Lewis’s essay The Funeral of a Great Myth in the anthology Christian Reflections*:*

Evolution is accepted by zoologists not because it has been observed to occur or…can be proved by logically coherent evidence to be true, but because the only alternative, special creation, is clearly incredible. (emphasis added).

Hmm… Seems like a faith to me.

 

[RNRobert]

Atheist-669:

To Robert:
I will ask you to think less about the “we are only atoms anyway” quote. It will eventually blind you from the fact that I have realized in here, “we are only humans anyway” . That does NOT mean I am no longer an Atheist (I will always be, promised), but I will no longer be as hard on that subject because I don’t want to ruin other person’s positive view of life. Please respect your fellow friends and humans, not for society’s sake, but for me and and your friends and family.

I already repect my fellow friends and humans. I do so because we are all God’s children, created to love and serve one another. This is what I was trying (perhaps unsuccessfully) to lead you to. As Doestoyevsky wrote in The Brothers Karamazov, “If there is no God, all is lawful.” C.S. Lewis explained in his book The Abolition of Man how most laws were based on religion. If you ever come across it, I highly recommend it. I would also recommend his book Mere Christianity (particularly the first couple chapters).

 

[itsjustdave1988]

Atheist-669,

The reason I posted the quotes from scientists, many being nobel prize winners, is that you seemed to assert that it was due to your science studies that you believe your conclusions are so obviously true. I suggest you haven’t studied enough. There are many with a greater study of science than either you or I who draw a completely different conclusion. It seems to me that Sir Francis Bacon is correct… “A little science estranges a man from God; a lot of science brings him back.”

Perhaps you too will figure this out. Good luck.

"I want to know God’s thoughts. The rest are just details."
– Albert Einstein

 

[itsjustdave1988]

Back to the original question … Do I need to be born again?

No. Unless of couse, you’d like to avoid hell.

 

[mlchance]

Atheist-669:

What I see, read, hear, experience, is that when you die, it’s over.

Let’s break these down:

What you see: You actually saw that when someone dies that there is no afterlife?

What you read: You’ve actually read primary source accounts of people who have died and not experienced an afterlife?

What you experience: You’ve actually died and not experienced an afterlife, but then somehow came back to life to tell us about it?

Earlier on, you asked me what I believe. Here’s what I believe: You don’t have a single good, philosophical or scientific reason to not believe in an afterlife. Everything that I’ve seen, read, and experienced in this thread supports *that *belief.

Atheist-669:

Big Bang didn’t happen. The anti-matter theory proves it wrong.

A theory, especially one that cannot be tested, can’t prove anything wrong.

Atheist-669:

And by the way archeologists have proved against some of the theories you just claimed about Jesus. He never leaved that grave.

Which archaeologists? When? In which journal were these findings published?

– Mark L. Chance.

 

[itsjustdave1988]

What you see: You actually saw that when someone dies that there is no afterlife?

Ya know, I read that in Plato’s time, accounts of near-death experiences are strikingly similar to today’s accounts. I read where a blind lady “saw” herself and could describe the room where she “died” and was medically revived. I found that rather interesting.

 

[Riley259]

Now that Atheist 669 is gone I’ll answer the original question again. No, once you’ve been baptized you don’t need to be born again. An evangelical Protestant may have a different answer, though. God Bless.

 

[hermit]

Jesus’s statement on the necessity of being born again is crystal clear to anyone who understands Zen.