To be fair, most Christians reject most Biblical teachings, they just kind of pretend they don't.
this post was submitted on 14 Feb 2024
114 points (96.7% liked)
Atheism
4062 readers
158 users here now
Community Guide
Archive Today will help you look at paywalled content the way search engines see it.
Statement of Purpose
- This is a support and conversation community for people who don't believe in gods.
- Superstition hucksters have no reason to subscribe or post here at all.
- If you are looking to debate or proselytize, options will be linked lower in the sidebar.
Acceptable
- Honest questions or conversations.
- Discussions on parenting or advice.
- Struggles, frustrations, coming out.
- Atheist memes. We can have fun!
- News headlines relevant to atheism.
Unacceptable
Depending on severity, you might be warned before adverse action is taken.
- Anything against site rules.
- Illegal and/or NSFW material.
- Troll posts and comments. There will be no attempt to explain what that means.
- Leading questions, agenda pushing, or disingenuous attempts to bait members.
- Personal attacks or flaming.
Inadvisable
- Self promotion or upvote farming.
- Excessive shitposting or off-topic discussion.
Application of warnings or bans will be subject to moderator discretion. Feel free to appeal. If changes to the guidelines are necessary, they will be adjusted.
If you vocally harass or discriminate against any individual member, you will be removed.
Likewise, if you are a member, sympathizer or a resemblant of a group that is known to largely hate, mock, discriminate against, and/or want to take lives of any other group of people, and you were provably vocal about your hate, then you you will be banned on sight.
Provable means able to provide proof to the moderation, and, if necessary, to the community.
~ /c/nostupidquestions
If you want your space listed in this sidebar and it is especially relevant to the atheist or skeptic communities, PM DancingPickle and we'll have a look!
Connect with Atheists
- Matrix: #atheism:envs.net
Help and Support Links
- Freedom From Religion Foundation
- The Secular Therapy Project
- Secular Students Alliance
- Black Nonbelievers
- The Clergy Project
- Atheist Alliance International
- Sunday Assembly
- Atheist Ireland
- Atheism UK
- Atheists United
Streaming Media
This is mostly YouTube at the moment. Podcasts and similar media - especially on federated platforms - may also feature here.
- Atheist Debates - Matt Dillahunty
- Rationality Rules
- Friendly Atheist
- Making Sense with Sam Harris
- Cosmic Skeptic
- Genetically Modified Skeptic
- Street Epistemology
- Armored Skeptic
- NonStampCollector
Orgs, Blogs, Zines
- Center for Inquiry
- American Atheists
- Humanists International
- Atheist Republic
- The Brights
- The Angry Atheist
- History for Atheists
- Rationalist International
- Atheist Revolution
- Debunking Christianity
- Godless Mom
- Atheist Freethinkers
Mainstream
Bibliography
Start here...
...proceed here.
- God is Not Great (Hitchens)
- The God Delusion (Dawkins)
- The End of Faith (Harris)
- Why I Am Not a Christian (Russell)
- Letter to a Christian Nation (Harris)
Proselytize Religion
From Reddit
As a community with an interest in providing the best resources to its members, the following wiki links are provided as historical reference until we can establish our own.
founded 1 year ago
MODERATORS
26% of children between the ages of 8 and 12 “consistently consult the Bible when trying to determine right from wrong”
26% of children are obviously lying. No 8 year old is breaking out the Bible every time they need to make a decision. Otherwise they'd know about the commandment that they shouldn't lie.
I love your circular reasoning here. It's rare to see someone "begging the question" in the original sense.
I'm glad most people seemed to get the joke.
The joke does highlight a glaring weakness with studies like this: kids questioned about something their adults might be telling them is very important can't be trusted to answer honestly instead of giving the answer they think is "right".
So studies like this likely overestimate the importance of religion to its study population.
So you don't have to go to the site, here are the statements from the survey and percentages that marked "agree"
Jesus Christ is the only way to experience eternal salvation, based on confessing your sins and relying only upon His forgiveness of your sins
36% of preteens
34% of parents
54% of pastors
the Bible is the true word of God that should be a guide to knowing right from wrong, and living a good life.
25% of preteens
44% of parents
62% of pastors
there are absolute truths — things that are right and things that are wrong, that do not depend on feelings, preferences, or circumstances — those truths are unchanging and knowable
21% of preteens
28% of parents
36% of pastors
the main reason to live is to know, love and serve God, with all of your heart, soul, mind, and strength
27% of preteens
33% of parents
56% of pastors
real success in life is consistently obeying God
17% of preteens
19% of parents
42% of pastors
I consistently consult the Bible when trying to determine right from wrong
26% of preteens
I believe turning to the Bible is the best way to distinguish right from wrong
21% of preteens
the means to eternal salvation is by confessing your sins and asking Jesus Christ to save them you the consequences of their sin.”
36% of preteens
35% of parents
The fact that they can barely get a majority of their own pastors to agree to those statements should be the real lesson here. They're just going through the motions and trying to keep from working at McDonalds.
26% of the kids surveyed recognized the question and knew the expected response
Former pastor here, I think your interpretation of the data is probably inaccurate.
The issue isn't pastors struggling to adhere to their own beliefs, the problem is these aren't very good questions from a theological perspective. They're very narrow and don't reflect the complexities of real life.
I suppose the problem is that someone thought those survey questions would provide the information they were looking for. If you're looking to illustrate lack of buy-in, you do like you said, ask the most narrow and fundamentalist questions you can. This is especially true if you're asking ten- to twelve-year-olds these "basic principal" questions. This would also help to illustrate a divergence of the youth group from the parent group, who are more capable of parsing and answering the questions.
I think it'd be safe to say that, if you asked those same questions of similar age populations even forty years ago, you'd see a similar divergence between adult and preteen answers.
Wait, what are they believing if they don't believe Jesus Christ is the only way to eternal salvation?? That's the whole point of the religion, or at the very least the whole point of the New Testament.
If you look at the specific questions, it's all the crazy fundy shit like
Jesus Christ is the only way to experience eternal salvation, based on confessing your sins and relying only upon His forgiveness of your sins
the Bible is the true word of God that should be a guide to knowing right from wrong, and living a good life
the main reason to live is to know, love and serve God, with all of your heart, soul, mind, and strength
Only several? Those are rookie numbers...
I, for one, think the bible has a number of gaping errrors making it unsuitable for moral guidance
The Bible says that grasshoppers have 4 legs, rabbits chew the cud, and that bats are birds, as well.
You'd think the "infallible word" of "god" would know that none of those things are true.
It also yadda-yaddas over how humanity went from a population you can count on one hand to multitudes not once, but on two seperate occasions.
Good.
I just want to point out that of the 400 kids they asked, only 141 of them agreed with the "Jesus as the only way to 'salvation" question. The other 259 of them were right.
Oh no!
Anyway
I hate the phrasing of the title. It sounds like some George Barna bullshit.
That's who did the survey
One of these links leads to a cardinal sin:
Pornhub.com
Google search big tits gangbang
The other too.