Patrick Greene Changes His Mind About Converting to Christianity

Unfortunately, he’s still an idiot.

*obliged

What difference does it make if he is a Christian or not a Christian if there is not God? With no God, Christianity is just as empty as atheism. Nothing has any meaning and permanence, and atheism elevates nothing.  Good people suffer, bad people prosper, both end up the same, dead like a beast.  Cruel people face no judgment, good people receive no reward. It is all empty and vain.  Also, where does the conscience he mentions come from?  To go through life and not seek God is a heart issue, not an intellectual issue.  Rejecting a lot of the obvious nonsense in religion is just an excuse used by many for not seeking God  because in the heart of hearts we really don’t want God  (we have “turned everyone to his own way,” as Isaiah states).  God has made His reality and power clear through creation so that man is “without excuse.” (Romans 1:20) 

Honestly, I don’t see it as an issue. The man felt drawn in while dealing with an unexpected illness and unexpected compassion (from an unexpected group!) Have none of you ever ‘thought’ something was genuine, yet soon realized that wasn’t the direction you wanted at all? Any relationships that seemed a good idea in the beginning, but quickly changed your mind?  Unless there is more to the story than what is on this page, I don’t understand why its a big deal that the man briefly questioned his own beliefs. Sure, it isn’t the best way to accept a gift, but at least he was honest enough to recognize the mistake and then own up to it.

Throw him back in the water.

Nothing has any meaning? What about all these people who have strong opinions on things that matter to them? Atheism is empty? What about the whole frickin’ awe-inspiring universe out there, ours to explore and decide how we fit in it. Good people suffer? Yes. Bad people prosper? Yes. Both end up the same, dead like a beast. Yes. None of that is news, but it sure can make us grateful for the life we have, and our opportunity to do something (we find) meaningful with it. Cruel people face no judgement? I would say there is at least a social cost to being cruel, if not a legal one depending on the circumstance. Good people receive no reward? Sometimes, but being good in itself can be intrinsically valuable. It is all empty and vain? Speak for yourself. My life is full of meaningful wonder, surprise, art, music, family, friends, striving, failing… Where does one’s conscience come from? That’s an emergent property of social beings learning to see from someone else’s perspective–also known as empathy. To go through life and not seek God is a heart issue as opposed to an intellectual issue? Many of us, including it would seem Patrick Greene have sought this God we’ve been told about, with both heart and intellect, and have found both susceptible to fallacy. Rejecting a lot of obvious nonsense in religion is just an excuse for not seeking God? What about the obvious nonsense of God itself? Man has made God his reality through wishful thinking, ignorance, rhetorical techniques and logical fallacies. Growing up, opening our eyes to religion as story, and recognizing the power of story and its use as metaphor, can be insightful, meaningful, and bring one peace–particularly when one is freed from the manipulative tool of “divine” judgement.

The guy certainly appears to be a twit, regardless of what he believes about gods.

It takes a lot for me to be angry at someone who has fallen victim to the weaknesses of our species. This man is more to be pitied more than anything else.

 How….

…how?

 Was someone angry about him? He’s confused, a little dumb in some ways, a little disingenuous, and pretty opportunistic, judging from details provided earlier. The only reason he’s mattered this past week is because professional Christian liars and fallacious thinkers invariably ascribe unwarranted importance to a “conversion”. See the “Lady Hope” hoax, which they’re still citing well over a century later and which wouldn’t have mattered even if it were true.

That didn’t last long. 

Either way, he’s still clearly an idiot.

Don’t apologize for the post Mr M, it’s been quite a popular subject & has probably had a few people wondering if they could ever see themselves doing the same thing in similar circumstances. I did & am happy to say that i don’t think i would. You have to be true to your convictions to really be Atheist & i’m pleased to see the guy did have some integrity, finally. We can all go back to ignoring this guy now (I hope).

I would think that losing your eyesight would be a pretty frightening  situation to be in.  We can rationalize all we want, but unless we find ourselves in the same situation it is hard to fathom how we would react.

Some years ago, I was given no more than 6 months to live. I went from stunned, to angry, to self pity and finally I decided to fight. As I am writing this, I obviously won the battle (we are all going to lose the war) but in the process I went through some pretty awful thought processes. 
I am not sure how I would have reacted if a bunch of religious people rallied around me and gave me at least some hope. I’d like to think reason would have prevailed, but the choice was not put in front of me, so I’ll never know for sure.

But I remember the terror and the desperation all too well.  Were I a Christian, I would not be too proud that it takes something of that magnitude to convert an atheist. If Christianity was as good as they say it is, why does one have to be dying or going blind to accept it?

Despite the fact that you wish you had not mentioned him in the first place, the story is not about “him” so much as the experience that he shared with the world.  Atheist fell under the spell of human warmth and love, made an emotional decision as a result, then in the cold light of dawn realised that this emotional decision did not correlate with what he believed on an intellectual level.

Message:
a) It’s all right to receive love, even when not a xtian.
b) It’s easy to let your emotions rule your intellect – beware.
c) It ultimately doesn’t matter to anybody else but yourself.  Dree your own wyrd.

No probs, I enjoy the photo of him giving Basement Cat a boost.

I didn’t understand how he could go from atheist to pastor in a New York minute.   This makes more sense but I don’t fathom the guy.    I was just trying to help him get past his immediate problem without him having to sacrifice whatever principles he had due to his illness.   I still don’t get how he’s flipped from needing $400 for immediate needs and saying the rest goes to the animal shelter to having enough money for a dream mobile home.    That doesn’t make sense and makes me feel like I’ve been had.

 It hurts to WATCH. Stupid atheist human empathy, making me feel others’ discomfort. Damn Satan for putting this biochemical reaction in us!

Worm food? Is that the only way you can reflect on your life? Your comments convey more about your sense of self than that of atheists. When I reflect on my life, I am so grateful for the decades I’ve spent with my family and friends, the joyful moments I’ve experienced with my wife and children, and the lessons I’ve learned from failures and been able to pass on. I think of how fortunate I am to have been born in an era where we’ve made so many great advances in our knowledge of our vast universe. I have been able to learn and do things that would not have been possible for people living a century ago, or even for billions of people today. It breaks my heart to see the masses of people around the world struggling and toiling in poverty. It pains me to see the suffering of millions of innocent men, women, and children dying from painful afflictions. There is no justice for their suffering, no divine plan or omnibenevolent deity intending it to happen for some divine purpose. 

It serves to remind me of how grateful I need to be for the life I’ve lived, and that I have to do all I can to help reduce their suffering. And yet, according to you, we’re supposed to be dissatisfied with our lives and mourn the immortality you foresee for yourself? If the only way you can think of yourself in death is as “worm food”, I would suggest you spend time in this life working to leave a legacy for your family and friends that is worth remembering and cherishing – rather than prophesying to atheists about their impending doom. 

 I can assure you, your apologetics have been thoroughly shredded for years, in some cases many decades, and that you have nothing to base your claims of being right upon except the desire to be right.

Why do you assume that absolute death is “nothing to look forward to”? DYING is scary. BEING DEAD is nothing to worry about at all. To paraphrase Mark Twain, we were already dead for fourteen billion years. Being back in that state isn’t really the least bit inconvenient (although getting there is a bitch).

 Considering how difficult things become after less than a century of living, we can see that much longer would be tremendously unpleasant, and in time maddening.

Imagine knowing right this minute with certainty that the monstrous injustice is occurring of one person being tortured infinitely for a finite offense. Now imagine knowing that outrage all the time FOREVER.

You can’t. Humans aren’t built to comprehend that sort of madness, which is one of many reasons why discussion of an “afterlife” is moronic at its base.

Also:
   1.If you don’t think that would outrage you, there’s something seriously wrong with how you view existence and other people.
   2.If you think God will take away all your negative feelings and give you eternal bliss, you’re saying that the afterlife strips you of who you are, in which case: what’s the point of continuing to live after death?
   3. As a corollary to #2, if God takes away all suffering after death and replaces it with bliss, and your soul after death isn’t burdened by things like the numbing effects of eternal amounts of time passing, then that really isn’t the same “You” anymore, in which case:
Why would you continue to be punished after death! That’s more psychotic than torturing a severe Alzheimer’s patient because he committed a crime when he was young and mentally competent.

 I’m glad you won the battle.  I had a few thoughts as I read your post.  1. Even though no Christians overtly reached out to you how do you know you did not have Christians praying for you?  Nurses at you doctor’s office? Co-workers?  2.  Aside from the Christian prayers, who says that God cannot help even those who do not reach out to Him?   In the Bible it happened both ways – sometimes those who needed Jesus came to Him, sometimes He went to them. 3.  I have been a Christian most of my life and the majority of Christians I know did not have to have some dramatic recovery from a life-threatening illness, etc. to become Christians.  Some people do take that route though.  For some it takes an accident or illness to understand the true frailty of the human condition and to realize that there is something bigger than themselves in control of it all.    I think it is a big leap though to say that one has to be dying or going blind to accept it.  I have never been in either situation yet still see God at work in my life and those around me on a daily basis.  We can disagree on the existence of God, but not the existence of Christians and it is a mistake to assume that most Christians seek/find God through some tragedy when that is actually the exception, not the rule.

He is not an idiot. He is an smart man. He receives  help so he says  that he has changed his beliefs.  Business are business

In other words, he was a fraud.

My question is, how much cash did he get? LOL!