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LINK Christian Film “20 Minutes” Falsely Suggests Atheists Find God When Facing Death | Hemant Mehta | Friendly Atheist | Patheos

I remember when I was diagnosed with leukemia (I have since recovered), thoughts of god never entered my mind. I was more concerned with... "If I survive this, how will I ever pay for it?"

snytiger6 9 Mar 7
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27 comments

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7

I have twice looked into the abyss of death - once with a coma after a car accident and once with cancer - and never looked for, saw, felt, or prayed to any god.

People like crediting their god with healing me and keeping me from dying. After my accident, someone told me "He must be looking out for you." My reply: "Then why did he have a deer run out in front of my car?"

7

It's a myth they choose to perpetuate... as in "There are no atheists in fox holes." implying that if in danger, an atheist will revert, in desperation, to belief.

7

Christianity and lies have been bedfellows since its inception.

5

I almost died in 94. I spent a month in the hospital and never once thought about praying for help. What I did do was be nice to and joke with the nurses, doctors, and techs since they were the ones taking care of my ass.

5

I imagine finding God is like finding Waldo. Every time you think you got something it turns out to be just another asshole in a red and white striped sweater.

4

Of course they claim that. They made a movie with Kevin Sorbo where he was an atheist because he was angry with God and repented just before he died. It's the only way they can stand our existence is to claim we're all 'secret believers'.

Which shows the extent of their individual and collective cognitive failure.

3

Having escaped Catholicism and lacking George Carlin’s comedic talents, i settle for “Fuck God.”

3

this sums up religion in my mind and its funny as anything also
Carlin was a very funny sociological genius
Imagine him as your teacher in sociology 101

Great going there, he really tells it like it is.

3

Some atheists figure out if they just agree that annoying prick will go away and let them die in peace.

LOL... I think you've just explained virtually every death bed "conversion".

3

I'm going to be strong. and not give in to invisible gods that don't exist, and hope the scientists can find cures so that people can not get diseases, and live forever, and have eternal youth, death is a disease, that I hope science can cure someday

Cripes! That would mean a very overcrowded planet taken to its conclusion.

we would have to colonize other planets so that everyone will have room.@Geoffrey51

@ml58n2 Sounds like an even greater scrabble for resources until extraterrestrial habitation was discovered and made sustainable.

Very unpleasant I would suggest.

@Geoffrey51It's worth a try, anything is better than getting diseases or dying, even if it does result in over population, It's better than the christian plan, and their plan doesn't sound fun to me, If science did figure out how to prevent death and live forever, and a cure for diseases, they would have to come up with a plan for the population increase, anything is better than diseases and death.

no death is the natural culmination of life-- for every living organism

@ml58n2 yes so long as we were willing masacre all the creatures who actually already lived there, you know like we did with America and Australia and so on

@ml58n2 "we would have to colonize other planets so that everyone will have room"

"When I take charge of Germany, they (the German master race) must have room to breathe and room to work."
Adolf Hitler's Lebensraum the ideological principle and justification for the German territorial expansion into the lands of "lesser" races.

Death is the natural end of our lie cycle. Living longer and staying healthy is fine, but we are not physically or mentally equipped for it.

A very intelligent friend of mine says, "I'm going to live forever. So far, so good."

3

My husband never faltered in his lack of belief and I was with in for almost every minute of the last 32 days of his existence.

3

That is absurd as the trope that there are no atheists in foxholes. The willful ignorance of the people that keep peddling that line both amuses and saddens me.

(Edited for a missing word.)

A moment's thought suggests that there are plenty of atheists in foxholes. The horrors of war are likely to make a person wonder how a "just god" could permit the world to run this way.

@Paul4747 I like that idea.

3

That is typical religious bullshit that they love to repeat even in memes, of course with zero evidence, so they can feel better about their brainwashed hypocrite selves.

3

When I had a heart attack/open heart surgery, I never thought "I need to repent so I can go to heaven". My only thought was how my children were going to get by if I died.

I did piss my evangelical sister though. I keep referring myself as a zombie since they had to stop my heart to do the surgery.

Later, when I was rushed to the hospital for AFib and pulmonary hypertension, it didn't occur to me to pray. I just didn't want to die in front of my son.

3

Belief is an extremely addictive thing. Those people who have it, need repeated dosages. They are to be pitied--but also avoided. I've been through the "window of light" twice in my life. During those experiences I received the knowledge there is no god. It's all make-believe.

3

I doubt I will find god again if I'm near death. I don't like wasting my time for anything.

3

Really glad you recovered.

Movies like this garbage reinforce my loathing for religion.
Believers just cannot grasp that non-believers are fine without religious delusions.
Even when things get scary.
I've been in a couple of dangerous situations. Not once did I resort to praying to god
for "rescue". If I had, I'm sure I'd be dead.

2

Wow. Had a cardiac arrest and was "clinically dead" except my co-workers were able to shock me back. Didn't face death, I died and basically it cemented my atheist beliefs. There was no white light, no dead relatives, nobody saying it's not your time yet.

we all want to know if you saw Elvis

@bklynite53 No, he had already left the building. Remember it's 3000 miles to Graceland.

@bklynite53 Everyone knows he is a truck driver in Arizona

@LenHazell53 I believe you are thinking of my youngest daughter's father-in-law. He looks and sounds like Elvis, but he isn't.

@TWDay videos....the only proof we desire

2

I'm not surprised by this idea. The film "God Is Not Dead" had the same idea and believers always seem to think more about death and "getting right" with their god.

I totaled a work truck out one time and it happened so quickly. I wore a seat belt and was not hurt at all. The last thoughts in my mind as the truck went out of control were "now I'm gonna be hit by all these other vehicles" but it did not happen. I had no god thoughts.

When I was 10-11 yrs old I made a 5th of July bomb. We sat it on a flat bed. I lit it went off. I can during meditation watch the explosion rip into me. I remember thinking this is it. I knew I was a goner, but position saved me. My doctors were all MASH doctors who did time in Korea, One said If you had rotated your torso 90 degrees, what went through your arm would have easily ripped your heart. You would have bled out in 2 seconds.

All non anesthetisied meatball surgery on an 11 year old for about an hour. Then months of revisits to remove more and again no anesthesia I was very religious at the time, and at no point did I feel a god or a presence, or see lights, 4 hours after getting home I went to eye surgeon, and then I was temporarily blind for a few days.

I still have all the scars, well mostly. And everyplace I look in the right light (dim) I see a black dot.

hey maybe Jesus didn't want me, the doctors all said it was a miricle I was alive, but no lights no dead relatives nuthin...

Did I cheat death, ordid the gods cheat me. After all I would then be in Jesus's loving arms, ( they always say something about suffering children to Jesus) . Was jesus a child molester?

I had a similar incident on black ice on US275 in the 80's. As I was sliding down the road backwards in a VW Beetle toward an oncoming semi, the only thought that came to mind was, "I hope this doesn't hurt much." No gods, though. The semi driver put his right wheels on the soft shoulder and barely touched my rear fender with his back dual, spinning me into a ditch, harmlessly. For good reason, he didn't slow down (it was still black ice for at least a couple of miles in his direction). After a bit, I backed out of the ditch and went the rest of the way to work.

1

Interesting delusion. When my father, a lifelong fundamentalist Christian, was in his last days all he did was worry about the existence of the afterlife and panic over the possibility of non-existence. Humans aren't even a little rational, so trying to derive some information (or satisfaction) from various forms of panic at end-of-life is at least as meaningful as reading tea leaves.

TWDay Level 4 May 13, 2020
1

Not even a temptation. I’ve seen my share of deaths, and faced the possibility of my own extinction several times, and don’t see any role for a god there. Like most folks, I wouldn’t care to die in a messy or painful way, but find the idea of death as final finis to be comforting.

1

There is an old axiom, "There are no atheists in a foxhole". I do not believe it for many, but I could imagine a lot of people losing their professed ideals when faced with death.

My neighbor is an Isreali jew. His scion of the family moved there b4 WWII. Every member of his family that was not in Palestine was murdered by Hitler with Stalin batting cleanup.He said many many Jews in the camps that survived just gave up on religion, completely . Israel became the homeland , but only because other still mark you Jew, and hence wheatfield fertilizer in two legs. We talk religion enough. My dad knew he was a short timer at 86 and refused to even talk to priests. My mom was religious until about 2 weeks b4 she died, and I think she gave up on god when I explained for the 100th time, I just do not believe and me praying does absolutely nothing.

ciao

I will go calmly into my death. I cannot fear any god.

"I could imagine a lot of people losing their professed ideals when faced with death." a lovely euphemism for fucking cowardly hypocrite

@anglophone
“And then he greeted Death as an old friend, and went with him gladly, and, as equals, they departed this life.” ― J.K. Rowling, Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows

1

An atheist friend of mine had 2 brushes with cancer, the 2nd one taking him, at age 62. He was proud to say that he'd not become, or been, a deathbed theist. I'm guessing that the Christian film will play to Christian audiences, who will already "know" the truth of the message. It is, after all, their fairy tale.

1

As wicked as I have been all my life...even when I had a few near death experiences I never once thought about any "God"...besides...what would he want with my sorry wicked ass and why would he think I am worthy...rediculous Religious BS.

1

Or maybe a lot of atheists think on their deathbed "Better one of them should die than one of us" ... and call for a priest. 😉

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