My 2 cents is as long as whatever flavor of a "moral compass" they have fits with the overall norms of the world, and leads them to making decisions for the greater good, etc - then it doesn't matter if they are christian, muslim, buddhist, atheist, etc.

So 99.9% of the time it wouldn't matter... it would only really matter if their faith led their first thought to be, "Would these people make an acceptable sacrifice to my lord, Cthulhu?!"

Originally posted by Benevolent Heretic
I admit, I read, "A true atheist ..... cannot possibly have a moral compass." And now that I look at the post, I see he put "true atheist" in quotes and then proceeded to define something that is NOT a true atheist.

I understand. He defined a person who is aspiritual. I can see why that might be upsetting to a spiritual atheist, but in all fairness, it is a mix-up which is easy to make if not being very careful with words. Others have done it flagrantly in this thread. It's not really a problem so long as we each can be humble about our lack of individual perfection.

Originally posted by Benevolent Heretic
"A type of religion" is a religion.

Somewhat, yes, and I see why even many are not able to appreciate the state of being versus the state of appearing. So then, to clarify; When I state "type of religion," I am referring to a concept which does have things in common with a religion, but is not clearly organized or defined as such (I do think I did attempt to delineate this already). An atheist can possibly have religion, but not necessarily "a" religion. Also, an atheist can have "a" religion (like Daoism). An atheist who is truly aspiritual and discusses the very same matter is probably so unpleasant to deal with, it would not be of much use to engage them or their confusion beyond common civil courtesy or execution of "helps."

Originally posted by Benevolent Heretic
That does not satisfy the definition of a religion. A religion has both organized dogma and a deity.

It does, because theism is not necessitated by religion as you stipulated. Again, Daosim is a better known example of this, but I am sure there are many more. Do understand that many theists would claim that "reason," "the earth," "oneself," etc., are different forms of gods that atheists follow despite a the formal worship of such. However, that doesn't change, by logic and common word meaning, that an atheist religion is not possible/consistent.

Originally posted by Benevolent Heretic
I totally agree with your last paragraph. VERY well-said!

Thanks.
I do pray/desire that spiritual wisdom will increase in the body of Man so that our spiritual decay/sickness is purged in a godly way.

I challenge you to conisder:
If life is life, then it is alive. And just as our own bodies' cells operate within certain boundaries, we do also. As each cell is unaware of and lacks full communion with our own greater consciousness, please consider that the "cycle" is continued on "upwards" so that we should be seeking out communion with the greater consciousness.

I do trust, personally and specifically, that Life did "come down" and manifest as a person for the purpose of communing with us, since we can not commune upward just as our cells cannot. I know, it's strange to consider, except that wouldn't our bodies' cells (if they could reason) find it hard to believe that a greater consciousness often subjects them to chemicals in order to alter their conduct? How much more does Life do for those who are alive? As I said, law is spiritual, so let us grow in our understanding and not call dead what is living.

I feel bad about being off-topic and I apologize, but this is the most interesting discussion I've seen for a while.

Originally posted by getreadyalready
I've heard that my version of atheism is incorrect before, but I don't understand it. By your definition, I would be an atheist, because I don't personify my God.

I'm not in the position to say whether or not you are an atheist. But the fact that you say "my God" leads me to believe that you believe in a deity of some sort. And just to be clear, by deity, I mean

Definition of DEITY
1 a : the rank or essential nature of a god : divinity b capitalized : god 1, supreme being
2: a god or goddess
3: one exalted or revered as supremely good or powerful

By that definition, I would guess that you are not an atheist.

I had an uncle that was an atheist, and he believed in the Cosmic Accident, pure evolution, nothing more, nothing beyond the observable whatsoever. I have also seen atheists on TV described in that manner. For example, the TV show, "Bones."

That makes my point that we (atheists) don't all have a common set of dogma that we adhere to or try to. Some atheists do believe as your uncle did. But others believe that we are more than our physical being. Some believe in life after death. You can't make any generalizations about atheists' beliefs because their beliefs about life and death are as varied as the color wheel.

So perhaps the big disconnect is assuming a "being" has to be personified in some way?

Perhaps. I don't think personification is necessary, because to me a supreme being indicates some central source figure, who is a creator and/or controlling force in the Universe. Something or someone aside from ourselves or our spirits that is powerful and aware of us and can communicate with us.

It only matters if the candidate puts his faith above the law.

We are a country of laws. We also respect peoples rights to practice the religion of their choice or no religion at all.

Just my opinion.

Originally posted by Frogs
My 2 cents is as long as whatever flavor of a "moral compass" they have fits with the overall norms of the world, and leads them to making decisions for the greater good, etc - then it doesn't matter if they are christian, muslim, buddhist, atheist, etc.

So 99.9% of the time it wouldn't matter... it would only really matter if their faith led their first thought to be, "Would these people make an acceptable sacrifice to my lord, Cthulhu?!"

My thoughts exactly. At the end of the day I consider a persons "faith" to be among the most intimate of secrets. Bottom line? Act decently and judge others not, lest you will be judged. As far as I'm concerned the farther faith and politics stay apart, the better. Being so intimate a thing, it has no place as a yardstick on wether someone is a good administrator of the public good or not. With faith were talking abut very personal stuff here, and my self i'm just not qualified to define ones "legitimacy in their faith". And when it comes to government, it shouldn't matter. Just do the damn job we elect you to do, let God, Ghia, Nature whatever sort it's self out in the end. Fair?

Originally posted by Dasher
I understand. He defined a person who is aspiritual. I can see why that might be upsetting to a spiritual atheist

It's not upsetting at all. It was a matter of me reading only part of the sentence. I do realize these things happen in Internet communication. It's not a big deal. We are understanding each other now.

Originally posted by Benevolent Heretic
An atheist can possibly have religion, but not necessarily "a" religion.

I guess you'll have to define religion for me or tell me what you mean by "having religion" because I don't have religion or "a" religion. I have my own personal set of beliefs about life and death, but it is not religious in nature, so I call it my beliefs. You can call it religion if you wish.

An atheist who is truly aspiritual and discusses the very same matter is probably so unpleasant to deal with, it would not be of much use to engage them or their confusion beyond common civil courtesy or execution of "helps."

I don't share your assumption about aspiritual atheists.

Originally posted by Benevolent Heretic
However, that doesn't change, by logic and common word meaning, that an atheist religion is not possible/consistent.

I didn't say that an atheist religion is not possible. I said atheism isn't a religion. There are atheists, who meet once a week and discuss atheism and science, I presume, and they do this "religiously" every week. That doesn't mean that atheism is a religion. I religiously take my dogs out for exercise, but that doesn't mean I have a religion around it. So,while some atheists are "religious" about their beliefs and positions, atheism itself is not religious OR a religion.

Originally posted by Benevolent Heretic
I challenge you to conisder:
If life is life, then it is alive. And just as our own bodies' cells operate within certain boundaries, we do also. As each cell is unaware of and lacks full communion with our own greater consciousness, please consider that the "cycle" is continued on "upwards" so that we should be seeking out communion with the greater consciousness.

Why do you assume that I have not considered that? And I haven't called anything dead.

Originally posted by getreadyalready
I don't consider myself an atheist, but then again, I don't consider you an atheist either.

Well, as I said, it's not my position to say whether or not you are an atheist. That's for you to say. And I will respect that. I wish you would do the same for me, but it's not necessary.

Yes, I do believe in a "creator," but I don't believe it is necessarily a "being" as one could possibly picture or attribute any characterizations to. I believe it is something far far beyond our comprehension, but I believe a piece of it is shared in each of us, and is recycled throughout all living things.

That's beautiful. And I certainly think it's a possibility. It's a lovely thought.

When I pray, and I receive answers, they might be coming from my own brain, or maybe from a collective consciousness, or maybe from a Socratic type of universal knowledge, I don't know, but I am certain it happens.

I totally believe you. When I have problems or issues of insecurities, frustration, sadness or just need an answer, I go inside and figure it out and get my answer, too. I don't know if it's from my brain, a collective conscienceless or something else, either. But I'm not going to name it as any of them just because I don't fully understand it. As far as I know, I am operating autonomously here on earth and there is something more than the physical. But that's all I can say. And I'm not even entirely sure about THAT.

It's good to talk with you.

Originally posted by getreadyalready
It is odd though, that we are so close together in our beliefs and almost opposite in our labels?

I'm not sure our beliefs are that similar. You believe in God. I do not. That's pretty basically different.

I guess we are a perfect example of why so many labels are more destructive and divisive than descriptive.

I hear that. Sometimes I regret saying that I'm an atheist here. So many people don't know what it means and want to impose their own definition and judgments on a word that really is fairly unimportant, IMO. And then I (and other atheists) end up defending our positions and I really don't care to. I don't need to defend my beliefs. I don't really even WANT to. But when people start telling me what I believe based on a label, I can't seem to shut myself up!

But I will respect you by whatever you call your self, I was just joking anyhow.

Thank you. I SO appreciate you and our discussions. You're a bright spot here.