Why do some Christians act so hostile toward questions?

zippy2006 said:

Original Sin is not the inheritance of transgressions, but the inheritance of a state of weakness. St. Augustine did seem to teach the inheritance of transgressions, but neither the Catholic nor Orthodox Church affirmed that part of his teaching. There may be certain Protestant bodies that hold such a thing.

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I can see why that leads to so much confusion, even among adherents of Christianity....

Saucy said:

This is exactly the point though. We are called to admit mistakes and correct behavior.

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That's a virtue, I agree, to be able to self reflect and improve oneself,.... its the concept of original sin, guilty by default, that I find unjust and would like to hear the views of others on it.

JD16 said:

I can see why that leads to so much confusion, even among adherents of Christianity....

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You see, one sect of Christianity teaches one thing and other sect of Christianity teaches something different about the same subject, and yet both claim to teach the truth of the bible. How are we, as non-Christians, expected to believe either one when Christians seem unable to get the story and scripture straight without contradicting each other? It is most confusing, IMO.

CrystalDragon said:

Haha, depends on what you mean by ""advanced on my journey". I just have always had a lot of questions and curiosity about things.

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Y'know....................you could waltz on over to ex-Christian.net and observe how some of them treat the Christians there......just so you could do a comparison.

Ygrene Imref said:

Then, if true (which I am inclined to believe,) why do people continue to have children knowing they will be at base "fallen"? Why do people bring them under the same curse without considering that/those people may be damned to hell?

I don't get that.

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People often use children as a reason for living,
or as a seeming "advantage", (often for money in the usa where they get paid more for the more children they have),
for the attention they get, the 'hope' (often maybe unknown) that they have,
rarely though
bring up children in the right way,
because so few know the right way. This is most sad.
YHWH(GOD) still provides for their healing salvation and forgiveness IF they turn to HIM.
So their lives and the children's lives also, perhaps, may be saved and won't be in vain.

Ygrene Imref said:

Then, if true (which I am inclined to believe,) why do people continue to have children knowing they will be at base "fallen"? Why do people bring them under the same curse without considering that/those people may be damned to hell?

I don't get that.

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Ephesians 6:4 "And, ye fathers, provoke not your children to wrath: but bring them up in the nurture and admonition of the Lord."

Christians seek to bring their children up in the nurture and admonition of the Lord, so they might one day accept Christ as Saviour.

CrystalDragon said:

But they might NOT accept Christ one day even if they were brought up in such a scenario.




Oh I've read several of those, some of the testimonies from former Christians are heartbreaking and often in the comments the ex-Christians are more sympathetic than the current Christians. That only furthers my "religion can be damaging" view.

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Sure, there are people who claim to be Christian but still mis-construe Christian faith and use it in a damaging way, but in regard to ex-christian.net, my point was that a number of them are fairly abrasive to the Christians who show up and dare to open their mouths, and they don't have to use 'clean' language' by which to do it with either like we do here. Just sayin.'

Another main point I'd like to make, Crystal, is that there are yahoos no matter where you go, and in every organization, including the Christian church, and a lack of religion in my experience isn't something that necessarily makes one nicer or better.

CrystalDragon said:

But they might NOT accept Christ one day even if they were brought up in such a scenario.




Oh I've read several of those, some of the testimonies from former Christians are heartbreaking and often in the comments the ex-Christians are more sympathetic than the current Christians. That only furthers my "religion can be damaging" view.

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They might not, but they might. It is not a light thing to have children. A Christian parent who has raised a child up in the nurture and admonition of the Lord, can rest in knowing that they did as God told them to do. This is why many people have dedication ceremonies in church. They're really beautiful. The parents of a baby basically pledge their dedication to raising their child to know God. The church family pledges to help the parents. It is a lovely ceremony if you've never been to one.

CrystalDragon said:

But they might NOT accept Christ one day even if they were brought up in such a scenario.

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Since most all the world does not trust YHWH, that's unknown to them.
Since most religious people I asked / talked to in person the last ten years/ do not raise up children right, that's unknown to them also.
(It takes a long diligent search, like KING DAVID DID, to find an honest person)
YHWH'S WORD (THE BIBLE) says it is so.
YHWH is faithful and true, perfect in all HIS ways. HE HIMSELF guards HIS WORD , even more than HE guards HIS OWN NAME.
So, I will rely on, trust, and believe YHWH'S WORD. Trust HIM, no matter what .

CrystalDragon said:

But they might NOT accept Christ one day even if they were brought up in such a scenario.

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I have known pastor's kids you would never know they ever stepped one foot inside a church unless someone told you so.

CrystalDragon said:

Oh I've read several of those, some of the testimonies from former Christians are heartbreaking and often in the comments the ex-Christians are more sympathetic than the current Christians. That only furthers my "religion can be damaging" view.

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I completely agree.

voices that carry said:

I have known pastor's kids you would never know they ever stepped one foot inside a church unless someone told you so.

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Yes,
but notice YHWH'S PROMISE is not to pastor's children,
and (realizing just now), not to church members/ goers.

Here's the thing (and please hear me out, this isn't a cop out answer. I'm going to give you my best answer as I understand it). We are limited creatures. We cannot understand the vastness of Him even if we wanted to. Why? I mean, I can't even comprehend the vastness of the universe. I've seen a video (and I know atheists mocked it) of drawing a circle. Imagine that inside the circle is all knowledge. Everything mankind has or ever will discover. All mathematics, science, geometry, exploration, everything man knows is inside the circle.

Now, within that circle, draw a circle that represents everything you know compared to all the knowledge there is to gain in the universe. Most people recognize they don't even come close to understanding all the knowledge that's in the universe, so they'd draw a much smaller circle to represent what they know. Then they're asked, is it possible that the knowledge of God is still outside of your circle?

The bible says man knows there's a God and only a fool says there is no God because we are without excuse. I'm not bringing that up to call anyone a fool, but to say that to a lot of people, the existence of God is truth in their life. I used to be an atheist. I used to make fun of my Christian friends. We'd watch movies in Oceanography class I remember looking at my friend who was a Christian and saying, "Doesn't that prove to you that God doesn't exist? Whales evolved, we evolved," and he was undeterred. It frustrated me. How idiotic was this person to deny what we just watched?

Well, I no longer believe in it either. I don't believe we evolved. I think science is helpful and amazing in a lot of ways. I've always been fascinated with the universe, the planets, studied astronomy and geology...it has its uses. But there are two things science has never been able to explain, nor do I believe they will be able to explain it.

1) Where the universe came from. There was a beginning. And all known matter was condensed into a space smaller than a head of a pin? Seriously? How did that form? You have nothing, and then something explodes and now you have everything. I can't wrap my head around it.

2) That life can form out of nothing or from non-life. I know there are theories about mud and lightning and all of that, but it does not make sense to me. Dare I even say literally impossible for life to just arise. Those who've done the math say it's a mathematical impossibility.

Then there's a lot of other questions, like how our solar system was set up so perfectly. The sun is the right size with the right amount of gravity. Earth sits in a perfect "Goldilocks Zone". A little closer or further away and life would be impossible. Earth is the perfect size. Life wouldn't exist (or would be radically different) without the moon. If the moon was closer or further away, that would disrupt things. We have water (how did we get water? We have no idea!). The amount of information packed into a single strand of DNA can fill a massive encyclopedia.

Maybe you're fine with all of that, but it's too much for me personally. I can't reconcile any of it. It literally makes no sense to me how anyone can accept that everything is through naturalistic processes and have SO MUCH of this perfect fine-tuning happen by accident or coincidence. It's mathematically impossible.

As for some of the other questions, like original sin and why did God still create us if He knew we'd sin? Well, the bible says He knew us before we were conceived. And He loved us still. He loved us and chose to create us. Like a good Father, God gave us a set of rules to live by, not out of spite or to set us up, but He knew how to live a good life and how we would best succeed. Man chooses their own actions and their own actions have consequences. My parents were druggies and alcoholics. They got that way because of their parents and on and on. We perpetuate these generational curses because it's what we picked up from generations past.

But we can change them, can't we? Everyone in my family are heavy drinkers, smokers, etc. I'm not. I choose to be different. I don't think I'm better than them because they're out sleeping around and doing all of that, but they reap the consequences of their actions, just like I reap the consequences of my own.

And to say God knew we would suffer and struggle, so why did He create us...well, how many in here want kids?

I sure know I want kids. Is it selfish of me to have kids knowing they will come into the world and struggle? That they will experience loss, disease, destruction, pain, heartbreak, etc? Should we just end the human race right here because there's no hope for anything and all we have to look forward to is evil in the world?

Even knowing we would struggle, God created us anyway out of love. The bible also says the fire purifies us. We become much better people through adversity. I was very angry at God when my dad was killed in a work accident. I blamed Him for allowing it to happen, but I later repented of that. My dad died because he was drinking on the job and pressed the wrong button. Despite the pain of that loss, I grew to become a much better person.

Knowing adversity makes me stronger.
Knowing that it's impossible for life to arise on its own (and it's too big of a coincidence for it to be a coincidence).
Knowing that I have a reason and a purpose for being here.
Knowing that morality and consciousnesses exists.
Personally experiencing miracles, hearing God speak to me, constantly feeling His presence, seeing Him work in my life.

I just know He's real.

And lastly, there's a message from Francis Chan I love. I can find the link for you if you want, but he gives an example of eternity. He tries to form it for us, knowing we have a difficult time understanding eternity. He created an illustration from a rope. He said, "Look at this rope. I have one end in my hand and image the other end is eternity. It just goes on and on and on into forever. Now, this front part I'm holding is colored red for a reason. This red part, that's only a few inches long, is your life here on earth. It's quick. It's fleeting. It's moving faster than you can imagine. But what you do in this red part impacts the rest of eternity. But a lot of people want to live their life as if what they do in the red part is all they have."

Maybe you believe that. You believe you'll die and that's it. If that's true, I've lost out on nothing. I met a lot of great people who always did their best to serve and love others, I went through a lot of stuff, like A LOT of stuff, but I would've gone through it either way, whether God exists or He doesn't. If He doesn't exist, then it was pointless. Either way, I'm going to die. But if I'm right, I get to spend an eternity in Heaven. There will be no more tears, no more struggle or pain.

It seems like a fantasy to some, as if we're trying to escape the real world. Yes, it's nice to think that I might see my dad again in Heaven. Am I just deluding myself? Why do you care if it brings me hope and joy, so I can endure losing him while I'm here on earth? If it's a fantasy, then I lose nothing. I die and that's it. But there's a real chance that it could be true. People have experienced all kinds of things that science tries to explain away.

Maybe I'll make another post another day, but there are miracles recorded in the bible that were recorded in other cultures that they couldn't explain. Like when Jesus died, the sun went dark at noon for three hours. That was a historically recorded event...except it was explained away as a solar eclipse. But there's something wrong with that explanation. 1) Eclipses last minutes, not 3 hours. 2) Jesus died during Passover, which means there would've been a full moon. The moon wasn't in the right place to cause an eclipse and 3) it was accompanied by an earthquake, which was also historically recorded. There are all kinds of different things.

This post is long and I'm sure you disagree with a lot of it. But at the end of the day, it's not an idiotic or foolish thing for me to believe in God. It's incredibly smart to me. After being an atheist and challenged in my heart about the existence of God. I chased down everything, but it wasn't until I found Christ that I was filled and at peace.

Ygrene Imref said:

Then, if true (which I am inclined to believe,) why do people continue to have children knowing they will be at base "fallen"? Why do people bring them under the same curse without considering that/those people may be damned to hell?

I don't get that.

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In addition to the answers given above, there are a million answers to that question.

Saucy said:

I chased down everything, but it wasn't until I found Christ that I was filled and at peace.

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Amein! HalleluYAH!
There is no peace apart from CHRIST. And the Peace HE gives , is permaent, forever, and no one can take it away.
Wonderful !

AvgJoe said:

In addition to the answers given above, there are a million answers to that question.

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Really ?!
HOW many people KNOW their own children , their own babies if they have them, "will be 'fallen' " / condemned ? (I forgot this part of the question earlier)
What churches, schools, groups, countries, religions teach people
that their children will be condemned ?

yeshuaslavejeff said:

Really ?!
HOW many people KNOW their own children , their own babies if they have them, "will be 'fallen' " / condemned ? (I forgot this part of the question earlier)
What churches, schools, groups, countries, religions teach people
that their children will be condemned ?

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?

Ygrene Imref said:

why do people continue to have children knowing they will be at base "fallen"? Why do people bring them under the same curse without considering that/those people may be damned to hell?

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AvgJoe said:

In addition to the answers given above, there are a million answers to that question.

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WHO has children, all the while THINKING the children ARE DOOMED ?
(it is TRUTH, that most of the world's population is DOOMED, but still, they don't usually know this)

CrystalDragon said:

Yeah, I have seen the atheists be scathing there as well, hostility comes from both sides. And kindness and caring come from both sides too, it's not all a black-or-white thing.

I more worded the OP question the way I did because that's what I experience quite a bit on here.

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Yes...one can definitely run into a few fundamental stalwarts here on CF who think it is their life mission to tell everyone else how much they fail to measure up or fail to hold the 'right and exact doctrines' of their particular denomination.

But, I've also met some really nice fellow Christians here as well ...