Soldato
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May 20 is ‘Everybody Draw Mohammed Day’
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Caporegime
Ermm nope...i was always taught from an early age about islam...i started reading the Quran at the age of 5...by the age of 10 i had read the Quran at least 10 times...obviously as i grew up i started to discover life and didnt pay much attention to islam etc...in fact from the age of 22 to about the age of 35 i wasnt all that islamic...i was too busy enjoying life and living it but then soon got bored of it as i had seen and done it all by the age of 35...by then i had decided to get back into islam, not to the extent of being overly religious as im pretty moderate in the way i practise islam as it is...i dont pray 5 times but do try to pray as much as i can...one thing i never ever miss is my friday prayers.
Caporegime
Yes that is true but i dont know about other muslims but with my parents me and my 2 brothers were pretty islamic till we hit our early teens...then our parents left us to it ie gave us the choice...follow islam or dont follow it as its your own choice but we have done our duty as a parent.
As for not following islam?...well my mum always made it clear that if we didnt follow or practice islam then we at the end of the day, will answer to God...simple as that...we werent emotionally blackmailed neither were we beaten to an inch of our lives. Whereas other muslim friends and family of mine had no choice but to forced into practising islam fully...i thank my lucky stars that my parents were never like that with us.
One thing it does say in islam is that no one should be forced against their free will to practise islam...if you dont want to then dont because if you arent doing it for yourself then only God knows whats inside your heart. Personally ill be carrying that same attitude with my kids as my parents did...make no mistake my kids will be raised as muslims, they will be given islamic backgrounds and upbringing but then after i and my wife have done that...i will leave the decision to them to either practise it or dont practise it...of course i wont be happy if they choose not to...my mum and dad werent happy about it and they used to keep reminding me and my brothers to do our prayers but they never once forced us to do anything we didnt want to do.
You're really so nieve as to think everyone, all over the world, just considering country/culture, has the same chance of believing in God?
Let's look just at Europe, and look at 'belief in God'... http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Religion_in_Europe
So of a 100 people born in Turkey, chances are about 95 of them will stand a chance of going to Heaven at least. Here in the UK, less than 50 would stand a chance. And in Estonia, well, you may as well just pack your sunblock because you're almost certainly going to hell.
How does God decide where people are born? Who's lucky enough to be put in Turkey, and who's unlucky enough to be thrown into Estonia? Someone in Turkey is almost certainly destined to believe in God... But the same person in Estonia would almost certainly not?
Can I PLEASE ASK that you actually stop and think about this for just one second. You repeatedly miss the point!
If you suggest people who die young, or who are mentally ill go straight to heaven, then haven't they been rather fortunate? They've won the lottery! Straight to heaven no test required. Why should some people have all this luck? While others risk failing the test! Why should some people be gifted a free pass to Heaven?
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Depends on your definition of 'opportunity'? Obviously some cultures seem to promote belief more than others...
If you look at the above graph, God deciding you should be born in Estonia would seem to imply he really doesn't want you up there with him. His putting you obviously into a country/culture that doesn't predispose as many people as in other countries/cultures to end up believing in God...
Take a hundred souls at random. Put them into Turkey, all else aside, most of them stand a chance of getting to Heaven. Put them instead into Estonia, and most go to Hell. Heaven or Hell decided just by the luck of where you're born? Doesn't seem very fair does it?
Furthermore, had I been born into Spawn's shoes, and I would now believe, and had he been born into my shoes, he wouldn't believe. Surely this shows further how daft the test is. And if Spawn suggests in my shoes he WOULD believe then the only difference would be the mindset we were born with, which once again God dictates. The test is utterly totally loaded/flawed. It's testing nothing other than the luck of the events that happen to befall you.
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Or he is giving you the opportunity to use the gift of Freewill. You might want to look at the figures for religious funeral ceremonies rather than spurious and misleading statistics such as those. What is the size of the poll for example?, what was the demographic of the poll and so on.
It seems even the Wiki states that those figures are to be taken with caution, as census figures are vastly different and suggest far higher levels of people who describe themselves as Christian, 70% in the UK.
Also countries where freedom of religion is curtailed such as Saudi Arabia, what if the Christian God is the correct one, then it's unfair to be born there, or even Turkey for that matter, you would be better off being born in Estonia.
The only thing that those stats suggest is that if you're an Atheist then you're stuffed, and as Atheists don't believe anyway it's meaningless to them so the unfairness is irrelevent.
You do seem pretty hungup on your lack of belief as if you are less somehow, otherwise why would you feel it's unfair to be able to choose whether you believe or not.
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I'm a little lost by your point(s).
Are you suggesting then if you take a random set of say 1000 people in one country (eg: Estonia) and 1000 people in another country (eg: Turkey), that infact at the end of the day roughly the same number of people will end up believing in God, and that those figures above are completely misleading?
That if you take a 1000 people from any/all countries/cultures around the world, the figure won't change? Or indeed even if you try different centuries?
The moment the figures deviate noticable in any country/culture/time period you have to conclude that those individuals, for one reason or another, had a lesser or greater chance of getting to go to Heaven (due to at least believe in God).
I really cannot see how you can deny this, and suggest if you were to play an individuals life though X different scenarios in different cultures/countries/time periods, that their propensity to believe would not differ at all?
Seems utterly clear to me that some cultures result in far more believers than others surely? Again, do you deny this?
The moment you agree some groups have a greater chance of ending up believers, you have to admit the game is unfair at least in this one way...
And then of course we can keep adding more and more elements that make the game even more unfair... To the extent of being competely rigged for some (100% go to Hell, 100% go to Heaven).
ps: I'm looking at this from a traditional religious viewpoint as supported by Spawn. ie: Don't believe in God, you're destined for hell.
Not really, it's just that's its a fairly clear weak spot in some religion's logic. Don't believe, go to hell.
Let's take Carl Sagan for example. The intelligence he was basically born into, and the luck of his parents supporting this, led him to the scientific path he spent his life travelling. This undoubtable led to his conclusion God did not exist. Our religious friend Spawn suggest this man is now in Hell, purely due to the events basically beyond his control. The intelligence he was predisposed to, and the upbringing that led him to the conclusion God did not exist. How does this seem a fair test? How does this sound the slightest bit logical? But none the less, peolpe such as Spawn say this is the way it is... Doesn't that hit you as being just the slightest bit illogical and ill-thoughtout? Isn't that worth discussing?
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What was the precise demographic of each country involved?, why do Census figures differ so widely from a random poll, maybe because a Census takes in vastly more people and gives a truer account of the statistics.
What if the Christian God is the true god and your born in Turkey? What if the Islamic God is the true one and youre born in Italy and so on.
How is having a choice unfair?
You are trying to attach significance to some kind of unfairness that you personally feel over your lack if Faith. I'm agnostic, born into a deeply Christian family, my wife is Irish Catholic, I feel no such sense of unfairness nor do I believe as they do or have any propensity to do so.
I just think your argument is slightly spurious, especially as belief is a profoundly individual and personal thing anyway.
What if the Christian God is the true god and your born in Turkey? What if the Islamic God is the true one and youre born in Italy and so on.
How is having a choice unfair?
You are trying to attach significance to some kind of unfairness that you personally feel over your lack if Faith. I'm agnostic, born into a deeply Christian family, my wife is Irish Catholic, I feel no such sense of unfairness nor do I believe as they do or have any propensity to do so.
I just think your argument is slightly spurious, especially as belief is a profoundly individual and personal thing anyway.
Soldato
LOl Neil, ur posts are starting to sound funny now!!
. It seems whatever we are trying to explain to you about Islam based on our understanding you are just refuting them. We aren't here to argue about whether you should accept islam or not. All we are doing is trying to make people like yourself more aware about some of the basics of islam.
Of course like I mentioned in my earlier post that if you want to research about islam then you should read what prophet Muhammed, Ali ibn talib and Abdul qadir jilani have said as they hold the most influence among all muslims. If you have queries then you can always visit some respectable scholars and discuss with them some issues about islam which are bothering you; as they would be able to help you much more than common layman over here. I wonder if you have also taken similar stance when discussing with followers of other religion aswell.
If you are just going to make a mockery of islam then please don't bother about islam.
. It seems whatever we are trying to explain to you about Islam based on our understanding you are just refuting them. We aren't here to argue about whether you should accept islam or not. All we are doing is trying to make people like yourself more aware about some of the basics of islam. Of course like I mentioned in my earlier post that if you want to research about islam then you should read what prophet Muhammed, Ali ibn talib and Abdul qadir jilani have said as they hold the most influence among all muslims. If you have queries then you can always visit some respectable scholars and discuss with them some issues about islam which are bothering you; as they would be able to help you much more than common layman over here. I wonder if you have also taken similar stance when discussing with followers of other religion aswell.
If you are just going to make a mockery of islam then please don't bother about islam.
Soldato
My God and my faith fits the Nicene creed -
We believe in one God,
the Father, the Almighty,
maker of heaven and earth,
of all that is, seen and unseen.
We believe in one Lord, Jesus Christ,
the only Son of God,
eternally begotten of the Father,
God from God, Light from Light,
true God from true God,
begotten, not made,
of one Being with the Father.
Through him all things were made.
For us and for our salvation
he came down from heaven:
by the power of the Holy Spirit
he became incarnate from the Virgin Mary,
and was made man.
For our sake he was crucified under Pontius Pilate;
he suffered death and was buried.
On the third day he rose again
in accordance with the Scriptures;
he ascended into heaven
and is seated at the right hand of the Father.
He will come again in glory to judge the living and the dead,
and his kingdom will have no end.
Do you believe in Jesus? If so, tell me why the word of your prophet is more important than the word of the son of God.
Considering Carl Sagan's Father was a Reform Jew and by Sagans own admission just took his Son's inquisitiveness "in his stride" and that he spent a lot of time alone in libraries, I would say Sagan's intellect and upbringing had little to do with his beliefs, especially as he wasn't an Atheist as you imply but Agnostic. He was skeptical of an anthropomorphic God as a sapient being, yet did not preclude the existence, stating and I quote
He denied he was an atheist stating "an atheist has to know a lot more than I know", "I'm agnostic."
He maintained that the idea of a creator of the universe was difficult to prove or disprove and that the only conceivable scientific discovery that could challenge it would be an infinitely old universe. Something we have yet to discover, with most physicists leaning toward a specific beginning point, rather than an infinite starting point.
Sagan also proposed that God could indeed be some form of extraterrestial superintelligence in various publications and interviews.
So we are back to the NATURE of God, and whether Manmade religion is a construct to explain something real yet incomprehensible to those who began the religions involved.
All things I can relate too.
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Soldato
Not at all matey, just very curious why the word of a self claimed peado prophet would be more important than that of the Son of God.
we believe jesus to be a prophet of god not a son.
also the quran was revealed by god not our prophet (peace be upon him)
Caporegime
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can someone answer this question?
if god wanted everyone to know his word, why did he whisper it to 1 man when he dreamt at night? why not just broadcast to everyone?
also on another note last night i dreamt that the angel gabriel came to me and told me that god wants me to start a new religious revolution in his name and that it surpasses islam, judaism and christianity.
this new religious revolution is that everyone must convert to sikhism.
he also said that after me there would be no more prophets and that i was the last.
true story yo!
if god wanted everyone to know his word, why did he whisper it to 1 man when he dreamt at night? why not just broadcast to everyone?
also on another note last night i dreamt that the angel gabriel came to me and told me that god wants me to start a new religious revolution in his name and that it surpasses islam, judaism and christianity.
this new religious revolution is that everyone must convert to sikhism.
he also said that after me there would be no more prophets and that i was the last.
true story yo!
Caporegime
LOL i dont know why that is...i havent got a clear cut answer for you im afraid....i have given you my reasons as to why i think thats the case but its quite obvious you cannot or refuse to acknowledge those reasons...in fact not only me but a few others have more or less said the same thing.
Perhaps when you meet your maker you can ask him these questions because quite clearly no one has been able to answer that question to your satisfaction...in fact i dont think anyone could with the way you keep bleating on about it.
Soldato
if someone goes into a school and shoots a load of kids .....what would you have him do with the children who died ?
(or are you are suggesting God sent the gunman there that day taking away his free will and made him kill those particular kids ?).
you also seem to be mistaken into thinking that as soon as you pass childhood that you're destined to hell........ only you can take yourself there.
if Spawn has been a good muslim for 2 years then suddenly he decides to go on a killing rampage should he complain it's because he lived so long ?
....maybe if he lived with the mentality that this day could be his last then why would he want to cause harm to others...just think tomorrow he could meet his maker.
live today like there is no tomorrow ?
living longer does give you more time to do bad but you also get the same amount of time to do good (is that not fair ?).
besides how hard can it be to go through the day without being an idiot towards others
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if someone goes into a school and shoots a load of kids .....what would you have him do with the children who died ?
(or are you are suggesting God sent the gunman there that day taking away his free will and made him kill those particular kids ?).
you also seem to be mistaken into thinking that as soon as you pass childhood that you're destined to hell........ only you can take yourself there.
if Spawn has been a good muslim for 2 years then suddenly he decides to go on a killing rampage should he complain it's because he lived so long ?
....maybe if he lived with the mentality that this day could be his last then why would he want to cause harm to others...just think tomorrow he could meet his maker.
live today like there is no tomorrow ?
living longer does give you more time to do bad but you also get the same amount of time to do good (is that not fair ?).
besides how hard can it be to go through the day without being an idiot towards others
Surely then as a loving and caring parent the very best thing you can do for your child is to kill them before they reach adulthood? Sure it means you have damned yourself to Hell but at least you have ensured Heaven for your child. After all, what is a few years extra of life against an eternity in Heaven?
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