@fmf saidI have knows non-believers who fear this alleged retribution and they spend the rest of their lives in fear unable to explain it. Indoctrination is a truly dangerous thing.
Have you ever met any non-believers who actually and literally fear retribution and punishment at the hands of the Christian God?
If so, how did they explain it?
@fmf saidThe straight answer would be 'no.' Fearing something that one has no belief in does, on the face of it, sound rather silly.
Have you ever met any non-believers who actually and literally fear retribution and punishment at the hands of the Christian God?
If so, how did they explain it?
That said, I don't believe in vampires, but spent much of my adolescence pulling the sheets up high around my neck at night, just in case. (Cotton sheets apparently stop vampires in their tracks).
@fmf saidFear is not always rational or subject to rational explanation. While I have not known such people as you describe, I can imagine that such people exist. I can imagine someone not being able to get himself to believe that the God of Scripture really exists, because he finds rational proofs of the existence of such a God inconclusive or faulty, but still being terribly afraid that that God does exist and will take a terrible retribution against non-believers. I would can such a condition "moral neurosis."
Have you ever met any non-believers who actually and literally fear retribution and punishment at the hands of the Christian God?
If so, how did they explain it?
@ghost-of-a-duke saidRather than a specific, like vampires, when I was a little kid (6 or 7, by adolescence I was pretty comfortable in the dark in my room) the thing to be afraid of at night was more along the lines of generic 'monsters'. And yes, word among my friends and I was that there was indeed something magical about bedcovers, the monsters couldn't touch them, so as long as you were under them, you were safe. 🙂
The straight answer would be 'no.' Fearing something that one has no belief in does, on the face of it, sound rather silly.
That said, I don't believe in vampires, but spent much of my adolescence pulling the sheets up high around my neck at night, just in case. (Cotton sheets apparently stop vampires in their tracks).
@ghost-of-a-duke saidYes, you nailed it. Fear is not rational and belief is only sometimes so or only partially so. Sometimes fear and belief and reason jive, sometimes they don't. So, yes, some people are confused, and frightened, both at once.
No, I don't think that is what he is saying.
It is more the case of there being atheists who don't believe God exists and yet still have an underlying fear that 'if they were wrong' such a God might punish them for not believing in Him. (An irrational fear).
@suzianne saidThen what is going on? Do you think the threat of retribution and punishment at the hands of the Christian God is [1] intended to coerce or persuade non-believers to become believers, or [2] it is intended to have some effect on people who are already believers? The threat may be empty and far-fetched but it must exist [in amongst the doctrine] for a reason, right?
No, obviously.