Where is God hiding and why.?

[vivandorron]

I do Not believe in God; despite my education which was in the Bible College of Wales.

Consequently, I say to those who are believers that, he/she is like an indifferent parent who allows its children to completely misbehave without any form of discipline being exercised.

Ron.

[vivandorron]

cupid... Perhaps, lots of Abers who do Not believe in God.:-)

Anyway, whom do you blame for all the evil.?

Ron.

[LazyGun]

In this world that we live in, we have been left a social and cultural legacy of religion, or spiritualism - Narratives that have grown up around the human, primate need for a satisfactory explanation, coupled with the fear of the unknown, and, over the centuries,driven by a bunch of likely lads and lasses who have noted that being a high priest of a religion is a nice indoor job with no heavy lifting and more than a few material benefits and perks.

As we have matured as a species, and exercised the brains we have, the world, the universe, and its creation have become matters of interest, and we have a wealth of evidence that shows us, more or less, the chronology and the manner of development of the the universe and life itself. This is the scientific method, and using it has enabled us as a species to achieve quite remarkable things.

We do have this legacy though, hanging around like an atrophied appendix within the body of our society - a legacy based upon fear of the unknown, and murderously suspicious of change. That legacy promotes much of the bad stuff that happens around the globe - ethnic cleansing, the spanish inquisition, mass murder, terrorism, suicide bombers, murder of doctors, blasphemy, apostasy, patronising patriarchy, shackling of womens rights, torture of children who are supposedly possessed by evil spirits - all of this stuff can be linked to fervent religious and / or spiritual belief. Many thousands, maybe millions, have died or been made miserable by the demands of religion and the faithful.

And we still get statements like "god is all around us", or "god is love", or god is all-seeing, all powerful - but this belief is based entirely upon faith - belief in the absence of any shred of evidence beyond the anecdotal, and we rationalists are expected to respect such thinking? Indeed, those of faith are proud of having faith - proud that their belief transcends or ignores the facts, the science, the evidence! Why, precisely,should such thinking and such attitudes be afforded any respect at all?

If you posit the idea that your particular flavour of God (and remember kids, all these gods are different, and logically, only one of them could possibly be correct) is all powerful, all seeing, and able to interact with humanity beyond the rules and laws of physics in order to answer prayers or perform miracles, then you have to accept that all the bad stuff in the world comes from the same source - becuase an all powerful entity would be able to put a stop to all of that stuff, right?If not, then you saying that your all powerful god is either incapable of stopping the evil, ie not omnipotent, or they are an evil sadist, deliberately inflicting humanity with plague and worse, just to test our resolve, to test our faith? Either way, not a particularly edifying being to entrust your worship, your faith to, surely?

You cannot have it both ways. If God is real, then there should be empirical evidence to show that - there is not.

If God is able to answer prayers, and perform miracles, can you explain to me why it is that God hates amputees so much? How else can you explain why it is that your God has never seen fit to perform the simple miracle of allowing an amputee to grow back a limb?

Belief in a God is an anachronism, a leftover, withered, vestigial remnant of our fear and xenophobia; a true sign of the maturity of our species is when religion is consigned to the dustbin of history for good.

"Good people do good things. Bad people do bad things. But for good people to do bad things, that takes religion" - I wish I could properly attribute this - cannot recall now who was the originator of this particular meme..

[vivandorron]

Hi LazyGun....I think you have said everything which I wish I had the knowledge and ability to say so.

It will be interesting to see if cupid replies to my question " Whom do you blame for all the evil.?" Also,I am holding out hope that other ABers will comment further; after consideration of your views.

Ron,.

[naomi24]

The Epicurean Paradox

Is God willing to prevent evil, but not able? Then he is not omnipotent.

Is he able, but not willing? Then he is malevolent.

Is he both able and willing? Then whence cometh evil?

Is he neither able nor willing? Then why call him God?

[solvitquick]

Dear Ron, despite airing my atheistic views on a similar discussion and on this I virtually challenged those "believers" to argue against the evidence I quoted for atheism. No sensible reasoning followed. LazyGuns excellent piece will be the same. Even I "thinking of playing devil's advocate" (odd phrase in these circs.) to my own or e.g.LazyGun am still as dumbstruck as the believers. No credible argument for god exists. So do not expect any contradiction of LG or anyone of similar persuasion (i.e. knowledge).

[keyplus90]

////I don't believe in God////

////Where is God now////

Does not make sense does it?

[naomi24]

Since religion affects everyone, it makes perfect sense to ask. You never know, it might even encourage the religious to ask the same question - which wouldn't be a bad thing for the world.

[jomifl]

Birdie, it was very kind of you to explain that point to Keyplus, personally I couldn't be bothered as it would only mean having to explain the next point resulting in the ultimate rejection of reason when it's application resulted in an unacceptable conclusion.

[waterboatman]

He is too busy with his ego problem to worry about mere mortals. The Catholic stock answer; 'God is testing your faith my son.' Yeah. Right.

[naomi24]

Waterboatman, that seems to be a stock answer across the religious spectrum. Muslims are rather good at telling people that too,

[Zacs-Master]

He's in my wardrobe and I'm not letting him out until he apologises for the error he made in DNA which caused the holocaust.

[Coldicote]

Ron, It's easy to say you don't believe in God, but what DO you believe in, if anything? I have no answer, but it seems to me we all need some kind of belief to cling to. I cannot help feeling there must be a Power of Creation out there somewhere - call it what you like.

[solvitquick]

Sorry Coldicote many of us have our Belief: we are mere creations of chemistry and physics. Why do we have to beieve in a supernatural creator, especially in the light of zero evidence for the existence of such a thing? You are saying "as god does not exist, we have to invent it". Must define such an invention as "it" rather unneeded sexuality. "Why not live our lives doing good for fellow humans given the horrible experiences we all hear about or suffer from. Lets do our best and then return to the non-existence from which we came? When you are deep asleep, what do you believe in?

[naomi24]

Coldicote, //I cannot help feeling there must be a Power of Creation out there somewhere - call it what you like.//

I think a lot of people feel like that, but if we don’t know what it is – or even if it’s there at all - there’s no reason to call it anything.

[vivandorron]

Coldicote..You have asked me if I believe in anything. To which I reply, perhaps nothing Biblical, apart from some, if not all, the teachings of Jesus; who incidentally never claimed that he was the only begotten son of God.

I have said in the past that if God materalised without a creator, could not the universe be in the same position.

Ron.

[solvitquick]

Dear Coldicote have you not been preconditioned since a child by believers notably Religious Education classes at school, school religously-based assemblies and parents/relatives? You may or may not believe in the stories in the King James Bible but that is where your preconditioning began. Otherwise, in the absence of the bible and scientific discovery you would probably believe in the Sun as god. That was only ever the sensible religion before science identified the sun's mindless structure. But the sun WAS actually the creator of life, you and me. Also it and sustains us and all living forms.