Askjo said:
God announced that the atheists are FOOLS! The Scriptures announced that atheists are FOOLS! The Scriptures and God announced that atheists have their own religion: Worship NO God.
Just reading that about atheists in those scriptures doesn't give understanding of what real atheists are like. Remember that the bible is a biased source with regard to such things. The bible is a religous book written as if the religion it's about is the One True Relgion. Such writings would naturally cast people of other religions and nonreligous people in negative light.
If you want to understand real atheists, you should ask us, instead of looking in a text biased against us.
If you say that atheists have their own religion that tells them to worship no gods, that is lumping us in with people of other religions. That makes it easier for religous people who believe in the bible to see the atheists in the same way they see people of other religions, as the Others who are wrong. Lumping atheists in with these other people also allows the bible followers to avoid thinking about what atheism really means. It's easier to think about everybody who doesn't follow one's religion as wrong than it is to think about the differences between people of other religions and people who have no religions, like nonreligious atheists. Nonreligious atheism, which is having no religion and no beliefs in gods, is quite alien to the religious mind, so religious people seem to think that atheists have a religion that tells them to deny, ignore and not worship gods, like say, the Christian god. So those religious people lump nonreligious atheists in with people of other religions as the ones who are Wrong.
If you actually asked us what it is like to be a nonreligious atheist, we'd tell you that we just don't have any religion or belief in any god. Remember, we believe in one less god than Christians do. If Christians understood why we and they don't believe in all of the thousands of other gods, they'd understand why we don't believe in theirs either. Yes, it is actually possible to live life with no religion and no beliefs in gods.
To have no belief in gods is not the same as knowing that those gods exist and deciding to go against them or it. It is simpily having
no beliefs in such beings. Grown up people have no belief in Santa. Does that mean that they know that Santa is real and decided to go against him? No, it means that they just don't believe. It's the same way with atheists and gods.
The bible makes claims about what and how atheists think and how they behave.
Askjo said:
Psalms 14:1 (KJV)
The fool hath said in his heart, There is no God. They are corrupt, they have done abominable works, there is none that doeth good.
We could find examples of Christians who are corrupt. Of course, you could say that they aren't real Christians. But the corrupt Christians would still claim that they were and if they had enough power, they'd make sure that their brand of Christianity was the Right one and call others wrong.
Have you met any real atheists. Like Christians, there are good and bad ones. Claiming that no atheists had done good is an extreme claim about all atheists. It seems like Christians trust that as true because it's in the bible, but how can they be sure? If they met a nice atheist, would that call the truth of that part of the bible into question? I guess that people who prefer to think that everything in the bible is absolutely true would stick with imaging all atheists, including me, as evil slime.
Askjo said:
Romans 1:20-22 (KJV)
For the invisible things of him from the creation of the world are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made, even his eternal power and Godhead; so that they are without excuse:
Because that, when they knew God, they glorified him not as God, neither were thankful; but became vain in their imaginations, and their foolish heart was darkened.
Professing themselves to be wise, they became fools,
The very crystral evidence shows that most atheists see everything on the earth and understand what they are created by God Himself because these atheists know God and rejected Him.
Here, the bible is claiming that atheists know that the god in the bible is real, but don't worship it and reject it. If you asked real atheists, the atheists known as neutral, weak or soft atheists would tell you that they just have no belief in the biblical god because there's no evidence for it that holds up. So they lack belief in that god. The atheists known as strong, positive or hard atheists would say that no, they don't consider the god in the bible real. They don't rebel against it because they they consider it imaginary. Are people who don't believe in Santa rebels against him? No, they are not. That's how atheists see it. They don't believe in the bibical god. It would be pointless to rebel against imaginary beings like Santa.
Also, remember that I said that the bible is a religious text, so that makes it biased against atheists because it was written to support the religions of the Judeo-Christian god. So it is not a good source of information on what real atheists think and how they act.
Askjo said:
Romans 1:28 (KJV)
....they did not like to retain God in their knowledge....
That is why these atheists refuse to worship God.
Actually, I enjoyed writing this because it made me think about religion and how it works. I also read about gods and religions sometimes for fun.
