Does Satan have our world under a strong spell?

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CHRISTINE77 said:
I’m curious where you got that figure. 13% of the population of what?
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Yes I would like to know as well. I don’t doubt it. Atheism isn’t as big as people think it is. You must remember there are many many people who profess belief in God but don’t practice any religion
 
LoganBice said:
Yes I would like to know as well. I don’t doubt it. Atheism isn’t as big as people think it is. You must remember there are many many people who profess belief in God but don’t practice any religion
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I know but I don’t know what he/she is talking about when they say “god”.
 
Winterwolf00 said:
So truth is based on popularity according to you?
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“It is rare that the public sentiment decides immorally or unwisely, and the individual who differs from it ought to distrust and examine well his own opinions.” Thomas Jefferson

(Excerpts, letter from Thomas Jefferson to John Adams, April 11, 1823)

“I can never join Calvin in addressing his God. He was indeed an atheist, which I could never be; or rather his religion was daemonism. If ever man worshipped a false god, he did. The being described in his 5 points is not the God whom you and I acknowledge and adore, the Creator and benevolent governor of the world; but a daemon of malignant spirit. It would be more pardonable to believe in no god at all, than to blaspheme him by the atrocious attributes of Calvin…. (Here Jefferson goes on to talk about the French atheists.) The argument which they rest on as triumphant and unanswerable is that, in every hypothesis of cosmogony, you must admit an eternal pre-existence of something; and according to the rule of sound philosophy, you are never to employ two principles to solve a difficulty when one will suffice. They say, then, that it is more simple to believe at once in the eternal pre-existence of the world, as it is now going on, and may forever go on by the principle of reproduction which we see and witness, than to believe in the eternal pre-existence of an ulterior cause, or creator of the world, a being whom we see not, and know not, of whose form substance and mode or place of existence, or of action no sense informs us, no power of the mind enables us to delineate or comprehend. On the contrary, I hold (without appeal to revelation) that when we take a view of the Universe in its parts general or particular, it is impossible for the human mind not to perceive and feel a conviction of design, consummate skill, and infinite power in every atom of its composition. The movements of the heavenly bodies, so exactly held in their course by the balance centrifugal and centripetal forces, the structure of our earth itself, with its distribution of lands, waters, and atmosphere, animal and vegetable bodies, examined in all their minutest particles, insects mere atoms of life, yet as perfectly organized as man or mammoth, the mineral substances, the generation and uses, it is impossible, I say, for the human mind not to believe that there is, in all this, design, cause and effect, up to an ultimate cause, a fabricator of all things from matter and motion, their preserver and regulator while permitted to exist in their present forms, and their regenerator into new and other forms. We see too, evident proofs of the necessity of a superintending power to maintain the Universe in its course and order. Stars, well known, have disappeared, new ones have come into view, comets, in their incalculable courses, may run foul of suns and planets and require renovation under other laws; certain races of animals are become extinct; and, were there no restoring power, all existences might extinguish successively, one by one, until all should be reduced to a shapeless chaos. So irresistible are these evidences of an intelligent and powerful Agent that, of the infinite members of man who have existed through all time, they have believed in the proportion of a million at least to Unit, in the hypothesis of an eternal pre-existence of a creator, rather than in that of a self-existent Universe. Surely this unanimous sentiment renders this more probable than that of the few in the other hypothesis.”
 
CHRISTINE77 said:
I’m curious where you got that figure. 13% of the population of what?
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LoganBice said:
Yes I would like to know as well. I don’t doubt it. Atheism isn’t as big as people think it is. You must remember there are many many people who profess belief in God but don’t practice any religion
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That’s the percentage for the planet.
In that large of a context such a high percentage is actually pretty believable.
 
Charlemagne_III said:
“It is rare that the public sentiment decides immorally or unwisely, and the individual who differs from it ought to distrust and examine well his own opinions.” Thomas Jefferson

(Excerpts, letter from Thomas Jefferson to John Adams, April 11, 1823)

“I can never join Calvin in addressing his God. He was indeed an atheist, which I could never be; or rather his religion was daemonism. If ever man worshipped a false god, he did. The being described in his 5 points is not the God whom you and I acknowledge and adore, the Creator and benevolent governor of the world; but a daemon of malignant spirit. It would be more pardonable to believe in no god at all, than to blaspheme him by the atrocious attributes of Calvin…. (Here Jefferson goes on to talk about the French atheists.) The argument which they rest on as triumphant and unanswerable is that, in every hypothesis of cosmogony, you must admit an eternal pre-existence of something; and according to the rule of sound philosophy, you are never to employ two principles to solve a difficulty when one will suffice. They say, then, that it is more simple to believe at once in the eternal pre-existence of the world, as it is now going on, and may forever go on by the principle of reproduction which we see and witness, than to believe in the eternal pre-existence of an ulterior cause, or creator of the world, a being whom we see not, and know not, of whose form substance and mode or place of existence, or of action no sense informs us, no power of the mind enables us to delineate or comprehend. On the contrary, I hold (without appeal to revelation) that when we take a view of the Universe in its parts general or particular, it is impossible for the human mind not to perceive and feel a conviction of design, consummate skill, and infinite power in every atom of its composition. The movements of the heavenly bodies, so exactly held in their course by the balance centrifugal and centripetal forces, the structure of our earth itself, with its distribution of lands, waters, and atmosphere, animal and vegetable bodies, examined in all their minutest particles, insects mere atoms of life, yet as perfectly organized as man or mammoth, the mineral substances, the generation and uses, it is impossible, I say, for the human mind not to believe that there is, in all this, design, cause and effect, up to an ultimate cause, a fabricator of all things from matter and motion, their preserver and regulator while permitted to exist in their present forms, and their regenerator into new and other forms. We see too, evident proofs of the necessity of a superintending power to maintain the Universe in its course and order. Stars, well known, have disappeared, new ones have come into view, comets, in their incalculable courses, may run foul of suns and planets and require renovation under other laws; certain races of animals are become extinct; and, were there no restoring power, all existences might extinguish successively, one by one, until all should be reduced to a shapeless chaos. So irresistible are these evidences of an intelligent and powerful Agent that, of the infinite members of man who have existed through all time, they have believed in the proportion of a million at least to Unit, in the hypothesis of an eternal pre-existence of a creator, rather than in that of a self-existent Universe. Surely this unanimous sentiment renders this more probable than that of the few in the other hypothesis.”
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So is that a yes?
 
PeopleB4Things said:
I think homosexuality is of God and is not the work of Satan or a black magic spell like thing. We see homosexuality throughout God’s creation, not just in humans.
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We also see disease and deformity throughout God’s creation. We see God’s creations (people) harm one another. The point being: that something is seen in creation really has no bearing on the question of its morality.
Homosexuality is a instrument of love and communion.
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How do you figure this? What does this even mean? I have good friends who are lesbians, who I think are wonderful and good people. But this doesn’t mean that every action they take is therefore of God.

And this is such a broad, blanket statement, that it ignores a great deal of the typical behaviors that go on among homosexual men. For instance, let’s take the fact that homosexual men typically have an exponentially higher number of sexual partners over the course of their lives. A gay man is much more likely than a straight man, for instance, to go to clubs where he has sex (sodomy) with multiple people in one night. Gay men are much more likely, as a result, to have diseases, and to die early.

How does any of this translate to your broad blanket, across the board assertion that ‘homosexuality is an instrument of love and communion?’

I stress again that I know gay people I think are wonderful human beings who are not living like that. But I also know (from some online forums) plenty of people whose homosexuality seems to be bringing them a great deal of physical and emotional pain, which does not seem to me to be the natural fruit of ‘an instrument of love and communion.’
To deny God’s creation is itself a human failure, a sin. We can read about it in our human written books, we can talk about it in our human written homilies, but those things don’t make the acts of judgment and hubris any less sinful.
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These are beautifully written words, but what do they actually mean? What does it mean to ‘deny God’s creation?’ To disagree with a behavior? To believe that homosexual acts are against God’s will? If disagreeing with a behavior is denying God’s creation, then is it also denying God’s creation to disagree with smoking or drunkenness or premarital sex or abortion?

What do you mean by ‘judgment?’ Judging another’s heart and deciding they belong in Hell? Or discerning the morality of an action? We are commanded not to do the first. We are commanded* to *do the second. (If your brother sins, confront him. If he won’t listen, bring in another. If he still won’t listen, bring in the whole church… Shake the dust from your feet and leave… Go and sin no more.)

But it has become a convenient tool these days to claim that any opinion at all about another’s BEHAVIOR and ACTIONS is ‘judgment.’
We should humble ourselves in the face of his creation, not try to correct God for his poor workmanship. God is love. We judge God when we judge love. So that begs the question, who are we to judge what is in the hearts of our homosexual brothers and sisters?
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Again: that a person is God’s creation does not mean that all of their ACTIONS and BEHAVIORS are good and pure, or that we must hold our tongue about immoral BEHAVIORS. To say that a BEHAVIOR is wrong is not correcting God’s workmanship.

To link ‘judging love’ to a discussion of homosexuality is disingenuous. Nobody is judging ‘love.’ We are talking about sodomy, a sexual ACTION. We are not talking about judging the hearts of others, but about the morality of the BEHAVIOR of sexual actions between two people of the same sex.
 
Winterwolf00 said:
Sure.
I figured that just posting a wiki page would be considered insufficient so I followed the citation.
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Religious: 59% Not Religious: 23% Atheists: 13%

That only says that 13 percent are atheists. 23% are probably not thinking about God or gods at all.
 
CHRISTINE77 said:
Religious: 59% Not Religious: 23% Atheists: 13%

That only says that 13 percent are atheists. 23% are probably not thinking about God or gods at all.
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Um yeah I said as much.
And the 23 percent are theists who don’t identify with an organized religion, so yes they are thinking of a god.
 
CHRISTINE77 said:
Religious: 59% Not Religious: 23% Atheists: 13%

That only says that 13 percent are atheists. 23% are probably not thinking about God or gods at all.
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Of the 59% Religious…many go to church on Sunday or on Easter & Christmas, and that’s it!
 
Winterwolf00 said:
So is that a yes?
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I agree with Jefferson’s view that when the vast majority take one position, and the slight minority take the opposite view, we do well to question more sternly the view of the slight minority. The slight minority could be right, but it’s far more likely they will be wrong.

Theism offers us many choices. Atheism offers us but one grim finale six feet under.

Humans favor choices. 🤷
 
Charlemagne_III said:
I agree with Jefferson’s view that when the vast majority take one position, and the slight minority take the opposite view, we do well to question more sternly the view of the slight minority. The slight minority could be right, but it’s far more likely they will be wrong.

Theism offers us many choices. Atheism offers us but one grim finale six feet under.

Humans favor choices. 🤷
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Sorry but reality is not a matter of public opinion.
The world did not cease to be flat because people stopped thinking it was.
 
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