People are Leaving their Churches in Droves Today

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yes wouldn't be too keen to hang around with him as a mate - judaism continues today as does christianity they are both on differerent paths of evolution - Christ was a Jew once for just part of the story and enactment but became something much bigger and wholesome and never set out to teach the world about Judaism - it just happens to be a small part of a larger story

Jesus was actually a rebel and tried to change the Jewish religion. That’s why the Scribes wanted to get rid of him. They convinced Pilot that Jesus was a troublemaker and needed to be silenced.
 

The title Heavenly Father is no mistake, how many people relate to the need for loving father when many earth bound fathers, not all, are wrapped up in their jobs, or an absent father, an abusive father? It seems god the father is a perfect example of fatherly love while human fathers sometimes let you down, god is there and a huge selling tool for recruiting members.
So true. I remember in Sunday School being taught that whichever part of the scriptures that said something about, "Ask your Heavenly Father for what you want/need and as your earthly father gives you what you need, so shall your Heavenly Father." (Or something like that.) And I remember glumly thinking, "Oh, great. I hope that's wrong because if the Heavenly Father is like my earthly father, we're all in trouble." ("Will you kids stop bugging me, goddammit?! I don't know what I did to deserve terrible kids like you!", etc.)
 
Yes, sadly this is so true, but that does not give Christians the right to hate Jews. They, too, are a product of a man-made, flawed religion. All religions are man-made, and flawed. This is why so many people are waking up and leaving their churches. They see the truth of religion. Man can worship God, our Creator, without a religion.
Also, I think the Jews were 1 of the first big religions to say human sacrifice is wrong.
 

Carolfrom TX asked what a “drove” is…well… according to Genesis 32:15-16, it means….

Thirty milk camels with their colts, forty nine, and ten bulls, twenty she asses, and ten foals. And he delivered them into the hand of his servants, every Drove by themselves; and said unto his servants, Pass over before me, and put a space betwixt DROVE and DROVE.
 
If the story of Jesus was left alone as a simple, realistic story in history, and the Roman Church had left it alone and untainted, not making him a god, but a great prophet or philosopher, his story would have been more believable, and accepted along with all the great philosophers in the world. It’s sad that didn’t happen, and so many people died in wars because of it. People never died because they believed a great philosopher.
 
If the story of Jesus was left alone as a simple, realistic story in history, and the Roman Church had left it alone and untainted, not making him a god, but a great prophet or philosopher, his story would have been more believable, and accepted along with all the great philosophers in the world. It’s sad that didn’t happen, and so many people died in wars because of it. People never died because they believed a great philosopher.
You act as if religion began with Jesus...it did not...
Organized religion traces its roots to the Neolithic revolution that began 11,000 years ago in the Near East !!
 
lets face it all we have available tomes and tomes of material on "The Christ" and one cannot simple come to the conclusion that the story of Christ is flawed. The Jews were/are meticulous in their accountings etc - read up about the family geneologies of Mary and Joseph going back to Adam and Eve even - there are no mistakes there. We sit with our boxes and boxes of books and read and read and read but in the end have to make up our own minds or let others take over our decision making for us? - i know where I stand on that one!

The Old Testament is full of contradictions and mistakes, including the made up stories of Adam and Eve, and Moses miracles. The Jews are very prolific writers, and love to exaggerate. I would say the Parables are the only good thing that came out of the Old Testament.
 
You act as if religion began with Jesus...it did not...
Organized religion traces its roots to the Neolithic revolution that began 11,000 years ago in the Near East !!

You haven’t read all my comments, Jamala. Go back, and see what I said about the history of religion.
 
When I was in my 20s. I once said to my mother that Jesus and His disciples seemed like Hippies - they didn't work at much, hung around with a guy with long hair and tried to persuade others to their beliefs of going against the establishment.
 
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So true. I remember in Sunday School being taught that whichever part of the scriptures that said something about, "Ask your Heavenly Father for what you want/need and as your earthly father gives you what you need, so shall your Heavenly Father." (Or something like that.) And I remember glumly thinking, "Oh, great. I hope that's wrong because if the Heavenly Father is like my earthly father, we're all in trouble." ("Will you kids stop bugging me, goddammit?! I don't know what I did to deserve terrible kids like you!", etc.)

Deists believe there is only one God, and He does not intervene in humanity and nature. He gave us all a brain and six senses to figure out how to solve our own problems. It is through science and nature, man has advanced to what we are today, and what we have today. All our modern medicine and technology came through the evolution of science and nature that God created. If man is evil, that is his own doing. It’s a mental health issue, and needs help. There are laws against violence, and your Dad broke many of them. You do not need religion to understand that.
 
Deists believe there is only one God, and He does not intervene in humanity and nature.
Unless this is true.
15 Verses That Prove God Has a Plan for Your Life

The Rescued Letters
https://therescuedletters.com › 15-verses-that-prove-go...
Oct 17, 2016 — To say that God has a plan is completely true. He is Sovereign and all knowing. This means, as Psalm 139 says, each day was planned before one ..

Then there is the one God.

How did God come into being?
 
Jesus was actually a rebel and tried to change the Jewish religion. That’s why the Scribes wanted to get rid of him. They convinced Pilot that Jesus was a troublemaker and needed to be silenced.
He wasn't trying to change the Jewish religion he was proving that it would be fulfilled " for unto them a child would be born and he shall be called Jesus - born from the virgin Mary" - Joseph and Mary were both from the lineage of King David - they were cousins - Jesus wasn't a rebel he was fulfilling the very scriptures the Jews followed religiously! they just didn't understand their own scriptures or didn't want to? All was prophetic - told by their own prophets. But one thing was very clear throughout the OT - the Jews were a very disobedient nation - always grumbling ; always wanting to do things the more exciting way against their own laws. The were admonished many times by God for this. As a family example God had created a very dissobedient and troublesome family named the Jews - now was God wrong for producing them so or can all the blame be placed on the Jews for being petulant and unruly? - or was it a good worldly script that was to be played out thus??
 
The Old Testament is full of contradictions and mistakes, including the made up stories of Adam and Eve, and Moses miracles. The Jews are very prolific writers, and love to exaggerate. I would say the Parables are the only good thing that came out of the Old Testament.
The parables are morality stories told by Jesus in the New Testament. Did you mean the Psalms?
If the story of Jesus was left alone as a simple, realistic story in history, and the Roman Church had left it alone and untainted, not making him a god, but a great prophet or philosopher, his story would have been more believable, and accepted along with all the great philosophers in the world. It’s sad that didn’t happen, and so many people died in wars because of it. People never died because they believed a great philosopher.

Karl Marx?
 
For declining religious services attendance, people just don't worship for nothing-they want to get something from it. It may be everlasting life in a spiritual eutopia, money, relief of illnesses, to ward off disasters, etc. As man's ability to protect itself from floods, earthquakes, and other catastrophes, there's little reason to implore a deity. Most of us have never faced a true famine, so we don't need a deity to protect us from one. As we become more self-sufficient, we need a deity less and less. And as a deity becomes less crucial to daily life, religion becomes less important.
And I do think that TV churches, with "feel good" services and claiming salvation, financial success, and medical cures in exchange for donations, tend to give religion a "huckster" appearance.
 
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Unless this is true.
15 Verses That Prove God Has a Plan for Your Life

The Rescued Letters
https://therescuedletters.com › 15-verses-that-prove-go...
Oct 17, 2016 — To say that God has a plan is completely true. He is Sovereign and all knowing. This means, as Psalm 139 says, each day was planned before one ..

Then there is the one God.

How did God come into being?

Have you ever considered that was all made up by man?
 
If man is evil, that is his own doing.
according to the Bible mankind inherited evil from first man, isn't it conveneit that Jesus steps up as a sacrifice to reconcile god and man? Thereby assuring the presence of worshiping god/Jesus even though sin was an invention to encourage or scare people into attending places of worship? Rough translation if you're not with me, you are against me and therefore my enemy. No wonder religion is sacred to many people, especially when threatened with the consequences noncompliance.

I don't believe any of the religious pitches made by my family, preachers or various speakers. While the messages were basically the same a few sermons stirred my emotions to feelings of remorse because of my sins. In retrospect a young boy with an unhealthy and unmet ideation of his dad made me vulnerable to receiving the perfect gift bestowed by my heavenly father of which I hoped to gain approval by my earthly father, guess what, it didn't happen.
 
For declining religious services attendance, people just don't worship for nothing-they want to get something from it. It may be everlasting life in a spiritual eutopia, money, relief of illnesses, to ward off disasters, etc. As man's ability to protect itself from floods, earthquakes, and other catastrophes, there's little reason to implore a deity. Most of us have never faced a true famine, so we don't need a deity to protect us from one. As we become more self-sufficient, we need a deity less and less. And as a deity becomes less crucial to daily life, religion becomes less important.

Yes, that’s true, because we have more science and reasoning in psychology, governing laws, education, etc.
 
All those "gods" across cultures and time are one of the reasons I'm a believer. Why has mankind always looked so hard for a creator if there isn't one?

I don’t think belief in a creator God was the result of research. Better to ask why have people always intuited the presence of gods or God in order to accept their lives in hard times and in good. I don’t think the existence of God is really the point so much as the capacity of that belief to make sense of our existence, preferably in a way that enabled us to put the general good above narrow self interest.
 
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