Answering an atheist

[PaulSacramento]

You will correct me if I am mistaken, but I would assume that an all-knowing omniscient God is aware that there are 750 million people in the world that are undernourished and starving at this moment. He knows this. He knew this from the beginning.

Does our free will trump God's awesome power? Is this what we tell the woman who can't breast feed her starving baby because she is to emaciated due to her dying of starvation herself? All as she begs for God's help with prayer.

God would not be "eliminating ALL free will" if he would intervene a bit more often to avert that next hurricane or volcano and prevent unnecessary suffering.

I find it difficult to accept that the rapist's free will trumps the suffering of the rape victim.

People are starving NOT because God does nothing but because WE do nothing.
You are presenting what is know as the classical argument from suffering, the EMOTIONAL problem of pain and suffering.
And you are asking WHy God permits this, indeed you are demanding that God SHOULD do something about this and yet failing to realize that WE DO This to ourselves, Not God.
As with any emotional argument against God I ask you this before we continue:
IS there ANY possible answer to this problem that will satisfy you?

[IceMobster]

You will correct me if I am mistaken, but I would assume that an all-knowing omniscient God is aware that there are 750 million people in the world that are undernourished and starving at this moment. He knows this. He knew this from the beginning.

Does our free will trump God's awesome power? Is this what we tell the woman who can't breast feed her starving baby because she is to emaciated due to her dying of starvation herself? All as she begs for God's help with prayer.

God would not be "eliminating ALL free will" if he would intervene a bit more often to avert that next hurricane or volcano and prevent unnecessary suffering.

I find it difficult to accept that the rapist's free will trumps the suffering of the rape victim.

One of the ways to take a look at this is the following:
God helps someone concerning something and it is visible (public notices this). I.e. God does what you expect from him to do.
Following that event, since God helped someone, others expect from him to do the same. However, certain people do not need some primary things for a normal life, but would like to get a car, a house, more money, love, justice,... (pretty much anything a person can think of. Possibilities could be endless.).
They ask God for that something. If he allows everyone to have everything they want, what would be the purpose of life? Material hedonism 101?
On the other hand, if he does not allow of it, he would be unjust and therefore imperfect -- not God.

Raises another question --- a world without suffering, pain, evil... How would human lives be formed? Life without evil could not form a person, could not change a person. There would be no balance if it was only good.
Take as an example some rape victim which then decides to help others concerning that. Knowing what rape victims do or will experience, (s)he can help the victims endure (if already raped) the traumatic times or prevent future cases.
(S)he experienced evil and decided to do something good out of it.

Reminds me of the first Newton's law:

• An object at rest stays at rest and an object in motion stays in motion with the same speed and in the same direction unless acted upon by an unbalanced force.

The object is the human. The unbalanced force is evil(ironically, it is actually balanced force since, through it, balance between good and evil is achieved ). We would rest forever or stay in that motion forever if there was not something to push as off. Something to shake us to the core. Something to actualize our potentiality... Exactly why no suffering is unnecessary.

[Duggie70]

WE DO This to ourselves, Not God.

The logic here seems to be this: When things are wonderful, all praise goes to God. When situations are all messed up, it is man's fault and God is bereft of any responsibility. Fallible man. Fallen man. God's ways are unfathomable to us. It is a win-win situation because God is defined as the locus of all that is good and the absence of goodness is defined as the absence of God.

We do not go out and discover that God is perfectly good, we merely define Him as such. When defined as all knowing and all loving, there is NO situation that cannot rationalize this God as being other than perfect. It seems to me that the God defined with such perfection does not comport with the reality of the way that we observe the Universe that we see.

IS there ANY possible answer to this problem that will satisfy you?

An occasional intervention from this allegedly intervening God would be a helpful first step.

It is curious how the non-intervention of a God who supposedly intervenes is indistinguishable from the non-intervention from a non-existent God.

What I see is an elaborate series of excuses and handwaving on behalf of this peek-a-boo master of the Universe. Essentially a perfect being who is perfect except when He is not perfect. Indistinguishable from a God who does not care or is not even there.

[Duggie70]

By the way, dismissing this as merely an emotional argument does not get God off the hook. The emotional aspect is a CONSEQUENCE of the problem of evil. Not the SOURCE of it.

[crackpot]

By the way, dismissing this as merely an emotional argument does not get God off the hook. The emotional aspect is a CONSEQUENCE of the problem of evil. Not the SOURCE of it.

The original question was just stupid. Very stupid. Have you read it?

Your "argument"...

An occasional intervention from this allegedly intervening God would be a helpful first step. It is curious how the non-intervention of a God who supposedly intervenes is indistinguishable from the non-intervention from a non-existent God.What I see is an elaborate series of excuses and handwaving on behalf of this peek-a-boo master of the Universe. Essentially a perfect being who is perfect except when He is not perfect. Indistinguishable from a God who does not care or is not even there.

...your "argument" just displays your own ignorance of how the Christian God claims to be. A proper atheist has read the bible. You obviously haven't. Go and read it then come back and tell us something beyond "Hey this makes no sense!"

I don't need yet another atheist making atheism look stupid.

[Duggie70]

It is true that I am not too bright. I apologize if I have wasted your time and your prodigious intellectual prowess.

I just desire to know what is true and to back it up with evidence and reasoned argument. Perhaps this is unreasonable of me.

After reading the Bible, it has raised more questions than answers for me. I was hoping to find clarification on this forum.

[crackpot]

It is true that I am not too bright. I apologize if I have wasted your time and your prodigious intellectual prowess.

What you say is true. Except I'm not an intellectual. Or smart.

I just desire to know what is true and to back it up with evidence and reasoned argument. Perhaps this is unreasonable of me.

Bullcrap.

After reading the Bible, it has raised more questions than answers for me. I was hoping to find clarification on this forum.

A cartload of bullcrap. If you want to know something about anything, you ASK QUESTIONS. You don't make accusations.

Do your homework. Or shut up.

[abelcainsbrother]

In my experience with atheists despite this stuff they claim about quoting the bible,like it is not going to convince them of anything until we prove to them God's word is true? Really we should just quote the bible and preach the gospel regardless of what they claim because no matter how much evidence we provide them showing them evidence and reasons to believe they just ignore it.All of this trying to prove the bible true to them is just a cop-out because they just play the denial game. No matter what evidence you might give them they just deny it.

The reason why they do this without realizing it is because it is they that have absolutely no evidence atheism is true and yet despite this fact it is they that believe atheism is true with no evidence at all and so no amount of evidence or reasons to believe or philosophical reasons,etc will convince them,because if they can accept atheism with no evidence? Then evidence will not be important to them and this is why evidence we Christians have given them will not persuade them.

Therefore we might as well just quote scripture and preach the gospel,I think we would have just as much of a chance of convincing them the bible is true than if we give them evidence. It is time atheists provide proof atheism is true because even false religions have more evidence than atheism does.

Atheists have absolutely nothing to bring to the table when it comes to evidence,they have nothing to hedge their bets with and yet they have willingly given atheism a pass for a lack of evidence while demanding we prove to them the bible is true. Evidence is not important to an atheist like they let on about,it is just an opinion at best they cling to without any kind of evidence that they choose to cling to and they choose to prop up their opinion over Christianity and religion.

Wish You could Hear
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fwlzD6zqpgY

[PaulSacramento]

WE DO This to ourselves, Not God.

The logic here seems to be this: When things are wonderful, all praise goes to God. When situations are all messed up, it is man's fault and God is bereft of any responsibility. Fallible man. Fallen man. God's ways are unfathomable to us. It is a win-win situation because God is defined as the locus of all that is good and the absence of goodness is defined as the absence of God.

We do not go out and discover that God is perfectly good, we merely define Him as such. When defined as all knowing and all loving, there is NO situation that cannot rationalize this God as being other than perfect. It seems to me that the God defined with such perfection does not comport with the reality of the way that we observe the Universe that we see.

IS there ANY possible answer to this problem that will satisfy you?

An occasional intervention from this allegedly intervening God would be a helpful first step.

It is curious how the non-intervention of a God who supposedly intervenes is indistinguishable from the non-intervention from a non-existent God.

What I see is an elaborate series of excuses and handwaving on behalf of this peek-a-boo master of the Universe. Essentially a perfect being who is perfect except when He is not perfect. Indistinguishable from a God who does not care or is not even there.

You are redefining God and His attributes according to what YOU WANT them to be.
It doesn't work that way.
God can NOT be all loving AND negate free will.
It's a logical contradiction.

The emotional argument stems from the erroneous belief that God, somehow, OWES us something.
They God SHOULD do this or that.
As the creator AND sustainer of ALL, God doesn't owe us anything. We owe HIM.

It is the very CARING of God that you are criticizing because YOU feel that God should do this or that for whatever reason you think He should.

There can be no love without free will and with free will comes the VERY real possibility ( reality) of refusing love and with refusal comes hate and evil and violence and the ONLY way to eliminate that is to create a species of "robots" that make no choices other than what God MAKES them make.
A God like that would NOT be GOD because He would not be all loving.

The emotional problem is NOT from there BEING pain and suffering BUT from the erroneous view that, for some reason, God OWES it to us to eliminate suffering.
He does NOT and for the reasons I stated above.
As the sustainer of ALL, He has done MORE than His part and has give to us ALL that we need to make this earth a paradise or a "hell".
The choice is, as always, ours.

[IceMobster]

By the way, dismissing this as merely an emotional argument does not get God off the hook. The emotional aspect is a CONSEQUENCE of the problem of evil. Not the SOURCE of it.

The original question was just stupid. Very stupid. Have you read it?

Your "argument"...

An occasional intervention from this allegedly intervening God would be a helpful first step. It is curious how the non-intervention of a God who supposedly intervenes is indistinguishable from the non-intervention from a non-existent God.What I see is an elaborate series of excuses and handwaving on behalf of this peek-a-boo master of the Universe. Essentially a perfect being who is perfect except when He is not perfect. Indistinguishable from a God who does not care or is not even there.

...your "argument" just displays your own ignorance of how the Christian God claims to be. A proper atheist has read the bible. You obviously haven't. Go and read it then come back and tell us something beyond "Hey this makes no sense!"

I don't need yet another atheist making atheism look stupid.

I suppose the forums doesn't need yet another arrogant atheist making atheism look stupid?

[tag]RickD[tag], [tag]Kurieuo[tag] this is the user you should ban, and not Audacity who does something useful, such as asking a variety of questions trying to understand it better or trying to provoke (which is good because you grow in faith by answering certain posed questions, no? Remember that you are not the only who reads this, eh?). Yeah, some people ask questions through, in your eyes, accusations but stop taking it so hard and try to answer it the best you can instead, huh??

I did the same thing with atheism (some of you probably remember my topic). I wanted to understand, yet everyone took such defensive formations as if I am trying to rip their heart out of them. Bah, why do I even try to explain....

[Kurieuo]

Audacity wasn't banned.

[IceMobster]

[Kurieuo]

I was meaning permanent.
I should have said, Audacity isn't currently banned.
Like your own it was only temporary and has been over for some time
He's not currently banned.

[smsavage32]

People are starving NOT because God does nothing but because WE do nothing.
You are presenting what is know as the classical argument from suffering, the EMOTIONAL problem of pain and suffering.

As an atheist, I'm always amazed at how often Christians side step this question with the "classical argument from suffering" dismissal.

And you are asking WHy God permits this, indeed you are demanding that God SHOULD do ...

Followed by the "Who the Hell are you to ask such a question" attack.

... and yet failing to realize ...

Followed by the "You are lacking in mental capacity" insult.

Is there any Christian out there that wants to take on the actual problem that is keeping the skeptic a skeptic, or is converting people to Christ just not very important to Christians?

[smsavage32]

A friend of mine who is an atheist challenged me with a question like this.

A tiger chasing a deer prays not to skip its prey while deer prays to save his life from the tiger. Whose prayer will be answered if God is just ?. This question put me in a dilemma. Can anybody reasonably give an explanation to this question.

I don't see this as a dilemma. What is more likely, that God will answer an evil prayer, or that people are lying when they say that God answers all prayers?