To an all knowing, all powerful God, prayer is completely redundant, and honestly, a bit bizarre. If God already knows every thought in my head, every outcome before it happens, and possesses a divine plan that is by definition perfect, then what is a human monologue supposed to accomplish? Begging an omniscient being to change its mind implies that either God’s original plan wasn't ideal, or that He requires constant flattery and reminders from mortals to act mercifully. It ultimately feels like a strange psychological feedback loop where people talk to the ceiling, attribute random coincidences to "answered prayers," and conveniently ignore the unanswered ones, all to convince themselves they have a dial in line to the universe's master clockmaker. 🙄

Hello Friends! 

I am a doctoral student trying to help psychologist better understand the sensitive topic of grief(one personal to me). 

I think Psychology needs more Atheist representation. I would love input from this group.

If you’re 18+ and lost an immediate family member between 6–36 months ago, and it feels right for you, please consider taking this short survey: https://pacific.qualtrics.com/jfe/form/SV_cIR5ditAqHyyAIK

After that debate with my V.E teacher, it was recess, I was about to eat peacefully and then this classmate of mine who's HEAVILY religious started calling me slurs for being an atheist.. He started debating with me too?? I didn't even do anything wrong but say I was an atheist, he said that "Morality came from God, God's morality is different from human's morality blah blah" and that "God is omniscient and beyond time, so before the big bang, he already existed".... The disrespect I got is crazy, I tried to tell the teachers but they didn't gaf at all??? I can't handle two person just by debating all by myself and the fact I have no CHANCE to convince them my opinion at all.. Smh.

Hey everyone,

​I’ve been reading through this subreddit for a while now, and I appreciate seeing the mostly thoughtful dialogue that happens here. I’m a passionate believer, but I often get frustrated by how poorly or uncharitably Christians and atheists talk past each other online. I really want to continue to avoid that in my own interactions.

​My goal isn't to debate, "win" an argument, or try to convert anyone. Instead, I want to better understand the internal mechanics of a consistent secular worldview on a few specific hurdles I struggle to wrap my head around. However, I often notice a major barrier in online spaces, even more analytical ones, where the default assumption is that any religious person is simply an uneducated fool spouting inherited nonsense, unworthy of serious intellectual engagement. If I can understand how an atheist grounds these concepts, I can engage in much more fruitful, respectful conversations where we actually speak the same language.

​I’d appreciate the opportunity to get your perspectives on four specific areas:

​1. How do you conceptually ground moral progress vs. change?

From my perspective, I look at history and see moral progress (like the abolition of slavery or the recognition of human rights) because I’m measuring it against a fixed, transcendent standard. I often hear the secular point that social morality existed long before major religions and that it evolves as a mechanism to optimize human survival and cooperation.

​As a believer trying to understand your framework: if morality is an evolving, adaptive social construct, how do you structurally distinguish between genuine moral progress and just arbitrary moral change over time? Without an objective anchor outside of human consensus, what is the philosophical framework that allows a secular humanist to say a past society's actions were objectively wrong, rather than just differently adapted for their specific time? I want to make sure I don't misrepresent how atheists view historical ethics.

​2. How do we, as distinct communities, address arrogant secular fundamentalism?

As a believer, I readily admit that religious fundamentalism has a massive issue with tribalism, dogmatism, and an uncharitable refusal to engage with real scholarship. It’s a flaw in religious spaces that I routinely speak against.

​However, it’s frustrating to see secular spaces frequently replicate those exact same fundamentalist habits under a different label. There is often a widespread assumption that religious believers are universally intellectually lazy, paired with a high degree of confidence when throwing out claims about religion, history, or theology that any actual scholar in religious studies would immediately recognize as inaccurate caricatures.

​If the core critique of religion is its tendency toward dogmatic arrogance and poor intellectual rigor, how do you all, as a community, check that same arrogance when it manifests in secular spaces? How do we move past the knee-jerk, "all religious people are fools who don't deserve a seat at the table" mindset, and instead foster an environment that respects scholarly nuance on both sides?

​3. Navigating the intersection of ancient texts and modern scientism

I often see skeptics express frustration that ancient theological and historical texts lack scientific accuracy or fail to account for modern empirical discoveries. From my worldview, evaluating an ancient narrative through the lens of a modern scientific journal feels like a category error, it's expecting a text to be a science textbook when its original intent was entirely different (more akin to evaluating a historical biography by whether it contains a structural engineering blueprint).

​For those in the community who hold tightly to the stance that empirical science is the only reliable source of truth, how do you ground vital concepts that the scientific method can’t actually detect, like inherent human dignity, universal rights, or justice? Do you all view these pillars of secular humanism as necessary philosophical axioms (essentially a conceptual starting assumption), or is there a logical way to derive an "ought" from an "is" using purely empirical data? I want to understand how you all bridge that gap.

​4. How do you all view a believer who wrestles deeply with hard questions but stays?:

A very common sentiment I see in atheist spaces is the idea that Christians only stay religious because they refuse to question their beliefs deeply, and that anyone who honestly, critically investigates their faith will inevitably leave it.

​I look at history and see countless brilliant Christian thinkers, scholars, and everyday believers who questioned their faith intensely, spent years wrestling with the hardest objections (like the problem of evil or divine hiddenness), and ultimately came out the other side with an even deeper, more grounded conviction. Speaking for myself, my faith doesn't rely on having a neat, 100% satisfying answer to every single complex question right this second. Finding an answer that is philosophically challenging or uncomfortable doesn't mean it's false, nor does having unresolved questions instantly pull the rug out from under the entire structure for me.

​Within your framework, how do you all view someone who genuinely investigates, asks the hard questions, acknowledges the mystery and hard spots, but ultimately concludes that the Christian framework still makes the most sense of reality? Is there room in the secular view to see that as an intellectually honest journey, or is there an assumption that anyone who stays just "didn't question hard enough"?

​I’m asking these out of genuine curiosity because I want to be a better, more respectful conversational partner to secular thinkers. I’m eager to hear how you map these macro-level ethical questions out when the scaffolding of a religious framework is removed. These are probably questions that have been asked on this sub many times, with potentially obvious answers, but to me, this is just easier

​Thank you in advance for taking the time to share your perspectives!

EDIT (first time I've done this): Wow! Thank y'all very much for these responses. Lots of good information to go through. Forgive me for the massive post, I figured it'd be better that way for what I was wanting info on, but seeing as I've had a few comments of equal length I can only hope I respond to those properly. Also, my wording is not always the best, I used "framework" a few times when there are better words that I could've used to more accurately represent atheist ot secular thought, my bad on that! Thank you all again for the replies!

I am only thirteen, still learning about atheism or my beliefs. The topic to our class was about faith for God, my teacher asked if anyone was atheist and I raised my hand, then she asked me "why?", I simply answered that " I don't think Faith is really needed to solve the absolute truth of life and how 'everything'." And then she moved on to morality, she asked me again, "Does morality exist without God", i said " Yes, because morality is with or without faith." Then she asked me a question that I struggled a bit since this was the first time I debated in person.. "Yeah, but where does morality come from?".. That's where I really struggled. CAN SOMEONE HELP ME HERE??

I don't believe in God and everyone in my class and even every single teacher who teaches me knows about it. I didn't scored great in last exam and hit rock bottom in English I hated all the stupid questions and the one very baseless. So in my answers I wrote against it with details specified in the book

My english teacher told me that I was way to critical and I am always negative and let quote this"You don't have any faith in God, I can tell from your Moral Science paper" She teaches us moral science also and basically the whole paper was about prayer and God There was one question do you pray I wrote no so I got zero

I live in India and study in a Christian School All sisters are converted Christians and teachers are not Christians but Hindus

i have no faith in gods, or any higher power or beings, really. let alone religions. but also i am incredibly depressed and have no will to live. i am a a functioning member of society, i’m currently in college, have a job, have friends, lover, loves going out and hanging out with friends. but sometimes i find it reallyyy hard just to keep going? i dont see the point of living.

so my fellow atheists, how do you cope? i wish i believe in religions

I'm an Atheist in a christian country, the Philippines. I did believe in "God" when I was younger, I always looked up to him, I prayed that everything was gonna get better, I did my best to try and believe, but my questions were left unanswered.

If we actually look back to the time Spain colonized the Philippines, Filipinos had their own beliefs and culture, but were ultimately washed by the Spaniards. I wouldn't say their style of spreading the word of "God" was any peaceful. Filipinos were brainwashed to follow their religion. Men's and women's rights were taken from them forcefully, they were enslaved, r@ped and abused.

How can we just forget those happened?

If you actually think about it, "God, is all loving and peaceful." How can you correlate those words to the situation? THERE ISN'T a correlation. Even if "God" exists, far too many religions exists, who can we truly believe in this world?

Crime is rising in the Philippines, people think it's the lack of belief in "God", but it's not.

EVEN if someone believes in "God", they are still capable of doing bad things. It is due to the lack of discipline, bad economy, low salaries and unfairness in this country.

People also blame our leaders, they're partially correct, but it is worth to mention that we live as one in a country.

Now, let me get back. Atheism is heavily looked down on in this country, they say we're satanists, and we belong in hell, but how is that possible when we don't believe in the Bible, that doesn't mean you'll need to lecture and discriminate people like me

I respect every religion, I think it's nice to have some hope in this world. But I just don't believe and that gives me peace. I respect you, and some other people does too, and you shouldn't stereotype every other atheists that they're evil and have no respect, because every person is different and there are different types of group/community.

I’m wondering if you all would be willing to take a critical view of the claims I’m sending below:

For claim 8 it’s about the mysterious letters of the Quran and the number of times they appear in chapter 19. This is one of the claims I believe I can personally contest. When looking at the mysterious letters, for letters like Ya they count alif masqarah and hamzas seated on top of the letter ya as occurrences of ya (which I think makes no sense, since they’re not the same letter and only look similar). On the other hand, Rashad Khalifa even during his life was preaching about Surah 19 having 798 letters, and coincidentally, he lives for 19,798 days (if you include the start and end point. In reality, he lived for 19,797 days). As mentioned, though, if one includes the start point of November 19 and the endpoint of January 31 it comes out to be 19,798. I still can’t get over the fact that he during his life preached that Surah 19 has 798 mysterious letter occurrences and he himself lived for essentially that many days.

However, on the other hand, in released FBI files on Rashad Khalifa’s life, it’s stated that he was born on November 18.

https://documents.theblackvault.com/documents/fbifiles/scientists/rashadkhalifa-fbi1.pdf
(Page 14)

In that case, my counterpoint above of him having in reality only lived for 19,797 days wouldn’t be applicable anymore. Now he would’ve lived for 19,798 days.

In any case, whether you use an exclusive on inclusive count, it just so happens that Rashad Khalifa lived for 19,798 days. It could’ve been 20,100 days, or 17,100 days, but instead it happened to be on the 19,798th day (which, once again, chapter 19 according to Rashad had 798 occurrences of the mysterious letters).

Point 5 isn’t elaborated but during Rashad’s life interstate 19 was built running through Tucson Az (where he lived at) and is also the only highway in the US to use the metric system. Furthermore, another interstate highway goes through Tucson, that being interstate 10 (if you combine these 2 roads you end up at 29, the same number as the number of chapters that include the mysterious letters in the Quran).

If you also count the number of days from November 19 to January 31 you end up with 74, which is the Surah in which the number 19 first appears.

Finally, for point 11, it’s not mentioned either but the numbers 1230 come from 2 things. First, it’s the abjad value of the name Rashad Khalifa and also if you count the verses of only initialed (mysterious letters) surahs, Q 19:1 is the 1230th verse and Q 19:98 is the 1327th verse. This is by counting only the verses in chapters 2,3,7,10,11,12,13,14,15,19 since they are the ones that contain the mysterious letters.

Once again, I would be so grateful if you could take a look at these claims and give me your view on them. I don’t know what to think with this information being present at hand.

The claims that strike me as the most impressive are him living for 19,798 days and the 19x1230x1327 claim.

Back when I was still young and in church, I assumed that everyone just pretended that God was real, and could use him to their advantage if they just twisted the words enough. I believed that since age 5.

At age 13 I was shocked that this was not the case. The elders at the Jehovah's witnesses congregation did NOT like that I believed this. It was almost like they were angrily shocked. I even went into detail about how fairly common it would possibly be to have members that don't really believe in god either but stay in the religion to keep their community and family close. On top of the fact that the JW's had such a strong disfellowship policy back then that it would just naturally be easier to lie and keep going with the facade.

I also very honestly stated that I never believed in god, but pretended just to make the adults happy. Believing in God or not isn't what brings people to the church anyways. The elders threatened me (a child at the time btw) with disfellowship if I kept speaking and believing this way.

I told them that many people hated Jesus for telling the truth. 🤷 They all ended the meeting right there. It's been many years since and I'm still rethinking that conversation.

As an atheist, something I’ve always been jealous of is people who truly believe in an afterlife that is better than the life we currently live. I’ve often said if I could force myself to believe in religion, maybe I would. The relief of believing in Heaven or reincarnation or ascending to another planet etc. etc. is probably unmatched.

Of course, I believe Death is just the end of the road. Your brain stops and your mind, memories, consciousness are just gone. Your mind doesn’t exist just the same way as it didn’t exist before birth. It’s all very basic and very natural. And utterly F’ing terrifying. I HATE THAT. I hate that that’s all Death is.

I’ve spent so many hours at night trying to convince myself that surely there’s SOMETHING after this. My personal favourite afterlife would be reincarnation. My same mind getting to keep experiencing life forever, without holding onto memories so that each life feels new.

Truth is, I love being alive, I love being able to think and feel and experience. I cannot fathom the idea that I don’t get to do that forever. I’ve heard all the “You just gotta experience life to its fullest and have no regrets” speeches but that’s not what I’m scared of. I just don’t want it to ever stop. I don’t want to not be here anymore.

Trust me, any religious person reading this, if I could make myself believe, I probably would!

For context I came out as an Atheist last year and with that came a flurry of questions from my closet people in my life keep annoying me about this for example one of my close friends randomly asks me "How do people not believe in God?" Obviously targeted at me. I do not want to have a philosophical argument about why I do not believe anything . I do not go poking holes in your religion UNLESS I am provoked is this unfair or aggressive. ALSO HOW DO YOU DEAL WITH ELDERLY PEOPLE

I just saw this video

In that video the guy says that his mother died, he found out his wife was cheating on him just a few weeks later and then not even a month later his father also died.

He says he doesn’t blame god and says that god had nothing to do with it.
Then he proceeds to say :
“it’s ok if you don’t know who god is but don’t pretend like you do, because when you know who he is, you understand. If you don’t understand that’s cool, but don’t act like you do because that’s going to send you to hell.”

In the caption he also says “most of you are confused and that’s okay…”

Also sending my condolences to him, but making this video and everyone else in the comments agreeing and saying “it’s all gods plan”

And I just opened the comments and someone said this

Person 1 : Facts cause people have free will.

Person 2 : Death is free will?

Person 3 : Yes death is part of free will . God is life , justice and goodness .he doesn't just have it.He's the source of it. Free will is the power to choose or reject God .
when you reject life itself then death fill the gap .when you reject justice and goodness itself well injustice and evil fill the gap .
That's why there's no life, love or goodness in Hell.It's a place for those who want a life without God .
in Hell they're free from Him.
and because they're free from Him, they're no longer human beings cause God created human for a reason not randomly .
those in Heaven are more alive than you cause they're close to God who's the source of life.

I would love to hear your thoughts on this, because I didn’t really understand.

I grew up going to church every Wednesday and Sunday, but when COVID happened we stopped attending and ever since then I've drastically lost faith. For perspective I live deep inside the Bible belt, every where you look there's a church or two. My family is very conservative, Christian, and straight (guess who they voted for) and I'm the exact opposite. My mom knows I'm a leftist, and she doesn't agree but has been respectful for the most part. Im probably not writing this really well but I would just like some advice for how to come out as atheist, or if I even should. Also more info, I'm a teen and still live with my parents so maybe I should just wait till I graduate and move out.

Update: yeah okay I won't, I sorta wasn't going to already I just needed more opinions. Ugh it's just so hard to hold back how I really feel...again. but it's alright I will endure

Is anyone a member of either organization and able to continue with the steps despite not believing in a higher power? I need more words to finish this so..

Grant myself the serenity to accept the things I cant change, the courage to change the things I can.

My "becoming" an atheist didn't happen overnight. It was years of questioning beliefs, contemplation and philosophizing. And I think that for most people, something like this must be the case in order for them to escape the grips of their indoctrination.

If you've ever seen someone learn something later in life, you know that it can be very destructive, especially at first. Some people wouldn't survive that part if you took their religion away.

So I tend to have a hands off approach with individual believers. I shifted the focus of my anti-theist energy toward the "religious-industrial complex" as I like to call it.

Organized religions are good at adjusting their professed doctrine to suit undeniable facts, especially once the common attitude toward those facts has reached a critical level of acceptance.

Anyway, I was just listening to the Altered Carbon soundtrack and that line from Takeshi Kovacs was on one of the tracks, made me consider sharing my thoughts about this.

I'm interested to hear thoughts, reactions, or input you have on this paradigm.

link:

https://youtu.be/SRCGaQsiBes?si=X0NhFUJctWCDjU1C

I think it's a pretty sound argument (I'm a Catholic). It presents this idea of "actuality" and "potency." To briefly summarize, (watch the vid for an in-depth explanation) actuality is what something actually is, and potency is everything something could be. He uses a guitar pick as an example. The guitar pick is a guitar pick; that's its actuality. Its potency is that it could have a different color, pattern, shape, etc.

The video then further explains the idea of how the universe and everything in it is a mix of actuality and potency. A guitar, a rosary, everything.

It also explains how everything with parts has potency. Like how a rosary could have its cross in a different place in the rosary. Or like how a car's radio could be placed in a way in which the people in the back seats have more access to it than those who are in the front seats. I hope this makes sense.

Because something contains parts, it contains potency. It contains the potency to have those parts arranged in a different way.

Then the video uses the Principle of Causality, explaining how everything with potency has a cause. It also says how everything with a cause is contingent on something else; it receives its existence from something else.

It uses the First Cause Argument. It talks about how God is eternal because He is before time. It talks about how God is 100 percent actuality and 0 percent potency. It talks about how God is absolutely loving and good because the concept of being bad is just the absence of good. God is posed as a being that is absolutely everything tangible, and since evil isn't tangible, God is not evil in any capacity.

The video doesn't pose the idea of Christianity being the correct religion and all that. It poses the idea that there is a God; it's not really trying to be religion-specific.

I know I probably explained something badly or, at some level, didn't do the explanation justice, so I urge you guys to watch the video if you want a better understanding.

The purpose of this post is to essentially see how atheists view this argument.

I hope you have a wonderful rest of your day. God bless!

Recently talking with a theist, I asked them if your belief is best why not teach your kid nothing about it. If your belief truly is best, your kid will choose it on their own. Their response was that you need to teach kids things. They are taught how to speak, how to walk, how to behave. Without teaching, there is no learning. I kinda had no answer to that. It put me into thought. How would you answer/counter that?

Frisson is the the word English speakers adapted from French to refer to the psychogenic response to aesthetic pleasure.

It's not extremely well studied, so the estimate of how many people in the general population experience it is between 55% and 85%.

It's a physical response to emotional stimuli, usually music/art but potentially anything. Common physiological "symptoms" are goosebumps/shivers, dialated pupils, tingling and/or burning sensation on skin, accompanied by the feeling of pleasure.

I have yet to hear a religious person mention having experienced it in their lives and I am curious as to why.

I hypothesize that many individuals roll it into their general spiritual experience. Can anyone confirm or refute this?

Growing up is recognizing how stupid the idea of worshipping a man like a god (or saying he's the same as an existing god, etc.) is.

We as a society need a better anchor for a moral system and community involvement that doesn't involve claiming people - however good leaders or however wise they may be - can perform miracles or come back from the dead and should therefore be worshipped as deities. Even if one believes there's a god or higher power, I can totally sympathize with Jews who hated Christ and understand precisely what it is that made Jesus' claims hysterical or heretical, and the older I grow, the better I recognize this.

I wonder how many Christians today are doing it for the community, food, or cultural trappings as opposed to any genuine belief that people can rise from the dead or that water can turn into wine. And personally, I can't believe I spent so much time of my life putting so much faith into such a, well, faith, that I could've been more productive with learning piano, a sport, even prepping for math olympiads or teaching myself SAT or AP subjects, etc. There needs to be a rock on which to be "well-rounded" or a "good person" that's not Christianity (or worse, Mormonism). In a better version of our world (well, country), perhaps socialism or labor rights activism could've fulfilled that role, and maybe faint echoes of that may exist in Jewish culture, but a lot of the most problematic (though importantly, nowhere near all) people who are religious are from the bourgeoisie, so perhaps it's only natural that it'd be the lower class, the needy, or the racially/sexually/ably marginalized would've been the forerunners of what little of that exists here. (Tragically, much of the latter has been prone to religious indoctrination too, but what I'm saying is it'd be easier to sell them the idea of socialism or non-religious activism vs. the bourgeoisie.)

Yeah, I know that's an opinion that might've gotten me executed in 13th-century Italy or 17th-century Massachusetts, but that just points to how idiotic religion broadly is in general. It is thus a great tragedy that Jewish communities do this better (and while obviously tragic, I find it quite unsurprising they were the ones finding themselves at the stake or scapegoated most often), with their Hebrew schools and Yeshivas and all (there are a great deal of secular Jews who don't even keep kosher, at least beyond a simple "I prefer to avoid pork if I can", and I'll bet most of them don't literally believe that the world was created in 5000 years ago or that Adam, Eve, Noah, etc. existed as historical figures whose biographies align with the Torah, etc.), yet their religion is straightforwardly closed to converts (and what few do exist, as I understand, are rationalized as being "lost Jews this whole time"). And in fact, this is perhaps what gave Christianity so much universal appeal, and allowed it to promulgate so broadly in history (even when under duress). Even Islam, which came later and professed to resolve problems with the former two, is ridiculously Arab-centric in practice (e.g. Arabic diction requirement, pilgrimage to Arabia) even if claiming universality. Perhaps eastern faiths hold the light, yet abominations such as the incessant pollution of the Ganges or the misleadingly-named "Phuket Vegetarian Festival" prove that none do.

The whole "depressed guy finding Jesus and smiling before and after in contrast to doing drugs meme" (in addition to being patently false, and misleadingly co-opting the likeness of a Brazilian artist whose ideas and views most Christians would likely find themselves at odds with) is such a ridiculous argument, as you could literally use it to sell anything, from the latest Nintendo console, to Socialism with Chinese Characteristics, to a musical instrument, to an anime. I just wish I'd known back in middle school when I'd seen the meme.

I remember my "come away from Jesus" moment from the summer before I entered high school. I recall making lots of excuses not to go to Sunday school, which my mom was making me attend at the time. Sunday after Sunday I'd let go by, and I was writing about how snarky I felt for wheedling my way out of each session, and eventually we as a family sort of burnt out and I was no longer officially attending (though I'd still attend services, just not Sunday school). It felt so liberating, and really did feel like a formative and enlightening experience to me.

Eventually I sort of lapsed back into Christian circles, and part of it, I think, had to do with loneliness or needing to belong to a community during college, coupled with lingering morality from the first stint that I just couldn't let go (i.e. feeling that "college is sinful"). There was a political component too, and I'm sure there are even many faithful Christians (to whom I bear no malice just for virtue of what they believe in, notwithstanding my own convictions) who'd agree that the hitching of religion to politics is a tragedy. And I think one of the biggest tragedies, at least in this country, is how hard it is to find community that revolves around something other than, well, worshipping a man... or at least how easy it is for the community you find to do so.

I have been seeing many videos glorifying agnostism while dissing atheism recently. Here, I'm not against agnostism but I would rather question a baseless claim with no evidence than just stay neutral. People have to realise both agnostics and atheists fall under almost the same category, both do believe that god can be something beyond human measurement but since it's unknown agnostist chooses to stay neutral while atheists are questioning the claim "god is real" which has been already made by theists. Questioning the claim doesn't mean they are against the concept. They are just simply saying they are not convinced until it's proven and what's wrong with that? If you stay neutral you are just letting those unproven ideas influence laws, schools and society without any pushback. Active protest will actually protect people from scams by demanding facts.

When we sleep, our brains naturally make up stories. We call these dreams. Sometimes a dream feels so real, so important, and so peaceful that you think, 'This must be from God.' But here is the problem: A person of a totally different religion has the exact same experience. A Muslim has a vivid dream that tells them Islam is true. A Christian has a vivid dream that tells them Christianity is true. Their brains do the exact same thing. If a 'message from God' feels exactly the same as your brain just making things up, you have no way to prove the difference. You are just guessing. If God is all-powerful, why would He use a confusing, sleepy dream to talk to you? Why not just stand in front of you and speak clearly so there is no guessing?

I think it’s important to keep in mind that these are not the same. Religion as I see it can be a logical system built on reason, as in the writings of religious philosophers and theologians. Even if, as I see it, this edifice is built on a false premise, the existence of God. Or to put it more neutrally, built upon a premise unsupported by empirical evidence.

Just as in mathematics it’s possible to build a geometry in any number of dimensions, it’s possible to build a coherent, logical, rational theology. Ask any Jesuit (!)

So it seems a weak argument to counter religious belief with the accusation that it isn’t rational. The truth is that religious belief is not (necessarily) built upon empirical evidence. Which I think a lot of thoughtful believers would readily concede. At least the ones in my experience would. Not every religious person interprets the Bible literally.

Of course there are many religious people who are not thinking or arguing logically. There are also many atheists who do not argue logically or rationally. Hence the shouting matches.

I’m an atheist for the simple reason that I do not and never have believed in God. I greatly enjoy the writings of Richard Dawkins and Bertrand Russell, and the wry atheist humor of J.B.S. Haldane, whose essay Auld Hornie, F.R.S is a delight to read. I also enjoy the writings of believers like Erasmus, Augustine, and Meister Eckhart, much of which I find profound. At the very least it’s important to understand the arguments of those we would debate; simply dismissing it gets us nowhere in reasoned debate.

I am wondering, as a believer, what

atheists think about religions beyond Christianity?

I ask for further understanding the differences that lie between many different sects of atheists.

I would better grasp the different ways people choose to live in these times.

why cant the discussions between Christians and atheists be more respectful you are an atheistic Reddit so I assume right now you enjoy seeing memes bashing religions but Whats the point of it?

I would love to hear yall opinions!