Atheist-Christian Debates

Debate #2: The Afterlife.

"The hope of immortality is the chief solace and greatest triumph of our reason...Even if revelation didn't teach us, we feel that we have something within us which shall never die; and all our experience of this life but makes us cling more fondly to that repaying hope."
-Charles Mackay.

"I don't have to make decisions about the afterlife."

Your statement implies that you can choose not to make a decision about the afterlife. In actuality, your non-choice is a choice in itself.

"We are not given enough information about the afterlife/There's not enough evidence for what it takes to survive in the afterlife."

God gives us plenty of adequate information, in the bible, about the afterlife.

"Every Christian should be just exuding eagerness to kick the bucket."

No, because Jesus came to give us life, to the full, meaning a good, holy life here and in the hereafter. And it will get better once the second coming has happened.

"Maybe you can erase those final satin - padded images I have of my relatives."

Well, I can't do that, but Jesus can. When Jesus returns from heaven, he will erase all those satin padded images from our minds by raising all those people who have died, and remaking them into his glory.

"A loving God would give scientific proof of the afterlife to us."

You are arguing the same exact thing that the rich man in hell was arguing in Luke 16. "Send Lazarus (from heaven) to my father's house, for I have five brothers, so that he may warn them, lest they also come into this place of torment(Luke 16:28)." Abraham (in heaven) replied "If they do not hear Moses and the prophets, neither will they be convinced if some one should rise from the dead(Luke 16:31)." A truly loving God wouldn't need to prove anything of the sort to us, because He'd make it so obvious that such a demonstration would be unneccessary. We'd know it intuitively, so we wouldn't need scientific `proof.'

"Accept the world as it is - because there is nothing more."

You say that there's nothing beyond this world or physical reality? By what grounds do you make that assertion? Are you no better than the ancient mystics who thought there was `nothing more' to the universe besides the earth? That every star and planet revolved around the earth, and there was `nothing more' out there? If they existed, the `flat earthers,' who believed there was the ocean and `nothing more' beyond it? How about the people who thought we had nine (or 8) planets in the solar system and `nothing more'?

"There are no souls, no afterlife. Nothing exists after death. The observable world is all there is."

That's a dismal way to look at life. And certainly not a very comforting thing to say at a funeral. It gives me no hope, no reason to live, except `to not die.' I want to be remembered for something, too. Human beings don't instill that hope in me. Tombstones fade, photographs disintegrate, and very few people remember anyone who died, even if they died recently, in some cases. If God doesn't remember us, then no one remembers us. Even when we're alive, people forget our names. Sure, you'll be too dead to care, but isn't that scary, too? Can you even imagine your existence ceasing? If you really thought about it, and spent more than a few minutes thinking about it, you'd be horrified. I like my life to have purpose and meaning. I like to have a goal in my life. If life is pointless as you are arguing, that we just die, then there's no incentive for me to help anybody but myself. There would be no incentive to make this website or attempt to convince people to believe in God. I'd do nothing but sit on my butt and play video games all day long, and never aspire to do anything greater, because I'd believe I were just going to die anyway. I would also be a coward. As a Christian, I'm willing to share what I believe with other people, even if they threaten to kill me for it. An atheist, on the other hand, if someone held a knife to their throat, they'd say, `I'll believe whatever you say, sir. Just don't kill me!' If I believed what you do, I'd be utterly ashamed of my existence, embarassed about all the praying and singing I did, embarassed about making speeches about God, and ashamed of losing friends over it. If I believed what you do, I'd think I were wasting my time and money. Most of the things I do are in the interests of the afterlife.

"The `new heavens and new earth' the bible speaks of all depend on translation and contextual drift. It might refer to what happens when one dies. If so, then the afterlife is just a cleaned - up and idealized version of this life. Sort of like Disneyland."

No, what it depends on is what is actually there. If you saw through the illusion of Disneyland, you wouldn't be saying what you're saying now, unless you want to argue that it's a facade. Besides, the Disneyland idea doesn't match what the bible says elsewhere about the afterlife. Isaiah 65:17-25 tells us of an afterlife that has little or no resemblance to our current one. The life we're in now won't even be remembered.

"Since science has not found any evidence for the existence of heaven, it proves that it doesn't exist."

This argument relies on the ad ignorantum fallacy. "Because we don't know, this must be false." Science is a continual process of experimentation and discovery. In the time of Aristotle, people would argue that atoms and quarks do not exist because science hasn't proven their existence. Because "science hasn't proven it wrong," they could argue, the sun revolves around the earth. You are assuming too much to say that it doesn't exist. Heaven could be somewhere in space, another dimension, or it could be a plane of existence invisible to our senses. What if it's still there? What if the whole sum of science and evolution and all that stuff you've learned about the way the world operates is completely different in the afterlife? What if the concrete is different? What if things are composed of different molecules we haven't even thought of discovering yet? Or what if life is a dream?

"I'm glad the afterlife doesn't exist. It's too stressful. If I knew that there really was an afterlife, the stress of deciding which religion (or none) showed the true path towards it, would be very stressful indeed! One mistake, even with the best of intentions could result in an eternity of misery."

You don't know for a fact that the afterlife doesn't exist. And ignoring it won't go away. In fact, you contradict yourself when you say "or none," because it shows that you still have to make a decision concerning the afterlife. No matter what you do to try to avoid the stress, you will still face the possibility that your current best intentions `could result in an eternity of misery.' However, as I say elsewhere, you don't suffer for eternity in hell. The smoke of your torment goes up forever, but your spirit dies.

"Eternity is too big and long lasting to trust to the translated, modified, selected sayings of the long ago and far away dead!"

First, death is irrelevant to this argument. Even if you don't believe Jesus is alive, a dead person can still leave good, valid advice for the living. Secondly, I make it a point to study the oldest translations of the bible, to make sure what I believe is close to the original text. I believe God has guided the selections. You can't prove that anything has been modified. Translation modifies the original text, but the original text is still available for comparison. And God is a God of the living, not the dead. All the patriarchs and stuff are alive through God's power. Those points aside, what alternative do I have? As a person who believes in no religion, no God or gods, no afterlife, what do you give me to replace my beliefs about the afterlife? How can you try to replace a person's beliefs about the afterlife, which are something, with agnosticism or atheism, which is nothing? Even if what I believe is a lie, it's better than believing that you rot in a grave and that's it. Metaphorically, death, and what happens after, is like a labyrinth. You're stuck in the middle, with no clue as to how to get out, if even possible. On the floor are several maps, some new, some old, some that look like they're missing parts. These maps are texts from various religions. Now, say, what if there something outside the maze? What if you wanted to at least attempt to get out of there, even if it's impossible and you're sealed in? At least it would be better than standing there and dying, or fumbling around with no guidance whatsoever. At any rate, you have these maps laying on the floor. As an atheist or agnostic, you might be saying that all the maps are rot, that they all lead to dead ends and you're sealed in there, end of story. However, what if one of the maps were actually correct? What if one of them had clear enough directions to help you find the way out? Wouldn't it be better to stick to one map than trying to fumble around blind or just standing in one place, pessimistically expecting your fate to be sealed? Christians believe that the bible gives us the best possible map to help us out of that labyrinth, that it will help us be welcomed by God into heaven. Even if this is all a bunch of rubbish, it's better than having no direction whatsoever.

"A loving God wouldn't force us to make decisions concerning the afterlife. This is eternity we're talking about!"

See the argument in the later section.

"What if there were no Heaven or Hell? What if there were no afterlife? Death would be final and Fin. Would you still want to love God, etc?"

Yes, because God could still bring us to life in the ressurrection. Even if there were no afterlife, He could bring the saved back from the dead. And if God makes us immortal, then we don't need to worry about the afterlife.

"`Life is a dream?' I've heard that souls are supposed to think of the just - ended life that way (though how anyone could know this is a real puzzler!). If so, then cruelty or `fast living' during life, is unimportant. So lets all have a mess of fun committing debauchery and mayhem! When we die, it won't matter, and we can spend eternity having a really good laugh over it."

That argument only works if Judeo-Christianity isn't true, and you can't `wake up' in hell.

Souls

"As you do not know how the spirit comes to the bones in the womb of a woman with child, so you do not know the work of God who makes everything(Ecclesiastes 11:5)."

"There are no souls because a properly designed and `wired' brain is all that is required for consciousness."

• You're giving a limited interpretation of consciousness, which defines it only by wakefulness.
• You're making this conclusion on insufficient evidence. There's no way of telling whether what you personally perceive with the senses, your awareness, your personality, is completely a product of gray matter. There's no way to disprove the idea that perhaps it is our souls controlling the electrical signals in the brain.
• The phrase `properly designed' and `wired' implies a Designer and an Electrician. A `design,' according to the classic sense and meaning of the word, is always something created by an intelligent entity. You may want to pick a different phrasing.
• If there's a Designer and Electrician, then something in the `wiring' and `design' could possibly survive after death.

...And such a chemical/mechanical being can also have a soul that controls or affects it. If what we call the mind (awareness, perception, consciousness, personality, what makes us "us") resides not in the gray matter but in the soul puppeting the gray matter, there would be no problem with this assertion.

"Only 3.5 pounds of gray matter is what does our thinking! Were it not so, damaging the brain wouldnt diminish intelligence, and damaging certain parts of it wouldnt dramatically alter one's personality."

1. You only assume it diminishes intelligence. You can't prove that the intelligence still resides somewhere.
2. You only assume it has altered the personality. You can't prove that the personality isn't still the way it was, somewhere.
3. The method of communicating the personality is damaged, not the soul/personality itself. It's like a telephone. Perhaps brain damage is just a "bad connection" with the soul.
4. A computer can't operate without electricity for very long. Even if it has malfunctions internally, it still has power. The soul could be like the power behind a human being. Perhaps the electrical energy, and something more, something added to the electrical energy.
5. I think of the human brain as a puppet. A hand can go in a puppet, but that doesn't mean the puppet is the hand. A dog puppet has a human hand inside of it. I think our souls look a lot different, have a lot different properties than our bodies. You puppet a "(Name)" in FurryMUCK.

• I believe there is a personality and a consciousness that is created there before the child's birth, and while we can't perceive it, it doesn't have to be nonexistent. We can't go into the child's mind and experience what it's going through.
• The argument made here is a hasty generization based on the unstated premise that there are no immortal souls, or souls that exist independently of the body. In other words, that, "what we perceive to be the soul is merely a product of 20 or so pounds of gray matter inside the human skull, nothing more," that "brain activity comprises the whole of our being and/or existence." From here, the agnostic jumps to the unstated hasty generalization that "if the body dies, the soul also dies." And then he jumps from that one to an illogical conclusion that "because the body has lost a finger, the soul must also have lost a finger," or "if the brain is damaged, the soul's brain must also be damaged."
• C'mon. A soul is useless if it cannot succeed, replace, or survive the body, both in its totality and in its individual parts, like the brain.
• See the `children are basically neanderthals' argument below.

• In order to make this argument, you presuppose that what the psychologist said was true. Just because he was on CBS means nothing. I find as much value in this scientist as I do for Dr. Atkins.
• I find as much value for this `being governed by emotions and impulses' as I do for your argument that genetics created religion (see below).
• Even a child has free will, which includes the ability to choose between good and evil. Your doctor's argument is just as good as a person, involved in beastiality, saying `I was born that way! I can't help it!'
• Where is the `proof' that the child doesn't get a brain boost after it dies?
• Children often have immense, inspiring faith. Their souls could possibly be twice as developed as `adults.'
• None of us have any grounds by which to judge the `development' or `undeveloped qualities' of the soul. We are in no position to make such judgements. That is God's job.
• It's good that we cannot judge a person's spiritual development. When people judge young people as being spiritually undeveloped, it prevents growth from happening.
• Just because a kid is retarded doesn't mean his soul is. The strength of God manifests itself in weakness, the wisdom of God manifests in fools, so the brain `normality' of God manifests in those who have `very little' brains, or `abnormal' brains.
• It's likely that intelligent souls lay dormant, their latent intelligence hidden in the soul behind the mentally challenged mind.

What? No, that's called `memory.' Even if I were an atheist, I wouldn't find that explanation satisfying because it doesn't include consciousness.

"The idea of the soul is irrelevant because a person's soul is identical to what we perceive here in real life. A flawed body means a flawed soul. A retarded person will have a retarded soul. A person with a mental disorder will have a soul with that disorder. If you lose a limb on your body, it means your soul has also lost a limb."

I don't understand where this idea comes from. This argument is extremely ungrounded, and is either too imaginative, or not imaginative enough. In a way, it's imaginative because they try to imagine the fault of something they can't prove. It is an unimaginative idea, though, because they imagine the soul will be exactly like the person or body here on earth. "Get hit by a car, and the soul gets tire tracks on it, get brain damaged and the soul's brain gets damaged." I find this idea ridiculous. Personally, I believe that the soul is the human's perfected state. A person that may seem retarded here on earth may have an extremely intelligent soul, even though we can't perceive it here on earth. The limbs and organs of our body are not the same thing, not identical to the soul. I don't understand how a person can even attempt to argue such an illogical point as "how can God make flawed souls?". It would be similar to arguing, "I don't believe in heaven because God is supposed to be a seven foot tall fire breathing reptile." Does a person's hand get hurt if a puppet gets damaged? Would not the hand be of more importance than the puppet? The same goes for a soul. The puppet is like the human body. The hand is like the soul. The hand cannot be replaced, but the puppet can.

"If a person becomes a vegetable or goes into a coma, their soul gradually fades away."

Again, this communicates a complete lack of understanding about what a soul is supposed to be. It's a complete contradiction of the classic textbook definition of a soul. The soul is not the same thing as the mind or the physical body. A soul is supposed to be immortal. It makes no sense for a person's soul to die when the person expires. A soul like that is useless. So, if a soul doesn't die after a person does, why would the person's soul fade away when they've got a brain problem?

"Who says consciousness can exist independently of the brain? Brain damage or death certainly diminish all obvious signs of it!"

Do you know for a fact that they're not seeing, tasting, touching, feeling, or hearing something? No! All you have are outward observations. You see the person asleep or knocked out. That's not the same as knowing what he or she is feeling at the moment. Consciousness cannot be directly observed or measured. How do you know that the `obvious signs' mean anything? You don't know anything about what's going on in their heads! Consciousness, like I'm talking about, cannot be directly observed or measured. So it's unfair to say that their consciousness, their soul, is like you observe. And yet, later you say, "The idea of connecting with your inner wolf fascinates me. Unfortunately, it's hard to describe something that is outside Physical reality. It just turned out this way."

"Do these eternals (souls) have to eat? If so, dying (of something) will continue."

Again, this misunderstanding arises from the idea that the soul is synonymous with the body. While it is true that the unbeliever will be punished with a death, and their nonexistence will continue for eternity, it doesn't mean that skipping meals in heaven will kill you!

"`Souls don't have to eat,' you say? That implies that anyone who enjoys fine chow will be unhappy!"

I'm sure you will still be able to enjoy food even if you don't need to eat it. It's unimaginative to think that any pleasure would be denied in heaven. In heaven, you wouldn't starve, you wouldn't get fat, and you could eat all you want and never get fat or full.

Heaven

"Where is heaven? What is heaven?"

It might be another dimension, but only if there aren't any other ones to interfere with it or this world. Besides possibly hell, and that wouldn't really be `interference.' I believe this type of afterlife would go by different laws of physics than that of earth, and of course you've seen movies where ghosts pass through objects and what have you. I can only guess that heaven's up in space somewhere, or in some spiritual overlay on top of the physical clouds we can see, unaffected by jet planes and hot air balloons. I read a book called The Divine Revelation of Hell. That book describes a similar, but not identical situation, where the afterlife exists as an overlay over the physical world. Or, maybe spirits travel years into the future until they find a resting place in the new heaven and new earth that will replace the current one, as described in revelation. In that case, space or the clouds or something would be be replaced by something new, more like the heaven we like to think of as heaven. It could be somewhere in space. The bible doesn't say where or what it is made of, but I believe there's a heaven anyway. This is not a core doctrine, so the fact that I'm guessing about it doesn't make the religion false.

"I'm not missing out on anything. Heaven will be sparsely populated, if anyone's there at all./There will be very few, if any, people in heaven."

You don't know for a fact that heaven will have a small population. You're just assuming that to make yourself feel better about being an atheist. I don't think for a minute that heaven will be sparsely populated. If evil people like me can get in there, those people filling the churches can, too. I believe God gives multiple second chances, and the parable of the prodigal son and the parable of the vineyard workers tell me that sinners can go to heaven. Heaven should be a crowded place, if the prodigal son parable and the parable of the vineyard workers is any indication. In addition to the many foxhole converting Buddhists and Moslems and atheists, I also think heaven may be filled, unfairly so, with unbelievers. Perhaps this is what Matthew 22:1-14 speaks of. `Into the streets' seems to indicate all sorts of vagrants. Perhaps the `wedding garment' is merely understanding the true meaning of Jesus' death, resurrection and ascention? That Jesus is still alive? Or that people believe such? Maybe you, too, even if a lifelong atheist, will go to heaven. Maybe the thought of "Well, Jesus forgives me of everything, so I don't have to worry or fuss about it, or Jesus or God or the afterlife," as you spend the years soldering together transistors on Sunday mornings or whatever, will be enough to get you into heaven. Maybe, instead of rejecting Christianity as irrelevant, you just dismiss it as a done deal, a gurantee, and get on with your scientific research or whatever, and live life like you've always done before. Maybe the mere thought of "okay, I'm saved" will be enough, regardless of what you think about organized religion or whatever. Throughout the course of many sermons and bible studies, I've heard the ministry of Jesus, and his description of heaven as `turning the system of the world on its head.' I believe heaven has an infinite supply of money and space, so your absence from heaven would be no good at all. Certainly not beneficial. I hear often of how people in heaven cheer when a lost sinner gets saved. I believe that every Christian denomination that claims Jesus as their savior will go to heaven. Catholic, Baptist, Presbyterian, whatever. That's half a billion people right there.

"I'm not missing out on much anyway. In heaven, there isn't that much variety and opportunity - just a lot of worshipping and singing praises./Christians have this idea that, in heaven, you'll stand in a chorus praising God."

That's not true. That's not all there is, and all Christians don't ascribe to that oversimplistic idea. Heaven is supposed to be an unimaginably wonderful place, with lots of variety and opportunity to do what you feel like, a place without any sadness or pain or death, a place where all you do is have fun and enjoy yourself. Because the place is so wonderful, people are compelled to worship and praise God, out of thankfulness and joy. It's not because they were forced to do it. Who says it's boring? To me, that is an unsatisfying idea! So what if people will be in complete agreement there. It can be argued that a lack of evil would make a place boring, too. I mean, no one likes fiction when there's no good vs. evil conflict in it. But I believe that's a cultural thing, a human thing. I believe, in heaven, when we are suddenly in a world where evil is gone, where those earlier petty disagreements are gone, that we'll find more enjoyment in the things we once thought were boring. People on earth enjoy Dante's Inferno more than the Divine Comedy. Divine Comedy is the one where it's talking about heaven, which is less popular because we live on earth, which makes it seem uninteresting. Of course, it seems boring, because you can't relate to it. You've never experienced a world where sin and evil don't exist, so the idea doesn't thrill you. A worm in a mud pile sees only a mud pile around himself. But I can imagine such a world exists, and that it's ten times more fun than anything we can experience on earth. It's too bad that we can't relate to it right now. Concerning your attitude about the whole situation, I can only sigh and shake my head. You only believe in what you can relate to, which isn't much, and that's pretty sad. While I believe there will be praising involved, I also believe THAT'S NOT ALL THERE IS TO IT. That is not a good heaven. There has to be more to it than that. And even if that's all we do there, we'll have a good reason, since God will wipe away every tear from our eye, bring back our loved ones, and give us everything we ever wanted.

"Heaven is just a carrot the power hungry and greedy people dangle in front of others in order to exploit them."

In protestant Christianity that kind of manipulation is ineffective, because we believe that heaven is a free gift from God, through Jesus, that we don't have to do anything to receive. So, in this case, the carrot is not dangled in front of the mule, but it is rather given to the mule with no strings attached.

"String theory says that millions of dimensions exist. If heaven is one of them, I have no use for it. There would be too many extra-dimensional entities interfering with too many things at once. It's just too much to worry about. This is no way to run eternity. It's too complicated, so I'm not worrying about the afterlife."

This is the difference between spiritual reality and science fiction. Science fiction says that there are bug eyed monsters and mischevious extra-dimensional aliens floating around in multiple dimensions, interfering with dimensions nearby. I wasn't arguing for the existence of four eyed buffalo from Dimension X. I was simply stating the possibility that one dimension besides ours might exist, the dimension of heaven.

"If heaven is another dimension, why would a loving God allow extra-dimensional creatures interfere with human life?"

The only extra-dimensional entity you'd have to worry about would be God. In Christ, we fear nothing.

"The afterlife is a do-it-yourself type of thing, where every man a God. Nothing exists until the will of the dear departed creates it. This offers the opportunity for any sort of Heaven, Hell, or whatever."

If the dead person's mind creates heaven, it's not a very good heaven. It makes it seem more like just a theater created by a decaying brain. Christians and Jews believe that heaven is not the creation of the human mind. It is so fantastic that our earth based minds cannot imagine it or relate to it. A worm in mud only sees mud, and can't imagine anything beyond it, because of its tiny size. We will certainly be amazed when we are taken off this patch of mud and placed in that world that human minds can't even visualize.

"If the duty, purpose, and joy of the Heavenly is to adore and praise God, how does an eternity of that not become just a smidge boring?"

Not if you have millions of ways to praise him and still use your full brain capacity, etc. I think there's more than one way to praise. And when God gives you everything you ever wanted and more, you'd have that much more to praise and adore him about.
The Purpose Driven Life book says something about praise having more than one meaning. You can praise God through your actions, or something. One of my church members suggested that smiling at people was an act of praise. I'm not sure what to think about all that, but I think being creative and artistic can be an act of praise. And if God gives us some of his powers, using them could also be an act of praise. We're obviously too spiritually immature to use them here on earth, but maybe in heaven we could.

"Eternal judgement isn't fair. A fair, loving God wouldn't throw people into hell."

• What kind of loving God would allow people to waste their lives serving and worshipping Him if everyone were just going to go to heaven anyway? What kind of loving God wouldn't reward his servants?
• If everyone, believers and unbelievers, all went to heaven, it would make heaven a lot like this place. The unbelievers would actually find their wrong beliefs reaffirmed if God let everyone be saved, regardless of belief.
• What kind of loving human being would reject the free gift of salvation and Christ's sufferings on their behalf by not believing?
• What kind of loving God would reward a man with heaven if he lives and dies without being a bit sorry for killing someone in cold blood?
• While the results of God's judgement is eternal, the suffering of hell is only momentary. The smoke of their torment rises forever, but that doesn't mean they're tormented forever. Because the unbeliever doesn't believe God exists, God makes them not exist. It's poetic justice to cancel the existence of a person who believes their existence doesn't continue after death anyway.
• What kind of intelligent God would let people continue mocking, discrediting, rejecting and scoffing at everything He tries to do for them?
• If a father decides to buy his son a brand new car, nearly going broke doing so, and the son sells the car for scrap, does the father not have a right to be angry? God gave the ultimate sacrifice, his son Jesus, for our benefit. He has a right to be angry at people who reject that gift. Otherwise, God would be too soft headed for us to even bother wasting our time on.
• If a person drowns because they were trying to fish a gold earring out of a swimming pool grate instead of leaving it there - whose fault is that? It's not God's fault. They're the ones who do themselves in for pursuing wealth and other things instead of eternal life.
• If a helicopter drops a life raft to a drowning person in the middle of the ocean, and the person is strong and able to reach the raft and use it, but doesn't choose to, and drowns instead, whose fault is it?
• If a guy is always calling a girl, but she doesn't every call him, keeps putting him on hold when he calls, always telling him to call back at a vague "later" or "during the day," without any committment to a specific time, if she's always "busy" and when he goes to her house, there are other boyfriends hanging around, would he not be justified in dumping her? And how easy it is, considering she never bothered to call him! So, too, God will `dump' people who treat him shamefully in the same way. There is no law that says he must try to love someone who is aware of Him but has another `boyfriend,' i.e. another god(or Nogod), or someone who constantly ignores Him, makes him wait, puts him off, puts him on hold, and doesn't call (pray) to Him. Would this be in line with our concept of a loving God? Yes. God gets jealous when we love other gods because He wants our love more. God is patient, but that doesn't mean he won't eventually give up on someone if they are adamant enough about not wanting to believe in Him. Plus, he's probably doing them a favor by wiping out their spiritual existence quickly in hell - so they don't have to be with a God they don't like anyway. God still loves them, and is crushed and heartbroken and longing for their love, but they never reciprocate, so He has to do something.

Hell is a place where the soul dies. Hell is a place of eternal death. If your soul is dead, it can't be floating around, agonized, in a lake of molten lava for all eternity. The bible says nothing about people being tortured forever. While "the worm does not die" and "the fire does not quench," the people thrown into the fire certainly are burnt up quickly. So they wouldn't be tortured endlessly. The book of revelation says that the smoke of their torment would rise forever, not that their torment would be forever. As an atheist, you argue that God doesn't exist. It is therefore poetic justice to cease to exist yourself at the last judgement, for believing and advertising such a belief. The bible speaks of God crushing his enemies, and they would be no more. This certainly contradicts the idea of endless punishment. The worm doesn't die, and the fire doesn't quench, but that doesn't mean the soul has to sit in it forever. Psalm 37:20 speaks of the wicked going up in smoke. So, it appears as if the unrepentant sinners will be dropped into the fires of hell, and be burned up, not tortured forever in the fire. Malachi 4:1-3 speaks of God's enemies being turned to ash at God's feet. They'll go up in smoke and vanish. Also, the Greek word for forever doesn't indicate eternity or infinity. "Forever," in Greek, just means nothing can stop it or prevent it, something that will continue as long as conditions permit.

"A loving God would eliminate free will and brainwash people into believing. If God were so interested in making everybody love Him, why didn't he just brainwash them into doing that instead of throwing them into hell?"

Forced love is rape. It's not love. God loves his creations, so he gives them free will. He did not create robots. If he truly hated the people who hate him, he would have struck them down by now. It's no fun to be surrounded by a bunch of mindless Furbys that just sit around praising you all the time. Many unbelievers have a long lifespan so that they have time to change their mind about God, so that more people can go to heaven. But as for the people who never accept God, they will just have their long lifespan, and that will be it, they'll be dead and be no more, since their existence will not continue in heaven.

"Why would you go to hell immediately for becoming an atheist? Doesn't everything you have done in your life count for anything?"

According to the bible, no. In the Old Testament, if a person intentionally sins, their good deeds are forgotten, their sins remembered. But Jesus fulfilled the ritual sacrifice to pay for all sin, so now we live in grace. Because of Christ's sacrifice, the New Testament writers can say "By grace you have been saved, through faith, not by works, lest any man should boast." Okay, so maybe I wouldn't die immediately and go to Hell, but I would live in constant fear of that happening. All the things I tried to do, all the good deeds, they'd all be swept away, because by not believing in God, by believing in something else, would be idolatry, and God would remember my sin, and since I wouldn't be believing in Jesus, either, because Jesus is the son of God, I'd be throwing all that away. It's "horribly unfair," but life isn't fair. I don't see why fairness would figure in the equation. It's a different worldview. An atheist can say, "It's not fair that people shoot each other, but that's just a fact of life. People do that." Or something like that. But a Christian can say, "It's not fair that people go to hell, but that's just a fact of life. Doubting hell's existence won't make it go away." That's just my worldview. What I believe in. How I see reality. And how other Christians see reality. To a Christian, it's very "real" to say, "Who are we to question why God throws people into Hell? Or how loving he is? He created us!" But that doesn't fit within the confines of your worldview. Life isn't fair. You can't always get what you want, but you can get what you need. I think we both can agree to that, at least. But my main motivation is not avoiding hell, but loving others like Jesus loved me, and to get reward in heaven. Hell is the very last motivation. The way I described it was a bit cruel sounding, true. Maybe your're right. Maybe it is a bit crummy. Maybe God will give me more chances than I know. I have doubted in His existence in the past. I struggled with my doubts for at least a day or so. He could have killed me at any time. I guess the fact that he doesn't squash me like a bug whenever I have a moment's doubt is very loving and kind. I can only be "eternally grateful" for that. But to go on doubting for a week? A month? A year? To become an Atheist? I think there's a limit to God's patience. He's a lot more patient than me, but when he gets angry, boy, I don't want to face that! But once you believe in Jesus, once you accept Jesus in your life, you don't need to worry about that. Forgiveness can't be taken away from you. When you're saved, you're saved. If you intentionally break God's commandments after being saved, and if you still believe in Jesus and worship God, you will be least in the kingdom of heaven, maybe a janitor or a poor person there, but you won't go to Hell. Of course, if you truly love God, and if you're being honest, you'll avoid sinning intentionally. Accidental slipups are always forgivable. Doubt is forgivable. Jesus forgave everyone's sins. They just have to repent and reach out and ask him into their lives. True, there is a fear of hell in the back of my mind. But the bible says, "The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom." But I don't fear DEATH as much. So I'd like to think I wouldn't be afraid to be a martyr. The people who came before Jesus were all saved. Moses included.

"The pastor says Hell is separation from God. Right now, that means almost nothing to me. "but I presume he means that when we die, we suddenly know much more and can feel the distance from God's love more acutely - and that the lack of it is the torture meant by `Hell'."

How about the separation from all that is good in life? Does that mean anything to you?