A question for Atheist.

reply to post by randyvs


Off the topic here, but ATS threads tend to drift. The wonders of google.com "advanced search". Don't surf the internet without it. The author is unknown. You can find many wonderful things using the advanced search mode of google.

I have to be honest and say that I am not an atheist but merely one who has little use for religion, any religion. I prefer to believe in God in a personal way that is free of all the usual man-made-authored belief requirements.

You use the words "bible" and "serious" in the same sentence then add "rapture" as though the three were complimentary. Wow. First, there is nothing biblical about "rapture". If there were all Christians and not just the "fringies" would agree with it. OK that takes care of "serious" and "rapture". Now for "bible". The bible is a man made document. No more or less. In a broad sense every thing in the universe is "of God". This includes the bible but God had nothing to do with it's origins or compilation. There are thousands of old sermons, letters and other writings including many of the same people who's work appears in the bible which were rejected for one reason or another by the first Holy Roman Emperor who presided over the first codexation of what came to be known as the Holy Bible. A very long time afterwards men decided to exclude anything that smaked of Roman Catholicism from the bible and so, quite arbitrarily, deleted some books for political reasons (they did not want any more papal influence in the "reformation Europe"). So here we see men presuming the authority to chop up "God's word"? This really happened you know. It's not rumor. I mention these well documented historical facts in order to suggest to you that what we see in the bible is what men want us to see only. The bible is the word of man, not God.

Now, if the rapture should actually happen what would I do? Well if the "christians" simply left the earth but nothing else happened I wouldn't miss them. They have always had the nasty habit of thinking their religion somehow trumped anyone else's. But wait. Which christians would leave? All of them from Catholic to orthodox to Baptists or just the very few who promote the idea of "rapture"? That's a tough one. After they leave the earth would have a chance to be a very different place where religious animosities would be greatly lessened and where the US big business interests would no longer use christian missionaries as an "in" to begin operations in third world countries in which the first step is to replace subsistance farming with displaced persons, ecological disasters, drug use and crime.

What would I do? Well if the world ended I'd go back to the spirit world that is the true home of humanity and get busy with whatever needed doing there. If the world did not end I'd stay here and continue the best that I know how to improve the conditions of the zillions of poor folk in the world.

Christianity should not be about a guy wanting to be "saved". It should be about a guy wanting to serve the poor. Just like Jesus told us.

[edit on 20-5-2010 by trailertrash]

reply to post by trailertrash


Thanks for your exceedingly long post your third paragraph was what I asked for thanks again.

I think I would have to just accept that i am wrong then i would try to ask god why he gave me an open mind and intelligent thought if all it was gonna get me was a trip to hell. Now that i have given you my truthful answer let me ask you what would you do if you woke up in the morning and we found evidence that it was all made up and the god of every religion was not real just wondering

reply to post by Conclusion


I know this is a little late, but I just read your comment about ALL humanity responsible for killing Christ... There are a few flaws with that statement IMO.

First, to say a family living in South Africa at the time Christ died, who had no knowledge of Him, was responsible... hmmm. Kinda unfair and unjust to place that blame on them. Plus God killed Jesus anyway...
Second, Jesus claimed to resolve all sin from man, Him being the perfect Lamb and all. So there is no worry for the murder anyway.
Next, if Jesus did wipe away all sin, then why do we need to repent? I mean, there is NO MORE SIN.... Oh, wait, that is ONLY if we proclaim Him as the savior...
Finally, if we don't proclaim Him as the savior, we wouldn't be held accountable for His death anyway... Because he was not dieing for the people who didn't believe in Him in the first place... Oh, wait He was! So, if He died for everyone and abolished the sin hanging over our heads, then the point is moot. We did not kill Christ, God with the help of a few men 2000 years ago did.
Meh, it really doesn't matter much anyway, IMO God is the inbetween and knows our core from birth, we are here to experience this life interacting with others to LEARN, not to be chained to a dogma of ancient superstitions(sp).
But to the OP, I would say, which rapture are you talking about? There are too many variations in just one sect religion to give an intelligent answer.
P.S. I am spiritual, and no longer follow any religion.