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See the new email below, see the first email under the blog about the nice lady wanting to save my soul. My responses are in bold. The original content of her email is not in bold.
-Star

i just wanted to make something clear
i wasnt refering to your brother when he was in the hospital, i was refering to the life he had and shared with you before this horrific thing had happened....

My brother basically had two 4-year lives. In the first one he was born a blond-haired little boy with blue eyes with lots of potential. That was his first four years - which included a lot of love, a manic episode and hallucinations of his mother, a miscarried sibling and threats of divorce. His second 4-year life was the life as a vegetable. However, when you say someone "had a good life" you have to look at the entirety of their life. If you were to stack up all the "good" things in his life next to the "bad" things in his life - well, no one would CHOOSE to live the life he led. Oh, and those four years weren't spent in the hospital. Those four years were spent in our home. I watched my mother pray by his bedside for four years, begging GOD for a miracle. I held my brother's hand while my parents yelled and fought in the next room. I suctioned the mucous out of his trachea so that he could breathe. I watched as my mother changed colostomy bags and wiped the feces off of his body. This was not in a hospital, in some distant place. This was at home, in your face, "God does not exist" REAL. If God did exist, how could he allow such bullshit to happen to his little, innocent children?

and you replied to me about "where was God at when i needed Him most?"
He wasn't anywhere because he doesn't exist.

you said that God doesnt exist at all!
making it an absolute statement, so for me to make one lets say that there is no gold in China at all... what would i have to do?
i would have to go all the way to China, look under every rock, in every chinesse persons mouth, every jewlery store etc etc to make an absolute statement, 100% sure that there is no God, which you did.

Some atheists ­ people with the lack of a belief in a god or gods ­ label themselves under different headings. Some people whom I would label atheist, label themselves as agnostic. Some of these individuals say they cannot KNOW if there is a god or not, and so do not move themselves fully into the realm of atheism. I once called myself an agnostic, because I don't KNOW if there is a god or not. But I don't BELIEVE that there is, and so I realized I should be calling myself an atheist. I have heard of individuals labeling themselves as agnostic atheists. Atheists who do not know if there is a god or not. Truly, shouldn't Christians be labeled agnostic as well? No one truly KNOWS if god exists, hence the controversy. If irrefutable evidence were to come to light on the existence of God, then as a rational atheist, I would refute my beliefs and become a believer.

so like many atheists today, they consist of "evidence", so since we are in the "evidence" era, what "evidence" do you have that God does not exist?

The burden of proof falls on the believer, not the atheist. However, there are some very strong factors that influence my belief that there is no God. Sit back and relax, this might take a while. :) Thanks for your patience and continued correspondence.

First of all, it's the great, vast enormity of our universe. People really don't understand just how vast it is. Consider this from the absolutely wonderful book, A Short History of Nearly Everything by Bill Bryson,

"Now, the first thing you are likely to realize is that space is extremely well named and rather dismayingly uneventful. Our solar system may be the livliest thing for trillions of miles, but all the visible stuff in it - the Sun, the planets and their moons, the billion or so tumbling rocks of the asteroid belt, comets and other miscellaneous drifting detritus - fills less than a trillionth of the available space. You also quickly realize that none of the maps you have ever seen of the solar system was drawn remotely to scale. Most schoolroom charts show the planets coming one after the other at neighborly intervals - the outer giants actually cast shadows over each other in many illustrations - but this is a necessary deceit to get them all on the same piece of paper. Neptune in reality isn't just a little bit beyond Jupiter, it's way beyond Jupiter - five times further from Jupiter than Jupiter is from us, so far out that it receives only 3% as much sunlight as Jupiter...On a diagram of the solar system to scale, with the Earth reduced to about the diameter of a pea, Jupiter would be over 300 metres away and Pluto would be two and a half kilometres distant (and about the size of a bacterium, so you wouldn't be able to see it anyway.) On the same scale, Proxima Centauri, our nearest star, would be about 16,000 kilometres away."

And that's just our solar system. It is estimated that there are 200 BILLION galaxies. With the enormity of the universe, I can't imagine that we are the only life and that all this was created just for us. We are a minute speck.

And time. It is estimated that the "Big Bang" occurred about 13.7 billion years ago or so. 13.7 BILLION YEARS. A long human life is about 650,000 hours. We aren't even a speck in the eye of time. Did the Christian God form the universe 13.7 Billion years ago so that he could just now, only 2,000 years ago, send his ONLY son to SAVE the man he only created 160,000 years ago? 160,000 years certainly sounds like a long time, but not in the face of 13.7 BILLION years.

So take my life experiences, the consideration of time and space and add very convincing evidence for evolution and you get what I am now. An atheist.

and i would like to know why you would have to have evidence to believe in something? what happened to faith, and i hope you know you have faith also, which is to believe that there is no God. It actaully takes an atheist to believe more that there is no God than anyone else religion or not.

NO, actually it doesn't. When I was a Christian I doubted all the time. I don't doubt at all now. I have evidence now, where before ALL I had was faith. Evidence=truth. Faith=belief in something without evidence.

Do you get Christianity?
You said where was God when we needed Him, well if you did understand it you wouldn't be questioning it for the fact that, He is here, but you don't believe so how can you see? It's like telling a blind man to look for a penny on the floor in the middle of New York City.. but if He was guided with the Lord, He would surely find it.

Have you ever SEEN God guide anyone to do anything? Do you talk to God? If so, please ask him to guide me to the key for my safe. It's been missing for years.

and why do you continue to blame God for the outragous acts that people create, was it God who created the bomb to blow up parts of israel, was it God who told that guy to drive that car that day?, or 9/11?

I DON'T blame God. It's hard to blame something that doesn't exist. However, I do blame religion for a lot of things. It was belief in RELIGION that caused all the things you mentioned.

if you dont believe in someone, why continue to talk about Him as if He really does exist?

Because most people believe he does exist and I believe they are delusional. I believe in the truth, I believe in science and I believe this world would be a lot better off if people did not believe in the literal "truth" of the Bible. I was raised with these beliefs and resent that I was not taught the reality of the world as a child. I want to help people realize that their beliefs, their precious beliefs that they hold so dear, are only their beliefs because of the society, time, and family they were born into. I want to help people realize the true nature of the world. Why live a lie?

why continue to try and let people "know" what your truth is?, which is in fact none...

Because it is reality. And whenever you have a majority of a population believing in a delusion, it hurts society. Having a president who believes he is ordained by God or who believes that the world will end in the next 50 years is harmful to this country, and other countries as well.

all you have is "evidence". nothing more

Evidence is an awful fucking lot. I'll take evidence over faith any day. Evidence is reality.

so how far is this evidence going to hold?

Consider these words from the late, great Carl Sagan: "In science it often happens that scientists say, 'You know that's a really good argument; my position is mistaken,' and then they actually change their minds and you never hear that old view from them again. They really do it. It doesn't happen as often as it should, because scientists are human and change is sometimes painful. But it happens every day. I cannot recall the last time something like that happened in politics or religion."

and why do i have to take a look in the mirror? are all Christians brainwashed? why not atheists? it kinda sounds like a racial division.

Christians base their beliefs on faith. Atheists base their beliefs on fact. Christians are typically indoctrinated in their youth. "Get them while they're young" is common practice.

and how are Christians not persecuted? have you actually read the Bible?

Yes, I have. I was taught all about David and the lions. Christians were persecuted. But Constantine changed all that. After Constantine Christians started persecuting other people. Ever heard of the Great Crusades? The Spanish Inquisition?

Christians today are known as terrioists!
Some of them with good right.

and why are we the number 1 hated religion?
Where exactly do you get this information from? I see a Christian church on almost every corner in my town. They don't look hated to me.

and your talking about being persecuted?, well didnt you just try an act of your own by saying that "i should look in the mirror, because you think im brainwashed?" Thanks for the laugh.

solified as a group? im sorry but i have enough strength from the Lord to go out there and do what He has called me to do without anyone else there, just as He did, we all need to grow up one day or another right?
Good for you!!! I am lucky enough to have human strength, no deity required.

you also said :

"You mean the part about how the Earth is only 6,000 years old? Or the part about Noah and his family repopulating the Earth? Or the flood? Or the part about a VIRGIN giving birth? Or a man coming back from the dead? Seen any of those things happen, oh I don't know ­ EVER?"

so you don't think anything is possible. That's the point! you don't believe anything is possible through the Lord, meaning you can't see or "imagine" like you say.

I believe that lots of things are possible. I believe that the Earth was formed about 4.5 billion years ago and that we exist as a result of evolution. That's pretty damn miraculous to me, once again, no deity required. Oh, oh - nows my chance to use this question. Get ready for it - it comes to you from the mind of a man named Marshall Brain. Do you believe that God heals cancer? That he heals sickness and disease? Still with me? Have your answer in mind? Is the answer YES? Then why will God NOT HEAL AMPUTEES? If an amputee came to you and asked if you thought God would grow back his missing leg or arm, what would you say???

Also, consider this from Bertrand Russell...I'm not sure if I remember the quote exactly but it goes something like this, "We are told that faith can move mountains, but no one believes it. Then we are told that an atomic bomb can move mountains, and everyone believes it." Why? Because there is evidence for atomic bombs moving mountains. Have you ever seen a mountain moved by faith alone? Have you ever seen an amputee's missing body part grow back???

how else do you expect mary to conceive a baby? through joesph who was also a sinner like us all, God had to send Jesus through mary without having intercourse so He could be Holy!

I don't expect a conception without sperm. That should be obvious. First of all, scholars will tell you that "virgin" is misrepresented - it originally meant "young woman" not "hasn't had sex." Also, there are many books written by people of the time who didn't make it into the Bible. Do you even know who wrote the Bible? Which books were chosen and why? Have you read the Gnostic scriptures? Do you ever wonder why there are no books in the Bible written by women? Do you ever wonder why there are no books in the Bible written by Jesus? If this holy book is what you are basing on your beliefs on, you should really do some research on it.

But regardless if they did or not, Jesus is still not of Mary, she had Him but when you read the Bible He doesnt consider her as His mother.

If you were betrayed, killed everyone who hurt you, except for your husband and yourself as well as your kids and their wives, would you repopulate. I think so.

I don't understand the above statements so really can't respond.

The Lord also put these parables and works He has done to give us examples of what we can actually do by faith and being rightous. He didnt put it there so we can say "hey this doesnt make sense, how could you do that"!

He didn't put it there at all. GOD didn't write the Bible. Men did.

Dont you think atheists are a little played out for the fact that the pharisees before us mocked the Lord already but still in amazment, like oooo ahhhhh.

He even proved to us in so many verses that He came not to condemn what Moses and Abraham had done before He came but to Fulfill what they didnt finish to that we would understand what He is, was and still is capable of and what we can do through Him to help others that need to be saved!I don't consider anything in the Bible as "proof".

How did we all get here then? the big bang?

Yes. The origins of life are certainly a mystery. It has been
theorized that

"Water, carbon dioxide, methane, and hydrogen cyanide formed key molecules such as sugars, amino acids, and nucleotides. Such molecules are the building blocks of proteins and nucleic acids, compounds ubiquitous
to all living organisms. A critical early triumph was the development
of RNA and DNA molecules, which directed biological processes and preserved life's "operation instructions" for future generations." More here


Most people know that in 1953, Stanley Miller simulated what was thought to be the conditions of primordial earth and exposed ammonia and methane to simulated lightning and produced organic compounds.
The fact of the matter is that there IS indeed life. Well, as far as we can determine using our senses and based on what we consider reality. So life exists and there is evidence for evolution. I am more inclined to believe that life formed than was created. You have to start with something - whether it be god or not. The problem with believing in
a god is that you have to assume that something complex has always existed.
You don't see complex items just popping into existence anywhere in the natural world. The pattern you see is simple things evolving into complex things.

The idea that something changes from a very simple thing to a very complex
thing is not hard to grasp. Look at agriculture .. we started out as gatherers, and now we have innumerable fields of genetically engineered crops. Look at weapons .. we started out killing each other with clubs and now have weapons of mass destruction that can be controlled with only the push of a button. On a lighter note, consider the video game system. Children of today's video game market would laugh at the original Atari. Look at the books that have been written over the centuries.
The Bible was written almost 2000 years ago and does not contain any current scientific facts, if any at all. If a book containing all the
scientific knowledge we had today had been written 2000 years ago, we
would be amazed. But such a book does not exist because we follow a natural path from simple to complex. We start as an egg and sperm coming together in the womb and after nine months we are born a human child.. simple to complex. The pattern is everywhere you look. "If incontrovertible evidence of intelligent design were ever discovered..this could only be evidence of a designer that was itself the product of natural selection or of some other as yet unknown escalatory process"(Richard Dawkins, Intelligent Aliens)

"Scientific evidence is accumulating that chemical and physical processes
on early Earth, aided by the emerging force of selection, produced very
simple cells through a sequence of four main stages: (1) the abiotic
(nonliving) synthesis of small organic molecules, such as amino acids
and nucleotides; (2) the joining of these small molecules (monomers)
into polymers, including proteins and necleic acids; (3) the packaging
of these molecules into 'protobionts,' droplets with membranes that
maintained an internal chemistry different from that of their surroundings;
and (4) the origin of self-replicating molecules that eventually made
inheritance possible." (Biology, Seventh Edition, Campbell/Reece, Pearson 2005)

since you know everything, i want to know, when you die where will you be going then?

I certainly don't know everything, but thanks for the compliment nonetheless. I won't be going anywhere. There's nowhere to go.

if there is no heaven nor hell why do many believe then, or wait, there brain washed too?

People WANT to believe that there is something after this. They certainly don't believe because of evidence. Just because a bunch of people believe something doesn't make it true. Many people used to believe the Earth was flat. I think we covered this already - but they were wrong. They were proven wrong by people who didn't take things at face value. By people who thought for themselves.

And last but not least, if the Lord were still here today (which He is, but in the flesh), doing His thing like He did in the Bible, you still wouldn't believe for the fact that He is who He is but no one likes Him, but i never really understood why?, for He only LOVES, and has never hurt you, told on you, kept a secret from you, hit you, hated you, put you down, etc, but we do that to Him because we feel its right, people said it was right, and we "think" we know its right...

If the Christian God were here and real and doing his thing. I probably wouldn't worship him because when it comes down to it, he's a vindictive God, petty and selfish with rather human traits. And if he were doing what he used to do, he'd kill me. And probably kill you too. He has a track record of only keeping a few people alive, and out of the entire Earthly population, I doubt either one of us would be left standing.

and we cry about our lives

all i have to say is to get across the bridge you have to

GET OVER IT!!!

There's no bridge for me to cross.
and forgive

I don't need to forgive anything. My past is my past. It's part of what has made me who I am today, and for that I am grateful.

and all will come to pass

Yep, time has a funny way of moving on no matter what you believe.

God Bless you and your family
<><

Thanks. Not that you were expecting it, but I WON'T be praying for you. :) If you haven't read The God Delusion yet by Richard Dawkins, I highly recommend it.