Intelligent Design Theory: Science or Religion?

I held my thoughts in secret, until at age eighteen I discovered Philip Wylie. To me a breath of fresh air. I had never encountered a mind that honest before. I became a little more open about things with my big brother. But he wanted to slap me down. I asked "What's wrong with discussing Wylie?"

He replied, "I don't mind discussions with my peers"

End of outreach.
A couple of years later I became semi-engaged to a girl that I still respect but ended giving up on. When she and a sitting in woman friend asked about my religion, I told them the truth. The sitting in woman went berserk. "You can't marry him."

Later, when alone, this girl told me she still wanted to marry me. The killer was that I would attend church weekly.

This marks the first time I was dicriminated against for atheism.

When I had to go to church I was in the minority at school.

We're not a very religious people at all.

My parents were believers. They just had no use for churches. I was the only member of my family making any appearances. I think lots of people are that kind of passive believer. My wife is one. She believes very strongly, but feels no attachment to a church.

There are cultural aspects to religion also. I'm of Italian heritage...and very few Italians eat meat on Friday...because of the predominantly Catholic aspect. Even though I am not religious at all...I have maintained that "no meat" protocol for Good Friday all my life. I just did not feel comfortable doing it. And the "no meat on Friday" was not meant for the GOD of the Catholics, but merely to show a willingness to obey a decision of the Church.

Many non-religious Jews still observe dietary restrictions. Luckily, dietary restrictions are not part of Protestantism, so they do not have to deal with the issue.

And although I am not religious, I have no problem with having a religious experience being one of the highlights of my life. Serving Mass in St. Peter's Basilica in the Vatican was huge for me...and has remained huge no matter the changes in my life.

By the way...this Good Friday was the first time I broke that tradition. I did eat meat (breakfast sausages in the morning and beef at the evening meal). It was no big deal...and I did not really think much about it.

The church experience was never a highlight of my life. It was something to be endured. There was nothing remotely spiritual about it. I heard some of the most ridiculous bollocks imaginable, I'm not talking about scripture, I'm talking about the bete noir of whatever lay preacher happened to be spouting.

One of them had a go at people reading books that weren't the Bible.

I came to the conclusion that if there was a god, he wasn't going to be hanging round listening to this shite.

I've never regretted it.

I had similar feelings during my church experiences. I wondered how people could fall for these ministers.

For the next few years any time I was asked about my religion every person I answered suddenly became an evangelist. Their arguments were ignorant. They all tried to appeal to my emotions instead of reason. "But what about your mama?" they would say.

After I hitchhiked back to California, having grown up there for ten years, the "religious" I met were more aggressive. In one encounter, I told the two men confronting me, "I don't want to argue>"

"I'm not going to argue," one said. "I just want to discuss it."

The first time I said something he lost his cool and shouted at me through the rest of the "conversation."

Shortly after arriving in Long Beach I joined the Navy. They stationed me in Long Beach, on a destroyer. As one of the "deck apes" I was just another sailor. But then the sonar gang wanted me to come over. One sonarman was Paul ------. He immediately drew me into religious arguments. For nearly three years our confrontations grew more nasty. Then Yancy, another sonarman decided to get in on it. He took to putting a Bible on my bed every time I was out of the quarters. I finally told him, "The next time I find a Bible on my bed I'm tearing it in half."

Yancy just knew nobody was so demented as to tear a Bible in half - even if he was so strong. Next time I went in there the Bible lay next to my pillow. My peripheral vision caught a glimps of Yancy hiding with an amused grin. I picked up the Bible and ripped it in half by tearing down the binding rather than across the pages. I dropped it in the wastebasket and went about my business.

Another sonarman was Walt ---. He talked me into attending his church one Saturday. Mary Baker Eddy's church - can't recall what it is called. He was pretty certain I just needed some exposure to see the light, I think. It was a boring experience. Thing about Walt, he had a brain. When I got in touch with him again over thirty years later, said he was no longer a Christian. He was no atheist, but he had done with the dogma. I believe his time in college influenced him more than anything I was capable of.

Mary Baker Eddy was the founder of the Church of Christ the Scientist.

My doubts were from my 15th birthday to mid twenties. I just didn't get the concept of Grace from Christ. I didn't see how I could be saved so easily. I couldn't see how I was worth it.

You're not, neither are any of us, but we are, if we repent of our past sins and strive to be a better member of our society.

We'll never be able to atone and stay in a sinless state.

We don't get saved because we quit sinning, we are saved because we recognize there is no way to save ourselves except through Christ. We have a redeemer because we can not by ourselves atone.

I never doubted that listening to some semi literate idiot complaining about people reading books was a waste of time.

Like I said earlier I don't have a problem with Christ, but his followers are a ******* nightmare.

Did I say there was? But when you accept the blood of Christ as the ransom price for your life, do you say; "Rightio, now I'm saved, I can continue to steal from my neighbor, and commit adultery with his wife, etc, etc, or are you asked to strive to become a better member of your society, and threat your neighbor as you would want others to treat you"?

And ignore the atheists on this forum with the contempt that they deserve, those who attack that of which they are totally ignorant.

When I was with a certain woman for a long time she knew going in I am an atheist. Said she didn't mind. After we broke up she used that for one of the reasons she couldn't stay. I told her, "I never tried to tell you what to think."

She said, "It's what society accepts. Society doesn't accept atheists."

I told her if society knew some things about her I know she would be in jail.

Society has no problem with atheists over here.

One of the more notorious lives in my lifetime in America was Madalyn Murray O'Hair. Notorious simply for being proudly and militantly an atheist.

The wicked shall be a ransom for the righteous, and the transgressor for the upright.
Proverbs 21:18

And died a terrible and undeserved death with a ton of twists. Truly tragic ending at the hands of a couple of scumballs.