closer toGod ??

[druiaghtagh]

Are sentient animals closer to God than Humans as they have innocence and are born without original sin?

[wildwood]

What are new-born Human babies guilty of?

[ReverendMat]

@wildwood: Catholics believe that we are all BORN with original sin. Which I think means that it's our nature to sin, thus we are sinners from birth. Or something like that. I think there's the same deal in Judaism too, but I might be wrong on either count.

[mikewith]

Surely you have to believe in god in order to be close (or distant) to Her (or Him). I'm unaware of any animals other than humans having such a belief system.

[Squirrel]

Do you really believe in sin, really?

[Squirrel]

Sorry, that sounded a bit rude, what I meant is "What is a sin?"

[Squirrel]

Perhaps a holy person can answer me this? Everyone else has gone silent.

Is a sin a way of "getting away with" unkindness, dishonesty or lawbreaking? For example, you really want a new car, but you have spent too much on recent luxuries and can't afford it. So you steal one. "Oh well" you think to yourself, "I know how to fix this...hey, God, forgive me, OK? Give no sign whatsoever if I am forgiven..."

Another dangerous idea spread around by the Bible: sidestepping the usual way of learning about what is right and wrong by making everything right, thereby reducing remorse.

[Doni]

Squirrel - funny to come across you again. Sin: disobeying the will of God. God's Will is an all encompassing term for how he "wants" (bad word) things to be. Obvious sin: breaking the ten commandments - murder, steal, lie... Not-so-obvious: God wants us to love our neighbor. Say I make a rude comment to my coworker and hurt her feelings. This is sin. I don't understand the dangerous idea... Please explain. When I sin, I ask God to forgive me. But true repentance doesn't stop there. I must try my hardest in the future to not commit that sin again.

[Doni]

P.S. Squirrel - I don't know how to phrase this, but what is your religion? Or should I say, what to you believe to be the truth. You've asked a lot of questions, but I don't get a good feel for what you believe...

[Squirrel]

Thank you for asking, Doni, but now I'm going to sound really arrogant. The easiest way to explain what I believe is to consider that some religious people believe that they can convert others to their faith; in the same way, I reckon they could be talked back to atheism in a few hours. The non-existence of good and evil clinched it for me: - condemning "bad" people as if they don't deserve a life, and such. Douglas Adams summed it up beautifully, I think, and his theory is very hard to disprove.

' target=_blank>http://www.biota.org/people/douglasadams/
(10^th and 11^th paragraphs)

'
target=_blank>http://www.positiveatheism.org/hist/quotes/douglas
.htm,

[Doni]

Adam's speech was very interesting. I agree with your statement that religions seek to convert. But when you think you know the "truth" about something, don't you want other's to know the "truth" as well. I do. Here's a popular answer to a basic question: http://www.carm.org/questions/whydidGodcreateus.ht
m

[Doni]

Have you read The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy?

[Doni]

I tried posting this under the other question, but I couldn't get it to work, so I'll try it here. My understanding is that evolution's driving force is survival of the fittest. If that is true, why would some animals put themselves in harms way to protect their offspring? Why would they care if their offspring survived? I believe God created this instinct in animals - and man. He says - fill the earth and subdue it.

[Doni]

At the risk of being pushy - God reveals himself to all. It is our responsibility to believe the truth. And we are not saved by our own merit. We all deserve to "burn in hell". But because God is loving, gracious, and merciful, he sent his own Son to suffer in hell to pay for our sins, and all we have to do is believe that to be saved.

[Squirrel]

Two long posts coming up.

Sorry.

[Squirrel]

I will try to summarise so far (forgive the highly biased style): Atheist: Do you agree it's time to stop believing in God?

Christian: No. There is a God - I just know it. How else do you explain flowers, love, and life in general?

Atheist: Evolution and chance.

Christian: Oh yeah, that. Can you prove it?

Atheist: Kind of. Well...not many scientists are Christian, and who knows more about life than they do?

Christian: That kind of talk could land you a life sentence in Hell. God won't hesitate to slam you in there unless you stop sinning and start believing.

Atheist: Yeah, but there's no proof that Hell exists...no postcards, nothing...and your definition of "Worthy of Heaven" condemns those who have never heard of God, and excludes non-human creatures who enjoyed their Earthly lives, and probably even excludes early humans. (Did no one go to Hell or Heaven before 0BC?) Furthermore, God apparently killed millions of animals because he didn't like them very much (flood), and now we're the bad ones just because we were brought up that way?


[continued...]

[Squirrel]

Christian: God will still let you in Heaven if you say you're sorry for sinning ' a quick apology will suffice ' and then you can stop feeling bad about kicking old Mrs. Featherstone down the stairs. If you're a promising candidate for eternal happiness, God will reveal himself to you.

Atheist: 'God will reveal himself', you say? You mean like, when told a pill will cure their common cold, a patient will start to get better surprisingly fast, unbeknownst to them that it was just a placebo, a sugar tablet? 'Oh yes, that really did the trick' they'll say, 'But it was just a Polo' the doctor will explain, 'Your mind created the idea that the pill would cure you, because I said so, and made you get better faster. The magic is all in the mind.'

Christian: '

[Squirrel]

'As for animals 'caring' about their young, this is another example of evolution. For it can be shown that a creature that has evolved naturally is only exactly as good as it has to be in order to survive; - there are no super animals. For example, as foxes and rabbits no doubt evolved alongside each other, a trait, such as reproducing often, became attributed to the rabbit, and predatory habits became more evident in the fox, and the two balanced each other out. In this way, it is unlikely that an animal could ever 'take over' the planet, i.e. become a giant, armour-plated, razor-toothed, eight-eyed, winged, poisonous blood-sucking chameleon that lives for a thousand years. That would almost certainly never evolve because if it did it would quickly consume all edible prey until it either died out or less extreme variations of itself took its place. To be balanced, some animals have many young, and a large proportion of them snuff it (e.g. turtles) and some protect the few that they do have (e.g. humans) by instinct. The variations of a species without the maternal instinct disappear quickly because their babies (who have the non-caring gene) don't survive without their parents' protection.

There are few questions on the subject of evolution that can't be explained.


[OK, so it was three.]

[Doni]

"Animals caring" - I understand that and agree. However, wouldn't man be considered a "super-animal" then? Also, that does not explain why a species would ever develop a maternal instinct - why would it care if it's species flourished?

[Doni]

As far as proving God exists: I guess that's why we call it faith. You can no more prove he exists than you can disprove he exists. You can have reasons to believe in what you believe, and possible "prove it enough" in your own mind. Atheists often use science as argument against religion. I myself have found no facts (exclude theories) in science (or history for that matter) that prove Christianity untrue.

[Doni]

P.S. Thanks for the good discussion. I enjoy having my beliefs challenged.