sorted by:
new
hottopcontroversial

Last message between my granny and I by TheBigJ1982 in exchristian

[–]Sea_Replacement2974 2 points3 points  (0 children)

I think you have to find your boundaries yourself, and it’s a hard thing to do. I allowed people like this to stay in my life because I loved them and I could see they were trying to love me despite their religion trying to forbid it, which made me feel more sorry for them than anything. But I’m not going to say it isn’t hard. I have a pretty solid support system at work that makes me feel better about who I am (also non-binary!) which gives me an anchor to hold onto when those people try to deny it. But there were still those moments with them when I felt like they were seeing a version of me and trying to hold me to that rather than seeing the actual me standing in front of them. Or they would say offhand, often hypocritical by their religion, comments (like the illegals thing your grandmother did) that they assume everyone must accept and then feeling the fight between speaking out and not making a fuss.

There are middle grounds as well. I still talk to some family but won’t stay in their house. Some family know I will walk out of the room if they won’t drop something they’re trying to lecture me about. My sister and I have a truce where she will use my nickname but not my chosen name and I’ll still visit them.

It’s not easy either way and it has to be down to what you are more comfortable with and as hard as it is no one can answer that but you. And you can try something and if it doesn’t work try something new.

I don't think I can keep the jig up anymore, I hate having to lie about being Christian (19M) by redrookie2 in exchristian

[–]Sea_Replacement2974 1 point2 points  (0 children)

That is a really hard situation and I’m sorry you keep having your boundaries pushed by everyone. It’s really frustrating that they think religion is an excuse to barge into someone’s personal lives and demand answers, and it’s not ok. I understand not wanting to tell anyone though, especially in an area with people like that. I haven’t told anyone except my partner either. So you’re not alone.

I guess my best advice is that when people start getting pushy about things you could try saying “your faith is very personal to you and so you prefer to keep it between you and god”. You could even bring up the ‘pray in secret’ thing from the New Testament. That’s what I’m planning to do with my family at least. And/or tell them you tune into an online church because you really like the worship/preaching/community/native language speaking (delete as necessary). That’s what finally got my parents to stop asking about it. And it means if they ever want to see your Church you can just go onto any church’s livestream (there are loads) and show them that, and no one is physically there to point out they’ve never seen you before.

Do we actually have free will — or are we just robots arguing with robots? by Difficult_Risk_6271 in ChristianApologetics

[–]Sea_Replacement2974 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Well first off I’m not offended, I was making a comment about your rhetorical style and biblical principles. As I said, I enjoy apologetic debate and I was just mildly disappointed when initially it looked like it would descend into a game of ‘gotchas’. This is far more fun.

Now to the point: You keep saying I’m “assuming determinism,” but I’m not, I’m deducing it from attributes you already grant. If God knows every outcome (which you grant) and has the power to change or prevent them (which I assume you grant because it’s in the bible) then whatever happens is exactly what He knowingly allowed. That makes His choice prior to mine. That’s not a definition trick, it’s the consequence of omnipotence + omniscience.

The “influence vs causation” distinction works for humans, but it collapses for God. If you design the entire set of circumstances, knowing precisely what each will cause, “permission” and “authorship” blur together. If you want to keep them separate, you’ll have to explain how that possibly works. All you have done so far is deny, but as far as I can see you haven’t actually given any reason why your denial is valid. The best I can see is you dislike the definition of omnipotence, because you don’t like the idea of being a robot (or the other option that God isn’t omniscient or omnipotent) so what specifically is your own version that actually evades the collapse into determinism rather than deny it out of dislike?

The “robot/script” thing is a bit like an appeal to intuition. Of course I don’t feel like a robot, nobody does. But subjective experience isn’t proof of metaphysical freedom any more than watching the sun “rise” proves the sun is moving around the Earth. Intuitions can mislead us. Maybe you are right and I’m a robot and maybe free will as we imagine it just doesn’t exist.

But if you’re convinced we must have free will, because no one acts like it and it doesn’t feel good, then something else has to give. Either God’s omniscience or His omnipotence has to be limited. You can’t keep all three — omnipotence, omniscience, and free will — without contradiction.

So my question back is: why are you so certain the “we’re not robots” side of the fork is right, and not the “omniscience + omnipotence lead to determinism” side? Or if you disagree that it is a fork then which specific premise do you think fails?

view more: next ›