Sophisticated Christian: My God exists and He is omnipotent, kind, and loving. He chooses to allow evil because X, Y, and Z.
Atheist: If your god exists (he doesn't) and if he is omnipotent, kind, and loving (he isn't) then he MUST create a perfect world where there is no evil. I reject your arguments X, Y, and Z for the following reasons. (Blah, blah, blah.) Because MY version of YOUR imaginary god requires that he create a world where there is no evil, and because there is evil in the world, god doesn't exist.
Discuss.
259 comments :
«Oldest ‹Older 201 – 259 of 259Not sure what you are getting at Johnny.
My colleague from my previous work is a former JW. He got kicked out twice from their church for abusing alcohol and I think he had an affair with his secretary. Overall he was a very decent and very honest guy.
To me that story about the child abuse just doesn't wash. If they kick out people for drinking and having an affair, why would they tolerate child abuse?
Maybe I'm wrong but for $13.5 a lot of people would do a lot of things. I'm not saying the abuse didn't happen but how it is handled is the key point. If JWs kick out people who are fond of alcohol why would they keep a child molester?
Newbie,
How could God's perfect law have a " loophole"? Just don't tell me that perfection is relative.
It looks like Ben Goren and Diogenes have disappeared ever since quest quit this blog. I wonder why?
Andy,
"Everybody gets their chance."
Ok, add a billion or so Muslims, since they are praying to the wrong god also. They don't get a chance either. They are assigned to hell for eternity.
How do you figure Chris? According to the Bible reference above they get their chance.
Andy,
The answer is simple. You allow metaphors to the interpretation of your favorite doctrines but you don't allow the same to the non-Trinitarians. That's at least hypocrisy.
Your not even acknowledging the horrific atrocities done by the Christianity over the last few hundred years tells me that you are just as ignorant as Larry calls it. Nothing else. You are going to pretend that burning people alive by the "Christians" never happened and you calling it terrible would cover it up. Yeah. Why am I not surprised that there are more atheists and agnostic every year. Thanks for reaffirming me in my beliefs Andy.
Well Johnny the Trinity is a way to describe God that is understandable to humans, or at least most Christians seem to think so.
When it come to atrocities that you have brought up, you have refused to give any details, so how could I say if they happened or not. You claimed scholars today called for burning heretics, again with out giving names or reference. How could I possibly respond to that?
Andy,
Do you acknowledge that innocent people were burned alive in the name of your Christianity?
Johnny, I'm sure there have been, but that doesn't make it biblical. Not sure why you bring it up unless you want to discuss a specific incident or phase of the history. The Spanish Inquisition was not a great phase for Spain or the church in Spain. There were atrocities in the crusades, as in all wars, but what is often forgotten is that without them all of Europe would have fallen to Islam and the world would look very different than today.
without them all of Europe would have fallen to Islam
I'm gratified to see that Andy knows as much about history as he does about theology.
John, some historians see the Crusades as confident, aggressive, papal-led expansion attempts by Western Christendom; some see them as part of long-running conflict at the frontiers of Europe; and others see them as part of a purely defensive war against Islamic conquest. You can choose what you want to believe. In any case Israel/Palestine had been under the Christian Byzantine Empire until the Islamic expansion.
John Harshman,
I think Andy knows both but he is deliberately trying to defend some leftover doctrines that don't wash anymore.
You can choose what you want to believe.
Hey Andy, you certainly can if you lack the slightest shred of intellectual integrity.
Andy said: "Yes, TWT, everybody. See Romans 1.20; 2.7; 2.14-15"
Oh yeah, you're right. How could I be so forgetful? After all, it's a fact that 'God' gave adam and eve a stone tablet with the wording from Romans 1.20; 2.7; 2.14-15 carved into it and then adam and eve made billions of paper copies of the tablet with the copier at their local library and handed out those copies to everybody on Earth from then on. Sheesh, do I feel stupid for not remembering that!
Andy said: "According to the Bible reference above they get their chance."
Hey Andy, my oldest brother was born unable to breathe. The doctor(s) couldn't revive him and he was pronounced dead. Did he get his "chance" to make a choice between spending eternity with or without your imaginary 'God'? Did he get a "chance" to accept or reject "salvation"? Is he spending eternity surrounded by 'evil'? Is he burning for eternity in hell?
Why are you afraid to answer these questions:
How do you know that your religious beliefs are the truth?
It it were discovered, and verified with irrefutable evidence, that there is a creator of the universe but that it is not your chosen, so-called "God' and is nothing like your chosen, so-called 'God', would you discard your religious beliefs?
If you had been born 500 years ago in what is now called Montana, or 5,000 years ago in what is now called Kenya, or 20,000 years ago in what is now called France, would you have been a christian?
others see them as part of a purely defensive war against Islamic conquest
Name one.
John, the Cambridge University scholar Jonathan Riley-Smith. What's your best reference? Ridley Scott and "Kingdom of Heaven"?
TWT, judging by your response you didn't even bother reading Romans 1.20; 2.7; 2.14-15.
I read it, and all the rest of Romans. What a horrible, incoherent, contradictory mess.
Judging by Andys response, he didn't read TWT's.
I'm curious, Andy, were you raised in a religious manner or did you acquire your religious beliefs later?
The whole truth, you forgot about the limbo doctrine. According to Andy's version of Christianity your brother and my sister are awaiting the heavenly bliss.
The whole truth, to me Andy sounds like one of those people who had a "spiritual awakening". Unfortunately, his views are so biased, so inconsistent and cherry-picked that he reminds me of many Christian priests I have come across over the years. I even have one in my remote family. We met at a wedding few years back. We got stuck at the table together and when he had a couple of drinks, he decided to convert me to Christianity. It was a disaster for him and an embarrassment.
He sent me a few emails since but his rhetoric has followed the same path as Andy's: God's grace, mysteries, bias against other religions but especially the Jews, Muslims and evangelical Christians. When he couldn't support his bias by the bible he would use some scholars as authorities or traditions.
Johnny, I don't believe in Limbo, that's not what is discussed in Romans 1.20; 2.7; 2.14-15. It says that says that the unreached people will be judged on a different basis than those who have heard the gospel.
The limbo of the infants is the result of the Catholic Church's view on original sin which I do not agree completely with. According to the scripture we are all held accountable only for our own actions. It stands to reason that an infant has not committed any sin, so there is no need for any Limbo. As I understand the teaching about Limbo has never been a doctrine in the Catholic Church just an accepted teaching.
Andy, you have dropped a name. But can you actually tell me where this name supports the claim you have made, that this historian sees the crusades as a "purely defensive war against Islamic conquest"? I doubt it.
I'm pretty sure that conquering a territory 600 years after it had been taken away from somebody else wouldn't count as defensive to anyone. And what that could possibly have to do with defending Europe is beyond me. I suppose you could shift goalposts to escape from your previous statements, say to claim you were really talking about the Byzantines. But it seems to me that the crusaders, in net effect, actually hastened the decline of the eastern empire. Sacking Constantinople doesn't seem like a good way to carry out a "purely defensive war".
"You forgot the Muslims Chris, you forgot the second largest religion."
Ok, include then as well. And all the Jews, too. According to Cristian doctrine, they are all going to hell for eternity because they are praying to the wrong god*. Where's their chance? And what about those molesting priests, Andy?
I'm just trying to get a handle on the "objective morality" of your god.
*Unless they are right and you are wrong and you are the one who is doomed. What then, Andy?
You can read about Jonathan's views in his book "The Crusades, Christianity, and Islam"
I can drop another name Thomas Madden, like wise a scholar on the crusades from St. Louis University. In the article "Crusade Myths" he also disagrees with your view. He writes "The First Crusade was called by Pope Urban II in 1095 in response to an urgent plea for help from the Byzantine emperor in Constantinople. Urban called the knights of Christendom to come to the aid of their eastern brethren. It was to be an errand of mercy, liberating the Christians of the East from their Muslim conquerors. In other words, the Crusades were from the beginning a defensive war. The entire history of the eastern Crusades is one of response to Muslim aggression."
"Romans 1.20; 2.7; 2.14-15."
Romans 1:20 says god has revealed himself, and we should therefore know what he wants, and so we have no excuse for not doing what he wants.
2:7 and 2:14-15 about how being good can get you into Heaven even if you are a Gentile (as you interpret it), this is is completely at odds with Christian doctrine which says salvation is only possible through accepting Jesus as your savior, and expressly denies the ability of ordinary humans to win salvation on their own through good works.
Andy, I've been thinking about what you said about "freedom" and "free will". It always amazes me that people who believe in, worship, and promote or force on others a so-called 'God', and especially one as horrible, demanding, oppressive, destructive, sadistic, two-faced, murderous, enslaving, etc., as the imaginary biblical 'God', claim to have freedom and free will. When I ask questions like the ones I asked you (that you still haven't answered) it's because I want to see if you are able to see outside of your enslaving religious beliefs. Whenever I ask god pushers such questions I either get no response at all or get an evasive, irrelevant response. There's no freedom or free will in being afraid to see outside of enslaving religious beliefs. There's no freedom or free will in being afraid of an imaginary, so-called 'God'. Being fearful and enslaved and imposing fear and slavery on others is not freedom.
Now, you probably think that I and others who aren't religious are afraid to even consider that there was, is, or may be a 'creator'. I can't speak for everyone else but I assure you that I am not afraid to consider it. I am free to consider it and talk about it and accept it or discard it or whatever. I'm not enslaved by any so-called 'holy book' or any other dogma.
I feel that people should get credit where credit is due but I'm not impressed by so-called 'authority'. For example, if any scientific inference or theory, and the person(s) who first proposed it or continue to promote it, were shown (with solid evidence) to be wrong, I could and would accept that the inference or theory was wrong, no matter who had been saying that it was right. And even if an inference or theory hasn't been shown to be wrong, I only accept it as far as it has been shown to be right.
When it comes to a 'creator', it wouldn't bother me at all if it were found that there is one (or more). I'm certain that none of the so-called 'Gods' that have ever been imagined, believed in, worshiped, and promoted or forced on people are real. They're all fictitious. I'm not certain that there is no 'creator(s)' of any kind. However, I don't see any reason to accept or believe that there is a 'creator' or 'creators' unless and until solid evidence shows that there is one (or more). Religious fantasies are not solid evidence of any 'creator(s)'.
As I said Chris, it's in the context of people that have not been reached by the gospel.
Andy,
The problem is your interpretation of Romans is diametrically opposed to the doctrines of Christianity. No Christian sect out there says if you are good but haven't been "reached by the gospel" that you are going to heaven anyway. They all teach that accepting Jesus as your personal savior is necessary for salvation. Otherwise he becomes sort of pointless, doesn't he? Just the good people go to heaven regardless of their religious beliefs. In fact, by this calculus, it would be better off to not be reached by the gospel and just be a good person. If you hear the gospel and don't reject your former belief system for Jesus, you are toast, no matter how good you are. It's just a liability to be reached by the gospel. And in this day and age, how many people can really claim to not be aware of christianity and it;'s claims that Jesus is the savior of all humans. Billions of good people simply reject Jesus in favor of the belief system they were born into. What happens to them?
Chris, Bill Craig holds this view. I consider him to be fairly mainstream Evangelical. To quote him directly: "This objection is, however, fallacious, because it assumes that those who have never heard about Christ are judged on the same basis as those who have. But the Bible says that the unreached will be judged on a quite different basis than those who have heard the gospel. God will judge the unreached on the basis of their response to His self-revelation in nature and conscience. The Bible says that from the created order alone, all persons can know that a Creator God exists and that God has implanted His moral law in the hearts of all persons so that they are held morally accountable to God (Rom. 1.20; 2.14-15). The Bible promises salvation to anyone who responds affirmatively to this self-revelation of God (Rom. 2.7). Now this does not mean that they can be saved apart from Christ. Rather it means that the benefits of Christ's sacrifice can be applied to them without their conscious knowledge of Christ."
Andy,
Craig has many interesting interpretations of biblical passages, although as an apologist he often makes internally inconsistent and illogical arguments (based on artfully 'common sense' premises). This is because of the constant need for Christian apologists to scour the bible for passages to fit their ad hoc rationalizations for doctrines that today seem very unpalatable, like god consigning huge swaths of humanity to eternal torment because they didn't hear about Jesus. This view of course, was widely held throughout Christianity, and is still the prevailing view for many. For centuries no one seemed to have a problem with it, despite access to Romans. This is the problem with selectively quoting the bible: you can use it to rationalize almost anything. This is no basis for a universal system of morality.
Chris, so you claim to understand my religion better than I do, better than evangelical apologists in general and definitely better than the doctrines of the Catholic Church that has stood the test of millennia...you don't think that's just a tad conceited?
Andy,
I was raised Catholic through the 12th grade and Christian for 45 years. But I don't claim to know the inner workings of people's minds; arguments from authority are invalid. If you have a problem with my statements, provide a counter argument. This has nothing to do with being conceited.
However, I think we were just about at our impasse in the conversation. I think we just demonstrated Dr. Moran's point in his original post again, after over 235 comments in this thread.
Chris said: "arguments from authority are invalid. If you have a problem with my statements, provide a counter argument."
Hmmm, are we even in the same discussion? It seams to me that I come with counter arguments and you turn them down with argument from authority, eg "your interpretation of Romans is diametrically opposed to the doctrines of Christianity" and when it turns out that I could show that it's a mainstream Evangelical view with a quote from Bill Craig your response was "as an apologist he often makes internally inconsistent and illogical arguments".
In any case we can agree that the discussion isn't leading any where, so I guess I sign off for now.
I consider him [Craig] to be fairly mainstream Evangelical.
Hey Andy,
How about that, so do I, if you consider the typical mainstream Evangelical to be someone who defends genocide and infanticide in the Old Testament.
Well, Andy, it's abundantly clear that you are unwilling to see outside of your enslaving religious beliefs. For as long as you choose to be a dummy for an imaginary ventriloquist, you won't be 'free'.
QED
Andy,
Forgive me if I don't believe without evidence that you are accurately characterizing your sources. But I do see you are slowly backing away. You started with a claim that the crusades prevented the muslim conquest of Europe, dropped back to one that they were purely a defensive fight, and have now dropped the "purely" part of it. I expect that in a few more rounds you may get to a claim that's actually true.
OK, at least you have quoted from an actual source. But the source makes little sense. The original appeal was for help against the Seljuqs in Anatolia, where the Byantines were in fact currently under pressure. But even the first crusade turned quickly into a fight for Jerusalem, which had been lost hundreds of years before and had nothing to do with the Seljuqs. I'm willing to agree that the initial appeal was for defense. That went away quickly.
So can you support the claim that the crusades saved Europe from conquest?
John, I know you don't like checking facts yourself, instead you try to get the opponent to serve it up for you and then you will try to discredit the answer. So now instead I will ask you to check some facts.
How much of the Christian world fell in the hands of Muslim invaders? How has their conquest affected what is today seen as part of Europe? What Central European capital was under siege by the Muslims? What percentage of the Middle Eastern population was still Christian at the time of the Crusades?
I guess that will keep you busy a little while. When you have checked the answers, then we can compare facts.
Andy,
The real question would be what any of your questions have to do with your claims. And the answer to that would be "nothing". I presume you're talking about Vienna, the last siege of which was in 1683. Nothing to do with any of the crusades. Same with the other questions. Would you like to support your claims with something?
But I do find one of them interesting. Are you claiming that parts of what is now thought of as Asia were once considered part of Europe? I didn't know that and I'd love to see it documented.
The Jehovah’s Witness church has a long and well documented history of murdering their children by denying them life saving blood transfusions, sexually abusing their children and covering up the crime and aiding and abetting the perpetrators allowing them to continue raping children, anti-semitism and colluding with the Nazi regime prior to World War 2.
I'm sure that at the individual level JWs run the gamut of human behaviour, as your personal and anecdotal observations demonstrate.
I am not claiming that JWs are the only religion that allows their children to be abused nor am I saying that this sort of child abuse is only practiced within religious organizations.
However given the special and most certainly undeserved and unearned exemption to criticism that has been granted to religious organizations this sort of disgusting behaviour on the part of the religious is hard to detect and stop.
And really, if you have trouble believing that JWs would tolerate child molesters while kicking out drunks I suggest you read a few of Newbies recent posts.
That should clear things up for you.
John, as I explained earlier the first crusade was called in response to the Seljuq Turks victory at Battle of Manzikert. The last crusade ended with the Battle of Varna in 1444, which was a decisive victory for the Ottoman Turks. The crusaders withdrawal led to the fall of Constantinople in 1453. From there follows continued Ottoman Expansion and European resistance culminating with the siege of Vienna 1529 which was the pinnacle of Ottoman power and expansion in Europe.
Have you ever reflected on that there is no naturally defined Borders for Europe? Have you ever wondered why Cyprus located south of Anatolia is a part of Europe?
Take some time to think about this and the other questions that I gave you.
It's a shame that the Moors didn't conquer France and take control of Western Europe. They were so much more enlightened than the Christians of that era. At one point (about 1000 BC) Córdoba was the cultural capital of Europe.
Well Larry I will save that battle to another time. Nice architecture though, and Andalusia is one of my favorite places in the world.
Larry, you mean 1000 AD of course...or maybe you prefer AH 400?
Larry, you mean 1000 AD of course ...
Yes. I keep getting confused about when the imaginary god was born. :-)
Well Larry I will save that battle to another time.
Very wise of you.
Andy, Andy, Andy. You persist in providing irrelevancies without defending your claims. Is Cyprus part of Europe? Not that I know of. Last I heard it was an island in the Mediterranean. If the Crusaders were trying to defend Constantinople, why did they capture, sack, and rule it for quite some time? Why did they on occasion ally with the Turks against the Byzantines (or Byzantines ally with the Turks against the Venetians)? Why did they spend so much time fighting over Palestine and Edessa? You're cherry-picking history to fit your preconceptions.
So, can you support your claims that the crusades were purely defensive and that they prevented the muslim conquest of Europe?
To avoid confusion I suggest 1000 BFSM (before the Flying Spaghetti Monster).
May you be Touched by His Noodly Appendage.
Ramen.
John said: "So, can you support your claims that the crusades were purely defensive and that they prevented the muslim conquest of Europe?"
Yes I can, but obviously not in a way that gets through to you. If you want to learn more, see the big picture and not just the individual battles, then I suggest you read the books of any of the two scholars I named above.
So Cyprus is not in Europe? So how did the get in to the Union? The geographic definition of Europe is vague, the real connection is culture and history, which brings me back to my original claim.
Now I will leave this discussion, I'm reading up on Japan in preparation of my trip there in the end of the month.
Andy,
So you can't actually support your claim. Perhaps it requires other ways of knowing?
Sure, the First Crusade began as a response to the Byzantine appeal a few years after the Battle of Manzikert. But it quickly changed to something entirely different. Cherry-picking again. No, Cyprus is not in Europe, and membership in the EU is not the same thing. And "Read a book" is the last refuge of those who can't support their claims.
So Andy,
You don't deny that the crusades were actually religious wars. Do you?
John, I have given you a direct quote from Thomas Madden. I have drawn up the the greater picture of the crusades from "The Crusades, Christianity, and Islam" written by the Jonathan Riley-Smith. You on your side come at best with totally unsubstantiated claims and anecdotal stories most likely based on Hollywood movies.
You top it of by discarding the European Unions definition of Europe, because you know better.
It's not so much about having different opinions, but it's hard to discuss with someone so totally lacking intellectual honesty.
Johnny,
I could go along with it being a religious war, probably more so than any other war in European history. Still when you get down into the details, there is so much else going on. I wouldn't go as far as many people at the time though, calling it a Holy War. Interestingly Marthin Luther actually thought the Islamic expansion to be just punishment of the Catholic and Orthodox churches for disobeying God. He changed his mind when the Turks were approaching Vienna and then argued for secular war against the Turks.
Andy,
Your boy Madden would seem to be a Catholic apologist. Perhaps he, not you, is the cherry-picker. Apparently it's a defensive war if you attack the muslims in any place that Christians used to rule, no matter how long ago. Good luck with that.
What makes you think there is such a thing as an EU definition of Europe? Hey, I suppose that since Turkey belongs to NATO, it must be located in the North Atlantic, right?
And I haven't seen any attempt to defend your notion that without the crusades Europe would have been conquered by muslims. The fact that the Turks besieged Vienna (twice) has no apparent connections to the crusades. Face it. You can't argue biology, you can't argue theology, and you can't argue history.
John wrote: "Your boy Madden would seem to be a Catholic apologist"
Well it *seems* to me that if you wrote the entry on Crusades in Encyclopaedia Britannica then you are considered an expert.
The name of the North Atlantic Treaty refers to where the treaty is valid, north of the Tropic of Cancer. If say Belgium Congo had been attacked it would mean that NATO did not have any obligations in assisting Belgium there, i.e. it's a false analogy with the EU. Has nobody told you that when you are in a hole -stop digging!
John wrote: "I haven't seen any attempt to defend your notion that without the crusades Europe would have been conquered by muslims."
The expression "Not seeing the forest for the trees" comes to mind.
John said: "Apparently it's a defensive war if you attack the muslims in any place that Christians used to rule, no matter how long ago."
Show me where I have said anything coming close to that.
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