Why must religion and science always be compared to each other. No one asks a theologian to explain atomic theory (except when they are trying to prove that religion is false). In the same manner why do people insist on bringing religion into the realm of science?

Because I have faith. Faith is that funny little thing where you believe wholeheartedly without having to KNOW for sure. Can I substantiate my claims in faith?. No way. They are a matter of FAITH, not fact.

Prophecy: bible predictions 2000 years ago. Israel will become a nation again. Israel will be hated by all nations. Europe, revived roman empire, to be the final world government. EU gives rise to Antichrist, who will come out of Spain (10th nation of EU) and form a peace contract with Israel for 7 years. 666: mark of the Antichrist - a biometric identification system that will facilitate commerce. Increase in technology, earthquakes, transportation all in association with Israel becoming a nation. Check out http://www.jvim.com/ for amazing biblical prophecy.

I like to think there is something more powerful than we can know or understand, but I do not believe in God as the Bible describes him. I have yet to discover an organized religion that I have complete faith in. I'm spiritual, but in my own way -- not how it's been defined by anyone else.

Its seems to me that the further you delve into the sciences the more apparent it is that a God exists.

There is no means for a doubt. You hear amazing stories everyday. Adding to it, read the bible. How is it that each and every one of todays problems is told as a verse in the bible, with an amazing example of how to deal with it.

The Law of Cause and Effect:
For every effect there is a greater cause.
I physically observe the complexity of the universe, and I therefore conclude that the cause is greater than the universe.

I absolutely believe in God. But I suppose I aught to provide a little more reasoning than simply "the Bible says He exists" or "people have always believed in a divine being of some sort." Rather I believe because I find that it makes sense with me. I find it comforting and many arrogant atheists have stated that religion is something that "common," "ignorant" people used to explain things they did not understand. I'm no missionary, nor do I seek to convert anyone here or anywhere else to my faith. Some may say that this is a sin unto itself. But if I where to go about preaching to non-believers who have already been exposed to my beliefs I'd be no better than the "door-to-door" missionaries who present themselves as models of faith which I find to be hypocritical. /nI firmly believe that religion has a place in any society and that religion and science can be reconciled by a little open mindedness on both parts. There are far too many people on both sides of the argument that believe that the other side is "damned to hell" and must be "redeemed" or are "ignorant" and "backward." My religious convictions aside I believe that people have a right to believe what they will, and not be condemned by any mortal for it.
With that, I think the question isn't "do you believe in God?" Rather we should all ask, "Can you accept that someone else believes something differently, and have a inviolable right to do so?"

Well at least theres something 'higher' than us anyway. Definitely something fishy going on with it all, maybe we're being controlled by white mice? Not sure, but I'll go with a YES.

YES. Wouldn't you would laugh at anyone who did not believe that there is a designer who designed your "designer jeans"? What about someone who thought watches and cars just accidentally fell together? The natural order leads to disorder...just look at our homes...just look at any machine that is not maintained.Can you see that it takes more faith to believe that our amazing bodies just fell together, then that they are designed by a designer? Just look at a leaf closely, or a sea shell, or even a spider web. Everything in nature points to an Intelligent Designer. Design only comes through some level of programing... by GOD. On top of that, we can also see that, "the heavens DECLARE the GLORY of GOD." says Psalm 19:1 from the NIV Holy Bible. It is clear that to be so blind as not to see God's hand in nature and in life, is the ultimate state of selfimposed darkness, emptiness, and meaninglessness. It is the opposite, of finding an Intelligent God who chooses to love us and who has shown it through his SON, Jesus Christ...What joy, hope, love , light and meaningFULLness this knowledge produces in us who see, and believe.Other species do not realize this truth because they were never programed to think about God. We were....

The funny thing about this debate is that regardless of which side you're on, you're there based on faith. I like to think that God intended this. Science and a belief in God do not have to be mutually exclusive of each other. I believe God intended us seek knowledge and question things...even Him. I also believe His design ensures that we'll never find all the answers. For everything science brings to the table, it won't be able to prove "scientifically" that the universe and everything in it, is a result of random happenstance. I don't knock those that question His existance because I didn't always believe. Like many, I believed because my parents taught me to believe. A time came when I realized that there would ALWAYS be something to be discovered, questioned, and debated, and I asked myself how likely is it that such a universe just happened? I have great respect for science and it's power to make things both good and bad, but I put my faith in God and will bet that He'll keep science questioning forever.

It is so much easier to not believe in God than to believe in him.

I believe in God.. as we can simply see today it was to simple to say you don't believe in God because of the matter that you never saw him!!!!! yet i am telling you... how can you ask if there really is God? it only indicates that deep within you there sis ca triggering factor that you still have faith in the Supreme being

YES!! why are we always losing these things. i have aswered the debate topic. yes. i have just reaffirmed my position

The evidence of God's existence is all around us: You, Me, Life the World, the Universe. There is no way science can explain how something can just come into existence out of nothing. The Big Bang Theory? Where did that little ball of matter that exploded come from? How did it come to be? There is no way to explain the existence of everything in the universe without God or some sort of higher power. In science, one has to know how to explain something, but we don't have to understand God. One must just have faith. The existence of God is what makes sense to show where everything came from, while science does not makes sense in this subject. Why did we come to be? What causes us to have morals? Do you really want to believe that your mind, body, spirit, and whole being are just a random collection of matter, that you mean nothing. I don't know about you, but that is such a grim thought to me.

If anything could prove the existence of God beyond a doubt, it is love. If we were only evolutions of animals, we wouldn't be capable of love. We wouldn't be capable of sacrificing ourselves for those we love.

I do believe in God and have experienced Him in my life! A year ago I was diagnosed with stage 4 stomach cancer, basically I was given a year to live, it was considered terminal. Well, I have been healed by the power of Jesus Christ, three months ago I was divinely healed in Lakeland Florida. I went because I had heard that people were being healed at this revival and I didn't have any other options so I went to worship God, and the pastor literally said someone here has stomach cancer and needs to come up here, so I waited and waited and I knew in my heart, I could feel the burning in my spirit that it was me he was talking about so I made my way up to the stage. He came up to me and said in the name of JESUS be healed and without even touching me I fell back on the ground literally slain in the Spirit and it was like my stomach was a wave pool, like a washing machine . . . so I come back to TN and go to the doctor and there is no cancer anywhere, I just wanted to add this to the debate because miracles like this need to be known and accounted for. I know that God exists and that there is power in the name of Jesus that there is healing in His name and He is good!!!!

ask yourself, how did humans existed in this world? It is very impossible that without any creator, people would exist in this world. A pair of cells is needed in order to produce a new living thing.

i believe in god so i won't go to hell ^.^

of course. Looking around us we see things that cant be explained away by futile theories created by people to fill the void in their life.

Take Yellowstone. Travel there, walk around and tell me if it takes more faith to believe that it was a random act of evolution or a planned act of an all-powerful God.

It is true that there is no hard core evidence that God exits, but there is no proof that he doesn’t exist. Can anyone who doesn’t believe in God provide hard core evidence that contradicts God existence? Not theories, stories, or assumptions, but evidence.

Just because we are incapable of proving God exists does not mean he doesn’t. Once people were incapable of proving that the world was round so did that make it flat? There is also archeology that coincides with the bible. Also the reason most Christians don’t need evidence is because we have FAITH. Those who believe that God doesn’t exist have just as much FAITH in the matter, because there is no hard core evidence that proves the belief that God doesn’t exist.

Of course I believe in the Lord. How else could we have possibly been created. I also believe that yes animals have evolved but they were put on the earth by God. Such as humans were.

I do believe in God I was brought up with it and I'd like to think that there is a chance that something happens to me ... not just in a dark abyss or something.

I'll put it this way, Life to exist without a deity of some sort (I personally belive it is my Father in Heaven but I'll debate that some other time) is near impossible, for example, a species is now defined as a group of organisms that can succesfully breed and create fertile offspring in the wild, so if, let's say, a homo habilis once did evolve from a homo erectus, the chances of just one evolving is near zero, but since species cannot breed out of species then how would humans evolve and populate the earth?

of course he is just have faith it will help you in the end i hope you people who say no dont burn i shall pray 4 u so ok

The face of a newborn child is the only evidence you need to prove the existence of a wonderful, powerful God who blesses us all.

Yes because he has spoken to me.

I believe in a "God"

Check out this supporting evidence, it is the best argument for the existence of God that I have ever read.

Yes, absolutely. I can point to a great many things where I know for certain He is with me every step of the way. Does that give me any reason to judge someone else that doesn't believe? Absolutely not.

YES a BIG YES. I believe in a GOD who created me. I believe in HAND that creates the rules by which we choose to live or not. I BELIVE in a GOD who Loves.

God is Himself, so that we can be His people.

1. The Argument from Change

The material world we know is a world of change. This young woman came to be 5'2", but she was not always that height. The great oak tree before us grew from the tiniest acorn. Now when something comes to be in a certain state, such as mature size, that state cannot bring itself into being. For until it comes to be, it does not exist, and if it does not yet exist, it cannot cause anything.

As for the thing that changes, although it can be what it will become, it is not yet what it will become. It actually exists right now in this state (an acorn); it will actually exist in that state (large oak tree). But it is not actually in that state now. It only has the potentiality for that state.

Now a question: To explain the change, can we consider the changing thing alone, or must other things also be involved? Obviously, other things must be involved. Nothing can give itself what it does not have, and the changing thing cannot have now, already, what it will come to have then. The result of change cannot actually exist before the change. The changing thing begins with only the potential to change, but it needs to be acted on by other things outside if that potential is to be made actual. Otherwise it cannot change.

Nothing changes itself. Apparently self-moving things, like animal bodies, are moved by desire or will—something other than mere molecules. And when the animal or human dies, the molecules remain, but the body no longer moves because the desire or will is no longer present to move it.

Now a further question: Are the other things outside the changing thing also changing? Are its movers also moving? If so, all of them stand in need right now of being acted on by other things, or else they cannot change. No matter how many things there are in the series, each one needs something outside itself to actualize its potentiality for change.

The universe is the sum total of all these moving things, however many there are. The whole universe is in the process of change. But we have already seen that change in any being requires an outside force to actualize it. Therefore, there is some force outside (in addition to) the universe, some real being transcendent to the universe. This is one of the things meant by "God."

Briefly, if there is nothing outside the material universe, then there is nothing that can cause the universe to change. But it does change. Therefore there must be something in addition to the material universe. But the universe is the sum total of all matter, space and time. These three things depend on each other. Therefore this being outside the universe is outside matter, space and time. It is not a changing thing; it is the unchanging Source of change.

From the Handbook of Christian Apologetics by Peter Kreeft and Fr. Ronald Tacelli, SJ (Intervarsity Press, 1994

2. The Argument from Efficient Causality

We notice that some things cause other things to be (to begin to be, to continue to be, or both). For example, a man playing the piano is causing the music that we hear. If he stops, so does the music.

Now ask yourself: Are all things caused to exist by other things right now? Suppose they are. That is, suppose there is no Uncaused Being, no God. Then nothing could exist right now. For remember, on the no-God hypothesis, all things need a present cause outside of themselves in order to exist. So right now, all things, including all those things which are causing things to be, need a cause. They can give being only so long as they are given being. Everything that exists, therefore, on this hypothesis, stands in need of being caused to exist.

But caused by what? Beyond everything that is, there can only be nothing. But that is absurd: all of reality dependent—but dependent on nothing! The hypothesis that all being is caused, that there is no Uncaused Being, is absurd. So there must be something uncaused, something on which all things that need an efficient cause of being are dependent.

Existence is like a gift given from cause to effect. If there is no one who has the gift, the gift cannot be passed down the chain of receivers, however long or short the chain may be. If everyone has to borrow a certain book, but no one actually has it, then no one will ever get it. If there is no God who has existence by his own eternal nature, then the gift of existence cannot be passed down the chain of creatures and we can never get it. But we do get it; we exist. Therefore there must exist a God: an Uncaused Being who does not have to receive existence like us—and like every other link in the chain of receivers.

Question 1: Why do we need an uncaused cause? Why could there not simply be an endless series of things mutually keeping each other in being?

Reply: This is an attractive hypothesis. Think of a single drunk. He could probably not stand up alone. But a group of drunks, all of them mutually supporting each other, might stand. They might even make their way along the street. But notice: Given so many drunks, and given the steady ground beneath them, we can understand how their stumblings might cancel each other out, and how the group of them could remain (relatively) upright. We could not understand their remaining upright if the ground did not support them—if, for example, they were all suspended several feet above it. And of course, if there were no actual drunks, there would be nothing to understand.

This brings us to our argument. Things have got to exist in order to be mutually dependent; they cannot depend upon each other for their entire being, for then they would have to be, simultaneously, cause and effect of each other. A causes B, B causes C, and C causes A. That is absurd. The argument is trying to show why a world of caused causes can be given—or can be there—at all. And it simply points out: If this thing can exist only because something else is giving it existence, then there must exist something whose being is not a gift. Otherwise everything would need at the same time to be given being, but nothing (in addition to "everything") could exist to give it. And that means nothing would actually be.

Question 2: Why not have an endless series of caused causes stretching backward into the past? Then everything would be made actual and would actually be—even though their causes might no longer exist.

Reply: First, if the kalam argument (argument 6) is right, there could not exist an endless series of causes stretching backward into the past. But suppose that such a series could exist. The argument is not concerned about the past, and would work whether the past is finite or infinite. It is concerned with what exists right now.

Even as you read this, you are dependent on other things; you could not, right now, exist without them. Suppose there are seven such things. If these seven things did not exist, neither would you. Now suppose that all seven of them depend for their existence right now on still other things. Without these, the seven you now depend on would not exist—and neither would you. Imagine that the entire universe consists of you and the seven sustaining you. If there is nothing besides that universe of changing, dependent things, then the universe—and you as part of it—could not be. For everything that is would right now need to be given being but there would be nothing capable of giving it. And yet you are and it is. So there must in that case exist something besides the universe of dependent things—something not dependent as they are.

And if it must exist in that case, it must exist in this one. In our world there are surely more than seven things that need, right now, to be given being. But that need is not diminished by there being more than seven. As we imagine more and more of them—even an infinite number, if that were possible—we are simply expanding the set of beings that stand in need. And this need—for being, for existence—cannot be met from within the imagined set. But obviously it has been met, since contingent beings exist. Therefore there is a source of being on which our material universe right now depends.

From the Handbook of Christian Apologetics by Peter Kreeft and Fr. Ronald Tacelli, SJ (Intervarsity Press, 1994

The greatest scientist of this century, Albert Einstein saw clearly that the universe is designed and orderly therefore, it must be the result of a mind not merely a matter of bumping around randomly if space. Einstein put it like this, "The order of the universe reveals intelligence of such superiority that it overshadows all human intelligence." So for all of you nonbelivers, yes there is a God and it doesnt take the amount of intelligence that Einstein had to tell that. Have you ever seen a sunset? Have you ever seen a newborn baby? That is God!!! If the moon was 6 inches closer to the Earth(literally) we would have such crazy ocean current and tide variations that it would make human existance on earth impossible. On the other hand, if it were 6 inches further away, our weather patterns would be so extreme that, likewise, human existance would be impossible. If you think that that is all just one big coincidence, then I would seriously question your intelligence.

I am totally lost with this one. i dont really know what to believe in sometimes. i think that there is so much going on to say the existance of god exists that what real evidence do we have that says that god doesnt exist? maybe all the different types of religion are scattered everywhere but if you join them all together then you will see that all religions are all going on about the one god in the end making that to have this many followers, it sort of says that god does exist in his own way

Quick question for those of you who are both atheists and Democrats (which, if my Republican friends are correct, that's all of them). Most atheists I know think that anyone who believes in God is a moron. So here's the question:

Is Barack Obama a liar or a moron? He says that he is a Christian, which, according to those atheists who believe Christians are morons, makes him a moron. Either that or he's lying about his beliefs. I've always been curious about people's opinions on the matter. Thanks!

I'm just going to say yes. Any questions about that?

The term, god, is not defined in this so called, babble.

Never debate a man who cannot define the terms of his propositions. When the term, god, is mentioned there are as many meanings to what god is as there are people thinking of god.

God: a term that denotes a supreme authority.

Even the Ten commandments implies the presence of other gods who too are worshiped.

Conclusion: All men/women believe in a god whose existence and authority are predicated upon the intellect of Its' creators.

Yes because God has pulled me out through the hard times, and is the one and only God who loves unconditionally and is fair. If you want a scientific view He created this Earth and there is no way this Earth could have been created by some accident. A cell with its complicated parts could not have been created by an accident either, but only by God and his perfection.

yes because without hope whats the point in living so why dont all you non belivers do a test shoot yourselves and get back to me on God and the Devil

I have faith and believe in miracles, and I believe in God

Yes, i do. I used to ponder upon the idea of there not being a God, but now im sure will all my heart that there is a God. No matter waht anyone else says.

People that don't believe in GOD have no structure in their lives.That is the people that is always complianing and being miserable.They have nothing to live for.Just remember the world is temporily.

Yes I believe in God. I also believe in religion because I'm Irish/Italian and I was raised Catholic because there was no other choice for me....but yes, I believe there is a God.

I do believe that their is something that created everything in the universe and i called it god because that is the word or term I grew up with but i do not believe in religion and it belief that theirs books came from the divined that is a load of crap and religion is just the earliest form of government

yes of course.

people used to say all this stuff that wasnt true and i would just prove them wrong.

it is hard to believe but thats life

Well for those of you who believe in the big bang theory where the Earth was cereated by an explosion of gases and other stuff, I ask you this: Where did the gases come from?

i think so because if you dont what will you bieleve in.

The minimum length for an argument is 50 characters. The purpose of this restriction is to cut down on the amount of dumb jokes, so we can keep the quality of debate and discourse as high as possible.

of course........god exist....

Nd the people who dnt believe that god exist dont belive on themselves......

Of course! Have you ever seen a sunset or thought of how a human body works??

The most basic proof of God’s existence is simply what He has made. “For the invisible things of Him from the creation of the world are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made, even His eternal power and Godhead; so that [unbelievers] are without excuse” (Romans 1:20). “The heavens declare the glory of God / And the firmament showeth His handiwork” (Psalm 19:1).