First I would start by defining what I mean by religion.

Theologically, philosophically, or metaphysically speaking, what I mean by religion is an act of homage by which we render to God both privately as individuals and publicly as social beings, the honor, gratitude, worship and obedience due Him and in the way prescribed by Him.

Religion, in the way prescribed by HIm, indicates revealed religion by God Himself.

Based on that I would say that there are so many different paths and religions due either to the ignorance or perversity of people. People are by nature religiously inclined and those who lack knowledge of the true religion, (that is, the one true religion revealed by Almighty God, and there can only be one), invented religions for themselves— religions which differed even as the outlook differed of those who originated them.

Catholic Christianity came into existence in 33AD when Christ founded a Church upon Simon renamed Peter, her first Pope and established Christianity. Modern Judaism was developed by Rabbis after 70AD, Mohammedanism (Islam) was developed in 650, the thousands of various sects that developed within Protestantism began in 1517. They all believe in God yet they are four distinct religions with different doctrines and different belief systems. Reason tells us that since there is but One God, it is impossible to believe that God, Supreme Truth Himself, revealed such contrary doctrines, teachings and worship.

So long as man arranges for himself what he will believe making a great act of faith in his own powers of discernment , there will inevitably be different churches, different paths, and thus different religions.

I am not going to try and walk around your self-contained circle of knowledge. It is self-justifying, self-defining and self-tolerant. There is nothing fair about it, nothing democratic about it and nothing free about it. These are all no-no’s in my secular world. Just not my cup of tea I guess.

I will agree that you have a self-contained paper trail … with an absolute disregard for the world around you. After a thousand years of correcting errors, I would not expect you to find any more now… and that is just the point. You have to look for the truth to find it but all you have done is allow yourself to believe what you have been told to believe, without question.

You seem to think that history can only be defined religiously and explained in its entirety from a crusty and too often mistranslated book written even before the Dark Ages when Christianity flourished. Contemporary technology has provided a genealogy for the evolution of man and there is nary a mention of virginal births or any of the other wonders of the bible, go figure.

And when all else fails, the best your scholars could come up with were archaic sayings like “The work of the devil” or “god works in strange ways” or “god has a plan” … and all is well.

RogueCaptain: Only the religious powers that be seem to have any confusion here and I have to disagree with your reasoning too. I was an agnostic for many years because I refused to take something of such magnitude on faith alone so it was simply a matter of ignoring the inaccuracies and going about my business as usual. After many nagging years, I decided to do my own research. To make this short, I decided that nothing has really changed; I still refuse to take something of such magnitude on faith alone, the only difference now is that I know they cannot prove their case … because they have no empirically data at all to support even one of their biblical claims. And I still go about with business as usual trying to ignore them. I am sure I don’t see any significant or notable changes having taken place. Who did you say does this counting and classifying anyway … I wonder, hehehe?

Just seems silly to me is all, go figure. If they were unable to do this in a couple thousand years, I hardly think 2001 years is going to change anything, do you. No faith involved here just facts … no facts no faith ... no faith no religion ... but you can call me Bill or Bob or Larry or whatever you like ... it doesn't mean or change anything either.

In my comments 1 and 2, I employed not a circle of knowledge but rather a lawful spiral argument of which the ends don't meet. We can subject the Holy Bible to the laws of historical criticism --the same as we apply other books. Turns out, they prove to be reliably historical documents. Now these historical documents tell us of a certain historical Person who declared that He was God, justified that claim which no ordinary person could do and established a Church and religion still in the world today.

As far as "self-serving individualism", no. I uphold the the infallible and consistent teachings of the Catholic Church. Christ established His Chruch and gave His authority to certain men and their lawful successors to teach matters of religion and morals throughout the ages until the end of the world. God never intended that the Holy Bible alone be the ultimate guide in religious belief. 

People who will not accept Christ's Church and who insist on puzzling out religious sense for themselves have no one to blame but themselves if they end  in skepticism. (If the government (God) establishes an inquiry office as a guide to the city (the Church) and a person refuses to use its services, he is to blame if he gets lost.).

I tend to agree.

Furthermore, Atheists do not merely disbelieve in God, the militant Atheists hate Him and hate religion, Christianity in particular. 

 
Self–serving individualism was used in the context of how I see, how you see me. It was not a reference to you or yours. This is what I mean about self–serving to me. There are few examples I can recall in which you did not make your arguments with theological references and scripture quotes, etc. It made no difference to you (seemingly) considering my religious preference. And the topic matter seemed to have no bearing either. It just seems that you cannot communicate any other way than religiously. Is this how you talk with your friends? Don’t you actually have any of your own feelings? I do not enjoy talking with people who cannot or don’t want to talk about anything but shop.

Enjoy your religion and bask in all its glory. All I ask is that you try to converse with me, human to human.

Well, these are the most profound two words you have said to me … “militant Atheists”. I never considered this view and haven’t seen used it before, but it explains much on the slant of your rebuffs. It doesn’t excuse them because I tried time after time to explain myself to little avail. Try to consider me a benign person who has lost their way and only wants to stay lost and my humanity is intact.

You seem to think that I do not have any faith but that is not true. I have faith in myself in my abilities to reason and grow in every way. I have faith in the American people (if not the Government for the last 60 years). I have faith that Nature will endlessly take care of our world. What I do not have is just your Faith.

we jehovah's agnostics have only one duty: go forth every morning at 5:30am or thereabouts block by block, knocking on doors of every residence therein proclaiming to those who open said doors that we've witnessed something but aren't sure what it was.

Atheism is a belief system that there is no God. Atheism is a belief system based on human faith.

You believe there is no God yet you have no proof there is no God and there is no one else who can provide proof there is no God. So it must be human faith upon which you believe there is no God.

Human faith is something we acquire on our own and is not to be confused with supernatural faith which is a divine or supernatural virtue which disposes the mind to assent freely, with certainty,and on the authority of God to all truths which He has revealed.  

I said this

becasue you said this:

BoobzTwo #11

Of course the existence of God has been proven. There is plenty of evidence that God exists.

St. Thomas Aquinas (1225-1274) is famous for his 5 proofs for the existence of God.  The basic premiss of his reasoning is this...if one pays close attention to the created world, study it, that one will inevitably be led to the conclusion that the only possible explanation for universe is the existence of a Creator, an all-knowing, all-powerful Being.

Then there is the argument of causality. There is no case in the world of sense in which a thing is the efficient cause of itself becasue it would have to be prior to itself, which is impossible.

The universe, limited, in all its details, could not be its own cause. It could no more come together with all its regulating laws that have been discussed on this thread so elequently than the San Francisco Harbor Bridge could just happen or a clock could assemble itself and keep perfect time without a bridge or clock-maker.

On the same principle, if there was no God, there would be no one to dispute His existence.

 And another indication of God's existence is universal reasoning or natural intuition of men. God and His handiwork is so clearly impressed upon creation that all intuitively know that there is a God. Given the fact that all people in all times have believed in some kind of supreme being, it is reasonable to conclude that there is a justification for that belief. Men do not have to persuade themselves that there is a God, rather they have to try to persuade themselves that there is no God.

The 4th  indication that God exists is from conscience which calls attention to the fact that all people in all times have a sense of right and wrong which transcends all cultures. The voice of conscience dictates to us a law which we did not make and which no man could have mad. This voice is often against what we wish to do, warning us beforehand, condemning us after its violation. The law dictated by this voice of conscience supposes a lawgiver who has written His law in our hearts. As God alone could do this, it is certain that He exists.

Finally, justice itself demands that there be a God. The very sense of justice amongst us resulting in law courts, supposes a Just God. We didn't give oursleves our sense of justice. It comes from Whoever made us, and no one can give what he does not possess himself. Yet, justice cannot always be done by men in this world. Here, good men suffer and the wicked prosper. And, even though human justice does not always balance the scales, they will be balanced some day by a Just God who most certainly does exist.

There are numerous things I could tell you, things I consider quite true but improvable (to you) for a myriad of reasons. I could tell you that there is no life on the moon … but I cannot prove it. I could tell you I believe e=mc^2 … but I cannot prove it.  I could tell you the age of the universe and the age of the earth but I could not prove it and here you would not believe me anyway. What I can do is tell you that nothing is nothing and needs no explanation, but I guess I cannot even prove that to you, go figure. I will not pander to this theological nonsense any more as I have told you a thousand times I DO NOT DO THEOLOGY. I have not seen so much doubletalk as you are wanting, as usual.

1. “if one pays close attention to the created world, study it, that one will inevitably be led to the conclusion that the only possible explanation for universe is the existence of a Creator”
2. “Then there is the argument of causality.” (Ever seen a child birth?),
3.  “or a clock could assemble itself”
4. “The universe, limited, in all its details, could not be its own cause.”
5. “On the same principle, if there was no God, there would be no one to dispute His existence.”,
6. “And another indication of God's existence is universal reasoning or natural intuition of men”,
7. “Given the fact that all people in all times have believed in some kind of Supreme Being, it is reasonable to conclude that there is a justification for that belief.  
8. “The 4th indication that God exists is from conscience which calls attention to the fact that all people in all times have a sense of right and wrong which transcends all cultures.”
9. “The voice of conscience dictates to us a law which we did not make and which no man could have made.”
10. “The law dictated by this voice of conscience supposes a lawgiver who has written His law in our hearts.”
11. “As God alone could do this, it is certain that He exists.”
12. “The very sense of justice amongst us resulting in law courts, supposes a Just God.”
13. “We didn't give ourselves our sense of justice.”
14. “It comes from Whoever made us, and no one can give what he does not possess himself”
15. “Finally, justice itself demands that there be a God”
16. “And, even though human justice does not always balance the scales, they will be balanced someday by a Just God who most certainly does exist.”

Is there any wonder why we cannot communicate? I can now understand why you need someone to try and prove god exists for you because you surely do not know how. Not that anyone else can either, so you are in good company … I guess. Sorry if I have offended you but you here but I am tired of this. All I do is express my beliefs and all you do is tell me how wrong they are … not my Idea of a conversation.

But I am trying.

C'mon...don't turn it around. What else do I have to go on other than what you said? So let's be clear....You made the claim you believe things on proof and based on that, I asked you to prove what you claim to believe....that God does not exist.

I didn't ask you to prove that God exists, why would I? I already know that He exists and gave St. Thomas' 5 proofs. It is true though that I am in good company with St. Thomas Aquinas. 

..................

Back to one of your statements in the original article....

Interesting that you describe this list as "concepts". Lying, deceit, murder and deception are human actions; and more to the point...they are sinful actions in my book.

We agree that they were in existence long before recorded time. As far back as the beginning of the human race for these are actions of our disordered nature after the Fall of Adam and Eve.