Atheist converts after mom wins $1 Million Lottery

[cleanhippie]

Sal Bentivegna, an atheist who mocked God by sarcastically praying for his mother to win the lottery, is no longer an atheist.

His joke prayer was amazingly answered when his mother won $1 million dollars the next day on the New York Lottery Sweet Million game.


http://losangeles.ibtimes.com/articles/153725/20110528/atheist-converts-after-mom-wins-1-million-lottery.htm

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I guess you win some and you lose some.

[baldguy]

1. .

[LAGC]

2. From the comments underneath that article...

So when a child is abducted by a predator, the parents pray to God for his/her safe return, and the child's body is later found having been sexually assaulted and violently killed (a scenario that has occured numerous times in North America), God apparently said fuck it, I need to help senior citizens win their local lottery instead. Anyone who believes this was a sign from God is an idiot. For every prayer that is seemingly answered (by coincidence), there are hundreds of others that see no reply.

Couldn't have said it better myself...

Then again, if someone offered me a million dollars on condition that I attend church every week, I'd take them up on that offer in a heart-beat. (As long as I get to choose the church, of course...)

[darkstar3]

5. +1

[MineralMan]

6. Yup. We always attribute good things to God, but not bad things.

People thank God for surviving a natural disaster, but don't blame God when people die in the same natural disaster. Isn't that an odd thing?

[onager]

16. Odd, yes. And the same idea that keeps psychics in business.

Humans tend to remember the hits and forget the misses.

[GKirk]

9. I'd insist on the cash up front...

...and a time limit on how long I have to attend church. :)

[Fridays Child]

11. +1

[obxhead]

15. Yeah, I would take that deal too.

They could make me show, but I would still refuse to give a shit. :rofl:

[MineralMan]

3. That's funny as hell.

I love it.

[KaoriMitsubishi]

4. Let's wait a few years and see what he thinks about his "blessing".

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jack_Whittaker_(lottery_winner)

[darkstar3]

7. Moron.

I've known more than one atheist who converted to Christianity, and every one of them had something in common: A complete lack of education in both science and religion. They were never raised with any particular religion, and so chose the label of atheist for themselves at some point while growing up, only to be moved by reading something like Mere Christianity or, as in this case, witnessing a stroke of coincidence.

I would bet dollars to pesos that this man couldn't answer the first question about something as simple as the Law of Large Numbers or confirmation bias.

I'll bet dollars to yen that this story was picked by the paper for a very specific reason, too...

[cleanhippie]

8. Yes, a VERY specific reason.

Just look at the first two sentences...


"an atheist who mocked God..."

"His joke prayer was amazingly answered..."



Very specific reasons, indeed.

[RaleighNCDUer]

10. For one thing, an atheist would not mock god.

He might mock other people who believe in god - that's not the same thing.

For another thing, I have a counter anecdote: I got in a heated discussion one day with a guy who firmly believed that the end days were here, that the perfect red calf to be sacrificed at the rebuilt, rededicated Temple had been born, and would not believe it would not happen - never mind that construction on the Temple has not begun, and can't begin until the Mosque of the Dome of the Rock is demolished, and that by the time the Temple was completed the calf would have died of old age.

I said, 'Never gonna happen" and challenged god to strike me dead right there if I was wrong (the guy actually stepped back). It's been seven years now, the calf is no longer a calf, and I'm still waiting for that lightning bolt.

But I never got written up in any newspaper for it.

[rurallib]

12. told a guy last year "If there is a God

may he strike you dead on this spot, right now!"

God didn't, but the guy refused to accept his survival as proof there was no God.

[Ian David]

13. ... and then he was hit by a meteor. n/t

[Odin2005]

14. Moron. Sounds like the folks that become devout Wiccans because their first spell "worked".

:rofl: