Non-believers being more insistent on dressing up for religious services

[John Dibble]

I can tell you exactly why I think this way - if you believe that there's an all-powerful superbeing that rules everything and demands your worship and respect and you believe you should worship and respect it, then you should act in a way that respects it. Human cultural norms throughout history have had some emphasis on specific types of dress for certain situations, and not adhering to these norms is oft considered disrespectful. You treat worshiping your deity like going to a concert, and dress accordingly. This is an indicator to me that you don't give a damn about God, and just want to go out and have fun. You make church service about you. I still think you don't take your professed beliefs seriously. Heck, have you even finished reading the Bible cover to cover yet? You've had ample time since we had that conversation, but you probably haven't bothered - is the word of your god too boring for you to bother? I don't really give a damn that you don't dress up for church, I give a damn that you don't take your own beliefs seriously. Intellectual sloth like yours is a blight upon humanity.

[John Dibble]

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It's important to try and understand one's faith, but way, way less important than actually trying to live it.

How will you know how to live the faith if you don't haven't even read the book on which it is based? I suppose you could let some preacher tell you how, but what if he's got it wrong? It's blind acceptance of an authority figure - unlike some people who have actually been killed for possession of a Bible translated to their own language, BRTD has free access and yet by his own admission he can't be bothered to take the time to read it. I'm not saying he needs to be Bible expert but it seems to me that common sense dictates that if you're going to bet your eternity on the contents of a book that you should read the damn thing.

I haven't read the entire Bible cover to cover (how many Christians have?) though my church does have a little devotional packet called "Leap of Faith 2012" (basically Lent, but they're not calling it Lent because that's too mainstream/traditional religion) that includes the entire Gospel of Mark in readings throughout 40 days. So I'll have read the entire Gospel of Mark by the end of it.

1. Only one in ten American Christians have read the Bible, but how is that relevant to you? If most Christians committed murder I don't think you'd say that murder is acceptable. The sloth of other people does not justify your own.

2. So you've read a packet that constitutes a mere two percent of the Bible and took you forty days to do it? Oh, yeah, that takes some real devotion right there.

[John Dibble]

Reading the Bible cover to cover isn't really necessary to be a good Christian, but shouldn't at least reading the New Testament cover to cover be?  (Assuming you're not from the Catholic tradition that actively discourages reading the book)

Personally I think if you ignore the OT you'd be missing out on part of the intended message. Things regarding bloodlines and whatnot are probably not too central in regards to the moral aspects, but considering that more than half of American Christians can't even name half of the Ten Commandments (which are part of the OT that supposedly still applies in most Christian theology) I think that they need to read it.

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The Bible isn't that daunting. Depending on translation the Bible usually has somewhere between 770k to 790k words. I read the Song of Ice and Fire series, which contains one million more words than that, in the span of about five to six weeks. Granted I read somewhat fast and I dedicated most of my free time to it at the time, but I think that it shouldn't be a problem for someone to read the whole of the Bible in the course of a year doing it casually.

[John Dibble]

you sure are stuck on the subject of clothes, more than any girl I've known

Keep in mind that BRTD obsesses over pretty much everything. If anyone disagrees with him on pretty much anything there's a 90% chance he'll make a poll on it, or at least a thread.