Gotta remember not everyone took any form of religious history classes... The words you speak are blasphemy... The Baptist faith, along with the Lutheran, Mormon, Catholics and everyone else are all 100% correct.... there is no room for error... Everyone is right... No one is incorrect so long as everyone agrees that their personal faith is the right one and everyone else is wrong :)

Oh no, you're quite wrong. They're all horrible lies and blasphemy, save for one. The one true faith. The faith that the Lawd himself penned (through various different people over the centuries, naturally). The faith that, unlike the tens of thousands of other religions, is the only path to everlasting bliss.
All the other faiths might say exactly the same thing, and deride the one true faith with equal revulsion, but they're poor misguided fools. Unlike believers in the one true faith, of course.
Whatever that is.

That one's legit. I don't think that anyone could have written such humorous content in quite such a formal manner otherwise.

The Bible is entirely internally consistent, given a few assumptions:
1) There does exist an omnipotent, omniscient, and omnipresent entity. (given that we only perceive the 4 dimensions of space-time out of a couple dozen, or what ever physicists think it is now, possible dimensions, I don't think this is that far fetched a possibility).
2) This entity is benevolent.
3) This benevolent entity is the Creator of the human race.
4) This benevolent creator involves itself in human affairs.
From the outside, Christianity seems like a bunch of circular logic. But, this is why it requires a Leap of Faith to believe in God. Once one believes in God, everything else makes sense. It isn't overlooking the faults, everything does become consistent (at least from my vantage point).
My trouble is that I had certain events in my life lead to a crisis of Faith. I find it very difficult to assume that a benevolent God that involves Himself in human affairs would allow such evil to persist in the world. I understand the doctrine about free will and how we must choose God of our own volition, however I believe the end result is more capricious than benevolent.

Belief in the Bible as truth requires faith, but belief in God does not. Given how the most commonly accepted origins of the universe require a beginning.

Well, I believe that an omnipotent entity probably exists. I also wouldn't argue that this entity created the universe (because it is truly a moot point). However, I do have trouble believing this omnipotent entity is benevolent and actively takes part in human affairs (one or the other might be true individually, but not both simultaneously). Hence, while there may be a godlike entity, it is not, in my eyes, the God of the Bible.
Maybe we are saying the same thing, but I wanted to clarify my point anyway.

That's not what I remember from reading it. Here's a few things Off the top of my my head:
1.The four different accounts of the resurrection found in Mark 16, Matthew 28, Luke 24, and John 20 seem to be in conflict.
2.John 18 seems to depict the betrayal of Jesus differently than Matthew 26.
[url=http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Matthew%2026:%2047-52&version=NKJV]Matthew 26: 47-54[/url] [url=http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=John%2018:%203-13&version=NKJV]John 18: 3-12[/url]
3.For an omnipotent, omniscient, and omnipresent deity, Yahweh/Jehova seemed rather absent minded while he was trying to lead King Ahab to his doom in 1st Kings 22.
4.Benevolent?Are we talking about the same guy that was behind Joshua's campaign of ethnic cleansing and later chastised Israel for not being aggressive enough?
I was leaning towards a more Calvinist view of the world before my deconversion, so I would have differed with you on the doctrine of free will. I still think Predestination and Preselection make more sense in the greater context of the bible.

The gospels blatantly contradict eachother on basic facts, especially those pertaining to the (alleged) crucifixion. There is no consistency whatsoever, unless you're insane and choose to believe that red can indeed be interpreted as blue once you just "believe in God".
That aside, the same gospels also at some points contradict established historical facts of the period. They also have rather huge gaps in them that believers are all too keen to fill with various "interpretations".
I've said it before, and I'll say it again; The Bible is nothing but a hodgepodge of censored documents cooked together by a roman council with some rather ... strong biases. We've known this for quite some time, however it was virtually proven with the discovery of the dead sea scrolls and their content.

Rofl. Delusional quote of the year.

I have explained it earlier. You are not asking for direct help, because saints can't do it. You are merely asking for a prayer in your case. You never asked anyone to pray for you?
“but nothing unclean will enter it” (Rev 21, 27).
And:
“for no one can lay a foundation other than the one that is there, namely, Jesus Christ.
If anyone builds on this foundation with gold, silver, precious stones, wood, hay, or straw,
the work of each will come to light, for the Day will disclose it. It will be revealed with fire, and the fire (itself) will test the quality of each one's work.
If the work stands that someone built upon the foundation, that person will receive a wage.
But if someone's work is burned up, that one will suffer loss; the person will be saved, but only as through fire.“ (1 Cor 3, 11-15)
Please excuse me using NAB translation.
I would point you to the books of the Maccabees, but I think that these may be missing in your edition ;)
Purgatory is a state of leaving all imperfections behind.
If you are referring to indulgences, then these are still here, and are connected to what I have written above (and distinction between mortal and venial sins). I can find parts about Relics if you want.
As you see – it's a matter of perspective ;)

I think that everyone that actually believes in something at some point has to experience, maybe not necessarily a crisis, but at least some doubts.
What you have written reminds me of one short story. (I have heard it once some 12 years ago so it may not be exactly accurate)
“A man met a beggar on a street, asking for help.
And the man asked God: “Why do You allow this suffering? Why haven't You done anything about it?”
And God answered: “I have. I have created you”.”

Not the point, why would God be more or less likely to accept a prayer from a dead person than from you? He answers all prayers the way that is best for what you need.
First, 1 Corinthians 3:11-15 is referring to false doctrines, since a literal fire cannot destroy spoken word then both parts are probably referring to a figurative fire, the the pain of human pride from repenting from spreading a false teaching.
And I should have put it better, God is all powerful, the only thing you need to do to be guaranteed salvation is accept it from Christ, given that God is benevolent, He would not put us through pain that we didn't need to be put through and given that He is all powerful He would not need to put us through any pain that we didn't decide to put ourselves through. And people who accept Christ are cleansed of their sins and reborn, so they aren't unclean anyhow.
Also, the books of Maccabees are apocryphal in the Anglican Church, so they are not missing, just taught as good lessons but not as the inspired Word, and it should probably be noted that the Roman Catholic Church did the same until 1546 when they canonized it at the Council of Trent, which was done specifically because it supported what they were teaching that wasn't supported by other scripture, such as Purgatory and their canonization was one of the largest reasons for the separation of the Anglican Communion. In fact, Saint Jerome who, if you'll recall, translated the Bible into Latin for common usage in the 5th century and is still what Catholic biblical translations are mostly based on today(and Anglican ones for that matter) even stated that the apocrypha should remain non-canon. And given that the texts of Macabees themselves actually say they aren't written by a prophet then they aren't the inspired Word of God.
1 Maccabees 4:46 "They stored the stones in a suitable place on the temple hill, until a prophet should come and decide what to do with them."
1 Maccabees 9:27 "There had not been such great distress in Israel since the time prophets ceased to appear among the people."
1 Maccabees 14:41 "'The Jewish people and their priest have, therefore, made the following decisions. Simon shall be their permanent leader and high priest until a true prophet arises."
Given that the books themselves state that that there were no prophets at that time, how can it be the inspired Word?

Oh, fuck off, the both of you.

Actually, that's more points in the gospels favour, they're written several decades after the fact, by people that were different places at the time, not significantly different places but everyone always hears something different than the person next to them, sees it from another angle and screws things up differently as years go by. If the gospels were all the same it would be very suspicious.
Remember, we don't actually know who wrote the gospels, they were anonymously written and it is assumed who they were written by based on the perspectives.
Nobody is forcing you to read this thread. It was posted by a Christian about a parody site that he thought was real and was annoyed because for some reason that is the image of Christians, which is odd, because most of the unreasonableness comes from within the denominations in a centuries old debate about things that largely don't matter as they actually all agree on the important bits.
So please, if you aren't going to contribute to the conversation don't bother posting.

This "statement" is so false there's just no words. It's not in their favour you fucking dumbskull. If you have widely disparate sources about any historical event, then that puts that historical event into serious question. In this case, it puts the entire foundation for the christian faith into question, as the historical curiousities, inaccuracies, and sheer impossibilities surrounding the crucifixion as the gospels portay it means you can not look to the gospels for accurate information. When looking elsewhere, the story of the gospels are further cast into doubt.
Even so, you're left with a couple of reasonable alternatives, but since these are not the ones presented in the oh-so-holy gospels, christians refuse to take them in.
That's how critical thinking works. The people who staunchly believe in the "written word" are usually found wanting in that respect.

Okay, in the annals of Tacitus (c. 116 AD) "Consequently, to get rid of the report, Nero fastened the guilt and inflicted the most exquisite tortures on a class hated for their abominations, called Christians by the populace. Christus, from whom the name had its origin, suffered the extreme penalty during the reign of Tiberius at the hands of one of our procurators, Pontius Pilatus, and a most mischievous superstition, thus checked for the moment, again broke out not only in Judaea, the first source of the evil, but even in Rome, where all things hideous and shameful from every part of the world find their centre and become popular. "
Now note that that is from someone who considered the Christians an evil in Rome, but he still acknowledges the existence of the crucifixion.
Also, all the Jews were strictly monotheist, to call someone God without thoroughly knowing it was true would be utter blasphemy, and yet...the Christian movement started with the Jews.
And I guarantee you if you ask four different people about something major that happened 50 years ago that they were all present at, they'll give you 4 different stories.