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Welcome
Enjoy... But remember
"Don't give in to winning the argument
and losing one of your eternal crowns..."
God bless you...
Enjoy... But remember
"Don't give in to winning the argument
and losing one of your eternal crowns..."
God bless you...
Good, hopefully not for too long 
What happens when we die? (Confused)
Ah, science to the rescue again (Interested )
Hi Interested, what did St Peter said about time? (eom) (Seeker)
Hi Seeker (Interested )
Things Creationists Hate 
Answers to Things Creationists Hate (edmund)
Theodicy (Seeker)
Problem solved, God is good! (Benjamin)
God is good, but evil still exists, it's not solved (Seeker)
Evil still exist, but not for long (Benjamin)
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Hi Benjamin:
>>>Is freedom of choice a flaw? What do you think?<<< Is evil a flaw? Assuming the answer is yes, does freedom of choice leads to evil (as Interested said in the other post)? If yes, it is a flaw. However, if evil is not a flaw, then we are in whole new ballgame, with a whole new set of problems. ------------------------------------------------------------ >>>Should God be faulted for giving man free choice?<<< If doing so will necessarily and knowingly result in evil and suffering, yes. ------------------------------------------------------------- >>>Is this issue and the resolution of this issue first and foremost critical and central to your decision to embrace Christ?<<< Among others, yes. If it defies my logic, it would be impossible to believe in it. ------------------------------------------------------------- >>>God’s higher ways means that it defies our human wisdom.<<< As I told Edmund in the other post, I cannot understand this. On one hand, we are supposedly given intelligence to think and make our own decisions. On the other, we are not intelligent enough to understand god's higher ways, thereby restricting information flow and hindering our ability to make the right decisions. Puzzling. ------------------------------------------------------------- >>>Perhaps you have not given much thought into it.<<< Hmm.....okay, okay, I am thinking :-)) ------------------------------------------------------------- >>>Perhaps like many other atheists you have a caricature of God which is not the God of the Bible. God is not all lovey dovey.<<< Well, this "caricature" of a lovey dovey god is painted by christians, theologians and the bible. Since I don't believe yet, I couldn't have come up with it. ------------------------------------------------------------- >>>God is not all lovey dovey.<<< Your position on this aspect of god is unusual. In fact, it's the first time I have heard it. It could lead to other questions, I'm sure, but I'm not thinking of it yet. ------------------------------------------------------------- >>>You must not emphasize God’s love and mercy at the expense of God’s holiness and righteousness.<<< That's why I said that that is a logical problem in the theology of the christian god. His natures don't add up. ------------------------------------------------------------- >>>Should the Judge of the world fail to exercise justice?<<< No, he shouldn't fail to exercise justice. But is submitting mankind to evil and suffering for something that I feel he has a hand in, considered justice? ------------------------------------------------------------- >>>If in our human courts we will decry any judge who simply decides to show love to a mass murderer and set him free, should we reduce the standard of God to that of a man?<<< Would you decry a judge for punishing the mass murderer PLUS all his family and descendents for generations to come? Especially if the judge is partly responsible in the first place, for allowing him to be instigated into committing the offence by another convicted mass murderer? ------------------------------------------------------------- >>>But just because there are unanswered questions do not mean that there is no God. At most it is an aspect of God that we cannot comprehend.<<< I can accept that. Hence, the problem with the logical problem of theodicy vis-a-vis the christian god. Like evolution, it does not disprove god. But it poses certain challenges to certain aspects of the christian god. ------------------------------------------------------------- >>>One thing for sure, it there was ever a better way to solve the problem than that which He has effected, God would have beaten you to it.<<< Yes, of course, UNLESS there is no god in the first place that is. ------------------------------------------------------------- >>>The problem with such instant quickfixes is that God is not a fairy God-father who take orders from man.<<< Yeah, but I'm not the one petitioning him via prayers to listen to me and fullfill my wishes :-)) It's just that it seem awfully simple for an all-powerful being to eradicate evil and suffering. ------------------------------------------------------------- >>>If God simply eradicate the problem of evil, we will all end up in hell instantly. Is that your idea of a solution?<<< I don't see why it has to be so. ------------------------------------------------------------- >>>Or maybe you want everyone to end up in heaven? But then, would you like to meet Hitler there? Does that appease your sense of justice?<<< If there is no evil in the first place, there would be no Hitler. Or Hitler could have been Mother Teresa if not for the inherent flaw of freewill. Moreover, according to this freewill theology, Hitler is a mere byproduct of the freewill script. It is not he who have to make reparations but the script writer of this whole episode. ------------------------------------------------------------- >>>You will have to think harder to arrive at a better solution, one that brings out the love of God AND does not diminish the holiness of God at the same time.<<< I'm trying. I think removing evil and suffering right now will bring out his love and holiness. "His love" in that he is actually doing something to stop his children from more suffering. "His holiness" in that he is not tolerating evil anymore and eradicating it forever. ------------------------------------------------------------- >>>But they won’t when He comes back.<<< When is the question. One second to a suffering person can seem like an eternity. ------------------------------------------------------------- >>>In fact, God has instituted civil laws and set civil authorities in place to restraint human wickedness in the present time.<<< From the way some of these civil authorities (Hitler, Amin, Pol Pot, Milosevic, Taleban, etc) are working (or rather not working), it didn't work out too well. In fact, some of these civil authorities are themselves personifications of evil. So how can they restrict evil? ------------------------------------------------------------- >>>Aren’t you glad it was only 6,000 years and not 15 billion years?<<< For the purposes of this discussion, it doesn't really matter. When it comes to human suffering, 6000 years is still a very loooong time. ------------------------------------------------------------- >>>Have you noticed that you have posed the question of evil in moral terms? That is, you have embraced some kind of moral standards and assumed that there is a moral basis for asking this question. But why should you even pose this question when it is an evolutionary world devoid of goals and purpose and morals? That’s not very consistent with yourself, isn’t it? In fact, it can be argued that you shouldn’t even be asking this question, for asking it presupposes that God exists.<<< This topic started from a reference to god's character, ie. all-powerful, all-loving, all-merciful. So yes, in it there is a presupposition that god exists. Then we (or I or they) try to position his character against the issue of evil and suffering. And a seemingly illogical outcome resulted. I don't think evolution need to be brought in since we are discussing god's nature vis-a-vis the existence of evil and suffering. As to why I pose the question, it's an attempt to understand the christian god better, why there is a contradiction of his nature and the actual world we live in. ------------------------------------------------------------- >>>Your analogy is flawed. Adam was a full blown adult, not a fumbling toddler.<<< Whether Adam is an adult or child is not really the point of the analogy, although it can be argued that he is a child despite his physical status. How long has he been created before the apple incident? Before taking the fruit from the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil, how "adult" can he be? But like I say, that's not the point. Putting someone in a room full of goodies, then telling him one is untouchable and will lead to bad consequences, then putting a convicted trickster who has a personal grudge to grind against me into the very same room, is just asking for trouble. That's the point. ------------------------------------------------------------- >>>I hope you have given more than a cursory thought to your own reply. Think about the deeper implications of such a God.<<< Hope you can elaborate on this. But I suspect the "deeper implications" will lead you to more contradictions. Which is the point I am driving at. If god is all-loving and all-merciful, retribution shouldn't be on his mind. We may want the evildoers to get their comeuppance at the end, and we may look to god to do it. But if he's all-loving and all-merciful, he won't. Then he will seem to be an unjust god. More contradictions. ------------------------------------------------------------- >>>God, being omnipresent, was surely with Eve.<<< But he did nothing to stop satan from tempting Eve, when it was absolutely within his power to do so. In a homicide trial, that would qualify one as an accessory to murder, and rightly so. ------------------------------------------------------------- >>>Why won’t you accept what the Bible says? Isn’t it because you do not trust the Word of God?<<< No, it's because I don't believe that the bible is the Word of God. The bible was written by man and is the word of men, men claiming to speak for god. If god is to speak to me as he spoke to Adam, and I refuse to believe, then I have nothing to say. But what I have is just a book, purportedly recording his words. ------------------------------------------------------------- >>>And we hope to live as though we are free and accountable to no one. <<< Actually, if people do good and resist evil BECAUSE they think they are accountable to a higher power, that is not nearly as honest as someone who does good and resist evil BECAUSE to him, that's just the right thing to do. It's like someone who gives to charity and announces his deed so that some higher power will take notice and commend him. Versus an anonymous donor who donated out of his own goodness. But I digress. Your point is that people prefer to pretend that there is no god and no eternal life so that they can have a rolling good time without inhibition. Once they accept god, they are prevented from having sinful fun and their freedom is curtailed. Recently, there's been a number of threads here detailing the colourful exploits of priests and pastors. Their beliefs certainly didn't stop them from their frolicking. What I am trying to say is that I don't think it is this that stops people from believing. It is the absence of evidence of god. ------------------------------------------------------------- >>>Moreover, how does evolution address the problem of evil? Is it capable of providing answers to these questions? What explanatory power does it have? Does it offer a better answer than the Bible? I see it as more reasonable to critique something if you have a better alternative or suggestion or are in a better position to resolve it.<<< It will distract us from the discussion if we bring in evolution. Would like to just deal with the christian aspect of theodicy first. Regards.
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It can happen anytime, just don't get caught dead without Jesus! by Benjamin, 2001, Jun 01
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