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Faith and Suffering and Listening

My heart goes out to Peter Cresswell who reacted poorly to the recent tragic deaths of six Christian college students and their teacher. Such is his desire to believe there is no God, he seeks proof of his non-existence at any opportunity. His faith in atheism is, well, like a rock. He asks questions, but he also provides the answers. The questions then are not genuine, but simply and opportunity for an attack, and the tone of his post is unfortunately deeply disrespectful.
When these young Christians died yesterday, where was their God? When they left their Christian school en route to their adventure, and no doubt prayed to God to keep them all safe, where was God? When they prayed that morning for success in their trek and God's guidance to get them through it safely, where was God? When they listened that morning to the weather forecast, which would have told them that heavy rain was on the way, where was their brain -- and where was God? When the heavy rain began flooding down the canyon and they first knew they were in danger, and no doubt prayed to God again ... where was God? It's the same question any honest person must have in every disaster.

What the hell is this 'god' doing? According to his adherents, he's supposed to be all-powerful, all-knowing and all-good -- and one famous argument for his existence argues that "part of what we mean when we speak of God is 'perfect being'" (and if he's not all-powerful, all-knowing and all-good -- and perfect -- then what would make him god anyway?). So where was he, this omnipotent being, and what the hell was he doing when seven of his adherents put themselves in his hands? Didn't he want to look after 'his' children?

I think you know the answer.
We have a certain amount of freedom in this world, and we use it to make choices every day. Some times these choices will lead us to immense suffering, just as they can lead us to profound joy.

I don't know why, given the history of the world Peter thinks that a Christian believes they live lives protected from all harm. It's a childish belief that Peter uses to build his own case for no God, and it is as a child he demands we believe him. Why? Because God does not always protect us from suffering!

A person's faith is not a shield to protect them from harm, it is a belief we are loved by God no matter the pain and suffering we experience. In understanding this, it can help to try our best to offer such love and charity to others. The Christian message doesn't have to get much more complicated than this.

Maybe somewhere there is a world where people are denied free will. Where they are magically prevented from making bad decisions and wrong choices. We know that place isn't here, and most people can understand the possibility that a loving God has a bigger plan for us, one that extends beyond this life, one we therefore cannot see or properly understand. We understand that God has given us free will, that we are not perfect beings, and that ultimately means we live in a world with consequences.

Ironically, free will and freedom in the purest sense are important concepts to Peter in supporting his own belief system. Issues of freedom, even to make mistakes, form the basis of Peter rejecting government intervention at almost every level. If Peter is genuinely interested in an alternative answer to his question, the answer is out there for him. It's just a matter of listening.

Related Link: Where was God?

JT's grist for the mill: On Evil and Suffering

Comments

  1. I too was shocked when I read Peter's post Zen. His timing was unfortunate, but his question is appropriate. There is nothing wrong with talking honestly about religion.

    We all react to tragedy in different ways - I think maybe Peter's way was to get angry. When you send your beloved children away on a school camp you do not expect they will come home in a box.

    I love Not PC, but man there's some awful people there.

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  2. I don't think you can separate the timing of the question from its appropriatness. Yes, it's apposite but the timing was gross.
    The urge to put the boot in was too strong rather than slipping it into the 'to-do' pile a month hence, which is what a more sensitive commentator would do.

    For all the trappings of culture in forms of sculpture, architechture, Lloyd Wright, and beer displayed on that blog it's notable than when it comes to LIVING culture, humanity, i.e. others, non-self, it is maladroit.

    That central insensitivity is a black mark through the centre of the Objectivist asethetic.

    I was a frequent vistor to not-PC until that post but I've since deleted it from my bookmarks and delicious.

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  3. The thing is that atheists like Peter don't believe there is anything after death, therefore death is seen as a "bad" thing, whereas a Christian realises that it is not a definite "end" it's just a change of state, so to speak.

    A Christian believes that they are only on Earth for a short time in this form and that everlasting life awaits in Paradise with God - if they believe in and follow that God - the dead are not ended; they're carrying on, but in a different place.

    We are a little sad if a friend or family member goes overseas but we know we'll see them again even if they're out of sight right now - it's the same with those who have gone to that great "undiscovered country" - we believe that we'll see them again.

    I was struck by the faith and the trust in God that the parents, school and community showed even though they were hurting.

    I think it was a great testimony that will speak to a great many people and maybe get them to ask questions and try and seek out the God who can give those such peace in their time of loss.

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  4. If you think PC's piece on the tragedy was blunt check this one out...

    http://nogodzone.blogspot.com/

    "Did God kill six young students and their teacher?"

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  5. Thanks James. Blunt indeed, but the "deductions" are still off the mark.

    What he is saying, or seeming to say, is that God drowned his daughter for the sole purpose of seeing if this man would still have faith in God. What kind of monstrous deity would do that?

    No, he is not saying that. So the conclusions are irrelevant.

    Still, the range of opinions on the nature of faith and God vary. Not all of them are correct.

    Perhaps these times of tragedy are at the least, an opportunity to learn more. The first lesson, and an obvious one, is that no person is immune to the eventuality of death, and the possibility of immense suffering.

    I very much doubt that parents of the deceased students see this as a n event arranged solely to test their faith. To suggest that is ludicrous.

    Furthermore, to fasten on every sound-bite reported by the media (a group not always known for getting the comments in full and in context), made by people undergoing great stress (and therefore maybe not properly able to articulate their thoughts well, which I suspect will be jumbled and changing from moment to moment as they grapple with the enormity of the tragedy) is also another reason blog-side analysis to make fun of the Christian faith is not a particularly wise or compassionate project at this time, and one that will prove to be without strong foundation.

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  6. That central insensitivity is a black mark through the centre of the Objectivist asethetic.

    No arguments from me there.
    For many years I used to read all objectivist fora - This comment frpm George Cordero was posted a couplke of years ago. I saved it and it is very relevant and true:

    What staggers the imagination is the sheer pretentious hypocrisy of it all: the lonely and alienated, lecturing the fulfilled and grounded; men that possess no discipline and order within their own personal lives, fanatically obsessing on what should be the proper social and economic order of the world; men that are failures at even the most mundane aspects of life, lecturing to those of genuine personal achievement; the unkempt and ugly, giving instruction on the arts and beauty; emotionally repressed geeks, giving lectures concerning joy and exaltation; and last but not least, people unable to create and maintain lasting relationships or friendships, pontificating on the nature of love and loyalty.

    I don't think that is Peter because I like him very much, but if you look at SOLO and Perigo, it most certainly applies.

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  7. A fine, timely post. Well said.

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  8. Mates
    This past week for me has been one of both agony and ecstasy. Agony because of the heartwrenching sorrow for those suffering the loss and bereavement of children and loved ones. Ecstasy over the honour, courage, dignity, and faith of those who suffer. Their example provides challenge and hope; the one glorified is their God.
    Several weeks ago I posted on the issue of suffering as a fundamental problem for unbelievers. They have no basis even to discourse meaningfully on the subject. The recent attempt referred to in this post is an apt example of the unbeliever's malady in this matter: "full of sound and fury, signifying nothing."
    If anyone is interested in my feeble attempt to discuss the problem of evil and suffering, it can be found at: http://jtcontracelsum.blogspot.com/2008/03/impeaching-gods.html It may provide some grist for the mill in the current debate.
    Cheers,
    JT

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  9. In case you missed GDZ's reply to your post on his site Zen.....

    Blogger GodlessZone said...

    "Zentiger: I was a fundamentalist, I know how these people think. This is precisely the way they interpret things. Either Satan is trying to destroy their faith or God is "testing" it. They take that interpretation from the Book of Job. I've heard more sermons than I would care to making precisely that point. Rebel Heart is right, that is their inspiration and this is precisely how fundamentalists think. God is sovereign. Nothing happens without God willing it. In this case he said it was to test his faith. Who else could test his faith but the sovreign God???"


    What say you Mr tiger...?

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  10. "Several weeks ago I posted on the issue of suffering as a fundamental problem for unbelievers. They have no basis even to discourse meaningfully on the subject."

    Nonsense. For a non-beleiver the basis for such discourse is the same as a beleiver. All religeon is a product of the natural world rather than a product of the super-natural. You talk as if we secretly beleive there is a god, and that he is the basis for religion, but we are choosing to ignore him. Some may harbour those feelings, I for one do not. Christianity evolved as a cultural expression, it's basis is entirely relevant to an athiest, just not in a theological sense.

    However, for the record, I agree that PC's post was in bad taste.

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  11. It is the classic religious debate.

    The notion that a perfect being created people, loves them all, but then lets some of them commit horrendous abuses against each other, lets "his" creation kill them at random moments (so called "Acts of God") and to top it off, lets many of those who preach on "his" behalf commit many of the abuses.

    To a free thinker it seems absurd or if it is true, it is an abomination. If any man treated those he loved like that it would be considered psychopathic.

    Yet this is propounded as a basis for morality. It's quite bizarre

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  12. There are so many fallacies in that short comment I'm not sure where to start...

    A free thinker might suspect that there is more to the argument than the way you couch it.

    It seems to me you are limiting your evaluation of Christianity based on previously formed ideas of what is possible or not, and from that to what you can only see and wish to test. Natural, but gravely flawed.

    And then you attempt to place God within the same framework as a human being to pronounce a judgment of what is good or evil.

    You wouldn't necessarily work in the opposite: judge the actions of man and snail on the same level. You recognise no doubt that you cannot possibly apply the same motivations and expectations of conduct to the snail.

    You no doubt demand freedom to choose as one of your rights. But if the state truly loves you, it must remove your freedoms to protect you for your own good. And promise to punish those that violate your freedom, after the act has already been done. Perhaps the state should lock you up in advance to protect some-one else from you?

    Or maybe the doctrine of free will with absolute freedom to experience consequences sounds a lot better?

    And if your existence did go beyond this life, and your soul turned out to be far more important than your body, what then?

    I've read some theories that try to prove there is only one universe and one existence and this is it, and I've read other theories.

    Are you absolutely sure there is only one form of existence?

    Not particularly well explained, but hopefully you might get the point. I just don't have the time right now to respond in greater depth to your comment.

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  13. "You no doubt demand freedom to choose as one of your rights. But if the state truly loves you, it must remove your freedoms to protect you for your own good."

    What a crock of shit Zen.....you are outed as the suck up socialist you are.

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  14. James mate, I was using a "horror story" to drive a point home. That sentence horrifies me as much you. The exact point is that we would not want the state to interfere with our lives, seeing it as a true block to9 freedom, and yet some are using the same logic to demand God interfere "for our own good" to prove whatever point they seem to think that makes.

    You can relax, and perhaps even agree that BOTH scenarios (God and state) would not play out as we would expect. :-)

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  15. When bad things happened, where is God, why didn't he stop it?

    I asked that question many times a long time ago, then one day i stopped and listened like you said.

    I thought of all the times in my life where deep down inside i know that i did doze off behind the wheel at 2am, that i don't remember looking before i stepped into that road, that i'm not sure i would have said no if i ended up with the wrong crowd at school. And so many other instances like that where things could have been a lot worse.

    If we are really honest with ourselves you would lose count of the number of times we got lucky and instead realize that he was there.

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  16. MK, don't you think god has more important things to do than worry you might not look before crossing the road?

    If we are really honest with ourselves you would never count the number of times we got lucky and instead accept is was blind chance.

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  17. "MK, don't you think god has more important things to do than worry you might not look before crossing the road?"
    If there is a God, then only a fool would presume to allocate to him either priorities or acceptable workload, surely?

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  18. God assigns each one of us a Guardian Angel who can act prevent harm from coming to us. I think I once had an experience where I was prevented (by my Guardian Angel) from stepping out onto the road a moment before a car sped through a red light in downtown Sydney. I remember wanting to step out onto the road, trying to step out onto the road but being unable to (for some reason) and the next moment a car sped past me. At the time I thought - that was lucky!

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