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Atheism has many advantages over religion.
For starters:
No self immolation.
You don't have to pay a tithe.
You can get laid before marriage.
You can use God's name in vain all you want.
You don't have to get up early in the morning on Sunday, get dressed up and go to church.
When you come home drunk at night, you can go straight to bed without having said your prayers.
You don't have to fast or give anything up during a specific time of year or celebrate weird religious holidays.
If it feels good, do it. You don't have to worry that you will burn in Hell for you moral indiscretions..., at least not until after it's too late.
You don't have to dress a certain way, wear your hair a certain way, cover your face, have a beard, wear a hat, wear a necklace, put a red dot on your forehead, or anything.
There are some draw backs, like Christmas. Unless you don't mind being called a hypocrite and can rationalize it away.
In conclusion, atheism is a good deal with many benefits and few drawbacks.
I almost forgot, you don't have to go door to door to try and convert people to your religion. You can do it from the comfort of your home, on your computer, here on CD or anywhere else on the internet ;)
The only people going door to door are Jehovah Witnesses. Christians usually do not go door to door. People can not convert others, only God can do that & it is up to the person to freely choose his faith. No one is forced to believe anything unless you live in Muslim nations.
Christianity was forced on so many people. The entire point of the crusades was to take back the Holy Lands and kill/convert anyone occupying that land. Native Americans were forced to convert or die, African Americans were forced to convert.
Do you have any idea how many times bigoted Christian haters talk about the dark ages? GET SOME NEW MATERIAL!
Those people back then were hypocrites & false Christians.... SO WHAT!
That is not what the Bible teaches and Christians today are nothing like that. Do you have any idea how ludicrous you sound? It's like Obama and the Democrats still blaming Bush for all their failures.
As an Atheist, I believe that life is easier as I am not confined to a set of beliefs or rules. I am free to do whatever I please, within reason, and not have to worry about 'sinning' or looked down upon by a God. I also don't have to visit a religious place of worship.
With Atheism you can do whatever you please and not worry about burning in hell. If you know me, then you'll understand how that could be appealing to me ;)
It's funny to listen to people who think that living the any thing goes lifestyle actually brings true happiness. Tell me what happens after you start acting upon every immoral urge you have? Well, after you have created kids you refuse to support, and gotten addicted to drugs or alcohol or cigarettes, etc. and when you are in debt up to your ears, and when these immoral choices in life no longer excite, and when you get bored with everything after a time, it all comes crumbling down.
The worldly pleasures lure you in and then spits you out.
For me, family, love, faith in God are what truly brings happiness for the long run.
Tell me what happens after you start acting upon every immoral urge you have?
Can't tell you. Neither I nor any atheist I know behaves that way. Can't understand why anybody WOULD. We have empathy, laws, accepted norms of behavior, practical considerations etc. Open your eyes, atheists may not believe the same things as you, but most of us conduct our lives relatively similarly to you day in and day out. In fact, we are LESS likely to go to jail, so get off your high horse and realize that professed belief in God tells you nothing about a person's morality.
I was not trying to say all Atheists choose immoral choices in life. My point is that they have no moral road map to follow because they refuse to care what the Bible says about morals. Tell me where your moral code comes from? If you say it comes from your own beliefs, then no man alive has the same moral road map to follow does he? If there are no moral values lifted up from a majority faith in a nation, what is it that stops dead beats from sleeping around getting many women pregnant and then walking away from the children? Is your answer making moral laws to stop those immoral choices? No, you have no answer and it is your mentality from the Left that has created this anything goes culture we live in. Can you grasp what I am saying?
All the broken homes, all the addicts, all the children with no fathers, etc. are a result of an amoral nation with no moral road map to follow. I personally know of one young man who got ten different girls pregnant and has abandoned every one of his kids. Tell me what it is in your Godless nation that would help prevent this from happening over and over again.
My point is that they have no moral road map to follow because they refuse to care what the Bible says about morals.
Simply put, the Bible is FAR FROM being the only "moral road map" out there. There is the rule of law for instance, social mores and simply listening to your intuitions regarding right and wrong. Whichever path we take, we still end up generally knowing it is wrong to kill, lie, steal, cheat etc. These prohibitions are nearly universal and found in plenty of places where Bible study is practically unheard of.
Tell me where your moral code comes from?
Two sources: empathy, and a desire to live in a harmonious relationship with the people around me. I won't kill because a) virtually all people have loved ones, and even though I've never had a loved one murdered I've known people who have. I wouldn't wish that sorrow on my worst enemy. b) if people had free reign to go about killing as they pleased, society would destabilize quickly. All the millennia of progress we have made would be jeopardized and we would all live in terror. And for good measure..c) fear of repercussion.
Why won't I lie? I need the best information possible to make the important decisions in life. We all do. Willingly spreading disinformation may gain the liar, but it is an unnecessary cost to society as a whole.
Theft, urinating in people's food, cheating on one's lover, and generally being a jerk are all things I don't want done to me, so I don't do them to others.
then no man alive has the same moral road map to follow does he?
Google maps will sometimes give you multiple routes to the same destination. 3 people take different routes, see different sights, arrive at different times....and yet when all is said and done, they all have obtained the same objective. Your way may seem the best to you, but don't be so myopic as to believe that other people's methods cannot achieve the same results.
what is it that stops dead beats from sleeping around getting many women pregnant and then walking away from the children?
Church is not a guaranteed cure for that. Some folks are dead beats through and through, and the best defense society has is being observant and extra-cautious with these folks. Reducing poverty and increasing access to education has repeatedly been demonstrated to reduce these incidents, as well as crime, drug use etc. Preventative measures, actually going out and making a change in the world doesn't take a Bible, it takes knowledge, compassion and will power.
All the broken homes, all the addicts, all the children with no fathers, etc. are a result of an amoral nation with no moral road map to follow.
No, its a result of people living in unstable situations, driven by desperation to despicable acts. I DO hold them accountable, but I've also seen first hand what tough times can do to a good person.
Tell me what it is in your Godless nation that would help prevent this from happening over and over again.
Better education in trouble areas would be a start. Better access to QUALITY mental health, resisting the 21st century urge to pull away from the community. And recognizing that no matter how many Bibles you push, people will still do these things. And, statistically speaking, the majority of them were raised Christian in this country, soooo....
The answers to our problems that you just stated (better education, being observant and extra-cautious with these folks, less poverty, etc. etc. HAVE NOT WORKED!!!!!!!!!!!!!! In the past 60 years, with all this new age Liberal movement, more money spent on education (most in the world), much more money spent on social programs, sex education, etc. etc. etc. and guess what? Broken homes with no Father's or Mother's at home keep getting WORSE! More and more kids joining gangs. More unwed pregnancies and many pregnancies never even seen because of abortions, more people on welfare roles, more people in debt, etc. etc.
Your entire theory has proven NOT TO WORK! Why is it when America was more traditional with Christian expression not being censored from our public lives, that more families were not broken from immorality? Divorce was considered immoral. Teen pregnancy was considered immoral, etc. etc.
Moral values were derived from our Christian heritage and as Liberals separate such traditional values, our nation dies one step at a time. For you not to see this is mind blowing!
Atheists 60 years ago understood that Christian values were good for this nation whether you were a Christian or not. Arrogant insecure Liberals have done all in their power to censor those moral values from this nation & we are seeing the results.
Your moral code comes from empathy, and a desire to live in a harmonious relationship with the people around me. What about the dead beats who think harmonious relationship means one night stands? What stops others from lying when it gets them what they want? What stops people from buying things they can never afford & expecting tax payers to bail them out over & over again?
Morals are something instilled from the very beginnings of life through a mother & father teaching their children moral values taught to them through a faith in something greater than themselves.
You are so wrong & refuse to admit the facts to what is happening to this nation as they implement your answers to a nation dying under self love immorality. Money, education will never replace a mother & father at home instilling moral values to their children.
The education today does everything in it's power to remove morality from our children's vocabulary!
The answers to our problems HAVEN'T HAPPENED in America.
Education? Yes we've spent more money on it, but that isn't how you fix these problems. Fact is, our student's academic achievements have been dropping, low income students still don't have better access to education and slum areas don't receive anything resembling a proportional amount of that funding.
On the other hand, Scandinivian countries, Japan and others have implemented a variety of programs aimed at uplifting the weak and have found phenominal success: high education rates, usually a high GDP, much less crime etc. And these aren't particularly Christian countries we are talking about. The Scandinavians are one of the most atheistic peoples on the planet.
Sex education
You do realize that teenage and unwanted pregnancies have gone down notably since sex education started right? Whereas with abstinence only education such levels tend to rise.
Divorce was considered immoral. Teen pregnancy was considered immoral, etc. etc.
And both of these are on the decline. Stop letting your fear of immorality cloud your vision and look at the statistics.
Your entire theory has proven NOT TO WORK!
Except in other countries. Our countries methods of handling this problem are NOT my suggestions.
Moral values were derived from our Christian heritage
Actually there is more and more evidence that they were derived from genetics, considering similar moral precepts are near-universal.
What stops others from lying when it gets them what they want?
You do realize actions can have repercussions, correct?
Morals are something instilled from the very beginnings of life through a mother & father teaching their children moral values taught to them through a faith in something greater than themselves
No, mostly they are either born with it or they are not.
You know, you act as though immorality is a new thing. That until Liberals came about there was no murder, theft, lying, deadbeat dads, drug users...but these things are as old as time itself. Christianity has had over 2000 years to deal with this, and yet the countries that do the best are some of the LEAST Christian.
Well it is time to end this discussion. If you actually have the nerve to say divorce is
on the decline.... WOWOWOWOWOWOWOW!
Maybe you missed it, most people are not even getting married today, THEY LIVE TOGETHER. This is why divorce is down. If they do get married it more often ends in divorce! But of course in your amoral world, living together is not immoral. Everything is ok in your perfect Godless world. Women are having abortions with no record of a teen birth. GET REAL!
Also, I'm pretty sure I've heard somewhere that couples who live together before marriage are less likely to get divorced. Which makes sense, since living with someone can be quite trying and troublesome. If one intends to avoid divorce, they are best served knowing their partner as well as possible and living together is a fairly efficient way of doing so. It's not immoral, its smart planning.
What EXACTLY is immoral about living together before marriage?
Like I said, man will make up his own moral standards and live any lifestyle that suits his wants. This is why our nation is lost and why our families are so broken. They are all living together not caring to commit for the sake of their own children. It is you who is a new age fool!
Like I said, man will make up his own moral standards and live any lifestyle that suits his wants.
And how is this any different if they read the Bible? Reading, even believing, is not the same thing as actually conducting one self in the prescribed mannerisms. This is obvious, otherwise we'd be seeing the very moral society you wish right here in America since we are still very predominately Christian, packed with fundamentalists even. Conversely, we should see chaos in the streets of Scandinavia and Japan and other countries that by and large ignore the Bible. THOSE should be the places where what we are talking about should be dominant, because by your measure, they are even more amoral societies than we are.
Indeed, as I've demonstrated previously, divorce is going down. As is crime in most parts of the country. We've still got a long ways to go, but as religiosity declines, our quality of life slowly improves, and plenty of other countries in the world can give us a taste of what we will be like when we pull even further away from ludicrous fairy tales and start observing and responding to REALITY.
Japan? LOL, you mean the Godless nation that bombed Pearl Harbor? Oh that's right, they became civilized when we dropped the bomb on them. Spare me your bigoted hatred for those you call fundamentalists. How dare they actually believe the faith they profess. The majority in this nation call themselves Christians, that is all. They could care less what the Bible actually says.
Your seriously going to bring up an incident that happened in WAR TIME 70+ years ago? Seriously? This is 2014 and Japan has one of the lowest crime rates in the world and a culture based around honor and respect. Most of the problems you complain about here, are practically non-existent there, despite being "Godless". That's my whole point: IF God exists, he doesn't all that much seem to favor his many followers in the Americas.
And where did I display hatred for fundamentalists? All I said is that there are quite a lot of them here compared to...well, almost everywhere else. Yet in spite of their deep faith and large numbers, we've got all these problems you see and complain about.
The majority in this nation call themselves Christians, that is all. They could care less what the Bible actually says.
If that was the case, homosexuality and evolution wouldn't be such big issues in this country.
You just made my point so very clearly.... thank you!
My entire argument was about what happens to a nation when the moral values derived from their majority faith is separated & censored from our public.
I told you that man could never agree on what is moral or immoral and as always you told us how man is fully capable of living moral lives without any notions of moral values coming from a nation's Christian heritage.
You just stated "What EXACTLY is immoral about living together before marriage". This is a perfect example of what happens when a nation's moral values, derived from their majority faith, is over ridden by man's notions of moral values. Fifty years ago the moral values lifted up by society considered living together as being immoral because of all the harm done to the children.
With man's ideas of morality, that conflicted with how he wanted to selfishly live his life. He wanted no guilt nor shame from lifestyles of changing live in partners year after year. No shame of walking out on the children when the live in partner wanted to try someone new.
This is man's sense of morals. Whatever feels good, DO IT! Man wants no guilt placed on his head over his personal choices in life. You just made my point of how living together is not immoral in your mind. It is immoral in another's mind so who sets the moral road map for a nation? GET IT? Man will never agree on what is moral & immoral so here we are in this self love culture. We are sliding down that slippery slope of debauchery and people like you rationalize it away.
What's so sad is that you must get it, or you truly are missing a few arrows in that quiver. You just refuse to admit the simple truth as our nation's culture falls apart. You have been so conditioned by the Liberal media to fear our Christian heritage in this nation. Go ahead, bring up the dark ages one more pathetic time to try and scare people from the true Christian faith that teaches us all to love one another and care for one another including our children.
Soon a married family with children being raised by their actual mother and father will be the rare exception.
A careful look at morality across the world today and throughout history makes clear the great similarity which exists. The need for order among groups of people living together existed as far back as hunter/gatherer groups roaming the plains of Africa. It seems most evident that morality existed before religion adopted it. The Bible was written by men.
I'm wasting my time here. IGNORE! I've never seen such radical people lost in their anti God ideology. It's like a gathering of insecure narcissistic cult members.
If religion provides this moral road map you are referring to, then how is it that "priests" ... PRIESTS!!! ... sexually abuse children while other priests cover it up? Just saying ;)
Please!!!!!!!! Do not use the actions of a few and paint an entire religion as if the entire religion itself supported such atrocities. I'm not Catholic, I am Protestant but I have enough sense to know most Catholics do not condone such behavior nor the cover up. I could use this abuse as an excuse to run down Catholicism (because there is much doctrine I do not agree with) but that would make me an ignorant buffoon to do so. I'm sure there are abusers in the Protestant Church as well but it in no way is accepted. It's anything but Christian to abuse children. There are abusers in all walks of life & only those who want to tear down those they disagree with, would uses such ludicrous examples to do so. I agree the Catholic Church has serious problems when officials would cover up these crimes or not remove the abusers instantly. That does not make the religion bad.
When you see a religion that supports killing Christians because they do not believe in Islam, you can then judge the religion.
The Christian faith has brought humanity to this world with the moral values and love it speaks to. Without some moral road map for a nation to follow, you have the Russia's of the world. I don't want to live in a nation made up of so called moral laws to control the people. I want a nation built from within with the basic humanity and moral values derived from their majority faith.
I'm not painting anything but the facts of what is going on in this nation. When was the last time you heard a Democrat politician speak to the moral break down in this nation? When's the last time you heard someone on the Left say it is immoral to sleep around & get pregnant out of wed lock, and have the fathers walk away from their responsibilities. This is not painting all Catholics from the actions of a few. What I am doing is speaking to an entire left leaning mindset that refuses to hold people accountable for their choices in life. It is fact, not conjecture.
when's the last time you heard someone on the Left say it is immoral to sleep around & get pregnant out of wed lock, and have the fathers walk away from their responsibilities. *
Communist Russia and China.
I think you're entire argument just fell apart. Maybe you should get it clear in your head what left wing is before equating it with liberal views.
Those numbers are not explanation for why an Atheist/nonbeliever is less prone to being imprisoned. So it doesn't prove, that being an Atheist makes someone less jail prone.
Atheists generally have more activity in the ACC (anterior cingulate cortex) than religious minded folks.
The ACC has many functions and one helps when critically thinking, when errors are made or uncertainty is encountered the ACC is stimulated. A stressor reaction is made that can aide in not making the same mistake over again (I think Peirce's Fixation of Belief fits well here) but can result in higher levels of stress. While religious folks can benefit from the lack of stress there are draw backs like making the same mistake over again.
For instance repeat offenders in the prison system generally have less activity in the ACC.
It would follow that people with lower activity in the ACC would show more commanality in their predispositions on religion and legal recidivism than those with higher activity in their ACC.
So becoming an Atheist or being an Atheist, will not, does not make one more or less prone to being imprisoned.
Being imprisoned has much to do with environmental factors. My points do not address the issue entirely but do explain a portion of the issue.
You were questioning why believers occupy a larger portion in prisons than they do in society.
Above I have shown that non believers are less prone to repeating mistakes, while believers are more prone to not to spot their own mistakes, a position shared due to similarities in the ACC with prisoners who are likely to repeatedly offend.
Those that are prone to reoffend are also prone to believe in religion. Non believers are less prone from unintentionally making errors that would see them imprisoned again. I am not sure how this fails to address your question.
In the studies linked they discuss it is the state of certainty about something that reduces stress, it is the lack of seeing errors the self has made giving the illusion of certainty. It is noted that totalitarian states can give the same certainty and stress relief as we see with religion.
When this mindset gets in positions of power erroneous ideas can find footholds and wreak havoc on large groups. For example in the US the assaults on sciences by pseudoscience like creationism or how Popes, Holy See, and Al Queda and so on affect so many around them with arguably ambigious laws and requests.
Being predisposed toward something doesn't mean it is set in stone though. Our brains have shown some elasticity when subjected to stimuli, one of the more well known studies on this idea was done on taxi drivers in london. Areas dealing with spatial navigation in the subjects were larger than average and grew larger over time with use.
Much like a totalitarian state religion can condition a mindset that is more conducive towards making illogical decisions. Augustine cemented in Christianity for instance the idea that "philosophy is religions hand maiden". This line of thinking subjugates philosophy to religion, philosophy could explain the religious texts but never question. This line of thinking can be detrimental to the group in ways that make a reduction of stress is negligible (subjugation of women, ostracizing groups like homosexuals etc.).
Being predisposed to be likely to be a believer isn't the problem, it is that religion itself can perpetuate this mindset that allows for logical errors to go unseen. This is problematic for those who are subjected to the power of groups that are less likely to notice their errors.
So, if the weatherman says to you, "There will be an 80% probability of rain on Sunday." you would respond with, "That number doesn't explain why it is likely to rain. So it doesn't prove that Sunday will be more prone to rain."
Is that right? If so..., OK. I am not about to argue with that "logic." ;)
The small piece of ground I was referring to is mathematical concepts. If someone lacks an understanding of basic math, then how can you reason with that person? ;)
I do understand ratios. It just takes more than ratios to validate your assertion that "It's the ideology a person carries which makes them more or less prone to jail time, not their reasoning capability."
Atheists are more likely to climb to the top of academia. (97% of the National Academy of Science Members are atheists. The 3,200 members includes more than 200 Noble Laureate recipients).
Religious folk don't attempt to climb that far up the mountain. So it would follow that the percentage of Atheist would be that high.
By saying that it is more likely for Atheist to climb that high you're jumping to conclusions whilst there are other explanations for the phenomenon , thus your assertion is invalid.
Unless you can follow up with a statistic that indicates the failure rate of religious folks whom try to climb that mountain.
Atheists have higher morality developmental growth. Famous American psychologist Lawrence Kohlberg writes that at moral development’s highest levels – moral judgments must be justified on rational moral grounds rather than by appeal to the order of nature or to religious authority or revelation. While Freud suggested that religion served to undermine moral responsibility while promoting fanaticism, he contended that people who behave morally only out of fear of a supernatural penalty, would be unlikely to respect and care for others from an altruistic perspective. ;)
I agree. Doing things that make you happy will never make you happy. Only living like FromWithin can make you happy. And I mean to say the 'true' type of happy. Not just the type of happy that FromWithin values to be false.
Really though, I like how you are automatically assuming that anyone who isn't religious is either a dead-beat parent, a drug addict, an alcoholic, addicted to cigarettes, or broke beyond belief. How incredibly judgmental and NON-CHRISTIAN like of you.
I thought Christians were supposed to be nonjudgmental?
I know a lot of people who don't follow any Religion, and they're happy, successful people.
I also know a lot of Christians that are the most addicted people I know.
Go talk to some people that you wouldn't normally, and please educate yourself with real people.
Did I say non Christians would never be happy? NO! Did I say that Christians would never sin? NO! Why don't you try addressing the argument instead of making ludicrous remarks.
When I talk of dead beats, I could care less who or what they say they are, they are dead beats because of their selfish choices in life.
Atheists and Liberals deny that these selfish irresponsible choices in life are immoral. They hate the very word morals. In their insecure arrogant world, only they will indoctrinate the people with their politically correct moral laws. They want to control your minds & want no competition from God. To these control fanatics, it is immoral to become rich even though many of them are rich. To them you are immoral if you spank your children, or if you support gun rights, or if you are pro life or if you do not support Gay marriage, etc.
Every person in this world will have a different view of what is moral & what is not. This is why any intelligent nation understands, a higher power, a faith in something greater than man, is good for the people and the culture.
Obviously an evil religion would be disastrous for a nation. I'm not talking about such religions. I'm talking about this nation's Christian heritage and the wonderful values it has given to our land.
Without our Christian values, our freedoms & way of life will die as evident in our social distress. People such as yourself refuse to see what is happening in this nation. You keep thinking more money, more education will solve our issues. It is not a matter of money, it is a matter of self love & lack of moral values.
Religion is not bad. its people's perception of religion that has caused and created certain issues. Also, i personally believe that religion just isnt about following certain rules. Its a source of hope. believing in something is what gives meaning to life.
believing in something is what gives meaning to life.
But is it healthy, either personally or for society, to believe in unproven concepts just for the sake of believing. There are plenty of demonstrable phenomena in the world to hinge one's values and understandings on. And since these are things we can actually work with and manipulate, wouldn't they make more sense.
While there is a lot of things spattered about in the Christian religion here and there that I find stupid (such as the people who seem to believe the earth is 2000 years old, and other such bollocks) I find the idea of No God to be entirely depressing. When a loved one dies, we want to believe they are somewhere better. Most of us do anyway, and most of us also want to believe that there is something more in store for ourselves. Not to mention, all of this existence stuff, can't be entirely meaningless. None of us will know for sure who is right or wrong, until we're dead. If the atheists are right we still won't know, because we will zap out of existence and nothing will have mattered.
Just because there might NOT be a God does NOT mean that there is no life after death. There may still be a life after death even in the absence of a God. ;)
All together there were about 100 000 000 000 of people who lived on Earth, however no one, not a single one ever made it back from the lala-land. So it is quite logical to say that there is no after life ....
OK..., just amuse me for a second...., if you died, and you realized that there is "life after death" and you could "fly" to any place in the universe in a matter of seconds...., would you spend one nano second trying to come back here? Just asking ;)
I am scared by the idea of death but I find the idea of a wizard in la la land waiting for me too retarded to even think about it... I was dead billions of years before I was born... so I have quite an idea what I am going in to....
Why does there have to be a God in order for there to be life after death? Why can't we (all of us) just be immortal souls? Why is it that there is only one immortal soul and that He is God? It makes sense to me that if there is a God, then there are others. But hey, that just me ;)
Souls, ghosts, gods, fairies, hobbits all equally likely to exists. All of them origins in fairy tales... in general as far I know, there is exactly same amount of evidence available for souls as there is for lepricons...
But how did life start to even begin the evolution process. Everything has to have had a starting point. How did the first atom begin, where did it come from? Those things can't be answered by science.
Maybe there's no such thing as the "first" atom because atoms have always existed.
If you agree with me that there are certain concepts that your finite mind cannot grasp/understand (such as infinity) then you can begin to just accept it. ;)
Wow on a completely unrelated note, what a bold claim. Can I see the Science that supports this claim, or your PHD in Physics. Because unless you somehow proved string theory, you can't back that claim.
You just made my point so very clearly.... thank you!
My entire argument was about what happens to a nation when the moral values derived from their majority faith is separated & censored from our public.
I told you that man could never agree on what is moral or immoral and as always you told us how man is fully capable of living moral lives without any notions of moral values coming from a nation's Christian heritage.
You just stated "What EXACTLY is immoral about living together before marriage". This is a perfect example of what happens when a nation's moral values, derived from their majority faith, is over ridden by man's notions of moral values. Fifty years ago the moral values lifted up by society considered living together as being immoral because of all the harm done to the children.
With man's ideas of morality, that conflicted with how he wanted to selfishly live his life. He wanted no guilt nor shame from lifestyles of changing live in partners year after year. No shame of walking out on the children when the live in partner wanted to try someone new.
This is man's sense of morals. Whatever feels good, DO IT! Man wants no guilt placed on his head over his personal choices in life. You just made my point of how living together is not immoral in your mind. It is immoral in another's mind so who sets the moral road map for a nation? GET IT? Man will never agree on what is moral & immoral so here we are in this self love culture. We are sliding down that slippery slope of debauchery and people like you rationalize it away.
What's so sad is that you must get it, or you truly are missing a few arrows in that quiver. You just refuse to admit the simple truth as our nation's culture falls apart. You have been so conditioned by the Liberal media to fear our Christian heritage in this nation. Go ahead, bring up the dark ages one more pathetic time to try and scare people from the true Christian faith that teaches us all to love one another and care for one another including our children.
Soon a married family with children being raised by their actual mother and father will be the rare exception.
Please before you tell me how you are not talking about children when you live with someone, what do you think happens with people living together? Quite often they get pregnant & have children! With no commitment to each other.
Oh your view on religion is borderline idiotic. The fact that you summed all religions into one category is ridiculous from the get go. Where to start..... 1. self immolation is practiced by so few religions it is practically non existent. The Tibetans are the only people who continually practice this so i'm not sure how you coupled this whole idea with religion in general. 2. Tithing is not a requirement "Each one must give as he has decided in his heart, not reluctantly or under compulsion" and many people in fact don't tithe. 3. Getting laid before marriage. I doubt many people follow this in whatever religion they practice, unless of course they practice there faith in a very very strong way, which today is not the case. 4. Gods name in vain? What kind of argument is this? This is just plain stupid. 5. Getting up on sunday and get dressed up? Again, invalid argument since you decided to sum religion into one group. All religions don't worship on sundays, nor get dressed up, nor go early. 6. Get home drunk and don't pray.... how many people do you think actually pray when they get home after a night of drinking? I can probably say not too many. 7. Not every religion fasts nor will you burn in hell for moral indiscretion as you call them.
Your argument is so opinionated that it deflates it. You say religion is bad because it forces you to do this and believe that, however, atheism itself forces you not to believe something. To not believe that there is a higher power than us is crazy to me (believe what you want) but this world didn't formulate out of thin air.