God Is Evil

[Bad Writer]

According to the Catholic Church, which, unless I'm mistaken, you're a part of, Ronedee, your priests can absolve all sin in the moment of confession. Last minute pleas for forgiveness are the bread and butter of your religion. Are you...gasp...moving away from all that?

[ronedee]

According to the Catholic Church, which, unless I'm mistaken, you're a part of, Ronedee, your priests can absolve all sin in the moment of confession. Last minute pleas for forgiveness are the bread and butter of your religion. Are you...gasp...moving away from all that?

...confession is NOTHING w/o a "contrite heart".

So... no, it won't help you in the end. Unless of course.....

[Bad Writer]

Yes, my excitement was a little preemptive.

[Beta Ray Bill]

Maybe God is simply not bound to your definition or understanding of the word love.

Okay then, let's look at a definition of love that I agree with:

love
ləv/
noun
1. an intense feeling of deep affection.
synonyms: deep affection, fondness, tenderness, warmth, intimacy, attachment, endearment;

Let's see how that holds up in the Bible:

1 John 4:7-8 Beloved, let us love one another, for love is from God, and whoever loves has been born of God and knows God. Anyone who does not love does not know God, because God is love.

Okay, that sounds nice. Let's try another word:

e·vil
ˈēvəl/
noun
1. profound immorality, wickedness, and depravity, esp. when regarded as a supernatural force.
synonyms: wickedness, bad, badness, wrongdoing, sin, ill, immorality, vice, iniquity, degeneracy, corruption, depravity, villainy, nefariousness, malevolence

Let's see how this holds up in the Bible:

I form the light, and create darkness: I make peace, and create evil: I the Lord do all these things.
—Isaiah 45:7

Wait, wait, wait! Hold the phone! I thought "God is love." How can God be love and yet be a creator of evil? How can someone that is supposed to, by a standard definition, be "an intense feeling of deep affection," and yet create "profound immorality, wickedness, and depravity?"

This statement from a website (http://www.patheos.com/blogs/daylightath...ates-evil/) says it better than I can:

"The text offers numerous occasions where God could have intervened to turn events to good and chose not to. He could, for example, have obliterated Satan and the rebel angels entirely, or at the very least confined them to Hell and not allowed them to escape, so that they could never have escaped to lead humanity into temptation. And God’s behavior in the whole Eden affair, in any case, smacks strongly of either extreme incompetence or deliberate malice – not least, his choice to transmit the curse of original sin to all subsequent generations rather than letting every human start off with a morally clean slate."

You say God is not bound by "my" interpretation of love. The Word of God says that he is love. How else am I supposed to understand it? What other definition is there? I've asked this on other threads: why would God make the Bible so confusing? Shouldn't he have written it, or at least guided the human writers so that it was clear, concise and unable to be debated?

If I am in error in some way, please, tell me what your definition of the love of God is, because if you think that I don't understand something, I honestly want to know what that is!

[Esquilax]

...confession is NOTHING w/o a "contrite heart".

So... no, it won't help you in the end. Unless of course.....

Then may I ask what the point of confession is, in that case?

I mean, religion has a single "product," in broad terms, and that's salvation; how does confession aid toward that goal if you can do it and it won't help you into heaven?

[Drich]

-or

Maybe God is simply not bound to your definition or understanding of the word love.

In which case it isn't love. Whether or not it is evil is still open - it could be total indifference, or it is merely the implementation of God's agenda on us which has nothing to do with any of these things (assuming his existence of course).

So, if your 14 year old daughter wants her 22 year old boy friend to move into her room in your house and you tell her no, then proceed to call the cops on the child predator, is it because you do not love her? What if she says "if you love me you won't call the cops and will allow him to stay?" Does that change your love for her even though you do not meet the CONDITIONS of her specific understanding of 'love?'

Of course it doesn't, because no matter how her mind has been twisted to only understand a love that serves her selfish wants and desires, the absolute standard and meaning of agape in this case does not change. Which brings me back to my orginal point. Perhaps God's love is not your version of love.

[Captain Colostomy]

Which brings me back to my orginal point. Perhaps God's love is not your version of love.

God's version of love is so twisted and provisional that this statement of yours gets a big 'Well, DUH!!!' from me at least.

[Bad Writer]

A law-abiding citizen would not accept the daughter's version of love the same way people nowadays shouldn't really care about Yahweh's version.

[Esquilax]

Of course it doesn't, because no matter how her mind has been twisted to only understand a love that serves her selfish wants and desires, the absolute standard and meaning of agape in this case does not change. Which brings me back to my orginal point. Perhaps God's love is not your version of love.

Isn't it funny how willing you are to tell us what god's love isn't, yet you're remarkably coy about what god's love actually is?

Please do: I'm in need of some new argument to chew on.

[Bad Writer]