Why is it so hard to believe in God?

Great Debates
201

I think you’re being a tad misleading here with your analogy. In questioning the nature of your relationship with God, there is only one person we can ask–you. (I suppose, if you want, we can ask God. But if He doesn’t respond, then that’s a strike against you trying to prove your case). In questioning the nature of your relationship with your wife, there are at least two people we can ask–both you and your wife. I say “at least” because we can further gather evidence by asking people who have seen the two of you together: friends, coworkers, neighbors, what have you.

In the former case, all we have to go on is your word. You can shout “I love God and He loves me” until your tongue falls out, but that doesn’t constitute “proof.” In the latter case, we can observe how you treat your wife and how she treats you. We can ask each of you for your opinion on the matter. We can ask numerous other third parties for their opinion, and we can observe you independently and come to our own conclusions. If, to quote the Eight Ball, all signs point to “Yes,” then I’d feel safe in saying that you do indeed love your wife. Is it proof? Just like in the first case, not really, no. But if I were a gambling man (which I am), I’d wager on the existence of the more readily verifiable husband-wife love than I would on the existence of the completely subjective and self-contained person-diety love.

I’d like to extend this point (and address the Topic Question in doing so) by telling a story. When I was in undergrad, I had two friends, Dan and Lucy, who were both a year behind me. I met them about a month after they met each other their freshman year. They were totally normal, moderate, non-Fundie Christians. About the only oddity in their relationship was that they married at a pretty young age–neither one of them was legally able to drink at their wedding. Okay, so there’s another strange fact about their relationship: Dan would occasionally hit Lucy.

About three months after the wedding, I noticed Lucy had a black eye, so I asked her about it. “I took a softball to the face during practice.” Okay, I guess. When I noticed some vicious bruises on her legs, the story was that some punk kid apparently ran a grocery cart into her at the supermarket. Now this did not jive, so I talked to Dan. Hearing the same far-fetched story from him did not make it sit any better with me. Out of nowhere came the truth.

“Mike, she got into a fender-bender because she was putting her lipstick on while driving. The damages weren’t that big of a deal, but I’ve told her a MILLION times not to do it! I had to get the point across somehow!” He was actually justifying causing his wife physical harm! :mad: I think I told him something to the effect that if he EVER touched her again, I would rip out his eyes and tape them to my hands, so he could watch me beat the living shit out of him. (I have, shall we say, historical reasons for being vehemently opposed to abuse against women. [Homer] Stupid traumatic childhood! [/Homer]). Apparently, something got through, because Dan broke down and wept for at least ten minutes straight. I stood there, stoically, offering not one platitude nor one ounce of sympathy. He nevertheless bawled–no whining, no more excuses, just tears and tears. Finally, the best he could offer up was, “I love her, Mike, I really do.” “Bullshit,” I eloquently countered. “If you really loved her, then you’d never even dream of causing her physical pain.”

My question–to Poly or to anyone else–is: Why should I hold God to a lower standard than I held Dan to? You do NOT purposely cause pain to someone you love. That is completely antithetical to the notion of loving someone. And yet, we let God off the hook. Our Loving Father gave this person pancreatic cancer. That person was born severely mentally retarded, by the grace of the All-Loving God. A third person has had not one, not two, but THREE miscarriages–made all the more cruel because she also has a son, and knows that it’s physically possible for her to bear children.

These are not “the wages of sin are death” cases. I also contend that these are not not NOT cases of love. Why do we let God get away with it? Every fiber of my being despises my wifebeater friend, and yet God, the Ultimate Humanbeater, deserves my unconditional love? And gratitude? :confused:

Quix

[sub]Yes, I know, “The Lord works in mysterious ways” and whatnot. But you’ll pardon me for not accepting that as proof that God exists[/sub]

202

Dreamer, I’m not going to quote your entire post of 12:07 this morning back here, and I think you can take as a given that I respect the fact that you’re doing what our Lord commanded in witnessing to others on your faith – but the bottom line here is that it appears to me to be a two-way street, in which some of the motivation in whether someone turns to God or not is supplied by them, and some by God. Again, I’d have to quote a good half of the Epistle to the Romans at you to make my case, but I’m sure you can see Paul’s repeated references to its being God’s initial idea. (The Roman Catholics call this prevenient grace, i.e., grace that goes before conversion, and I think that’s a handy term to use.)

To other posters: I don’t think God is out to have you concur in the evidence of His existence, but to see Him as Someone that you can put your trust in. This has almost become a mantra for me in religious threads, because everyone seems to be using “believe in God” to be a parallel construction with with “agree that there’s enough evidence for the theory of punctuated equilibria to accept it as ‘proven’” – and my understanding of “faith” and “belief” is that they’re nearly synonymous with “trust.” If I choose to drive to Lynchburg or Virginia Beach, I can see large edifices built through the work of Jerry Falwell or Pat Robertson, but that doesn’t motivate me to trust them. I trust people like Fr. Mychal Judge and the couple I know who decided to go help out at a hospital in Malawi for a year.

This very dichotomy might be the exact reason why God operates in “mysterious ways” – as Gaudere keeps asking for reasons behind. He’s not particularly interested in having His existence affirmed as though he were a new subatomic particle or a particular subspecies of orchid or armadillo; what He wants is for people to enter into a relationship with Him out of love and trust. Pushing Himself on them as an obvious object with major threat characteristics is not a way to get there; being evident but not obvious is. (That sounds like I’m saying that God is “playing hard to get” – and I suspect that is a hijack this thread does not need!)

Dreamer, one sidelight on this thread is that you affirm the validity of the Bible stories as historical accounts, and I’m not about to condemn you for that. But there seems to be quite a bit of evidence, both in the physical universe and internally in the Book itself, that much of Scripture is written in non-literal language, that there is not going to be a seven-headed ten-horned Purple People Eater show up at the appropriate point in the Great Tribulation scenario but rather that that is metaphorical for some person or force driving people away from Christianity (there are a couple of threads on this subject lying dormant in the archives), that the Flood story was not necessarily a historical account of a deluge that submerged all land but rather a depiction of God’s protective hand over people based loosely on legends about floods in Mesopotamia (which did have regular floods and the site of Ur where Abraham came from) – stuff like that.

Uh, the “eternal torment” POV is a major reconstruction on the pain that people who have not chosen to follow God are supposed to feel at their loss when they realize the truth. I despise the sort of evangelism that says that a God who loved humanity enough to send Himself to die in torment in our behalf is nonetheless sufficiently sociopathic to enjoy watching sinners writhe in torment eternally. It just doesn’t compute.

Rather, what God seems to be up to is parallel to the idea that if you were all-powerful, you might command the person of your dreams to fall in love with you and they’d be forced to comply, but what you really want is for them to choose to love you unforcedly. Catch the distinction between what He could do and what He (according to this view) does do. And proving His own existence is not what He’s up to at all.

203

IMO he has proven his existence. Your choosing not to believe it.

204

[QUOTE]
*Originally posted by Polycarp *
I respect your opinions Polycarp and of course I don’t mean people to think that it’s all up to them alone to find God. I didn’t mean that and apolgize if that’s how it came out.

I don’t think the purple monster is literal but I do in fact believe the flood did happen the way the bible says it did. Maybe not the best example - but here are some reasons why.

AMEN :slight_smile:

205

quizotic78 I wish I had the answers for you. My heart aches when I read these things because I know and completely understand these feelings and questions, and the confusion they bring. I have the same questions too, only I have chosen to trust that God has the answers.

Sometimes you have to look at the other side of things too though. What about the person who has cancer and is healed? What about the people who are in terrible car accidents but by a small miracle, are saved from death? There are just as many good stories as there are bad ones.

206

Dreamer that link’s not working for me, but here’s a http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/faq-noahs-ark.html"]discussion of problems of the Flood myth.

[ul]
[li]How did Noah gather the koalas, the tigers, the polar bears and so on together, when many of the animals cannot survive outside of a particular climatic zone, i. e., if it’s cold enough for the polar bears, the tigers will freeze, and vice versa.[/li][li]How did Noah feed the animals? [/li][li]Why is there no evidence of a Flood in ice core samples or tree rings?[/li][/ul]
And so on. Sorry, but the only evidence for a flood is in the pages of Genesis, whiich the Hebrews borrowed from the Mesopotamian flood myth of Ut-Napishtim.

You really need to learn about geology, biology, physics, and the many, many problems inherent in fundamentalist creationist mythology.

See, now that’s insulting. You seem to think that nonbelievers are just closing their ears to The Truth out of bloodyminded perversity, when we see that the case for God based on a literal interpretation of Scripture is extremely weak.

I compliment you on your sweet disposition, which already puts you way ahead of most fundamentalists, but you really need to marshall your facts better. Read the talkorigins.org FAQ and then come back for further discussion.

207

How? And how is the evidence any more convincing than for any other religion?

208

Quixotic, I don’t have an answer for what theologians and philosophers have called “the Problem of Pain” – which is, in essence, what you’ve defined by that horrific story and the other examples you give.

A small piece of it, if you’ll allow me a partial answer, can be seen in the classic ratio metaphor that God:man::parent:child. When next I babysit my honorary grandchildren this weekend I could use my greater physical strength and authority to keep them from hitting and pinching each other – or I could allow them to play together, using punishment and example, precept and guidance, to teach them how to behave like decent human beings. The latter is preferable, since they will grow up and need to know that hitting and pinching are not (usually) acceptable adult behavior. By His putting us in a world where problems and tragedies happen and we are free to comfort and aid one another – or not – we learn how to be whatever it is that He wants us to be in the long run.

My wife once quoted something she’d heard as a child with reference to a prolonged and painful fatal illness, “Death is the ultimate healing.” Though this is far more philosophical and stoic an approach than my compassion wants to accept, I can see the point – that death is a release from suffering, whatever (including nothing) you may think lies beyond it.

In the particular case you quote, I am not prepared to tell you how you ought to have behaved, but it would have been clear to me that I was involved with Dan and Lucy and hearing Dan’s confession of his spouse abuse in order that I might be such help to the two of them as I could and get them to the help that they needed that was beyond my own ability. That would include being there for Dan and finding out what in Hell was stressing him to the point that he was being abusive. (I had a very similar experience some years ago when there was a case in a neighbor family of uncle-neice child abuse, with the uncle in late adolescence and the neice’s parents totally incompetent – I had to be there for both parties and not indulge in judgmentalism, and was able to get the uncle into the therapy he needed for his own problems – which turned out to be in part derived from abuse by the girl’s mother, his own older sister, when he was little. I found out later that that sort of “family tradition of abusiveness” is often common in such cases.)

No, I don’t have all the answers. I believe in doing all the good I can, asking Him for help in dealing with the rest, and trying to make the world a better place to live. I have no idea why He might have made a world with as much trouble and pain in it as this one has – but I feel confident, knowing Him, that He had good reasons for it. Trying to say that without sounding like a Pollyanna (instead of a Polycarp;)) is quite difficult, though.

209

dreamer: you still haven’t answered my question.
Where do you get the 10,000 year earth age idea?

210

Darn. Here’s the link.

Have you considered Hindu Creation Science? According to their scientific discoviries, they found that the lord Brahma was hatched from a primordial egg, “And out of those two halves he formed heaven and earth, between them the middle sphere, the eight points of the horizon, and the eternal abode of the waters.” It’s recorded in the Vedas, which are much older than the Bible and therefore closer to the Creation, and thus more accurate. Certainly, the Hindu creation tale has every bit as much validity as the story in Genesis.

Or there is Chinese creationism, in which the world was created of out the body of a giant.

Or the Norse creationism, in which the world was also created out fo the body of a giant.

Or Shinto creationism, in which the divine couple, Izanami and Izanagi, stirred land from water with a miraculous spear.

Or Hopi creationism, in which the gods Tawa and Spider Woman created the earth, the other gods, and the animals from clay.

211

I choose not to believe? Well, Dreamer…I guess you have it all figured out, huh? I’ll let all the people who’ve been sick or crippled, displaced due to flood, drought or whatever know that your god “has his reasons.” Maybe if they would just choose to believe, these little inconveniences of life wouldn’t happen. You know, crappy lives also happen to believers. It’s not much of an insurance policy when you buy into it and you’re STILL not covered.

212

See, the part you keep missing is that I can’t choose God. I look at the world, and I see a huge, pulsing multiplicity of competing, conflicting, contradictory supernatural beliefs. To choose God, I would have to choose a God. It would be like throwing a dart at the biggest McDonald’s menu in the world.

And besides, from my perspective, while the various discrete elements that make up that swirling nebulous mass of multifarious supernatural creeds may differ in certain specific details (were we willed into existence by a wise benevolent human-like being in the middle of a very momentous week, or by a mischevous Coyote with too much time on his hands?), they all have one important thing in common: None of them has anything resembling evidence or proof except for the fervently expressed beliefs of followers and adherents. Every single religious alternative on the planet shares this critically important characteristic, and that’s enough to convince me that the whole thing is bunkum. Powerful and emotionally satisfying bunkum, yes, but then the same can be said for John Edward’s shameful con act.

Your perspective: God is there, and I choose to turn away from him.

My perspective: I choose not to buy into a fantasy I find irrelevant to my emotional health.

213

Were this an attractive god, I may have, at one point “chose” to believe (whatever THAT means). But why would I want to? Some of the believers in this thread say I shouldn’t forget about all the GOOD things he has done. But the fact remains, if he can do good things, why doesn’t he do them ALL THE TIME? This is not a loving being. Why would I put my emotional money on such a long shot? What would the purpose be? MAYBE he’ll choose me to be good to? He’s burned many a believer before!

The very concept of “faith” is that you trust that something will behave the way it always behaves. Well, the christian god picks and chooses. You don’t have a recognizable pattern going here. Why would you possibly think that your faith will end up being a good thing?

214

Please tell me you do not seriously believe that the early Christians were plotting the overthrow of the Roman Empire. Where on earth did you get such an idea? (IOW, cite? )

I would think they would have been more concerned with avoiding becoming the torches for Nero’s next dinner party.

Add me to the list of people quite insulted by this. I was raised a Christian, but found the faith to be unfulfilling for me, despite a great deal of study and prayer. (After still more study and prayer, I have found my faith, but it is not Christianity.)

And you are equating me to a toddler who sticks her fingers in her ears and yells to avoid hearing something she doesn’t like.
It is presuptuous and belittling to me, all of my efforts, and everyone else who doesn’t happen to believe the same things as you.

215

Well, there’s the rub for me. I asked God into my life over a period of at least four years. Believe what you will, but I think I’ll take a play from the Book of Dreamer and tell you that you just have to trust me :wink: I was as sincere, as pitiful, as selfless, and as needful as any human being in history in my quest for Jesus’ love. And the answer I got was silence. God told me, “Nope, I don’t want you.” So really, I have no reason to trust him at all. (But, in a way, I’m relieved–my life is so much better now that I’m an agnostic! I’m happier, much more fulfilled, much more tolerant, and basically full of more love NOW than I ever was when I was nominally a Christian.)
**

To me, that’d be similar to Dan in my story saying, “Hey, it could have been worse. Lucy should be thankful I didn’t break her nose.” I’m supposed to say, “God, thanks for taking away my cancer!” when He’s the one who gave it to me in the first place?? :confused:

Well, at some point, I would hope that you would indeed use that strength and authority to curtail serious violence. If they start brandishing knives at each other, you’d better step in–and no one will think the worse of you for doing so (quite the contrary, actually). But I’m not asking God to keep us from “pinching” each other. When you’re babysitting, you have a policy of laissez-faire until, say, fists are involved. When God is “babysitting” us, there is no “until.” He takes a completely hands-off approach. What is the lesson that humanity is supposed to take from such a stance? Your grandchildren, essentially, learn a “Don’t sweat the small stuff” mindset. God’s grandchildren, OTOH, learn a “I don’t sweat ANYTHING” mindset. That’s healthy?

So who causes the child’s prolonged and painful illness in the first place? If I were to infect a child with Ebola and then kill her three weeks later, that wouldn’t be a gift; it’d be torture. Again, you are holding God to a lower standard than I hold myself to, and that just blows my mind. He’s all-encompassing Compassion, and I’m just pitiful ole me… but I know that it’s not cool (to say the least!) to give the child a prolonged and painful illness in the first place.
**

Truedat. I dropped the ball on that one. I can make whatever excuses and rationalizations I want (and indeed, I have). I was leaving for grad school anyways, so I wouldn’t be around to see the process through. Spousal abuse in my parents clouded me with rage. Whatever–I regret my actions.
**

I agree with the first and third clauses, and have found in MY personal experience that the second clause is unnecessary (and, in my personal case–but not necessarily anyone else’s–detrimental).
**

Again, I agree with the first part.

216

Polycarp, I have this amazing new financial investment system that’s guaranteed to give 100,000-to-1 returns, and I want to let you in on it! Just send me all your money, then sit back and wait for the riches to come in. On the off-chance that you die before I give you the return on your investment, I’ll pass the money to your family and descendants instead. Are you in? :slight_smile:

Well?

What’s the matter, don’t you trust me? :frowning:
I trust I don’t need to draw the rest of this analogy. :wink:

217

Dreamer,
I’m sorry but this is silly and pompous.

  1. Gravity exists. You can deny it, put your fingers in your ears, scream loudly and so on. But you’ll still be pulled towards the Earth by gravity.

  2. You believe God exists. What is your evidence?

It is staggering how many religions there are and what they believe, yet you believe not only that God exists, but that you know which religion is true.

Here are some religious beliefs that many other people believe as deeply as you do:

  • The Pope is God’s representative on Earth
  • The Pope is Satan
  • Jesus is the Messiah
  • Jesus is not the Messiah
  • We are endlessly reborn
  • We go to Heaven when we die
  • Sinners burn in hell forever
  • Cows are sacred
  • All life, including insects, is sacred
  • Haile Selassie was God
  • Blood transfusions are sinful
  • Joseph Smith had a direct message from God
  • Jesus was a prophet, as was Muhammad

You choose to believe that these millions of religious people that don’t agree with you are all wrong.
Why? What evidence do you have? Did God speak to you?

If God didn’t exist, there would be deaths from accidents, natural disasters, disease and evil people.

Well there are people dying all the time from road accidents, air crashes, floods, volcanoes, forest fires, earthquakes, cholera, AIDS and wars.

So if God exists, why (for example) did he set the Earth up to kill so many people. Was the Black Death a religious event?

Incidentally I do hope your last sentence doesn’t mean that you think God saves about half these people (or that if he did, it would make him a good God). Miracles happen very rarely - that’s why they are called miracles.

Now I’ve been pretty aggressive here. But your two quotes above were asking for it.

We here can respect your personal belief in God. What we don’t like is when you claim there is evidence we can all examine, and that we are somehow ignoring it.

218

I’m sorry gobear, I didn’t mean that to sound insulting. I was just responding to what EchoKitty was saying. I don’t want to be one of those “fundamentalist” who put themselves above others. I’m really trying to understand here.

219

Yes, of course crap happens to believers and non-believers alike. And in equal amounts, but the difference is how the believers choose to respond to what life brings them and trust God. It’s not easy to believe one way or the other.

220

And you heard him say this? If God would do anything you asked him to, what could he do to make you believe?