# Believers: do you believe miracles occur today? What do you mean by the term? **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [January 18, 2010, 10:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/believers-do-you-believe-miracles-occur-today-what-do-you-mean-by-the-term/525475 "2010-01-18T22:28:50Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 6\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Snnipe\_70E](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/b5a626/32.png) [@Snnipe\_70E](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Snnipe_70E)\ **Post date:** [January 21, 2010, 6:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/believers-do-you-believe-miracles-occur-today-what-do-you-mean-by-the-term/525475/21 "2010-01-21T06:24:24Z")
Yes I do believe in miracles. **ONE** A baby that fell into a swiming pool and was underwater for what was estamated as over 5 minutes. When admited to Valley Medical Hospital the Drs examined her, he thought she would die that night. When she got to ICU the staff there thought she would not make it to morning. Friends of the parents started calling around to get people to pray. The girl was admitted Tuesday night and went home Thursday afternoon. After testing the Drs. pronounced her in good health the only thing that they thought might crop up was that the girl may learning disiabilities. **TWO** In 1998 I was working on the electrical crew at a Christian Music Festibal. We had many electrical problems because the festibal grew in size and had more food vendors then the year before. In one area I had an electrical panel with 3 fifty amp and 1 thirty amp breakers, all 3 phase breakers. I was trippping the breakers right and left, each of the four. My use age was 180 amps going out of the panel. We need to make a change in that area, I went back to the main panel and checked the breaker feeding the sub panel. It was being feed with a fifty amp breaker. And when I took a reading it was reading approx 50 amps. 50 amps in 180 amps out. I have experienced and seen other examples. ---
**Author:** ![Nava](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/da6949/32.png) [@Nava](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Nava)\ **Post date:** [January 21, 2010, 6:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/believers-do-you-believe-miracles-occur-today-what-do-you-mean-by-the-term/525475/22 "2010-01-21T06:40:58Z")
I go by the canonical definition, which rephrased from memory is “something for which current science has no explanation and which according to current science should not have happened.” That sure makes for a LOT of miracles every day! Interview with a prominent Navarrese Socialist politician, right before he left office, translated from memory. Reporter: “Mr President, you’re a Socialist.” Politician: “Is that supposed to be a question?” R: “Not really, no, just stating facts.” P: “Ah. Please do go on.” R: “You’re also a former priest.” P: “No, a Seminar graduate. I took minor orders but not major ones. I’m an ordained deacon, but not a priest. Anyway, what was your question?” R: “Uh, ah… are you a believer?” P: “… may I ask, where are you from? You’re not from around here, are you?” R: “Well, no, but I’m the reporter here!” P: “Bear with me, nobody from around here would ask that question so, where are you from?” R: “Uh, from Burgos.” P: “Ah. See, the reason nobody from around here would ask that question is that several hundreds of miracles take place in this area, many of them in this very town, and those that happen here in Pamplona are even televised. It’s called the Sanfermines bullruns, you may want to look it up. Any time an idiot touches a bull, or grabs his attention, or falls down and gets up instead of staying down until they bulls have passed, or there is a pileup and nobody gets hurt, constitutes a miracle, 'cos God knows those morons ought’a have been killed and haven’t.” ---
**Author:** ![appleciders](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/85f322/32.png) [@appleciders](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/appleciders)\ **Post date:** [January 21, 2010, 6:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/believers-do-you-believe-miracles-occur-today-what-do-you-mean-by-the-term/525475/23 "2010-01-21T06:51:56Z")
Nope. I believe in a higher power, but I specifically believe that He won’t bail out humans for human mistakes. He might provide moral support, or provide us with opportunities to help each other, but he won’t do the work for us. Like the old saying says, “God helps those who help themselves.” ---
**Author:** ![kanicbird](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/5f8ce5/32.png) [@kanicbird](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kanicbird)\ **Post date:** [January 21, 2010, 1:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/believers-do-you-believe-miracles-occur-today-what-do-you-mean-by-the-term/525475/24 "2010-01-21T13:25:16Z")
> [@appleciders](#): > > Like the old saying says, “God helps those who help themselves.” Just to note this is not scriptural. ---
**Author:** ![cmyk](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cmyk/32/3353_2.png) [@cmyk](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/cmyk)\ **Post date:** [January 24, 2010, 7:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/believers-do-you-believe-miracles-occur-today-what-do-you-mean-by-the-term/525475/25 "2010-01-24T07:51:18Z")
> [@Skald\_the\_Rhymer](#): > > Because…? Well, consider it. Isn’t this the ultimate philosophical question? The fact that something exists rather than nothingness, does this mean that true nothingness is some sort of meta-impossibility? Unstable? That existence, in and of itself, is actually the more natural state over nothingness? Seems ironic and unintuitive, but apparently, that’s the way it is. OTOH, Is existence and nothingness mutually exclusive, or can they coincide? _Doesn’t existence make the concept of nothingness meaningless?_ ETA: BTW, I’m not saying this is a miracle, more of a wonder. Something that fills me with awe. ---
**Author:** ![handsomeharry](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/e9c0ed/32.png) [@handsomeharry](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/handsomeharry)\ **Post date:** [January 25, 2010, 2:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/believers-do-you-believe-miracles-occur-today-what-do-you-mean-by-the-term/525475/26 "2010-01-25T02:19:14Z")
> [@handsomeharry](#): > > I don’t totally agree with this, but I can see it. If ‘spontaneously’ in this sense, means for \*no \*good reason, at all, then I do agree with it. > Many times, people will let some bum be torn apart by a dog, and do nothing. Other times, somebody will fight the government, dogs, a hundred Klansmen, 50 Black Panthers, and jump into a burning building to save 1 baby. I don’t understand it, but, since there are conflicting actions, in similar, but not exact events, I attribute the help being given to some unknown variable, rather than a miracle. (I am calling a miracle a ‘known’ variable) Now. OTOH, all of the people that I am friends with, I know, generally, how they will act. If they both help me if I’m dying, I will call that their nature. However, A will lend me money, or give it to me. B will not give, neither lend it to me. If B calls me up, and slips me a few hundred tomorrow, that will be a miracle. If A does it, that will be because he is a friend, and is going through something that reminded him of our mutual history, and his psyche was stimulated to strengthen the bond that we have. Point being, I have witnessed some amazing acts of human kindness, but, even knowing that they were amazing, I still know that they weren’t miracles; but, the opposite is true also. I have seen minor things happen, but they were miracles. The non-glurge kind of stuff. > > hh OOps, forgot to give a definition. For me, a miracle is a suspension of natural physical laws (which include health) or laws of timing (X shows up with $ just when I need it, a tree falls onto the head of somebody aiming a gun at me, etc…with no reasonable stimulus.). Also, the CS Lewis def, as mentioned earlier. hh hh [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/believers-do-you-believe-miracles-occur-today-what-do-you-mean-by-the-term/525475.md?page=1)