@Ignorant

Does he suffer with the ones that he pretermined will go to hell?

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Does he burn in hell with them for eternities? Is it just to doom someone to eternal burning and suffering?

(December 17, 2016 at 7:29 am)Ignorant Wrote: 1) No. God created all of us so that even those who suffer and live in misery can share in God's life and joy, even in the midst of that suffering and misery. Christians suffer too, and they praise the glory of his creation because his creation includes the resurrection and renewal of all things, and not merely this age which is "passing away".

2) He created us to share in his life, not bow before him. Sharing the divinity causes you to kneel in humility, rather than kneeling causes you to share in the divinity.

3) I am pretty sure everyone suffers, and some more than others. He let himself suffer, and united his suffering to all of ours. His divinity can transform my suffering and sublimate it, because he suffered it right there with me. In this way, I don't put up with it in anticipation of going to heaven. Instead, heaven itself has come to me in my suffering. The suffering remains real, but it is suffered WITH the divinity itself. That is a game changer for the poor and the oppressed and the outcast.

4) It certainly makes it easier knowing that God himself has gone through all of it with us.

1) How can we share in god's life and joy if we are suffering? Should five year old children with cancer be joyous that they are sharing god's life and joy while they go through chemotherapy?

2) How do you know this? What is your proof for this? Some verse in the bible?There is no humility in bowing to a nonexistent god... only shame.

3) Most, if not all individuals, experience hardship in some way, shape or form. But I'm sorry the fact that I experienced some traumatic events in my childhood does not compare to a child being born with no arms or legs... That is suffering. And you think this is okay because at least this child got the opportunity to suffer with god? You're an asshole.

4) No, it doesn't because there is no proof that your god even exists.

I bow before no god. Especially not one that lets five year old kids starve to death, or get bone cancer, or die of some tropical disease from a fucking bug bite. If you really believe what you're saying you are a sick fuck.

(December 17, 2016 at 5:51 am)robvalue Wrote: It's pretty clear that a lot of theists need us to have free will, because it excuses their deity from the bad things people do. Now, I don't buy that anyway, as I've mentioned above. The deity still created the framework, and decided that suffering was something it wanted to include.

What I don't get is why they need the deity to know the future. In fact, it seems at odds with everything. According to many, God is screwing with our affairs. Often on a daily basis. Why on earth would it do this, if it already had a perfect plan and knew what would happen? Did it deliberately make it so that things kept going wrong so it could dive in and help? Hero complex? This is another contradiction. How do some people so easily live with these?

And the idea that God has a "plan" is at odds with knowing the future. The word "plan" indicates a strategy, usually. A way of going about things, to try and achieve a goal. But how can God have goals? It has nothing stopping it instantly achieving anything it wants. It needs no strategy. It needs no "means to an end". It needs no sacrifice in order to deal with some problem that has arisen.

This points to other contradictions many people seem happy to live with. God is all powerful; yet it must do things in a certain way to cope with what is happening. It created everything: what is possible and what is not, the rules regarding how things work, our capabilities and intentions; yet somehow it has no responsibility whatsoever for what happens.

It's a feature of monotheisms. In monotheistic faiths the god pretty much as to be all powerful, as he's supposed to be the sole reason for everything. But few monotheisms are happy (or even recognise) with the fact that in order to be all powerful god has to be the source of all evil, because goodness is equated with perfection in the human mind.

Religions with colleges of gods don't have this proble as there is a group of beings with similar levels of power, so not one of them is all powerful. Polytheistic gods can therefore be evil or do evil things because they are fallible and the logic of their mythology alliws them to make mistakes.

(December 17, 2016 at 7:42 am)operator Wrote: 1) How can we share in god's life and joy if we are suffering? Should five year old children with cancer be joyous that they are sharing god's life and joy while they go through chemotherapy?

2) How do you know this? What is your proof for this? Some verse in the bible?There is no humility in bowing to a nonexistent god... only shame.

3) Most, if not all individuals, experience hardship in some way, shape or form. But I'm sorry the fact that I experienced some traumatic events in my childhood does not compare to a child being born with no arms or legs... That is suffering. And you think this is okay because at least this child got the opportunity to suffer with god? You're an asshole.

4) No, it doesn't because there is no proof that your god even exists.

I bow before no god. Especially not one that lets five year old kids starve to death, or get bone cancer, or die of some tropical disease from a fucking bug bite. If you really believe what you're saying you are a sick fuck.

1) Excellent questions. I don't mean that we feel happy when we are suffering. I mean that, because god suffers with us, our suffering somehow brings us into a share god's divinity. It is part of the reality of suffering, even when it feels like the complete opposite. That doesn't make us enjoy suffering.

A poor child enduring cancer and chemotherapy can only be as joyous as they find reason for joy. Some children with cancer and chemotherapy are comforted and find joy in the fact that god endures that cancer and chemotherapy with them. It does not take away the pain. It does not take away the immense suffering. all it does is provide a small light amidst that incredible darkness.

2) I know this because Jesus died on the cross, and rose from the dead. Jesus endured all of humanity's suffering on the cross (even every single suffering of every single child who ever endured cancer), and then Jesus rose from the dead. That is what we can expect. Suffering with god, and rising from the dead united to his divine life. Of course, if there is no god, then none of that means anything.

3) No, I do not think it is ok. I still think it is messed up that children suffer all kinds of unimaginable abuse, illness and neglect. I don't know why god wrote that into our story. All I know is that he does not distance himself from it, and instead, he is close to all of those children and will give them more joy in the next life than he will to me who has suffered very little.

4) Fair enough

I wonder where the fuck they came with that god is in another dimension and all that shit, was it written in the bible? Is it logical to make up loads of shit just to keep your beliefs intact?

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(December 17, 2016 at 7:29 am)Ignorant Wrote:

(December 17, 2016 at 7:11 am)operator Wrote: So basically... god created all of us so that while many of us suffer and live in misery, some others in our group can praise the glory of his creation? [1] So he created us to worship him.... [2] and then let's many of us suffer... [3] and you're completely okay with chalking all of this up to 'god's plan?' [4]

1) No. God created all of us so that even those who suffer and live in misery can share in God's life and joy, even in the midst of that suffering and misery. Christians suffer too, and they praise the glory of his creation because his creation includes the resurrection and renewal of all things, and not merely this age which is "passing away".

2) He created us to share in his life, not bow before him. Sharing the divinity causes you to kneel in humility, rather than kneeling causes you to share in the divinity.

3) I am pretty sure everyone suffers, and some more than others. He let himself suffer, and united his suffering to all of ours. His divinity can transform my suffering and sublimate it, because he suffered it right there with me. In this way, I don't put up with it in anticipation of going to heaven. Instead, heaven itself has come to me in my suffering. The suffering remains real, but it is suffered WITH the divinity itself. That is a game changer for the poor and the oppressed and the outcast.

4) It certainly makes it easier knowing that God himself has gone through all of it with us.

(December 17, 2016 at 7:37 am)RozKek Wrote: @Ignorant

Does he suffer with the ones that he pretermined will go to hell?

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Does he burn in hell with them for eternities? Is it just to doom someone to eternal burning and suffering?

just gonna quote meself C:

(December 17, 2016 at 8:26 am)RozKek Wrote: I wonder where the fuck they came with that god is in another dimension and all that shit, was it written in the bible? Is it logical to make up loads of shit just to keep your beliefs intact?

Yea this is actually very interesting. Where do theists get this "god is outside of time" stuff? Or the idea that god is in another dimension? Or that "god exists in a place we couldn't begin to comprehend" or "god itself is beyond our comprehension?" I'm sure the basis for some of this stuff is in the bible but it honestly seems like a lot of it is just made up as they go along.

(December 17, 2016 at 7:37 am)RozKek Wrote: @Ignorant

Does he suffer with the ones that he pretermined will go to hell? [1]

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Does he burn in hell with them for eternities? [2] Is it just to doom someone to eternal burning and suffering?

1) In this life, he suffers with everyone, not just those who will go to heaven.

2) No, but this is a position which the Church allows some differing views. I personally believe that Jesus suffered the principle suffering of hell, i.e. his human soul was deprived of the share in the divinity to which it was united. But that is not to say that he suffers-with those people currently in hell. Their lives amount to a rejection of god's presence (i.e. their temporal lives manifest an eternal choice to live without god - which is the principle reality of hell).

As long as you are alive, god suffers with you.

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(December 17, 2016 at 8:37 am)operator Wrote:

(December 17, 2016 at 8:26 am)RozKek Wrote: I wonder where the fuck they came with that god is in another dimension and all that shit, was it written in the bible? Is it logical to make up loads of shit just to keep your beliefs intact?

Yea this is actually very interesting. Where do theists get this "god is outside of time" stuff? Or the idea that god is in another dimension? Or that "god exists in a place we couldn't begin to comprehend" or "god itself is beyond our comprehension?" I'm sure the basis for some of this stuff is in the bible but it honestly seems like a lot of it is just made up as they go along.

I personally find it to be both bad philosophy and bad theology.

(December 17, 2016 at 7:05 am)Ignorant Wrote: He wrote himself in as the one who experiences all of those rapes, murders, hunger, and tragedies (he really suffers the experience of every particular rape, murder, hunger and tragedy) on the cross. He never wrote a single moment of suffering into the story without writing his own suffering of that same moment.

This is something that seems creepy to me. It also seems excessive and, in the end, not very useful.

Humans are made in the image of god, which means we can empathize and sympathize with others. We can understand many feelings on some level and share many common experiences, so we are driven to be compassionate when we hear of someone going through a particularly bad experience. We may not have gone through the experience ourselves, but we feel compelled to express that compassion in various ways. We know that there are humans who have risked their lives --and lost them-- in order to spare someone else a particular fate. We know that humans give of their money and time to help people who are poor and hungry. Who have been through the trauma of rape or are feeling suicidal. Who have seen the horrors of war, and so on. Many of the people who volunteer their time and money have not experienced these things, or have not done so on the same level. Yet they are compelled to help.

Why would Jesus need to experience EVERY SINGLE human tragedy in order to understand it, or to act to alleviate it? Was he incapable of empathy or sympathy? Was God just a soulless automaton until he hung on the cross and experienced millions of individual events of suffering and pain? Why wouldn't such a traumatic experience convince him to do something about it right then and there, instead of leaving humanity hanging for almost two thousand years now, during which even more people have suffered the experiences that he now understands on a direct and personal level? Perhaps he was driven mad by the experience? Or perhaps his return to godhood made the whole thing so manageable that he was able to shake it off? Even a single traumatic experience can completely ruin a person. So many all at once would have forced a normal person's brain to shut down for good. Maybe God cannot feel empathy or sympathy for us because his super-brain is impervious to the effects of traumatic human experience?

(December 17, 2016 at 2:03 am)robvalue Wrote: God creating reality, knowing every detail of what will happen the instant he creates it, is akin to him writing a very complicated story. He writes every word. He writes every murder, rape, AIDS baby and hurricane. He could have changed any of those details so that something else happens at that precise time, since he has an infinite numbers of scenarios to choose from and he has no boundaries (so we're usually told).

In this story he decides to write, for some reason he thinks making some elements of it self aware is a good idea. Let some poor bastards endure all the rape, murder, hunger and tragedy. Sure, they get to enjoy some good times too. But that doesn't justify all the bad stuff he's choosing to write in. He knows the bad stuff will happen. He could have missed every and any single instance of it out. But he didn't. Sadist.

You contradict yourself with this position. If God predetermined our every thought and action, then there is no "self" that is aware.

Put another way - I think, therefore I am. If God has predetermined my every thought, then I don't think, and I am not.

(December 17, 2016 at 9:36 am)Tonus Wrote: This is something that seems creepy to me.  It also seems excessive and, in the end, not very useful.

Humans are made in the image of god, which means we can empathize and sympathize with others. We can understand many feelings on some level and share many common experiences, so we are driven to be compassionate when we hear of someone going through a particularly bad experience.  We may not have gone through the experience ourselves, but we feel compelled to express that compassion in various ways. [1] We know that there are humans who have risked their lives --and lost them-- in order to spare someone else a particular fate.  We know that humans give of their money and time to help people who are poor and hungry.  Who have been through the trauma of rape or are feeling suicidal.  Who have seen the horrors of war, and so on.  Many of the people who volunteer their time and money have not experienced these things, or have not done so on the same level.  Yet they are compelled to help.

Why would Jesus need to experience EVERY SINGLE human tragedy in order to understand it, or to act to alleviate it? [2] Was he incapable of empathy or sympathy? [3] Was God just a soulless automaton until he hung on the cross and experienced millions of individual events of suffering and pain? [4] Why wouldn't such a traumatic experience convince him to do something about it right then and there, instead of leaving humanity hanging for almost two thousand years now, during which even more people have suffered the experiences that he now understands on a direct and personal level? [5] Perhaps he was driven mad by the experience?  Or perhaps his return to godhood made the whole thing so manageable that he was able to shake it off? [6] Even a single traumatic experience can completely ruin a person.  So many all at once would have forced a normal person's brain to shut down for good. [7] Maybe God cannot feel empathy or sympathy for us because his super-brain is impervious to the effects of traumatic human experience? [8]

1) Yes. Our hearts "feel" the pain of others. So in an abstract sense, we "suffer with" them when we are compassionate.

2) He didn't need to do any of it. It is just what he did. 

You don't need to physically travel to Syria and experience people's suffering there in order to empathize and feel compassion for the Syrian people. If you did, however, feel so moved by that compassion so as to travel there to provide some sort of help while suffering with them, I don't think you would find that strange at all. I think you might even admire such a person. The person whose compassion moves them to give money to help those in Syria are also commendable, but something tells me that there is something more admirable in the former case.

3) Like you said before, the image of god means the ability to empathize and be compassionate. Not only was he capable of empathy and compassion, but empathy compassion and mercy are what define the relationship between god and humanity. Mercy (which is active compassion which restores what is lacking) is the entire purpose of God becoming human.

4) No. What happened on the cross revealed something about the nature of reality. I.e. God has been with us since the moment of creation, and our sins did not turn him away. Our sins are related to our suffering, but they are not enough to keep god out of our lives. His disposition is to restore any of our lacking either in this life or the next. He has always been with us in a transcendent and abstract way even when we sin, always there calling us back to the good. In Christ however, he now suffers with us as a human in a concrete way. It isn't hidden. We can look at Jesus on the cross and see the reality of God's being so close to humanity that he even suffers what humanity suffers. In other words, how can we know that god is compassionate and merciful toward humanity? Because we can see god himself enduring all human suffering on the cross, swallow it up, and restore humanity to its fullness in the resurrection. That's what we see, anyway.

5) That's the thing. He did do something about it, right there and then. He rose from the dead. That is what awaits us all. He told us that the cross waits for us all in our own ways, but the cross is not the final chapter, and neither is death. Life has the final say, and not merely human life, but a human life which shares in the divine life. That is what awaits us. That is what awaits everyone who knows that god suffers human life in Jesus so that humanity may enjoy god's life in Jesus.

6) Well, that's kind of what happens for Christians. Faith is a real share in the divine life. It gives knowledge of the reality of suffering, redemption, and resurrection. That divine knowledge gives new meaning to suffering and makes it manageable.

7) Maybe even sweat blood! No, seriously though, I think you're right about that.

8) Well that is the thing. God united humanity to "his super-brain". He CAN empathize and sympathize BOTH as God AND as human. As many of the church fathers were fond of saying: God became man so that man might become like god. God became human to suffer with humanity, so that humanity could enjoy divinity with god.