re: "God's plan" God does not save us from earthly suffering

Trust the plan

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So you are saying he is either not omnipotent or not 100% good. Both of which are against my 14 years of Catholic school teaching.

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Suggesting that God empowers us with free will and does not necessarily step in when we screw up implies neither of these things. Just because you can do something doesn't mean you should. Without consequences, there is no learning and no development toward good. If you are a parent.....are you going to tell me that you believe you do your kids a favor by intervening for them when they make mistakes? Or do you sometimes allow them to learn?

I'm genuinely interested in how you view this.

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And you won't.

Not the Christian God anyways. He has no parts, is not made of atoms, etc.

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There's enough fraud in this world as it is to start believing people talking about an incorporeal being with omnipotent powers.

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More often than not, I don't think He actively intervenes in our problems on earth and one could argue that perhaps that sets a prescendent.

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People sure think He does. If someone gets sick and goes to the hospital and people pray for him and he gets better, you can bet people praise God about it.

But on the flip side there two things:

1. No one ever blames God when prayers aren't answered. If someone is sick, goes to the hospital, people pray for him, and he dies, people just say it was God's will.

2. No one really prays for or expects God to intervene in far-fetched ways. If someone has an arm cut off in an accident, no one prays for God to grow it back. If someone is rescued from a house fire with 3rd degree and 4th degree burns all over his body, no one prays to God to heal him back to normal.

In situations where God has to intervene is some visible, tangible way, people don't really believe it will happen. People find God in things that are coincidental, fortunate, and not fully understood.

All the good things are god

All the bad things are us

It's easy this way

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You are correct, they do. And while their prayers are answered, the answer is not always what those people want. Of course, when it is, they will praise (as they should). I have no idea why He answers some prayers as we ask for them to be and others He doesn't. That's His will. I can only accept it.

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I believe that on a day-to-day basis a lot of good and bad things are going to happen to people regardless of how much prayer is involved, and I don't think things that are impossible and would require the noticeable intervention of a deity will ever happen. And deep down, I don't think Christians do either.

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And I agree. I don't pretend to always understand it. I don't. But I recognize that sometimes, no matter how hard or fervently we ask for it, the answer will not be in the affirmative.

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I suspect that if you prayed to Zeus your prayers would be answered at about the same rate as when you pray to God.

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That is correct as well. Unfortunately, these things often happen as consequences to actions of ourselves or others.

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And they often don't. Pete Maravich collapsed and died while playing basketball at just 40. How many obese people and chain smokers who can't run the length of a basketball court without getting winded live past 40?

There's a lot we can do to improve ourselves and our lives, but there's also a lot of random shite swirling around us that can do anything from make us a corpse to a lottery winner.

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Creation didn't happen by some cosmic chance because the odds simply don't favor it.

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We know quite a bit about the evolution of the Universe and how complexity resulted from forces like gravity and nuclear fusion and principles like natural selection, and future generations will know more about it as science progresses. The role of deities has always retreated against the progress of science.

In 2021, we think it's silly that ancient people used to believe that deities caused things like thunder. We know better now. One day, people will look back on this time and think things like Creationism and a deity becoming a man are just as ignorant.

It's better to defer today's mysteries to future generations rather than conjure deities to explain them because we can't live without an answer right now.

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Also, there is too much order to the world to be a spontaneous creation out of nothing unless there is a creator.

This is such a tired argument.

First of all, nothing around you just appeared. You were born from a woman, the Sun you see was created by gravity and hydrogen fusion, the plants grew from seeds, and so forth.

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I agree 100% that nothing around you just appeared. You were created from a man and woman, the sun was created, if by gravity and hydrogen then that's how God created it. Plants do grow from seeds, if all these things are true then why do you believe the entire universe spontaneously created? It to must have a creator. That creator is God.

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Well, the proof I'm looking for is I would like to actually see a deity. I have lived for 42 years and been to 6 continents and still haven't seen one.

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God did come down to earth. His name was Jesus. He claimed to be God, worked miracles such as raising people from the dead, was crucified and reportedly resurrected by his followers and non followers. It is as much of a historical fact that Jesus existed as any other figure we know of at that time in history. He couldn't be just a good man because He claimed to be God. So he is either Lord, liar or lunatic. I believe He was God.

Strange that so many agree with your post but then say "God wouldn't let that happen" in regards to climate change.

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God did not start the Catholic church.

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Jesus Christ started a church. That we know from scripture. The apostles went out and preached the good news and built up the church as instructed by Jesus.

After some years some believers started having a different opinion of what was being taught and started preaching some different versions of the good news. The apostles and church fathers needed a way to identify the true church and called themselves the universal church. The greek term is katholiko'. Which is where the term Catholic comes from.

The catholic church has stayed true to the teachings of the church fathers until today. Even standing their ground on tough issues such as contraception and sterility.

Ah, the hubris of humanism. It's sad to see.

Rejecting God eliminates the rational basis for a lot of things you folks take for granted, and living consistently with your atheism would result in a world of horror.