Why FAITH is actually a form of suicide (page 3)

freydo

If belief in nothing is your faith that rejects the ransom offered for your crimes - you're dead. You just haven't keeled over yet.

THE GLADIATOR

If belief in nothing is your faith...

How can belief in nothing be faith?

Faith requires belief in a concept. The absence of that belief can never amount to faith.

To say that it can, is to say that faith itself is nothing; a negative.

I don't see why it should. Action in the real world helps to convince believers that their faith has a basis in reality but action has no real conection with faith. The driven Paul of the bible may have stated that faith without works is dead but that was just his opinion.

Faith may require that we take no action. For example; put faith in God and wait for him/her to solve a problem instead of taking action ourselves.

freydo

When you publicly, as on this forum, proclaim that you believe your ancestors were monkeys, you are expressing faith in your belief by your action. Without such action, your belief is only a personal opinion. Agnostics are a similar group in that they publicly proclaim that they are "ignoramuses" which is the meaning of the word agnostic. So their faith in in not knowing anything rather than outright rejection of known facts.

leavingwt

freydo:

When you publicly, as on this forum, proclaim that you believe your ancestors were monkeys, you are expressing faith in your belief by your action. Without such action, your belief is only a personal opinion. Agnostics are a similar group in that they publicly proclaim that they are "ignoramuses" which is the meaning of the word agnostic. So their faith in in not knowing anything rather than outright rejection of known facts.

It appears that you're not trying to evangelize or empathize. A more throrough examination of the beliefs of others may reveal a thoughtful and honest position, even though it's different than yours.

not a captive

Dear Gladiator, Faith is not a form of suicide if God really exists.

The problem is that we have to engage with God at some point ourselves before we will risk our life--right?

The life of Abraham is a good example if we want to entertain the idea that this story is worth looking at.

When Abraham had finally wandered in the desert for years believig that he wasn't just talking to himself he arrived at a point where a kind of suicide presented itself to him. What's a burnt offering of your son?

He is referenced often as a father of faith, " Against all hope, Abraham in hope believed and so became the father of many nations."

BurnTheShips

Why FAITH is actually a form of suicide

Oy vey! Leave it to Terry for the over the top titles.

I don't think I really ever had faith until I was starting to check out of the JWs. JWism required no faith, at least for me. I was born in, and had it drilled in during all my formative years.

There was no doubt, hence, no need for faith.

Once I started to see a bigger world, nothing was set in stone any longer. Since the gov body's authority became suspect, there was no certain thing to hang on to. Now I have doubt, and along with it faith.

Someone already mentioned Christian Existentialist philisopher Soren Kierkegaard. I'd like to throw a couple of quotes from Spanish Existentialist Miguel De Unamuno also.

Life is doubt, and faith without doubt is nothing but death.

Faith which does not doubt is dead faith.

Hence, according to Unamuno, pure, undoubting faith is suicide.

And yet...

"Reason speaks and feeling bites" said Petrarch; but reason also bites and bites in the inmost heart. And more light does not make more warmth.

"Light, light, more light!" they tell us that the dying Goethe cried. No, warmth, warmth, more warmth! for we die of cold and not of darkness.

It is not the night that kills, but the frost.We must liberate the enchanted princess and destroy the stage of Master Peter.

(Light=Reason, Warmth=Faith)

BTS

THE GLADIATOR

Atheism can never be a faith. An atheist is void of faith in the existence of God.

A hole in the ground is not a piece of ground that is missing. It is a void; the absence of ground.

An atheist accepts the concept of God and the fact that some believe God to be, not just a concept, but real. While accepting the possibility that God exists, the atheist has not yet found enough conclusive evidence to turn the concept into a reality in their own mind.

BurnTheShips

Your void shall be filled when I meet you on the arena, Gladiator. You will see a divine flame reflected in my gladius hispaniensis as I bring your end upon you. I will be merciful and kill you fast and clean. Your death will please the populace, and enhance Caesar's prestige. And when you journey to Elysium, your doubts will be no more.

I will see to it that your remains are buried with honor.

Or shall I burn them?

ArdeoNaves

Why FAITH is actually a form of suicide

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