The Way God Intended.

@ViciDraco I don't worship important figures.

@sree251 I did not say you did. I just suggested it is weird that they are they written as exemplars of faith if they behaved in ways that God did not intend.

@ViciDraco We live in a world of hype. What is God to you anyway? Do you even believe in that damn thing?

@sree251 I was raised catholic, even going to a private school, but shifted to non-denominational Christian. Throughout my life questions kept mounting that nobody had good answers to. As a young adult I finally decided to read the Bible on my own with a critical mind and to stop accepting what others are telling me things meant.

I came away realizing there was a lot of good and bad but that ultimately there wasn't a shred of evidence any of it was true or divinely inspired. After that, I tried to cling to faith for a time but realized I was pretending. Once I fully accepted I did not believe anymore, I started to become aware of the societal harm that people believing these things was causing.

I am not just an athiest - someone who does not believe in god(s)
I am an anti-theist - someone who believes god beliefs are causing real and present harm to society

@ViciDraco I was raised a Catholic also. I went through the same phase as you did and started reading the Bible on my own. My grandma was a devout Catholic. She did me no harm. She loved me and was a wonderful matriarch, a steadying influence on the family. I liked listening to her ramblings down memory lane and would sit with her for hours. One day, she asked me: "What if God was not true?" I knew God was not true by then but didn't respond to her question. She needed her belief that has been her strength in life. She didn't do anyone any harm. The strength she drew from her believe in God enabled her to provide confidence to my mom and aunts in dealing with issues in their lives. What societal harm did she cause? When there was death in the family, Father Ed was there. Christianity is about the family living in the grace of God. The Church is there for Christian families.

Why do you hate people of faith? They do you no harm.

@sree251 What have I said that implies I hate people of faith? My maternal grandparents are/were deeply religious. And some of the best people I know. I made no attempts to disrupt their faith.

What I do do, is attempt to disrupt proselytizing and conversion. I do not seek to rip religion away from those who have it, but to prevent its spread to those who are not already indoctrinated.

Though I view the decline of religion as a positive for society, I far prefer the slow process of vaccinating against the mind virus than I do the forceful clash of wills that drives people further into their position regardless of the quality of arguments.

I very rarely expect the person posting pro-religious sentiments to consider my words. Rather they are offered for the audience to have alternative viewpoints to consider.

@ViciDraco Ok, so I guess you find my OP offensive and you want to disrupt my proselytizing? Well, I was just speaking out loud to myself and posted it for discussion.

So, what alternative viewpoints do you have? If you are waiting to be born into this world, and have a choice, what alternative to "The way God intended" would you choose?

@sree251 Well, the original point was that the Bible seems to have conflicting messages on monogamy vs polygamy, and indeed exact rules that in some circumstances requires breaking monogamous rulings. That is unless you claim Jesus created a new covenant that eliminates those old rules, which is also theologically controversial given readings of the Bible. Especially given that Jesus himself claimed the law could but be changed.

So in this case, my attempt to disrupt proselytizing was to demonstrate "The Way God Intended" is not necessarily even correct according to the source material (the Bible).

The reason why I felt this was important to disrupt is because the greatest danger I view in religion is in how people promote it to be legislated into law. Your statement could be used as a rallying cry to strip rights of gays to marry, for example. Or to deny them the ability to adopt. Or could be used to denigrate single parents or divorcees as going against God's intentions.

There are a lot of ways to take your statement and consider a lot of people "less than" because they do not live up to intention.

@sree251 As for being born into a family, a stable polyamorous family honestly seems the best - if I were to choose one. Multiple adults able to provide resources and supportive roles. Note my terms include stable but not polygamous. I view marriage as optional, and do not have a prescription for optimal numbers of male or female participants.

@ViciDraco You said: "As for being born into a family, a stable polyamorous family honestly seems the best - if I were to choose one."

Is this even possible? Where are you going to find such a family even if God could scan the world to look for one for you? You have to consider reality. How would you start such a family? Are you talking about a bunch of guys and gals working at Home Depot or Amazon getting together and set up home to raise your kind of family? I am sure it's great to sleep around with whom ever you want but who is going for the fat girl?

@ViciDraco You said: "Well, the original point was that the Bible seems to have conflicting messages on monogamy vs polygamy,..."

You drifted away from the Bible, you said. Me too. So, why bring up the Bible and its interpretations by practitioners of the Christian faith? We are not discussing biblical teachings but what I have (or you have) learned through our reflective inquiry into God's intention for human relationship.

Put yourself into the position of the baby arriving in the world we are living now. Every second, there are 4 babies joining the human race. You are one of them, and you can choose: one parent, two parents, no parent.... What? I have identified the best family for the baby. You have a better one? Let's discuss your choice.

@sree251 There is so much to unpack here that I am not going to get anywhere close to all of it.

There are many polyamorous family units across the US and across the world. They make up a minority of relationships but they not non-existent.

I am in a polyamorous relationship and have been for eleven years. The same one. I am a straight male. I have not just slept around with whomever, as that is a gross misunderstanding of what poly relationships are about. The children, not my biological but from a previous relationship, are well adjusted and get attention and support from multiple parental figures. As do many children from monogamous relationships that split up and then have two sets of step parents.

I don't understand why you believe fat girls would be less desirable in a polyamorous relationship. Would you elaborate on that?

@ViciDraco There were characters in the bible who did that, but those actions weren't really condoned by the Hebrew God in the scriptures. It says that the king should only have one wife, and if you actually examine the stories about the men with multiple girls, it usually demonstrated that being his downfalll.

The apostle Paul also write in the NT that a church leader should be the husband of one wife.

@BRUUH The Bible also says that if your brother has a wife and dies before they have a child, you are supposed to make her your own wife and have a child with her. Independent of whether you already have your own wife.

@ViciDraco You sound genuine. I will address questions we bring up with due respect.

I am not saying that all fat girls are the top pick for a roll in the hay. I was just using her as a figure of speech.

The word polyamorous means non-exclusive relationship. It is difficult for me to visualize your situation for discussion. I cannot think of a viable example for analysis other than a herd of elephants. Even though the calf clings to its mother who is primary caretaker, the rest of the herd do tend to it when it is no longer attached to her. Can we live like elephants? If we can, then that would be God's intention for the human family too.

There is obviously something wrong with monogamy. It is culturally contrived and not as natural as I think. And you say?

@sree251 Many tribal societies around the world raise children as a village. Each child is the responsibility of every man in the village. In some of them exact fathers are known, in others they are not.

I am not saying that something is wrong with monogamy either. It works very well for some people and not so well for others.

The very notion that some deity has an intention leads people to trying to determine what that intention is and then assigning values of right and wrong to it. When maybe what is right is not so clear-cut with a huge amount of nuance and benefits and drawbacks that make what serves as the best option extremely situational and impossible to nail down.

@ViciDraco Cite me one tribal society that practices polyamorous relationship. I am skeptical for the very reason why I feel monogamy is not natural. Multiple sexual partners is one form of western responses to monogamy, a traditional cultural construct.

@sree251 I can't find the articles I read over a decade ago and quick searches reveal mostly hearsay and oral evidence of past poly societies or describe ancient societies. In not finding quick reference to modern information. Largely because apparently a lot of polycules are adopting the tribe terminology for their family unit.

Your claim that multiple sexual partners is a response to western monogamy is... weird. Poly relationships, especially one man, many women have popped up numerous times in history. Nepal is a famous exception for being one woman many men. To claim multiple sexual partners, a thing that existed before "western society" is a response to western society is confusing.

@ViciDraco Nepalese and other people in remote places in the Himalayas do not practice western style open sexual relationships. Nepalese women do not have many men unless they are westernized prostitutes living in the west. There are extenuating circumstances where a man allows his brother access to his wife with the approval of tribal elders only because she is the only woman within a hundred miles and there is need for more children.

@sree251 You missed the part where I mentioned this was historical, not modern. Likewise, there is no need to jam "western style open sexual relationships" into the discussion. You are taking a very broad category and narrowing it into a single thing. I am speaking about non-monogamous practice as a whole, which takes many forms and as mentioned before works in some scenarios for some people but not in others.

You seem to want to keep honing in on very specific definitions to find a "Most correct model". But my point is that a most correct model does not exist.

@ViciDraco "Most correct model" is not the same as an ideal model which is a concoction. I did accede to your suggestion that the best model is that of the elephant herd. If it can work for elephants and probably other herd animals, then it could be the best model for humans. I know for a fact that monogamy is unnatural. As such, it cannot be God's plan. I wish you would discuss the elephant model for humans with me. How can it work for us and why isn't it happening?

@sree251 what makes you believe monogamy is unnatural for all people?

@ViciDraco It very well may say that somewhere in the torah. In my comment, I wasn't trying to say the Hebrew God is reasonable. I'm simply saying that your implication that christian theology doesn't promote monogamy, is not entirely true. Again, you point to kings and bible figures having multiple wives, yet if you examine those stories carefully, the moral of those ancient stories are probably "don't be a man hoe" lmfaoo

@ViciDraco Monogamy can happen if you meet your "twin-flame". This is a term I found on a spiritual forum. Apparently, there are couples - man and woman - who mate for life from the moment they meet, usually in their teens. But it can happen later in life. Ordinarily, men and women struggle to make their relationships work. If you have to struggle, then it isn't natural.

When I was in my teens, I was susceptible to infatuation with girls. It was pretty powerful stuff. It wasn't sexual attraction. There is nothing sexual about a sixteen or seventeen year old girl. Sexual allure is a contrivance and quite evil. Infatuation was spell binding, and it was all about her manner, her eyes, her voice. And left to our own devices, she and I would have copulated for sure without premeditation and intent. Think about that. I am speculating, of course. A sustained relationship, to my mind, is unnatural unless it is a twin-flame situation. This is why monogamy is unnatural. The marriage bond is an imposition that society places on its members for obvious reasons: parental responsibility for offspring, as well as, social harmony. The human father is an cultural artifact. Nature has no fathers, only mothers.

@sree251 That is a lot to unpack. But I am going to have to agree to disagree with several points, including that twin-flame (also frequently called a soulmate) is a thing that exists or a requirement for successful monogamy. That sexual allure is somehow a contrivance or evil. And the statement that nature has no fathers.