Oh my, it's finally happened. I have been spending a lot of time with my neighbors lately. They are wonderful people, both Christian and it appears one deeply believing in end times prophesy, considering all the pamphlets I see scattered about the house.

I think she said she was Baptist and was recently saved, what ever that means.

Anyway the husband showed me a pamphlet about some scary stuff that is about to happen and that will happen. I remember thinking, oh ****, I knew this time would come, now what do I say... I mumbled that that stuff scared me, I immediately thought to myself 'Well that was a lame a$$ thing to say'...

He told me to take the pamphlet home and it would tell me who I am? HUH.. anyway he dropped it, I guess sensing that I wasn't into discussing it.

I absolutely do not believe in any of that, and don't want my mind cluttered with violence and stuff I don't believe... so what do you say, especially when you love the people wanting you to read that stuff?

I spoke to the wife this morning and told her what happened, she told me she doesn't believe that stuff either but her husband does. I told her well I will figure out what to say next time that won't be as stupid as what I did say...

I didn't get a chance to ask her what Baptists believe and frankly I wasn't feeling up to knowing what either...

Most of my friends through out my life have been Christians, but they never preached to me, which I am grateful for. But I knew there would come a day and it has arrived.

If you don't believe, what would you say?

if you don't believe you tell them that

Just tell him that you're not concerned about the end of the world.

Tell him that you're totally at peace with your creator and you're cool with whatever she might have planned.

If the end of the world is imminent, you’re ready.

Ask him to pull out the lawn chairs and crack open a keg and you'll sit with him to watch the end of the world unfold.

If he's frightened, offer to hold his hand through the whole process. If he feels that he isn’t yet ready to meet his creator then just offer that She’s not as bad as he imagines and assure him that it’ll be alright.

That’s about all I know to do with these paranoid people. Or you could give him the number of a good therapist if these symptoms persist.

Just tell him to quit worrying and have a little FAITH.

Introduce him to other spiritual practices away from this dogmatic belief system that ruins lives.

Those belief systems would include those that don't speak of the end of time, make you feel guilty, or a sinner, instilling fear, or have you turning a 360 making you a person scared to even take a crap in your own toilette.

Tell him that life is a gift full of happiness and that there are many great spiritual practices or philosophies even that can show how.

If anything one doesn't even have to become religious. One can just become more involved in fun activities. I can think of a thousand of them that will calm the soul and keep your mind positive and strong.

When I was younger I tried to "save" unbeleivers, but I've realized that it wasn't my place to do so. I still have friends that do not beleive in what I believe, but I don't judge them and I don't try to change them, if they are interested in what I beleive they can always ask me about it, and I will be more than happy to share with them, but if they don't ask, I resepect that now.

I don't think it's our job to put our believes on anybody else. I do think that we should share only if asked to do so, otherwise we should respect each others difference and not judge each other, but have love and respect for one another.

What's strange is that he doesn't seem paranoid, just matter of fact about it. She on the other hands is quite fun to be around, as she doesn't seem to take life seriously, which is fine by me, though don't know why she felt the need to be saved and don't really care, that's her choice.

He was brought up with that hell fire stuff, and don't know if he could let that go, and again as long as he doesn't bring it up with me it's fine if he chooses to believe it, I just can't. I love them the way they are. But I think he's of an age where he might not be able to change his views, so I won't got there unless he does.

I don't know that even a therapist can help some people that just plain believe this end of times stuff. I think only humans can make up such a horrid thing.

Then how do you explain these people that come door to door trying to save them.

It's pretty creepy to me is that anyone would try to save anyone, what's to be saved from? That's like saying hey buddy, I believe people are going to hell, and your one of them, but heck I'll be your friend right up to the day they drop you off in hell.

Too wierd for me, My friends are my friends for life, no matter what they believe, if they go to hell, then I'm going with them, not with some god I can't see or hear...

I appreciate that you don't feel the need to put your beliefs on others though, makes life a bit less stressful.

The End Of The World stuff is a scam used by con men to make money

Well the thing with religious people that seems so strange to me is that if they believe in these prophecies and they believe this is "God's Plan", then why don't they just accept that?

I mean, why dwell on these things if this is God's Plan then so be it. Just accept it.

The whole doomsday scenario has always been a ploy of religion to try to convince people that they must convert before it's 'too late'.

Even the gospels have Jesus doing this very same thing. According to the Gospels Jesus told the people that everything he was predicting would come to pass before their generation had passed!


Matt.24
[34] Verily I say unto you, This generation shall not pass, till all these things be fulfilled.


Mark.13
[30] Verily I say unto you, that this generation shall not pass, till all these things be done.


Luke.21
[31] So likewise ye, when ye see these things come to pass, know ye that the kingdom of God is nigh at hand.
[32] Verily I say unto you, This generation shall not pass away, till all be fulfilled.

According to the gospels Jesus was indeed a doomsday preacher preaching that heaven is at hand and that people need to wise up real quick because there isn't much time to wise up!

I personally don't believe that Jesus ever taught these particular things. I personally believe that this was demagoguery that was added to the rumors of Jesus to make it appear that he was preaching a doomsday warning. It was the standard tactic in those days that the religious authoritarians always used.

In fact, that's the whole reason they made up the idea of eternal damnation with no chance of parole. If you don't shape up in this life you won't be given a second chance!

Without this threat they have no leverage.

In fact, this very tactic is clearly a manmade tactic and not the tactic that any genuine divine being would use.

In fact, most of the things that the Bible has God doing are not the kinds of things that any all-powerful and all-wise deity would need to stoop to.

Like asking people to stone sinners to death or murder heathens. No God would need to ask men to do that. The only reason the authors of the Bible asked people to do these things is because they knew they wouldn't be there to to it themselves and that was the whole POINT of writing the godforsaken dogma in the first place!

It was just a way for the authoritarians to control the masses and get them to do their bidding.

No divine being would have ever stooped so low as to ask mere mortals to do his judging and killing for him.

Only mortal men would be desperate and powerless enough to have written a book that requests such things from its readers.

It's truly unbelievable how many people have bought into that book as being the 'word of God' and continue to support this insanity to this very day.

Especially in light of the fact that we now know that the book cannot possible be true as written.

Its a scam that has been used by con men for centuries to make money

The people that go door to door are creepy, we used to close the curtains and not ansswer the door when they came. Those people are way off on what Christianity is.

True Christianity is not about judging others and condeming them and trying to get them to believe what you believe.

Its all made up. Thats why you have to flip back and forth thru the bible and read scriptures out of order to be able to come up with the end of the world story they are telling.And some of it isn't even in the bible but just made up.This scam has been going on for so long that its become ingrained into christian theology. Except for people that read the bible for themselves and can actually understand it.

Here is an example of how the "End Times Theology" scam works



1. Turn to Ezekiel 38 & 39. Don't read the first 37 chapters of Ezekiel, they don't matter. And don't read Ezekiel chapters 40 to 48 -- they don't matter either. You're supposed to start reading Ezekiel at Chapter 38. That's obviously why it's Chapter 38.

2. Turn from Ezekiel 39 to 1 Thessalonians 4:16, being very careful not to read verses 13 and 14 of this chapter. (Those verses introduce the section that follows as being about death, hope and grieving and you're going to have to try, instead, to read this section as though it is about the disappearance of all of the earth's children, which it doesn't actually mention.) Anyway, read on through the 11th verse of the following chapter and then jump to the obvious next passage in the plainest, most literal and logical reading of the Bible ...

3. Revelation Chapter 11. Don't read the first 10 chapters of Revelation -- not yet. First finish Chapter 11, then turn to ...

4. Revelation 6:1-2. Don't read the third verse yet, because first you need to turn to ...


5. The ninth chapter of Daniel. Skip the first 19 verses and start with Daniel 9:20.

Even if you read the bible from page 1 to the last page you come up with the same conclusion.

It is a book with no morales written by men who wanted to control the masses.

I wouldn't suggest anyone to use the book to raise their children with or even teach others on how to live a life.

A book full of bigotry and contradictions.

Jesus is truly misunderstood for his efforts and was used as a sacrifice to revitalize the old testament.

What is the testament?

It is writings about how a God wants it all and to judge those even kill them if they don't follow.

No thankyou!

I can think of much better spiritual belief systems that offer true solutions to coexisting in peace.

So boo2u if you find him your friend then show him a different perspective to contemplate on. Who knows you might be doing him a favor?

We are talking about the "End Of The World" theology. Remember the summary of the Left Behind book series I gave in the other thread? The one about all the christians getting beamed up ,a supervillain taking over the world,and then Jesus landing in a giant spaceshipcity on top of Jerusalem and killing all the non believers. The way I showed in my post above is how the con men come up with that scenario.

Personally I think Jesus was just a man who thought he had another way to live life and tried to teach it simply, though I don't think anyone can prove he was anymore than just a man that saw things differently, wether it all went to his head after a while or not, I still think no one every wrote the real story about this man if he even existed.

If he did, I don't think he preformed miracles at all but if you want to gather people around that's one way to get their attention with a few magic tricks, which preachers have been using ever since.

A part of me would like to believe there is a god, but it's probably just the part of me that was indoctrinated as a child. Either way I can do with out it just fine.

Well you have a honest approach on the situation. To bad many cannot do this.

I think you are right concerning who Jesus was. He was a ordinary man that offered a better solution on how to coexist in peace as opposed to the old testament. Many liked his idealogy and praised him for it. However, he was a threat to the powers that wanted him gone.

In which they did just do this.

Too bad, for I would have loved to have heard about his further adventures until a ripe age.

Perhaps then (Christianity or a different name it could of have) would have had a different take that provided less atrocities and a more peaceful movement that many could embrace.

Unfortunately it didn't and many still follow this belief system claiming they don't judge people, use bigotry, and their contradictions to a point of confusion (on purpose) to ensure many followers to keep their faith system alive.

So ask your friend to take off his blindfold and see the world as it is. It is beautiful with many cultures that offer beautiful spiritual practices that provide positive energy as a whole without being confusing, judgemental, or feeling guilty or as a sinner.

That is what friends do.

If you want to believe in a creator then just believe.

You don't need to succumb to any dogma to do that.

Christianity isn't about appeasing God, it's about appeasing the Christains.

You don't need to believe in any religion to believe in a spiritual creator.

No myths need be true.

All you need to do is have faith that if such a creator exist he/she/it is probably are more intelligent and loving than any of these yo-yo's on Earth who claim to speak for God.

In a very real sense the hateful dogmas of the Mediterranean mythologies are actually turning people off to the idea of spirituality altogether.

That's a shame.

It's like saying, "Either God is lusting to cast people into hell and has people nailed to poles to appease himself OR there is NO GOD AT ALL!"

What a horrible CHOICE!

Actually given that choice atheism looks heavenly!

Religion is actually turning modern man against the very idea of spirituality altogether because these hateful judgemental bigoted dogmas of the Mediterranean mythologies have made God out to be dispicable.

Too bad Wanka Tanka didn't survive to become the world's favorite God.

We'd be far better off!

I find this a bit humorous if only because historically speaking you would have been beheaded if you stated this opinion during the crusades.

It also seems to be saying that all modern evangelists are not true Christians because they most certainly are engaged very methodically in the business of trying to get other people to believe what they believe.

But the bottom line is that if every individual defines their own personal views to be "True Christianity" then what does the term even mean?

I could claim that my views are "True Christianity".

I read the book. I recognize Jesus as a mortal man who came along to denounce an ancient violent religion and was crucified for his efforts. Then even more books were written that attempted to nail Jesus to the Old Testament, (the very dogma that Jesus himself denounced).

So that's what I get out of these texts. So to me "True Christiantiy" is to recognize the fact that some mortal man actually tried to save us from a horrible false dogma.

To me, that should be "True Christianity".

Accept Jesus as a man, and denounce the God of Abraham. Then follow the moral values of Jesus, which are the same as those of Buddha.

In an odd sort of way his actions show he cares about you I think. I might be wrong but...

At any rate, I have friends from many different religious backgrounds. I to have found myself in similar situations once or twice in my career as a human being.

My standard reply is to tell the proselytizer that I respect their beliefs and hope they would do the same for me. With reasonable intelligent people that usually ends it.

I did have to tell a co-worker who would let it go that I was going to enjoy the weekend sacrifice of a chicken that would be followed by naked dancing and sex in the woods around a bonfire. She paled and never ever brought up saving my soul again.