I take comfort knowing that I do not have to deal with these people anymore. I don't see how believing that these people are going to hell would give me comfort, or would make me any better than they. What's the difference, really, in taking comfort that someone is going to hell, and celebrating it?
Except that you seemed to have missed the part where I simply wrote, quote, "that they will get their desert". I did not write these people will go to hell -- I don't presume to know that: you added that part. The difference there is neither accidental nor insignificant.
I should think that for an atheist, the concept of hell itself is meaningless, and consequently, also wishing someone to hell (or heaven). From your point of view, regardless of how we choose to live our lives, we'll all end up atoms in the endless cycle of life, right?
As a Christian I don't, for instance, believe in seeking revenge in this life, because I don't have to, as I trust that at the end of the day, we'll all get our deserts. I assume there might be atheists who seek revenge in this life precisely because they see it as their only chance of getting "even" or getting "justice" or whatever. I assume this might even include dancing on someone's grave with the intention to show disrespect. I assume there may also be atheists, quite a few, actually, who refrain from such expressions of revenge, nevertheless. Exactly why they choose to pass, I wouldn't know.
But see, you have it wrong. They're showing their love and admiration for a God whose judgment and hate for these two sinners is perfect and absolute. You see it as treating your neighbour badly. They see it as worshipping a perfect God doing what a perfect God said He would do. How can you say they're wrong?
Regardless of their personal intensions and justifications, their action is not in keeping with the Golden Rule. The Greatest Commandment has two parts: love thy God is inseperable from loving your neighbours
as yourself. For the dead teen, their actions are already wholly inconsequential: a dead corpse cannot see their antics, cannot hear it, cannot feel it, thus does not give a fig. The only people who see it and feel it are the living -- and who would wish to be kicked when they are already down on their knees?
And, they believe that these people belong in hell not because they randomly believe these people belong there, but because the Bible itself clearly says so. I'm sure I don't have to look up scripture to explain what we all already know is true. Whereas I see no scripture that says that celebrating the eternal sentence to hell is a road there.
While the Bible says all people belong to hell, the latter part of it also tells how people can choose differently. A bunch of sinners thinking a bunch of other sinners belong to hell does not make it so. By elevating themselves to be the judges of their fellower sinners, sinners only condemn themselves.
For I take no pleasure in the death of anyone -- so should the sinners celebrate it?
Agreed. But unrealistic. If a guy singing the The Gilligan's Island Theme runs up and kicks me in the groin, and then another guy singing The Gilligan's Island Theme runs up and kicks me in the groin, it's a pretty safe bet that every time I hear someone singing the Gilligan's Island Theme, I'm going to "cover up."
And never mind that millions of Christians do not celebrate the death of any one sinner, Jew, Muslim, adulterer or the child of an adulterer, war-mongerer, fellow church-going Christian with an acerbic tongue, greedy appetite, tight purse-strings, or judgemental nature.
I'm not the only one who thinks this way. People fought against a mosque near Ground Zero because all Muslims are terrorists. An unarmed kid in Florida was killed last month because all young black men are gangmembers. Texas legislators tried to expel a Jewish speaker of the house because Christians were wholesome, while Jews were greedy. I have had it explained to me that because I'm an atheist I am also an extreme communist and (somehow) also an extreme capitalist. Even God Himself finds it difficult to brook the likes of us...
Well, you could try to turn this into an argumentum ad populum and see how that goes.
Besides, Jesus said that True Christians(tm) would be hated. So, what's the problem? These grave dancers are clearly the ones doing God's work.
Says you, your judgement.
Me, the best I can do is try to do what's decent in my mind, which is why, as a Christian, a follower of Jesus Christ, I feel compelled to speak against such expressions of hatred done in the name of the Old Testament.
So why fight it? Go with it.
I refer back to the start of my post here: as an atheist, why are you not simply "going with it" too? I believe I would be condemning myself, but what's keeping you from simply succumbing to mindless rage, hatred, revenge and lashing out whenever you feel like it?
Forgiving doesn't mean he didn't condemn.
The mere fact he claims forgiveness is needed means condemnation has occurred.
God unfairly judges every human by their mere affiliation of being human.
And, for human beings who don't believe in God and Jesus Christ the Son, all this is inconsequential, as they they don't believe in such judgement anyway, whereas the believers don't doubt the fairness of the judgement. So, at the end of the day, we can all die secure in our chosen beliefs.