Do not blame God for the evils of men. He has more or less stated outright that He will help us in our time of need… unfortunately (from a mortal perspective) His aid is not neccessarily what we would choose. He will not stop us from doing evil nor prevent us from taking the consequences of our actions. But He does bring good out of evil. It is only the evil of men constantly warring with God which keeps this world in misery and hatred.
Yeah, but he’s not claiming to be ABLE to protect everyone. The christian version of god DOES.
Ok, so the Godmother and the reporter are preaching to you (in your opinion). Not the little girl, who should not be taken to task for wanting to speak with her Pastor.
Maybe it’s because I am from Texas and have a different idea of what preaching is, but to me, that ain’t it.
Again, to me, that’s not preaching. Preaching is when someone tells you that you are a sinner, tells you why you are a sinner, and then tells you that you are going to hell unless you accept Christ as your savior. She was simply telling the reporter the events as they happened. She added the bit about it being a beautiful thing because she isn’t a politician, she isn’t a public figure, and she isn’t a reporter. She is simply the little girl’s Godmother and was telling the reporter her account of things.
Is what this woman said really that offensive to you? Why?
Cool. He said what he wanted to and thanked who he wanted to. If he had mentioned God in his statement would he then be lumped in with the pitting?
That’s nice (and so profound!), although I actually used the word “constancy”, and was asking why you saw fit to question whether she was a genuine believer at other times. What’s with this “fairweather believer” line? You know next to nothing about this girl’s beliefs, both prior to and after her rape. As has been pointed out, you don’t even know that she believes in an omni-everything interventionist God (OIG from now on), and while you blithely dismissed this point, it seems really rather crucial.
Right, we’re having a perfectly dispassionate debate about the logical consistency and healing efficacy of the post-trauma beliefs of a rape victim. Just like we might have a perfectly dispassionate debate about eternal damnation at a funeral. Hey; there are some important and weighty theological issues thrown up by the child’s partially reported remarks, and you know, I’m pretty sure that at some point in the last few years there was a thread about religion in GD - maybe one that even dealt with the question of an OIG, who knows. It’s about time we revisited the question, and this is just the place for it.
Oh, wait; no, it’s not. Don’t you think it’s just slightly tasteless? Just a touch? I know it’s a message board, and I know none of this is going to be seen by the kid, but there’s still such a thing as a time and a place. I don’t think there’s a satisfying answer to the problem, which is in large part why I don’t believe in a God, but I don’t see what’s gained by picking (even at a distance) on a girl who just wants some comfort. Ha HA! little girl, your very predicament invalidates your own reaction to it! Taste our fiery irony!
Yay, more platitudes. Now perhaps if you can explain how disabusing an eight-year-old of her beliefs at a major crisis point in her life is a sensible thing to do, maybe we’d be getting somewhere. Shall we tell her there’s no Santa while we’re at it? Or shall we be the bigger men, and accept that a belief with which we don’t agree is nonetheless of considerable benefit to the child at this point? I don’t hold out much hope, since in your eyes it’s not an alternative belief, is it, it’s “outright lies”.
Yes, thank you, I did. Truly, your logical skills are legend among eight-year-olds, and your skills of selecting examples to illustrate a point are nonpareil. My point is that, amazing though you think you may be to have pointed out the problems of an OIG, you are far from the first - possibly not even the first on this board, today - and that this subject is so amazingly tired that your choice of illustration will rather inevitably become the focus of the thread. I’m aware that you generously said that you “guess” you’re really blaming the parents who taught her such pernicious naughtiness, but it nonetheless amazes me that you’re unable to see just how heartless your OP appears. You really have to be wrapped up in the rightness of your own beliefs (or lack thereof) for your first reaction to this story to be opening a pit thread attacking not the rapist, but the victim.
Really? For me, preaching starts with a coworker asking me, thirty minutes into a long drive, “So, Joe, have you taken Jesus Christ into your heart?” If I want to get me some religion and find out all the benefits of such (such as a small chance of being rescued after being raped, beaten, and dumped) I’ll go and watch The 700 Club.
Nope. He even said “It’s a miracle” which could either count as bringing God into it (or possibly just bringing probability into it - I don’t know the guy well enough to judge). However, instead this guy actually brought praise and attention to the guy who, you know SAVED HER LIFE.
What a wacky idea.
-Joe
Thanks, man. That was some funny-ass shit.
But that would be so wrong. He’s holding up the sky.
Oh. I missed the part where she said, “Everyone should take Jesus into thier heart so that they can be rescued from being beaten, raped, and dumped”. What I saw was her saying:
She never said that you should accept Jesus and become a Christian. What she said was that the little girl asked for her Pastor so that she could pray with him and thank her God. And then she asked if you found that bit of information as cute as she did, considering the girls age. Undoubtedly, you didn’t find it as cute.
I still don’t understand what exactly is so offensive about this? Seriously, I’m not being intentionally obtuse here. I just don’t understand what is in that statement to get so upset over.
Well good. Now they’ve been recognized for the outstanding police work they did, and everyone can quite complaining.
Well, to get back to the OP, the complaint is not about what the girl did. No one is pitting what she did. The complaint is that children are taught that God gets credit for the good shit and gets a pass on the bad shit.
No, they don’t.
No, you don’t. Implications are not automatically biconditional. Just because a seamstress sewed a button on your shirt does not mean that when you lost it, she ripped it off.
Damn, beat me to it.
Also, did you miss the part where part of my complaint was her Godmother basically celebrating how deep the girl’s indoctrination was? It was so beautiful!
To quote the thread title “Fallacies get imprinted young…”
I still think she should have thanked Thor.
-Joe
Ok, but what is the problem with that? If that is thier religion and they don’t preach to you about it, then where’s the problem? What does it harm?
That’s because He doesn’t do bad shit. He’s not the source of bad shit. You’re like the guy who trashes his house and blames the maid.
Nope, didn’t miss it. I just don’t see what the harm is or any reason to get worked up or pit anyone.
I agree, that would have been funny.
You know, you’ve always pretended to be smarter than this. Was it just an act?
Change your idiotic “seamstress” thing to…
“Just because an omniscient and omnipotent seamstress sewed a button on your shirt does not mean that when you lost it, she ripped it off.”
Because, you see, it does mean that.
Unless you’re saying that God and a seamstress are the same thing. That both have the same level of knowledge and both have the same level of power.
Because, if that’s so, I should either have become a seamstress (even if the operation would be expensive) or God is nothing more than some Guatamalan kid working in one of Kathie Lee Gifford’s sweatshops.
-Joe, expects to be corrected in that KLG’s sweatshops are probably located in Asia
Then I guess you’re one of those relaxed Texans. Good for you.
I’m just tired of seeing the self-lobotomized (Liberal is being a perfect example in this thread) playing one side of the fence, constantly.
If a bunch of people got angry because, say, Brett Favre blamed God for his blowing a pass that cost the Packers the game, what would you think of their being angry with Favre?
-Joe
I guess you think calling me stupid makes you look smart.
Ridiculous. If God is responsible for every event in your life — including the buttons on your shirt — then everything you’re saying now is on His behalf. It is He speaking, and not you.
What does power have to do with it? You need to take your gripe to a religion that believes man is a helpless puppet, or a robot programmed by God.
I would think it was pretty stupid to get pissed at someone for thier religious beliefs (or lack thereof) as long as they aren’t trying to force them on people. If it makes Brett Farve feel better to blame God for his botched pass, then where’s the harm. If he keeps throwing bad passes then he can blame God when he doesn’t get his contract renewed. It’s no skin off my sack either way.
Gosh, buddy, I guess you could be right about that, but there is really no way for you to infer that from my post. I was simply re-capping the argument.
At the risk inviting one of Liberal’s soul-smashing similes, I will attempt to summarize the argument. After that, if you wish, we can discuss what I think about it. It goes like this:
Some folks would prefer not to have their lives ruled by superstition. Many of them feel that religous appeals, or appeals to “God,” fall into that category. What concerns them is that such thinking can come to have a powerful effect on public policy, and even the way society is constructed. It therefore frustrates them when they see evidence of such ways of thought in someone as young as eight years old.
If the seamstress had full control over whether or not the button was lost, and it was no extra expenditure on her part whether or not there were any forces capable of removing the button present in the universe, and she had chosen to create a great many of these button-removing forces, and especially if she claims that she has a vested interest in keeping out buttons on our shirts, then yes, I’m blaming her. Moreover (to extend the metaphor way past the breaking point), the seamstress could have sewn the button such that it could’nt have been removed. Finally, since the seamstress has an amazingly good sewing machine, we know that whatever goal she was trying to acheive, she could have acheived without having the button removed.
And yet, the button is gone.