Do you believe in the existence of the hell?

[Ferguson97]

We believe that everyone is born a Muslim, they are only corrupted by their environment or their families. Me personally if you're asking me if I'm choosing to be a Muslim, I'd definitely say yes especially with me growing up in the West, it's a conscious decision you make every day to get up early, pray, give charity, fast, follow other rules etc., not just like you can be Catholic and than not do anything "Oh I'm a lapsed Catholic" Islam doesn't really work like that even if some people'd like it to.

Still doesn't change the fact that it's intrinsically easier to choose to continue to be a Muslim than to convert from an entirely different religion.

Also this isn't really how it seems, I don't think that 99% of Pakistanis are going to heaven and 99% of Americans are going to hell. Even though there's a geographic correlation, it's likely much weaker than that.

There are plenty of people who are born in Muslim countries and live in Muslim families whose lifestyle is hardly Islamic, even if they say La Ilaha Ilallah on their lips they continue with egregious sins and rarely thinking of God. Oftentimes these are the people who are out there doing Bacha Bazi sitting in their trucks, or the corrupt local official, or even some small petty thief who's never been caught and feels no remorse. Even though there's a higher absolute percentage of people who are practicing Muslims it's probably not 97%, 99%, 94%. The true percentage only Allah (SWT) knows.

On the other hand in places like America you sometimes have people who are living completely good non-corrupt lives, and often they even have fear and love of one God, but they haven't been able to hear about Islam or its teachings in a way that isn't completely slanted or fabricated (think of a guy in Nebraska who barely hears about Islam aside from some bombing in a faraway land on his local news or only thinks of the 9/11 terorrists or "moon-god" angry bearded men who beat their wives).

I mentioned Ahl al-Fatrah in an earlier post but there's actually some debate as to whether these guys would be considered as such, however at the end of the day it really doesn't concern us as only Allah (SWT) will be the one to decide

How can the fate of billions of people not concern you?

However the first and foremost reason (and really the only one that matters, all these various anecdotes and statistics above be damned) this is of no issue to me is that I trust in God how he's placed us in this world is what is right for us, and that he will judge us all properly based on how we have acted in this world with the information available to us.

But you still haven't told me WHY you have so much faith in him.

Literally the world we live in, that you're here right now breathing. That alone is enough reason for me (and honestly for most Muslims I know), I'm sure the theological arguments and justifications go on and on and back and forth with these various cosmological theorems and whatnot but you'll have to talk to someone else about that. For me it's really simple why I believe in God*, after all Allah (SWT) made Islam easy for mankind.

*  (why I think Islam in particular is the right religion is different but essentially I just think it's the most logical)

What does that mean, the world around us? That's extremely vague. And the world is full of hate and suffering. Hardly the sort of thing that a loving god would allow to flourish.

I don't care what you think about "my God" (who's your God too) or my "cruelty" because I'm right.

But how do you know that you're right?

Anyway who decides what is cruel? Your feelings?

How is me using my own internal moral compass to decide what I think is right and wrong any less valid than you using words on a book written by man that is supposedly the word of God? I'm actually thinking for myself, you're just blindly trusting that what the Imam is preaching to you is the truth because of "faith" - even though you've admitted that you don't understand why God does certain things. The reason you don't understand is because you know in your heart that what you're saying is wrong. That's your conscience.

[Ferguson97]

It does not concern me in the sense that I'm not busy trying to cast judgement on billions of people only God can do that.
In fact it's strongly discouraged for us to be judging people or talking about people directly that they will go to hell they will go to heaven except a few figures who we know about.

Only God knows enough about each person to properly judge them.

I'm not asking you to judge someone. I'm asking you to feel empathy for another human being.

You keep saying "oh well I want everyone to come to Heaven" but that doesn't really mean anything because at the end of the day, you do believe that it is objectively morally correct to sentence billions of people to eternal torture just because they don't believe in God. At the end of the day you do think that this is a just punishment.

All I'm asking is for you to put your religious upbringing aside for a second, and ask yourself really deep down, "is eternal torture a proportionate punishment for not believing in Allah"? 

To say that "well it's impossible for us to understand the morality of God because we are mortals" is honestly such a massive cop-out because you don't want have to actually think about how messed up that kind of thinking is.

And if you do still think that eternal torture is a just outcome for non-believers... well... then you're just a terrible human being.

Yeah exactly, as I said previously this is the mindset difference between you and me, I've written at least five paragraphs across several paragraphs at this point outlining it exactly and you don't seem to understand. The Qur'an verses I cited earlier are literally exactly about people with this kind of mindset and its not something someone can change by brute force. This is why there's us humans cant institute compulsion in religion, it doesn't work like that it has to be from within.

Why would you cite Qur'an verses to me as if that's going to strengthen your argument to me? I don't believe in your God. I'm not asking you what the Qur'an says. I'm asking what YOU how you internally know that God is real - beyond some vague "oh look at the blessings bro" because that doesn't actually mean anything.

I'm just thankful to live in this world, you're complaining and begging for more not even realizing all the processes that allow you to move your fingers to type this up not realizing at any second one of these could fail and you'd be crippled. You or I could get a brain aneurysm right now and there's nothing you can do about it.  We're blessed that we have all of our body and mind in working order

So what of the people who do get cancer and brain aneurysms, such as my grandfather? Why should he be grateful?

A few weeks ago, a childhood friend of mine took his own life. Why should I or his family be grateful for that?

You assume that all of my grievances are superficial or irrelevant, and that's frankly extremely insulting.

And this ungratefulness is why you all are so depressed and nihilistic all the time and you end up committing suicide and stuff.

Classy...

Bro it's really simple to me I look at the blessings we have and don't find it rational to think that there is no God. You don't get it right now, maybe one day you will.

As I said above, that's not really an answer, but whatever.

Because mine comes from God and yours does not.

"My views are correct because they come from God" is circular reasoning.

It's all gonna come down to this again and again since we see the world differently, all your replies are predictable because of this and I could hear it a million times by any Reddit or Twitter NPC if I want

I find it difficult to believe that you don't live inside a bubble if this is your idea of what an irreligious person looks like. "Atheist is when Reddit" is such a cringy and childish way of looking at things lmao.

[John Dule]

Ferguson, what are you doing criticizing Islam? You're not a former Muslim; HR could fire you for this.