(February 7, 2016 at 1:15 pm)BlackBird Wrote: Wait, wait. So if God won't show himself because to do so would invalidate my free will, what does that mean for Adam and Eve? Noah? Abraham? Moses? Any of the prophets? So are you telling me now that most of the major characters in the bible didn't have free will? Why should God care for my free will and not theirs?
Precisely.
Adam and Eve were (according to the story) in the presence of god, and yet disobeyed him. Cain slew Able despite having spoken to God.
And what of Pharaoh's free will? God hardened his heart in the story of Exodus. Apparently it was fine to mess with his free will so that he wouldn't do what God wanted him to do so God could do what he wanted to do to get Pharaoh to do what he wanted him to do. (Confused yet? And you thought him sacrificing himself to himself to change a rule he himself made was weird!)
As for the issue of 'why are we predisposed to belief', I think part of it has to do with how accepting we are during the early development of our brains. For example a child is more prone to believe that monsters lurk in the dark. Checking for the monster under the bed only suggests to the child that the monster is real. This makes them more afraid. It's why as a parent, and a lot of parents I know don't check under the bed or in the closet for monsters. Instead we tell them that there's no such thing as monsters. A parent who insists that there is a god, instills that idea in their childrens minds I presume. Even unintentionally.
The whole tone of Church teaching in regard to woman is, to the last degree, contemptuous and degrading. - Elizabeth Cady Stanton
