Clever attempt at misdirection. You stated that not handing out condoms meant that Catholics don’t have sympathy for AIDS patients. You didn’t mention anything else that Catholics do for people in Africa suffering with disease. Condoms just aren’t the method they choose to use to help people in Africa, but that doesn’t mean they do not care, and do not help.
Your statement relied heavily on what you ommitted, so claiming that you didn’t ‘say’ something, is sort of disingenuous.
In this case, the decision not to use condoms, ‘Happened for a reason’.
Otherwise with your overall point I agree. Oftentimes people use ‘Everything happens for a reason’ as an excuse to be assholes.
If someone has the power to stop X and they don’t, and you are supposed to think that someone is the best, the brightest, the most merciful, the most compassionate, the greatest, the most loving, the biggest, the cat’s pajamas, the creator of the world, the origin of all that is good, the exemplar of righteousness, then why would you need to act differently than that?
You can maintain any thing you want, though I’d appreciate it if you’d stop saying that any one thing is or isn’t a teaching of “the Christian religion.” You don’t speak for “the Christian religion.” And I never claimed anything was or wasn’t a teaching of “the Christian religion.”
What you are saying is that God should violate our free will in order to keep us from suffering.
Human beings are not an omnipotent creator, and therefore do not have the ability to remove free will in violation of a covenant between creator and created.
No. I said that some use their religion as an excuse not to help. I never said that no Christians anywhere have ever done anything charitable, so you telling me that some Christians do is pretty pointless.
And since there are documented cases of the RCC lying about condoms, I think what I said was pretty damned mild.
If God were to miraculously cure every crack baby at birth, whose free will would be violated? What act of will did the baby commit that caused him to be born addicted?
I’m sorry. Was that an answer? I asked what the baby did to get born that way, and you responded with something about how the baby will deal with it? Forget about dealing with it. How would free will be affected if *every *baby were to be born completely healthy?
You said this :
*What you are saying is that God should violate our free will in order to keep us from suffering. *
What is the link between free will and suffering? Are you suggesting that free will is impossible in a world without suffering? That is not at all obvious to me. What has suffering to do with whether I choose a chocolate milkshake over a vanilla one?
You also said this :
Human beings are not an omnipotent creator, and therefore do not have the ability to remove free will in violation of a covenant between creator and created.*
So, because we suck, we should be held to a higher standard than god. God doesn’t have to bother with it because he’s so perfect and good and all. Yeah, that makes sense.
Which Christianity? Because I have given you examples of churches that have used their religious beliefs as excuses not to help people. I have given you the example of Prosperity theology which says that the poor are poor because they lack faith. I have given you the example of the Dutch Reformed Church that used the Bible to excuse Apartheid.
I guess I overlooked a really obvious example in some pentecostal or charismatic Christians and Christian Scientists who refuse medical assistance for their children because God will heal them if he wants to. And if he doesn’t want to? They die. These people take it to an extreme, but to act as if this is unheard of amongst Christians is stupid.
I don’t consider it a leap of logic and, as I’ve repeatedly shown, it is hardly unique to me. Just because you don’t think that you’ve ever thought it (which I also would have argued while I was a believer) doesn’t mean that it’s unusual.
Many Christian churches have worked hard to try to maintain the status quo, to get the downtrodden to accept their lot, to justify and defend things like slavery, feudalism, passivity, poverty, inequity, monarchism, etc.
Most of the people would say that isn’t what they are doing. They’d say they care deeply about the poor, but in the back of their minds they don’t really consider it their problem. And there’s always that next life to make up for any injustice in this one.
coughs slightly What do you mean only two vikings? I assume that was a slipup and you meant three. (why are people always forgetting me when they pull out the smores and vikings??)
So, I somehow damaged my kids from making sure they weren’t crack babies? That the crack babies would be worse off somehow being born whole? Do you think we should break the legs of runners at the beginning of a race to see if they can really persevere?
Crack babies, growing up in the ghetto, would no doubt have plenty of other challenges, ones they might have a better shot at surmounting without being handicapped at birth. Your god is a monster.
BTW, you might think about the women in Africa who never cheat on their husbands, but get AIDS anyway since they have a Catholic duty to their husbands, and because they are not allowed condoms. They are not supposed to practice abstinence. It would be wonderful if their husbands did, but thanks to Catholic teachings they suffer through no fault of their own. Maybe they should divorce - whoops, can’t do that either.
Wow. Hateful. I can’t believe anyone actually thinks like this.
I wasn’t a crack baby, and I think my life has been just fine. Normal life has plenty of tragedy to deal with and learn from without throwing really excruciating and damaging stuff into the mix, especially when it makes people more dysfunctional and less emotionally and psychologically capable of dealing with these things. People living thousands of years ago lived lives of abject misery. Many people in the world do today compared to Americans. Are we to think that somehow life was better back then? Should we plunge America into famine so we can have all sorts of great things to deal with? Should we mourn if we succeed in eliminating African famine because it will have deprived ghouls like Mother Teresa their vicarious pleasure in “learning” and celebrating from the suffering of others, all the while resisting the idea that anything substantive should be done about it other than making sure that when those people cry out in pain, they cry out the exact magic words that her ideology requires?
Your children are yours. From the beginning to the end. The fruit of your loins. If you revel in the peace of CRACK, it is their foundation. How they evolve is your responsibility. The fault lies with YOU . Good or bad. It is your choice. Do you think the children of all, grow to be monsters? No. It is the choice of the parent. The seed you plant in their souls is the foundation of their LIVES. Do you think those that grow up with no guidance can be held responsible for themselves? That is an animal. Guttural instincts rule the soul. My problem lies when they cross over to adulthood. There is no forgiveness. No quarter. All they do, whether they crawl or run, is YOU. Plan ahead my children. Don’t let the sins of the father rule the child.
