Mopac

Friedrich Nietzsche is not important to what I am saying.

What I am saying is that to say there is no Ultimate Reality or Absolute Truth(which is what God means), is to embrace nihilism.

So atheism and nihilism are very much connected.

But besides this, truly, nihilism is at its core the denial of reality. Existence is meaningless!

God is The Existing One, so what does that mean? God is meaningless! 

Nihilism is very consistent, and even the delusions that are used to prop it up on its foundation of sand can be understood better if you realize that a philosophy of denial of truth can only be propped up by lies.

And surely enough, atheist arguments(because as I said, atheism is really nihilism) are made out of convenience, not truth. If an argument will sound convincing to someone, it will be used. It is not really important if it is true, because there is no truth. If you can appeal to someone's belief in truth to convince them to adopt a position that means there is no truth, you are arguing like a true nihilist! It is about what is convenient. It is also so easy even the simplest of people can argue like an atheist. Simply deny everything unless you can use the belief of another to convert them! 

Nihilism and its less scary sounding manifestation atheism are satanic in the truest sense. The worldview itself kills, steals, and destroys. The ones who spread it do so by magic. Those who get sucked into it go down a path of delusion.

And being so intrinsically tied to pride, it is a particularly dangerous form of prelest that is not easy to overcome. After all, those who don't acknowledge or even recognize they are sick cannot seek to be cured!

It is a condescension to slow learners who have to hear it over and over, an epiphany to those who believe, and a theophany to those who see.

Atheism, which is really just another way of saying nihilism, disproves itself.

Sums it up pretty good.

"Your" ultimate reality is a nonsensical expression.

The Truth is God.

It is self evident that The Truth exists, right?

If you love The Truth with all your heart, mind, soul, and strength, there is a right way to do this. The active work of purifying the nous.

Or as it is expressed in the trinity, worshipping The Father in Spirit and Truth.

The Church has always understood God to be The Truth itself.

If you make God anything other than this, not only are you talking about a different god, but none of our theology can make sense.

Lets go back to a previous post of mine.

"Orthodox Christianity is apodictic(self evident) truth expressed in mysteries, allegories, and parables......Christianity is literally Truth worship, and we do this through the purifying of the nous, which usually gets translsted as intellect, understanding, mind, or even heart, but has more to do with what influences us and compromises our ability to live in truth."

What abiut this doesn't sound like truth worship to you?

If you really wanted to understand, you would adopt a different approach.

As it stands, you won't get anything out of what I say.

The Truth is God

Therefore to deny this God is nihilism.

I try to avoid saying things simply to be mean.

The definition I used is literally the first one in the dictionary I cited. But you make light of what I am saying so you can poo poo it away with little thought. If you are struggling with this, you would have a rougher time with the deeper things.

I think something you fail to realize is that my religion is well over a thousand years older than the English language. I am simply relaying to you what the church teaches. 

You are trying to so hard to refute my religion and you don't even understand it. I think that is far more foolish than what you falsely accuse me of doing.

As I believe I said earlier, you are being haughty. 

And that is how you are an atheist. In your foolish pride, you lean on your own understanding. And being full of pride as you are, you will likely simply point back at me and go "No you are!" Instead of considering the possibility that you might be wrong about something.

As I said before, my religion is Truth worship, and so when you deny my God, you are denying The Truth, and even though you aren't doing it with knowledge, it reflects in the way you are interacting with me. If you cared about truth, you would try to get on the same page as me rather than rush into rebuttal mode.

Believe it or not, theocracy( or maybe more accurately, clericocracy) is not only not a very Christian thing, but we Orthodox may even have a technical name for that heresy in Caesaropapism.

Islam on the other hand has this sort of thing built into it. It is a kingdom of this world.

Nihilism is self defeating, and nihilists are dupes.

As God is The Ultimate Reality, atheism is nihilism.

Once you see it, you can't unsee it!

That is why they even think "ultimate reality" is a meaningless term.

Very relevant quote from John Chrysostom...

"The decision to receive treatment does not lie with the man who administers the medicine, but actually with the patient. That wonderful man, Paul, knew when this fact when he said to the Corinthians, "Not that we have lordship over your faith, but are helpers to your joy." For Christians above all men are forbidden to correct the stumblings of sinners by force. When secular judges convict wrong-doers under the law, they show their authority is complete and compel men, whether they will or no, to submit to their methods. But in the case we are considering it is necessary to make a man better not by force but by persuasion. We neither have authority granted to us by law to restrain sinners, nor, if it were, should we know how to use it, since God gives the crown to those who are kept from evil, not by force, but by choice.

For this reason a lot of tact is needed, so that the sick may be persuaded of their own accord to submit to the treatment of the priests, and not only that, but be grateful to them for their cure. If a man struggles when he is bound(for he may still choose to), he makes his suffering worse. And if he ignores the words which cut like steel, he adds a second wound through his contempt, and intention to heal becomes the occasion of a more serious disease. For the man does not exist who can by compulsion cure someone else against their will."

And this should make clear a few things.

1. We recognize that spiritual illness is at the root of these issues, including sexual immorality.

2. We have a therepeutic method for curing these spiritual illnesses.

3. It is not on the healer but the sick to not only to consent to treatment, but follow through with it. 

4. We do not heal through compulsion, it has to be in the will of the one being healed.

5. The church is not intended to be a secular authority.

There is no mandatory rule that Christians cannot serve the immoral. In fact, it is integral to the faith to recognize that we all sin. We are called to serve all of mankind. This, however, has no value unless it is done without coercion and by one's free will.

However, for the state to force us into defiling our sanctuaries with a homosexual "marriage" is a violation of our right to have a place set apart and holy from such abominations. We would sooner give up our government licenses to marry than compromise on this issue.

Sexual immorality is clearly destructive to the individuals involved and society at large. Tolerating its existence is not the same thing as pretending there is nothing wrong with it or even worse, condoning it.

We do have a deeper insight to sexual immorality, and recognize it as a symptom of idolatry. To us, it is a shameful thing to be motivated by  our lusts and passions, which not only obscure truth, but compromise one's ability to love with purity.

For those like you who likely do not believe in idolatry or at least do not believe in it as we do, the psychological effects on society, the effect it has on the stability of the family, the exploitation of people, including women and children, and the spresd of disease should be obvious indicators to anyone who isn't perverse themselves that sexual immorality is in every way destructive and in no way should be encouraged.

The type of mystery you speak of has a conclusion. It is not really the same thing. You live thanlsgiving, you don't simply "get it" so to speak.

You don't figure out marriage. Lol

Merriam Webster defines mystery as

"a religious truth that one can know only by revelation and cannot fully understand"

Now to relate that to Orthodoxy, a mystery is not figured out, it is experienced. The knowledge that is revealed is not simply "gnosis" or knowledge but "epignosis". True knowledge that comes from experience.

The simple example is that thanksgiving is not something to figure out, it is something to live. To experience. To simply intellectualize it is only a shadow of the real thing.

Your "rebuttals" are proof to me that you are simply being argumentative and have no intention of understanding what you falsely believe you understand already.

You don't know my religion.

It's really that simple.

It seems very clear that this bill is aimed at protecting religious organizations, and marriage is very much something we consider sacred, at least in Orthodox Christianity. In fact, marriage is considered a sacred mystery.

And yes, it would be an abomination to perform a homosexual "marriage" in the sanctuary of an Orthodox.

I certainly see it as a right of a business owner to be able to refuse service to anyone, and deal with the consequences of those decisions.

The most honest way of me addressing your critics is that I think it is awfully arrogant of you, an outsider, correcting me, an insider, after I told you it is a mystery religion.

You are the freshman trying to teach the professor. A tourist to my country trying to explain my culture to me.

No, you are very much in the dark, and the same pride that has afflicted you with the know-it-allism to contradict my explanations is the same pride that has you reducing us to the same level.

If you want to learn, I am here to teach. If you want to ask questions, don't be haughty about it. 

A mystery in the context of Orthodox Christianity is something to be experienced, not a question to be answered.

In other words, you think you know better, even though you are in the dark.

You literally clipped the first half of that sentence which was "as you mentioned".

I'm not interested in argument for arguments sake. Especially when my entire post was practically confirming what you said.

Definition of "proof" courtesy merriam-webster...

"the cogency of evidence that compels acceptance by the mind of a truth or a fact"

You can present irrefutable evidence to a fool, and all they have to do is stubbornly refuse to admit they are wrong. They can keep going "Ha ha, I see no proof!" And not be lying.

One of the defintions of "god" is "a powerful ruler"

Vladimir Putin is a god? Donald Trump? Pope Francis?

Atheism, nihilism, anarchism...

Somehow all very much related in their thinking! Denial of reality ties them all together.

In many icons you see of Saint John The forerunner(aka John the baptist), you will see him depicted with angel's wings.

As you have mentioned, it is because the word for angel means messenger.

That said, a message does not have to be delivered by a flesh and blood human being. There are many forms a messenger can take (a little bird told me, eh?). 

Bodiless powers are a thing though. You could say here in the contemporary world, technology has made them more visible than ever! 

It means that our religion is expressed in mysteries(not like a thing to be solved, but something to experienced). Also, it is something that looks different to outsiders than what the hidden meaning of it actually is.

To give an example of a mystery, we have the institution of the eucharist. People in the west call it communion or the lord's supper, but the meaning is actually more obvious in Greek... thanksgiving! Thanksgiving is not something to be solved or intellectualized, but s ok mething to be lived out.

Orthodox Christianity is apodictic(self evident) truth expressed in mysteries, allegories, and parables. To demonstrate why it is done that way, I have very consistently since I joined this forum explained that Christianity is literally Truth worship, and we do this through the purifying of the nous, which usually gets translsted as intellect, understanding, mind, or even heart, but has more to do with what influences us and compromises our ability to live in truth.

So there is a lot more to it than people realize, especially those who have primarilty been exposed to unenlightened western forms of "Christianity".

We Orthodox do not have a divine command theory.

What we do know is that God is Good, and to love God is to love goodness. As human beings are made as bearers of God's image, to love them is also like loving God.

God is Good.

I am not here to hijack the topic, my only intent was to point out to Stephen that Christianity is a mystery religion, so him noticing thst something bbn is being hidden is actually a good observation.

The fact that Christianity is a mystery religion happens to be lost in the protestant/evangelical world.

Believe me though, my words would fall on deaf ears whether or not I was posting in this topic or any other topic in this nihilist circle jerk of a "religion" forum. 

I'd like to point out that I am the only Christian here who actually participates on this forum. Even so, there are already those talking about running me off. Really, if I were any of you, I would take full advantage of the fact that I am here, especially since I am an Orthodox Christian, and you won't find too many of them who speak English on a forum like this.

Of course, in another topic.

Unless of course you would like me to pointnout how every reason to be an atheist is a bad reason. After all, the real answer to the question "How I became an atheist" is "I don't know any better"

I disagree whole heartedly, as the subject of God and even the existence of God is even moreso a philosophical question than a religious one. Historically speaking, God has been the subject of much philosophy. 

That said, in many cultures and languages the distinction between religion and philosophy is practically if not outright nonexistent.

As God(with a capital G) is another way saying "The supreme and ultimate reality", to deny God is to embrace nihilism which is self defeating and irrational.

You have to approach the faith with humility and charity, otherwise you will be locked out. It is done this way for a reason, and it has to be this way. You are right to discern something is hidden, but you are wrong about what it is that is being hidden.

If you want to talk about it somewhere else, you know how to reach me.

While in any other case you would be right to say, this is special case.

Who is doing the commands in this case? Goodness itself. Goodness is what commands. 

So in this case, it is in fact doing good for the sake of good.

That is why we Orthodox don't take faith as something to be simply believed in the mind or accepted. Faith is lived. We don't simply believe in The Truth, we strive to live Truth.

And that is what the faith is really about. Abiding in The Way. This is a walk, not an intellectualization.

The one making the commmands is Goodness itself. That is why it is good for goodness sake.

We Orthodox are very weird about defining God. If one contemplates what "The Supreme and Ultimate Reality" means, and considers what it is in fact pointing to, putting it into a box can only serve to cheapen it from what it truly Is.

It is not possible that God be circumvented by defining or anything else in creation for that matter. 

What we can say is that we know it exists, and that a lover of Truth abides in it, and lives it through the purifying of the nous.

Not suprising, as you can't even admit that there is an ultimate reality. 

It should be apparent that you are dependent on many things, the source of which is the underlying originator and sustainer of all creation.

As God is The Ultimate Reality, atheism is a denial of absolute truth. It is nihilism. 

That being said, not only does nihilism destroy everything, it also destroys itself.

The hard skepticism inherent in nihilistic ways of thinking is a very easy way of avoiding having to think real hard about anything.

Christianity is in fact a mystery religion, and that being the case, hiding and revealing is a very real aspect of it.

As The Orthodox Church is the true One, Holy, Catholic, and Apostolic Church, we understand this better than anybody. 

But I think it is worth noting that the reason the faith takes this form is not likely for the reasons you may suspect. One big reason is because spoken plainly these things aren't really understood anyway. Part of what I have been doing here is belaboring that point.  

To give you an idea, I say "The Truth is God", and people here either think I am saying something other than what I am really saying, or they ask for a sign or miracle(proof). The irony here is that this response is predicted in scripture, but anyway... you have to have a mustard seed of faith for this mountain of disbelief to be cast into the sea! "I believe, but help my unbelief."

To declare independence from The Truth is to embrace delusion.

Abide in The Truth, and you will find real charity.

To think that you have any existence apart from God is delusion.

It amazes me how the two of you put so little effort into understanding what I say, and then accuse me of not clarifying.

I feel no conviction at all. I can see plainly what I have to work with.

Though I can see neither of you are genuinely interested in understanding Christian theology, what is meant by "position of children" does not imply immaturity, but a relationship of a child to their father. We who are of Christ are sons and daughters of God.

Rather, this is a mature relationship with God. An immature relationship with God would be thst of a slave or mercenary.

While the atheist sees no need for God, it isn't because they are good. Without God, the atheist has no real knowledge of what good is. After all, God is the highest good, because God is The Truth. The atheist, who by nature is in denial of Truth, inevitably has an arbitrary conception of what good is. To the atheist, good is simply whatever lines up with their aesthetic preferences. 

In fact, the atheist would nearly always fall into the category of slave or mercenary because their measure for good tends to be utilitarian.

I'm just reporting what I see. Obviously, lacking the perspective of an outsider looking in, you would not see what I am seeing. Though an entire book can be wrote on the subject, I did a pretty bare outline of how these values are things inherited from the Roman mentality and the Latin church that western civilization descends from. If you want to argue fine, but I think intelligent debate comes from getting on the same page through inquisitiveness rather than imply contradicting whatever the other person says.

You atheists are not very bright. The only argument  you have is to redefine God into meaning something we don't mean.

All the while denying that you are guilty of making a straw man argument.

Refusing to be corrected, also guilty of invincible ignorance.

Western values seem to be...

Individualism rather than personhood. While personhood has much to do with someone and how they relate to others, individualism takes the self distinct from others as being the focus. Personhood implies relationship. A husband implies a wife. A mother implies a child. An individual is by themselves.

A lawyer like engineer type view of things rather than an experiential view of things. You know a tree by chopping it down, counting its rings, examining its bark, etc. Contrast this with knowing a tree by planting it, taking care of it, watching it grow, living in round it, passing it to your children.

Truth is looked at as something that is seen through proper education and logical reasoning. Believing the right things. Compare this with the idea that Truth is seen through purifying the intellect of influences and intentions that pervert it.

The west is mostly influenced by the Latin speaking church that eventually broke away from Orthodox Christianity and became Roman Catholicism. Scholasticism developed in the west, and when the protestant reformation caused many in the west to ditch the corrupt Roman church, it kept many of these western values that hhad a great to do with corrupting the latin church. No longer having the latin church limiting it, the protestant world became increasingly secular until the logical conclusion of its pride and over reliance on reason led to the outright denail of God, an embrace of nihilism and its less obvious forms. Having abandoned absolute truth, and embracing relativism, the individualism of the west gave birth to materialism and anarchy. The legalistic and engineering aspect gave rise to state enforced anarchy(Communism!), fascism, and consumerism. Truth being relativistic and individualistic and based on ones own reasoning became whatever one can get away with.

Western Christianity, being over a thousand years seperated from Orthodoxy has devolved into an anarchistic and unenlightened mess. Having failed to deliever what only true Orthodox Christianity can, the west has ditched God, whored after false gods even under the pretense of atheism, and has become thoroughly pagan.

 

We are fastly approaching a time, and indeed may already be there in some places in the west, where someone who maintains their sanity in this mad world will be seen as crazy for not joining everyone else in their insanity.