I asked once and don't think you answered - do you think those following a different faith are as "right" or as likely to be "right" as you are?
…I'd be pretty stupid to devote my life to something that I was only 8% sure was right, wouldn't I? …
So your parents weren't the same religion as you? If they were, you started with a bias towards believing in Christianity. Unless you have gone through the religious education provided by each of the other religions, how can you say you really understand what they believe. Therefore I would say you have devoted your life to the religion you just happen to have been born into and choose to believe it is right.
My point was that you choose to devote your life to one religion without shopping around. You went with what you were given, because it's what you were given. It's not a non-sequitor. It was calling you out. Just like I did with your showing appreciation comment, and just like I did when you claimed there was so much evidence against evolution.
I don't care if you believe something, because it's what your family has always believed. Just don't imply you believe it, because you have researched all of modern religion and have made an educated choice.
I never said that I had thoroughly studied every religion or that I had done a comparative analysis. (Although your comments would seem to imply that you have.) I also never said that I was perfect at appreciating everybody. I said I am convinced Christianity is true, which I am. I said that appreciation is good and has great benefits benefits, which is true. I did not claim that I am personally perfect in either knowledge or character. You have nothing to call me out on.
If God deliberately creates a world with the potential for evil, then isn't it His fault if evil occurs? Isn't that like an engineer making bridge with a built-in potential for collapse? I do have an answer to that question, but it isn't a strait up "yes" or "no". Rather than try to explain it in a big messy paragraph, I ask to pose you a question that I think is a way-point on the way to the answer:
I don't think the engineer analogy is very good. As far as I understand Christianity, God wasn't just involved in the creation of the world. God still influences the world. He just chooses to do it in a subtle way. He is both omnipresent and omnipotent. Why does he wait until people are dead for them to feel the consequences of their actions, rather than address those right away?
By "address those right away" do you mean damn sinners immediately instead of waiting for them to die? There wouldn't be any people on Earth, in that case, since everyone has sinned. Damning everyone on the spot would be perfectly just and within God's prerogative, but it would result in an unpopulated Earth and Heaven, which is not what God wants. The reasons He refrains are mercy and love: He wants people to come to Him and He likes having people around. He loves people and sees their beauty and potential, and so He chooses to let the world continue rather than summarily smite it.
Sure, you can say that he's giving people a chance to refore, but it's not as simple as that, since he lets them affect other people. [...]
I think my response to Czhorat will address that.
As Windup pointed out, Christianity argues that we have but a limited time to determine the status of our eternal soul. Why is this time not granted equally?
Why? Well, the world is generally broken, but beyond that I don't know. I suspect it's ontological: Things just don't work like that. Beyond that vague speculation I have no answer.
Can one solve all of the world's problems without abrogating free will? No. But could God have done better? In no particular order, here are a few things I would change.
1) The human reproductive system. It's figuratively and, as any female past the age of puberty will tell you, literally a mess. Monthly flows of hormones make it difficult for some women to control their moods. It's too hard for some people to get pregnant and too easy for others. At the very least it would be nice to have a simple "on/off" switch to avoid getting pregnant by accident and then turn ones fertility on when it's child conceiving time.
2) Disease. This is an easy one. There's no reason for a just god to have created a world in which so many people are, through no fault of their own, painfully and terminally ill.
I see your points here. The world seems to have a degree of inbuilt suffering, unrelated to any human actions. My answers to this will probably not satisfy you, but I have two:
First, I would argue that physical suffering is not generally what makes people miserable. We all know (or know of) people who have gone through horrible suffering and come out happy on the other side. And we certainly all know people who have never so much as stubbed their toe who are miserable and makers of misery for others. People are miserable when they see their lives as meaningless. People who see purpose can be happy through suffering and even because of suffering. I really don't think physical pain is
of itself very important, all things considered. (This is more a philosophical tangent than I want to get off on. Ironically, that sounds pretty Buddhist.)
Second, the Bible is quite explicit in saying that most (if not all) of this suffering has come about due to sin in the world. When God made nature, it was much nicer. Exactly
how sin messes up nature is not stated. I have theories, but that's all they are.
3) The ambiguity of the message. I'm sorry, but writing a book is NOT the best way to spread your message, especially if the shelves are crowded with similar books containing different messages. Make press releases clearing up issues regarding homosexuality, masturbation, slavery, etc. If people are to commit atrocities, then let them not be in my name.
Again, I'd say the message is not really very ambiguous. Check this out:
Russell Nash says that everyone should worship Yahweh!Now, is Russell obligated to come and refute that? Or has he already spoken clearly enough on the topic that readers should know that's not something Russell Nash would say? If people read that and believe it, whose fault is that? His? Mine for writing it? The reader for believing it?
As for the idea of God controlling the publishing industry to suppress all competing messages:
4) Redistribution of wealth and power. Take property, money, and land away from the rich and give it to the poor. Do this every generation or two. What about free will, you ask? This could enhance free will. As things stand countless millions of people live hand-to-mouth, barely able to scrape together the bare necessities of life while others live in unconscionable luxury.To take away a bit of the freedom of the super-rich to pass on their riches to their children could greatly enhance the freedom of many others to live lives free of abject poverty.
There are two big problems here, and they are this: 1.) If God comes along and messes with everybody's stuff every so often, then Russell no longer has the prerogative of telling Him to fuck off. This would totally rob anyone of the option of not believing in God, which leads into 2.) This would make most human action meaningless. I don't have to work for myself: God will come along and fill up my my coffer on schedule. I don't have to love my neighbor: God will take care of that. I don't have to think about what I believe or why: The answer is literally in front of my face where I couldn't deny it if I wanted to.
God wants people to
choose to be good and do right. He wants partners and friends. Taking so much out of our hands would rob us of choice and make out deeds and thoughts insignificant. For our deeds to be meaningful, they have to be 1.) freely chosen and 2.) effective.
There's more, but you should get the idea. What I don't understand is what makes you such a panglossian figure who seems to truly believe that this is the best of all possible worlds. Do you lack the imagination to see anything better, or is it because the possibility of a better world would contradict your faith?
I think I've said several times that this world is screwed up. The world we see around us now is broken on several levels, decayed, degraded from what it was made to be. I am far from panglossian. I am not arguing that the world is all good. I am arguing that the world makes sense.
Czhorat and Russell, you both mentioned that God does not acknowledge your existence. (What a jerk!) To that, I can only say that I don't relate to your experience. As silly as it probably sounds to you, I say that I have something of a relationship with God. There is dialog. I'm not a prophet: I don't get revelations or visions, but I do claim there is a subtle but very noticeable communication between myself and God. Occasionally (very rarely) this has amounted to explicit instructions, which I have followed to good results. I have never heard words. I actually struggled for a long time because my experience of God was so much less dramatic than some of the stories I'd heard from other people, but I'm cool with it now.
Impossible to evaluate without knowing more. Are you open to the possibility that you are mistaken or deluded?
Sure. Do you watch "Stranger Things?" In the pilot episode, a priest makes the horrifying discovery that invisible "prayer leaches" are floating above churches and literally eating the prayers that naive worshippers think are directing toward God. If you could show me something like that, I'd certainly have to reconsider the source of my impressions. But aside from prayer leaches, I'm not sure what sort of proof there could be of my delusion.
Are you open to the possibility that I'm not deluded?
Do you see how the bookshelves full of competing books at the very least make it difficult to decide which message is the "true" one?
Absolutely. It bugs me and I really wish people would quit writing them already. But if people weren't free to write crap, where would that mean for their free agency?
And why would a just god put some people at a disadvantage just because of where they happen to be born? Any reason, or is he just capricious? Alternatively, you could accept all religions as man-made which would account for local difference. Which solution makes more sense to you?
I think it's more telling if you flip that question around and ask why all religions are so similar. There's a lot of truth in many religions. For instance, they've all got this idea of personal corruption that everyone needs to have expunged. Moral codes the world over have a lot of similarity (no one likes a traitor, for instance). Why would that be? Maybe because there's some underlying truth that they're all reaching toward and succeeding to unequal degrees? Sounds like a reasonable explanation to me.
As for people being at a disadvantage: I don't know. I personally find some of the ways God does things pretty weird and, yes, unfair. But if this is really GOD we're talking about, then I would expect to not understand everything. And I don't.
I asked once and don't think you answered - do you think those following a different faith are as "right" or as likely to be "right" as you are?
Well, no. I mean, I'd be pretty stupid to devote my life to something that I was only 8% sure was right, wouldn't I? Why would you bother with something that you think is only somewhat likely to be true?
Christianity says I will go to heaven. Islam says I'm going to hell. Atheism says I will go nowhere. Buddhism says I will be reincarnated. Can I believe that it is equally likely that I will go to heaven, hell, nowhere and be reincarnated? Is that even possible?
I believe that I will go nowhere, but that reincarnation, heaven, and hell have pretty much equal possibilities. It IS possible to not know and think any alternative is equally likely. WHY do you think your answer is more likely? Is it, as Russel suggested, that it's what you were brought up with? If so, can you at least acknowledge that your indoctrination is as big a part of your belief than any rational reason?
I don't understand how you can entertain those four beliefs all at once. How does that work out in you mind?
I say that I was never indoctrinated. My beliefs as an adult are very close to what I was taught as a child, but that is because I've spent my whole life aggressively questioning what I'm taught and my parent's teaching has held up under my scrutiny. For their part, they always encouraged me to ask
any question, and I did. Same goes for all of the preachers I have had. I don't think that qualifies as indoctrination. And I have many friends (and a spouse) who were brought up far from the Christian faith and only came to Christianity as adults.
Wow, that was really long... I was going to write some kind of concluding statement, but now I forgot what it was.
Oh yeah: Is God responsible for evil on Earth? Yes and no.
No: It is God's will that no one should ever do evil and everyone who does is disobeying Him. Yes: God created the world with the potential for evil and full knowledge that that potential would be realized. He knew all this shit would happen and He lets it happen.
The explanation for this seeming paradox is simply this: Without choice, life is meaningless. God thinks that having beings who can
choose to love, to appreciate, to respect, to create, to enjoy, to build, etc. is worth the cost. Life is so beautiful that it's worth the incredibly steep price, not only of all the shit in the world, but also of the death of Christ Himself.
If y'all don't feel like replying to something that ridiculously long, I won't take offense. It was cathartic for me, anyway. I like to write stuff.