Comment Thread for The Resurrection of Jesus - Apologiaphoenix vs Gary

[Mikeenders]

Who gives a rat's ass about atheists. Its "non-religious", "secularist", "non-theist", that are the new labels for people who believe your superstitious belief system is a load of silly bull...crap.

Yawn numbers wax and wane over centuries on that. I could not care less. according to the latest poll from Pew the latest change in ideology in years was 3%. Your claim of a rapid decline is mythological and is bound to swing the other way the more the public hears secularist and naturalism appealing to the supernatural.

Your presence here is a prime proof of you being aware of your minority status. You wouldn't think you needed to be here posting on christian threads if Christianity were about to vanish as you claim. Your actions rebut your own hope and prayer

[Gary]

When you are in the minority you have to hold on to every sign of hope. Its true that mainline protestants are in decline but they try and spin that as atheism when in fact even the latest polls indicate the asses are not running to a purely naturalistic worldview

http://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank...ligious-nones/

In the last seven years agnostics have picked up less than 2% and atheists less than them

This rapid decline in theism Poor Gary is conning himself into believing is mythical. People are attending and identifying with brick and mortar churches less but thats the part of the internet connection skeptics are not getting - its not all about their skeptic crusade its about the social changes of being connected without having to meet.

Christianity can be debunked by one glaring false claim by the Apostle Paul:

Dear world: Jesus looooooooves you sooooo much. But he will burn your miserable, sorry ass for all eternity if you don't love him back.

That's conservative Christianity, folks. It's BS.

Yawn numbers wax and wane over centuries on that. I could not care less. according to the latest poll from Pew the latest change in ideology in years was 3%. Your claim of a rapid decline is mythological and is bound to swing the other way the more the public hears secularist and naturalism appealing to the supernatural.

Your presence here is a prime proof of you being aware of your minority status. You wouldn't think you needed to be here posting on christian threads if Christianity were about to vanish as you claim. Your actions rebut your own hope and prayer

Actually, I'm doing my darndest here, Mikey, to help speed up (conservative) Christianity's inevitable demise.

Moderated By: Littlejoe

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[tabibito]

Didn't Gary cover this "He will burn you in Hell" story some place before in the thread? Maybe he thinks his failure to provide a scriptural reference showing that God will do so can be made up for by a video.

[Mikeenders]

However, it remains that opponents of Christianity will gain ground while the churches continue to promote precepts that quite clearly are erroneous. The biggest factor in such strength as atheist groups have is simply the Churches' failure to properly address real problems. 80% demonstrable failure by atheist argument is still a 20% success rate. And while churches deny the existence of that 20%, they do the detractors' work for them.

Thats probably because there is a vast difference of opinion on what those problems actually are but I will probably part ways with those that think the number one issue with any decline (as small as it is) is message (not saying it isn't a strong number two). I happen to think the church is pretty horrible at adopting technology and media and part of what exacerbates that is the unscriptural notion that the church meeting and buildings are for outreach/evangelism. We spend faar too much money building places to invite people to come in than we do going out and engaging the culture in more ways than preaching. Right now for example protestants/evangelicals are the largest demographic that has no visual media entertainment channel geared to us. IF its a christian channel its all preaching or its not running christian programming the rest of the time. We lagged way behind on the internet, we are only now beginning to get back into movies and My son has asked for years for a good christian video game and I have yet to be able to put one into his hands.

Lets take an obvious and real example of how poorly Christians use technology because we are hunkered down in church buildings and it relates to this thread. EVERY SINGLE POLL HAS INDICATED THAT ATHEISTS ARE NOT EVEN INTO DOUBLE DIGITS. However get online - youtube, general forums, comments on various sites and you would think it was at least 50/50. People like Gary (atheist or not) also are still in the minority but they are able to fool people (and like gary - themselves) on many sites that the Christian is in the minority. Youtube is probably the best example. You would think viewing and being Engaged on youtube that Christianity was at 20% and atheism was 80%.

We simply are not using technology as we should and that world is now DEEPLY intertwined with it - however in that particular case its because we have allowed the anti religious telling us they don;t want us stuffing their religion down their throat. We have been conned into being relatively quiet - because as Gary so aptly demonstrates - they have no problem with trying to cram things down the throats even on Christian sites. its was just quite the lie (for some) that they thought message thumping was despicable. They just wanted the cramming to be their message.

[Apologiaphoenix]

Yep. All because of the internet.

You know, the same place you can go to learn about Reptilians in Congress....

To learn that man never landed on the moon and it's all a hoax....

To learn that the Illuminati are behind everything that happens....

The problem isn't the internet. The problem is a lack of discernment.

Gary is a shining example of a lack of discernment. He believes everything he reads on the internet provided it argues against Christianity. He does not know how to sift through information and frankly, neither do the huge majority of people in the world today who feel through data rather than think through it and don't know how to respond to claims.

The problem isn't the internet spreads information but that it gives everyone a voice and lets everyone be an authority. Sure. Some voices get heard that might not otherwise and these voices on both sides are informed on what they talk about.

But unfortunately, many also get through that do not know what they're talking about, but hey, they speak loudly enough and to those who don't know better, it sounds convincing.

Gary in the medical field should know for instance about the claim that vaccines cause autism. This gets spread rapidly thanks to the internet. There are a plethora of bogus claims about health and well-being that spread because of the internet and because someone thinks they know what they're talking about because of what they watched on Dr. Oz.

This is why you read books. The best information is still in books.

[Mikeenders]

That's conservative Christianity, folks. It's BS.

I don't know the rules on it but I can't think it isn't a work around to language filters to use abbreviations of curse words on a Christian site. I don't expect you to show the required class but maybe a mod will show it to you

But no Gary you didn't even touch Christianity with that blurb. Its true the Bible teaches Hell but its equally true it teaches that hell is thrown into the lake of fire in the second death.

Its also true that Biblically timelessness is more a function of eternity than the length of time but I suspect that would go light years over your head.

Still its curious thinking that something is proven wrong just because you don't like it

[Apologiaphoenix]

I don't know the rules on it but I can't think it isn't a work around to language filters to use abbreviations of curse words on a Christian site. I don't expect you to show the required class but maybe a mod will show it to you

But no Gary you didn't even touch Christianity with that blurb. Its true the Bible teaches Hell but its equally true it teaches that hell is thrown into the lake of fire in the second death.

Its also true that Biblically timelessness is more a function of eternity than the length of time but I suspect that would go light years over your head.

Still its curious thinking that something is proven wrong just because you don't like it

We could recommend a book, but that requires actual work.

And actual work would require that Gary have to think.

That's why the internet is so helpful for people who don't like to do their own thinking but want others to do it for them.

I believe it was Kierkegaard who spoke of people wanting freedom of speech to speak when they so seldom use the freedom of thought to think about what they say.

[Mikeenders]

But unfortunately, many also get through that do not know what they're talking about, but hey, they speak loudly enough and to those who don't know better, it sounds convincing.

Great point which made me look this up. I think you might get a kick out of it

http://www.wsj.com/articles/SB100014...84981644790098

When we're constantly distracted and interrupted, as we tend to be online, our brains are unable to forge the strong and expansive neural connections that give depth and distinctiveness to our thinking. We become mere signal-processing units, quickly shepherding disjointed bits of information into and then out of short-term memory.

Why oh why does that paragraph seems so powerfully representative of a certain poster?

lol

[Christianbookworm]

This is what the internet does to your brain!

Squirrel!!!

[Mikeenders]

That's why the internet is so helpful for people who don't like to do their own thinking but want others to do it for them.

Yep...There are no end of signs its making us as a culture stupider.


Fights between two singers on Twitter are making major news

no user controlled news website has escaped being turned into a mush of madness in their hands

You can get a million hits and thanks for posting the most inane antics on youtube

anything longer than a normal web page is too wordy.

and anyone with zero knowledge on a subject can challenge the world on the subject they know nothing of with a free blog on Wordpress.com in 60 seconds or less.

[psstein]

Yep. All because of the internet.

You know, the same place you can go to learn about Reptilians in Congress....

To learn that man never landed on the moon and it's all a hoax....

To learn that the Illuminati are behind everything that happens....

The problem isn't the internet. The problem is a lack of discernment.

Gary is a shining example of a lack of discernment. He believes everything he reads on the internet provided it argues against Christianity. He does not know how to sift through information and frankly, neither do the huge majority of people in the world today who feel through data rather than think through it and don't know how to respond to claims.

The problem isn't the internet spreads information but that it gives everyone a voice and lets everyone be an authority. Sure. Some voices get heard that might not otherwise and these voices on both sides are informed on what they talk about.

But unfortunately, many also get through that do not know what they're talking about, but hey, they speak loudly enough and to those who don't know better, it sounds convincing.

Gary in the medical field should know for instance about the claim that vaccines cause autism. This gets spread rapidly thanks to the internet. There are a plethora of bogus claims about health and well-being that spread because of the internet and because someone thinks they know what they're talking about because of what they watched on Dr. Oz.

This is why you read books. The best information is still in books.

Or academic journals, if you have access. Sometimes a book can be well summarized in a 25 page journal article (by the same author).

Gary is now using Zeitgeist to "debunk" Christianity. This can't be serious, can it? This has to be some sort of Christian troll to see how we react.

[Christianbookworm]

No Christian troll would be so stupid! Unless... they are parodying a fundy atheist? Naaahhhh...
Or maybe Gary is really a computer program! Not really, I don't think chatbots are quite advanced enough.

[Apologiaphoenix]

Zeitgeist? Dang. I hadn't really been looking at each video.

Okay people. Place your bets. How long before Gary's a mythicist?

[One Bad Pig]

Zeitgeist? Dang. I hadn't really been looking at each video.

Okay people. Place your bets. How long before Gary's a mythicist?

You mean full-blown mythicist? He brought up the possibility way back, but moved on from it fairly quickly.

[Mikeenders]

Or maybe Gary is really a computer program! Not really, I don't think chatbots are quite advanced enough.

No chatbot is required for what Gary does. You sure can programmatically grab a page off the internet, save it, strip out the markup and do a httppost

and you have what gary does 80% of the time

a copy and paste

Gary is now using Zeitgeist to "debunk" Christianity. This can't be serious, can it? This has to be some sort of Christian troll to see how we react.

remove the word "Christian" and you have got it. I like to do a little homework on people I respond to online and if you click around a bit in his blogroll and comments I think you will see ample evidence I was not just being accusatory. He is and likes to troll Christian sites.