"My sister, although she professes to be an atheist, has been interested in eastern religious things for a long timeNot actually following the "religion" or anything but like she has a lot of buddhist decorations in her house.
But then last night we all met at golden corral for dinner and...she has a new tattoo. She has several and everyone in the family hates them but this is too much. On her forearm she has a buddhist "god"!!! It's an elephant with a bunch of arms. Right there where anyone can see it."
PROTIP: Siddhartha Gautama, a.k.a. 'The Buddha' (or 'Enlightened One') was just a man. Who, at no time, professed himself a 'God'. He merely taught others how to attain Enlightenment, via the Eightfold Path:
http://www.thebigview.com/buddhism/eightfoldpath.html
I'm sure your sister would be beside herself too, with your utter ignorance (but I guess Comparative Religions wasn't in your 'hoemskuling' curriculum eh, nursingmom?).
But she would let such worries flow over her like water. As per said Eightfold Path.
Buddhism: a religion without a deity. Three Words: Flying Spaghetti Monster:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flying_Spaghetti_Monster
PROTIP: Better not Google 'Necoho', if you know what's good for you.
[/Warhammer Fantasy]
Buddha (Siddhartha Gautama). God. One of these things is not like the other. Which is it, nursingmom & everyone on Ruptured Retards?
[spoiler]Like I say, the man who ultimately became known as the 'Buddha' actually existed.[/spoiler]
@Skatepunk
"Wow... even the others on RR think she's going too far."
Indeed, in that same thread (emphasis added):
@OnceWasLost
"Good News!!!!
We can't stand in the way of God saving someone. He knows if or if not she will be saved. If she is to be saved He knows it and He can use any means to do it. He asks us to witness, but He is not dependent on us being up to the task."
So therefore the question should be asked:
Why bother 'witlessing' in the first place?
As a comedian (can't remember whom) once said (emphasis added):
'If God is the most powerful being in the universe, why does he need a bunch of bozos to do his P.R.?'
Ask yourselves this question, Ruptured Retards:
Just suppose Richard Dawkins knocked on your door and told you that if you continued 'believing' in a nonexistent deity, something unimaginably hideous and infinitely painful would happen to you for eternity when you died - and he continued haranguing you thusly 24/7, in the street with a megaphone, pushing pamphlets in your hand, telling you that you're stupid for being a 'believer' and so on - would you like it?
If your answer is anything other than 'No', you've destroyed not only your argument, but your entire justifications for the very existence of not only your right-wing Fundamentalist 'beliefs, but yourselves too (the Religious Right, Teabaggers, Neocons etc as a whole). And you're also a liar.
...oh, and as for
"If she is to be saved He knows it and He can use any means to do it."
Then so much for 'Free Will'. Your 'God' is therefore infinitely worse than Hitler. Ergo, your whole religion has no right to exist too. QED.