God suffers with those who suffer

By the way, Pamsm,

Keep up the insults. Just shows that you can debate on a forum without losing your cool.

You should spend some time with Christians so you won't loathe them so much. The internet tells people nothing about who others are. Only person to person , face to face works.

Oh, I am sure that there are some atheists that help others. But not in mass and not at the level that Christians and other "religionists" do. They just don't have the wherewithal to do it, and are more interested in finding hypocrisy in Christians and others that believe in God.

Atheism is akin to selfishness and elitism , especially those that are radical like Dawkins, Hitchens and Harris. You just don't hear much about atheist organizations doing that sort of thing- helping poor people etc. I think really this is due to the chip on their shoulders and primary reason to organize to whine and complain about people who believe. From the websites I have looked over that is what I see.

Christians do alot of work to help others, and their reason for doing so is that they are commanded and asked to love others like themselves, and to love God first. It is ultimately impossible to love others and your self to the highest degree without this love for God.

Pamsm, no problem. You are under no obligation to read my thoughts on the matter. I will be continuing to respond to the "on faith" issues as well as other issues here:
http://www.examiner.com/x-8928-Philadelphia-Atheism-Examiner

You can choose to read it or not.
-Staks
http://www.DangerousTalk.net

Hello Counterww,

I have to second Pamsm here, in reaction to your lovely and utterly biased and prejudiced statement:

"You don't see atheists do anything to help mankind, but you always see Christians at the forefront helping people(Haiti)."

That is a lie and you should know it.

I am aware that Christian organizations are often at the forefront, or among the frontrunners, (at least conceptually if not in fact), of humanitarian efforts in times of (God Caused?) crisis and need. But we see many secular organizations, some of which Pamsm noted, also in the first column going in to help.

Christians do much good when it comes to reaching out a helping hand to those in need, and often have ongoing efforts at home and inside their own congregations, and that by itself is a blessed thing. If only that was all that Christians intended in the offering. But beyond the Christian axiom of offering charity to those in need is the deeper drive for witnessing and conversion. Ahhh, ulterior motive? Get 'em while they are down, raise 'em up to the True Faith! God is Great! Allahu akbar!

Whoops, I done crossed faiths!

You will not see the Marines of National Guard converting hurricane victims to sign up. You will not see that from the Red Cross or UN.

You will from Evangelists. And the corresponding Muslim charity organizations. Such people are not content to give out a free meal. That meal may not be free, but comes at a cost.

Please consider your statements of the valuelessness of secularists and secular organizations prior to publishing, lest your very real Christian arrogance, (of how damn good you are!), shines through the silver lining of the cloud you are on.

If you want to spout, go for it, but it means nothing if you can't see the FACT that Christians go out and help the poor, the down trodden, and those that are in real trouble. Atheists don't do that but complain and whine about what God did in the OT.

It is just an excuse not to admit your sin.

Pamsm,

Nice post to Calsailor, and to the point. I agree. For all the horrors that we have had over the last 40 or 50 years, and there have been plenty that the mind would like to wipe away, we are far better off than past centuries in terms of human atrocities toward other humans. It is horrid to contemplate what forms of torture and mistreatment was afforded foreigners to the perpetrators. We have made these advances for the liberalization of societal and governmental processes and systems.

We are far from universal human dignity as a standard, not to mention human interactive dignity to the animal, plant and mineral kingdoms. Aside of your current age examples are Khmer Rouge, the Congo genocides of Hutus and Tutsis, Croatian genocides and others in the last 40 years. More deaths may occur as population is far beyond what it was in 400 AD. But civilization is far beyond that as well.

Perhaps population is the greatest threat for further human atrocities than it ever was...

Tribalism vs. universalism may be the battleground to find whirled peas.

Dangeroustalk,
If you have something to say, say it. I'm not following you to some Web page.

Calsailor says:
"Unfortunately, man's inhumanity to man has increased through the centuries..."

I hear this all the time from you religious people, and yet it never fails to astonish me. It is absolutely unsupportable!

You had barely finished writing about the way that criminals were punished in the Roman empire - crucifixion, and you followed it by noting that only a few countries now have the death penalty, and that we administer it as humanely as possible... so how does this fit?

Remember that in most Middle Eastern countries (including Israel/Judea) of biblical times, stoning people to death for religious and other transgressions was quite popular. Remember, too, that slavery was practiced to an almost unimaginable extent (I've read that 2/3 of people in the Roman empire were slaves). Slavery was approved throughout the bible - neither testament had anything bad to say about it.

God instructed "his people" to slay everyone and everything (animals, too) in the cities they attacked - dashing the brains out of children, and ripping open pregnant women.

And in later times, too - wars were fought with brutal weapons, and people were tortured in horrible ways and burned at the stake. There were no child labor laws, and children were often maimed to make them more pathetic beggars.

Is everything sweetness and light now? No, but given a choice of a century to live in, I'll take this one over all previous. And it's not religion that has brought on the improvements!

Admittedly, the philosophical problem of evil was the catalyst for my break from religion. However, as I learned more about the Abrahamic religions, I started to dismiss the problem of evil in favor of more compelling arguments.

However, after listening to Christians attempt to respond to the problem of evil, their responses seem incomplete at best and quite possibly just plain silly. As such, I have gained a new found respect for the problem of evil.

You can read the rest of my response to this topic: http://lnk.ms/5VVDW

I will be responding to every issue posted in the 'On Faith' section. If you would like to be notified when my new response is up, please subscribe.

Cal Sailor,

Re: Your post

I think when culturally Christian atheists quote Tanakh, "out of context," in English mistranslation, from Greek mistranslation, the original Hebrew, to further their argument Jews have the right, indeed, the obligation, to respond.

And as Pamsm said in reference to Tanakh, the NT says what is says. (Btw., a log of gnashing of teeth in those pages. Guess night guards hadn't been invented yet.)

INteresting that you mention Martin LUther. Would that be the Martin LUther who penned "The Jews and Their Lies?"
Would that be the Martin Luther so beloved by antisemities here and abroad, the darling of Hitler and the Nazis?

I'm just askin'.

If culturally Christian atheists want to use the NT to argue against a virulent God, one who believed that Adam and Eve (LOL) had committed a sin so grave that it could not be forgiven except by deicide at the hands of human, sobeit.

If they want to say that insodoing they created a nightmare psychoGod, who legitimized human sacrifice, which Christians, since Constantine have practiced. That would be the human sacrifice that was to end forever with the Binding.

When cultural Christians, scared as was Volataire (as is Dawkins and crew, fear to take on the NT, and instead attack another people's sacred text, a people that the Christians, atheist and observant, have periodically mass murdered, genocided, and whom they continue to abuse, those people have the right, are obligated to respond.

Central:

The issue of suffering is one of the paradoxes of Christian theology, and indeed, of all religious faith. For Christians, a crude way of stating the problem is to say "If God is good he can't be God; if God is God, he can't be good."

In my meditation and study over the years, I conclude that there is a paradox here. I believe and testify that God IS all powerful (omnipotent). But, when he created humanity, he gave us freedom of will. And in that freedom is the possibility of doing evil. I believe that the story of God's revelation is that he has chosen to honor our freedom, and that, as a consequence, evil and disaster exist. It is into that, and for that reason, that he sent his Son, that he might know the experience of our lives. And so, as we deal with death and sorrow, I find it more comforting to understand that God has allowed me to experience the highs and lows, but that he knows the lows, and he does not forsake us. Indeed, as a parish pastor, I learned that there were any number of members who could lead people in worship--some could probably preach better than I could--but that the real gift of the congregation to me, and my true calling was to walk with my members through death and tragedy. It was my privilege to be able to be with people in suffering...to shed tears with them, and to testify with them in the words of Elie Wiesel: "I believe" (Ani Ma'amin)...no matter what. I believe.

I would recommend Dietrich Bonhoeffer's poem "Who Am I" to anyone interested...it is one of the most powerful statements of faith from this young pastor condemned to death in HItler's Germany.
http://www.cbn.com/spirituallife/devotions/Dietrich_Bonheoffer_Who_Am_I.aspx

Pr Chris

Reply to Counterww

While I believe as a Christian that the ultimate understanding of the Hebrew Bible is found in the Christian Bible, I respect that the Jewish faith does not feel the need to do so; there is plenty of "gospel" in the Hebrew Bible. One cannot say that the Hebrew Bible is of condemnation, and the Christian Bible that of redemption, there is both in both parts.

However, I do take objection to your blanket statement that atheists do not reach out to help others. There are many who are either atheist or agnostic who find the plight of other humans, and of the creation, to motivate them to the same sorts of heroic work to help those in need. While I find my faith as a tremendous reason for giving to help others, I know atheists who are shoulder to shoulder with me in the effort to effectively redeem the world. Their motivation comes from a different calculus, but the need to be part of the solution is very real. Morality does not only come from religion. It also comes from humanity.

Pr Chris

Farnaz:

You can quote a number of verses to prove your point. Most of your quotes are out of their context (which helps understand the intent with which we are to take it; some were parables, designed to be taken as a single important point, and sometimes the "lesson" is not contiguous with the text. [the parables in the first half of Matt 13 are interpreted later in the chapter.] Some verses are deliberately intended to be impossible to meet [the Sermon on the Mount]. Lutherans call these verses "law", by which Martin Luther meant, those things which serve to show us our sins and failures and thus drive us to the "gospel", the good news of what God has done for us in Jesus. Until people are convinced that they cannot "by their own reason or strength [or will]" to do it themselves, they are not open to the radical freedom of the gospel.

I am not trying to say that these verses don't exist; they are part of our scriptures. Whether any of these are part of the "historical Jesus" or are artifacts of the early church, the fact remains that they are part of the written gospels. Those gospels, being theological documents and not biographical narratives, are the witness of the early church in the congregations to which they were addressed. Yes, they require thought and understanding, and yes, some of them are troubling.

I think this list is a good reason for Christians to not throw stones at Muslims for what appears in the Qu'ran...we have enough of our own proof-texting to deal with.

Pr Chris

Calsailor: "The verses you cite are from the legal codes; as such they are among the harshest in scripture. Like any legal code, they stress the maximum punishment in order to deter."
Ummmm...I don't recall seeing any minimum punishments listed... I believe that our legal codes do that.

The Hebrew codes as listed in the Hebrew Bible typically list the worst punishment. But over the history of the Hebrew Bible, we see a deliberate growth away from what some believe is "an eye for an eye" (which was initially a limiting factor...in that one was not entitled, upon losing an eye, to destroy the villagers of the person who caused it. They could only do equivalent damage. That was soon transformed into financial settlement in the codes. And then, the final development--within Scriptures themselves--where the legal sanctions are specifically and radically reinterpreted by the New Moses: You have heard it said that whoever commits murder shall be liable...but I say to you, whoever is angry with a brother...shall be liable to judgment"

Calsailor: "And so, he sent his Son, not to be a military general, but to be a victim of the worst the world can offer: crucifixion and death.

Do you honestly think that crucifixion is the "worst the world has to offer"?? There are many worse ways to suffer and die - and Christians have come up with quite a few of them (read about the Inquisition, and burning at the stake). And, I should remind you, that he supposedly didn't stay dead. BFD.

At the time of Jesus' crucifixion, a legal citizen of Rome could not be crucified. That fate was only for non-citizens. By today's standards, it is not the most brutal, but by the standards of Jesus' time, it was a common, and, properly done, slow agony of suffocation and starvation/dehydration. Crucifixions could go on for days, as the one being crucified was kept alive (the purpose of the footrest, that allowed one to gasp for a little more air, and so prolong death, and the background of the sour wine offered Jesus on the cross.) to suffer as long as possible. It was one of the most barbaric. I don't know how you'd compare the death of Jesus with the deaths of martyrs thrown to lions, but either one is not something I'd care to experience.

Unfortunately, man's inhumanity to man has increased through the centuries, and we have the paradox in this country that we enforce the death penalty more frequently than only a very few unsavory countries... and yet generally use lethal injection as a form, in order that we might not be inhumane while taking a life.

Pr Chris

"My heart is broken for the people of Haiti, and my prayers go out to all who are suffering."

That and $3.50 will get you a small latte. Do you believe that your prayers are helping the people of Haiti?

"God is suffering in the midst of the evil with those who are suffering."

How does thinking God is also suffering change your reactions and actions to others' suffering? Do you think it matters to the suffering? That is, are Haitians at least soothed by thinking God is also suffering?

Atheists don't help out? http://newsweek.washingtonpost.com/onfaith/panelists/elisabeth_cornwell/2010/01/helping_haiti_because_it_makes_us_feel_good.html

Calsailor: "The verses you cite are from the legal codes; as such they are among the harshest in scripture. Like any legal code, they stress the maximum punishment in order to deter."

Ummmm...I don't recall seeing any minimum punishments listed... I believe that our legal codes do that.

Calsailor: "And so, he sent his Son, not to be a military general, but to be a victim of the worst the world can offer: crucifixion and death.

Do you honestly think that crucifixion is the "worst the world has to offer"?? There are many worse ways to suffer and die - and Christians have come up with quite a few of them (read about the Inquisition, and burning at the stake). And, I should remind you, that he supposedly didn't stay dead. BFD.

This paragraph,

"You don't see atheists do anything to help mankind, but you always see Christians at the forefront helping people(Haiti)",

should have been attributed to CounterWW below.

CWW: "I believe you are mistaken..."

Those passages don't come from the bible? Sorry - it's you who's mistaken.

CWW: "...and I believe that the any person that looks at the Old Testament without regarding the totality of the Bible..."

What a load of crap, Counter. It says what it says. Either your God did and said those things, or he didn't. Which is it?
And I hardly find the NT any better, with its threats to throw people into a lake of fire, and God killing his son (himself?) on the cross so that he can forgive people for their sins. Huh? Why not just forgive them?? Especially since he created them with their "sinful" natures.

You don't see atheists do anything to help mankind, but you always see Christians at the forefront helping people(Haiti).

Oh, give me a break, you arrogant ass!

Last I heard, the US Marines, the National Guard, volunteer search & rescue teams, the Red Cross, and Project Hope were thoroughly secular institutions.

I have personally donated to Project Hope, and to a fund established by the company I work for - a company made up of people of many different faiths, and no faith at all.

Just because there's not a charitable organization with the word "atheist" in its title, doesn't mean that atheists don't care, or give.

CWW: "It is just an excuse not to admit your sin."

Hard to "admit" to a concept you don't believe in. I feel very sorry for all you Christians who are so filled with self-loathing. Must be a terrible way to live.

Is God suffering in Haiti? Is Zeus suffering in Haiti? Is the flying spaghetti monster suffering in Haiti? Such absurd questions on the suffering of non-entities.

Unless you talk to God on a regular basis then what you say is just another opinion. No worse or better than anyone else's.

The arguments, as to what part God plays in the affairs of Man, always tend to weaken themselves by omitting some obvious conclusions. If God suffers along with we humans, during terrible times, then God is not "all-powerful", else God would not permit such suffering. The other conclusion would be that God, being all-powerful, plays "board games" with humans, knowing full well the course of events and the final outcome. I have never heard any explanation of this puzzle.

Khote14:

The passages you quote are, first of all mistranslations from the Greek, which was mistranslated from the Hebrew. Frankly, I can never understand how the Christians read Tanakh, eg., taking the Psalms as personal prayers (LOL), or the passages you cite as a "divine threat."

That said, the NT is far more relevant to Robertson and his ilk. Discussion logically starts there. Here are some highlights from Matthew. Highlights from MLJ, etc., available upon request.

Matthew

# Those who bear bad fruit will be cut down and burned "with unquenchable fire." 3:10, 12

# Jesus recommends that to avoid sin we cut off our hands and pluck out our eyes. This advice is given immediately after he says that anyone who looks with lust at any women commits adultery. 5:29-30

# Jesus says that most people will go to hell. 7:13-14

# Those who fail to bear "good fruit" will be "hewn down, and cast into the fire." 7:19

# "The children of the kingdom [the Jews] shall be cast out into outer darkness: there shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth." 8:12

# Jesus tells a man who had just lost his father: "Let the dead bury the dead." 8:21

# Jesus sends some devils into a herd of pigs, causing them to run off a cliff and drown in the waters below. 8:32

# Cities that neither "receive" the disciples nor "hear" their words will be destroyed by God. 10:14-15

# Families will be torn apart because of Jesus (this is one of the few "prophecies" in the Bible that has actually come true). "Brother shall deliver up the brother to death, and the father the child: and the children shall rise up against their parents, and cause them to be put to death." 10:21

# Jesus says that we should fear God who is willing and "able to destroy both soul and body in hell." 10:28

# Jesus says that he has come to destroy families by making family members hate each other. He has "come not to send peace, but a sword." 10:34-36

# Jesus condemns entire cities to dreadful deaths and to the eternal torment of hell because they didn't care for his preaching. 11:20-24

# Jesus will send his angels to gather up "all that offend" and they "shall cast them into a furnace of fire: there shall be wailing and gnashing of teeth." 13:41-42, 50

# Jesus is criticized by the Pharisees for not washing his hands before eating. He defends himself by attacking them for not killing disobedient children. So, does Jesus think that children who curse their parents should be killed? It sure sounds like it. 15:4-7

CONTINUED:

# Jesus advises his followers to mutilate themselves by cutting off their hands and plucking out their eyes. He says it's better to be "maimed" than to suffer "everlasting fire." 18:8-9

# "And his lord was wroth, and delivered him to the tormentors." 18:34

# In the parable of the marriage feast, the king sends his servants to gather everyone they can find, both bad and good, to come to the wedding feast. One guest didn't have on his wedding garment, so the king tied him up and "cast him into the outer darkness" where "there shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth." 22:12-13

# Jesus had no problem with the idea of drowning everyone on earth in the flood. It'll be just like that when he returns. 24:37

# God will come when people least expect him and then he'll "cut them asunder." And "there shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth." 24:50-51

# The servant who kept and returned his master's talent was cast into the "outer darkness" where there will be "weeping and gnashing of teeth." 25:30

# Jesus tells us what he has planned for those that he dislikes. They will be cast into an "everlasting fire." 25:41

# Jesus says the damned will be tormented forever. 25:46

Yes, Pamsm, I have debated you before. I believe you are mistaken and I believe that the any person that looks at the Old Testament without regarding the totality of the Bible without Jesus and Paul's words just does not understand the Old Covenant versus the New one and wants to question God's every move.

You don't see atheists do anything to help mankind, but you always see Christians at the forefront helping people(Haiti).

If you want to spout, go for it, but it means nothing if you can't see the FACT that Christians go out and help the poor, the down trodden, and those that are in real trouble. Atheists don't do that but complain and whine about what God did in the OT.

It is just an excuse not to admit your sin.

You claim that "Pat Robertson is increasingly irrelevant" yet he has millions of followers. The 700 Club is makes a lot of money and it isn't because Pat Robertson is irrelevant or believe people don't agree with him. The sad fact is that millions of Christians agree with Pat Robertson.

Second, you claim that, "the God of the Bible, does not cause evil." Have you actually read the Bible Mr. Wallis? Isaiah 45:7 is just one verse which proves you are incorrect. There are many more. The fact is that the character of God as portrayed in the Bible is an evil tyrant who not only is the creator of evil, but has commended the genocide and murder of those who don't worship him.

Fortunately, your god (the God of the Bible) isn't real. If he were real, he would worship him anyway. I would fight to my last breath in opposition to such tyranny. You should be ashamed of yourself for not doing the same.
-Staks
http://www.DangerousTalk.net

Khote:

The verses you cite are from the legal codes; as such they are among the harshest in scripture. Like any legal code, they stress the maximum punishment in order to deter.

But Christians do not accept Leviticus as the final statement of God's relationship to us. The key text for us is the one that Jim Wallis knows: John 3:16...for God so loved the world that he sent his only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish. The key note to pick up in this text is that God's love comes BEFORE he sent his son. He loves the broken world that we have made of his wondrous creation (the current broken state of the world is the result of the ability to human beings to make choices; these choices have led to all sorts of evils in the world. They are the price of our humanity.) But through all of our evil actions, God still loves the world...and everything in it. And so, he sent his Son, not to be a military general, but to be a victim of the worst the world can offer: crucifixion and death. He KNOWS what it means that your beloved son dies at the hads of others...and yet, he didn't react in hatred but love.

So, quote all the "evilbible" texts you wish. I'll live my life according to John 3:16.

Pr Chris

"The God I serve, the God of the Bible, does not cause evil."

Yes, He does.

He created the universe and the earth in a form that inevitably causes immense suffering to all their inhabitants.

In law, a person is presumed to have intended the natural and probable consequence of his acts.

Suffering is a natural and probable consequence of the earth's having been created in the form that it has.

So God must be presumed to have intended that suffering.

Only someone that ignores the good Christians do on this earth would see things this way khote.

Apparently Pat Robertson did read his Bible, thoroughly too.

It appears that the good that Christians do in this world is in spite of their bible, rather than because of it. Perhaps they, like you Counterww, are ignorant, blissfully ignorant of the great evils perpetrated upon humanity by the god of your myths.

"Only someone that ignores the good Christians do on this earth would see things this way khote."

Gee, Counter, all he did was quote directly from your freakin' bible.

Pick it up and read it sometime - he barely touched on God's atrocities.

Only someone that ignores the good Christians do on this earth would see things this way khote.

You must be in misery to be so bitter.

http://www.evilbible.com/

If after this you still refuse to listen and still remain hostile toward me, then I will give full vent to my hostility. I will punish you seven times over for your sins. You will eat the flesh of your own sons and daughters. I will destroy your pagan shrines and cut down your incense altars. I will leave your corpses piled up beside your lifeless idols, and I will despise you. I will make your cities desolate and destroy your places of worship, and I will take no pleasure in your offerings of incense. Yes, I myself will devastate your land. Your enemies who come to occupy it will be utterly shocked at the destruction they see. I will scatter you among the nations and attack you with my own weapons. Your land will become desolate, and your cities will lie in ruins. Then at last the land will make up for its missed Sabbath years as it lies desolate during your years of exile in the land of your enemies. Then the land will finally rest and enjoy its Sabbaths. As the land lies in ruins, it will take the rest you never allowed it to take every seventh year while you lived in it. (Leviticus 26:27-35 NLT)

If even then you remain hostile toward me and refuse to obey, I will inflict you with seven more disasters for your sins. I will release wild animals that will kill your children and destroy your cattle, so your numbers will dwindle and your roads will be deserted. (Leviticus 26:21-22 NLT)

-----------

And so on, and so on. The god of your mythology is surely one of the most evil gods humanity has ever worshipped.

Your problem with Pat Robertson isn't that he gives chrisianity a bad name, he's giving it's the name it deserves.