Thread by @thomthomastoo

Just a reminder y'all. I don't believe in any gods. I do believe in humanity's ability to be love & justice we want to see in the 🌍 We, in ourselves together are the good & the evil plaguing our world. Salvation will not be suprnaturl. It'll be a practice of love, material, real

What we think of as "spiritual" is simply our social-psychological relationship to the life around us - not just other humans, but biological (& bio-adjacent) life (even possibly AI.)

Why am I, once a true believer in the god of Abraham, convinced there are no gods? Well ...

It is obvious to me that humanity has a more accurate, less passive aggressive global communications system than the all powerful, ever present, all knowing god described in the ancient texts.
Exhibit A: Supposedly god uses hand written copies of copies of copies lost to time to

communicate some of his/her/its most important information? With no clear stamp of approval, some texts are accept by some sects & not others. These disagreements results in billions of lives lost over recorded history. But we're supposed to believe that said god is also loving?

An all powerful god would have been able to designed a better way to communicate whilst still respecting the "free will" of humanity. If god is the father/mother of humanity - what kind of parent would ignore the cries of their children for direct contact, but instead use

"still small voices" (that aren't any different from a person's internal dialog,) or would use unreliable copies of copies of copies of disputed texts, some copies, w/ some copied sections having words added, edited subtracted on the whim of the person transcribing -

when two archeological sources representing the same verse/chapter contradict or greatly vary, who decides what is and isn't this god's words?

How is it loving to communicate in such a confusing way when mere mortals have figured out a multiplicity of ways to

transmit data over space/time. I love my children, and I manage to communicate w/ them in a way that there is no question that I am present & understood. That is how love communicates. Not w/ passive aggressive "tests" & mysteries & hocus-pocus. Kindness finds a way to meet ppl

where they are & to communicate w/ them in a way that minimizes the signal to noise ratio.

Even if we were all "spiritual" helen kellers but w/ no sensory perceptions - an all loving all powerful god would hear the cries of his children & comfort them w/ an undeniable presence

I spent 15 yrs of my life, from preteens to mid/late 20s desperately seeking "god" - I prayed, fasted, sat quietly for hours, worshipped in church, out of church, in my heart, in small group. I begged & cried & despaired that there was never anything but my own internal voice &

statistically insignificant coincidences my peers & elders told me is how god spoke to us. My faith was so profound, I would not accept these answers as anything other than ppl lying to themselves. I refused to lie to myself & I refused to offer god anything less than all the

truth I could muster. Ppl said, "but the holy spirit ..." and I said, "yes. The holy spirit would be decidedly not my own mind." And others said, "God works in mysterious ways" & I'd say, "Yes, but we are told in the scripture that god is true and loving. We do not need to

accept these false, manufactured voices / groupthink / wishywashy emotional & irrational guessing games. I refuse to accept ..." & they wld say, "Who are you to refuse to accept ... " & I'd say I'm a child of god seeking him in his fullness and I will not accept false gods

And they would say, "How will you know?" and I said, "Is not scripture clear? It is simple. God is love. And Jesus & the apostles clearly defined love as a practice of benevolence, grace, kindness & wellness towards others" and they would say, "Yes. Maybe you are not seeking

Him or obeying him or ..." & I'd interrupt & say, "Other than obey what we see in scripture, how am I to obey if he will not communicate w/ me? And how else am I seek him? What have I not done? I desperately seek god" and they'd say "God is mysterious" & "Obedience is better than

sacrifice," & I'd say, "Yes, brother. You are true. Why is it that we protestant evangelicals support the death penalty when Jesus said to love our enemies? How's that obedience? How are we obedient when we cheer on the [1st US] war w/ Iraq when Jesus told us to love our enemies?

How do we obey Christ and allow our tax money to be used to bomb civilians including children? How is blowing up our enemies & their children obedience to Christ?" And they would answer w/ weakly understood quotes from Romans and I'd answer, "Yes brother, we are to submit the gov

as Paul instructed, but in our system of governance, we are the gov. W/ a majority of US citizens claiming christianity, how is it that we allow our complicity in the bombing of our enemies?" And no one could answer me. My pastor told me, "Sometimes, we just have to have faith" &

I answered, "Yes Pastor. We do. We should have faith that Jesus meant what he said when he said to love our enemies & we should be obedient. You say this is a Christian nation. Jesus says in scripture that a nation that wld follow him would not bomb their enemies nor their kids &

a nation that followed Christ would feed the hungry, heal the sick (healthcare) & visit (care for) the imprisoned & the widowed. You are familiar w/ the parable of the Sheep & the Goats, yes Pastor? As a nation, are we a nation of sheep or a nation of goats? Are we obedient? How

can so many of us claim to hear god's voice & yet so directly contradict scripture w/ excuses & justifications that amount to self deception? How can we claim to worship god and be so ignorant. It's as if many of us worship a totally different god than the god of Esther & Jesus."

He looked at me, just a jr. in high school & said, "I don't know son. You have studied & I know of noone that could disapprove of your understanding. I believe that you will find the answers you are looking for." It took me a decade after that moment, but I did find the only

theory that fits the data. There is no god. Once I plug that into all the data of my life, of history, of antiquities, of biology, of psychology & anthropology, of linguistics & physics - the theory that there is no god let's all these pieces fall into place.

And there being no god explains soooo much of what I saw growing up in contemporary western conservative evangelical Christianity - especially the "charismatic" sects - religion, though necessary in the socio-evolutionary survival of humanity, is a legacy appendage much too

prone to a cancerous metastasization w/in the bodies of civilizations & cultures. Contemporary western conservative evangelical Christianity isn't even christianity, it is cancer eating away at the body of the mythical Christ & all the good ppl that try to practice his love.

Contemporary western conservative evangelical Christianity is a contagious psychological cancer that destroys people's ability to practice love as their supposed savior instructed them to. The god they now worship is no longer the god of abraham & jesus. It is more akin to

Moloch where they will sacrifice the children of the world to their god to cover their bloodlust & greed & petty & devastating cruelty. If the god of abraham were real, I'd be that voice chastising his children for their wickedness - not for their sexual partners or beliefs but

for their cruelty & hardened hearts, for their violence against those that can't defend themselves, for their greed & exploitation, for their bloodlust & bigotry & hatred of certain of god's children.

If there were a god of abraham, we'd have OT prophets & talking donkeys &

& even still, the god of abraham would be a giant asshole - because using homeless crazy guys covered in mud is still not good comms man. A talking ass - that's closer to the unequivocally sourced communication a loving god would chose, but still lacking. How about a sit down or

an evening snuggle where we pile on our father/mother & delight in the absolute sensory surety of god's presence - much the same way my two boys & I & their mom will enjoy each other's presence - communicating w/ love & kindness. If I - a mere mortal, a failure at so much,

surely an all powerful god w/ all knowledge that's ever present cld do at least as good as me.

There are no gods. We'll be all the❤️this world'll see - will it be enough to sustain the species & protect life on this 🌍? Or will we flame out after billions of yrs of survival

victims of our own untreated hate?

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