Below is the long awaited final statement from Leo Pardus of de-conversion. When began this debate asking what the practical implication of believing in God are for society. Now we ask why believe or why not believe. Here is Leo’s response:
Why do you believe that your position (atheism/theism) best reflects reality?
Because it seems to make the most sense in the face of the evidence I have access to. I’ll reference some of my thoughts and evidence in a moment but first I want to say that I did not come to my position lightly or even very willingly. Leaving the faith I fervently believed for 25 years wasn’t easy and it didn’t happen quickly or without a fight. But it had to happen when continued “faith” would have required deliberate cognitive dissonance on my part. (And for your readers, that does NOT mean that belief on their part requires deliberate cognitive dissonance.)
Now to the reasons I could no longer hold to the faith I would like to provide some links to articles I put on the de-converion.com blog site. This is in lieu of retyping them here or trying to shorten them too much.
Reasons why I can no longer believe: 3 – Unchanged lives
http://de-conversion.com/2007/11/11/reasons-why-i-can-no-longer-believe-3-unchanged-lives/
Reasons why I can no longer believe: 2 – God as a ‘no show’
http://de-conversion.com/2007/11/08/reasons-why-i-can-no-longer-believe-2-god-as-a-no-show/
Reasons why I can no longer believe: 1 – God is “we know not what”
http://de-conversion.com/2007/11/05/reasons-why-i-can-no-longer-believe-1-god-is-we-know-not-what/
Would you hold to it even if you couldn’t find any pragmatic reasons to do so?
Certainly not. A maxim I’ve long held is, “I don’t care what the truth turns out to be. I just want to find out what the truth is and get on the right side of it.” If a belief/position doesn’t have support, make sense, stand up to scrutiny, and so on, it belongs on the rubbish pile.
Filed under: Blogs, Philosophy, Politics, Religion | Tagged: de-conversion, God in Society, Leo Pardus
[...] Final Statement 2: Why I am an Atheist – LeoPardus [...]
God has always had a people for his name.His name is Jehovah(YHWH)
Dear Sir:
In those articles, most notably the first, the claim is that once one has placed faith in Christ, then that person should not sin. That that person needs to live a perfect life if Christ truly exists. It also exemplifies the fact that many so- called Christians are many times worse than non-believers. Even as a firm believer in the Redemption I can hardly agree more with the latter point. However, just because a person has placed faith in the fact that Jesus suffered and died to save our sorry butts, does not magically change that person’s sin nature. Placing faith in Christ simply means that you believe that He died and rose to save you. It does not automatically make you into a perfect human. If it did, then there would be no point to His dying in the first place.
If you can recall from your many years of belief, in the OT people had to sacrifice animals continually to pay for their sins as they committed them. Jesus changed that. He died once and for all, so that as you continue to sin, you have no need to sacrifice. He made the ultimate sacrifice. He made it because He knew that we as humans are always going to sin. It’s our nature to do so. So he died once and for all for all our sins. However, this does not mean that we should go out and commit every sin in the book, only to go back the next day and ask for forgiveness, because we know that we’re going to be forgiven. We as Christians need to step up and start behaving what we preach. The modern-day Christian has become lax, I believe and far too comfortable, and absorbed with the world and all it has to offer to even bother with behaving like he believes in anything, even though he might.
I am very sorry you have abandoned your faith. Jesus loves you and died for you and will always be there should you return to Him.
-Kate
If God is perfect it only stands to reason that when he supposedly created man, man was made perfect, as in the Image of God. Foe some reason This so called God decided he had to test his creation ( Man ) with the choice of good and evil- If God created good then he must have created evil- His perfectly created man could never choose evil over good because choosing evil would indicate a flaw in Gods creation. But alas I don’t think you superstious fanatics will be able to grasp this concept because you might have to think beyond your noses. peace my brothers.
@ Gene
before you preach your concept my friend, take one thing into consideration. God gave man, and also every being in heaven, choose to believe in heaven or not, He gave them all free will. Nothing is shoved down your throats, you have the right to choose. (Now not all christians live up to this you know, no one is perfect, and the Bible says that again and again.) The exact same with salvation, you are free to choose the Salvation and saving grace of Jesus, or continue on the road to eternal hell. Your choice.
You can look at things in history, and many centuries later come up with your own concept and truth, or stick to The actual Truth.
Man failed, there were beings/angels in heaven that failed as well. (in Biblical language, ‘came short of the glory of God.’) And all as a result of choice. Once you make a choice, stick with it and stand firm, cos the Bible also says that God despises those who live in the middle. For a finite man to explain a finite God is completely impossible. Its still impossible for finite man to fully explain the earth (that’s also cos they decide to use their own concept, instead of following God’s concept, Creation.) If you choose to think you’re smarter than God, that’s your choice, and I hope you don’t stick with it. That was satan’s mistake in the first place. Peace and love, Gene…!
BenjiJK§