18 thoughts on “Humor (or not): God’s Plan

  1. To Bob S,

    Yeah, simplistic ideas of Providence are absurd. This is no news. God won’t prevent children dying or people starving to death. I don’t think that God is relevantly like a human father, whatever Jesus may have said.

    On the other hand, believers think that this life is only part of the deal. There is an afterlife, and if we don’t take it into account, we cannot give religion a fair hearing. If people were destroyed at death, I would agree that God would be plain nonsense. But until I know more about the life to come, I withhold my judgment on the ways of God. All I can say is that Freud was right that the world is not a nursery. Still, it is not clear that if God exists, he has the moral duty and that he has the power to make this kind of world. God is not Santa Claus or the tooth fairy. But it is understandable that God may be disappointing to some.

    • There is an afterlife, and if we don’t take it into account, we cannot give religion a fair hearing.

      What afterlife? I’m happy to give religion a fair hearing, but what is this afterlife of which you speak and why should I assume that it exists? I’ve seen precisely zero meaningful evidence of an afterlife.

      Still, it is not clear that if God exists, he has the moral duty and that he has the power to make this kind of world.

      Might makes right. God could be an SOB, and we’d just have to suck it up and take it. But the god of the OT isn’t worth any adoration (except in the hope that he likes sycophants and will let us into heaven).

  2. What afterlife? I’m happy to give religion a fair hearing, but what is this afterlife of which you speak and why should I assume that it exists? I’ve seen precisely zero meaningful evidence of an afterlife.

    So what you are saying is everything you know has been empirically observed? Really? That is where Tabash got slammed by Bahnsen . And Bahnsen reduced that claim “that all knowledge is empirical” to absurdity. You may want to listen to that debate.

    God could be an SOB, and we’d just have to suck it up and take it. But the god of the OT isn’t worth any adoration (except in the hope that he likes sycophants and will let us into heaven).

    There is no difference of the God of the OT and the God of the NT. God is Holy an Just. God punishes those who break His laws. They are getting just what they deserve. But God in His infinite love also gave us His Son to be a substitute for the punishment we deserve.

    • To broken Bob Calvan,

      And why do babies and young children suffer and die??? Where is the justice there?

      • Indeed, why do other mammals suffer?

        Doesn’t look like the actions of a just God.

    • So what you are saying is everything you know has been empirically observed?

      I try to accept things in proportion to the evidence. Can you think of a counterexample?

      That is where Tabash got slammed by Bahnsen .

      Nuh uh!! Tabash totally wiped the floor with Bahnsen!

      (Y’know, maybe we should be bringing up specific points to make our cases instead of simply making groundless, broad “My side wins!” claims.)

      God is Holy an Just.

      Nope. The word “just” is defined in the dictionary. Yahweh’s actions in the OT are not just as we define it today.

      God punishes those who break His laws. They are getting just what they deserve.

      Living an imperfect life (unavoidable since God made me imperfect) warrants eternal torment in hell?

      Nope, that’s not what I deserve.

      But God in His infinite love also gave us His Son to be a substitute for the punishment we deserve.

      A sad attempt to rationalize away the nuttiness in the OT, I’m afraid.

      According to the rules in the NT, Jesus’s substitution doesn’t apply to me.

      Doesn’t quite seem fair, y’know what I mean?

  3. And why do babies and young children suffer and die??? Where is the justice there?

    We all die because we are fallen sinners. The age of the sinner is irrelevant. Hitler was a baby once. What if he died as a baby?

    Doesn’t quite seem fair, y’know what I mean?
    That is Eddie Tabash’s argument..He does not like the God of the Bible. Seem’s you have the same problem.

    • We all die because we are fallen sinners.

      And again, this is not the kind of “justice” we know of here on earth. If that’s the way God rolls, that’s fine, but that’s not justice. (Look it up.)

      Hitler was a baby once. What if he died as a baby?

      If you were God and you didn’t wanted to kill Hitler, you would do it painlessly.

      Are you saying that every child that dies in agony after a months-long illness deserves it? (Silly question! Of course you say the baby deserved it. You rationalize away your humanity simply to preserve your belief in an Iron Age superstition. Why not follow the facts where they lead and reclaim your humanity? You’re better than that. When you scratch your head in puzzlement at what animates atheists, this is the kind of abdication of morality that we’re talking about.)

  4. Your problem is you just do not like how the Creator God decreed how things are. We hold to a purpose for evil, God has a purpose for all the evil there is . God has a moraly suffient reason for the evil that exists. You have no purpose for evil, it’s just the way it is.

    Of course in Darwian evolution of a chance world. Where everything is sound and furious signifying nothing. And everything is molecules in motion. Babies and children suffer, just like any animal. There is no good or evil , it’s just the way it is. There is no purpose just ramdom chance. People suffer and die, who cares? Hitler was no beeter or worse than Mother Terisa. They both die and turn to dust. Big deal. So I ask you . ” your better than that”?

    • No, the problem is that your “Creator God” looks like just another myth. Instead of all these gymnastics to make sense of the Christian worldview, it’s far easier to drop the god presupposition. Then things make much more sense.

      God has a moraly suffient reason for the evil that exists.

      Trust me: to an outsider, this is a very weak argument. Your rationalization looks like rationalization, not like following the facts where they lead.

      Babies and children suffer, just like any animal.

      Makes more sense, doesn’t it? Pain is an feature produced by evolution that doesn’t always work as we might like it. (What’s the point in pain when you have terminal cancer? It’s not like it’s alerting you to something you don’t already know.) We do our best to minimize it, and we’ve made some great strides.

      The God hypothesis, by contrast, requires you to imagine a God who could easily minimize pain … but for reasons known only to him, chooses not to.

      Some god! Hardly the best explanation for the facts.

      People suffer and die, who cares?

      Uh … I care. As do atheists. Christians, too, I’ll bet.

      Hitler was no beeter or worse than Mother Terisa.

      From a nonexistent absolute perspective, correct. Since there is no evidence of such a perspective, we can focus instead on the human perspective, in which case Hitler was worse (though Mother Teresa was no saint).

  5. From a nonexistent absolute perspective, correct. Since there is no evidence of such a perspective, we can focus instead on the human perspective, in which case Hitler was worse (though Mother Teresa was no saint).

    But in a chance ramdom universe, who cares if Hitler was worse. It is ireelvant. Just another bag of protoplasm. As your brother Dan Barker says ..We are no more importand as far as the universe is concerned than Broccoli

    • To Bob C,

      Why care about what the “universe” thinks about us? We had better care about other people and how to find ways of living together, striving for fulfillment with minimal mutual inconvenience. A kind of social contract, if you will.

    • But in a chance ramdom universe, who cares if Hitler was worse.

      You didn’t believe me the first time I said it? I answered this last time.

      As your brother Dan Barker says ..We are no more importand as far as the universe is concerned than Broccoli

      This is tiresome.

      Yes, the universe doesn’t care. That doesn’t mean that we don’t care. (And, in fact, we do.)

      And, as OT noted, who cares what the universe thinks? Let’s worry about the thinking beings that we know exist instead.

  6. And, as OT noted, who cares what the universe thinks? Let’s worry about the thinking beings that we know exist instead.

    Why? In your worldview they just die and cease to exist? Think the Brown bear worries to leave a better world for baby brown bear?

    • Your question is nonsensical. Humans care about each other. No objective moral anything is required for this to happen.

    • Values are in people, they are not in the “universe”. We don’t need a God to acknowledge that people (humans and some nonhuman animals) are bearers of values.

      People have worth, God or no God.

      If you claim that the atheistic worldview commits atheists to moral nihilism, I think you are attacking a strawman. Sure, some atheists think that evolution being true means that everything is pointless and that morality is an illusion. But it’s not the necessary consequence of atheism in itself. There are also atheistic humanists.

  7. There are also atheistic humanists.

    What is an atheistic humanist? Please explain?

    • The Humanist Manifesto (the first version of which was written in 1933) is one take on defining “humanism.”

      IMO, humanism is an atheist philosophy, but I think there are other views on that.

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