Living hope new church

[La_Dolce_Vita]

On 12/20/2023 at 6:54 PM, HeliX said:

They cater to people guaranteed to have poor critical reasoning abilities.

It's like scam emails being intentionally obvious so they don't waste time on intelligent people.

But it's not so much a problem for some people. It affects very many of us.

I know several people who are CofE Christians, Methodists.and other churches. I don't necessarily think they have poor critical reasoning abilities as a whole but they all abandon critical reasoning when it comes to Christianity.  It's the same when people come out with tripe about their belief being that they think there is 'something there' and can't say no more about this to back it up. 

Some incredibly intelligent people are religious. I can't remember his name but one renowned biologist believes in intelligent design.  It's seems hard to think that someone educated and intelligent can beliefs in the Christian God but if these people have bad reasons behind their beliefs and want to keep them then they hold on to them.

When we live in a society where so many people want to hold on these children's toys because others around them hold on them then it is very easy to hop from one collection of nonsense beliefs to another. It's all about what people want to feel and nothing about the truth.

The problem is for us all to be more rational and care more about the truth. It's not just a problem of a minority's vulnerable minds.

I think the appeal with LIving Hope for many is that it does offer community, which is a wonderful thing.

And for those who have bad thinking and believe in a God, it's a fresh-seeming and more hip form of Christianity. It seems to pull in a lot of people who liked New Age woo-woo. And I think a lot of south Africans love it because they have had the 'big church' and charismatic presence in their country for longer.

Edited December 27, 2023 by La_Dolce_Vita

[Gladys]

Good posts, LDV. But more than what you say is the justification these religions give for disliking certain types of people.  You could call that discrimination, or even bigotry. 

[La_Dolce_Vita]

But the problem.with morality in Christianity is that it is not a religion founded on good morals. It explicitly condones slavery and the stories of the Ark, Abraham and Isaac, Tower of Babel, the snake in the Garden, most or all of the commandments are things we wouldn't see as good  when we think about them more.

With L.H., from what I understand of Christianity, which is from reading that which is plainly stated in the Bible, things like homosexuality are stated as being immoral.

I think the Living Hole is more scripturally conformist than many other churches around that we are more used to.  When I hear of churches marrying gay couples or having women priests it all sounds rather bizarre to me.  It's cherry-picking. And if people don't hold to the Bible then what is the foundation for their Christianity? More made-up shit on the personal and shared belief of assuming what the (fictional) God is really like.  But how is this known without the Bible as the foundation. It becomes so inconsistent and contradictory then it seems even more adjectly ridiculous than being fundamentalist.

If I knew someone was having problems with their church and their acceptance of their sexuality, my conversation wouldn't be about trying to help them work to change their church or find another church; it would be about trying to be more rational and look for the truth.

We don't need religion and the idea that it is ok because it makes people happy is ignorant.

It ignores that a person isn't choosing to believe. They have become convinced and are better becoming unconvinced of the fiction and look for happiness in what is real.

 

 

 

Edited December 27, 2023 by La_Dolce_Vita

[The Phantom]

Religion was created for two main reasons.  

1) To get groups of people to work towards a common purpose.

2) To provide reasons and answers to stuff people don't understand. 

Nowadays to replace this, we have 

1) The limited liability company

2) Science (and Google). 

 

[Holte End]

1 minute ago, The Phantom said:

Religion was created for two main reasons.  

1) To get groups of people to work towards a common purpose.

2) To provide reasons and answers to stuff people don't understand. 

Nowadays to replace this, we have 

1) The limited liability company

2) Science (and Google). 

 

I thought religion was created, so when things went tits up, people would have someone else to blame.

 

[CrazyDave]

Just now, Holte End said:

I thought religion was created, so when things went tits up, people would have someone else to blame.

 

Sort of.

Religion creates marriage.

Marriage then gives you someone else to blame when things go tits up.

[The Phantom]

2 minutes ago, Holte End said:

I thought religion was created, so when things went tits up, people would have someone else to blame.

 

True.

Now instead we have rich people / the Govt. 

[Gladys]

36 minutes ago, The Phantom said:

Religion was created for two main reasons.  

1) To get groups of people to work towards a common purpose.

2) To provide reasons and answers to stuff people don't understand. 

Nowadays to replace this, we have 

1) The limited liability company

2) Science (and Google). 

 

Add a third, to control the populace. Hence the church and state being very closely linked historically. 

[Manx Bean]

It will be interesting to see who ends up having ultimate beneficial interest in this new building..the church or a company being a subsidiary of LHC where the main shareholder is..the main man himself..

[The Phantom]

8 minutes ago, Gladys said:

Add a third, to control the populace. Hence the church and state being very closely linked historically. 

That's what 1) evolved into.  As soon as you get a group of people working together to do something, you need someone to guide and then control.  As populations and civilization increased and evolved, you then have more than just a few family groups or a small village co-operating and you need that oversight centralized.  Power then corrupts etc. 

[Holte End]

58 minutes ago, The Phantom said:

True.

Now instead we have rich people / the Govt. 

Flooding use to be called an act of god, but now we have climate change. But in reality, it is because they build on the flood plains. 

[kevster]

1 hour ago, Manx Bean said:

a subsidiary of LHC where the main shareholder is..the main man himself..

God?

[Steve_Christian]

3 hours ago, The Phantom said:

Religion was created for two main reasons.  

1) To get groups of people to work towards a common purpose.

2) To provide reasons and answers to stuff people don't understand. 

Nowadays to replace this, we have 

1) The limited liability company

2) Science (and Google). 

 

I think there’s a third reason - to make a profit.

[The Phantom]

3 minutes ago, Steve_Christian said:

I think there’s a third reason - to make a profit.

Again, that is the case now.  Not why religions appeared in the first place.  There is plenty of evidence that religions of some description have been in place pretty much since Homo Sapiens appeared - ritualistic burials, figurines of what appear to be deities. No profits to be had then. 

[WTF]

19 minutes ago, The Phantom said:

Again, that is the case now.  Not why religions appeared in the first place.  There is plenty of evidence that religions of some description have been in place pretty much since Homo Sapiens appeared - ritualistic burials, figurines of what appear to be deities. No profits to be had then. 

back then though our alien overlords were still amongst us  without the disguises they wear today.