Belief in a God Who Intervenes

[Eric J in MN]

From http://moveleft.com

"If we define a Christian as a person who believes in the divinity of Jesus Christ, then it is safe to say that some of the key Founding Fathers were not Christians at all."

"Benjamin Franklin, Thomas Jefferson and Tom Paine were deists--that is, they believed in one Supreme Being but rejected revelation and all the supernatural elements of the Christian Church; the word of the Creator, they believed, could best be read in Nature," wrote Brooke Allen in The Nation magazine ("Our Godless Constitution" posted Feb. 3, 2005.)

A couple of questions about the concept of a God who intervenes:

Does God intervene?

Is it good in any sense to believe that God intervenes, whether or not it can be determined if God intervenes?

There was a tragedy on Saturday in which God didn't intervene to stop eight people from being killed in a church.

The killer seems to have been upset, not comforted, by the notion of an interventionist God who was soon going to bring the apocalypse.

The uncle of girl who was injured, also seems to be upset, not comforted, by thoughts of an interventionist God who didn't protect people in that church.

The church is a meeting room in a Sheraton Hotel in Brookfield, Wisconsin, where members of "The Living
Church of God" pray on Saturdays (not Sundays) per the rules of their denomination.

50-60 church members were at the service on Saturday, when a computer technician who was also a church member opened fire, killing seven people and wounding four before killing himself ("Church Terror Gunman 'Was About to Lose Job'" PA News via Scotsman.com, Mar. 13, 2005.)

That man, 44-year-old, Terry Ratzmann, was upset that he was expecting to lose his job, and also upset by "a taped sermon by the church's spiritual leader, Roderick C. Meredith, according to a fellow congregation member who survived the attack. She reported that the sermon by Meredith, who is seen on many of those broadcasts, dealt with a coming 'spiritual war.'" ("Tragedy puts spotlight on small, obscure church" by Dave Umhoefer, Wisconsin Journal Sentinel, posted Mar.12, 2005.)

The Journal Sentinel article continues:

Members believe that the "Great Tribulation" - war and famine as prophesied in the Bible - is nearing and that Christ will return as "King of kings."

Meredith, the church's presiding evangelist, warned in a February sermon of the urgent need to prepare physically and spiritually for the "end time," according to a text of the sermon on the church's Web site. He talked of a pending financial collapse that could devastate the United States, and he encouraged church members to prepare by paying off debts and gathering savings to guard against job loss and bank failures.

The other people who heard this sermon didn't go on a massacre, but in the case of Terry Ratzmann, belief in an interventionist God wasn't comforting at all.

The notion of a God who sometimes intervenes in modern affairs also wasn't comforting to the uncle of a girl injured by Terry Ratzmann ("8 dead in church meeting massacre" by Frank Main, Monifa A. Thomas, and Rummana Hussain," Chicago Sun-Times, Mar. 13, 2005):

Don Free, 48, of West Allis, Wis., said his sister's daughter, Angel Varichak, 19, was one of the wounded -- but was expected to survive. Varichak, a church member, was shot in the abdomen, but the bullet missed major organs, he said.

"I wanted to know where God was when this happened," Free said. "He was supposed to be everywhere. He could have at least been there."

I don't believe in an interventionist God. To anyone who does, how could you answer Mr. Free's question? If God intervenes at all in the modern world, then why didn't God reach down to stop Terry Ratzmann before he hurt anyone?

For a previous article I wrote which deals with the philosophical implications of belief in an interventionist God, especially with regard to tragedies, click below:

The Religious Beliefs of Al Franken

[Tux]

1. God doesn't intervene

But on rare times, it can alter the cause and effect conditions so things can happen.

The shooter and those in the church weren't protected yet they shouldn't think god abandoned them. God just doesn't get involved much since it would intervene with our lives and the karma (cause and effect) we create for ourselves.

[Eric J in MN]

2. What is the difference between intervening and

altering the cause and effect?

[Tux]

41. Small things

Like pushing for certain events that effect a larger time like evolution. As for us, we're on our own.

[donco6]

3. Can't help you there.

I've always wondered how people can believe in an interventionist God. I guess my perspective was savagely altered when my brother drowned as a small child. Now, when I see those inane TV programs on angels and shit - usually doing something critically important like helping some girl get a date to the dance - I can't help but ask, "So, was Ronnie's angel asleep? On vacation? How come he didn't get help? Was he bad?"

Nope, sorry. I do believe in a consciousness, but not an interventionist.

[H2O Man]

4. Book of Uncommon Prayer

by Daniel Berrigan; from personal communication to poster, 1983

Why, O God, are you silent
Why does evil have the upper hand?
Maker, ruler of all,
into what hands have the reins slipped?
The question arises: whose side are you on?
You weren't always so distant --
not a page of that famous book doesn't say it.
You -- plucking people from disaster
Interposing yourself
Turning natural forces around
Making sure, making sense, making love
Mailing things down, clarifying, repairing
night watching
Not allowing evil a rat hole to slink out of.

Who you are
is far less clear
given the ebidence
daily shoved in our faces --

Let me make bold to remind you --
"Faith is a two-way street."

Hope is a hand to hand clasp.
So, come. Believe in me. Take my hand.

[trotsky]

5. Simply invoke the "mysterious ways" defense.

No thinking required.

[Stunster]

6. How do you know God didn't intervene?

Let's suppose God became present in the killer's consciousness as a mental urging not to go ahead with what the guy was intending to do.

That's an intervention.

Let's suppose the killer deliberately resisted, ignored, or rejected this mental suggestion.

But so what? In what alternative way should God have intervened?

Let's say that God creates rational beings who are morally free agents. What would be the point of that if God systematically thwarted all bad choices?

The key considerations are very well expressed by these extracts from this article by Daniel Howard-Snyder:

If God systematically prevents us from harming others yet permits us to have a significant say about the sorts of persons we become, then it will have to look to us as though we can harm others even though we can't. For if I know nothing I do can harm others, then I won’t have the same opportunity to develop my character as I would if it seemed that I could harm others. But deception is incompatible with God's goodness, one might urge.

If God were to arrange things so that none of the horrific consequences for others of our choices really occurred although they appeared to, then we--each of us--would be living a massive illusion. It would seem as though we were involved in genuine relationships with others, making choices that matter for each other, when in fact nothing of the sort really occurred. Our whole lives would be a charade, a sham, a farce; and we wouldn't have a clue. While such massive deception would not result in an utterly meaningless existence (we would still be self-determining creatures), it isn't obvious that such massive deception about matters so central to our lives would be permissible or loving.

Reply 2. A related reply agrees that self-determination does not justify God's permitting us to harm others, even if it does justify God's permitting us to harm ourselves. What other goods, then, would be lost if God were to give us the freedom only to affect ourselves? Well, as indicated in the last reply, we would have no responsibility for each other and we would not be able to enter into the most meaningful relationships; for we are deeply responsible for others and can enter into relationships of love only if we can both benefit and harm others.

This point deserves development. We are deeply responsible for others only if our choices actually make a big difference to their well-being, and that cannot happen unless we can benefit them as well as harm them. This seems obvious enough. Frequently missed, however, is the fact that a similar point applies to love relationships, as contrasted with loving attitudes and feelings.

Two persons cannot share in the most significant relationships of love unless it is up to each of them that they are so related; this fact can be seen by considering what we want from those whose love we value most. Jean-Paul Sartre expresses the point like this:

"The man who wants to be loved does not desire the enslavement of the beloved. He is not bent on becoming the object of passion which flows forth mechanically. He does not want to possess an automaton, and if we want to humiliate him, we need only try to persuade him that the beloved's passion is the result of a psychological determinism. The lover will then feel that both his love and his being are cheapened.... If the beloved is transformed into an automaton, the lover finds himself alone."11

Since those love relationships which we cherish most are those in which we are most deeply vested, in light of love's freedom they are also those from which we can suffer most. It simply is not possible, therefore, for us to be in relationships of love without (at some time) having it within our power to harm and be harmed in a serious fashion.

Something analogous might be said of our relationship with God as well. Suppose God wanted a relationship of love with some of His creatures, and so made some of them fit to be loved by Him and capable of reciprocating His love. Here He faces a choice: He could guarantee that they return His love, or He could leave it up to them. If He guaranteed it, they would never have a choice about whether they loved Him, in which case their love of Him would be a sham and He'd know it. Clearly, then, God cannot be in a relationship of love with His creatures unless He leaves it up to them whether they reciprocate His love. And that requires that they (at some time) have it within their power to withhold their love from Him. But, that cannot be unless they are able to be and do evil.

Deep responsibility for others, relationships of love with our fellows and with God: if these were worthless or even meagerly good things, God would not be justified in permitting evil in order that we might be capable of them. But these are goods of tremendous--perhaps unsurpassable--value. And they are impossible in a world where our choices only have an effect on ourselves.

.......In order to have a world with creatures who can choose freely, the environment in which they are placed must be set up in certain well-defined ways. One of these environmental requirements is that the world be governed by regular and orderly laws of nature. Why is this a requirement?

Well, imagine a world in which nature was not governed by such laws. What would it be like?

Simply put, there would be no regular relationship between the occurrence of one sort of event and another. Let go of the ball and sometimes it drops, sometimes it flies straight up, sometimes it does a loop and crashes through the window. Things would happen haphazardly. The world would be quite chaotic.

But why would this disrupt our ability to choose freely? Because without a great deal of order and regularity in nature we could not predict the effects of our choices, even in the slightest; but we can choose freely only if we can predict the effects of our choices, specifically their most immediate effects. To see the point here, imagine a world in which, despite our best efforts, things just happened haphazardly. Suppose I chose to give you a flower and a big hug to express my affection, but my limbs behaved so erratically that it was as likely that my choice would result in what I intended as that I would poke you in the eye and crush your ribs. Or suppose you were very angry with me, but the air between us behaved so irregularly that any attempt on your part to give me a piece of your mind was about as likely to succeed as rolling apair of sixes twice in a row. If that's how things worked, then our choices would be related to the world in the way they are related (in this world) to the results of pulling a lever on a slot machine. How things came out would be completely out of our control. They wouldn't be up to us. So we cannot be free unless we are able to predict the (immediate) effects of our choices.

And that requires an environment that allows our choices to have predictable effects, that is, an environment that behaves in a law-like, regular, constant fashion.

But now the downside. The very laws of momentum that enable you to give and receive flowers will also cause a falling boulder to crush you if you happen to be under it. The same laws of thermodynamics and fluid dynamics that allow me to talk via air causing my vocal chords to vibrate also cause hurricanes and tornadoes. In general, the sources of natural evil which afflict nonhuman animals, and us--disease, sickness, disasters, birth defects, and the like--"are all the outworking of the natural system of which we are a part. They are the byproducts made possible by that which is necessary for the greater good".17

What about worlds with different natural laws?

The most wide-ranging objection to the natural law theodicy is that there are worlds God could have created which operate according to different laws of nature, laws which do not have sources of natural evil as a byproduct of their operation but which nevertheless provide a sufficiently stable environment in which we could reliably predict the effects of our free choices. Thus, God could have made free creatures without permitting natural evil, in which case we can't say that God might justifiably permit natural evil for the sake of freedom.

Reply. This objection presupposes that there are worlds with the requisite sort of natural laws, those that would provide a stable environment for freedom but which don't have natural evil as a side-effect. But no one has ever specified any such laws. Furthermore, the very possibility of life in our universe hangs on "a large number of physical parameters have apparently arbitrary values such that if those values had been only slightly (very, very slightly different) the universe would contain no life," and hence no free human persons.18 For all we know, the laws that govern our world are the only possible laws; alternatively, for all we know, there are very tight constraints on what sorts of adjustments in the laws can be permitted while retaining life-sustaining capabilities. Thus, for all we know, there couldn't be a world of the sort the objector appeals to: one suitable for free creatures to relate to each other but governed by laws which have no source of natural evil as a byproduct.

Couldn't God prevent a lot of natural evil without undermining freedom?

...One might say that justice requires even-handedness. In that case, if God--who isperfectly just--intervenes to prevent the pain of this or that nonhuman animal in isolated circumstances, He would be obliged to act similarly in all cases of similar suffering. So, for example, if He were to prevent a squirrel deep in the Cascades from feeling pain as it hit a limb on its way down from the top of a towering Douglas fir, even-handedness would require Him to prevent me from feeling pain when the wind blew the car door shut on my thumb. But if God prevented the pain of every nonhuman animal in isolated circumstances, then even-handedness would require the same intervention for humans; such massive intervention would severely undermine the regularity of the laws of nature and hence eliminate our freedom.

11 Being and Nothingness (New York, 1956), 367, quoted in Vincent Brummer, The Model of Love (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1993), 160.

17 Bruce Reichenbach, Evil and a Good God (New York: Fordham University Press, 1982), 101. See also Richard Swinburne, "Natural Evil," American Philosophical Quarterly (1978), 295-301, and The Existence of God, chapter 11. C.S. Lewis takes this line in The Problem of Pain (New York: Macmillan, 1978, 21st printing), 30ff.

18 Peter van Inwagen, "The Problem of Evil, the Problem of Air, and the Problem of Silence," in The Evidential Argument from Evil, 160. For more on the physical parameters in question, see Robin Collins, chapter x, and John Leslie, Universes (London: Routledge, 1989), chapters 1-3.

http://www.ac.wwu.edu/~howardd/god,evil,andsuffering.pdf

[trotsky]

9. Nonsense.

First off, the doctrine of original sin, as espoused by your Catholic Church, pretty much damns us (no pun intended) to having an innate disposition toward the wrong moral choices. From the 1994 Catechism: "Following St. Paul, the Church has always taught that the overwhelming misery which oppresses men and their inclination toward evil and death cannot be understood apart from their connection with Adam's sin and the fact that he has transmitted to us a sin with which we are all born afflicted, a sin which is the 'death of the soul.'"

Here's the rub: until they had eaten of the forbidden fruit, were Adam & Eve limited in any way? Were their lives "a charade, a sham, a farce"? That's how your god supposedly set things up in the first place - and yet your author thinks that such an existence would not be "permissible or loving." God's perfect creation was imperfect? Fascinating how often Christian theology ends up tripping over itself.

Would it not have been logically possible for your god to create humans that were predisposed toward making the right moral choices instead of the wrong ones (sin)? If not, why not?

And what happens in heaven? Heaven is supposedly a state of being where there is no suffering, and there are no bad moral choices. What then of our existence in heaven - would it be considered "a charade, a sham, a farce"? What stops us from making bad moral choices in heaven, and why can't that same system be implemented on earth?

Finally, your free will defense does nothing to address the problem of needless suffering. Over 6 million Jews were killed in the Holocaust. Whatever "greater good" may have come from that, is it unreasonable to think the same greater good could have been achieved if only 5,999,999 had died? 5,999,998? We don't even know exactly how many Jews lost their lives, so how can we say that all of them "had" to die to achieve this mythical "greater good"?

Or how about the suffering of a fetus in utero? If you believe that a fetus can feel pain (and certainly at some stage they must), this is a problem. Some fetuses develop a life-threatening condition in the womb, and some even die during gestation due to some malady like cancer, a deformity, etc. What point was there to the fetus' pain and suffering? Who learned anything from it? What "greater good" was achieved by allowing this?

Sorry, Stunster, your "free will" defense fails miserably.

[H2O Man]

10. Interesting.

While I don't agree with all of what you said, I appreciate that it is well thought out, and you raise valid points. The part about wouldn't 5,999,999 dead have made the same point is perhaps the highlight.

The thought of heaven being disconnected to suffering, which is one of the immature teachings of some Christian churches, misses the point of Jesus's teachings and life. I think it should be excluded from serious conversations on this topic.

[trotsky]

12. You believe there is suffering in heaven?

I'm curious - what do you mean?

[H2O Man]

13. Good question.

From a Christian standpoint, I'd go back to Jesus. He said that the kingdom of heaven was at hand, and indicated that it is a state of being. In the sermon on the mount, for example, he talks about nine avenues to heaven. In our language, the bible says "blessed are the ...." but in the language of the day, the word "blessed" means simply, "bliss." And several of the avenues to bliss include suffering. I do not think that there is a moment where the road stops, and suffering ceases, and a painless heaven begins. I think that is far closer to the things we teach little children, who while innocent and good, are nevertheless incapable of understanding concepts such as heaven in a mature manner.

From the time of his 40 days in the desert, Jesus had achieved bliss. Yet he suffered greatly, perhaps far more than he had before, or would have had he not accepted the role of Son of Man.

Heaven, bliss, or the state that is described by other words in other languages, is obtainable by human beings on earth. It is not as separate and distinct as is presented in children's tales. I think that people tend to view it in terms of "after life," which is closely related .... and I have thoughts on that, also. However, in terms of what Jesus said about heaven, it seems clear that suffering is part of it.

[trotsky]

14. But does that also mean people can hurt others?

That's one of the features of Stunster's argument - that humans must be free to hurt each other, or we're not truly free.

I must admit, though, that in reading your discussion of "bliss" and suffering, all I can think of is an S&M enthusiast. :) Certainly their view of heaven would include a lot of suffering - but what about the rest of us?

[H2O Man]

15. Well,

if you think of S&M, I guess that indicates where your mind is at. (!)Perhaps you should consider going to confession, though that might bring other unpure thoughts to your mind. (grin)

Hurting others is a pretty open concept. We can hurt others by telling the truth, for example. If, however, you mean hurting others in a vicious way, I think the answer is pretty obvious.

[Stunster]

18. Baloney

I'm not a literalist about Adam and Eve.

Your understanding of Catholic theology of original sin is defective in other ways too, but that would take us far afield so I'll ignore that for now. You may however want to read up on Karl Rahner and the 'supernatural existential'.

inclination toward evil and death cannot be understood apart from their connection with Adam's sin.

Yeah, while I'm not a literalist about Adam and Eve, there's a connection between inclining towards evil and death, and sin. They can't be properly understood apart. I don't see a problem with that. People who choose evil become corrupted by it. God allows death so that those who choose evil cannot inflict it on others forever. The only evil thing evildoers can choose to bring about forever is their own spiritual corruption.

But let's go with your set-up....Adam and Eve, Garden of Eden, etc.

"until they had eaten of the forbidden fruit, were Adam & Eve limited in any way?"

Yes, of course. They weren't infinite beings.

"Were their lives "a charade, a sham, a farce"?

No.

Would it not have been logically possible for your god to create humans that were predisposed toward making the right moral choices instead of the wrong ones (sin)? If not, why not?

It's not logically possible for God to determine that people only make good moral choices, because the notion of an '(externally) determined moral choice' is a contradiction in terms. Classical theism says that God can do all things that are logically possible, but God cannot do anything that is inherently logically impossible.

As for giving humans a predisposition towards the good, rather than towards evil, I think God did do that. That's why even now most people naturally will and desire what they perceive to be good, rather than what they perceive to be evil. That's why most people have such a thing as a moral conscience, etc. But unless a predisposition compels the will, then it's still possible to choose evil. Which apparently happens sometimes. But it's not as if everyone is constantly trying to be as evil as they possibly could be. God's grace does not compel, but it does draw or incline the will toward the good, rather as a beautiful painting may attract us, but does not compel us to buy it or hang it on our wall.

That's how your god supposedly set things up in the first place - and yet your author thinks that such an existence would not be "permissible or loving."

Baloney. They had free will, and they exercized it, for crying out loud! They weren't constrained by God only to do what is right! I mean, duh!

Now, as I said, I'm not a literalist about Adam and Eve. But if there are people now who freely act in evil ways (and and it seems there are), and human beings haven't always existed (which they haven't), then there must have been some point in the past when human beings first began to act freely in evil ways.

So I'm having a very hard time seeing how you could possibly have come to think that anything Howard-Snyder says suggests that Adam and Eve having this moral freedom wouldn't be permissible or loving. Seems to me he is saying the opposite of that, and that they in fact had it. So you've created a non-problem for the theist out of your own confusion.

Are you suggesting that Adam and Eve weren't free? That God forced them to disobey him? Howard-Snyder isn't suggesting that they weren't free, or that they were compelled, and nor am I. So your argument is so off-base and confused that I'm amazed by just how off-base and confused it is!

What then of our existence in heaven - would it be considered "a charade, a sham, a farce"? What stops us from making bad moral choices in heaven, and why can't that same system be implemented on earth?

Heaven is the result of a perfect loving union between God who freely offers it, and human persons who freely will and embrace it. Love by its nature is freely willed, not compelled. What stops people from sinning in heaven is their own wills, which are perfectly united in love with God, and so are overflowing with divine grace. But God can't simply create heaven straight off the bat, because by its very nature heaven has to be freely willed. Your suggestion that God should have done so is like suggesting that a man who wants a perfectly loving wife should simply create a robot who cannot help 'loving' him perfectly. But far from that being perfect love, it wouldn't be love at all. Let me repeat the quote Howard-Snyder gives from Jean-Paul Sartre that drives home this point:

"The man who wants to be loved does not desire the enslavement of the beloved. He is not bent on becoming the object of passion which flows forth mechanically. He does not want to possess an automaton, and if we want to humiliate him, we need only try to persuade him that the beloved's passion is the result of a psychological determinism. The lover will then feel that both his love and his being are cheapened.... If the beloved is transformed into an automaton, the lover finds himself alone."

But a freely willed perfectly loving union between persons is logically possible. And that logical possibility being realized is what heaven is. Hence it's the result of freedom. But it wouldn't be a perfectly loving union if the persons then acted evilly. To be fully free, we must be able to rationally will that our personal and moral character be a certain way forever, and have that will realized. That's heaven (and hell too) in a nutshell.

This life is thus the arena in which human freedom plays out what it's going to will to be the case regarding our personal character forever. If we were created 'already in heaven' it wouldn't be a freely willed loving union between us and God, and hence it wouldn't be heaven.

Also, you're assuming a notion of time in heaven. I don't think time in our sense has any real meaning in heaven. Even in the physical universe, there is a growing willingness among scientists to think it may not represent a truly fundamental aspect of reality. I'll send a second reply dealing with that separately. But if heaven is experienced in a kind of timeless way, then the idea of loving God perfectly, and then later ceasing to, doesn't even make sense.

Finally, your free will defense does nothing to address the problem of needless suffering. Over 6 million Jews were killed in the Holocaust. Whatever "greater good" may have come from that, is it unreasonable to think the same greater good could have been achieved if only 5,999,999 had died? 5,999,998?

Utter nonsense! The whole point of free will is that it doesn't act from necessity. So, sure there's no need for the Holocaust! There's no need for any Jew to have been murdered by the Nazis. The way you're arguing, you're making it look as if the free will defense claims that murder is necessary. That is so perverse a misreading that I hardly know how it's even possible that any sane person could arrive at it.

Needless suffering is caused by human beings acting freely. DUH Well, gee, that's exactly what the theist is claiming in the free will defence!. It's needless! It's not necessary! It's due to bad use of our freedom! Right! Exactly!

What you need to argue to make your case is that the suffering resulting from bad use of free will is so bad that it outweighs the moral goodness, love, and joy resulting from good use of free will and that hence, God should not have created human free will. But that comparison is not calculable, and so the determination that the bad outweighs the good cannot be demonstrated. But you would need to demonstrate that to make your argument work.

However, one indication that people think that life with moral freedom is worthwhile overall is that most of them don't commit suicide, and indeed try to avoid death. If it was so bad, why wouldn't everyone have jumped a cliff ages ago? "Biological instinct." But what about those who do commit suicide? I mean, anyone can do it. It's pretty easy. Well, it seems to me that the reason people don't do it more often is because the prospect of death and physical extinction seems worse than struggling through life as best one can, even with all its toils, risks, sufferings and troubles. But that means that most people think life with moral freedom is, on the whole, worth having, and worth living. So, if most people think life with moral freedom is on the whole worth having and living, why shouldn't God have thought the same thing, and so create life with moral freedom?

[H2O Man]

20. That's interesting .....

.... that you view sin, evil, and death as intertwined, and do not see death as distinct. While you are certainly every bit as entitled to your views as I am to mine, I'm wondering if you could think of what difference it might make in your interpretation of "good and evil" if death were simply a natural part of organic life, not any more associated with "evil" or "sin" than say the seasons or dusk and dawn? I'm not asking this in an attempt to sway you, or certainly not to insult you. Just wondering if your belief system allows you to think of other possibilities? Thanks.

[Stunster]

30. The answer

lies in something I referred to near the beginning of my post---Karl Rahner's notion of the 'supernatural existential'.

Let's back up for a moment, though.

The classical Catholic doctrine regarding these matters states that:

1) human beings are mortal by nature
2) eternal life is a supernatural gift
3) God always intended us to have that gift
4) By original sin, we lose the gift of eternal life
5) But God graciously restores it through Jesus Christ

Ok, now there's a way of thinking about these doctrinal statements that interprets them as if they are within a temporal and historical framework, such that they form a sequence in time, and that God arrives at the decision specified in 5 in a temporal response to the sin mentioned in 4. What Rahner (a 20th century German Jesuit theologian) does is to reinterpret these doctrinal statements so that they are not seen as following a temporal sequence. Rather, the grace of Christ is 'always already' present and is trans-temporal, extending both forward and backward in time from Calvary. Similarly, the gift of eternal life is 'always already' available and willed by God.

So, it's not as if there's a historical sequence whereby we are created with mortal natures, and then God adds the supernatural gift of eternal life, and then humanity sins, and then Christ redeems us, and then the gift becomes available again.

No.

What happens is rather that human existence is 'always already' going on within the supernatural dynamic of sin, grace, redemption and eternal life . There's always sin, always grace, always redemption, always eternal life occurring in 'human nature' or in human existence. In other words, the proper way to interpret the doctrinal statements is not as a sequence that takes place successively in time, but as conceptually and (theo-)logically interrelated general truths about the human condition, such that whenever and wherever there are human beings, these truths apply.

So yes, we're always mortal by nature, and we're always offered the supernatural gift of resurrection and eternal life through Christ. Thus, although there is a formal conceptual distinction between natural life and supernatural life, EXISTENTIALLY the human condition always includes both, AS IF BY NATURE. But that last phrase really refers not to our physical nature, or even our spiritual nature, but rather, to GOD'S TIMELESS DECISION TO CREATE/REDEEM/GIVE US ETERNAL LIFE, which takes place in the timeless light of God's eternal knowledge that humans would be sinners if God created them.

God timelessly (fore)knowing this, nonetheless chooses to create us and redeem us because, I suppose, that's more loving than NOT creating us and redeeming us.

[H2O Man]

31. While I already understand

what you believe, and was merely asking if you can consider any possibility other than that belief system, I guess you actually did answer it. Thanks for that.

[Stunster]

34. Wait a minute

You seem to be thinking that the answer I gave doesn't address the possibility that you asked about in your first reply. But I really can't see why you would think such a thing. And here's why I'm puzzled...

You wrote:
I'm wondering if you could think of what difference it might make in your interpretation of "good and evil" if death were simply a natural part of organic life, not any more associated with "evil" or "sin" than say the seasons or dusk and dawn?


I responded:

The classical Catholic doctrine regarding these matters states that:

1) human beings are mortal by nature......

........So yes, we're always mortal by nature, and we're always offered the supernatural gift of resurrection and eternal life through Christ.

I guess I thought that you were interpreting my saying that sin and death are connected to mean that somehow we're not mortal by nature. But in the part of my answer I've just quoted, I was explaining that Catholic doctrine says that we are mortal by nature. And hence I thought that your question betrayed a misunderstanding on your part of what I was saying. Sure, we're mortal by nature.

But it doesn't follow from our being mortal by nature that eternal life in Christ is not part of God's plan, and wasn't always part of that plan. But it's, as I clearly stated, a supernatural gift. And I explained earlier why this supernatural gift isn't given straight off the bat, and why death (rather than as a punishment for sin) should be seen as a way of limiting the harm that evildoers can inflict on other people, while still giving them enough time, freedom and moral autonomy to choose and form their own personal character.

[H2O Man]

35. Oh, yes, I understand you.

And I think that your belief system is fine, and it clearly works for you. But I think that there are possibilities outside of what the Catholic Church interprets as natural, mortal, and supernatural .... indeed, that natural is supernatural, and that there is not the division, as marked by concepts such as sin, evil, and death. While I would agree that sin and evil exist, and are indeed stumbling blocks that hinder the reunification with the divine, I do not place death in the same group. Birth and death are the same process; the ancestor and the womb are the same thing.

But, again, I respect your beliefs 100%, and am pleased that you feel and believe strongly.

[trotsky]

38. Sandwich.

They (Adam & Eve) had free will, and they exercized it, for crying out loud! They weren't constrained by God only to do what is right! I mean, duh!

Sure, they lived in a perfect paradise and had free will - which is exactly what you & most apologists say is logically imposssible, or not an environment where we could really be human, or whatever. And that time lasted - for awhile. If left to their own devices, it may have stayed just that. But there was another character in this story, if you remember. One that goaded Eve into tasting the forbidden fruit. If it had not been for the serpent, would A&E have eventually eaten it? How can we know? Keep in mind that they had not, and from the text of the bible, even been tempted by the tree itself, until that serpent came into the picture. You kind of ignore that, and even if you're not an A&E literalist (and I really didn't suspect you would be), there's still the question of why your god was able to create (or guide evolution to create) sentient beings capable of loving him but who were also restrained from making bad moral choices, whereas now you say he cannot.

Are you suggesting that Adam and Eve weren't free?

Sort of, but not in the sense that you go on to berate me for. Until they ate of the forbidden fruit, things were just "peachy" in the garden. They had free will, but they didn't make any bad moral choices, did they? My point in using them as an example is to show a situation in which humans existed, had free will, but (up until that serpent intervened - who created him, anyway?) didn't make bad moral choices. Why not? That's your problem, not mine.

Heaven is the result of a perfect loving union between God who freely offers it, and human persons who freely will and embrace it. Love by its nature is freely willed, not compelled.

Such as by telling people they'll burn in hell forever if they don't love you, right? Or spend a few eons in no-man's land while their sins are purged to make them worthy. Give me a break, Stunster.

What stops people from sinning in heaven is their own wills, which are perfectly united in love with God, and so are overflowing with divine grace. But God can't simply create heaven straight off the bat, because by its very nature heaven has to be freely willed.

Why doesn't your god just create a simulation world for each soul, where each person can be judged on their actions, but their actions will never harm a real person? Surely this is within your god's power to do, and it serves the same purpose as earth - to weed out those who can't make the right decisions.

I'd also question why your god can't just infuse his children with "divine grace" from the start. We spend but a tiny fraction of time here in our lives on earth, how could it possibly be so important, and how could every person be subjected to enough situations to perfectly judge how well they will choose to do good? We don't all live the same number of years or grow up under the same circumstances, do we?

To be fully free, we must be able to rationally will that our personal and moral character be a certain way forever, and have that will realized.

This makes no sense. Our personal and moral character, according to Christian theology, is thoroughly corrupt. Original sin, you know. If it's going to be that way forever, we couldn't ever be in a heaven-like state.

The whole point of free will is that it doesn't act from necessity.

Either you're getting confused, or you're deliberately misrepresenting what I'm saying. Given your past history of abusive language and treatement, I'm inclined to think it's the latter.

Let's put it this way: I am acknowledging that the theist (the Christian theist, at least) justifies the existence of evil (which includes suffering) because of the importance of free will. Why you felt you had to re-emphasize that, I don't know. Perhaps your point is weak. At any rate, as you eventually note, what is to be questioned is just how much suffering is necessary for free will to be valid.

Now obviously the answer is not infinite (not all of us endure unbearable pain from birth to death), but it's not zero either.

So the question is, why is the line drawn where it is, and if it becomes reasonable to say that we could imagine a possible world where the consequences of a morally evil act were "bad enough," then a world in which they were greater than that would be unnecessarily cruel, thus posing a problem for the apologist. This kind of reasoning is used by theists all the time, why can't I turn it around on you?

And so furthermore, I'm saying that it seems reasonable to believe that not every single one of the 6+ million deaths in the Holocaust was absolutely necessary to protect the precious gift of free will.

I'd also like to hear your take on fetal pain & suffering, you seemed to ignore that point.

Why don't people commit suicide? Because the purpose of life on earth is to propagate DNA. Not very romantic, but there you have it. That's what evolution is all about - different strands of DNA competing with each other. Now obviously an animal that will easily take its own life is not apt to leave many offspring, and so we have a perfectly simple naturalistic solution to your question. Most of us have a genetic predisposition towards living!

[Stunster]

40. "Ham"

Sure, they lived in a perfect paradise and had free will - which is exactly what you & most apologists say is logically imposssible, or not an environment where we could really be human, or whatever.

Neither Howard-Snyder nor myself said that living in a perfect paradise while possessing free will is impossible. It is possible. It is a logically possible state of affairs that there be no human being who ever sins. But the realization of that state of affairs depends on them freely choosing never to sin. If God simply made it the case that they never sinned, then they wouldn't have free will.

there's still the question of why your god was able to create (or guide evolution to create) sentient beings capable of loving him but who were also restrained from making bad moral choices, whereas now you say he cannot.

They were not restrained from making bad moral choices. The Genesis story suggests no such restraint. What it suggests is that they had moral freedom, and used it to choose badly.

The serpent aspect doesn't make much difference because the serpent did not compel them to choose badly. It was their own choice. (Again I stress I'm not a literalist). The way I would interpret the serpent figure is simply as a vehicle for delivering the idea of humans making themselves gods. God wants to share divine life with humans, but humans are tempted to create a divine life for themselves without receiving it from God. But true divine life cannot be created by humans. It can only be received and freely accepted from the One who is truly divine.

They had free will, but they didn't make any bad moral choices, did they? My point in using them as an example is to show a situation in which humans existed, had free will, but (up until that serpent intervened - who created him, anyway?) didn't make bad moral choices. Why not? That's your problem, not mine.

It's not a problem at all. You're imagining a problem for the theist where there is none. They had free will, and for a time didn't make bad choices. And then they made a bad choice. They didn't have to make that bad choice. They weren't compelled to make it. They freely made it. They could have refrained from making it.

Free will doesn't necessitate bad choices. But it makes such choices possible. (It also makes good choices possible). The garden of Eden cannot be equated with heaven. Heaven is the result of a certain type of free choice. The garden of Eden is merely an arena in which choices are made. It's not itself the result of human choices. It's where those choices get made. Heaven is, by contrast, the consequence of the right kind of choice.

It seems to me that you're confused about the Fall. Catholic doctrine does not teach that human nature is wholly corrupt. What it teaches is that at some point in the past, humans began to sin and that this has had lasting effects on the human psyche. The paradigm is the abused child who then abuses others as an adult. For this paradigm to occur in history, there had to be a first unabused abuser. I think the first moral wrongdoing injured and corrupted our psyche to a significant degree, and this led to the wounding of the psyche of each generation, since they grew up in a psychological environment that was already scarred by sin. But grace has always been at work too. Again, the supernatural existential of Rahner is the best way to understand this.


Such as by telling people they'll burn in hell forever if they don't love you, right? Or spend a few eons in no-man's land while their sins are purged to make them worthy. Give me a break, Stunster.

Hell is not loving. It is not a punishment that God inflicts if people do not love. It simply is the resulting state of lovelessness itself. It is the choice not to love rather than a punishment for such a choice, which does indeed generate misery.

Why doesn't your god just create a simulation world for each soul, where each person can be judged on their actions, but their actions will never harm a real person?

This is answered explicitly in the Howard-Snyder excerpts I already posted.

I'd also question why your god can't just infuse his children with "divine grace" from the start.

God does. That's the point of Rahner's 'supernatural existential'. Grace is 'always already' present, along with the psychological woundedness of the human condition. If we cooperate with divine grace, we become healed. If we resist that grace, our woundedness and misery only grow worse.

Our personal and moral character, according to Christian theology, is thoroughly corrupt.

Not in Catholic theology.

what is to be questioned is just how much suffering is necessary for free will to be valid.

The quantity of suffering is in large part a function of population. Six million Jews being killed sounds like a tremendous amount of suffering to us in part because the Jewish population is not in the millions of trillions. Around 54 million people died in World War II. That sounds terrible. But it is actually a fairly small percentage of the total population. Let's suppose that in 1940, there were 26 human beings on the planet. They then had a fight, in which 23 were killed. In percentage terms, that's worse than World War II.

So the question becomes, is there a 'best' number of free-willed creatures that God should have created? 100? 1000 trillion? An infinite number? The more God creates, the more the possibilities there are for both love and happiness and sin and evil. So if you're saying God should have reduced the number of free-willed creatures so that there'd be less Jews killed in the Holocaust, you face the problem that you might get down to 26 free-willed creatures, 23 of whom end up being killed, which is not an obviously better outcome than creating billions of human beings and having the Holocaust. Similarly, one can imagine this same conversation being had between members of a multi-trillion species, with one asking, "Why did God allow 80 trillion of us to die---couldn't He have got it down to, say, a mere 6 million?"

So the question is, why is the line drawn where it is,

That's one question. Another is, why not draw the line here? (Cf. previous paragraph).

if it becomes reasonable to say that we could imagine a possible world where the consequences of a morally evil act were "bad enough," then a world in which they were greater than that would be unnecessarily cruel, thus posing a problem for the apologist. This kind of reasoning is used by theists all the time, why can't I turn it around on you?

Not sure of what exactly it is you're asking here. What I'm saying is that to show that there's more evil in the actual world than would be justified by free will is essentially an incoherent project because the amount of evil and good is a function of population. Let's say you only make 2 human beings. And one murders the other and then starts burning cats alive for fun. Is that a better world than ours, or worse, or about the same? Seems to me one could easily say it's worse even though there's less human suffering than in our world.

I'd also like to hear your take on fetal pain & suffering

What about it? Well, specify the alternative physics that would result in physical beings endowed with rational consciousness and moral freedom, but produce less physical suffering than the actual world does. In fact, it would be a good idea if you published what that alternative physics is, complete with detailed equations and calculations showing the much smaller amount of pain your physics would produce compared to God's.

Of course, if you don't know what that alternative physics looks like, then you don't know that the actual physics isn't the most pain-minimizing physics capable of generating physical beings endowed with rational consciousness and moral autonomy. And in fact, there are scientific reasons to think that this physics is necessary for physical beings to have rational consciousness. So far as we know, a physical creature needs to have a brain like ours to be rational and morally autonomous. But if you need to have brains like ours, then you need to have physics like the actual physics. But then that's going to produce the kind of suffering and pain we have in the actual world that is due purely to physical causes.

Most of us have a genetic predisposition towards living!

Yes, a predisposition. But if things got bad enough, though, we'd probably prefer to die. Now what's interesting is that despite a large amount of pain and suffering in the world, most people do not prefer to die. That suggests that for most people, the amount of pain and suffering, though great, is tolerable. We can imagine things being worse. Suppose we were invaded by space aliens who loved torturing people. I think you'd see a sudden jump in the suicide rate. The point I'm making is that most people do not commit suicide (I think the rate globally is about 1 person in 6000), but we can imagine circumstances that were so bad that most people would commit suicide. We can imagine circumstances in which the rate would jump to 1 person in 100, or 1 person in 10, etc.

So when you say that there's too much suffering and pain for free will to be justified, I reply in two ways: a) the amount is a function of population, and b) there's no way to tell whether the amount is so much as to outweigh the good. Well over 99% of people don't find it bad enough to commit suicide.

[trotsky]

42. and Cheese

If God simply made it the case that they never sinned, then they wouldn't have free will.

So you keep saying. But you haven't established that at all. Our choices are limited already by our physical surroundings and our bodies themselves - there are literally thousands of moral choices that I cannot make because of such limitations. A person's body is capable of killing others that they can overpower, but not those they cannot (unless they employ tools like a gun, but that's not relevant). We are not on equal footing with other human beings to make moral choices, so how can you say god cannot "make" certain moral choices off-limits? He already has!

The Genesis story suggests no such restraint. What it suggests is that they had moral freedom, and used it to choose badly.

Yes, once tempted by an outside agent. (That was placed in the garden why, exactly?) We have no reason to believe that the paradise life in the garden could not have continued indefinitely - according to the Genesis story, that is.

But even so, why can't we ALL start out in a paradise and live there until our moral choices expel us from it? A&E got that opportunity, but no one else. Why are the consequences of the bad choices of the fathers visited upon their innocent sons?

Hell is not loving. It is not a punishment that God inflicts if people do not love. It simply is the resulting state of lovelessness itself.

Right. Hell = not god. You go to hell because you don't love god. Sorry but that's still a threat, no matter how you spin it.

If we cooperate with divine grace, we become healed. If we resist that grace, our woundedness and misery only grow worse.

So you have an easy way to tell if someone is a good Christian (or good Catholic) - they're always happy and rewarded by god. Uh, right? So poor and suffering people are that way because they have turned away from god? Stunster, are you a Catholic or a Calvinist?

So if you're saying God should have reduced the number of free-willed creatures so that there'd be less Jews killed in the Holocaust, you face the problem that you might get down to 26 free-willed creatures, 23 of whom end up being killed, which is not an obviously better outcome than creating billions of human beings and having the Holocaust.

Nope, I'm not saying that. Your god's options in limiting the suffering of the Holocaust were endless. How about making one of the death trains skip the tracks, allowing thousands of Jews to escape? Let a guard have a heart attack at a crucial time, allowing a whole camp to escape. Your god, being infinitely powerful, would theoretically have an infinite number of options available to it. Why are you limiting what your god can do?

What I'm saying is that to show that there's more evil in the actual world than would be justified by free will is essentially an incoherent project because the amount of evil and good is a function of population.

Well of course it's impossible, because we don't have any way to precisely quantify suffering or accurately show alternate timelines. I'm just asking you to think. Imagine other possibilities as to how suffering could be minimized, and if you can find just one tiny option that could lessen the amount of suffering - even a miniscule amount - without interfering with our free will, BAM - the justification for evil is gone and we do not live in the perfect world where it's just right for the precious gift of free will.

Well, specify the alternative physics that would result in physical beings endowed with rational consciousness and moral freedom, but produce less physical suffering than the actual world does.

LMAO. Stunster, you're a hoot. Rather than simply defend your positions, you try to set your opponent up with an impossible task so that when they come back and say they can't do it, you feel your position is justified. "Alternate physics"? Please. How about something simple - until the umbilical cord is cut, a fetus cannot feel pain. I don't know how this would be accomplished, but then I wouldn't be the one having to do it. Tie it into the central nervous system somehow. Seems like it should be possible to me, especially if I had the infinite power and wisdom supposedly possessed by your god.

But if things got bad enough, though, we'd probably prefer to die. Now what's interesting is that despite a large amount of pain and suffering in the world, most people do not prefer to die.

Is this supposed to be some kind of argument that the amount of pain & suffering in the world is perfect because not everyone wants to kill themselves?

Stunster, each person's level of tolerance for suffering is different. I shouldn't have to point this out. Not everyone in the world experiences the same level of suffering in their lives, either. And you don't have to bring aliens or anything else into this. Clearly there IS enough suffering for SOME people to want to kill themselves, and considering the monster sin that is to Catholics and most other religions, that's a big question mark as to whether suffering is truly at the minimum level to allow human free will.

[Stunster]

43. "on lightly toasted rye"

I don't have a lot of time today to argue with you.

If God simply made it the case that they never sinned, then they wouldn't have free will.

So you keep saying. But you haven't established that at all.

It comes from the meaning of the concepts involved. I can't be bothered having to spell it all out for you in detail. It's like, if you were free, you would vote for Kerry. But someone puts a drug in your beer which makes you vote for Bush instead. Did you freely vote for Bush? No.

Et cetera.

Well, specify the alternative physics that would result in physical beings endowed with rational consciousness and moral freedom, but produce less physical suffering than the actual world does.

LMAO. Stunster, you're a hoot. Rather than simply defend your positions, you try to set your opponent up with an impossible task so that when they come back and say they can't do it, you feel your position is justified.

OK. You say "if there were a God, he should and would have chosen a better physics than the actual physics. Since we've only got the actual physics, that shows that there's no God."

Then you admit that you have no idea if a better physics is even a logical possibility. And you're laughing your ass off?

Suppose I said to an engineer, "Your engine design is terribly inefficient." And he says to me, "OK, show me a more efficient design", and I say, "Oh, I don't know if a more efficient design is even possible", he'd think I was a stupid jerk, and he'd be right.

So, if you're going to say "the actual physics sucks", and then say "Oh, it's impossible for me to know if there's a better physics", people are going to laugh their asses off at you.

That's all for today, thanks.

:-)

[trotsky]

44. With tomatoes

It's like, if you were free, you would vote for Kerry. But someone puts a drug in your beer which makes you vote for Bush instead. Did you freely vote for Bush? No.

That's not what I'm saying. When you have more time, you can address my observation that we already have "god-given" limitations put on our free will, thus negating the supposed prohibition against limits.

Then you admit that you have no idea if a better physics is even a logical possibility. And you're laughing your ass off?

You betcha! Look, all I'm saying is that if you can just imagine even one scenario where a little divine intervention would A) lessen even an infinitesimal amount of suffering and B) not interfere with human free will, then the current system is faulty. (Well, faulty if you are a theist who posits that the current system is the perfect balance of suffering to allow for free will.)

You essentially say, "The system is perfect because it's the one we have."

I'll let you identify THAT logical fallacy.

[Stunster]

45. Hold the tomatoes

You're not operating with the right mental picture.

For a timeless, omniscient being like God, 'further' tinkering with the actual laws is simply equivalent to selecting a different set of laws in the first place.

In other words, for a timeless, omniscient God, the divine 'interventions' are 'built into' the laws of physics. That is one major reason why physical nature is quantum mechanical, rather than strictly deterministic.

How might this manifest itself in our experience?

Vast numbers of people experience 'close calls'. Vast numbers of people make surprising recoveries from illnesses. Vast numbers of people have 'lucky' escapes, or enjoy 'good fortune'.

But if one has a vast population, then one can't build into the physics a zero probability of harm and still have a coherent physics capable of grounding rational expectations about nature, and capable of producing rational conscious animals with brains sophisticated enough to study physics and engage in moral reasoning.

One has no grounds to think otherwise if one can't specify the supposedly better physics.

[trotsky]

46. At least some stone ground mustard?

I didn't say your god had to "tinker" with the laws, only come up with a system that has just a little bit less suffering.

Nor am I saying such a system has to have "zero probability of harm." (Although that's a very easy strawman to argue against, isn't it?) Again, my point is that if a system could exist that has even the most miniscule amount LESS suffering than our current system, one of the pillars of Christian monotheistic thought would collapse. (Namely, that the current amount of evil/suffering in the world is required in order for us to have free will.)

You've avoided answering my questions.

[Stunster]

47. If you're using mustard, then forget the cheese

Again, my point is that if a system could exist that has even the most miniscule amount LESS suffering than our current system, one of the pillars of Christian monotheistic thought would collapse. (Namely, that the current amount of evil/suffering in the world is required in order for us to have free will.

Let's suppose that the amount of evil/suffering necessary for us to have free will is precisely the same amount as the actual amount minus one toothache. Then, by your argument, a person would be justified in believing that the amount of evil/suffering is compatible with the existence of God up until the moment that the extra toothache occurred, but would not be justified in holding that belief once the additional toothache kicked in. And this would be so even if it's the case, once that toothache occurs, that the total amount of joy, pleasure and goodness still outweighs the total amount of suffering and evil.

But it is very hard to see how any human being could ever be in the epistemic position of being able to tell that one more toothache in the universe would render theism untenable. In other words, the scenario you've set up, in which theism 'collapses' because of a small amount of additional suffering, does not represent a genuine epistemic possibility for human beings and presupposes a far more fine-grained calculus of suffering than human rational agents can operate with.

[trotsky]

48. C'mon, mustard & Swiss were made to go together with ham.

"In other words, the scenario you've set up, in which theism 'collapses' because of a small amount of additional suffering, does not represent a genuine epistemic possibility for human beings and presupposes a far more fine-grained calculus of suffering than human rational agents can operate with."

First off, I'm not saying that theism in general would collapse because of this, only specific versions of theism (Christianity, for example) that offer up as an explanation for the problem of evil this "free will defense". If you believe that a malevolent god created the universe and seeks to cause its creatures pain, the problem of evil is no problem at all. Well, if anything, the problem of evil for THAT theist becomes "Why isn't there MORE evil?"

And secondly, sure it represents a possibility. The only weakness of the argument is that you have to believe your god wants the amount of evil & suffering to be at its absolute minimum. Considering that your god is generally defined as all-good and all-loving, this is not unreasonable.

Still waiting for answers to my other questions.

[Stunster]

49. "No sandwich (or God) for me, my tooth hurts"

First off, I'm not saying that theism in general would collapse because of this, only specific versions of theism (Christianity, for example) that offer up as an explanation for the problem of evil this "free will defense".

Without forcing me to repeat myself, why would Christianity be tenable up to a certain point, but then have to 'collapse' because you woke up one day with a toothache?

Still waiting for answers to my other questions.

What other questions?

[trotsky]

50. Then I'll put my tomatoes back on.

Without forcing me to repeat myself, why would Christianity be tenable up to a certain point, but then have to 'collapse' because you woke up one day with a toothache?

That's not even remotely close to what I'm saying, and I don't appreciate you distorting my statements. The theist who acknowledges a problem of evil, and presents the free will defense as a response, then must (if he believes in a god that loves and cares for us enough to minimize the amount of suffering we have to endure) be able to demonstrate that the current amount of suffering IS at a minimum. And my challenge to that demonstration is suggesting possible worlds (or scenarios) where a little divine intervention without affecting anyone's free will is possible.

What other questions?

Here you go:

A person's body is capable of killing others that they can overpower, but not those they cannot (unless they employ tools like a gun, but that's not relevant). We are not on equal footing with other human beings to make moral choices, so how can you say god cannot "make" certain moral choices off-limits? He already has!

But even so, why can't we ALL start out in a paradise and live there until our moral choices expel us from it? A&E got that opportunity, but no one else. Why are the consequences of the bad choices of the fathers visited upon their innocent sons?

So you have an easy way to tell if someone is a good Christian (or good Catholic) - they're always happy and rewarded by god. Uh, right? So poor and suffering people are that way because they have turned away from god? Stunster, are you a Catholic or a Calvinist?

Your god's options in limiting the suffering of the Holocaust were endless. How about making one of the death trains skip the tracks, allowing thousands of Jews to escape? Let a guard have a heart attack at a crucial time, allowing a whole camp to escape. Your god, being infinitely powerful, would theoretically have an infinite number of options available to it. Why are you limiting what your god can do?

On edit: the above questions all came from Post #42, if you want to go back and review the context.

[Stunster]

51. Enjoy

The theist who acknowledges a problem of evil, and presents the free will defense as a response, then must (if he believes in a god that loves and cares for us enough to minimize the amount of suffering we have to endure) be able to demonstrate that the current amount of suffering IS at a minimum.

No we don't have to demonstrate that. We believe in theism. We understand that there are good reasons why God would wish to create the laws of physics, and free will, and we attribute natural evil to the laws of physics and moral evil to the bad use of free will. Along comes the non-theist who claims that theism is not true because there's too much evil and suffering in the world. But how does the non-theist know that there's too much? It's all due to physics and bad use of free will, but there are good reasons for creating physics and free-willed creatures.

True, there is more evil than there needs to be, but this is due to bad use of free will. And here I'd simply be repeating myself that "a free creaturely action that is constrained by God to be morally good" is like a "square circle"---it's an incoherent concept.

Next I'd be repeating myself about the quantity of moral evil being a function of population. One could reduce the quantity by having just two free-willed humans. But what if one tortures and eventually murders the other and thereafter sets cats on fire for fun? Is that a better world than this one? I don't think so.

And my challenge to that demonstration is suggesting possible worlds (or scenarios) where a little divine intervention without affecting anyone's free will is possible.

For any given set of free-willed creatures, God cannot determine that they will freely choose less evil than they actually do. Why? Because "determining what someone else will freely choose" is a self-contradictory notion.

God may and does offer grace, by which humans are attracted to the good. But grace is resistible, because 'compelled salvation' isn't salvation, any more than 'compelled love' for one's spouse is love for one's spouse. But spouses can attract each others' love by being gracious.

A person's body is capable of killing others that they can overpower, but not those they cannot (unless they employ tools like a gun, but that's not relevant). We are not on equal footing with other human beings to make moral choices, so how can you say god cannot "make" certain moral choices off-limits? He already has!

There are many ways to skin a cat. A strong man can rape an elderly woman, but not if she has already murdered him by poisoning his coffee.

But even so, why can't we ALL start out in a paradise and live there until our moral choices expel us from it? A&E got that opportunity, but no one else. Why are the consequences of the bad choices of the fathers visited upon their innocent sons?

If evil choices didn't have evil consequences, what would be evil about them? That's the nature of evil---innocent people get hurt.
We are responsible for our own moral character. Our character is initially formed by our actions, and our actions then reflect the character we have adopted. But the formation of character requires that we see that certain kinds of action will have certain kinds of effects, and predictably so. Intentions have to be realizable in a consistent way for rational agency to be possible. And rational agency has to be possible in order for us to be responsible for forming our own moral character. Hence, intentions have to be realizable in a consistent way if we are to be responsible for forming our own moral character.

So you have an easy way to tell if someone is a good Christian (or good Catholic) - they're always happy and rewarded by god. Uh, right?

Uh, of course not. They might be martyred by bad people using their free will in a bad way.

So poor and suffering people are that way because they have turned away from god? Stunster, are you a Catholic or a Calvinist?

Catholic.

Your god's options in limiting the suffering of the Holocaust were endless.

Oh no, not tinkering again! I've already told you what's wrong-headed with that idea. It's either this set of physical laws, or another set. If you can't specify another, superior set, then you have no grounds for making this assertion.

Why are you limiting what your god can do?

I'm not limiting God. You're simply confused about omnipotence.

[trotsky]

52. Delicious!

But how does the non-theist know that there's too much (evil and suffering)?

By merely being able to postulate scenarios where at least some suffering could be eliminated without interfering with anyone's free will.

Next I'd be repeating myself about the quantity of moral evil being a function of population.

There's no point in that because it has no relevance to what I'm saying. Even if there were only two people in the world, there would be ways the suffering could be minimized without harming the exercise of free will.

For any given set of free-willed creatures, God cannot determine that they will freely choose less evil than they actually do.

Well, that's fine and dandy, but that's not what I'm saying. I am specifically focusing on those things a god *could* do to minimize suffering without influencing free will. Your mind seems to have locked onto this idea that I'm not espousing.

A strong man can rape an elderly woman, but not if she has already murdered him by poisoning his coffee.

This example does nothing to counter my observation. The woman has to resort to using a tool (poison). The man could perform his act without any assistance. If anything, your example only strengthens my case - people can be restricted by all sorts of "natural" things from exercising certain moral choices.

That's the nature of evil---innocent people get hurt.

No, that just *is* evil. Your god set up a system in which the decision to sin condemned all those who followed. I bet he designed flies just to pull their wings off, too.

But the formation of character requires that we see that certain kinds of action will have certain kinds of effects, and predictably so.

Which brings up an interesting sidenote - the fruit that A&E ate came from the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil. How could they have known WHAT was good or evil UNTIL they had eaten the fruit?

They might be martyred by bad people using their free will in a bad way.

You originally said: "If we cooperate with divine grace, we become healed. If we resist that grace, our woundedness and misery only grow worse."

I asked if this was some sort of sure-fired way to tell if someone is on good terms with your god. The only answer you could give had to do with the limited case of martyrdom. What about all the other cases where bad people are enormously successful (e.g., Bush) while good people get dumped on?

Oh no, not tinkering again! I've already told you what's wrong-headed with that idea. It's either this set of physical laws, or another set. If you can't specify another, superior set, then you have no grounds for making this assertion.

If you're against any "tinkering" then you're a deist, Stunster. Are you? The Fatima story - do you believe that? Was that your god "tinkering" with things? Surely by doing all the things that are purported to have happened at Fatima, he was influencing everyone's free will, wasn't he?

[Stunster]

53. Chacun a son gout

By merely being able to postulate scenarios where at least some suffering could be eliminated without interfering with anyone's free will.

If you're talking about moral evil and keeping the laws of physics the same, then there's no way to do that without interfering with someone's free will. I've already asked you to come up with a better set of physical laws, but you found that too hard. So you have no grounds for thinking that the laws of physics ought to be different.

So, talking about moral evil, and keeping the laws of physics the same, how does one eliminate suffering? Well, there are various ways. For example, we can lock someone up in prison. But that's an interference with their free will.

Essentially what you're saying is that God should make the world like a prison for people who would otherwise carry out evil acts, but not for the rest of humanity. God could do that. But if God did do that, it would be an interference with free will, and hence would not be an example of suffering being eliminated without such interference.

Suppose God stops you from hurting someone's feelings by calling them names in the schoolyard---how far should this 'imprisonment of the will' go?

Now of course, if we could inflict pain endlessly on other people, that would create grounds for doubting the existence of a Christian God. But we can't. That's what death is for--to prevent us from inflicting pain on others endlessly, and to prevent us from having pain inflicted upon us by others endlessly. So God selects a range of average human lifespans ---a range which permits the autonmous formation of character, but which also necessarily limits the amount of evil we can do if we choose to develop an evil character.

there would be ways the suffering could be minimized without harming the exercise of free will.

Well, there are limits. It's fairly hard to wipe out the entire population of the world. It's fairly easy to hurt another person's feelings. So eliminating all possibility of harm requires that God prevent anyone from hurting another person's feelings. But that is tantamount to abolishing moral autonomy. So, the permissible amount of harm would have to be somewhere between permitting endless torture for everyone, and nobody ever having even their feelings hurt. Well, it seems we're in that in-between range.

If you think that the actual amount is too high, I am wondering how you're performing that calculation. Let's say a mother gives her child too many sodas because she's too lazy to turn the faucet on, and the child develops a toothache as a result of drinking too many sugary soft drinks. Should God have prevented the toothache? And so on for a colossal number of similar questions. There's just no way for a human being to be epistemically justified in thinking that one small amount of additional suffering renders Christian theism logically untenable. It's just not a coherent epistemic scenario. Your argument depends upon the possibility of making a certain kind of calculation, and requires that an actual calculation of that kind be performed, and requires that this calculation be compared with the result of another one based on different parameters for human activity. And I'm replying there's no way that we can perform the kind of calculations and comparison you're envisaging, and hence your argument cannot be shown to succeed.

Just as an aside, this is one reason why most philosophers of religion now concede that the old 'logical' argument from evil fails. Instead, they've turned their attention to the 'evidential' argument from evil. The latter type is admitted to be not deductively valid, and hence leaves the existence of God tenable. What the latter type of argument tries to show is that it is more probable than not that theism is false, given the actual amount of evil in the world. I think this conclusion only follows if you can show that the actual laws of physics and the actual number and nature of free-willed creatures is probably not morally justifiable. But I think that they are both probably morally justifiable, so I don't think even the 'evidential' form of the argument from evil succeeds.

This example does nothing to counter my observation. The woman has to resort to using a tool (poison).... ...people can be restricted by all sorts of "natural" things from exercising certain moral choices.

Yeah, and people are. An obvious and universal natural restriction is death. Are you suggesting that God should ensure everybody dies before their 5th birthday?

"That's the nature of evil---innocent people get hurt".

No, that just *is* evil. Your god set up a system in which the decision to sin condemned all those who followed. I bet he designed flies just to pull their wings off, too.

Yeah, well, you're being misled by your theologically primitive misinterpretation of Genesis. Read Karl Rahner on the 'supernatural existential', or read one of my earlier posts about that. It's better to interpret that story as one that applies to Everyman, rather than just Adam and Eve. "Adam", indeed, means "man".

How could they have known WHAT was good or evil UNTIL they had eaten the fruit?

How do you know what wrongdoing is until you engage in it? We don't hold babies morally responsible for their actions because they don't understand how their actions might hurt others, nor do they have sufficient powers of self-control. But after a certain point, we begin to hold people accountable for their actions. We tell the child, "Don't point that Uzi submachine gun at your little sister, it might go off and kill her." The child obeys for a time. But then, at age 12, he takes the Uzi out and blasts his kid sister's guts all over the bedroom.... And if he says, well, I was only trying to find out what it's like to be evil, we will not be impressed, and he will not be excused.

Similarly, after a certain point, I think God holds people accountable for their actions. At some point in evolutionary history, and in the history of each individual, morality and moral responsibility kicks in.

The only answer you could give had to do with the limited case of martyrdom.

It's not the only answer I could give. It's merely an example. But in any case, your question is totally wrong-headed because it confuses spiritual healing/misery with material well-being/misery. I was talking about our psychological woundedness and misery due to sin, which one may experience even if one is Michael Jackson.

If you're against any "tinkering" then you're a deist, Stunster.

No, I am not a deist. This is a standard confusion caused by a failure to grasp the implications of divine timelessness.
http://www.faithquest.com/modules.php?name=Sections&op=listarticles&secid=5

The Fatima story - do you believe that

Yes.

Was that your god "tinkering" with things?

No. If something happens, by definition it's not a violation of the laws of nature. This post explains why it's not.
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=214&topic_id=14266&mesg_id=14378&page=
There are no tinkerings. There's just what happens.

Surely by doing all the things that are purported to have happened at Fatima, he was influencing everyone's free will, wasn't he?

Suppose I suggest that you eat some ice cream. I place the ice cream tub on the table in front of you. Suppose I say, "Go on, have some ice cream."

Have I taken away your free will? Have I compelled you to eat the ice cream?

My posts on this thread go into this in much more detail:
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=214&topic_id=8846&mesg_id=8846

[trotsky]

54. Old tricks

Essentially what you're saying is that God should make the world like a prison for people who would otherwise carry out evil acts, but not for the rest of humanity.

Nope, that's not what I'm saying, it's what you keep putting in my mouth so you can argue against a strawman.

There's just no way for a human being to be epistemically justified in thinking that one small amount of additional suffering renders Christian theism logically untenable.

Then it's a good thing I'm not saying that. Sheesh. Don't you ever quit with the strawmen? I've restated the same thing so many times, and you keep twisting it around. I'm not going to play this game, Stunster. You can't address my points as written - you apparently have to distort and mislead.

An obvious and universal natural restriction is death. Are you suggesting that God should ensure everybody dies before their 5th birthday?

Not at all (if you had really been paying attention), but you bring up a great point: what of those who do? Surely if the point of all this suffering on earth is for people to build moral character through exercise of their free will, what of infants, children and those who are mentally incapable of learning those lessons? Do they never become "complete" people? Do they spend eternity in purgatory because there's not enough evidence to indicate whether they get to go to heaven or hell?

And if he says, well, I was only trying to find out what it's like to be evil, we will not be impressed, and he will not be excused.

You do have a gift for hyperbole, don't you?

But in any case, your question is totally wrong-headed because it confuses spiritual healing/misery with material well-being/misery.

OK, let's look at spiritual healing & misery then. You've exhibited some pretty nasty behavior on threads, getting posts deleted when you've attacked people personally. Is that a sign of spiritual misery? Are you not right with your god?

Suppose I suggest that you eat some ice cream. I place the ice cream tub on the table in front of you. Suppose I say, "Go on, have some ice cream."

Have I taken away your free will? Have I compelled you to eat the ice cream?

Suppose your god writes a message in the sky that only a man who is about to rape a woman can see. It says, "Please do not rape this woman." Has your god taken away his free will? Has he compelled him NOT to rape the woman?

[Stunster]

56. Rapists doesn't need messages in the sky

They know what they're doing is wrong already. It's called conscience. Conscience is much more undeniable than messages in the sky, because it's right down deep in the heart of us. A message in the sky might be interpreted as a hallucination. But the judgement of conscience gnaws within.

You've exhibited some pretty nasty behavior on threads, getting posts deleted when you've attacked people personally.

The moderation is farcically unfair. I've been the target for abuse far more often and of a far worse kind than I've dished out.

You can't address my points as written

No, it's just that they're not good points or you haven't thought them through well enough.

what of those who do? Surely if the point of all this suffering on earth is for people to build moral character through exercise of their free will, what of infants, children and those who are mentally incapable of learning those lessons? Do they never become "complete" people? Do they spend eternity in purgatory because there's not enough evidence to indicate whether they get to go to heaven or hell?

Jesus told his disciples not to stop the little children from going to him, for it is to such as them that the kingdom of heaven belongs. MATTHEW 19: 13-15

Why does heaven have to be populated solely with adults? Seems to me that there's no need for that to be the case.

But equally, I can think of reasons why it ought not to be populated solely with young children who have not reached the age of reason.

Seems to me that heaven would be nicer with people of all ages.

So I think God intends that heaven be populated with the full range of humanity---"people of every nation, race, tribe, and language". REVELATION 7: 9

[Stunster]

32. Time and timelessness in modern science

Another reason for thinking that human persons in heaven will never sin after they get to heaven is that to get there, and then sin later on, implies that heaven is bound by time. But there's no reason to think that.

People in moments of profound bliss (or shocking distress) often say things like "Time seemed to stand still". I suspect it's be a bit like that for those who have passed from this life.

An objection to this idea is that timelessness makes no sense. However, science itself (especially string theory) is now telling us that time may not be a fundamental feature of even the physical world, let alone heaven.

A recent book arguing for the view that physical nature is truly timeless is A World Without Time: The Forgotten Legacy of Godel and Einstein, by Palle Yourgrau.

Another is, Time's Arrow and Archimedes' Point, by Huw Price. More details on his views here: http://www.usyd.edu.au/time/price/TAAP.html

And this from several years ago in the Los Angeles Times:

November 16, 1999

Time, Space Obsolete in New View of Universe

Many physicists are embracing a revolutionary, still mysterious idea
called string theory. The concept rejects several familiar notions and includes the existence of 11 dimensions.

OF SPACE, TIME AND STRINGS. Rocking the foundations of physics. First in a series

By: K.C. COLE
TIMES SCIENCE WRITER

Ever since early astronomers yanked Earth from center stage in the solar system some 500 years ago, scientists have been pulling the rug out from under people's basic beliefs. "The history of physics," says Harvard physicist Andrew Strominger, "is the history of giving up cherished ideas."

No idea has been harder to give up, however--for physicists and
laypeople alike--than everyday notions of space and time, the fundamental "where" and "when" of the universe and everything in it.

Einstein's unsettling insights more than 80 years ago showed that static space and fixed time were flimsy facades, thinly veiling a cosmos where seconds and meters ooze like mud and the rubbery fabric of space-time warps into an unseen fourth dimension. About the same time, the new "quantum mechanical" understanding of the atom revealed that space and time are inherently jittery and uncertain.

Now, some physicists are taking this revolutionary line of thinking one step further: If their theories are right, in the words of Edward Witten of the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton, space and time may be "doomed."

Concurs physicist Nathan Seiberg, also of the institute: "I am almost
certain that space and time are illusions. These are primitive notions
that will be replaced by something more sophisticated....."

I'm not sure if the full article is still available on the web, but the ideas in the article are also spelled out in Brian Greene's best-selling introduction to string physics for the lay reader, THE ELEGANT UNIVERSE.

[ayeshahaqqiqa]

7. the problem with 'intervention'

is that people define it the way they want. "Why didn't God intevene to save these people?" Maybe it was their time to go. Maybe this was the completion of some greater plan, the paying back of karma, a plan that, subconsciously, the higher selves of these people had decided upon.

[H2O Man]

8. Interesting.

I think that the idea also indicates a separation hinted at in the "fall from grace." The concept of intervention implies "my will, not Yours." Everything in the creation is divine intervention.

[tjdee]

36. I agree with this.

It's not all about us and what we want/need.

And while that may be so, it's actually the scariest thing I can think of.

[imenja]

11. Free will

Christianity tells us that God gives human beings free will. With that will, we can act from love and carry out good works, we can commit unspeakable horror, or something in between. Free will is the essence of what it means to be human.

[Dhalgren]

16. Sometimes "free will" is just the name given to our

state-of-being comprised of not knowing. We call our lack of sufficient knowledge "free will", because we cannot "connect the dots". The gods don't intervene, because they have nothing in which to intervene. They are either a part of "it" or they or not...

[imenja]

17. meaning?

We should somehow be able to foretell the future?

"The gods don't intervene, because they have nothing in which to intervene. They are either a part of "it" or they or not..."
Whose gods? And what is "it"?

[Dhalgren]

19. Ok.

Yes, if our knowledge was sufficient, we would know what will happen next (basic Chaos theory).

Any gods.

"It" is reality. There is no reasonable proof that there is more than one reality. As Epicurus says, (paraphrase) "The gods are either real or they are not. But if they are, they are a part of this world just as you and I are." If the gods are "real" and are "big" enough to "intervene" for or against anyone, then they do so or do not do so based on their own whims and limitations.

[imenja]

21. of course there is no proof

Religious belief, as Soren Kierkegaard notes, requires "a leap of faith." Proof has nothing to do with it.

You of course are entitled to your own view of the world. If you see human beings and life itself as purely material, that is your own prerogative. But it is quite ridiculous to impose your own comic book view of spirituality onto others. You don't believe, yet insist you should be able to define what are quite complex spiritual matters that minds far greater than yours or mine have grappled with for centuries? I suggest you refrain from trivializing that which you are clearly unfamiliar.

[onager]

22. In other words...

"Please be quiet, non-believers. You're scaring my Omnipotent, Omniscient God."

[H2O Man]

24. Gosh.

What else could it be?

[imenja]

27. see post 26

[H2O Man]

28. I just did.

Well said!

[imenja]

26. no

I wrote in a language called English, and I thought I made my point quite clear. I will restate it. Non-believers may non-believe whatever they choose. What I resent, however, is a determination by some to decide they think they have a right to tell me and others what to believe. If you are a non-believer, by definition you are not Christian. You therefore are hardly in a position to tell me what my faith may and may not consist of.

I don't tell atheists what atheism consist of. I therefore don't
expect atheists to define Christianity or other religious beliefs. Am I expecting too much? Or must you claim the right to limits the thoughts of every person on earth?

[Dhalgren]

23. My beliefs are just that, mine.

That you consider them "trivial" does not surprise me. After all, if it isn't within the realm of what is acceptable to you, it is of no consequence and "comic". What an ass!

If you consider Epicurus, Parmenides, and Xanthipus "comic" and "trivial", then I suggest that you try your best and maintain your own comic-book beliefs, because "minds far greater than yours" are at work as we speak and not just "centuries" ago. The idea that gods may or may not act in the lives of men and women have been discussed for ages before Paul had his "fit" on the road to Damascus, so if you and your little beliefs are not up to dealing with this topic, don't try and push it off on others. May the gods bless you...

[imenja]

25. of course you can and should believe as you choose

I would never for one second suggest otherwise. What I resent, however, is what I interpreted as your determination to decide what I and others believe. You said there was no proof God existed, therefore suggesting you are not religious. You then went on to argue that if "the gods" are "big enough" (as though size had anything to with the question) to one thing they should do all.
You responded to my post about Christianity. I was not aware that I had entered into any discussion of polytheistic religions and made no comments about them. What I instead objected to was I saw as a rather farcical interpretation of Christianity.

If I misunderstood you, I apologize. Please feel free to clarify.

[Dhalgren]

29. Ok.

Here's what I actually said: There is no proof in more than one reality. As Epicurus says - if the gods exist, they exist in the same reality as you and I. I didn't mean that to be offensive to anyone. I was just saying that from a standpoint of "intervention" that there is but one reality. I did not say that if the gods were big enough they should do all; I said that if the gods were big enough to intervene in your live, they would do so of their own will - or not. This was not,as far as I could tell, a discussion of Christianity, rather it was a discussion of whether deity intervenes in human life. And then it sort of segued into a discussion of "free will". I was not trying to put anyone down nor attack anyone's beliefs, but I do reserve the right (unless I am breaking any rules) to state what it is I believe.

[imenja]

33. Thank you for the clarification

and I certainly respect your beliefs.

My use of the term free will related only to it's Christian meaning. I realize there are many different ways of understanding God's role in our lives, both between religions and within Christianity itself. Even as I identify myself as a Christian, I do not believe mine is the only or most legitimate religion. I believe there are different paths toward God, and She welcomes all such journeys.

[Dhalgren]

37. Then in this, I am happy to say, we are in accord.

Peace...

[YankeyMCC]

39. If god doesn't

intervene doesn't that make it irrelevant?

[Imperialism Inc.]

55. please read these 48 pages of horse-shit so you to can know

that you are wrong.
<begin sarcastic imitation>
If you could only see that man is the center of the universe then your atheistic materialistic religion would melt away and you could finally see the truth.
Here, let me cut and paste, word for word, 53 of my previous responses to other threads on this forum, for the thousandth time, to make things clear.
<cut - paste>
<cut - paste>
<...>
<cut-paste #53>

So as you can surely see God is simply the watchmaker and he made the rules the only way they could be and he can't intervene to change them or you wouldn't be free. See god is the great liberator. Well, except that stuff I believe about him turning himself in to human form and coming down to the earth, and walking on water, and raising the dead, and turning water to wine and, rising from the dead himself. And ok that stuff where he turned that one person to salt, and made a flood with more water than physically possible, and got every animal from a bazillion different natural habitats to all live together on a boat, and the fishes from salt and fresh water happily mixed together. Yeah sure that stuff violated his laws but it was only because he is so perfect. See he has to follow the rules and not follow the rules at the same time. That's what makes him so cool.

But, that doesn't mean I believe in intelligent design. Here are 42 1/2 more links so you can understand.
<cut-paste 42 1/2 links>
See, God designed it all so that man could be born because we are perfect. That fact that we are perfect should show us that he loves us so. And I know that sounds like intelligent design but it isn't so (all together now) "stop saying that"! Besides, even though I don't believe in intelligent design, evolution and all the materialistic Darwinists are all wrong anyway. That much should be clear. That it is no different than a religion. But that is how God set up the rules at the beginning of time anyway , even though I don't believe it sometimes (when it suits my purpose).

If you could only see that, then you would understand but you are not capable of speaking gibberish so you cannot understand and can never hope to. That's why you are so ,umm, Stun-ned at my logicalatiousness. Not to change the subject, again, but you should know that there is a God and we were made by him for our morals. No other animals have behaviors and social norms. Well ok most do but not like ours and we are clearly the end all and be all of the universe so they don't count. Who can read the bible and not be in awe of the kind gentle morals of a god who has his people slaughter women and children and bash infants upon the rocks. Surely he implanted the morals in us to see that and to know that that book must be the work of God because of it. After all we can understand the world through our great and noble minds. (See above for a link to a philosopher that once agree with me 300 years ago.) That very fact tells us we must have been created to be like God. Because no other animal can understand the world. They all fall down and run in to things all the time. Well, not really but we understand it better. Except for that crazy science stuff. Quantum mechanics shows us that we really don't understand the world after all. But the "weird" nature of it shows us clearly that there is a God. So you see, when we understand the world that shows us there is a God and when we don't , that does too! God does work in mysterious ways doesn't he!

Not to change the subject, again, but it is obvious that Christianity is the one true religion. After all people feel like it is to them and that is enough to understand the universe due to our God like minds as mentioned above. I know other religions feel the same way so maybe they are all connected to some underlying truth. Well, except for the pagans I mean more than one God? naw can't be. That may sound like a good argument for why believing the Christian religion is possibly horribly incorrect but it isn't. I know that one of the many could still possibly be true but I can't know which one without evidence. But evidence doesn't matter to me because I know which one is right in my heart(just like all the other believers in other religions do).

Surely you can all see now the supreme logicality of my thinkinations? If not I will proceed to flood this post with 48 more pages in a couple minutes (it isn't that hard I just cut and paste my same responses over and over). But I would be really Stun-ned if you don't get it by now.

<end sarcastic imitation>