If God Answered Prayers
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XUhIvqWyrPM

I'll watch this later. I like his videos.

Looking for conflict with others , I see.

Edited 1/19/2016 00:40:12

Looking for conflict with others , I see.

lol +1

I wouldn't say "conflict". I'm looking to engage people, sure, but i'm not looking for conflict. Darkmatter2525 always makes good points about the logical flaws in the omnipotent/omniscient/omnipresent god hypothesis. Points that i think are worth discussing. Not only that, but his videos in my opinion have very good comedy material, wether you agree with him or not. He doesn't take himself as seriously as other atheists on youtube. Also, i found it hilarious that he makes fun of "atheists always looking for a debate", since i obviously fit in that stereotypical category

Watched it. It was good. Then I took a look at some of his more recent videos. He's really improved his animation skills by ... a lot! And in fact I find some of his more recent videos even sharper and more poignant than his older ones. Not only has his animation improved, but also his writing.

we need to be tolerant of islam. Okay the islamic people have a right to their beliefs and disrespecting them in such a manner is highly inflammatory. Pls remove this racist trash from the forums. Thank you. allahu ackbar

Edited 1/20/2016 22:49:57

@wct

Yeah he has improved a lot, but i think it is because he has more people helping with the video too(edit: that's actually not true, i thought he has people helping him because in one of his videos i think he said that jefferies' design was improved by someone else). And his patreon feed is doing well, he make 3k$/video, wich gives incentive to produce great content and up his game

Edited 1/21/2016 00:42:13

how dare you ignore the demands of POC. RACIST!

we need to be tolerant of islam.

Why must we be tolerant of any religion? Religions are not people. I can understand being tolerant of people, but not religions themselves. And 'tolerance' is a slippery word these days, so it also depends on what you mean by it.

Okay the islamic people have a right to their beliefs and disrespecting them in such a manner is highly inflammatory.

You're disrespecting my belief that beliefs deserve no special respect! That's highly inflammatory!

See how that works?

I find Darkmatter's videos to be largely preaching to the choir (if you'll pardon the expression. lol)

He makes prayer sound like god is supposed to be some genie that grants wishes or something, but I can't think of a single Christian (or someone who knows a shred of bible doctrine) who thinks that. that's not really what the bible teaches about it either.

Darkmatter refers to a local preacher he knows who claims his prayer helped him find his car keys. It depends where you live. There are lots of places in the states where you find god-is-a-genie believers.

Also, the bible preaches that if you pray to move a mountain, it will be moved. So, yeah.

defintely not inciting conflict with this topic or anything...

@Wct - A 2011 Gallup survey reports, "Three in 10 Americans interpret the Bible literally, saying it is the actual word of God. That is similar to what Gallup has measured over the last two decades, but down from the 1970s and 1980s. A 49% plurality of Americans say the Bible is the inspired word of God but that it should not be taken literally."

Biblical literalism is a small sector of the Christian movement, largely confined to evangelical or fundamentalist faiths. Most people consider the word of the Bible to be metaphorical and geared towards inspiration.

if you pray to move a mountain, it will be moved

Many would interpret this as a metaphorical statement with a religious message imbibed within it (i.e. have faith in God). That's all.

"Also, the bible preaches that if you pray to move a mountain, it will be moved. So, yeah."

That passage is referring to faith. Not prayer. Whether you interpret it as metaphorical or not, it still doesn't refer to prayer.

I guess, let me try to give you all a break down of biblical prayer and why I think that darkmatter's treatment of it doesn't really get to the heart of the matter. Please understand that I'm not trying to start an argument here or argue anyone else into becoming a Christian. You can disagree with some or all of what I have to say, but if you are going to take issue with me on something, please keep it respectful. Here we go...

Let me share with you how the Lord taught his disciples to pray:

Our Father in heaven,                       (recognizing who God is)
hallowed be your name.                      (recognizing his holiness)
Your kingdom come,                          (God has promised his kingdom will come)
your will be done,                          (God's will is already being done)
on earth, as it is in heaven.               (in both places)
Give us this day our daily bread,           (God has promised to supply our needs)
and forgive us our debts,                   (This is referring to our sin debt)
                                            (God has promised to forgive all those who trust)
as we also have forgiven our debtors.       (God has commanded us to forgive others sin)
And lead us not into temptation,            (God has promised that He won't)
but deliver us from evil.                   (Check out I Cor. 10:13)

I admit, I'm trying to interpret the scripture here on the fly, but looking back over that list, where do we see people asking for stuff? for kittens? for money? for cars?

What we see is we pray to:
Agree with him on his person and position
Agree that his promises are true
Agree that he has forgiven our sin
Agree with his commands to us regarding our treatment of others

Our position in prayer ought to be US making sure that WE agree with GOD, not getting God to do stuff for us. Everything that was asked of God in that prayer was stuff He has already promised to do.

I guess let me finish with this: I am a Christian. I do pray, but not for stuff. Most of my prayers tend to deal with my own sin and failures. I don't mind darkmatter doing these videos. I've watched a few just to see "how the other side thinks" and all. I just don't really feel like it's very applicable to actual biblical Christianity.

And on the other side of the coin, if there are Christians out there that think God is going to make them rich or give them power, I question whether that is Christianity at all. Whether that is a Christian who is just doctrinally confused or whether that person is putting the Christian label on materialism and not a Christian at all I'm just not sure.

Either way guys, that's my two cents. Take if for what it's worth.

That passage is referring to faith. Not prayer. Whether you interpret it as metaphorical or not, it still doesn't refer to prayer.

Blech, it amounts to the same thing. Here you are trying to tell us that god doesn't perform magic tricks like a genie, and when pointed out that the bible promises magic tricks, you equivocate. Whatever. Have fun moving mountains with your prayers -- oops, I mean faith. lol

Three in 10 Americans interpret the Bible literally, saying it is the actual word of God
...
Biblical literalism is a small sector of the Christian movement

Since only about 83% of the US identify as Christian (google search), 0.3 / 0.83 = 0.36.

So 36% of US Christians, by *your* reckoning (which I don't disagree with, if your poll reporting is accurate; just saying that you admit to these numbers) are biblical literalists.

And you call this a 'small sector' of the Christian movement.

Would you call the Catholics in the US a 'small sector' of the Christian movement? They make up only 22% of the population, and -- if, as you suggest, they are not literalists since they are not evangelicals or fundamentalists -- are thus (0.22 / 0.83 = 0.265) only about 26.5% of the US Christians.

So, if you are going to call the Catholics a 'small sector' of US Christians, then I will have to concede your rather banal point.

But if you just *think* about what you're saying, then you must realize that there are *more* biblical literalists in the US than there are Catholics.

Many would interpret this as a metaphorical statement with a religious message imbibed within it (i.e. have faith in God).

And many (literally almost 100 million) believe it is literally true, as you just admitted.

Edited 1/24/2016 06:17:05

you realise that not everyone that says their christian is... the census says I'm Roman Catholic, and I'm really not.

According to http://www.gallup.com/poll/15370/party-affiliation.aspx, only 26% of Americans identify as Republicans (as opposed to Republican-leaning independents).

So, I guess actual Republicans are just a 'small sector' of US politics, right?

you realise that not everyone that says their christian is

Do you realize that this would make my point *stronger*, not weaker?

E.g. Let's assume that only 90% of people who call themselves Christian on a census *actually* consider themselves Christian.

Clearly, those who believe the bible is literally true, and the word of god, actually consider themselves Christians. So that 3 in 10 remains 0.3 of the US population.

The 83% are decimated down to (0.83 x 0.9 = 0.747) 74.7% of the US population.

Thus, in the US, (0.3 / 0.747 = 0.4) about 40% of people who consider themselves Christian are biblical literalists. 40% is greater than 36%.

The more Christian-by-tradition-not-by-belief people there are, the worse it gets for actual believing Christians as being literalists.