Poll: do you believe in God?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

PP makes it pretty clear that she is not a fundamentalist (like you?) who believes there is only one path to God. In the past, she has said she respects the atheist "path" as well, but it seems to go unmentioned here as a legitimate way to live.

In fairness, that wasn't really part of the OP's survey. The questions were specifically about religious faith. If you ask me if I believe the atheists path to be "legitimate", of course I would agree that it is. I believe in God the same way I believe in gravity. I can't see it, but I can certainly see the effect. I strongly believe that all beings eventually find "God" whatever the word means to them. I don't need to worry about the atheist's path. God has that covered. He/She doesn't need my help.

The poster questioning my Christianity is concerned about my statement that I do not believe humans need to be "saved". I probably should have phrased it more clearly. I believe every person is born good. I reject the concept of original sin completely. God is good and therefore incapable of creating evil. We have free will. We screw up over and over again. That's the nature of ego. But every single being on this planet is inherently good. There is a light in each person. Some just hide it really, really well. I believe that when Christ spoke of salvation, he was speaking metaphysically. Salvation comes when we begin to let go of ego and move towards enlightenment. I believe we all get there. It may take many lifetimes. I believe we are literally "born again" and again and again until we are finally capable of being born into eternal communion with God. We all eventually join the creative consciousness of our creator. We return to our beginning when our soul journey is complete.

Jesus the Christ is my way-shower. I follow Christ therefore, I Am a Christian. Others follow different paths with different way-showers. All are manifestations of the same God.

Just MY personal beliefs. I enjoy discussions about religion and spirituality. I do not appreciate being told I am "not a Christian". To the poster who said that - May I gently suggest you spend a little time thinking about what it means to be Christ-like?

I don't appreciate being told different paths are all "manifestations of the same God." And atheists might not appreciate being told that God had their path covered.

Just sayin'.

Big difference - I said over and over and over again in my posts that these were my beliefs. My path. I think it's great that others have different paths. We learn a lot from each other. I respect the atheist who does good because he truly loves others much more than the fundi Christian serving soup to the homeless once week because it looks good and because he is terrified of going to hell. To me, the atheist is the one behaving like Christ. It's hard for me to imagine an all powerful being needing to scare people into worship. That's just not the God I know.

But it doesn't sound as if you understand that atheists don't have a "wayshower" You may believe that they do, but they not.

You talk about different paths, but when you say "That's just not the God I know" it sounds like you somehow know that there are a lot of different gods out there. And that people can choose their own to believe in.

Right. But the poll - The questions asked - Were specifically about my personal beliefs. There is no way I could believe in a God just for believers. It's not possible. There either is a God or there is not a God. I believe there is. Therefore, I have to believe everyone on earth has the same access to God. God doesn't exist because of belief. I believe he/she exists regardless.

That doesn't at all mean I cannot respect the atheist's belief. I can disagree and still respect. I didn't start explaining until I was accused of not being a Christian. It's dangerous when other believers start deciding who can or cannot identify as Christian.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Because a totally unrepresentative sample of DCUM is much better?

And what makes you think professional polling methods are flawed? Or that people would be "more" honest on DCUM? Or that DCUM's atheist trolls wouldn't post multiple times in a way that professional pollsters could control for?

I work for Pew-seriously. I know a lot about polling and statistics.

Your poll is ridiculous.

Agree. DCUM is predominantly liberal, and liberals tend to have a lesser belief in G-d. Skewed sample.

Disagree. I'm extremely concerned liberal and religious. However, I do think that, on this particular forum, the atheist buzz saw of hatred for all things religious has driven off a lot of religious posters. Therefore I doubt the survey would be representative for that reason.

Let me guess: Catholic?

No, mainline Protestant.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Because a totally unrepresentative sample of DCUM is much better?

And what makes you think professional polling methods are flawed? Or that people would be "more" honest on DCUM? Or that DCUM's atheist trolls wouldn't post multiple times in a way that professional pollsters could control for?

I work for Pew-seriously. I know a lot about polling and statistics.

Your poll is ridiculous.

Agree. DCUM is predominantly liberal, and liberals tend to have a lesser belief in G-d. Skewed sample.

Disagree. I'm extremely concerned liberal and religious. However, I do think that, on this particular forum, the atheist buzz saw of hatred for all things religious has driven off a lot of religious posters. Therefore I doubt the survey would be representative for that reason.

not believing is not a buzzsaw of hatred. It's just not believing. Believing in god is not on its own a good thing. It's simply a thing. Some of those who believe find great comfort in it. Others seem fearful of a punishing god and others seem to think that they must deride people who don't believe the way they do.

Do you think you convince anyone when you play innocent like this? Everybody with a passing familiarity with this forum has seen some of the atheists here-not all-calling religion "fantasy" and "fairy tales" and calling believers pathetic sheeple. Some of you post gross stereotypes, like we all think non-believers are going to hell, no matter how many times we correct you. You derail almost every thread about religion with your whiny "but god is a fake and a farce." You reduce religion to a crutch, or a control mechanism, and absolutely refuse to acknowledge a possible role for faith-like you just did in your post above. It's all extremely disrespectful, at a minimum, and downright hateful and abusive some of the time.

If you were even remotely intellectually honest you'd acknowledge this. You're not, but that's OK because we all know what we've seen and read.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

PP makes it pretty clear that she is not a fundamentalist (like you?) who believes there is only one path to God. In the past, she has said she respects the atheist "path" as well, but it seems to go unmentioned here as a legitimate way to live.

In fairness, that wasn't really part of the OP's survey. The questions were specifically about religious faith. If you ask me if I believe the atheists path to be "legitimate", of course I would agree that it is. I believe in God the same way I believe in gravity. I can't see it, but I can certainly see the effect. I strongly believe that all beings eventually find "God" whatever the word means to them. I don't need to worry about the atheist's path. God has that covered. He/She doesn't need my help.

The poster questioning my Christianity is concerned about my statement that I do not believe humans need to be "saved". I probably should have phrased it more clearly. I believe every person is born good. I reject the concept of original sin completely. God is good and therefore incapable of creating evil. We have free will. We screw up over and over again. That's the nature of ego. But every single being on this planet is inherently good. There is a light in each person. Some just hide it really, really well. I believe that when Christ spoke of salvation, he was speaking metaphysically. Salvation comes when we begin to let go of ego and move towards enlightenment. I believe we all get there. It may take many lifetimes. I believe we are literally "born again" and again and again until we are finally capable of being born into eternal communion with God. We all eventually join the creative consciousness of our creator. We return to our beginning when our soul journey is complete.

Jesus the Christ is my way-shower. I follow Christ therefore, I Am a Christian. Others follow different paths with different way-showers. All are manifestations of the same God.

Just MY personal beliefs. I enjoy discussions about religion and spirituality. I do not appreciate being told I am "not a Christian". To the poster who said that - May I gently suggest you spend a little time thinking about what it means to be Christ-like?

I don't appreciate being told different paths are all "manifestations of the same God." And atheists might not appreciate being told that God had their path covered.

Just sayin'.

Big difference - I said over and over and over again in my posts that these were my beliefs. My path. I think it's great that others have different paths. We learn a lot from each other. I respect the atheist who does good because he truly loves others much more than the fundi Christian serving soup to the homeless once week because it looks good and because he is terrified of going to hell. To me, the atheist is the one behaving like Christ. It's hard for me to imagine an all powerful being needing to scare people into worship. That's just not the God I know.

But it doesn't sound as if you understand that atheists don't have a "wayshower" You may believe that they do, but they not.

You talk about different paths, but when you say "That's just not the God I know" it sounds like you somehow know that there are a lot of different gods out there. And that people can choose their own to believe in.

It seems inherently contradictory for this PP to say something like "that's not the God I know" after saying that God is what we believe God to be. It seems PP wants to have it both ways... to state categorically that God is not like something because PP doesn't like the concept of that particular thing, but then to say that we all find our own paths because hey, God is cool with whatever.

I'm also curious why we think God isn't like something particular. We all are. Why can't God be? All the things said to be God in the various religions are like something particular. How can they all be the same thing?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Because a totally unrepresentative sample of DCUM is much better?

And what makes you think professional polling methods are flawed? Or that people would be "more" honest on DCUM? Or that DCUM's atheist trolls wouldn't post multiple times in a way that professional pollsters could control for?

I work for Pew-seriously. I know a lot about polling and statistics.

Your poll is ridiculous.

Agree. DCUM is predominantly liberal, and liberals tend to have a lesser belief in G-d. Skewed sample.

Disagree. I'm extremely concerned liberal and religious. However, I do think that, on this particular forum, the atheist buzz saw of hatred for all things religious has driven off a lot of religious posters. Therefore I doubt the survey would be representative for that reason.

not believing is not a buzzsaw of hatred. It's just not believing. Believing in god is not on its own a good thing. It's simply a thing. Some of those who believe find great comfort in it. Others seem fearful of a punishing god and others seem to think that they must deride people who don't believe the way they do.

Do you think you convince anyone when you play innocent like this? Everybody with a passing familiarity with this forum has seen some of the atheists here-not all-calling religion "fantasy" and "fairy tales" and calling believers pathetic sheeple. Some of you post gross stereotypes, like we all think non-believers are going to hell, no matter how many times we correct you. You derail almost every thread about religion with your whiny "but god is a fake and a farce." You reduce religion to a crutch, or a control mechanism, and absolutely refuse to acknowledge a possible role for faith-like you just did in your post above. It's all extremely disrespectful, at a minimum, and downright hateful and abusive some of the time.

If you were even remotely intellectually honest you'd acknowledge this. You're not, but that's OK because we all know what we've seen and read.

This is what could be called "a buzzsaw of hatred for all things atheist."

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

PP makes it pretty clear that she is not a fundamentalist (like you?) who believes there is only one path to God. In the past, she has said she respects the atheist "path" as well, but it seems to go unmentioned here as a legitimate way to live.

In fairness, that wasn't really part of the OP's survey. The questions were specifically about religious faith. If you ask me if I believe the atheists path to be "legitimate", of course I would agree that it is. I believe in God the same way I believe in gravity. I can't see it, but I can certainly see the effect. I strongly believe that all beings eventually find "God" whatever the word means to them. I don't need to worry about the atheist's path. God has that covered. He/She doesn't need my help.

The poster questioning my Christianity is concerned about my statement that I do not believe humans need to be "saved". I probably should have phrased it more clearly. I believe every person is born good. I reject the concept of original sin completely. God is good and therefore incapable of creating evil. We have free will. We screw up over and over again. That's the nature of ego. But every single being on this planet is inherently good. There is a light in each person. Some just hide it really, really well. I believe that when Christ spoke of salvation, he was speaking metaphysically. Salvation comes when we begin to let go of ego and move towards enlightenment. I believe we all get there. It may take many lifetimes. I believe we are literally "born again" and again and again until we are finally capable of being born into eternal communion with God. We all eventually join the creative consciousness of our creator. We return to our beginning when our soul journey is complete.

Jesus the Christ is my way-shower. I follow Christ therefore, I Am a Christian. Others follow different paths with different way-showers. All are manifestations of the same God.

Just MY personal beliefs. I enjoy discussions about religion and spirituality. I do not appreciate being told I am "not a Christian". To the poster who said that - May I gently suggest you spend a little time thinking about what it means to be Christ-like?

I don't appreciate being told different paths are all "manifestations of the same God." And atheists might not appreciate being told that God had their path covered.

Just sayin'.

Big difference - I said over and over and over again in my posts that these were my beliefs. My path. I think it's great that others have different paths. We learn a lot from each other. I respect the atheist who does good because he truly loves others much more than the fundi Christian serving soup to the homeless once week because it looks good and because he is terrified of going to hell. To me, the atheist is the one behaving like Christ. It's hard for me to imagine an all powerful being needing to scare people into worship. That's just not the God I know.

But it doesn't sound as if you understand that atheists don't have a "wayshower" You may believe that they do, but they not.

You talk about different paths, but when you say "That's just not the God I know" it sounds like you somehow know that there are a lot of different gods out there. And that people can choose their own to believe in.

Right. But the poll - The questions asked - Were specifically about my personal beliefs. There is no way I could believe in a God just for believers. It's not possible. There either is a God or there is not a God. I believe there is. Therefore, I have to believe everyone on earth has the same access to God. God doesn't exist because of belief. I believe he/she exists regardless.

That doesn't at all mean I cannot respect the atheist's belief. I can disagree and still respect. I didn't start explaining until I was accused of not being a Christian. It's dangerous when other believers start deciding who can or cannot identify as Christian.

You don't HAVE to believe it. You just believe it - like everything else you believe about god. It seems like you are constructing a god of your liking and setting up your own rules about how your god operates. It brings you peace and comfort. It makes you accepting of others. The God you've constructed based on the Christian God is a nice god -- but it's really your personal god, subject to change if you change. It seems more like a life philosophy.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Because a totally unrepresentative sample of DCUM is much better?

And what makes you think professional polling methods are flawed? Or that people would be "more" honest on DCUM? Or that DCUM's atheist trolls wouldn't post multiple times in a way that professional pollsters could control for?

I work for Pew-seriously. I know a lot about polling and statistics.

Your poll is ridiculous.

Agree. DCUM is predominantly liberal, and liberals tend to have a lesser belief in G-d. Skewed sample.

Disagree. I'm extremely concerned liberal and religious. However, I do think that, on this particular forum, the atheist buzz saw of hatred for all things religious has driven off a lot of religious posters. Therefore I doubt the survey would be representative for that reason.

not believing is not a buzzsaw of hatred. It's just not believing. Believing in god is not on its own a good thing. It's simply a thing. Some of those who believe find great comfort in it. Others seem fearful of a punishing god and others seem to think that they must deride people who don't believe the way they do.

Do you think you convince anyone when you play innocent like this? Everybody with a passing familiarity with this forum has seen some of the atheists here-not all-calling religion "fantasy" and "fairy tales" and calling believers pathetic sheeple. Some of you post gross stereotypes, like we all think non-believers are going to hell, no matter how many times we correct you. You derail almost every thread about religion with your whiny "but god is a fake and a farce." You reduce religion to a crutch, or a control mechanism, and absolutely refuse to acknowledge a possible role for faith-like you just did in your post above. It's all extremely disrespectful, at a minimum, and downright hateful and abusive some of the time.

If you were even remotely intellectually honest you'd acknowledge this. You're not, but that's OK because we all know what we've seen and read.

This is what could be called "a buzzsaw of hatred for all things atheist."

Amen

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Because a totally unrepresentative sample of DCUM is much better?

And what makes you think professional polling methods are flawed? Or that people would be "more" honest on DCUM? Or that DCUM's atheist trolls wouldn't post multiple times in a way that professional pollsters could control for?

I work for Pew-seriously. I know a lot about polling and statistics.

Your poll is ridiculous.

Agree. DCUM is predominantly liberal, and liberals tend to have a lesser belief in G-d. Skewed sample.

Disagree. I'm extremely concerned liberal and religious. However, I do think that, on this particular forum, the atheist buzz saw of hatred for all things religious has driven off a lot of religious posters. Therefore I doubt the survey would be representative for that reason.

not believing is not a buzzsaw of hatred. It's just not believing. Believing in god is not on its own a good thing. It's simply a thing. Some of those who believe find great comfort in it. Others seem fearful of a punishing god and others seem to think that they must deride people who don't believe the way they do.

Do you think you convince anyone when you play innocent like this? Everybody with a passing familiarity with this forum has seen some of the atheists here-not all-calling religion "fantasy" and "fairy tales" and calling believers pathetic sheeple. Some of you post gross stereotypes, like we all think non-believers are going to hell, no matter how many times we correct you. You derail almost every thread about religion with your whiny "but god is a fake and a farce." You reduce religion to a crutch, or a control mechanism, and absolutely refuse to acknowledge a possible role for faith-like you just did in your post above. It's all extremely disrespectful, at a minimum, and downright hateful and abusive some of the time.

If you were even remotely intellectually honest you'd acknowledge this. You're not, but that's OK because we all know what we've seen and read.

Can you reference some times when Christians said they did not think atheists and other non-Christians were going to hell? Having been a liberal Christian, I know that they are not focused on hell, but truly, I don't recall it coming up on DCUM. What I recall is fundamentalists assuring atheists that they were hellbound.

[Anonymous]

1. Do you believe in God? No
2. Do you believe in a "higher power" or intelligent force at hand? No
3. Do you participate in organized religion? No
4. Do you believe most of the tenets of your religion? Some
5. Which religion? Christian
6. How often do you pray? Almost never
7. How often do you attend religious services? Once per year
8. How were you brought up in religion? Same religion as now? Raised in evangelical churches, went to Jesuit school for college
9. How are you bringing up your children wrt religion? DH is not religious at all, so it will be up to me. I may start attending UU to expose them to some type of religious perspectives
10. How important is your religion/spirituality to you? Not important

Some questions about sharing that information with others:
A. Were you comfortable responding to these questions on DCUM? Yes
B. Are you comfortable discussing your true personal beliefs with friends and family? Depends. Some people yes, some no.
C. Would you share your true personal beliefs to a stranger on a telephone poll? [b] No

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:1. Do you believe in God?
Yes. As Spirit, the loving source of all that is. The one power, all good, everywhere present, all wisdom. Not in the angry, smitey judge with a long white beard sitting on a throne kind of way.
2. Do you believe in a "higher power" or intelligent force at hand?
Yes
3. Do you participate in organized religion?
Yes
4. Do you believe most of the tenets of your religion?
My religion has very loose tenets. So yes.
5. Which religion?
Unity
6. How often do you pray?
Many times every day
7. How often do you attend religious services?
It depends on what you mean by "services". I attend a church service every Sunday morning. But I practice my faith daily.
8. How were you brought up in religion? Same religion as now?
I was raised in an evangelical southern baptist church. Very different from my faith now.
9. How are you bringing up your children wrt religion?
My children are exposed to many different spiritual paths. I want them to find their own. I have four grown kids and one in high school. My oldest is a Catholic but attends UU services as well. My second is Unity. My third is Catholic but identified as Wicca for several years. My fourth is all over the place right now but she leans towards Unity. My youngest is agnostic/Buddhist today.
10. How important is your religion/spirituality to you?
I am a minister. It's very important

Some questions about sharing that information with others:
A. Were you comfortable responding to these questions on DCUM?
Yes
B. Are you comfortable discussing your true personal beliefs with friends and family?
I have to be careful with my extended family. They are very southern baptist and are not ready to accept that no one spiritual journey is more sacred than another. We are all on our own paths. I believe there are many, many paths to God. With friends I tend to be a little guarded as well. Because I am a minister, I think people sometimes expect me to start proselytizing. That's not at all who I am. I love to discuss religion and spirituality. But I'm not out to "save" people. I don't believe people need to be saved.
C. Would you share your true personal beliefs to a stranger on a telephone poll?
Sure.

Then you're not a Christian minister, correct? Just checking.

I am definitely a Christian minister. Ordained by a Christian church. And working to be more like my Christ every single day.

Well, I hate to break it to you, but one of the major foundations of the Christian faith is that all persons are sinners and are in need of a Savior. So, you're more than a little off base here.

[Anonymous]

1. Do you believe in God? no
2. Do you believe in a "higher power" or intelligent force at hand? no
3. Do you participate in organized religion? no
4. Do you believe most of the tenets of your religion?
5. Which religion?
6. How often do you pray? never
7. How often do you attend religious services? never
8. How were you brought up in religion? Same religion as now? I was raised a Christian. Specifically, we went to a Methodist church.
9. How are you bringing up your children wrt religion? I have 2 kids, haven't ever taken them to religious service or involved them in religion in any way and do not plan to do so.
10. How important is your religion/spirituality to you? not at all

Some questions about sharing that information with others:
A. Were you comfortable responding to these questions on DCUM? yes
B. Are you comfortable discussing your true personal beliefs with friends and family? for the most part, yes. But I wouldn't be comfortable talking about this with my grandmother because I think it would make her sad/upset if she knew the extent to which I am not religious (I think she knows I don't go to church but we've never discussed it)
C. Would you share your true personal beliefs to a stranger on a telephone poll? yes

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Sounds like some people aren't comfortable sharing their beliefs about God so current polls may be inaccurate.
http://m.huffpost.com/us/entry/us_58f67e31e4b0de5bac41d3eb

So let's do a little informal poll to see who we have here in DCUMland.

1. Do you believe in God? No
2. Do you believe in a "higher power" or intelligent force at hand? No

3. Do you participate in organized religion? No
4. Do you believe most of the tenets of your religion? N/A
5. Which religion? N/A
6. How often do you pray? never
7. How often do you attend religious services? never, unless it's part of wedding, funeral, baptism, or bar mitzvah
8. How were you brought up in religion? catholic Same religion as now? no religion now
9. How are you bringing up your children wrt religion? we baptized them for the sake of ritual but don't take them to church. We talk to them about different religions so they have a basic understanding of others' beliefs. We're not anti-religion but obviously don't have any religious beliefs ourselves so we impart a live and let live attitude.

10. How important is your religion/spirituality to you? not at all except that I'm probably something of a cultural Catholic. I like the Christmas and Easter stuff, which isn't really religious but more about tradition. I also absorbed a lot of "whatsoever you do to the least of my brothers" mentality growing up in a liberal Catholic household in the 1970s.

Some questions about sharing that information with others:
A. Were you comfortable responding to these questions on DCUM? yes
B. Are you comfortable discussing your true personal beliefs with friends and family? depends on who they are. Not with my ultra Catholic relatives or Catholic school classmates who are still believers
C. Would you share your true personal beliefs to a stranger on a telephone poll? yes
[/quote]

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Because a totally unrepresentative sample of DCUM is much better?

And what makes you think professional polling methods are flawed? Or that people would be "more" honest on DCUM? Or that DCUM's atheist trolls wouldn't post multiple times in a way that professional pollsters could control for?

I work for Pew-seriously. I know a lot about polling and statistics.

Your poll is ridiculous.

Agree. DCUM is predominantly liberal, and liberals tend to have a lesser belief in G-d. Skewed sample.

Disagree. I'm extremely concerned liberal and religious. However, I do think that, on this particular forum, the atheist buzz saw of hatred for all things religious has driven off a lot of religious posters. Therefore I doubt the survey would be representative for that reason.

not believing is not a buzzsaw of hatred. It's just not believing. Believing in god is not on its own a good thing. It's simply a thing. Some of those who believe find great comfort in it. Others seem fearful of a punishing god and others seem to think that they must deride people who don't believe the way they do.

Do you think you convince anyone when you play innocent like this? Everybody with a passing familiarity with this forum has seen some of the atheists here-not all-calling religion "fantasy" and "fairy tales" and calling believers pathetic sheeple. Some of you post gross stereotypes, like we all think non-believers are going to hell, no matter how many times we correct you. You derail almost every thread about religion with your whiny "but god is a fake and a farce." You reduce religion to a crutch, or a control mechanism, and absolutely refuse to acknowledge a possible role for faith-like you just did in your post above. It's all extremely disrespectful, at a minimum, and downright hateful and abusive some of the time.

If you were even remotely intellectually honest you'd acknowledge this. You're not, but that's OK because we all know what we've seen and read.

This is what could be called "a buzzsaw of hatred for all things atheist."

Amen

Heh. That was a list of real-life things you've actually said here on DCUM. If you think it's ugly, you need to look in a mirror.

You're like a toddler who thinks piling on the insults will somehow magically cause his parents to ignore his other bad behavior.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Because a totally unrepresentative sample of DCUM is much better?

And what makes you think professional polling methods are flawed? Or that people would be "more" honest on DCUM? Or that DCUM's atheist trolls wouldn't post multiple times in a way that professional pollsters could control for?

I work for Pew-seriously. I know a lot about polling and statistics.

Your poll is ridiculous.

Agree. DCUM is predominantly liberal, and liberals tend to have a lesser belief in G-d. Skewed sample.

Disagree. I'm extremely concerned liberal and religious. However, I do think that, on this particular forum, the atheist buzz saw of hatred for all things religious has driven off a lot of religious posters. Therefore I doubt the survey would be representative for that reason.

not believing is not a buzzsaw of hatred. It's just not believing. Believing in god is not on its own a good thing. It's simply a thing. Some of those who believe find great comfort in it. Others seem fearful of a punishing god and others seem to think that they must deride people who don't believe the way they do.

Do you think you convince anyone when you play innocent like this? Everybody with a passing familiarity with this forum has seen some of the atheists here-not all-calling religion "fantasy" and "fairy tales" and calling believers pathetic sheeple. Some of you post gross stereotypes, like we all think non-believers are going to hell, no matter how many times we correct you. You derail almost every thread about religion with your whiny "but god is a fake and a farce." You reduce religion to a crutch, or a control mechanism, and absolutely refuse to acknowledge a possible role for faith-like you just did in your post above. It's all extremely disrespectful, at a minimum, and downright hateful and abusive some of the time.

If you were even remotely intellectually honest you'd acknowledge this. You're not, but that's OK because we all know what we've seen and read.

Can you reference some times when Christians said they did not think atheists and other non-Christians were going to hell? Having been a liberal Christian, I know that they are not focused on hell, but truly, I don't recall it coming up on DCUM. What I recall is fundamentalists assuring atheists that they were hellbound.

There are several who say this all the time. Including the minister above. I've said it multiple times. I don't have time to trawl through old posts, but I say this with absolute confidence. It's like there's an atheist who loves to drop this canard to rile up the Christians she knows will deny it. Yes, there's one vocal fondue, but she's outnumbered by the multiple Christians who do *not* believe this.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Because a totally unrepresentative sample of DCUM is much better?

And what makes you think professional polling methods are flawed? Or that people would be "more" honest on DCUM? Or that DCUM's atheist trolls wouldn't post multiple times in a way that professional pollsters could control for?

I work for Pew-seriously. I know a lot about polling and statistics.

Your poll is ridiculous.

Agree. DCUM is predominantly liberal, and liberals tend to have a lesser belief in G-d. Skewed sample.

Disagree. I'm extremely concerned liberal and religious. However, I do think that, on this particular forum, the atheist buzz saw of hatred for all things religious has driven off a lot of religious posters. Therefore I doubt the survey would be representative for that reason.

not believing is not a buzzsaw of hatred. It's just not believing. Believing in god is not on its own a good thing. It's simply a thing. Some of those who believe find great comfort in it. Others seem fearful of a punishing god and others seem to think that they must deride people who don't believe the way they do.

Do you think you convince anyone when you play innocent like this? Everybody with a passing familiarity with this forum has seen some of the atheists here-not all-calling religion "fantasy" and "fairy tales" and calling believers pathetic sheeple. Some of you post gross stereotypes, like we all think non-believers are going to hell, no matter how many times we correct you. You derail almost every thread about religion with your whiny "but god is a fake and a farce." You reduce religion to a crutch, or a control mechanism, and absolutely refuse to acknowledge a possible role for faith-like you just did in your post above. It's all extremely disrespectful, at a minimum, and downright hateful and abusive some of the time.

If you were even remotely intellectually honest you'd acknowledge this. You're not, but that's OK because we all know what we've seen and read.

This is what could be called "a buzzsaw of hatred for all things atheist."

Amen

Heh. That was a list of real-life things you've actually said here on DCUM. If you think it's ugly, you need to look in a mirror.

You're like a toddler who thinks piling on the insults will somehow magically cause his parents to ignore his other bad behavior.

If you are trying to address a specific person, go start new thread. You've dumped enough off-topic hate and insults on this thread.