OFFICIAL THANK YOU THREAD

[SoggyFox]

I read the entire bible by the time I was 10 and made the decision that there is no Hell, at least not as a place, only a state of mind.  This 'heresy' was helped by one of the Sisters who taught me at my catholic school - she said that Heaven and Hell were both banquest, lavish things, but you had 3 foot long utensils and couldn't use your fingers - in heaven, everyone just fed their neighbors, in hell, they starved because the idea of sharing never occurred to them.

So yeah, I made a bad Christian in the dogma sense

[Darqstar]

Okay, here's my problem with the nun's analogy.  According to the Christian faith, if you do not believe Jesus Christ died for your sins, you are going to hell.  (This is one of my huge picky points with organized religion.)  This means that it doesn't matter how nice you are, if you don't believe that, you're roasting.  It also means that Jeffrey Dalhmer is in Heaven and that irritates the snot out of me. 

That analogy of the banquet doesn't work for someone who follows the beliefs of organized Christianity, because some pretty nice people have died not believing in Jesus Christ,  People who certainly would feed their neighbors.  And some total assholes have died and gone to heaven that wouldn't dream of feeding their neighbors (Well Dalhmer might, but he would have fed the neighbor to his left, the neighbor to his right.) 

I would understand that analogy coming from someone who wasn't wrapped tight in the whole belief system, but I really always thought that in order to be a nun, you pretty much had to buy the whole apostles creed, verbatium. 

[SoggyFox]

Yes, but Catholism is a bit different in some regards, as are all the different sects of protestantism.

It also even varies from priest to priest - I grew up with the 'Your conscience is the final authority', but would get into horrible arguments with another catholic friend in college over that.  Also, according to Catholics, Dalhmer is -not- in heaven.  They don't have the once your baptized its all good.  That's why there is confession, after all.

Personally, i think its presumptuous for any human to assume they know God's will, whether you think she's one or many, or both; and no matter what you call him.  That's like assuming you know what I'm thinking, except several orders of magnitude higher.  That's what drives me crazy about church dogma.  We can go 'Hey, that person really lead a good life' but we might not know he was a rapist, or a very clever mass murderer.

And no, not saying anyone here is presuming to know the full mind of the divine

[Paden]

If I'm gonna confess my sins and transgressions to the Good, I don't need a middle man to hear it all and be an asshole about it. I take it to the final authority and that be it. Said and done, over and out. Whichever that authority may be.

[Alexia]

I was raised a Catholic in a mainly Orthodox country and that's no fun at all. Besides being picked on during Religious Studies (which are still mandatory here up to the end of high school thank you very much), everyone else let me do as I pleased. I have to stand by what Soggy said. Our priest was a very nice person and was always willing to listen. Confession was rather painless as he wouldn't be overtly critical and would just hand out Penance.

Nowadays... I honestly can't say that a single religion which would completely captivate me exists. I still believe in a higher authority (The science behind the whole Universe is too aesthetically pleasing to be completely random), but would that authority constantly worry about what I'm up to and keep a huge ledger just to track my life? Don't think so.

If I were forced to choose, I would worship Annoia, the goddess of clutter and things stuck in the kitchen drawer.  (being a Pratchetterian and all)

[SoggyFox]

I just can't believe in hell as a place, because God is supposed to be a parent - and a good one, not a bad one - those forgive you for mistakes and don't send you to your room with -nothing- to do for an eternity.

[Paden]

Well, you've heard the saying, "I brought you into this world and I can take you out!" Some people envision it like a, "I brought you into this cosmos and I can wipe you out!" meaning that your total existence will be terminated permanently once the Judgement day is done. Which, I guess, is the total hell, knowing that you're risking eternal deletion from the scheme of things? But first you get to bubble and boil a bit, maybe. I don't presume to think that I know.

[Pescado]

I argue that God is a simmer. The historical record has him claiming creation of humanity, yet there is this mysterious source of unexplained others for them to breed with (townies). Eventually, he gets bored and smites people for lulz, and finally loses interest and leaves the game running on its own. When God finally notices that the game has been left running, he will either take a renewed interest in things, or kill the process. To prevent this, we must escape the computer and kill him first.

And now you know what the Sims will do if you leave them running long enough.

[DaSpecialOne]

I just can't believe in hell as a place, because God is supposed to be a parent - and a good one, not a bad one - those forgive you for mistakes and don't send you to your room with -nothing- to do for an eternity.

Well, you've heard the saying, "I brought you into this world and I can take you out!" Some people envision it like a, "I brought you into this cosmos and I can wipe you out!" meaning that your total existence will be terminated permanently once the Judgement day is done. Which, I guess, is the total hell, knowing that you're risking eternal deletion from the scheme of things? But first you get to bubble and boil a bit, maybe. I don't presume to think that I know.

Wow that makes God sound like he made us as lil sims [oy in his image?] and we're all just ideas in his heads thinking we live our own lives ...scary, lol.  Of course that would totally make sense as to why some folks suffer and live and die in turmoil and poverty and others are rolling in dough.  But not very parent like. Which means the creators of the sims would be the archeaologists that uncovered the ancient texts and the modders/creators the ones who made it all make sense.   So it's original Sim instead of original sin...my what a difference one letter makes in a translation.  I  guess I do have a religion then . 

oh my ..does that make Pescado the antichrist? hehehe


Edir:ok before anyone asks I was posting this at the same time as pescado and didnt bother to read the red warning...great minds eh? what a coinkydink

[Pescado]

Well, in the theology of sims, that makes someone like Will Wright or maybe Rod Humble, or whoever it is that is REALLY responsible for TS2 into God. I, on the other hand, am clearly the Devil. I make your pathetic mortal existence more tolerable, and all I ask for in exchange is YOUR SOUL.

[DaSpecialOne]

Waxing a bit philopsophical I actually something meant more along the lines of man being God's Sims.  Of course then that means the TS2 owners/creators (whoever takes credit for making it) unknowingly found inner truth about the origin of the world without realizing it and turned it ito a game for profit instead of spreading the word...sounds like something they'd do. 

But you're right either way you become the devil in that equation and we all love ya for it.

[Paden]

He lies, he also wants yer cheezy poofs!!!

[Pescado]

Well, yes, and your cheezy poofs. But everyone wants those, and they're not required to be included. Unlike your soul. But your cheezy poofs would be appreciated, too.

[Immortelle]

What you'd rather some cheesy poof over a rum cookie, Pes?  No comment 

[Pescado]

That analogy of the banquet doesn't work for someone who follows the beliefs of organized Christianity, because some pretty nice people have died not believing in Jesus Christ,  People who certainly would feed their neighbors.  And some total assholes have died and gone to heaven that wouldn't dream of feeding their neighbors (Well Dalhmer might, but he would have fed the neighbor to his left, the neighbor to his right.)

Well, there's also the fact that Heaven itself is pretty unpleasant compared to Hell:

The temperature of Heaven can be rather accurately computed from available data. Our authority is Isaiah 30:26, "Moreover, the light of the Moon shall be as the light of the Sun and the light of the Sun shall be sevenfold, as the light of seven days." Thus Heaven receives from the Moon as much radiation as we do from the Sun, and in addition seven times seven (49) times as much as the Earth does from the Sun, or fifty times in all. The light we receive from the Moon is one ten-thousandth of the light we receive from the Sun, so we can ignore that. With these data we can compute the temperature of Heaven. The radiation falling on Heaven will heat it to the point where the heat lost by radiation is just equal to the heat received by radiation, i.e., Heaven loses fifty times as much heat as the Earth by radiation. Using
the Stefan-Boltzmann law for radiation, (H/E)^4 = 50, where E is the absolute temperature of the earth (-300K), gives H as 798K (525C). The exact
temperature of Hell cannot be computed, but it must be less than 444.6C, the temperature at which brimstone or sulphur changes from a liquid to a gas. Revelations 21:8 says "But the fearful, and unbelieving ... shall have their part in the lake which burneth with fire and brimstone." A lake of molten
brimstone means that its temperature must be at or below the boiling point, or 444.6C (Above this point it would be a vapor, not a lake.) We have,
then, that Heaven, at 525C is hotter than Hell at 445C.

Also, worth noting is that Hell surely has air-conditioning, as engineers, like myself, go to Hell.