Why Do You Stil Believe In God?

[Theland]

Given the obvious evils in this world, (wars, hunger, disease, poverty, crime, immorality, ad-infinitum), then why, if you are a believer, do you still believe in God. Is your faith not shaken? If you are not a believer, why do you think that believers still hold on to their faith, in the face of so much evil?

[Theland]

"Still."

[Louisa 69]

The fact that there is evil in the world only reinforces my belief in something good. Everything has it's opposites. Most of the evil in the world is man so why blame god ??? We are given our freedom of choice and god can't interfere with that. There is lots of good in the world also, but sadly reporting on the good doesn't sell the news.

[wizard69]

Playing devil's advocate, eh! Theland?
Personally, I think that its natural to want to believe in something more than just this life. Nobody wants to think that they are going to cease to exist one day and the horrors of what you have just mentioned can make people want to believe even more.
Dont make it true though, anymore than a child wanting Santa to be true on xmas eve.

[jackthehat]

Again..............God does 'good things' , Man does 'bad things'.........It is impossible for God to do 'bad things' and if man does 'good things' that has only been made possible by Gods grace..........
Bah ! They get you coming and going these darned religious types......

[Theland]

But there are people who survived the Holocaust, for example, who turned their backs on any notion of God because of the horrors they witnessed, whereas others found God, or had their faith strengthened, in the face of these same unspeakable horrors.

[jackthehat]

And who amongst us has the right to gainsay either of those reactions ?

Neither of them, however, is any sort of proof that there is a supreme being orchestrating our lives.............

[paulos66]

Theland thoise sort of horrors could mess about with anybodies brain

[Theland]

jack - none of us has the right.

paulos - Fr Bill has seen some pretty horrible things, but apparently has not abandoned his belief.

[jake-the-peg]

Maybe this is relevant

http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn7147.htm l

[jackthehat]

Agreed.........but nor does any of us have the right to hold up these deeply personal reactions to the horror of their experiences as evidence, to the rest of us, that there actually is a God.

[Sen]

I still believe in God because according to my faith, God has put humans on this Earth as a test, to see who are willing to submit to His will, regardless of what their life is like, no matter how bad, no matter how good. He wants to see how far we are willing to strive for Him and whether we will stay with Him no matter how hard life gets. It doesnt matter to Him if we are far from ever being perfectly religious, all that matters is that we do our best and we continue to do our best and never give up. This would be our proof that we lived our life for Him, not for ourselves and not for others.

This test can only work with the existance of good and evil and giving us humans the freewill to choose between the two. Without evil we have no choice but to be good and so the test of proving ourselves to God can not be possible.

I have learnt a great deal about God and my faith to come to some sort of an acceptance on the people out there who suffer a great deal (i think the vast majority of us go through suffering of some sort, heck i am now).

1. We are being tested to see if we will still stay by God no matter how hard it gets.
2. If we committed sins, the suffering we go through compensates for those sins and wipes them out. This is seen as a mercy from God, so that less sins will be held against us on the day of judgement.
3. God gives hope to the suffering people, that by striving to do the best we can in obeying God, we will be rewarded with an eternal life of happiness and be given all that we desire (good, pure desires that is!). Once we are there we will see that the suffering we experienced on Earth was worth it as we lived our lives for God.
4. Some people maybe suffering as a result of leading evil lives and hurting others. So their suffering is a punishment.

Heh, this is just a dose of my many reasons in believing in God.