(September 26, 2011 at 6:26 am)tackattack Wrote: 1- God was allowing me to have free will to stray from the path he preferred for me. I agree the meeting and reward would have taken place regardless. I asked my boss this morning what caused him to submit the paperwork. He said, “something just told me I needed to”. And he’s moderately religious. That’s not the point though. Please explain how the timing of everything as well as the quantities matched up so exactly to my request.
2- One and a half to 2 weeks and it was day 2 or 3. I’m aware it could have been a placebo, then a few months ago he scraped his knee and leg rally bad falling off his Bike. He wanted me to pray for him, but honestly he was doing stupid tricks and while I felt bad that my son was in pain, I had told him not to play on the bike ramp with the big boys. I prayed with him, letting him do most of the talking and my only thoughts regarding his wounds were “you did it to yourself” mentality. The pain didn’t instantly cease, despite the fact that verbally the 2 prayers were practically the same, merely the intents and causes were different. Would the same placebo affect worked on him a second time?
Firstly, to thebigfudge you said that it happens 'quite often' that people pray for a sick kid to get better and they do. This may be the case but all that's really saying is 'a lot of people pray for sick kids'. Also what happens a lot is they don't get better at all and they die after enduring a lot of agonising pain. Cancer goes into remission sometimes. The prayers are absolutely incidental to the recovery. By ignoring all the times the prayers don't 'work', that is confirmation bias. It's fine to say 'cumulatively, all these times prayers get answered and the kid gets better is indicative that prayer works', as long as you also knock points off every time nothing happens. It's not a fair test, it's rigged.
Now onto your two ridiculous stories. The timing appears to be a thing known as COINCIDENCE. However, it's actually also another example of your confirmation bias. You're saying 'oh how brilliant, a few days after I failed to give my church money I got some money' - surely it would have been more impressive if you'd got the bonus the week before and didn't have to miss paying your dues in the first place? Or if God had helped you manage your money better beforehand so you weren't in the financial shit? You're ignoring all the places where things went wrong and only picking the good. Praise God!
Finally, this addendum to the second story tells you all you need to know. Just because you didn't pray to make your kid's leg better, your son did. And nothing happened. I cannot believe this needs pointing out to you. So does God ignore the pleas of children in pain, so it's only adults he listens to? Or have you personally got a hotline to him not afforded to your son and others?
It's almost like....get this...sometimes good things happen to you, and sometimes they don't! Sometimes pain goes away quicker than expected, and sometimes...IT DOESN'T!
Finally, would you mind telling me when you last prayed to Shiva?
