Alpha Course Week 4 31/10/2011
Meal was sausages with mashed potato and peas. The sausages were obviously from a “catering” pack and so were mushy and without texture. The mashed potato was a bit runny and possibly (although I couldn't swear to this) instant mash. The peas were tinned processed peas. It was OK but not the best – and I don't want to seem ungrateful. During the meal I spoke to a lady on my left for quite a long time, and then I spoke to the chap on my right who happened to be the “senior lay-person” I described in my previous submissions. We had quite a long and in depth discussion about the topic of the day which was “Why and How do I Pray”. I introduced my main point about prayer – which is that if intersessionary prayer works, is god changing the future in your favour ? If so how can he know the future ? The “senior” broadened the discussion by talking about the battle between good and evil but I kept dragging the chat back to the specific question I had asked. It was like herding cats, each time I brought things back to it he started to talk about the broader context, and somehow implied that I was being trivial when there were deeper issues to consider (like his favoured battle of good and evil) . Nevertheless we remained on good terms and not confrontational which I was quite pleased about.
Numbers :- 19 people, only 5 men. Can't understand why I didn't notice this imbalance before last week. What does it mean ??
The Talk. - Why and How do I Pray
This was conducted by the Portuguese student I have mentioned in week 1. He is about 21 and a very popular member of the church. He sprinkled his talk with jokes and anecdotes which were generally quite amusing, and his English is very good. His theme was how and why we pray, about the ways god has intervened to help him but cynics would say were a coincident (his words) . Then talked about praying to god as helping to form a relationship, and how god answers prayers in three ways – yes, no, or wait (no clue as to how to distinguish between no and wait). Also that god will not answer prayers if it is not good for you – god's really on to a winner here, he gets the credit whatever he does. In truth, this chap is so pleasant and good natured it was hard to be negative, but his talked was specifically directed at Christians, it did not cover any theological issues about prayer and meant nothing to me as an atheist.
The Group Session.
Numbers :- 12 in my group, 7 in the other, does this mean anything ???
At the start of the session, “father”- who was leading the discussion – announced he would be using the “talking book” scheme from last week. I asked if we had to wait till the book came round, or could anyone ask for the book when they had something to say. Agreed to the latter, and for the rest of the session stuck to this but ignored it on occasion. Generally it was successful, I said plenty and seemed to follow the spirit of the scheme and no-one appeared unhappy so I'll say no more about it.
As usual the book went round the group and no-one wanted to say anything so as soon as it got to me I launched into one of my arguments. I asked the Portuguese chap whether he is able to tell when a good thing happens to him, (like winning a raffle or getting a job etc.) , whether it is a lucky coincidence or whether god intervened to make it happen. I tried to make it as simple and direct as possible because Christians are masters at evading a question. “Lots of happy and unlikely events happen to you – you find your lost keys, your lost ID is found on a bus by a friend even though you live in a big city (his example) , you are worried about having enough money to go out but then find £20 in the pocket of some trousers you haven,t worn for a while (this happened to me once !) etc. Are these ALL the work of god, or are some happy coincidences. If so can you tell which ones are which” The answers I got were mostly “if you prayed for it it was god”. The session then descended into a succession of people giving an example of how prayer helped them of the “we were broke/within an inch of death then we offered 3 jobs/miraculously recovered type. It got quite tedious like last week, it wasn't testimonies but it wasn't much different.
My original question got lost in all this, so at the next opportunity I said “I have a problem with prayer, the ones that offer praise or thanks are understandable – they're like a hymn, but if intersessionary prayer works, aren't you asking god to change the future in your favour or that of a third person, if so how can god know the future and how can he be omniscient - I just wondered what people thought about it” (I often end my statements like this now – it seems to make things less adversarial) As I am beginning to get used to now, there was no addressing of this question. There followed another round of anecdotes about “how prayer has helped me”. The book got to a Portuguese woman of about 30 who has quite a thick accent, she spoke for a long time but it was almost impossible to understand what she was saying. At one point she got upset because she was talking about her mother, had to be led off for some tea and sympathy. To this moment I do not know whether her mother died or had recovered, but I now had to make sure I did not use medical analogies, or make them very very general. Book got to “daughter” who briefly alluded to her fathers recovery from illness. “Oh good “ I thought, at least that is out of the way now. How wrong I was because the book immediately passed to “father” who treated us to another exposition of his testimony – special extended version with extra medical detail this time !! That's 4 times now, every week he does this. I looked at the others and they were gazing at him with rapt attention !! Are they mad !!
I was determined to stick to my question and make it even simpler and more unavoidable. When I next had the book - “Does God change the future in your favour if you pray to him ? If not what is the point of intercessionary prayer ?” One of the young women said “If it is Gods will then that favourable outcome will happen”. I said “ If “what will be will be”, then what is the point of intercessionary prayer which every Christian in this room has claimed is effective and actually works ?” . I was beginning to get tired of saying “intercessionary” and it felt like wading through treacle. The “father” used the “god moves in mysterious ways” cop-out “we haven't got the answer to all your questions”. The “mother” said it was an obscure theological matter. The “father” immediately ended the session, but I was able to have a final say - “This is not an obscure theological matter, it goes to the heart of what Christians believe about prayer – does it work or not. I am surprised that nobody is interested in tackling the issue. If I were a Christian, I know that I would want these questions nailed to the floor for fear that the things I believed were false.” Quite glad to get that in as a closing statement !!
There was a brief further exchange,
“father” - Don't you think you would pray for your children if they were gravely ill”
me - Couldn't answer that, it's possible if I was desperate. The Hindus pray to their gods in those circumstances, so what does that prove – is their god true”
female church elder - “There is only one true God”
me - That's what they say.
Female church elder – They are wrong
me - That's what they say
Pretty good knockabout stuff ehh !!!!
That's it. Feeling much better this week , no tempers lost, helped to put chairs away – even said goodbye to people. This is much nicer. Feeling more like their tame atheist who they regard with fond indulgence .
Regards
pgrimes15
Meal was sausages with mashed potato and peas. The sausages were obviously from a “catering” pack and so were mushy and without texture. The mashed potato was a bit runny and possibly (although I couldn't swear to this) instant mash. The peas were tinned processed peas. It was OK but not the best – and I don't want to seem ungrateful. During the meal I spoke to a lady on my left for quite a long time, and then I spoke to the chap on my right who happened to be the “senior lay-person” I described in my previous submissions. We had quite a long and in depth discussion about the topic of the day which was “Why and How do I Pray”. I introduced my main point about prayer – which is that if intersessionary prayer works, is god changing the future in your favour ? If so how can he know the future ? The “senior” broadened the discussion by talking about the battle between good and evil but I kept dragging the chat back to the specific question I had asked. It was like herding cats, each time I brought things back to it he started to talk about the broader context, and somehow implied that I was being trivial when there were deeper issues to consider (like his favoured battle of good and evil) . Nevertheless we remained on good terms and not confrontational which I was quite pleased about.
Numbers :- 19 people, only 5 men. Can't understand why I didn't notice this imbalance before last week. What does it mean ??
The Talk. - Why and How do I Pray
This was conducted by the Portuguese student I have mentioned in week 1. He is about 21 and a very popular member of the church. He sprinkled his talk with jokes and anecdotes which were generally quite amusing, and his English is very good. His theme was how and why we pray, about the ways god has intervened to help him but cynics would say were a coincident (his words) . Then talked about praying to god as helping to form a relationship, and how god answers prayers in three ways – yes, no, or wait (no clue as to how to distinguish between no and wait). Also that god will not answer prayers if it is not good for you – god's really on to a winner here, he gets the credit whatever he does. In truth, this chap is so pleasant and good natured it was hard to be negative, but his talked was specifically directed at Christians, it did not cover any theological issues about prayer and meant nothing to me as an atheist.
The Group Session.
Numbers :- 12 in my group, 7 in the other, does this mean anything ???
At the start of the session, “father”- who was leading the discussion – announced he would be using the “talking book” scheme from last week. I asked if we had to wait till the book came round, or could anyone ask for the book when they had something to say. Agreed to the latter, and for the rest of the session stuck to this but ignored it on occasion. Generally it was successful, I said plenty and seemed to follow the spirit of the scheme and no-one appeared unhappy so I'll say no more about it.
As usual the book went round the group and no-one wanted to say anything so as soon as it got to me I launched into one of my arguments. I asked the Portuguese chap whether he is able to tell when a good thing happens to him, (like winning a raffle or getting a job etc.) , whether it is a lucky coincidence or whether god intervened to make it happen. I tried to make it as simple and direct as possible because Christians are masters at evading a question. “Lots of happy and unlikely events happen to you – you find your lost keys, your lost ID is found on a bus by a friend even though you live in a big city (his example) , you are worried about having enough money to go out but then find £20 in the pocket of some trousers you haven,t worn for a while (this happened to me once !) etc. Are these ALL the work of god, or are some happy coincidences. If so can you tell which ones are which” The answers I got were mostly “if you prayed for it it was god”. The session then descended into a succession of people giving an example of how prayer helped them of the “we were broke/within an inch of death then we offered 3 jobs/miraculously recovered type. It got quite tedious like last week, it wasn't testimonies but it wasn't much different.
My original question got lost in all this, so at the next opportunity I said “I have a problem with prayer, the ones that offer praise or thanks are understandable – they're like a hymn, but if intersessionary prayer works, aren't you asking god to change the future in your favour or that of a third person, if so how can god know the future and how can he be omniscient - I just wondered what people thought about it” (I often end my statements like this now – it seems to make things less adversarial) As I am beginning to get used to now, there was no addressing of this question. There followed another round of anecdotes about “how prayer has helped me”. The book got to a Portuguese woman of about 30 who has quite a thick accent, she spoke for a long time but it was almost impossible to understand what she was saying. At one point she got upset because she was talking about her mother, had to be led off for some tea and sympathy. To this moment I do not know whether her mother died or had recovered, but I now had to make sure I did not use medical analogies, or make them very very general. Book got to “daughter” who briefly alluded to her fathers recovery from illness. “Oh good “ I thought, at least that is out of the way now. How wrong I was because the book immediately passed to “father” who treated us to another exposition of his testimony – special extended version with extra medical detail this time !! That's 4 times now, every week he does this. I looked at the others and they were gazing at him with rapt attention !! Are they mad !!
I was determined to stick to my question and make it even simpler and more unavoidable. When I next had the book - “Does God change the future in your favour if you pray to him ? If not what is the point of intercessionary prayer ?” One of the young women said “If it is Gods will then that favourable outcome will happen”. I said “ If “what will be will be”, then what is the point of intercessionary prayer which every Christian in this room has claimed is effective and actually works ?” . I was beginning to get tired of saying “intercessionary” and it felt like wading through treacle. The “father” used the “god moves in mysterious ways” cop-out “we haven't got the answer to all your questions”. The “mother” said it was an obscure theological matter. The “father” immediately ended the session, but I was able to have a final say - “This is not an obscure theological matter, it goes to the heart of what Christians believe about prayer – does it work or not. I am surprised that nobody is interested in tackling the issue. If I were a Christian, I know that I would want these questions nailed to the floor for fear that the things I believed were false.” Quite glad to get that in as a closing statement !!
There was a brief further exchange,
“father” - Don't you think you would pray for your children if they were gravely ill”
me - Couldn't answer that, it's possible if I was desperate. The Hindus pray to their gods in those circumstances, so what does that prove – is their god true”
female church elder - “There is only one true God”
me - That's what they say.
Female church elder – They are wrong
me - That's what they say
Pretty good knockabout stuff ehh !!!!
That's it. Feeling much better this week , no tempers lost, helped to put chairs away – even said goodbye to people. This is much nicer. Feeling more like their tame atheist who they regard with fond indulgence .
Regards
pgrimes15
