You got me, my motivations are to destroy christianity by a LSU forum discussion thread. Muahahaha. Either answer the topic question or don't. All of this is fluff and getting incredibly boring and irrelevant. This was your answer you keep pointing to, but will not clarify. Let's break it down: Irrelevant to the discussion. I can inquire about Christian doctrine without being a Christian. How do you know the message of Christ before the bible? You keep saying this over and over like there is some other historical sources on what Christ's message was. Can you list some so I can read them? It's a fair question; I'm not aware of any other sources of the message of Christ, but if they are there I'd like to read them. Yes, that's my question. I would as well. Your point? This is where I don't understand what you are talking about. How does this tie into my question about one's ability to be saved without hearing the word of god or accepting Jesus? I never said that. Nice attempt at a straw man argument, but it doesn't answer the question. The bible says in multiple places that a person is born with a sinful nature, and unless he accepts Christ as his savior, he will, at best, be separated from god as punishment; at worst he will burn eternally. This is literally and non-literally the major theme of the New Testament. Do you disagree? So I'll ask one more time before I give up on getting any sort of relevant answer from you, and I'll rephrase it to be more PC. If one has never heard of god, or of Jesus, or of salvation, or of sin, can that person go to Heaven? If so, why?
I believe that the child goes straight to Heaven. Christians believe in what is referred to as "the age of accountability." Is that a magic number? Is like the 5000th day of your life? I believe that it is different with every person due to many reasons. 1) how mature that person is 2) the influence of others he/she is around (ex.-Christian/non-Christians) 3) if they are lead to know the Lord. (a person in some countries today have never been told about Christ........) It is one of those things that no one can't give a certain date or time. If we could honestly "explain" everything in the Bible, that would put us right up there with God's wisdom. I believe there are many things that we will "understand better, by and by." Most of it doesn't even matter to me. Cain slew Able and then left to a far away land and took a wife. Where did she come from? I don't know. The Bible tells us that God created Adam and Eve. It doesn't say He stopped there. Things like that, I don't care about. As long as He keeps His promise that I will be in Heaven one day, I am completely contented.
I think the problem with the question and with the answer is you are saying the following. Yes babies go to heave b/c they haven't had the chance to learn about god/jesus yet so they are "grandfathered" in if you will. The problem is if you take that route how about a trible in the middle of the jungle. And lets say 1 person in that tribe takes pride in killing others. Yet that person has never heard of god/jesus and or the rules that you have to abide by. Does that person get a free ticket as well?
The age of accountability would make the most sense, and if I was a believer that is what I would go with. I just haven't seen much in the bible about it. This is something that I asked my pastor long ago, but he never really gave me a great answer other than "God knows the hearts of men". But if that was true, I don't see the point in sending Jesus to die for our sins, if acceptance of that isn't technically necessary. By the way, it was this issue and question, and the failure to get a satisfactory scripture supported answer that started my path to atheism, so despite what is assumed by another poster, my motivations in asking these are not what he thinks they are.
I've been reading this thread and felt compelled to contribute to this site just to reply to this thread. I am a Christian and will admit that I don't know everything about God and I believe that it would take all of eternity in order to even begin to fully understand everything about God. But the question of this thread is do babies go to heaven if they die? The only place in the bible that I have found which sort of addresses this situation is in 2nd Samuel 12. It is a verse from the story of David and Bathsheba. She becomes pregnant on the night of their affair causing David to kill her husband and marry her in an attempt to hide his sin. David is then confronted by the prophet Nathan. (2nd samuel 12:13-14) "Then David said to Nathan, “I have sinned against the Lord.” Nathan replied, “The Lord has taken away your sin. You are not going to die. (14)But because by doing this you have made the enemies of the Lord show utter contempt, the son born to you will die.” After the child is born, he is alive for 7 days and then he dies. When he is told of the death, David responds (2nd samuel 12:23) "But now that he is dead, why should I fast? Can I bring him back again? I will go to him, but he will not return to me.” The phrase "I will go to him" is where I believe the belief that babies will go to heaven if they die comes from. Ultimately, however, it is God's kingdom and it is his decision who he lets in. As it has been said on this forum a few times (Romans 10:9) "That if you confess with your mouth, “Jesus is Lord,” and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved." Does this mean that anyone who has never heard about Christ or the bible will not be saved? Honestly, I don't know. Does God have "special rules" for those who have never heard of Christ? again, I don't know. All I do know is that God is sovereign, and righteous, and just. Ultimately it is His decision, and who am I to question the decision that God will make.
I'm glad my thread made you feel compelled to donate. TheDude didn't understand it at the time, but it is now clear that my motivations were to attract new donors to TF (j/k, but welcome aboard, your perspective is very welcome here. Religious topics are infinitely interesting to me) Yours is a very sensible answer. Sometimes "we don't know" is the most rational answer. If god is truly a just being then he would take these circumstances into consideration. However, the justness of god is depicted in drastically different ways from the OT to the NT, so hopefully it would be the NT personality of god that would be the judge of these things. Otherwise god would be truly horrible in his nature, and the implications of that would not be good to Christians and Non-Christians alike.
USMTiger, I like having you share your thoughts with us. It's obvious that you've given a good deal of thought to the subject of religion and that it is something you are very interested in. It's not common that you find people like that. I'd be curious to know know a little more about what exactly it was that led you to believe whatever it is you believe now (I'm really not sure what you believe). Also, why do you still go to a Christian Church every week and why do you go to a Christian bible study group every week? Do you plan on raising your child as a Christian? What do you plan on teaching him about religion? Also, what does your wife believe? Is she a Christian? And if so, are you just going to church out of respect for her?
First of all, thank you very much. Religion is indeed fascinating to me, because it has shaped the dynamics of social interaction on a micro (personal) and macro (national) level for thousands of years. I was born and raised as a god fearing Baptist from birth, and got "saved" at 8, and later 15 when I was actually old enough to comprehend the scriptures. I am now an atheist. I would say that I started having serious doubts at about the age of 17. What got me started on my path to atheism were the two topics that I started here, and the subsequent discussions that I had with my pastor about them. That pastor later became the president of the Southern Baptist Convention, and has a Doctorate of Theology, so he was a pretty good source to go to in my opinion. Basically I was confused about the question of salvation for those who have never heard of god, or had a chance to hear about him. The other question was about why Adam and Eve were punished for doing wrong, when they had no concept of right and wrong. The end result of these discussions was either "Ask god when you see him", or "the lord works in mysterious ways". That started putting my faith on very shaky ground, and after reading the bible from a critical, "outside my christian box" perspective, the whole house of cards fell down for me. I would say that I've read the Bible at least 3 times front to back, and still like to study it from time to time. My dad is a deacon and Sunday school teacher, and my mom is a bestselling Christian author, so I still have much respect for people who choose to follow god, as long as it doesn't intrude on my life, even if it doesn't seem so in some of these discussions. From the moment I left the house to go to college, I refused to set foot into another church unless I was visiting my parents, or holidays like easter. A couple of years ago, my wife really wanted me to start attending church, because we knew we would start trying for a child, and she wanted him to grow up in a church environment. She is a Methodist. I was EXTREMELY reluctant to do so, but I went, grudgingly. I was impressed when in our Sunday School discussion, people were talking openly about not taking the bible literally in many places. That was a refreshing change from the dogmatic fundamentalism taught in Southern Baptist Churches. Methodism to me is a very non-intrusive religion. The good aspects of religion are amplified, and the torment/hell/punishment parts are not really harped on. While not really being honest with the bibles actual message, in my opinion, it was much more tolerable to me as an atheist. After getting to know the other people in my Sunday School class, who are of a similar age and socio-economic status, I started actually enjoying going. Although I do refrain from the discussions, and am not open about my atheism. I don't really want to be "that guy". :wink: Thankfully, the people that I've met in my church have really helped me put my opinion of Christians back into a positive light; knowing that there are many views of Christianity that aren't so dogmatic and extreme. I plan on raising my child with the guiding principle being the "Golden Rule": treat people how you want to be treated. So love, respect, kindness, compassion, etc etc etc... I will let the church do the religious education on him, and will let him make up his own mind as to whether or not he believes any of it. I will let him know that the bible isn't meant to be taken literally, but that it contains many good lessons about how to conduct your life, but is not the final authority on morality. My wife is a Christian. She is pretty much in-line with the teachings of the Methodist Church, but is more of a casual Christian. It was the way she was raised, and she doesn't see much of a personal reason to deny or question it. I've stopped trying to discuss religious issues with her, because if she finds comfort in it, I'm not going to try to undermine it. Thanks for asking, I am always glad to share my opinions on pretty much anything, and I think many Christians assume that atheism is born of ignorance or anger. Quite the contrary, most atheist that I know are former Christians as well, like myself.
let me guess. IT. better yet, a programmer. I never met one that was able to think beyond code, proof and science. I know they exist but I personally have run into the immature "Oh, yeah, well prove it!" yahoos too many times in my life, and most are in IT.
