Atheists turn back to God?

yes, just like the difference between a woman who is pregnant and a woman who is not pregnant is not much - after all they have both avoided the fertilization of the billions of sperms in the world .....

 

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I knew a guy in the army that was a militant atheist.
One restless night he was lying on the couch in a half-asleep daze, flipping through channels and stopped at a televangelist for shits and giggles.
He said he felt like he was having a heart attack and he had an overwhelming feeling that God entered him and was attempting to get him to change his ways.

Now he is a Christian preacher.

 

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So it wasnt a heart attack?

 

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Only if you're afraid of death - and that fear is what many religions prey on.

Religion survives partly because it takes people's deepest darkest fears and insecurities and preys on them.

It takes this driving fear of not existing after we die and offers a pretty alternative.
It tells us, "You can avoid mortality if you want to. However, the only way to do that, is play by our rules. You can't do it without me."
In this way, it ensures it's OWN survival and immortality.

That's one of the biggest problems I have with many religions.
It doesn't help people overcome their fears, it takes advantage of them and offers them a placebo in return - and people become addicted to that placebo, because the fear is constantly there.

 

It might have been.
He was a lazy, fat bastard.
I don't know how he ever got through basic training.

 

FEAR? Who is not afraid to die? Even people on death row cry when it is time for 'the walk', i think your taking things for granted, like never being confronted with it.

I still say that if someone has thoughts like the one i mentioned then they can no longer be classified as an Atheist. Oh, i am OK now...yeah right.

I dont see how religion can be viewed as a placebo at all. The closest i came to death was one time, all motor skills were gone, sporadic vision etc etc etc, the whole nine yards, i know for a fact what was imminent be it stroke heart attack, catastrophic failure of the physical being. At that point the strangest thing happened and i am here now, divine intervention? well it does not matter, one point is i can accurately recognise this because i have been in that same place five or six times (young stupid, taking chances, playing with fire- call it what you want, just read between the lines

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and you should know what i am talking about) well that was like another lifetime so what can you do? I know now what can happen and there is nothing good to take from it really.

http://www.cnn.com/2003/HEALTH/12/25/medical.miracles.ap/

So dont take my word for it

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Are buddhists considered atheists?

 

First of all, Antony Flew was a philosophy professor, a bullshit artist.

Secondly, he became a deist, you know, those who come to a conclusion that gods exist and then attempt to find evidence to support their conclusion, which is the opposite method to the scientific method.

Thirdly, Flew does NOT believe in an afterlife, one of the main tenets that the Abrahamic religions rely in order to maintain their flocks.

Fourthly, his claims are more inline with Intelligent Design proponents.

And last, the guy turned 81 and lost his marbles.

On the other hand, you should be proud to have demonstrated you found ONE SINGLE individual on the planet who converted... in a way... sort of... but not really...

 

It entirely depends on why they became an atheist in the first place. If a person is an atheist because they have made an honest attempt to examine all the evidence and concluded that god probably doesn't exist based on logic and reason, they aren't likely to change their minds. But many people simply believe whatever they want to be true. A large percentage of Christians simply like the idea of Christianity, so they believe in it without ever really giving it serious though. When they later decide for some reason that they don’t like the idea of Christianity, they switch to atheism (or some other religion) because it’s more appealing. Such “atheists” are likely to switch back at some point when their mood changes yet again.

 

I won't. Fact is everyone's health is different, what will kill one person may be completely harmless to another. Doctors like to make all kinds of predictions, which are almost always just educated guesses based on statistics. If a disease has a 99% mortality rate, does that mean 1% of people are handed a miracle by God? Or does it simply mean that 1% of people are biologically different in a way that makes them more resistant to that disease?

The human mind plays a huge part in recovering from illness or injury, if you believe you'll get better chances are you will. If praying and believing in miracles helps you establish that belief then great.

 

These sorts of "miracles" always end up being things that also happen naturally to a small percentage of people anyway. For some reason we never see miracles that involve things like severed limbs growing back.

 

as a greater and more influential atheist than yourself, what does that make you?

so what

so what

so what

do all people who turn 81 lose their marbles, or only those that have different opinions than yourself?

so in other words you concede that your opening 5 points were all red herrings?

 

While I will not quibble over influence, it's not clear how you have come to the conclusion that one guy you don't really know is "greater" than another guy you don't really know. What criteria are you using to come to that conclusion?

 

Anyone that REturned to belief in God must at first have believed in God then became atheist and then REturned to belief in God.
So they never actually were atheists to begin with, not really... i think.

 

I think Snakelord asked the appropriate question here. A greater atheist is a greater disbeliever?? :shrug:

So, Deists come to conclusions gods exist, without any reason or rationale whatsoever. They then look for reasons to support their conclusions, allegedly based on science. It's a crock, of course. They are as convincing as you, which is not at all.

Big difference.

So, since Antony does not believe in an afterlife, he hasn't really converted to a religion making false promises, like the religion you belong, for example.

Big difference.

So, his position is more in line with Intelligent Design proponents, which are basically creationists masking their nonsense as science, which isn't really any kind of conversion at all, or is scientific. Yet, he is supposed to be a professor.

Big difference.

Not necessarily all who turn 81, but Antony Flew did.

What gives you that idea (other than your tenuous grasp for synthesis)? I'm simply pointing out that the ONE SINGLE person you have found to have claimed to having been converted to religion is specious, at best.

Again, big difference.

 

I know of an atheist who turned theist for the last 17 years of his life. I was surprised, cos I hadn't even known he was an atheist. He only came out to friends, not family.

 

Yeah but the question in the OP was "Know of any atheists who returned to religion?".
REturned... :shrug:

 

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Really?!?

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Really.

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