Shopping for a religion

[KQ]

I know there's a bunch of atheists on this site, but that seems like the worst idea because if there is an afterlife and God, you're kinda fucked. At least if I have my ticket punched on one of the main religions, I have a chance.

on the contrary - if you are an atheist and upon death are confronted with God it can go one of two ways:

God is benevolent and forgiving he/she/it will commend you for use of the free will you were endowed you with, or
God is vile and vengeful so belief wouldn't have mattered anyway (look at Moses, after 40 years of wandering the desert, leading god's people out of bondage, he was forbidden to travel into the promise land for banging his staff twice on a rock instead of speaking to it).


Have you considered Baha'i?

[BmillsSkier]

on the contrary - if you are an atheist and upon death are confronted with God it can go one of two ways:

God is benevolent and forgiving he/she/it will commend you for use of the free will you were endowed you with, or
God is vile and vengeful so belief wouldn't have mattered anyway (look at Moses, after 40 years of wandering the desert, leading god's people out of bondage, he was forbidden to travel into the promise land for banging his staff twice on a rock instead of speaking to it).


Have you considered Baha'i?

To be fair to Moses, I think God's tone changed the day he sent his son down to slum with all of us.

Anyway, can we get back to the part about the margarita baptism? Cause I think I want in on that.

[iceman]

Well there's Congregationalism. In which each congregation decides what exactly it believes in and how to go about doing the whole worship thing. A man with the force of personality of, say, Timberridge might find that he quickly rises to a lead position in the congregation and has an outsized influence on what the group thinks. And get them to do his bidding. It's kind of a ready-made cult. And they have nice buildings all over the place in New England and a few other places. A cult with a fancy fort, yours for the taking. Worth considering.

It might be a lot of work, though. Unlike Unitarianism, which takes basically no effort at all. You just show up. Or not.

[SB]

https://media0.giphy.com/media/1BeZZ...DfuE/giphy.gif

[BmillsSkier]

Well there's Congregationalism. In which each congregation decides what exactly it believes in and how to go about doing the whole worship thing. A man with the force of personality of, say, Timberridge might find that he quickly rises to a lead position in the congregation and has an outsized influence on what the group thinks. And get them to do his bidding. It's kind of a ready-made cult. And they have nice buildings all over the place in New England and a few other places. A cult with a fancy fort, yours for the taking. Worth considering.

It might be a lot of work, though. Unlike Unitarianism, which takes basically no effort at all. You just show up. Or not.

"Sounds exhausting".

[Meadow Skipper]

Praise Jesus!

[Timberridge]

Well there's Congregationalism. In which each congregation decides what exactly it believes in and how to go about doing the whole worship thing. A man with the force of personality of, say, Timberridge might find that he quickly rises to a lead position in the congregation and has an outsized influence on what the group thinks.

I never really fancied myself a spiritual leader, but this has a certain allure.

[iceman]

Manson thought he was gonna be a rock star but he switched gears, and so can you.

[BmillsSkier]

TR, if you do a hostile takeover of a church in Londonderry and offer free margaritas I'll make a point of stopping by.

[SB]

The Church of the Holy Margarita

It is your destiny.

[exsparky]

The list of diest's is pretty impressive, its been around for 2500 years in some form.
Its like Unitarianism - light.

I self label as modern diest. My wife doesn't care to learn what that might be because she is "normal christian" but can't explain what that is either.


Ethan Allen (1738–89), early American revolutionary and guerrilla leader[1]
Anaxagoras (c. 500–428 BC), Pre-Socratic Greek philosopher.[4]
Neil Armstrong (1930–2012), American NASA astronaut, test pilot, aerospace engineer, university professor, United States Naval Aviator, and the first person to set foot upon the Moon.[5]
Napoleon Bonaparte (1769–1821), French military and political leader[8]
Thomas Alva Edison (1847–1931), American inventor and businessman.[24]
Benjamin Franklin (1706–90), American polymath; one of the Founding Fathers of the United States[26]
William Lloyd Garrison (1805–1879), American abolitionist, journalist, and social reformer. He is best known as the editor of the abolitionist newspaper The Liberator, and was one of the founders of the American Anti-Slavery Society, he promoted "immediate emancipation" of slaves in the United States.[28]
Jean-Baptiste Lamarck (1744–1829), French naturalist. He was a soldier, biologist, academic, and an early proponent of the idea that evolution occurred and proceeded in accordance with natural laws.[48]
Abraham Lincoln (1809–1865), sixteenth president of the United States of America. He never joined any church and has been described as a "Christian deist". As a young man, he was religiously skeptical and sometimes ridiculed revivalists. During his early years, Lincoln enjoyed reading the works of deists such as Thomas Paine and Voltaire. He drafted a pamphlet incorporating such ideas but did not publish it. After charges of hostility to Christianity almost cost him a congressional bid, he kept his unorthodox beliefs private. James Adams labelled Lincoln as a deist. In 1834, he reportedly wrote a manuscript essay challenging Christianity modelled on Paine's book The Age of Reason, which a friend supposedly burned to protect him from ridicule. He seemed to believe in an all-powerful God, who shaped events and, by 1865, was expressing those beliefs in major speeches.[citation needed]
Gottfried Leibniz (1646–1716), German mathematician and philosopher. He is best known for developing infinitesimal calculus independently of Isaac Newton, and his mathematical notation has been widely used ever since it was published. He has also been labeled a Christian as well.[49][50]
Gotthold Ephraim Lessing (1729–1781), German writer, philosopher, dramatist, publicist, and art critic[51]
John Locke (1632–1704), influential English philosopher in the field of empiricism[52]
Mikhail Lomonosov (1711–1765), Russian polymath, scientist and writer, who made important contributions to literature, education, and science. Among his discoveries was the atmosphere of Venus. His spheres of science were natural science, chemistry, physics, mineralogy, history, art, philology, optical devices and others. Lomonosov was also a poet and influenced the formation of the modern Russian literary language.[53]
Dmitri Mendeleev (1834–1907), Russian chemist and inventor. He is credited as being the creator of the first version of the periodic table of elements.[58]
Moses Mendelssohn (1729–1796), German philosopher influential in the Jewish Haskalah[59]
John Muir (1838–1914), Scottish-born American naturalist, author, and early advocate of preservation of wilderness in the United States.[60]
Simon Newcomb (1835–1909), Canadian-American astronomer and mathematician.[61]
Thomas Paine (1737–1809), English pamphleteer, revolutionary, radical, inventor, and intellectual, and one of the Founding Fathers of the United States[62]
Max Planck (1858–1947), German physicist, regarded as the founder of quantum theory.[67]
José Rizal (1861–1896), a Filipino patriot, philosopher, medical doctor, poet, journalist, novelist, political scientist, painter and polyglot. Considered to be one of the Philippines' most important heroes and martyrs whose writings and execution contributed to the igniting of the Philippine Revolution. He is also considered as Asia's first modern non-violent proponent of freedom.[68]
Maximilien Robespierre (1758–94), French revolutionary and lawyer[72]
Andrei Sakharov (1921–1989), Soviet nuclear physicist, dissident, and human rights activist.[73]
Friedrich Schiller (1759–1805), German poet, philosopher, historian, and playwright.[74]
Adam Smith (1723–1790), Scottish Philosopher and economist; considered the father of modern economics
Mark Twain (1835–1910), American author and humorist[38]
Jules Verne (1828–1905), French author who pioneered the science fiction genre in Europe. He is best known for his novels Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea, Journey to the Center of the Earth, and Around the World in Eighty Days.[78][79][80][81]
Voltaire (1694–1778), French Enlightenment writer and philosopher[82]
George Washington (1732–1799), one of the Founding Fathers of the United States and the 1st President of the United States[56]
James Watt (1736–1819), Scottish inventor and mechanical engineer whose improvements to the Newcomen steam engine were fundamental to the changes brought by the Industrial Revolution in both his native Great Britain and the rest of the world.[83][84]

[hikesalot]

Another Unitarian vote if you must.

[pfluffenmeister]

There's actually a Unitarian church near me.

Went to a couple of my friend's Unitarian wedding service and they ended their vows with:

"Be sensuous to one another and make love often."

[Self Jupiter]

Fuck off with the no weird shit. Immortality already lies within you. Do you want to meet Tom Cruise?

[BmillsSkier]

Fuck off with the no weird shit. Immortality already lies within you. Do you want to meet Tom Cruise?

Last I heard that's the gatekeeper question for PolyAss.

[MTT]

Become a Wicken ?

[Timberridge]

TR, if you do a hostile takeover of a church in Londonderry and offer free margaritas I'll make a point of stopping by.

They could use a spiritual guide in that town.

The virus is bearing down on the metro NY area, so I think I'm going Unitarian. Thanks Iceman and everyone for the suggestion. I'm gonna talk to the minister about what the Unitarians do for death rites if I become one of the 3.4%, and if I like the answer, I'm in.

I'm not taking any chances so I'm smearing some lambs blood on my front door (as well as the back door and mudroom door.) The garage door I had stained and varnished last fall so no blood on that..yet.

As for Buster and the rest of you unrepentant heathens, I'll do my best to put in a good word for you if I reach the other side.

[Buster Highmen]

As for Buster and the rest of you unrepentant heathens, I'll do my best to put in a good word for you if I reach the other side.

What happened to this uncaring god you cited? It's not going to give a shit. But maybe Oprah (Shiva's earthy form) will be pissed.

[whipski]

I vote Church of the Powder Day Saints

[Buster Highmen]

I vote Church of the Powder Day Skirts

FIFY

[Timberridge]

What happened to this uncaring god you cited? It's not going to give a shit. But maybe Oprah (Shiva's earthy form) will be pissed.

I don't know why you continue to post such heresy.

[BmillsSkier]

Timberridge's margaritas and moderately-engaged Christianity; the moral compass of Londonderry, Vt.

I'm in. I assume there will be post-skiing service times?

[Buster Highmen]

I don't know why you continue to post such heresy.

It's fun. Besides, deduction, logic and the scientific view supplanted the autocracy of religious thought a long time ago. Get with the paradigm.

[Buster Highmen]

The problem with margaritas is that when you spill them , you're left with a sticky telltale mess.

Hence, the civilized mans drink: the g&t.

[BmillsSkier]

The problem with margaritas is that when you spill them , you're left with a sticky telltale mess.

Hence, the civilized mans drink: the g&t.

I'm as big a fan of the G&T as you'll find, but I'm not in the mood to start my own parish of a partially-engaged branch of Christianity, much less in Londonderry.

This is TR's bus. I'm gonna let him drive it.