October 26, 2008, 6:40 pm by dc-agape.

     I am serious about using capitalization were respect is due.  Many words deserve capitalization.  Names of cities, states, and countries deserve it.  National cultures have been developed by the people living in each of these places.  Those cultures, whether we agree with it or not, deserve respect.  Any group of people who will not respect a group of people within their own nation (or state, or city) deserves no respect!  Respect is something that I give naturally to people that I meet.  I take that respect away when proof is given that respect is no longer deserved.

     The term “christian” has entered that level.  It no longer deserves respect.  Living in a “christian” nation I have first-hand experience from “christian love”.  It’s bullshit!  The “christians” in this nation love themselves and only other people like themselves.  Many talk about being tolerant and accepting.  When I find a “true christian” that can love a gay atheist…I will let you know.  Even thinking that I am going to “Hell” is flat out hatred.  I have lived all over this large and powerful nation, from Boston to Orlando and all the way to Hilo, HI.  Prejudice occurs in all those places.  And it perpetrated by “Christians”. 

     The christian love that allows this to continue is fake.  It has no source from a supernatural being, it is sheer human nature.  The christian nation has done nothing to improve it, there is a lot of lip service…but that’s all it is.  In the Word, YHWH clearly tells all who claim to be christians to love your neighbor.  In fact here is one of the verses about love:

^{Ro 13:9} The commandments, “Do not commit adultery,” “Do not murder,” “Do not steal,” “Do not covet,” and whatever other commandment there may be, are summed up in this one rule: “Love your neighbor as yourself.”  ^{Ro 13:10} Love does no harm to its neighbor. Therefore love is the fulfillment of the law.

Love does no harm!  The Word says that.  No harm, none what-so-ever!  Not even a little bit.  Yet “christian love” does nothing for the most preventable permanent act anyone can do:  suicide.  According to Wikipedia (I know, I know…but it’s true) and this resource, high risks groups are the ones most likely to commit suicide.  These are the people that need true Christian Love.  Yet christians turn their heads, and say things like: “Oh, it’s only teenage angst”, or “children will be children”, or best of all is:

^{1Co 10:13} No temptation has seized you except what is common to man. And God is faithful; he will not let you be tempted beyond what you can bear. But when you are tempted, he will also provide a way out so that you can stand up under it.

Well guess what:  if some commits suicide…it was more than they could bear!  And faithful YHWH was nowhere to be seen, because “christian love” turned a blind eye.

     Growing up being an outsider (both gay and book smart), I felt the knife twist and turn each time I felt “christian love”.  I survived and I did grow stronger, but YHWH was not responsible.  I found who I was and I accepted myself.  If all “christians” felt this way:

Desmond Tutu, Anglican Archbishop of South Africa:
We reject [homosexuals], treat them as pariahs, and push them outside our church communities, and thereby we negate the consequences of their baptism and ours. We make them doubt that they are the children of God, and this must be nearly the ultimate blasphemy. We blame them for something that is becoming increasingly clear they can do little about.
Marilyn B. Alexander “We Were Baptized Too: Claiming God’s Grace for Lesbians and Gays”, Westminster: John Knox Press (1996)

it would be a wonderful world.

Posted in State of Mind, Becoming an atheist | Print | 2 Comments »

October 25, 2008, 9:46 pm by dc-agape.

Genesis Chapter 2:15-25

    Now man was alone in the garden, and YHWH brought all the animals before man to be named.  Science and religion agree here, only mankind can name every living thing on earth (with human names).  But what about women, they were created in Gen 1:27.  Boy was that 6th day busy!  God finishes creating all the animals and mankind (man and woman).  Add to that man naming every living thing on the plant and then falling asleep so YHWH can take his rib and make women.  Wow!  Both tasks were finished in 24 hours, because women were made on the 6^th day as well.  Or is this another one of those places in the Word that we can’t take literally, I must be getting really confused.  How about you?  I sure hope this confusion was due to not writing all this down for couple hundred years until Moses came along.    

     Next what about the woman from the rib of man story.  Now does that mean that we were created with 13 sets of ribs?  We have 12 sets now.  And I wonder which type YHWH used, the true, false, or floating rib.  This may have some meaning as to why men and women can’t seem to figure each other out.  But I can see why christians don’t cloning to occur.  YHWH did and made women from men.  But it does seem that YHWH could have done it with less tissue.  All we need is one cell, and you don’t have to be put to sleep to collect the sample!  Maybe this all powerful creator could learn something from us!<–>

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October 20, 2008, 9:38 pm by dc-agape.

This last week was very distracting.  A number of things got in the way of writing a few posts.  I had hoped that I would be able to write daily.  Well that did not happen.  So let me tell you about my state of mind last week.

First, I was preparing for a cume.  I failed miserably on the last one.  So I wanted to be prepared for this one.  Well that did not work either.  The little free time I had was devoted to study.  But a few things got in the way.  My research hit a few bumps.  Between dealing with auto-cad, Swagelok, and molecular sieves, I was busy traveling between meetings and venders.  And then there was the homework from the chemical engineering course I am taking.  Learning both the math and the software at the same time is somewhat daunting.  I did get thought those but there was more.

Second, I got a good dose of chiggers.  It seems that some things do not make it on the web.  Treatment of chiggers seems to be one of those things.  Most of the sites tell you about prevention.  Well, I can tell you, when infected with chiggers, prevention is a little too late.  And the little monsters don’t go away.  I finally went to the doctor and got a cream that worked.  But until then, sleep was limited.  That loss of sleep definitely made the week much more difficult to focus on any extra activities, like writing and reading the Bible. 

Well, finally, the cume was over, but I had a friend come into town.  To say the least, running out to Cherokee and Rugby were exhausting.  Both trips were fun, but took all day and I did not have the energy left to write on this blog.  The trip to Cherokee was great.  The trip involved traveling through the Smokies into a historic, tourist destination of the Cherokee Indians.  But I have to admit I was even more impressed with Rugby.  They have a library that contains 7,000 books all written before 1900.

So anyway, I am back now.  I should be starting again on the reading of the Word again tomorrow.

Posted in State of Mind | Print | 1 Comment »

October 18, 2008, 12:21 am by dc-agape.

Genesis Chapter 2:1 – 14

So after creation the creator rested.  Here is a question that should be though about: if it took 14.5 billion years to create the universe, the earth, all the plants and animals, and finally mankind…is the creator still resting?  That would make each “day” about 2.4 billion years long.  Maybe we are still in the 7^th day of creation!  That would explain why almost all prayers go unanswered (examples here and here).  This is a very important question that requires an answer.  In future posts I will go deeper into this question, because the Word does make promises about intervention prayers.

So a garden is created for man (not yet mankind, even though in the 1^st chapter both man and woman were already created).  In the center of this garden YHWH has placed 2 trees.  One of the trees is the “tree of life”, the other tree is the “tree of knowledge”.  Here is another conundrum for the believer: if all plants were created to be eaten (see the following verse), has YHWH already made the first lie?

Gen 1:29-30 Then God said, “I give you every seed-bearing plant on the face of the whole earth and every tree that has fruit with seed in it.  They will be yours for food.  And to all the beasts of the earth and all the birds of the air and all the creatures that move on the ground – everything that has the breath of life in it – I give every green plant for food.” And it was so.

Read that verse very carefully, look at its context.  Seriously, mankind has been told that all green plants are to be used as food.  Shouldn’t an all perfect creator (that never changes or lies) make sure that what he says is what he really means?  Unless, of course, the two “trees” in the center of the garden are not green and do not have fruit!

We are missing another thing that an all-knowing creator should have thought about.  Put your creation in a garden, with one taboo item, what will happen over millions of years?  Think about it, it was bound to happen.  Curiosity, boredom, anger, jealousy, any one of these emotions would have been enough.  Just once, just one taste, in a million years, and presto…original sin.

The verses 10 – 14 talk about the water source for the garden.  We have lost the meaning of the words “Pishon”, “Havilah”, and “Gihon” since the original writings.  Again, it seems impossible that a perfect creator could allow the meaning of these words to be lost.  I mean, come on, he saved the word, but somehow forgot to save the meaning of the word.  Very strange!  It seems very strange, indeed, for an omnipotent, omnipresent, omniscient being to have made such a blunder.

Posted in Genesis, Readings | Print | 2 Comments »

October 11, 2008, 10:30 pm by dc-agape.

     My first memory of questioning religion was much later than many.  I remember sitting in Sunday school of a Southern Baptist Church and wanting to ask a question.  But because on the church I was at being Southern Baptist I was not going to open my mouth and ask.  You have to understand that kinda of thing was just not done.  Like any unanswered question, this one did not go away or get answered.  The question was: In biblical times what happened to the non-Jewish souls?  It certainly was not the non-Jewish people’s fault that they were born into the wrong nationality.  It was also obvious that you could not become Jewish if you believed.  So how did a benevolent, loving YHWH send all those people to Hell?  He is the one who choose what nationality you are born into, yet all those people were punished for his choice.  It made no sense to me.           

     It spread to non-biblical times, how could all the Romans, Chinese, Japanese, and Islamic people of the world be punished for YHWH choosing their nationality? I understood how hard it would be for an American to change religion.  So I knew that any other non-christian nation citizen would also not change their faith that simply.  But I had also read where YHWH hardened the hearts of men (like the Pharisee, King Saul, Judas and Pontius Pilot), so I knew that YHWH was responsible for the choices that men make.  So how could a benevolent creator exist?

In the end, just this one question, without an answer, would begin the journey to atheism Many questions and many steps have been involved.  The journey was not quick, nor was it in a straight line.  I have been baptized as a Presbyterian, Southern Baptist, and Church of Christ member.  I have been a missionary.  I have studied the Tarot cards, the Wiccan art, and alchemy.  I have been a member of the Philadelphia Ethical Society.  Many experiences have shaped my point of view.  But all have lead to this single outcome:  No christian god can exist.

Posted in Becoming an atheist | Print | 1 Comment »

October 7, 2008, 7:38 pm by dc-agape.

Genesis Chapter 1:14-31

Continuing in the first chapter of Genesis, plants are created before animals.  Wow!  How about that both science and religion agree!  But then here we go again, in verse 14 religion claims that the lights in the sky were created.  Interestingly, light was already created yet that initial light had no source.  Now that’s real magic!

In verse 20, animals are created before mankind.  Good religion and science are in accord, again.  During the 5^th “Day” an interesting verse is written.  It is repeated in Genesis 1:28, but here is the first example:

Ge 1:22 God blessed them and said, “Be fruitful and increase in number and fill the water in the seas, and let the birds increase on the earth.”

In the verse YHWH says “be fruitful and increase in number”.  Do you thing that an omnibenevolent, omnipresent, omnipotent being would tell all the species on earth to multiply until overpopulation occurred?  Of course not!  In the plant and animal kingdoms natural checks and balances keep populations under control.  Yet for some reason mankind does not have to follow the same controls that YHWH created???  What type of omnipotent being would be that foolish?  As the only species on the plant that does not have godly controls over population control, we must do it ourselves.  We must do it properly, not with a lot of hand waving woo  (HT to PZ Myers)!  Just because YHWH forgot to mention in Genesis just what was meant by “fill” or “subdue”, does not mean that we should over populate the planet and destroy the earth!

I will move on to the 24^th verse of Genesis.  So both science and religion agree that land animals were one the last things to populate the earth.  Both, also, agree that mankind was the last “new” kind to be created.  Then one of the most important verses was written:

Gen 1:26 Then God said, “Let us make man in our image, in our likeness, and let them rule over the fish of the sea and the birds of the air, over the livestock, over all the earth, and over all the creatures that move along the ground.”

Mankind is god-like and rules over all other life on earth.  Wow! Have we screwed-up big time.  We have totally forgotten why YHWH created us!  We were created to rule over life on earth.  It is a YHWH given job to take care of the life on this planet!  What benevolent god-like rulers let so many species under their care die out completely?  What benevolent god-like rulers greedily destroy the environment that we are responsible for taking care of?  If you think that you are a TrueChirstiansTM and you do not stand-up for the environment and for every species that your YHWH created…that is the original sin!  You were created to take care of his creation.  Period!  How have you performed your duties today?  How about this week?  How about this month? How about this year?  How about in your entire life?  Get busy, YHWH has a plan for you…it’s to take care of his creation!

One more note: both man and woman were created at the same time.  The 27^th verse of chapter 1 says that YHWH created man and woman at the same time.  Mis-reading that verse you might say that man was created in YHWH image.  It does not seem that way unless you are a misogynist.  Re-read the verse!  Man and woman were created equally and at the same time, on the same day!

The final point I want to make in this first chapter of Genesis is laid out in the 29^th – 31^st verses:

Gen 1:29-31 Then God said, “I give you every seed-bearing plant on the face of the whole earth and every tree that has fruit with seed in it.  They will be yours for food.  And to all the beasts of the earth and all the birds of the air and to all the creatures that move on the ground – everything that has the breath of life in it – I give every green plant for food.”  And it was so.

All the green plants are given to mankind and animal to eat.  I guess at the time, 3448 years ago, not a single poisonous, or allergic plant existed.  I would have loved to live back then!!!

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October 6, 2008, 9:16 pm by dc-agape.

Genesis Chapter 1:1-13

I was hoping to be able to read one chapter of the Word of God each day.  I see that starting with Genesis 1 will make this impossible.  My responses to the reading of the first chapter of the Word may take much more than a day.

Reading the introduction to Genesis brings this impossibility home.  Genesis is most likely written by Moses very near the year 1440BC.  Yet all through the notes references are made to books written much later (1000 years later to be exact).  This is like explaining the philosophies of Socrates using Carl Yung’s writings.  First, the rest of the Bible is influenced by the Pentateuch.  The Constitution of the United Dates influences everything about our lives here in the US.  How much more were the authors of the later books of the Word influenced by the religious documents of the Pentateuch?  Second, how can we be sure that the authors of the newer books of the Bible understood what Moses meant after 1000 years?  After only 221 years we can’t interpret the Constitution of the US, how could the Israelites know the meaning of what Moses wrote.  But we are supposed to “know” that the christian god has kept the literal meaning of his word throughout all the ages.

From the 5^th verse the literal translation and science diverge.  Yet some people mention that the original Hebrew word “yom” is nearly impossible to translate.  A simple Google search for the word “yom” brings back overwhelmingly only the young earther’s definition.  Yet not one of them has a reference.  I did find one web page that used a reference for “yom”.  This reference mentions that the word “yom” does not have to mean a literal 24 hour period.  All of a sudden, literalist and science are not at odds.  Hurrah!

Neither science nor religion has a problem with the sun being created before the earth.  So the 6^th – 8^th verses are OK.  But in the 9^th verse trouble brews.  Science is certain that only at the very beginning, long before man, did the waters gather in one place.  By the time humans existed, many continents also existed.  Unfortunately, the christian religion never gets around to explaining the multitude of continents.  In fact, since the Bible never correct the 9^th verse…does this mean that only one continent exists now?  Of course not, we can see that the world has more than one continent.  So literal translation of the Word of God cannot be assumed, we must take each sentence, each chapter, each book and weigh the words against what is known facts about the world and the universe.  In fact I will certainly have to take Paul’s advice:

^{1st Thess 5:21-22} Test everything. Hold on to the good.  Avoid every kind of evil.

This project, as you can see, has become complicated within the first chapter of the first book of the Word of God.  I will do my best to keep the literal translation in mind, but logic and science will be obstacles to this promise.

Posted in Genesis, Readings | Print | 5 Comments »

October 5, 2008, 12:53 pm by dc-agape.

Here is conundrum for the believer.  Which “Word of God” should be used?  Should one use the king james version, the book of mormon, or possibly the New International Version?  (Again, I will use capitalizations when it counts).  I respect the NIV for a few reasons.  First, I respect the concept the translators of the NIV use.  Here is a quote from the preface of the 2002 edition: 

“From the beginning of the project, the Committee on Bible Translation held to certain goals for the New International Version: that it would be an accurate translation and one that would have clarity and literary quality and so prove suitable for public and private reading, teaching, preaching, memorizing and liturgical use.” 

A number of languages over numerous centuries were used in the writing of the Word of God.  The translations must be accurate if they are to be followed and applied to life on Earth; otherwise, they are errant and not the perfect word of god.  Second, I hold unity as an obtainable concept.  Unity is another concept that has been lost to the christian world.  Here is how the translation teams felt about unity: 

 “In working toward these goals, the translators were united in their commitment to the authority and infallibility of the Bible as God’s Word in written form.  They believe that it contains the divine answer to the deepest needs of humanity, that it sheds unique light on our path in a dark world, and that it sets forth the way to our eternal well-being.”   

If only all christians acted upon the belief in these sentences.  Finally, these translators have this to say about the source of the Word of God. Re-read the first sentence of the last quote: 

 “In working toward these goals, the translators were united in their commitment to the authority and infallibility of the Bible as God’s Word in written form.” 

At least in print the translators of the NIV Bible believe that the Word truly has an infallible quality.    

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