Thomas II
Contributor
It's not a matter of being mutually exclusive. Works stand on it's own. Faith needs works to be alive.
People without faith can do good.
"Works" means "good deeds".
Faith is not a deed. It's a belief.
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Heartsick Boy Asks If Atheist Dad Is In Heaven. Pope Francis Reveals The Answer With A Hug.
- Thread starter Potoooooooo
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It's not a matter of being mutually exclusive. Works stand on it's own. Faith needs works to be alive.
People without faith can do good.
"Works" means "good deeds".
Faith is not a deed. It's a belief.
Thomas II
Contributor
Good exists before your faith.
Jimmy Higgins
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Who needs faith when pain and joy actually exist and can be felt and seen?
To reduce pain and increase joy is ‘good’.
T.G.G. Moogly
Traditional Atheist
Too bad the kid had to even experience this situation. Seems like a story about a good family, the head of which knew gods were just pretend. Maybe in another couple thousand years we'll read about it in revised gospels.
All things considered, Frankie did okay. He really is a good person at heart, that much is obvious. Can't say that for lots of other religious indoctrinees.
All things considered, Frankie did okay. He really is a good person at heart, that much is obvious. Can't say that for lots of other religious indoctrinees.
Can you imagine what it'd feel like to stick a pin in a baby's eyeball and make it scream in agony?
Would you feel good or bad about the pain you caused?
Did you need a "datum" ... a mere idea about "sticking pins in baby's eyes is bad" ... to know (bodily feel) that doing such a thing would be bad?
Knowing is deeper than just merely believing an idea.
Surely at some level you already know this, in spite of the religious training.
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ideologyhunter
Contributor
Fuck the dad. I wanna know if the kid will get to see his puppy in heaven. What do you think, kids in the crowd? Would god be a big meanie and kick the puppy out of heaven? And it was a good puppy, too. "There's your answer, little boy."
I'm pretty sure that puppy was licking his own balls. You can't get into Heaven if you self-pleasure. Every sperm is sacred.
braces_for_impact
Veteran Member
Catholicism, hell religion, in general, reminds me of the golden rule of pencil and paper RPG's. Never allow the rules to get in the way of a good story.
Ramaraksha
Senior Member
Reminds me of Hitler's Germany - Hitler didn't care who the Jew was - what he/she did, what they did in life, good or bad, all it mattered was that they were Jews. Same thing under ISIS - being non-muslim was a crime enough
And we see the same thing here - not being a Christian is a crime punishable by being sent to Gas Chambers in Hell!
But while Hitler and ISIS are deemed evil and there are reams and reams of letters, articles, editorials and movies - religious hate and division is actually promoted all around the world!
"Jesus wants you in heaven but he can save you only if you accept him" - that's the nice version of pushing the same idea
The idea also says morals and ethics do not matter to God - all that matters is one's religious affiliation - God is so simple-minded that way. Our works do not matter, what we did in life does not matter - the purpose of life is, drum-roll please, is to make sure one joins the "right" religion - grovel to the "right" God, polish the "right" shoes. It is sort of like living under a Dictator or a Corrupt country - throw away your resume, your qualifications do not matter, all that matters is your pocket book and whether you have the right contacts
And these, sadly, are the dominant religions of the day
I have said it before, and say it again, Atheists, Hindus and Buddhists(the latter two religions do not condemn people in this manner) are the 2nd class people of this world. Atheists might be brainwashed by religion even though they claim to hate it
And we see the same thing here - not being a Christian is a crime punishable by being sent to Gas Chambers in Hell!
But while Hitler and ISIS are deemed evil and there are reams and reams of letters, articles, editorials and movies - religious hate and division is actually promoted all around the world!
"Jesus wants you in heaven but he can save you only if you accept him" - that's the nice version of pushing the same idea
The idea also says morals and ethics do not matter to God - all that matters is one's religious affiliation - God is so simple-minded that way. Our works do not matter, what we did in life does not matter - the purpose of life is, drum-roll please, is to make sure one joins the "right" religion - grovel to the "right" God, polish the "right" shoes. It is sort of like living under a Dictator or a Corrupt country - throw away your resume, your qualifications do not matter, all that matters is your pocket book and whether you have the right contacts
And these, sadly, are the dominant religions of the day
I have said it before, and say it again, Atheists, Hindus and Buddhists(the latter two religions do not condemn people in this manner) are the 2nd class people of this world. Atheists might be brainwashed by religion even though they claim to hate it
braces_for_impact
Veteran Member
That's absolutely completely wrong. It's arguments made in bad "faith" (if you'll excuse the pun) that lead to far too many people equating faith with being a good person. It does not. Nor is faith necessary to know what good is. What faith does is allow one to act for either good or ill, to be inspired, but be untethered from the real world repercussions of such acts. This can lead one to be good for the wrong reasons, or more importantly, allow one to easily justify any morally reprehensible action. These real-world repercussions are all around you. There are no areas across the globe where any certain religion reigns supreme that are bastions of civility and mercy, where enlightenment rules and people have access to all that good their faith tells them exists. Show me a place where religion is in control, and I'll show you a den of misery.
Thomas II
Contributor
[video]https://www.ted.com/talks/frans_de_waal_do_animals_have_morals[/video]
ronburgundy
Contributor
No that is not faith. Faith is thinking that something is "good" or "bad" just because an authority (e.g., "god") tells you it is. Note that this is also the definition of authoritarianism, which is why faith in incompatible with reason, democracy, and liberty.
Moral and rational people do not "believe in the existence of good" and "bad" as though they are objective. That is what the mindless robots of faith believe, and why they are significantly more likely to harm other people. Moral and rational feel that harming others is "bad" simply because it feels bad to harm others. IT isn't a "belief", but a subjective feeling that just is. Beliefs about what actually "is" objectively true come into play when deciding how to act to avoid harm to others, but only the mindless use faith to make those decisions. Those who truly care about avoiding harm reject faith in favor of evidence based reasoning which must be used to determine the causal impacts of actions on physical and psychological harm to others.
IOW, to the moral and rational person, saying "that is bad" is just shorthand for saying, "I prefer a world where harm to people is minimized, and all relevant facts imply that action increases harm."
Contrast that with the faithful who saying "that is bad" to mean "I prefer a world where everyone blindly obeys authority, and some old book says that some invented authority doesn't like that."
Keith&Co.
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Actually, HIS good exists before his faith.
No two groups of The Faithful will show the same list of which Biblical morals still apply. No one can find a clear tool in the New Testament for figuring out which Old Testament strictures are still 'good.'
Whether or not to stone people to death, whether or not gays should be shot, exiled or welcomed, how to figure a bride-price, the whole list of death-penalty violations.
So anyone picking and choosing from the commandments is not getting their morality from The Books. They're using their non-biblical idea of what is or isn't 'good,' and finding support for that within Scripture. And if they can find support, they tell themselves they used the Books to build their morality. And thus, they tell themselves they got their 'good' from God.
Problem is, the gods are inventions of mankind. Everything credited to one or more Gods as a revelation is actually manmade. So their morality is man-made, just like the rest of ours, but sponsored by inventions of man.
Christian morality is no better than atheist morality, but it's much, much easier to get people to say they agree with you. At least until specific issues come under scrutiny....
Lion IRC
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Of course it doesn't. And I don't argue that it does. Note that my claim is about the need to believe in the ontological (properly basic) idea of The Good in order to do 'good' works. Works and faith are inseparable. 'Walk the talk' and so forth. Mens nostra concordat voci nostrae
There's no point trying to devise an epistemology of "good" unless you hold a pre-existing ontology that such a thing is real.
By all means argue about whether abortion on demand is 'good' or 'bad' but both sides of the debate are trying to achieve and end called "good". Neither side says there's no such thing as the "right" or "rights". Both sides believe in the existence of "good" otherwise there's no 'true north' for your moral compass to aim for.
Keith&Co says no two groups of the faithful can agree on what bible morals apply but even if that were true, the one thing they all agree on is that God's morals exist and that they 'ought' to apply - and that God Himself would be the umpire of last resort who could arbitrate the matter.
Thomas II
Contributor
Mark 10:18
"And Jesus said to him, "Why do you call Me good? No one is good except God alone."
What is the meaning of this?
Look at Bugs and Daffy there. I guess the idea is these are unbelievers without an umpire to help them. It could just as well depict two believers arguing they each have heard God's umpiring. "Gawd says wabbit season!!" "No, Gawd says duck season".
Even if Christians agree God's the umpire, they show no ability to hear any such umpiring. There are only the claims that they do. So the disagreements remain.
Playball40
Veteran Member
Please define "works" in this sentence.
Copernicus
Industrial Grade Linguist
The important things to me about this story are that the child may have been somewhat comforted by the Pope's skillful handling of his problem and that Francis he is also doing something to tone down the hostility that Catholics have traditionally felt for atheists and other nonbelievers. That is a welcome change from the previous Pope.
It is unfortunate that the Pope tied the father's salvation to a church ritual, but he hasn't always done that. Religious belief and its accompanying intolerance of nonbelief will not be disappearing soon, if ever, so I think that the best we can hope for is that believers find some way to live with the widespread skepticism of their religious doctrine, which isn't going away either.
It is unfortunate that the Pope tied the father's salvation to a church ritual, but he hasn't always done that. Religious belief and its accompanying intolerance of nonbelief will not be disappearing soon, if ever, so I think that the best we can hope for is that believers find some way to live with the widespread skepticism of their religious doctrine, which isn't going away either.
Lion IRC
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God is the datum. The ne plus ultra. If you don't think there even is a "gold standard" then how can you do good works? Jesus wants us to understand that there is only One objectively true datum. (If there were many - if we can all decide for ourselves what is 'good' according to our own post modernism - then the word good becomes meaningless.)
BTW - Jesus tells us that He is the way. The way to get somewhere? (Direction) The way to do something? (How)
Both interpretations imply the need for an ontological 'destination' to actually exist. And an optimum way to efficiently get there.
I have faith that God really is The True North.
But I have no doubt that True North actually exists
Wait - I'm not claiming that believers never argue about whether it's 'wabbit' season or duck season. I claim they ALL agree that a hunting season law-giver exists. Both Daffy and Bugs would agree that a Higher Authority could settle the matter.