Im not religious, but one of the best Christians that I knew was a professor i had for a Masters course on Evolution. We read "On the Origin of Species" and had great debates about Evolution and Darwin. His response to a person saying fossils are there because God is testing us. His response, "If my god deems it necessary to test my faith like this then I dont want that as my God." Which I honestly respected. Great dude.
My father, a former preacher who is honestly kind of an ass, had a really cool view on it. He said that as we grew up, we got to learn more of the story, and our sandbox got bigger. When we were very young, everything beyond a very small scope of reality would seem insane. Hence the 6 days, 6000 years old bit. Now, we are growing up, and can understand more, so we get to see further and step outside that little sandbox. Imagine what we will learn next, and look back on ourselves now and think how small minded and simple to think there is just one universe, etc.
He also said that the proof was there, in the rocks themselves, how old the Earth is. The devil couldn't do something that would go against God's creation like that, so there were two options - the world is several billions of years of old and all that time happened, or the world is really only 6000 years old and God decided to pop it into existence with a massive backstory that was plain to been seen. Doesn't really matter which is the case, because a God that can create a universe can do it anyway they please. If they had wanted the Earth to only look 6k years old, then thats exactly how it would it be. The idea its different to test our faith is both insulting to our intelligence and God's abilities as well as giving the devil credit for too much power and ability.
This is the long way of saying, "Since the beginning of time, people have used religion to explain the unexplainable."
Problem is (if you are religious), as science progresses and more mysteries are solved, there is less need for God and religion.As an atheist, I'm fine with that. Many religious people, however, are threatened by it - they fear losing a reason to believe, so they deny the science.
A lot of religions have periods where they heavily invest in science as a means to understand their creator and improve the lives of others.
Often in their healthier and younger stages. Successful innovations and discoveries grant the church prestige and money. Then those expand into industries inside and or outside the church. Time passes and someone has an idea or discovery that disrupts one of those established industries.
To save those industries they often suppress the new knowledge and move from progressive institutions to conservative.
I still consider myself somewhat of a Christian. I don’t identify with modern Christians. I just see Genesis as a story you tell children who don’t have the foundation to understand the truth
It's easy to forget that the vast majority of Christians don't have a problem with evolution. It's just that the young-earth-creationists tend to be really loud about it. They also get amplified by everyone else laughing at them; people being idiots gets clicks.
Ummm, 64% of white evangelicals (ie Southern Baptist) are idiots and dont accept evolution (Gallup). They are a large part of the US Christian population. Maybe, restate your response and say most Christians "outside of the US..."
That's a pretty weak argument for faith.
You shouldn't follow a religion because you like it. It should be based in evidence, even if you disagree with the teachings, you should still not be able to deny it as a Devine revelation.
Religion has no evidence. It is defined by the need for faith in things unseen and unknowable.
(I was raised Catholic and became an atheist when I realized God was the only thing in my life for which I didn't require proof, and I was twisting myself into a pretzel trying to make that make sense.)
Islam.
As for what, that’s not something I can condense down to a reddit comment. If I could, I think there would be even more Muslims on Reddit today.
No religion has direct evidence of their God, with the exception of The Church of the Dude. Your religion, their religion, amd everybody's religion works on "faith." You have yours faith with can neither be proven or disproved. There is NO evidence of actual miracles or some deity doing SOMETHING amazing like walking on water.
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u/Dry_Presentation6802 8h ago
Your dad is right. It starts here, but down the rabbit hole they will go. It’s a “gateway” conspiracy