GRcade

Possibly my favourite Christian song is this delightful number by Reverend Alicia. You can really tell she's enjoying herself.

Drumstick wrote:

Ad7 wrote:Oh wait no that's the devil.

You're thinking of Derren Brown.

He's the closest thing we've got

itt

IAmTheSaladMan wrote:Say want you want about Christians, they sure have some catchy songs...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7-NOZU2iPA8

Christian music can be very odd, it seems like a lot of it has nothing to actually do with God, which I guess is fine, maybe the band has Christian values but they don't want to make every single song about God.

It is odd sometimes when there is a song that is very clearly about God, or whatever topic actually and people have no idea. An atheist friend of mine was pretty surprised when I told him Black and Gold, which he really liked was about God, he flat out refused to believe it.



How do you listen to those lyrics and not realize it's about God?

It's like listening to that Before 4 song and not realizing it's about... well you can listen for yourself

Faith +1 is some quality christian rock.

I find myself a lot more interested in the societal/political aspect of religion than the actual theological stuff, find it interesting looking at how it's essentially been used throughout history as a tool for people to gain influence and direct society. Did a lot about the early Islamic world and how religion was co-opted to legitimise the various ruling/conquering forces over the centuries in one of my modules last year, now I'm on another one looking at the development of Islamism and how the initial revivalist/reformist ideologies have been twisted into today's political movements. Also did a module based around medieval Japanese temples and how they fitted into the ruling elite last semester.

Personal opinion on religion is basically that if there is a God/gods, odds are I'm not going to be able to choose the right god(s) to follow the rules of so may as well just try and be nice to everyone and if God isn't chill with that then strawberry float them they're a dickhead and I don't want to be in their dumb afterlife anyway.

The return of one of GRcade's most nuclear threads in a post DISCUSSION world.

20 pages, sure

I'm ignostic. I don't believe humans can comprehend god, but on some level, love is the same force of creation that is "god".

I grew up non-religious but went to CoE school. I believe Jesus was a guru and a nice guy and it sucks he was murdered but resurrection etc, yeeeeah...

The bible is a great book.

I guess I follow some aspects of Buddhism and I meditate as well.

My strongest moral maxim is probably to create not destroy.

Also I got a B in short course GCSE Religious Studies after everyone else walked out and got G grade, this means I'm qualified to lock this topic.

Just kidding.

Green Gecko wrote:The return of one of GRcade's most nuclear threads in a post DISCUSSION world.

20 pages, sure

I'm ignostic. I don't believe humans can comprehend god, but on some level, love is the same force of creation that is "god".

I grew up non-religious but went to CoE school. I believe Jesus was a guru and a nice guy and it sucks he was murdered but resurrection etc, yeeeeah...

The bible is a great book.

I guess I follow some aspects of Buddhism and I meditate as well.

My strongest moral maximum is probably to create not destroy.

Also I got a B in short course GCSE Religious Studies after everyone else walked out and got G grade, this means I'm qualified to lock this topic.

Just kidding.

Interesting. I share a lot of this. Never hear of ignostism before. Feeling a bit non-educated now!

Edit: wiki'd it. Very interesting to read that the term was coined by a humanistic Jew. I'm interested in the concept of non-thesistic religion. Heard of it in a Buddhist and Protestant sense but not Jews before.

For Preezy and Jenuall.

On the issue of prayer and God intervening in the world I thought I would just offer some thoughts.

My favourite answer if anyone asks me if I believe in a God who intervenes in the world is yes, so don't upset me! But as Jenuall has already said, as Christians we have to say prayer is a mystery. There are no easy answers and if we want to claim too much for prayer we end up in deep holes given how messed up the world is.

Christians pray because Jesus taught his disciples to pray. I would suggest most Christians also pray because our experience is perhaps summed up by this quote by William Temple "when I pray, coincidences happen". Again that is not claiming any direct one to one causality, it is a way of putting into words the mystery of prayer. Without opening a much bigger can of theology at this point, perhaps an example might give this some context.

If I pray with someone who is in hospital I would not pray that God turns up with his magic wand and breaks the laws of nature. I would pray that through the care, attention and skill of the doctors and nurses, that they would know the best way to help this person. Now there is clearly a causality between the skill and performance of medical professionals and the outcome for a particular patient. If through this prayer, I believe that those involved in such care might be more alert or less distracted I am not expecting any laws of nature to be broken, but if in some mysterious way that prayer does make the doctor or nurse more focussed then a different outcome could result. Similarly, for the one prayed for, it's easy to see how such a prayer can give them confidence and mental strength which might aid their recovery without violating any laws of nature.

I guess all religions would have different answers for this, but I’ll ask it aimed at Christianity as I’d imagine we have more Christians than other religions.

I’ve always wondered what happened to the “souls” of people that died before even getting a chance to hear of Jesus. As I understand it, in most Christian denominations, the only way into heaven is through believing in and following the teachings of Jesus. Were there different rules for those that lived and died before Jesus was born? What about those born in America or Australia before the Old World landed there and spread the religion?

Heathens

The best Christian song is that one from God's Not Dead about roaring like a lion. Something the Newsrooms I think.

Green Gecko wrote:My strongest moral maximum is probably to create not destroy.

If I cut down a tree to make a fire, did I destroy a tree or create a fire?

Depends, was anyone around to hear you cut the tree down?

OrangeRakoon wrote:If I cut down a tree

Calm down mate, you are a racoon not a beaver.

Sorry, I'll rephrase

If I knock over a bin but eat the contents, did I destroy the bin or create a meal?

OrangeRakoon wrote:Sorry, I'll rephrase

If I knock over a bin but eat the contents, did I destroy the bin or create a meal?

How hard did you knock it over if the bin is destroyed? Do you have weak bins in Reading?

They only collect them every 2 weeks so it was overfull and structurally unsound

That's an excellent question OR. If you can allow me to backpeddle a bit, I would say one can destroy or reform to create anew, provided that net good is created towards happiness. If there is greater overall destruction, particularly suffering, due to natural or unnatural consequence, then I would say to not create that thing, because there is a better way.

That really does make me some like some kind of sustainable design Jesus.