Quote: So let me get this straight.... You think this incredibly loving and compassionate deity allows children to be born with life altering conditions so that they can develop "courage", "compassion" or "unconditional love"? And what about babies that are born with such severe problems that they spend their entire lives unresponsive? How does someone with a condition like this ever develop any virtues whatsoever? And if this is how your deity helps develop virtues, he's an incredible prick. I'll pass on developing "courage" if it means I have my sight.
It allows for others to have unconditional love on the other on their human dignity alone.
Quote: And all those tots that were drowned? They never had a chance to exercise "free will", did they?
free will means that are actions have real reprucussions. So when somone does something stupid it really affects other people, and often times it affects the innocents. In the case of free will and birth defects, God typically allows for the world to continue on in a contingent manner.
Quote: So drowning swaths of children is justifiable because "at some point in the future something great will occur"? The mind just boggles....
that and a being like God is the only kind of being that could justifiably take any life. But further God also knows the sunjunctive actions of each individual. So He would have known what each of those who drowned would have done had they not drowned, and we can assume that they would have been evil, or else God makes a way for them through some other means.
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You're right.... your analogy fails on many levels. The simplest of which is that people voluntarily join a football team. I don't think any children VOLUNTEERED for drowning.
Children don't volunteer to eat their vegetables but a loving parent will make them anyway.