Christianity

[Alexis Jacobi]

I'm afraid you really don't know what Christians believe at all. I have to say that, because you're so often wrong when you declare what they "must" think, and I know very well they don't.

So I have a number of different thoughts here but first, as always, I have to state my *intentions* -- that is, to say what I am doing here and why. There are various levels. The main one, the one that propels me in this extended conversation, is that in my own inner world of faith and spirituality very little is decided and very little is solidly determined. When I compare myself to you, for example, and doing so is inevitable in the context of these extended conversations, I see you as someone firmly grounded in absolutely defined ideas about what Christianity is, who and perhaps what Jesus Christ is, and all of these defined, clarified and settled ideas operate within your apologetics project. If that is not the reason you write here -- it surely must be -- then I need it revealed to me what you are up to.

As I have said, in different ways, everyone here has a purpose. And whether or not their purpose is stated, or not, and even if their purpose is not fully known to them, nevertheless they have one. So, aside from the theological and spiritual issues that I face personally, and on a daily basis, I have an almost sociological interest in What makes people believe what they believe and act as they act in the larger context of the Chaos of Agreement: the coming undone of vast ranges of agreements that allowed people to live and act in some harmony.

This is not a minor issue and I refer here to the book you recommended by Eugene Rose on Nihilism.

I will quote here what I recently wrote that, I imagine, seems not simply a result of careless misunderstanding but possibly dangerously wrong (according to your understanding):

So in this sense the Germanic world, through Protestantism, undertook to throw off the influence and the yoke of a Universalizing Roman Church and to assert itself in a range of ways in direct opposition. True, some part of this was 'reasoned' and 'logical' but on another level it was deeply psychological and reactive.

It is very curious to see and understand how important it was, and it still may be of course, to separate Christianity from Judaism. There are two strains of this, or two poles, that can easily be discerned in our modern today. One is the side that aligns itself with Judaism and Israel, and seems to define Christianity as a branch of Judaism; and the other which sees Christianity, and indeed the God that Christianity defines, as uniquely distinct from 'Yahweh' and the Judaic God that Jesus opposed. It is a very curious problem and it is completely central to Christianity: Jesus's direct opposition to Judaism and to a 'structure' which he opposed. But to say 'he' must mean to say, quite literally, what God opposed. Whatever that was -- it is very hard to define because Christianity is so bound up in mythic notions -- was toppled, again by God's will. The Jewish diaspora, according to Christian view, was a result of that toppling.

I also referred to this aspect of the Christian story -- and I use that word not to imply, necessarily, that the story is false, or to undermine its meaning, but simply to stress that it is a Story, and the Story has a story-line -- a narrative purpose:

When Jesus had cried out again in a loud voice, He yielded up His spirit. At that moment the veil of the temple was torn in two from top to bottom. The earth quaked and the rocks were split. The tombs broke open, and the bodies of many saints who had fallen asleep were raised. After Jesus’ resurrection, when they had come out of the tombs, they entered the holy city and appeared to many people.

So what does your disagreement with me involve? I think it primarily involves the issue of interpretation. He who interprets does so with or without 'official sanction' -- a granted right to make statements and to formulate interpretations. So in your case, and this I assume, you have an extremely solidified and carefully worked-out set of interpretations as to what each obscure reference in the Gospel stories really & truly means.

He did not speak to them without a parable. --Mark 4:34

A parable (parabolē) refer to placing one thing beside another for purposes of comparison. In classical Greek it refers to a comparison, an illustration, an analogy. But in New Testament Greek it is said to correspond with the Hebrew mashal which means riddle or dark saying. What is the point of pointing this out? Well, that we are dealing with an obscure text and obscured symbols. The idea of the veil being rent could have been expressed just as you and many Protestant hermeneutists in fact do. And why was it not? Why such inscrutable obscuration? Why is it all left up to interpretation?

So here is a statement that some person, involved in mysteries, might make if I could enter into their thinking-process:

I am now going to tell you a truth yet I am going to place it within a parabolic riddle that you may get, but then on the other hand you may not be able to get because, and this is part of the message of this parable, your consciousness is darkened. A powerful force has settled on you and this force actually hold you back from getting the essence which I seem to desire both to reveal and simultaneously obscure.

Again, I try to reveal what motivates me and what I am up to (instead of keeping it obscured and hidden from view). I believe that we are in a vast chaotic period in which even the most simple things cannot, and perhaps will not, be agreed on.

One other extremely (and I mean extremely) contentious element in what I have recently written, which is not necessarily what I personally believe but is yet being considered and believed by some (and always for specific purposes and within intentions bot revealed and obscured) is that some Christians see the murder of the Son of God as an act that necessarily transferred the dispensation (and that is a big word) from 'the Jews' to 'the Gentiles'. And I think you have gathered (I have stated it pretty openly) that I am not a dual dispensationalist -- insofar as I have or can have, given my orientation, any specific and determined opinion on this matter.

But again I have to struggle to keep trying to get to the core of what the issue really is. And I mean this in the widest sense and that sense which is clearly visible in this entire thread! It has to do with the breakdown in the possibility of agreeing, at any fundamental level, about how to interpret literally everything. The world (or 'the world'), the Cosmos, existence, meaning, value, reason. The acids that dissolve this possibility seem to me the area, or one area, that we really must examine more carefully.

So what I notice that you do in relation to some of the things I said, which seemed to have provoked you to state that I am opining wrongly, is to challenge my capacity -- or is it right? -- to interpret. To engage with the text as a hermeneut. You obviously do not grant me that right and you obviously grant it to yourself (and you define yourself plurally).

You own and you therefore define Christian meaning.

I have no problem, per se, with that at all because when it comes to all the crucial matters on which meanings hang, I do not have access to an interpretive Rosetta Stone. But here again to get to the essence here we have to bring in the extremely intangible force and power of what is described as 'the Holy Spirit'. Unless I am mistaken, and I do not think I am, all of the interpretations of obscure and parabolic symbols that are part-and-parcel of Christian Story require the intersession of a Spirit that aids one, or perhaps ultimately determines, what the *correct* interpretation is. What a problem this is. Who has that right and to whom is that right given? And what if that right is taken or assumed without the permission of authority?

This is a quote from David L. Miller's Hells and Holy Ghosts: A Theopoetics of Christian Belief.

So, ego asks: “How long, O Lord?” How long must I be in
the middle of it all, in the middle of the impermanence and
flux of images, where nothing seems real and everything,
even when charmingly mythopoetic and imaginative, is so
transitory that I am caught between the disappearance of
this and the next appearance of that, between a death of one
way of understanding and the birth of some new way, dying
daily, always and forever descending ad inferos. “How long,
O Lord?”

The ego and its perspective wants an answer, and it has
received many. The theological tradition has had a chronic
capacity for chronological literalism. Some have said, “If
you will only repent and believe, then the promise will be
fulfilled at once.” “Today, thou shalt be with me in
Paradise.” Others have said, “After three days there will be a
resurrection of saints.” Still others have declared,“Not until
forty days and forty nights have passed -- or is it fifty? -- will
the Holy Spirit come upon one pentecostally.” Even less
optimistic, yet still with historical and temporal literalism, a
chiliastic response to ego's cry has been, “Not until the
Second Coming, not until the Rapture.”

[henry quirk]

Does objective evil exist for a deist even though Man subjectively defines it?

Sure. We can talk about it in another thread (there are a few on the subject we can migrate to) if you like.

[Alexis Jacobi]

The "globalist" project first appears in Genesis 11, in a place called "Babel"; and it's roundly deplored in Jewish and Christian theologies. After that, you'll find that there is absolutely no call at all for efforts to "universalize" or "humanity-unite"; to imagine that such a thing would even be possible without the personal intervention of the Messiah, the Prince of Peace would be totally contrary to Scripture.

What I tried to communicate and to present as a 'fact' that pertains to the nature of the Christian historical project, is not particularly complex. It is easy to grasp in fact. It is within the nature of Christianity to go out into the world and bring the Christian message to all peoples. There is a definite and I think undeniable impetus to engage in activism in relation to the Christian mission. So what I try to say is that it seems possible to me to examine Christian cultures, and also the post-Christian culture of America -- to examine Americanism -- and to notice that in this idea of manifest destiny, in this idea that what America is represents something that must, necessarily, be applied to the whole world, points to a tendency that is visible within Christianity generally. That is to say that it has a missionizing determination. It does this even if it is not aware that it is compelled to do this.

It seems to me that you misunderstand what I am attempting. I do not at all disagree that a world-level globalization-process must be resisted. And when I say *must be* I mean that to do so is morally defensible.

You can certainly assert, if you wish to and if it serves a purpose for you, that Christian cultures should never have done what they did in fact, but in fact they really, actually and definitely did do what exactly they did. And what was set in motion continues in motion. The impetus of Christian missionizing seems to have become installed in certain people -- notably the Americans and the way they saw their system of government as a manifestation, quite literally, of something Divine and metaphysically proper and necessary to be applied to the whole world.

[Alexis Jacobi]

AJ: Here I refer, for example, to the so-called Q-anon movement...

IC: A poor example, I would say. They do exist, but nobody really takes them seriously, and they have no significant public presence at all. Like "white supremacy," they're pretty much just another Leftist bogeyman, just an excuse for extending their totalitarian impulse.

Oh no, not at all a poor example. So I will refer to my source for my understanding of the profundity and deep reach of 'conspiratorial thinking'. My reference is Michael Barkun's A Culture of Conspiracy: Apocalyptic Visions in Contemporary America.

American society has changed dramatically since A Culture of Conspiracy was first published in 2001. In this revised and expanded edition, Michael Barkun delves deeper into America's conspiracy sub-culture, exploring the rise of 9/11 conspiracy theories, the "birther" controversy surrounding Barack Obama's American citizenship, and how the conspiracy landscape has changed with the rise of the Internet and other new media.

What do UFO believers, Christian millennialists, and right-wing conspiracy theorists have in common? According to Michael Barkun in this fascinating yet disturbing book, quite a lot. It is well known that some Americans are obsessed with conspiracies. The Kennedy assassination, the Oklahoma City bombing, and the 2001 terrorist attacks have all generated elaborate stories of hidden plots. What is far less known is the extent to which conspiracist worldviews have recently become linked in strange and unpredictable ways with other "fringe" notions such as a belief in UFOs, Nostradamus, and the Illuminati. Unraveling the extraordinary genealogies and permutations of these increasingly widespread ideas, Barkun shows how this web of urban legends has spread among subcultures on the Internet and through mass media, how a new style of conspiracy thinking has recently arisen, and how this phenomenon relates to larger changes in American culture. This book, written by a leading expert on the subject, is the most comprehensive and authoritative examination of contemporary American conspiracism to date.

Barkun discusses a range of material-involving inner-earth caves, government black helicopters, alien abductions, secret New World Order cabals, and much more-that few realize exists in our culture. Looking closely at the manifestations of these ideas in a wide range of literature and source material from religious and political literature, to New Age and UFO publications, to popular culture phenomena such as The X-Files, and to websites, radio programs, and more, Barkun finds that America is in the throes of an unrivaled period of millenarian activity. His book underscores the importance of understanding why this phenomenon is now spreading into more mainstream segments of American culture.

Michael Barkun's book is worth reading. I also read Religion and the Racist Right: The Origins of the Christian Identity Movement and found it slanted, naturally given his orientation, but very useful.

Let me put it this way: If you (if one) do not take the time to examine what is going on in the fringes -- and fringes which are quickly moving toward the center within American culture specifically (my principle domain of study) -- you will misunderstand, misperceive and misinterpret the full picture of the looming ideological and interpretive crisis that is manifesting in our present.

I certainly agree that the Progressive Left as a power-center that is struggling for power in the United States, but also in other places (perhaps globally) will use the idea of white supremacy and a whole range of terms to vilify and suppress the legitimate concerns of those, like Renaud Camus, who articulate a coherent argument about 'the Great Replacement', nevertheless the extremism (as it is called) of some groups and factions that are making definite inroads into the so-called mainstream (Nick Fuentes is a good example) need to be examined very carefully and with a critical eye.

Here is another audio-visual presentation of a speech in French -- quite eloquent -- in which Camus speaks more in depth of what the Great Replacement means. It is pretty dense but worth watching and reading a couple of times to get what he means.

I think you might confuse my intentions here? I read extremely widely. I also have been reading (3/4ths through) Ramón Gutiérrez and Kathleen Belew's A Field Guide to White Supremacy which reveals the complete view-structure of the Radical Left which is operating in America today.

One has to go right the the sources and read what these people are writing, both on the Left and on the Right.

In contrast to Belew's book I could also refer to Greg Johnson's The White Nationalist Manifesto.

Multiculturalism is a social experiment imposed by international elites on unwilling nations. That experiment has failed. Diversity is not a source of strength, but of alienation, hatred, and violence. But even those problems pale before the fact that the white race in all its historical homelands is on the road to biological extinction--unless there is radical political change.

These are books that lay out in plain view extremely opposed visions about what is and what should be. Myself, I tend with some caveats to gravitate to a more radically conservative platform, and I do not necessarily condemn those formulating perspectives that turn strongly against our modern liberal system and ideology, but I do try not to be *captured* by one view or another.

My larger view is that everyone is making efforts to interpret reality. It is more interesting to try to understand why they think what they do than to align with what they propose.

Here is a somewhat recent writing by Michael Barkun on the QAnon phenomenon. It is worthwhile to consider his perspective, even if it twists and molds it to some ulterior purpose.

Consider also a recent interpretive message from Pat Robertson. It surely helps to clarify things, doesn't it? Now we know, because it has been revealed.

[Nick_A]

Does objective evil exist for a deist even though Man subjectively defines it?

Sure. We can talk about it in another thread (there are a few on the subject we can migrate to) if you like.

Like Einstein wrote, the basic believer lives by fear, next is the higher belief in a personal God demanding morality. The third is an ineffable God in which the necessities of our conscious universe are the basics of conscience and revelation: a priori knowledge.

Obviously I'm not one of those who believes living in fear of some imaginary deity or believing some personal God will be insulted if I pinched a girl's behind. It seems senseless. However the universe as the body of God as a machine serving the mechanical purpose of our source beyond the domains of time and space makes perfect sense. This means the universe has a purpose which Man has forgotten. It seems similar to my superficial understanding of deism. I'd like to post your previous reply on another thread we'll call Deism and try to discuss the ideas if this is OK with you

henry quirk wrote: ↑Sat Feb 12, 2022 1:59 am
Nick,

Could you back up for a moment. Am I wrong to assume you are a Deist and as such do not see any personal Gods interacting with humanity. I am the same way and believe our source and the source of consciousness is beyond the limits of time and space and what creates the material contents of consciousness within time and space. The Son in the image of God is within creation serving as an intermediary between the father and Man. That is why the Son and the Cross are the essence of Christianity. What they have provided makes conscious evolution possible. But how is a personal God part Deism unless you believe the Father and the Son are the same?

So if you believe God is concerned with individuals, what is the deist God concept you refer to?

Yeah, let me explain...

Like any vanilla deist, I don't believe God is directly, personally, involved in Reality. I have a couple of reasons why I think this is the case (which we can talk about, if you like).

Unlike the vanilla deist: I don't believe God is disinterested. Man has reason, free will, and conscience. Conscience -- to be dramatic about it -- is God's will or purpose inscribed into our souls. We haven't been abandoned: we've been tasked. As free wills, we each can choose to ignore that task, but that's on us, as individuals, not Him.

So, God works in the world, thru each of us, as each of us agrees to let Him.

It's a peculiar take on deism, yeah.

What is the purpose of morality according to Deism? Is it to please a deity or to serve as a necessary purpose within the universal machine we call creation. Has Man devolved conscience into self serving morality? These are the kind of questions that can be discussed.

[henry quirk]

Nick,

As I say...

We can talk about it in another thread (there are a few on the subject we can migrate to) if you like.

[Nick_A]

Alexis

American society has changed dramatically since A Culture of Conspiracy was first published in 2001. In this revised and expanded edition, Michael Barkun delves deeper into America's conspiracy sub-culture, exploring the rise of 9/11 conspiracy theories, the "birther" controversy surrounding Barack Obama's American citizenship, and how the conspiracy landscape has changed with the rise of the Internet and other new media.

Sometimes we need kids brave enough to shout out that the emperor is naked. I remember when the birther controversy was going on. I thought it is easy enough to resolve. The government works for me so just demand proof of citizenship and the issue is resolved. Heh heh heh foolish child. Ignorance is bliss

I quickly learned anyone questioning Obama's eligibility was a racist, sexist, or anything else ending in ist. The bottom line is that the government doesn't work for me anymore but the people now work for the government. The people are now considered both unworthy of and too stupid to deserve constitutional protection in the form of proof of citizenship. Those days are over.

Sometimes we need an unconventional source to reveal what is really going on.

[Alexis Jacobi]

Alexis

American society has changed dramatically since A Culture of Conspiracy was first published in 2001. In this revised and expanded edition, Michael Barkun delves deeper into America's conspiracy sub-culture, exploring the rise of 9/11 conspiracy theories, the "birther" controversy surrounding Barack Obama's American citizenship, and how the conspiracy landscape has changed with the rise of the Internet and other new media.

Sometimes we need kids brave enough to shout out that the emperor is naked. I remember when the birther controversy was going on. I thought it is easy enough to resolve. The government works for me so just demand proof of citizenship and the issue is resolved. Heh heh heh foolish child. Ignorance is bliss

I quickly learned anyone questioning Obama's eligibility was a racist, sexist, or anything else ending in ist. The bottom line is that the government doesn't work for me anymore but the people now work for the government. The people are now considered both unworthy of and too stupid to deserve constitutional protection in the form of proof of citizenship. Those days are over.

Sometimes we need an unconventional source to reveal what is really going on.

It’s funny: I spent time examining each of the major ‘conspiracy’ puzzles: 9/11, Oklahoma, Wako, Ruby Ridge, Kennedy — even the conspiracy that claims the moon landing was staged in a studio! — and of course the birther question (there are a few other, too). I had to examine the presentations to see what was there.

It’s funny but Joe Arpaio put together a whole narrative video presentation that “proves” the birth certificate was created — in Photoshop! It is compelling but of course it is impossible to conclude anything from it. Except paranoid doubt.

[promethean75]

Lol Henry abandons the abrahamic religions because he's got sense enough not to give consent to the outrageous claims made by em... but still he's not at peace with his own meaningless and mortality, so he holds on to what enlightenment philosophers have convinced him is a more reasonable way to consider 'god'.

He threw the bathwater out, but wants to keep the baby.

[henry quirk]

Henry abandons the abrahamic religions

[Immanuel Can]

You can certainly assert, if you wish to and if it serves a purpose for you, that Christian cultures should never have done what they did in fact...

I don't say that. But then, it seems that you and I don't even agree on what a "Christian culture" would be.

[iambiguous]

Well, I'd say that given this -- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_c ... _disorders -- many might find it hard to even imagine what an omniscient and omnipotent Christian God was thinking when He brought it all about.

Wait.

Before we deal with your allegation against God, we must understand what you mean by it. You mean that childhood diseases are "evil," or "bad," presumably. As a Theist, I would agree they are...but I say that as a Theist, of course, so in accordance with the standards of "good" and "evil" that Scripture provides.

You tell me then what your Scripture says about why on Earth a God, the God, your God brought into existence a human biology able to be afflicted with...

https://dph.illinois.gov/topics-service ... -list.html

Or, for parents of infants and toddlers, these afflictions...

https://www.cdc.gov/parents/infants/dis ... tions.html

But what I can't understand is how you mount that allegation from an Atheistic point of view: for it must surely be quite obvious that the Atheist cannot be referring to Scripture when he calls childhood diseases "evil," or "bad."

To what standard can he be referring?

My point is only to suggest that in a No God world, moral standards are rooted subjectively/intersubjectively out in a particular world understood in a particular way existentially...as the embodiment of dasein. That, in other words, in the absence of God, there does not appear to be a way to describe this or that behavior as either objectively moral or immoral.

Thus...

But you give me something to work with, for you say:

...from my frame of mind, "evil" is an intersubjective and inherently problematic perspective rooted in particular historical, cultural and interpersonal contexts.

So you mean that childhood diseases are "intersubjectively" a problem...? I'm not sure what that means, but perhaps you'll explain.

Horrific childhood diseases don't exist because individual subjects are of the opinion that they exist. They exist because for a reason I can't even begin to imagine from an alleged loving, just and merciful God said to be both omniscient and omnipotent, human biology is such that they are objective medical conditions that millions upon millions of completely innocent infants, babies, toddlers and children endure around the globe.

Day in and day out. Year in and year out. Century in and century out.

You say that your assessment would be "rooted in particular historical, cultural and interpersonal contexts." So you must mean, I assume, that childhood diseases are only "evil" is one is raised in the historical, cultural and interpersonal context" where people believe they are evil.

No, I'm wondering why, if a mere mortal were to create a new medical affliction that brought terrible pain and suffering to children around the globe, he or she would be called evil, while God has created hundreds and hundreds of terrible afflictions and He is not construed to be evil at all.

Why? Well, of course: His mysterious ways.

Unless Christians here have a more specific explanation.

But the problem is that that "historical, cultural and interpersonal context" is clearly not Atheism itself. For it is clear that in Atheism, what IS, simply IS. There is no objective fact of "evil," and none of "good" either; these have to be mere illusions, maybe feelings people happen to have in some contexts, but which absolutely cannot possibly refer to any objective truth.

Yes, that's the terrible psychological burden of atheism. You look around you at a world where a countless number of children are in agony day in and day out, and there is no teleological reason for it. Shit just happens given the brute facticity that is an amoral nature and all you can do is to hope that it doesn't happen to your child.

So childhood diseases, Atheistically considered, are not "evil." So your accusation boils down to this:

You accuse the God you don't believe exists of allowing things you don't have any basis to regard as evil.

How can a disease of nature be evil? The part about evil revolves around situations in which a mere mortal might deliberately inflict a child with a disease. Or mental, emotional, physical or sexual abuse.

But even here with an omnipotent God, that can be prevented. Instead, He does nothing. We get to blame the abuser, as though that somehow lets this omniscient/omnipotent Christian God off the hook.

If you'll forgive me, I don't see how that presents much of theodicy problem. It looks to me that accusing somebody -- especially somebody non-existent, of allowing something not objectively evil doesn't amount even to something that requires an answer...even if the thought behind it could be rendered coherent; but at the moment, I can't see that it can.

Come on, I have no capacity to demonstrate that your Christian God does not exist. Of course He might. And, if He does, how on Earth is the terrible suffering of children explained then? It would seem to be incumbent upon Christians to "think up" possible reasons. Instead, because of the staggering amount of suffering involved here, most Christians fall back on His mysterious ways.

But this is a philosophy forum. So, perhaps, philosophers who happen to be Christians can go a little deeper?

You speak of "excellent answers". Okay, note some. But again, taking into account the sheer enormity of the suffering endured here. Imagine being one of those "approximately 3.1 million children that die from undernutrition each year" around the globe.

Try this. Stop eating food. Go for days and days down the path to starvation. And as the pain and suffering begin to mount and mount ask yourself then what on Earth your Christian God must be thinking to inflict this on literally tens of millions of children over the decades. Give us what you construe to be the most "excellent answer" of them all.

Do you at least believe that childhood diseases are actually, objectively "evil"? If you do, how do you, as an Atheist, justify that value claim? And if you don't, then how can you expect to be understood if you ask a question the basic terms of which you believe are entirely fictive?

No, nothing that happens to any of us is objectively evil. From my frame of mind, No God, no objective morality. Indeed, how many Christians themselves will come around to this in regard to just how ghastly the world would be if atheists and moral nihilists are right.

And what is it with this capital letter Atheist. Again, as though technically a "serious philosopher" is actually able to define or to deduce this Atheist into existence.

When, in reality, given both "the gap" and "Rummy's Rule" aren't we all really agnostics. There's what we think ourselves into believing about the existence of God and there's what we can actually demonstrate to others is the objective, factual truth.

[Alexis Jacobi]

You can certainly assert, if you wish to and if it serves a purpose for you, that Christian cultures should never have done what they did in fact...

I don't say that. But then, it seems that you and I don't even agree on what a "Christian culture" would be.

However and with that said i fully understood why you don’t recognize those cultures I label as Christian as really being so.

I got that at the first go-by.

[Immanuel Can]

Well, I'd say that given this -- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_c ... _disorders -- many might find it hard to even imagine what an omniscient and omnipotent Christian God was thinking when He brought it all about.

Wait.

Before we deal with your allegation against God, we must understand what you mean by it. You mean that childhood diseases are "evil," or "bad," presumably. As a Theist, I would agree they are...but I say that as a Theist, of course, so in accordance with the standards of "good" and "evil" that Scripture provides.

You tell me then...

No, no...you owe me an answer. If you can prove that you know what "evil" is, I'll happily tell you.

My point is only to suggest that in a No God world, moral standards are rooted subjectively/intersubjectively out in a particular world understood in a particular way existentially...as the embodiment of dasein.

Word salad. This says nothing. "Rooted," "subjective," "intersubjective," "understood in a particular way," "existentially," "embodiment" and "dasein." All words you just through in with no clear purpose or meaning.

Spell it out. No jargon.

...in the absence of God, there does not appear to be a way to describe this or that behavior as either objectively moral or immoral.

There we go.

Horrific childhood diseases don't exist because individual subjects are of the opinion that they exist.

The term "horrific" is a value term, and thus needs an objective reference. Absent God, there is no objectivity to values, so nothing is "horrific." So you need to justify your use of that term.

But the problem is that that "historical, cultural and interpersonal context" is clearly not Atheism itself. For it is clear that in Atheism, what IS, simply IS. There is no objective fact of "evil," and none of "good" either; these have to be mere illusions, maybe feelings people happen to have in some contexts, but which absolutely cannot possibly refer to any objective truth.

Yes, that's the terrible psychological burden of atheism.

Well, then, you're cooked.

If you have no objective judgment to offer, then you have no accusation against God.

So childhood diseases, Atheistically considered, are not "evil." So your accusation boils down to this:

You accuse the God you don't believe exists of allowing things you don't have any basis to regard as evil.

How can a disease of nature be evil?

That's the point. If you think diseases are just "of nature," then they can't possibly be "evil." They're neither good nor evil, because you don't believe either word has any objective meaning.

If you'll forgive me, I don't see how that presents much of theodicy problem. It looks to me that accusing somebody -- especially somebody non-existent, of allowing something not objectively evil doesn't amount even to something that requires an answer...even if the thought behind it could be rendered coherent; but at the moment, I can't see that it can.

Come on, I have no capacity to demonstrate that your Christian God does not exist.

True, but I'm not asking you to. I'm only asking you to justify your claim that evil exists. Absent that, you have no accusation at all.

You speak of "excellent answers". Okay, note some.

Gladly. Will do. But first, explain to me what your accusation is. I can't answer a question that doesn't even make sense on its own terms.

Do you at least believe that childhood diseases are actually, objectively "evil"? If you do, how do you, as an Atheist, justify that value claim? And if you don't, then how can you expect to be understood if you ask a question the basic terms of which you believe are entirely fictive?

No, nothing that happens to any of us is objectively evil.

There it is again. And right afterward, you start naming things you claim are evil.

Please explain: do you believe in objective evil, or not? If you do, you have an accusation, and we can go forward. If you don't then you don't even have an accusation.

[Immanuel Can]

You can certainly assert, if you wish to and if it serves a purpose for you, that Christian cultures should never have done what they did in fact...

I don't say that. But then, it seems that you and I don't even agree on what a "Christian culture" would be.

However and with that said i fully understood why you don’t recognize those cultures I label as Christian as really being so.

I got that at the first go-by.

Yes, but you continue to make the nominalist mistake (i.e. taking nominal identification as real and authentic). You take for granted that anybody who ever called themselves a "Christian" did not need to do a single thing more than that to have earned the term. But nominalism is, even just from the view of the secular sociological study of religion, practically useless as an identifier. It's always wildly erroneous. Since it has no criteria but the name itself, it automatically includes under one umbrella term, things that have nothing to do with the religious phenomenonn in question.

I understand why it's appealing, though: it enables very broad generalizations and hypotheses that, under a more specific and better definition, simply would not be plausible at all. If the way you use your key term means practically nothing, you can say anything you want about it without fear of being contradicted.

That's what I detect in your theorizing about "Christian culture": the desire to keep the definition at such a vague height, such a helicopter level, that it will allow the sorts of historical readings and theories you want to advance to remain plausible, to a degree that a good definition simply would not.