How do you feel about atheists?

[Faithdancer]

I don’t see them as any different than anyone else. People are people.

No. They are like anyone else who is given the choice to believe in God or not, and they’ve chosen the latter. In general that question is there for everyone “Do you believe in God?” and God gave everyone a free will. It is up to them to decide, if they say “no” then why should I pity them for using the free will God gave them?

I hope for everyone, no one religious group over another, no difference between theist, non-theist and anti-theist. I do pray them along with everyone else.

I use to belong to a philosophy forum and would “debate” with atheist, but the forum was taken over by another forum and it wasn’t the same, and I left. Now I belong to another forum where the majority are atheist. I don’t debate, discuss, or argue with them. I kinda heard the same argument over and over, where is a tad bit trite. I just don’t find debating with atheists interesting (and can be a bit frustrating) cause they can’t get pass square one. Everything I know is based on that “first truth” - there is a God, and everything I come to know is incorporated onto it. I’ve come to realize the whole metaphysical understanding of God’s place in the universe He created doesn’t matter one iota to an atheist.

When it comes to have a discussion with atheist I always think of this passage. “Do not give dogs what is sacred; do not throw your pearls to pigs. If you do, they may trample them under their feet, and turn and tear you to pieces.” - Matt 7:6 What is sacred in your faith and you have to be careful who you share it with cause they will use that opportunity to criticize and demean either you, your Catholic faith (any religion really) or God. So I try not to give them cause.

Yes, Brother, Matthew 7:6 occurs to me as well. And it might seem Calvinistic but at some point you have to realize that if the atheist is meant to be saved then he will be and if not, All we can do is present the truth and then keep them in our prayers.

 

[adamhovey1988]

How do you feel about atheists? Do you pity them? Hope for them? Argue with them? Pray for them?

Love them.

 

[RebeccaJ]

Yes. Mine hasn’t started yet. Schools open Wednesday. I look forward to continue my efforts to subtly evangelize while teaching.

Good luck. I’m in the tech field, for a media/entertainment organization. All very behind the scenes. I’m like the computer nerd in a movie, whose desk is somewhere, no one really knows for sure where. I exist when something tech doesn’t work satisfactorily, and it feels good to call someone (me and others) to do something about it.

But I like what I do. Satisfying when everything is working satisfactory and my existence has been forgotten. Then I can do what I want.

Right now, changes are being made for the sake of change, errr, progress. So I’m heads down getting new stuff to work. Servers, databases, applications and whatnots. I’d like to evangelize those servers. Maybe I can give them saint names, and they’d act like holy servers rather than the demons they’re being at the moment.

 

[Jelrak_TB]

I don’t see them as any different than anyone else. People are people.

No. They are like anyone else who is given the choice to believe in God or not, and they’ve chosen the latter. In general that question is there for everyone “Do you believe in God?” and God gave everyone a free will. It is up to them to decide, if they say “no” then why should I pity them for using the free will God gave them?

I hope for everyone, no one religious group over another, no difference between theist, non-theist and anti-theist. I do pray them along with everyone else.

I use to belong to a philosophy forum and would “debate” with atheist, but the forum was taken over by another forum and it wasn’t the same, and I left. Now I belong to another forum where the majority are atheist. I don’t debate, discuss, or argue with them. I kinda heard the same argument over and over, where is a tad bit trite. I just don’t find debating with atheists interesting (and can be a bit frustrating) cause they can’t get pass square one. Everything I know is based on that “first truth” - there is a God, and everything I come to know is incorporated onto it. I’ve come to realize the whole metaphysical understanding of God’s place in the universe He created doesn’t matter one iota to an atheist.

When it comes to have a discussion with atheist I always think of this passage. “Do not give dogs what is sacred; do not throw your pearls to pigs. If you do, they may trample them under their feet, and turn and tear you to pieces.” - Matt 7:6 What is sacred in your faith and you have to be careful who you share it with cause they will use that opportunity to criticize and demean either you, your Catholic faith (any religion really) or God. So I try not to give them cause.

A fair strategy…for the atheist is not likely to be convinced by argument, but by action…

 

[PRmerger]

A fair strategy…for the atheist is not likely to be convinced by argument, but by action…

I don’t know this to be true.

Many an atheist has been converted first by the argument. That’s the purpose of apologetics: get to the heart through the head.

You can’t love what you don’t know.

 

[PRmerger]

I do not know if it is or not. For example, can you imagine telling people 1000 years ago we would know what the stars are composed of.

This sounds suspiciously like a prompt for the Science of the Gaps argument.

 

[PRmerger]

We know when through repetition we can find correlations between the emotions and physiological, chemical and brain reactions. there are literally 1000s of papers on this subject.

And there are literally 1000s of papers on the existence of God.

Just apply your skepticism to these arguments to me.

#wedontfindtheevidencecompelling
#wearethesame

 

[CompSciGuy]

I am currently reading Trent Horn’s “Answering Atheism.”

He points out that, while many “new atheists” do not have a lot of respect when addressing Christianity, we do not have the excuse to take the same approach.

Most of the atheists I have encountered have a lot of hostility. This makes it difficult for me to have conversations with them. I had a friend back in college who was, for the most part, a respectful atheist and we had a lot of dialogue about Christianity and atheism. When I left college, however, it seems like he became increasingly hostile and anti-religious. It was sad to see that happening to him. I don’t use facebook anymore but I did whenever ISIS was first making the news. I had set my profile picture to the Nazarene symbol in solidarity with the Christians being killed and persecuted over there. He told me that I was wrong to do that and that this was a form of tribalism. But then whenever the Charlie Hebdo attacks happened he changed his profile picture to a “Je Suis Charlie” picture. Apparently it isn’t tribalism when atheists do it. He also told me that he believes atheists should use intentionally offensive rhetoric when talking about religion (I assume he learned this from Sam Harris).

I realize that most hostile atheism happens online. I think YouTube is the most obvious example of this. The comment section is full of irate atheists and there are plenty of YouTube channels by atheists getting angry about everything you could imagine and making all kinds of straw man attacks on Christianity. Unfortunately this is really the only kind of atheism I am usually exposed to. I kind of doubt that most people have the guts to say such nasty things to someone’s face… the anonymity of the web seems to magnify people’s obnoxiousness.

My older brother is an atheist, though he isn’t quite as outspoken, but he makes his positions clear when we do talk about it.

 

[PRmerger]

Sye Ten is that you?

Hey…be careful, MrE.

It’s good for you to be here and in dialogue with knowledgeable Catholics.

Insulting members, even with a smiley face, is not permitted.

At any rate, could you please answer the question I posed:

“Incidentally, are you absolutely certain that your last sentence is true?”

Please answer, in light of the doctrine you asserted here:

I find the certainty of your position to be worrying and perplexing. The journey to truth is a long and ever changing road; and the instant you make claims of absolute certainty you have already stepped off it.

 

[PRmerger]

Actually the do sell chemicals to alter human emotion, the are called antidepressants and 100s of millions of people take them.

So here’s where that fundamentalist thinking comes in.

No one here ought to be denying that chemicals alter human emotion.
Heck, anyone who’s lived with a prepubescent teen knows that!

What we do deny is that emotions are ONLY the result of chemical stimulation.

Someone said (Napolean, I believe): scratch a Russian, find a Tartar.
Now, it’s scratch an atheist, find a fundamentalist.

 

[estesbob]

Good luck. I’m in the tech field, for a media/entertainment organization. All very behind the scenes. I’m like the computer nerd in a movie, whose desk is somewhere, no one really knows for sure where. I exist when something tech doesn’t work satisfactorily, and it feels good to call someone (me and others) to do something about it.

But I like what I do. Satisfying when everything is working satisfactory and my existence has been forgotten. Then I can do what I want.

Right now, changes are being made for the sake of change, errr, progress. So I’m heads down getting new stuff to work. Servers, databases, applications and whatnots. I’d like to evangelize those servers. Maybe I can give them saint names, and they’d act like holy servers rather than the demons they’re being at the moment.

I wish you could come evangelize one of the printers in my office that suddenly decided to start printing in Klingon and only partial pages at that . I did manage to find an obscure setting having something to do with soft fonts that seems to have appeased the computer gods for now

 

[Contarini]

I do not know if it is or not. For example, can you imagine telling people 1000 years ago we would know what the stars are composed of.

That wouldn’t have surprised any educated person 1000 years ago. Shucks, people were discussing this sort of thing 2500 years ago in Greece and Asia Minor.

Edwin

 

[PRmerger]

And that is where we differ, I am not convinced there is a who.

But you ought to consider the possibility that there is a Who.

Also, I know you’ve been busy, as all of us typically are, but you asserted that you could provide independently verifiable evidence for the existence of the mind and the existence of numbers.

Could you please do so?

 

[MrEmpiricism]

Hey…be careful, MrE.

It’s good for you to be here and in dialogue with knowledgeable Catholics.

Insulting members, even with a smiley face, is not permitted.

At any rate, could you please answer the question I posed:

“Incidentally, are you absolutely certain that your last sentence is true?”

Please answer, in light of the doctrine you asserted here:

Apologies, I honestly meant no offensive I was making a light the question you asked me as that is one of Sye Tens favourite tricks. Let me explain it this way, I reject the very notion of absolute certainty, so the question you then asked me clearly makes no sense for you are asking me to apply a concept that I just told you I reject.

 

[Jelrak_TB]

I don’t know this to be true.

Many an atheist has been converted first by the argument. That’s the purpose of apologetics: get to the heart through the head.

You can’t love what you don’t know.

Is it possible to love a thing without witnessing it in action? Would a pure argument for the potentially unknowable sway the skeptic without proof? Is not action potentially the greatest quiet proof of all?

 

[PRmerger]

Would a pure argument for the potentially unknowable sway the skeptic without proof?

That is a tautology. It’s saying, "Would a proof for God not sway the skeptic without proof?

 

[MrEmpiricism]

So here’s where that fundamentalist thinking comes in.

No one here ought to be denying that chemicals alter human emotion.
Heck, anyone who’s lived with a prepubescent teen knows that!

What we do deny is that emotions are ONLY the result of chemical stimulation.

Someone said (Napolean, I believe): scratch a Russian, find a Tartar.
Now, it’s scratch an atheist, find a fundamentalist.

I have never said that it is ONLY the result of chemical stimulation.

 

[PRmerger]

Apologies, I honestly meant no offensive I was making a light the question you asked me as that is one of Sye Tens favourite tricks. Let me explain it this way, I reject the very notion of absolute certainty,

Which means, amusingly, that you are quite certain that there is no such thing as absolute certainty.

#inconsistent
#selfrefuting

 

[MrEmpiricism]

That wouldn’t have surprised any educated person 1000 years ago. Shucks, people were discussing this sort of thing 2500 years ago in Greece and Asia Minor.

Edwin

people were discussing a star being a thermonuclear fusion of hydrogen into helium?

 

[PRmerger]

I have never said that it is ONLY the result of chemical stimulation.

So what else is emotion the product of?