Dan Barker found God
and saw that he was good.
'Who would be so blind to deny the power of God',
Atheism came slowly to him, more a ''migration'' than a lightning strike of reason.
'The likelihood of the existence of God keeps getting smaller and smaller - to a point where you have to round it off.
The phrase I like to use is that I dumped out all the bathwater and I found there was no baby there.''
Believing in an afterlife kind of takes away some of the dignity of the actual life we have. If life is eternal, life is cheap,''
 
God is gone from Mr Barker's life now.
His conversion from evangelical preacher to non-believer, is the topic of his talk at today's Global Atheist Convention

You Sir '
 
are going to Hell.
 

 
Although, "pennine"s 'take' on what constitutes a reasonable argument, is lacking in any appeal-to-reason' foundational backup; It would be presumptious of Any 'mortal' to say where Anyone is 'going,' @ this juncture. As in: 'Who can know the mind of God'?! {or Scripture, to that effect}.
A precise, 'chapter & verse' Bible quoter, I am Not. Plus, who's to say, whether or not, "pennine"s own {proverbial}, 'Road-to-Damascus' revelation-experience; Is yet to take place!?
 
For what it's worth; Emmanuel Swedenborg, found out through a personal 'revelation'; That technically speaking... God, condemns No man {or woman}, to Hell.
Rather, they are literally 'drawn' to those 'nether' & ethereal {post-physical death}, regions; Through their love & attachments, to various & sundry, deceptive reasonings; And their decided preference, for 'darkness' in general. Regardless, of the precise form, that 'darkness' takes!

I've been watching cable tv recently; scientific programs about how the earth was formed. It is fascinating stuff and renders Genesis redundant, as a primitive,ignorant, and simply laughable book. To Doorman; of course I am going to hell. See you there. Along with everyone else. Have you not read the Bible.That bit where God had a look at the 170 billion galaxies, and decided that he liked the look of the Milky way, and out of the 200 billion stars in it he picked on the earth, but only gave his favours to a group of small tribes , scraping out a living on the Med coast. Same tribe who wrote the Bible. A bit suss if you ask me.But that's it ;you are not going to heaven if you're not one of them.Don't get sucked in by charlatans who claim you can get round this by going to church or by helping little old ladies to get across the road.

 
There's a cryptic, stand-alone quote by 'JC' in the Scriptures {New Testament}; Which can be 'googled' if one wishes to; That goes: 'Other sheep have I, which are Not of this fold.'
 
Whether He was referring to, the Eskimos, Chinese, etc. Or some other galaxy, or perhaps both. Apparently; Jesus didn't consider it important, for us somewhat ignorant earthlings, at that point in time, to know; Re. the specifics.
Just as you or I, would probably be 'bored-to-tears' to learn of the latest pressing issues, in each others immediate neighborhood. Which often are similar, {if not in specifics}, in any event.
 
Also, people, {esp. the skeptics}, L-O-V-E to second guess, as it were; God. Or at least, what a given % of people, regard; As having been, an inspired message.. From, God!
 
You say you don't like or respect, how the Creation account of Genesis, {and its follow-on chapters}, read?! Sorry, my fiend {or 'friend,' as most would say}; But the God-of-the-Bible, long anticipated, yours {and others}, mocking reaction, when He 'wrote': "The wisdom of God, is the foolishness of {'fallen'; As in Sin-sick}, man." Plus: 'God's weakness, is Greater than man's greatest strength; And His foolishness, is More than man's foremost wisdom.' {a near-quote, to be sure; Given that I'm the one who spontaneously made reference to it --} {see: wisdom of God, versus man, For 'starters' on the Web; If anyone is so inclined!?}.
 
Ps.- Since, the 'God's chosen people,' Scriptural line-of-reasoning, sounds like a big 'stretch' to you {pennine}; Given that God operates, and reveals Himself, primarily through our individual Faith; Anything of a more direct nature, of God revealing Himself to man; Could easily result in our death; As the 'OT' {Old Testament}, Jews recognized.
 
And even if it were something short of that, {death}; It would much more likely, inspire 'Fear'; Which is the opposite of Faith! -- It has been said, that if you or I, wanted to communicate a message of some sort, to let's say an 'ant', {a God versus man analogy}; We would First need to become an 'ant' ourselves. Since for obvious reasons; Us reaching down and {gently} picking up the 'ant'; Would only produce fear, and-or perplexity, in the ant; And nothing more! --

  So you are coming to Palm Springs California this summer .
 
 
Ive watched that series also. It is facinateing. Still it's not a terrible idea to help little old ladys cross the street. As far as all that other hocus pocus ,I don't buy that either.
 
 
D

Who was the bright spark who thought it was a good idea to put an international airport in the middle of Palm Springs? Other than that PS looks like heaven.

 
An example of god's wisdom:
 
Judges 11:30-40 (New International Version)
 
30 And Jephthah made a vow to the LORD : "If you give the Ammonites into my hands, 31 whatever comes out of the door of my house to meet me when I return in triumph from the Ammonites will be the LORD's, and I will sacrifice it as a burnt offering."
 
32 Then Jephthah went over to fight the Ammonites, and the LORD gave them into his hands. 33 He devastated twenty towns from Aroer to the vicinity of Minnith, as far as Abel Keramim. Thus Israel subdued Ammon.
 
34 When Jephthah returned to his home in Mizpah, who should come out to meet him but his daughter, dancing to the sound of tambourines! She was an only child. Except for her he had neither son nor daughter. 35 When he saw her, he tore his clothes and cried, "Oh! My daughter! You have made me miserable and wretched, because I have made a vow to the LORD that I cannot break."
 
36 "My father," she replied, "you have given your word to the LORD. Do to me just as you promised, now that the LORD has avenged you of your enemies, the Ammonites. 37 But grant me this one request," she said. "Give me two months to roam the hills and weep with my friends, because I will never marry."
 
38 "You may go," he said. And he let her go for two months. She and the girls went into the hills and wept because she would never marry. 39 After the two months, she returned to her father and he did to her as he had vowed. And she was a virgin.
From this comes the Israelite custom 40 that each year the young women of Israel go out for four days to commemorate the daughter of Jephthah the Gileadite.

 
--SoCo
 

What follows, is a copy-and-paste I came across, {from: answeringgenesis.org}; After I'd 'googled': "Why was the God of the O.T. {Old Testament}, so mean?" Incidentally; There were numerous page links, to this phrased question, {some apparently, in your 'camp'!}.
 
And to the degree that this Doesn't answer your own {or anyones'}, doubting reservations; Keep in mind; That God {Himself}, does Not 'owe' us an explanation, for All of His actions; {"Job" questioning God; And how God answers, {in the 'book of Job'}, should've made you realize that!}.
 
I have to assume, that it bears on; No 'mortal' is in a position, {moral, legal, or otherwise}, to 'cross-examine'/question, God. Otherwise, that would run contrary to us accepting Him, on a faith-like basis! ..And 'Faith' as you {should} know; Is what & where, the Scriptures are All about! ... Consider it, as God's perogative choice; Of how He {presumably eons ago}; Decided to reach us with His message.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
 
For a while a question has been on my mind; How come in the Old Testament, God seems so mean and brutal?
 
I hear of unbelievers using this against Christians and it also makes me doubt my faith a bit. I want to try to find an answer. Please, help.
– Donny, U.S.
 
This view of God is commonly referred to in the secular media. We often hear that the God of the Old Testament seems very harsh/brutal and “evil.” But as Christians, we need to evaluate such claims against the Bible, and see if they are with or without merit.
 
Such claims are an attack on God’s character; But are the claims true?; Or are they missing something? -- Knowing that God is good {Mark 10:18}, when I hear this; The first verse that pops into my head is:
 
Woe to those who call evil good, and good evil; Who substitute darkness for light and light for darkness; Who substitute bitter for sweet and sweet for bitter! {Isaiah 5:20}
 
The intent of many of those who make such claims is to make a good God look evil; To justify their position of rejecting Him, His Word, or even His existence. But if God didn’t exist and the Bible weren’t His Word; There would be No basis to say that good and evil exist, and therefore; Brutality would be neither good nor bad. Few that I have spoken with realize this, when they attack God’s character, in an effort to make a case that He doesn’t exist.
 
At any rate, let’s analyze this and see if God really is harsh/brutal and evil. Among the common events in the Bible where I’ve heard people say God is harsh, they usually begin in Genesis: the Flood or Sodom and Gomorrah. Of course there are others, but for this short feedback, I will just discuss these.
 
 
The Flood
 
God is often attacked for killing “all the innocent people and even children” in the Flood. But judging Scripture by Scripture, we read that no one is truly innocent {Romans 3:23}; And all will die eventually anyway; A repercussion of our own actions {1 Corinthians 15:22; Romans 6:23}. Second; Let’s see what brought such a judgment on the people before the Flood:
 
Then the LORD saw that the wickedness of man was great on the earth, and that every intent of the thoughts of his heart, was only evil continually. {Genesis 6:5}.
 
What a strong statement! Every intention and thought was evil all the time. Imagine the murders, rapes, thefts, child sacrifices, cannibalism, and so on. This was happening continually. Yet this was about 120 years {maximum} before the Flood {Genesis 6:3}. So God was still patient, allowing time for repentance and change {1 Peter 3:20}. And God even called Noah to be a preacher of righteousness {2 Peter 2:5}; Yet people still refused to listen and continued to murder, rape, and so on.
 
God even went so far as to offer a way of salvation! He provided an Ark through Noah and his family and yet others didn’t come. Only Noah’s family was saved (2 Peter 2:5). The means of salvation, preaching of righteousness, and God’s patience were there, yet everyone else refused them and received their judgment.
 
As an aside, the claim of children dying in the Flood has always been of interest to me. If people really were evil and their thoughts evil all the time, then abortion, child murder, and child sacrifice were likely commonplace. And disobedience to God would mean disobeying God’s command to be fruitful and multiply (Genesis 1:28). Resisting this command would result in drastically fewer children, so I wonder if many children were even around at the time of the Flood. Noah himself had no children until he was 500 years old (lending to my postulation that children were few and far between in those days—I wouldn’t be surprised if Noah took a long time to find a godly wife who wanted children as well).
 
Even so, children are sinners and can also have every evil intentions and thoughts (Romans 3:23). Today for example, we see children killing children in school, rape among children, and so on.
 
 
Sodom and Gomorrah
 
Please read Genesis 18:20–33. In this section, the Lord revealed to Abraham that Sodom and Gomorrah has sinned exceedingly. Their wickedness was not entirely revealed (Ezekiel 16:49) but we do know of their acts of sodomy (later in the chapter) had overtaken them in their actions, enough to rape.
 
Abraham asked if God would sweep away the righteous with the wicked. He asked the Lord if there were 50 righteous, would the Lord spare it; He said yes. He asked the Lord if there were 40 righteous, would the Lord spare it; He said yes. He asked the Lord if there were 30 righteous, would the Lord spare it; He said yes. He asked the Lord if there were 20 righteous, would the Lord spare it; He said yes. He asked the Lord if there were 10 righteous, would the Lord spare it; He said yes.
 
This reveals how wicked and sinful the people were. They were without excuse and judgment was finally coming. This also reveals something interesting about the Flood. If God would spare Sodom and Gomorrah for only 10 righteous people, then would God have spared the earth if 10 people were righteous before the Flood? It appears that He did. Methuselah and Lamech, Noah’s father and grandfather may have been those two that made 10 (along with Noah, his wife, his 3 sons and their wives). Of course, there may have been others who were righteous too, up until the Flood. But at the time of the Flood, we can surmise there were only 8 (Methuselah and Lamech had died just before the Flood).
 
Lot and his family numbered less than 10 in Sodom and Gomorrah (Lot, his wife, his two daughters, his two sons-in-law, and two angels only made 8, the same as the Flood). Yet, God provided a means of salvation for them. The angels came and helped them get to safety.
 
Were there children in Sodom and Gomorrah? The Bible doesn’t reveal any, and homosexual behavior was rampant, so there may not have been any children. Since God made it clear that not even 10 people were righteous in the city, then even the children (if any) were being extremely sinful.
 
I hope this helps explain that God acts justly, punishing those whose crimes reach a point that it is time to act. Interestingly enough, people who say God is cruel want justice when they are wronged, e.g., if someone steals from them, attacks them, and so on. So they really have a double standard.
 
God is the same God of the Old Testament and New Testament. In both cases, people have/had the opportunity to get back to a right relationship with Him. In both cases, God judges sin (2 Peter 3:5–7). Mercy and patience were to be found through God’s vessels Noah, with his preaching for years, and Abraham, with his pleading for Sodom and Gomorrah (even Lot urged the people not to be so wicked)—just as mercy and patience are still available today (2 Peter 3:9). And He has provided a means of salvation in Jesus Christ (1 Peter 3:18), as the Ark was with the Flood and the angels were in urging Lot and his family to flee Sodom and Gomorrah.
 
No one can blame God for not providing a merciful alternative or call Him evil for providing justice against sin. Please pray that people will open their eyes and realize that they should hate sin (Romans 12:9) and love God (Deuteronomy 6:5) who acts justly against sin (2 Thessalonians 1:5–10). Yet he offers abundant mercy to those who love Him (Exodus 20:6; Deuteronomy 7:9; Ephesians 2:4). I pray this helps, and for those reading this that are not familiar with the good news of Jesus Christ please take some time to read this short article on the subject.
 
Kindness in Christ, Admin. Brian --

 
Fictional characters can't answer questions
 
 
See above
 
 
She doesn't need any help.
 
 
That's a laugh and a half. The point of the conversation is to decide whether or not the bible is full of violent, evil acts, so Donny feels better about worshipping a blood-thirsty sociopath, but we should throw out a completely false and biased premise to begin our discussion!
Moral codes date to before the bible was written. The code of Hammurabi predates the bible by some 300 years and it is a based on earlier codes like the Code of Ur.
 
 
Hey, guess what! They commonplace for a certain deity to partake in. Examples:
 
Rape and Murder
(Judges 21:10-24 NLT)
So they sent twelve thousand warriors to Jabesh-gilead with orders to kill everyone there, including women and children. "This is what you are to do," they said. "Completely destroy all the males and every woman who is not a virgin." Among the residents of Jabesh-gilead they found four hundred young virgins who had never slept with a man, and they brought them to the camp at Shiloh in the land of Canaan.
 
(Numbers 31:7-18 NLT)
They attacked Midian just as the LORD had commanded Moses, and they killed all the men. All five of the Midianite kings – Evi, Rekem, Zur, Hur, and Reba – died in the battle. They also killed Balaam son of Beor with the sword. Then the Israelite army captured the Midianite women and children and seized their cattle and flocks and all their wealth as plunder. They burned all the towns and villages where the Midianites had lived. After they had gathered the plunder and captives, both people and animals, they brought them all to Moses and Eleazar the priest, and to the whole community of Israel, which was camped on the plains of Moab beside the Jordan River, across from Jericho.

Moses, Eleazar the priest, and all the leaders of the people went to meet them outside the camp. But Moses was furious with all the military commanders who had returned from the battle. "Why have you let all the women live?" he demanded.
 
Child killing
 
The glory of Israel will fly away like a bird, for your children will die at birth or perish in the womb or never even be conceived. Even if your children do survive to grow up, I will take them from you. It will be a terrible day when I turn away and leave you alone. I have watched Israel become as beautiful and pleasant as Tyre. But now Israel will bring out her children to be slaughtered." O LORD, what should I request for your people? I will ask for wombs that don't give birth and breasts that give no milk. The LORD says, "All their wickedness began at Gilgal; there I began to hate them. I will drive them from my land because of their evil actions. I will love them no more because all their leaders are rebels. The people of Israel are stricken. Their roots are dried up; they will bear no more fruit. And if they give birth, I will slaughter their beloved children." (Hosea 9:11-16 NLT)
 
And I mentioned Judges 11 in the above post which is child sacrifice that pleases god.
 
answeringgenesis.org labeled these acts as EVIL and the god of the bible commits them all.
 
 I hear he is coming for confirmed bachelors, so you had better watch out.
 
--SoCo

.. I regret to say 'SoCo'; That much as I wish I could adequately address ALL of your questions, {and apparently, I Have to assume; Objectively 'surface-level' indictments of 'Jehovah'/JC}; That a signifigant portion of your indictments, {I mean 'grave' reservations}, are above my 'ken.'- Congrats!
 
My 'weak,' decidedly UNinspired answer, to your most damning {presumably, 'surface-level' reservations}; Is that: Haven't you heard, that an '800 pound gorilla, can sleep/do, Anything he wants'?!
I truly believe, that the answers are 'out there'; And that Don't make out the Deity, as a 'Creep.' It's just that, beyond repeating what I've already typed; You'll need to seek out someone more knowledgeable than I! ..And since I don't imagine, that you'll condescend {as in 'lower yourself'}, to pay any 'born-again' theologian or minister, a scheduled personal, 'Q & A' session; 'Googling' your heartfelt reservations, {in questionlike form}, on your friendly {Google} search-engine; Seems like a 'passable' alternative. And meticulously reading through as many of the 'links' as humanly possible, {that Don't agree with your own mindset}; Lest you 'miss something'!
 
Ps.- As for your adopted atheistic belief-system, {whether or not it's at the 100% level, only U know!?}.. You'll be no doubt be 'cheered,' that I'm ending on this Scriptural passage; And No offense!: 'The Fool hath said in his heart, there is no God.' --

Odviously you have not been here in the summer. 110 to 125 for 6 months.
Its hell Pal, Com'on out right now one and a half months of paradise to go.
 
D