[sliding in the thin edge of the wedge] Ah, but where do you get this idea of what “wrong” is? It sounds like you’ve got strong convictions, and for you “wrong” is not merely equivalent to “what I can’t get away with”; people like Osama and Hitler were “wrong” in a sense of more than “they didn’t succeed and paid the price”. There is, dare I say it, an objective Wrong with a capital R and you know it when you see it? But if so, then . . . how?
To me wrong is anything that will bring harm to myself or others. There are many grades of wrong, A small wrong action would be if I went out in the cold without a coat and if the temperature was cold enough I could freeze.
Osama and Hitler caused the unnecessary suffering of many thousands of people, If I were the parent and knew this ahead of time I would run away from my partner as fast as I could so I wouldn’t conceive them in the first place. If I make a dress or a car for someone and I know it is defective I would have to make it right, or return their money. If a car is defective so that it causes harm or death to the person who bought it I could be sued.
Monavis
God’s creations are not flawed, He made us in His image perfect in every way. We make mistakes because we are learning to be like Him. It doesn’t mean we are imperfect just young children and trying to gain knowledge of the world.
And I find it absolutely hilarious when people keep mistating the positions of others. Atheists do not “denounce” God, any more than you denounce Spider-Man. Atheists, because of a lack of evidence, do not believe in the existence of gods. Some atheists are also of the position that, if the god of the Bible did exist as he is put forward by that book and by the words of some of his followers, he would be responsible for the defective product he made.
Thus, the “God” premise put forward is dismissed for two reasons:
- Lack of evidence that can can be presented to others(see how I eliminated that “personal evidence” bugaboo that always pops up in conversations of this sort?).
- Lack of logic in the concept in the first place. All-knowing god creates defective product, blames said product for defects, then gets upset, while knowing what the end result was going to be in the first place. The universe is too damned structured and has lasted too damn long for the existence of such a mad god to be possible.
All clear now?
I have created a perfect computer program that makes mistakes.
For 20 points and a chance at what’s behind door #2, who can tell me what is wrong with that statement?
A computer program is not a copy of God.
Perhaps more explanation is needed, we are created as “sparks” meaning small perfect copies of God in the spiritual world. We lack nothing as far as spiritual attributes are concerned. We then begin to learn and gain knowledge of who we are and what our purpose is, just as a human baby grows and learns. We make mistakes, go down dead ends, and put our trust in the wrong thoughts and things just as human babies do. But at no time are we any less perfect than we were when created. Of course, that’s not always true with human babies. The physical attributes will deteriorate and fail, but our spiritual attributes will always remain perfect.
I see.
Your premise is correct because the part of us we cannot detect by any means we now possess is “perfect”, and the parts we can detect(our bodies, our decisions, our interactions with others, the conditions in which we are raised etc.) aren’t the important parts of the equation.
I don’t think so.
I can’t imagine the size of His hemorrhoids, then, which also helps explain some of the Old Testament vengeance.
Whatever, but millions of people can and do detect their spiritual nature, I know I do. Now our physical bodies are important to us as long as we are in the physical world, and our interactions with others, the choices we make are important in both dimensions. It’s ok if you don’t think so, no harm done either way.
Why would you think He has hemorrhoids? Just funning, I know.
You said I was made in His image, and perfect in every way. Therefore the Creator must share my hemorrhoids, and they must be perfect.
Looking around at the rest of His creations, I must deduce that the Lord Almighty also possesses a harelip, flipper hands, and various other freakish and disfiguring birth defects, which are perfect (who could gaze upon the sight of a newborn baby with its heart formed out the outside of its chest and doubt the presence of a merciful Creator?) Other perfections bestowed upon us by the God of Abraham include blindness, Down syndrome, cystic fibrosis, leukemia, rectal cancer, and any number of other perfectly painful diseases.
Perhaps He, with His infinitely busy schedule, at some point confused perfectionism with sadism?
Since reading this yesterday I have been trying to find out what God’s image is if He is invisible,and known only what some human has said He was like. There are so many versions of what God is or what the word means it is confusing to tell false from fact. I would say it just means what ever one wants it or God to be.
Monavis
I’ll go on the record as saying that I am a Christian who thinks that, whatever Heaven means, there is not any morally significant freedom of the will to be found in it. Morally significant freedom is for the Temporal realm, not the Eternal.
However, the Eternal wouldn’t be what it is (and what it is is a very good thing) if there were no morally significant freedom in the Temporal. For if there were no morally significant freedom in the Temporal, then there would be no moral significance to existence in the Eternal. And that would be worse than the actual case–which is that existence in the Eternal has ultimate moral significance.
-FrL-
But why not make us such that we understand this stuff from the beginning? You are saying that at that time, it will be compatible with our having a free will that we understand all the things you mentioned. It seems to follow that we could have free will now and at the same time understand the things you’ve mentioned. So what is the reason that we are not made such as to understand them now?
-FrL-
To have a free will concerning an act is to have the power to either will nor not will the act.
That is not the same as having the power to either do or not do the act. This latter is simply having freedom concerning the act.
-FrL-
He is not invisible in that you can see Him in all creation. Not the answer you wanted, but true. There is a great difference between the God man wants and the God that is. Those that have been in the presence of God describe Him as unconditional love. Not really a Him, there is no sex in the spiritual world, but sounds better than It. Man wants a God they can manipulate, one that will do those things they should be doing for themselves. A God that will clean up their messes and let them continue to make them. A God that will smite their enemies, and win all their battles. It just doesn’t happen that way. God is unconditional love.
Please establish in a manner that is falsifiable that individuals have been in the presence of God.
because if you can’t then…what?
Why?
First of all, if God is seen in all creation then God is not a being but being( or existence). There has been no one that can truly claim they were in the presence of any God, They can say they believe they were in God’s presence but it would not be a fact. If how ever God and existence are the same thing then yes, that could be so. One can say God is unconditional love but that doesn’t make it so and many would disagree with your meaning of God. Each person sees God to be something different. If all agreed there would be just one Religion instead of the hundreds that do exist.
Monavis