Mother Theresa died an atheist

[Icthus]

MAGsolo, since you made the statement, prove :

Evil and Suffering are irreconcilable with a Christian worldview.

Christian worldview involves believing in a God that is good/benevolent, omnipresent, and all powerful. If God is good/benevolent, he would despise evil and seek to prevent it. If God was all powerful, he would prevent evil. A good/benevolent and all powerful God is not reconcilable with a world where abject suffering and evil are prevalent and have always been prevalent. Therefore evil and suffering are not reconcilable with a Christian worldview. One cannot be capable of stopping/preventing evil, consciously choose not to do so, and still be considered good. So God is either not good, not all powerful, or he doesnt exist.

This sounds a lot like the logical problem of evil. No philosophers that I know of still defend it, preferring instead to argue for a probabilistic argument instead. The reason is that even the possibility of God having sufficient reason to allow evil is enough to shatter the logical argument. This is an overly simplistic objection.

[Byblos]

MAGsolo, since you made the statement, prove :

Evil and Suffering are irreconcilable with a Christian worldview.

Christian worldview involves believing in a God that is good/benevolent, omnipresent, and all powerful. If God is good/benevolent, he would despise evil and seek to prevent it. If God was all powerful, he would prevent evil. A good/benevolent and all powerful God is not reconcilable with a world where abject suffering and evil are prevalent and have always been prevalent. Therefore evil and suffering are not reconcilable with a Christian worldview. One cannot be capable of stopping/preventing evil, consciously choose not to do so, and still be considered good. So God is either not good, not all powerful, or he doesnt exist.

Seriously? We're back on this subject with you again?

[PaulSacramento]

MAGsolo, since you made the statement, prove :

Evil and Suffering are irreconcilable with a Christian worldview.

Christian worldview involves believing in a God that is good/benevolent, omnipresent, and all powerful. If God is good/benevolent, he would despise evil and seek to prevent it. If God was all powerful, he would prevent evil. A good/benevolent and all powerful God is not reconcilable with a world where abject suffering and evil are prevalent and have always been prevalent. Therefore evil and suffering are not reconcilable with a Christian worldview. One cannot be capable of stopping/preventing evil, consciously choose not to do so, and still be considered good. So God is either not good, not all powerful, or he doesnt exist.

To echo others, this view has been discredited quite a bit.
In its simplest critique we have the fact that Good CAN come out of an evil act and base don that alone, God may have sufficient reason to allow evil.
Then there is the doctrinal evidence that states suffering and evil are to be EXPECTED in this world as a result of free will and man's fallen nature and God's will NOT to force man into obedience and worship of Him.
There are many other answers to this "issue" but in short the fallacy in that argument is that it presupposes the evil and good can exist without each other to define each other.

[Danieltwotwenty]

MAGsolo, since you made the statement, prove :

Evil and Suffering are irreconcilable with a Christian worldview.

Christian worldview involves believing in a God that is good/benevolent, omnipresent, and all powerful. If God is good/benevolent, he would despise evil and seek to prevent it. If God was all powerful, he would prevent evil. A good/benevolent and all powerful God is not reconcilable with a world where abject suffering and evil are prevalent and have always been prevalent. Therefore evil and suffering are not reconcilable with a Christian worldview. One cannot be capable of stopping/preventing evil, consciously choose not to do so, and still be considered good. So God is either not good, not all powerful, or he doesnt exist.

How many times must you be told, God is NOT responsible for the suffering in this world, WE are, stop trying to shift blame from yourself and the rest of humanity.

We made this mess through our own will and volition.

If God prevented evil, there would be no freewill, no thought, no you.

Dan

[jlay]

MAGsolo, since you made the statement, prove :

Evil and Suffering are irreconcilable with a Christian worldview.

Christian worldview involves believing in a God that is good/benevolent, omnipresent, and all powerful. If God is good/benevolent, he would despise evil and seek to prevent it. If God was all powerful, he would prevent evil. A good/benevolent and all powerful God is not reconcilable with a world where abject suffering and evil are prevalent and have always been prevalent. Therefore evil and suffering are not reconcilable with a Christian worldview. One cannot be capable of stopping/preventing evil, consciously choose not to do so, and still be considered good. So God is either not good, not all powerful, or he doesnt exist.

Says who? You.
Also, define evil, conditioned on benevolent God not existing.
The reality is what you state is exactly the opposite. Apart from a transcendant, benevolent God, there is no way to define "evil" in the sense you are using it.

So God is either not good, not all powerful, or he doesnt exist.

Or there is another option you refuse to consider, and thus you are wrong.

[Furstentum Liechtenstein]

This topic on Mother Teresa being an atheist is just toooo stupid, so I won't even address it.

Anyway, I was in a Walmart Superstore today (in the USA) and noticed that TIME has a a magazine out that is a pictorial biography of Mother Teresa. There is also quite a lot of copy in the magazine as well. The price is $12.99. I didn't buy it today but I think it would make a nice gift.

FL

[bippy123]

the article said she died with her doubts, had stopped praying and all that. Her doubts seemed pretty severe so if not a complete atheist, she was agnostic.

Says who? You, an atheist?

Im not an atheist

She was neither an agnostic or an atheist. She went through what the mystics call the dark night of the soul, and the article is typical of pro secular misrepresentations of what she went through.
Throughout her dark night she never stopped praying at all.

If magsolo is an atheist it's no wonder why he doesn't understand the dark night of the soul, but some of the greatest saints in Christian history went through this test . In the bible it specifically says not to trust your feelings when it comes to your faith. Mother Teresa did not either. It's amazing that she was being tested this way and still Desired to please God every second of her life and this is why she is considered a saint by millions.
Faith is a call to action, trusting God even in complete darkness.

She was as far away from being an unbeliever as you can get. In fact she was the complete opposite, and from what I heard she had passed through the dark night before she died. Most of the Christian saints went through it for 2 to 8 years but Mother Teresa went through it for almost 60 years, yet God sustained her work even with the agony she had. Been suffering with. I applaud the catholic church for releasing her diary as it helped many others who also went through this dark night.

[bippy123]

This topic on Mother Teresa being an atheist is just toooo stupid, so I won't even address it.



FL

I agree totally furstentum, it is total ignorance. To me she had an advanced faith that could move mountains.

[ultimate777]

At best she was strongly agnostic, but I think this shows just how strong the problem of evil and suffering are when you are face to face with it on a daily basis for years. Evil and Suffering are irreconcilable with a Christian worldview.
http://www.cbsnews.com/2100-18563_162-3199062.html

Linkie no workie.

Linkie workie for me.

[narnia4]

When I make claims, especially controversial claims, I try to research everything thoroughly. The idea that Mother Theresa died an atheist is pure conjecture without support, and in fact the evidence is strongly against it. What's called the "dark night of the soul" as bippy mentioned, is what many believe was happening with her throughout much of her life.

You also have to assume that the Catholic Church is made up of nothing but hypocrites who want to cover up and construct a Saint. I think rational people know better and understand that there's been thorough, honest investigations into all of this. If Catholics who have investigated the matter much more than the media at large or myself thought that Theresa was an atheist, would she be on the road to Sainthood? Catholics take Canonization seriously, you'd think skeptics would grant them that.

So all in all, I don't think there's a leg to stand on with this particular claim.

[bippy123]

When I make claims, especially controversial claims, I try to research everything thoroughly. The idea that Mother Theresa died an atheist is pure conjecture without support, and in fact the evidence is strongly against it. What's called the "dark night of the soul" as bippy mentioned, is what many believe was happening with her throughout much of her life.

You also have to assume that the Catholic Church is made up of nothing but hypocrites who want to cover up and construct a Saint. I think rational people know better and understand that there's been thorough, honest investigations into all of this. If Catholics who have investigated the matter much more than the media at large or myself thought that Theresa was an atheist, would she be on the road to Sainthood? Catholics take Canonization seriously, you'd think skeptics would grant them that.

So all in all, I don't think there's a leg to stand on with this particular claim.

Exactly Narnia, but then again skeptics like Mag will see what they want to see, and if they did a bit of research they would have known that Mother Teresa had a spiritual advisor and always participated in the eucharist and was obedient till the end, and never ceased in Praying. The dark night of the soul was one of the reasons why the church wants to canonize her, not in spite of it.

[MAGSolo]

the article said she died with her doubts, had stopped praying and all that. Her doubts seemed pretty severe so if not a complete atheist, she was agnostic.

Says who? You, an atheist?

Im not an atheist

She was neither an agnostic or an atheist. She went through what the mystics call the dark night of the soul, and the article is typical of pro secular misrepresentations of what she went through.
Throughout her dark night she never stopped praying at all.

If magsolo is an atheist it's no wonder why he doesn't understand the dark night of the soul, but some of the greatest saints in Christian history went through this test . In the bible it specifically says not to trust your feelings when it comes to your faith. Mother Teresa did not either. It's amazing that she was being tested this way and still Desired to please God every second of her life and this is why she is considered a saint by millions.
Faith is a call to action, trusting God even in complete darkness.

She was as far away from being an unbeliever as you can get. In fact she was the complete opposite, and from what I heard she had passed through the dark night before she died. Most of the Christian saints went through it for 2 to 8 years but Mother Teresa went through it for almost 60 years, yet God sustained her work even with the agony she had. Been suffering with. I applaud the catholic church for releasing her diary as it helped many others who also went through this dark night.

Wrong, she admitted herself that she stopped praying. Please stop making stuff up.

[MAGSolo]

When I make claims, especially controversial claims, I try to research everything thoroughly. The idea that Mother Theresa died an atheist is pure conjecture without support, and in fact the evidence is strongly against it. What's called the "dark night of the soul" as bippy mentioned, is what many believe was happening with her throughout much of her life.

You also have to assume that the Catholic Church is made up of nothing but hypocrites who want to cover up and construct a Saint. I think rational people know better and understand that there's been thorough, honest investigations into all of this. If Catholics who have investigated the matter much more than the media at large or myself thought that Theresa was an atheist, would she be on the road to Sainthood? Catholics take Canonization seriously, you'd think skeptics would grant them that.

So all in all, I don't think there's a leg to stand on with this particular claim.

It doesnt really matter what people "believe" she was going through when she explained in her letters precisely what she was going through; a loss of faith. You clearly just have no idea what you are talking about

Jesus has a very special love for you. [But] as for me — The silence and the emptiness is so great — that I look and do not see, — Listen and do not hear.

Darkness is such that I really do not see-neither with my mind nor with my reason-the place of God in my soul is blank-There is no God in me

[Philip]

Christian worldview involves believing in a God that is good/benevolent, omnipresent, and all powerful. If God is good/benevolent, he would despise evil and seek to prevent it. If God was all powerful, he would prevent evil. A good/benevolent and all powerful God is not reconcilable with a world where abject suffering and evil are prevalent and have always been prevalent. Therefore evil and suffering are not reconcilable with a Christian worldview. One cannot be capable of stopping/preventing evil, consciously choose not to do so, and still be considered good. So God is either not good, not all powerful, or he doesnt exist.

This is a false view shared by many atheists and agnostics. And most key is that they view actions of evil only within the context of what is happening now, in the short term, and not in terms of what God's ultimate and eternal objectives are. In God's plan, evil is temporary, often is used a tool for good, will be punished, and will one day will be carried out no more. And as we are finite beings, many of God's purposes are not currently knowable or understandable.

[tinaruiz]

I dont think mother theresa is agnostic.I think shes just confused about her feelings.maybe she wants a feeling that is more defined literally.shes not aware that by helping the poor,subconsciously means how she loves God.since mother theresa are sorrounded by people who suffers it might trigger some form of depression on her part.(reason for being negative)Its so depressing to see people suffers.It happens to me I question my faith.Im not contented of the way I feel.I want to feel something more ,that I cannot really explain what kind of faith I want to achieve,I expalined this to my Pdoc 3 yrs ago she told me that even priests cannot feel the faith Im talking about.I think faith is complex.Its like asking what really happiness and love means.but onething Im sure: with all complexity of life at the end all points to God.I believe there are no atheist in the foxhole.