(August 25, 2023 at 12:20 pm)Vicki Q Wrote: Therein lies the problem. Aquinas came up with the modern idea of miracle as something outside nature. In this view, God sits around all day drinking tea, occasionally popping into our world to alter something He doesn't like before putting on another brew. This is seriously misleading.
The NT view is that God is always at work mysteriously within His battered but still beautiful world, and sometimes acts in unexpected ways. The New Testament speaks of ‘powerful’ or ‘unexpected’ deeds; of ‘paradoxes’.
God’s powerful presence is everywhere within the world, the hidden text that interprets and sometimes brings healing and hope to ordinary events. The early Christians saw this kind of thing as a genuine sign, an advance anticipation, of the new creation which Isaiah promised. These are glimpses of a new creation.
Quote:Since God granting prayers is impossible on the face of it (both teams praying to win, for example), the only option left is that God never grants any prayers, ever.
Because God is not a slot machine that does what we tell Him, asking for action in a football match is not a proper or meaningful use of prayer. Unless it's Liverpool vs Man Utd, obviously.
Either miracles are rare, or they are common.
Either miracles break natural order, or are indistinguishable from natural events.
Rare + Breaks Nature: God's existence can't be often tested, but surely "big" events like the Holocaust would result in miracles, but none are seen.
Rare + Natural: Why imagine a God at all?
Common + Natural: How is God distingushable from nature?
Common + Breaks Nature: God's existence is verifiable, and would have been verified. God would be part of science. Magic would be real.
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Miracles are nonsense given the type of world we live in.