"I just have faith"=BS

Let's call this BS right now. "It's just my faith."
DS made a great point. How can anyone who does NOT have faith in god, even after intense study of the subject be blamed for somehow not being blessed with this magical "faith?"
Religious folk, as per usual, will state that they are not there to assign blame. But they are lying. They want to blame people who do not hold their personal religious tenants as fact.
They want to turn "god's word" into law.
But then they turn around and say it is their faith.
This is a baldfaced lie. It is not faith. It is a belief system and they do not have just one article of faith but an entire system of ideas, mythologies and constraints.
There is no faith involved. This is a way of covering up the reality of the situation.
"I believe in the resurrection--i just have faith."
But it doesnt stop there.
"I believe Jesus was the son of god."
"I believe there is a hell and eternal damnation."
All of this is faith?
No, this cannot be so. You have seen the light on all of these issues? You KNOW the word of god on everything under the sun, do you?
Let's have some honesty in this forum.
You bought into a system of beliefs and faith has nothing to do with it. You have not experienced this god, you do not know god's mind. All of the rhetoric is absurd.
If you want to admit that you have decided to believe something that has no proof, no logical basis, and no way to intelligently discuss the merits of it, THEN and only then you can begin an honest discussion. Honest and short discussion because it ends when you admit that there is nothing about it which makes sense.
When somebody says it is their faith, call BullS*** on them. Is that word a magic shield? Is that now a sacred word? Faith? Faith protects you from scrutiny and question, does it?
Maybe in your own mind it does. But that word is just a word. It does not add up. it does not equate with an entire system of beliefs and ideologies. It does not answer how you DECIDE which particular doctrine to espouse. How do you decide morally what is right and wrong.
Faith on all counts? Faith tells you when to wake up, how to speak to your children, which version of the bible to read, which branch of your religion to belong to?
Faith, faith in the pope.
Faith in priests.
Thats a lot of "faith" my friends.

"I just have faith" when spoken during a religious debate=a mafioso pleading the 5th.

yours,
-g

[RJT]

gorv,

I’ll respond later to the crux of your post. For now:

[ QUOTE ]
Faith, faith in the pope.
Faith in priests.

[/ QUOTE ]

We don’t have faith in people. We might have levels of trust in folk. Stating such things could lead one to think that you are not very familiar with certain Religions.

RJT

Agreed.

[Darryl_P]

To say I have faith is a true statement, so I don't see what's wrong with it. I suppose your problem is that you think that we think it's a satisfactory answer to your questions. If we don't say that explicitly then why do you assume we think it? Are we obligated to give you answers to your questions that *you* find satisfactory? Maybe you watch too much TV. Maybe you're too accustomed to big bucks being spent on entertaining you and offering you stuff. Maybe you should think about why those guys spend the big bucks and think about what is wrong with *them* rather than think about what is wrong with *us* because we don't spend the big bucks to win your approval.

[ QUOTE ]
I suppose your problem is that you think that we think it's a satisfactory answer to your questions. If we don't say that explicitly then why do you assume we think it? Are we obligated to give you answers to your questions that *you* find satisfactory?

[/ QUOTE ]
Actually, the fact that you give answers at all is patently dishonest in this realm. This is a realm of discussion and debate. You come into the debate constantly pleading the 5th (ie. saying "its just my faith").
This is unsatisfactory and also a lie.
Faith means nothing. That word has no meaning whatsoever in this context. It means, I refuse to answer your question on the grounds that it may incriminate me. It means, I have no real answer.
It means, I refuse to discuss this intelligently.
I am calling BS on a rationale which is not a rationale.
It has nothing to do with you satisfying me.

-g

What kind of proof would you require to sufficiently prove someone has experienced God?

[ QUOTE ]
What kind of proof would you require to sufficiently prove someone has experienced God?

[/ QUOTE ]

Firstly, I am not asking for proof that someone experienced god. I am asking for their claims to make sense and be reasonable. For that to occur, I would need an explanation of what "experiencing god" means to that person and how that experience relates to their decision making.
For instance, say I prayed to God to save me when I was feeling very low and I then miraculously felt the presence of God.
Okay. Does that mean I now am assured the King James Bible is the edition I should be reading? Do I now understand and KNOW that the resurrection took place?
Or is it more vague...perhaps since I "felt" god's presence I now feel more at ease and believe life has purpose.
In the second case, I still cannot claim any extraordinary knowledge about god's intentions, the validity of the bible, etc. All I can say is that I felt a presence.
While it is not proof, this is a relatively honest answer in my opinion.
The first example smacks of BS. That is, I felt a presence so now I know the King James Bible is the word of God, now I believe in the resurrection, etc.
The majority of religious believers are patently dishonest in that they claim to have knowledge which is impossible to have based on the information at hand. They retreat to a position of "it's just faith" when the heat gets too intense.
I have no problem whatsoever with the divine. I have a problem with liars.

-g

[Darryl_P]

[ QUOTE ]
I am calling BS on a rationale which is not a rationale.
It has nothing to do with you satisfying me.


[/ QUOTE ]

How about expanding on what you think the expanded version of the statement "I just have faith" is?

I can tell you that when I say it it means the following:

A) I believe in God, not because I have proof, but because the totality of my experiences suggests to me that He exists.

B) I am not explaining it all to you because that would take too long. Explaining only bits and pieces wouldn't give a proper picture and, therefore, isn't worth it.

Which part do you think is BS, or what else do you think I mean that isn't in A or B above?

[ QUOTE ]

A) I believe in God, not because I have proof, but because the totality of my experiences suggests to me that He exists.

B) I am not explaining it all to you because that would take too long. Explaining only bits and pieces wouldn't give a proper picture and, therefore, isn't worth it.

Which part do you think is BS, or what else do you think I mean that isn't in A or B above?

[/ QUOTE ]

Firstly, I think you should take however long it takes to explain your beliefs in a way that makes sense, or I think you should not enter debates and discussions in this forum on this topic. Why? Because you can end every discussion with the cop-out: "I dont have time to explain all of my well-thought out, sensible beliefs."

Secondly, you state that the totality of your experience "suggests" that "He" exists. Well that is full of holes already. "Suggests" implies that you are not at all certain. "He" implies that you know god's gender and that you know it is one god as opposed to multiple god's, a life force, etc.
So, I think you need to be more specific or admit that you cannot discuss this rationally or intelligently.
Are you practicing a particular religion? If so, why? What have you experienced that points you to the validity of that religion?
If you take the cop-out (faith) stance, you are a liar. If you answer honestly, it may take you awhile to explain. I, for one, would appreciate the latter.

-g

Many things about God can be logically deduced. Empirical data will tell you God is perfect (If you need proof, I'd be more than happy to tell you some). If He is perfect, He is singular (if something else was perfect, then you would find it's the same as God). Along with perfection, He is unchanging (if He was changing, he wouldn't be perfect, because any change would lead him away from perfection). (Many epistemological philosophies use logical reasoning to know what constitutes God. I've only studied a few epistemological and empirical philosophies, but I'd love to help with what limited knowledge I have.)
We also call God a "He" from tradition...in fact he is genderless. Humanity tends to give unfamiliar things familiar names to make them less "scary". Calling God a "He" or "Our Father" or whatever else is to make Him more personable. In essence, those are imperfect names (But it's much nicer to call Him a "Him" instead of an "it")
As to saying the King James version of the Bible is correct...I don't think the version really matter (NIV, King James, and all that are essentially the same things with slightly different words. The Catholic Bible contains the deutorocanonical apocrphya, and there are other slight discrepancies)
As far as the inerrancy of scripture, I'm still looking for that answer. I've been reading the Bible, and interpretations of it and such, and as far as I know it's very philosophically consistent, and never contradicts itself. (Have you tried reading the Bible? Even if you don't think it's from God, it has some good stuff in it.)