Gallup poll on the Bible

[Kharakov]

Given conscious cherry picking of chapter and verse for the purpose of deception, I wonder how some Preachers manage to live with themselves.

What makes you believe that they are consciously doing so? Their consciousness could be on the deceived side of the line, while they act instinctively to preserve the pleasant deception that provides them with food, shelter, wealth, happiness, and comfort.

OR rather, autonomic instinctual processes create a comfy heaven for their conscious state by preventing them from knowing certain facts about reality.

 

[Underseer]

Gallup's latest poll on American's view of the Bible shows some heartening news. 21% of us no longer accept it as anything but a collection of myths and fables. That's up from 10% in the mid-80's. In the meantime, literal belief in the bible has decreased to an all time low of only 28%. The middle view has stayed steady.

http://www.gallup.com/poll/170834/three-four-bible-word-god.aspx

Here is the poll results:

View attachment 413

Note though the slight growth in religious belief after 2009. I would attribute this to the recession. Gains made against religious belief are very fragile. We still have a tendency to revert to religion in the face of troubled times.

SLD

Judging from the graph, it looks like the increase in our numbers is coming almost entirely from biblical literalists, which corroborates what I've seen in the deconversion testimonials on this forum.

 

[DBT]

Given conscious cherry picking of chapter and verse for the purpose of deception, I wonder how some Preachers manage to live with themselves.

What makes you believe that they are consciously doing so? Their consciousness could be on the deceived side of the line, while they act instinctively to preserve the pleasant deception that provides them with food, shelter, wealth, happiness, and comfort. OR rather, autonomic instinctual processes create a comfy heaven for their conscious state by preventing them from knowing certain facts about reality.

Quite possibly. And that is probably the most common condition, and why I specified ''some Preachers.'' Some Preachers being those who become conscious of the discrepancies and the contradictions, the absurdities and the deceptions yet keep on their chosen mission to convert the unbeliever and tend to the spiritual needs of their flock.

 

[Kharakov]

Given conscious cherry picking of chapter and verse for the purpose of deception, I wonder how some Preachers manage to live with themselves.

What makes you believe that they are consciously doing so? Their consciousness could be on the deceived side of the line, while they act instinctively to preserve the pleasant deception that provides them with food, shelter, wealth, happiness, and comfort. OR rather, autonomic instinctual processes create a comfy heaven for their conscious state by preventing them from knowing certain facts about reality.

Quite possibly. And that is probably the most common condition, and why I specified ''some Preachers.'' Some Preachers being those who become conscious of the discrepancies and the contradictions, the absurdities and the deceptions yet keep on their chosen mission to convert the unbeliever and tend to the spiritual needs of their flock.

Maybe they believe they are comforting their flock?

 

[DBT]

Given conscious cherry picking of chapter and verse for the purpose of deception, I wonder how some Preachers manage to live with themselves.

What makes you believe that they are consciously doing so? Their consciousness could be on the deceived side of the line, while they act instinctively to preserve the pleasant deception that provides them with food, shelter, wealth, happiness, and comfort. OR rather, autonomic instinctual processes create a comfy heaven for their conscious state by preventing them from knowing certain facts about reality.

Quite possibly. And that is probably the most common condition, and why I specified ''some Preachers.'' Some Preachers being those who become conscious of the discrepancies and the contradictions, the absurdities and the deceptions yet keep on their chosen mission to convert the unbeliever and tend to the spiritual needs of their flock.

Maybe they believe they are comforting their flock?

Maybe some preachers do believe that. If so, this still entails the conscious use of lies and deception by the preacher who has lost faith.

 

[Kharakov]

It's almost like they preserve the faith in others because they care about what others feel, and know that there are innocent minds within their flock, minds that have somehow made it to adulthood without losing their faith, minds that do not deserve to have this light of faith ripped from their hearts by the cold, harsh hands of reality (joking- reality doesn't have hands, it has claws, and they are dripping with molten spacetime, ripped from the chaos aether).

 

[Red_Geranium]

In my experience growing up in the Baptist church, people were encouraged to read the Bible for themselves. Our church thought it was really important for all Christians to know their holy book and to be able to explain what they believe and why. There was a big emphasis on scripture reading - you just had to do it using a particular set of 'axioms' (for lack of a better word).
- The preacher is an expert
- The Bible is completely true and good
- If science or history contradicts the Bible, the historical/scientific scholarship is wrong
- If the Bible appears to contradict itself, the reader is necessarily wrong about at least one passage in question

Also, at that point in time, while the church's position was that the Bible was the true, perfect word of God, they did not insist on taking every word of it literally. (I never got a good answer about how to know what's literal and what's not...but that's the topic of another conversation!) From what I understand, the Southern Baptist Convention has moved much more toward a literalist position over the past couple of decades.

Here's another interesting observation: While certainly not everyone who reads the whole thing de-converts, most of the ex-fundamentalists I know personally (de-converted entirely or moved to a non-fundamentalist church) are folks who put a lot of time and energy into studying it.

 

[Malintent]

What is the OT but a "stage setter" for the NT, right?

HUGE

I like to say that the OT is the bible inspired by the creator... as for the NT.. any asshole can write a sequel.

 

[credoconsolans]

Gallup's latest poll on American's view of the Bible shows some heartening news. 21% of us no longer accept it as anything but a collection of myths and fables. That's up from 10% in the mid-80's. In the meantime, literal belief in the bible has decreased to an all time low of only 28%. The middle view has stayed steady.

http://www.gallup.com/poll/170834/three-four-bible-word-god.aspx

Here is the poll results:

View attachment 413

Note though the slight growth in religious belief after 2009. I would attribute this to the recession. Gains made against religious belief are very fragile. We still have a tendency to revert to religion in the face of troubled times.

SLD

We always will. When people feel helpless and powerless, people will turn to religion.

 

[dockeen]

There is a newish, yet oldish way of looking at the bible. It says that, no matter how hard or prayerfully one studies the bible, there will be parts that one will not understand until one gets to heaven and talks to the father, and gets the Aha! moment. These are tests of faith, sand traps on the way to the heavenly 18th hole.

 

[ideologyhunter]

In that case, god needs to have a walking, talking snake on the premises. I want to see how the damn thing walks, and then and I want to talk to it, and come to think of it, I want to see that talking jackass from Numbers, too. If I can see that, it'll be a different story. 'Excuse me, god, I had it all wrong.' And if god is really a forgiving fellow, he'll pat me on the head and make all the people who just believed this crap on the face of it wear dunce caps. It could happen.