Atheist friend said something that devastated me

[ZoonCorp]

Long story short, we were discussing the topic of “truth” via Skype. It all began with that I said that i think its wrong that so many people in my home country Sweden practices fornication. To that, he replied something like: “Who are YOU to judge people? Would you like it if I were to rule your life? Is fornication really that bad?”

To that, I answered something like: “Well, actually I’m no one to judge anyone. But if you were to know better about something, and you knew that your knowledge is the right one, it certainly would be better if you told me what is right and what is wrong. What if my view on fornication is the right one? There can not be ‘my’ truth and ‘your’ truth. If there would be multiple truths, they wouldn’t be true anymore. There can only be one single truth, regardless of what people think.”

That’s when the discussion started about what is true and what is not.

Then my atheist friend continued: “I could say that I am an the only true god, with the goal of making life hard for people. You wouldn’t be able to prove me wrong?”

I didn’t know what to say, so I said:

• “There is no evidence that it would be so.”
• “Then how will you prove me wrong?”
• “Is that even relevant? In that case, you have not done so well.”
• “Or have I? I may have driven you away from the true path, in a big practical joke against my creator.”
• “If you are someones creation, there are someone higher than you, which would mean that he had good intentions.”
  “Do you see how much I can go on to claim that I am the one true god, and make it impossible for you to prove that it is not so?”
• “It’s not impossible. It’s about what is rue and what is not. Some people may think that you are right, while other will know that you are wrong. Those who know that you are wrong therefore knows the truth.”
• “So the people who doesn’t believe in my divinity, despite the impossibility of proving me wrong, possesses the truth?”
• “Yes.”
• “You have just thought like an atheist!”
• “But do you know that you are right?”
• “Well, I am the true god, am I not? You can’t prove me wrong, yet you say that I am wrong.”

Now I really regret ever talking to him. I have always been 100% sure that my faith is the truth and that God exists. I still want to believe so, but after this discussion I feel unsure. What says that Catholicism is the truth and that God exists? How can we know for sure? I certainly need help with this so that I can return to God, fully believing in Him. It’s a strange feeling: One side of me tells me that I do indeed possess the truth, the other side tells me that I can’t be sure that I do.

I feel terrible for even thinking like this, I feel lost. I used to have a really strong faith, and I let an atheist persuade me because I’m not good at arguing.

 

[Trishie]

People can argue all they want but the reality of God remains.
And you know for absolute certainty that your friend is not God.
He did not create the world, the huge universe.
He is a mere man prone to illness and death. You bought into his premise but it was a false one. You would be unwise to argue with him furthers, better to avoid him if you cannot avoid being drawn into his mindset.
You accepted his premise but his argument was false. You could in fact prove he is not God.

If you, dear soul, are persuaded by word then let me share some of my own

Mystery of Redemption

Holy God, we do not grasp how awesome and incomprehensible are Your truths. We mistake our conceptions regarding You as the essence of the reality that they fail to encapsulate. Human Reason cannot make sense of God becoming subject to obedience, humility, selflessness and suffering, in love for His creatures! Thus, while we seek You, we are required to trust as little children.

We can only suspect a flicker of the magnitude of this God through His Creation of a stunningly vast universe containing massive expanding galaxies in an immensity of space. Yet, God of such greatness, You also create the fragile intricacy of tiny insects and the worlds of microscopic lifeforms in their intrinsic perfection! Holy God, open our minds and hearts to the supreme greatness and the sublime mystery of Your works!

From our tiny planet, so important to us but insignificant amongst the countless orbits of the universe, we dare to say ‘our God’ and ‘our Father’ in contemplating the Creator of all these marvels and capable of unknown wonders inconceivable to us. Perhaps the greatest wonder, however, is the love and mercy You show to Your human creatures on this planet, Earth!

All things are held in being in continuous creation within You. Yet, to our knowledge, only human creatures dare to sin. You require of us a life of charity and justice, of prayer and self-denial, of trust and faithfulness during our earthly existence—in promise of everlasting union with the everlasting I AM WHO AM, which is Yourself. Slow to trust, we are reluctant to accept sacred Your dream and plan for us as individuals and as community. The choice to reject or accept is ours.

The Angels, whom You created before us, also faced a choice to love and honour God or to serve themselves. Two-thirds obeyed God and now dwell with You in glory and delight. To the rebellious remainder, punishment was swift. Doubtless, You gave these glorious creatures generous opportunity to fulfil their radiant destiny!

Yet many people habitually accept Your revelations and promises with spasmodic attention or with vague complacency. Before so great a God, the purest human zeal and the highest knowledge and goodness are as nothing. How intense should be our gratitude before the wonder of our relation to You. How great our repentance should be before the arrogance of neglecting our Creator’s laws and astonishing mercy! Holy God please lead us through awareness, repentance and rebirth into continuing spontaneity of response to Your creative love!

So that we in our unworthiness may be saved and made whole, through Your mercy the seeming-impossible occurs. The eternal Son of God enters the limitations of created time and matter. He assumes fully our humanity, while also retaining His infinite divinity. With His humble, obedient life as human being, He bridges the immeasurably vast difference between God and creature for all humankind!

In our disobedience and ingratitude, our God, You have not destroyed us, but have become for us—a defenceless infant…a humble labourer…a man murdered by Your chosen people. You have become for all time, food to be assimilated into the functions of the human body and soul of mere creatures, devout and lukewarm alike. You have become bread to be tabernacled in centuries of neglect before multitudes of unbelievers and of apathetic followers…cherished only by Your true friends. Yet even these have not lived without offence against You, excepting one pure woman, chosen as Mother—for the Son did not enter our nature in resplendence as a magnificent adult. Rather, the Father humbly, through an Angel, sought permission of the sinless young virgin to accept Him as a helpless embryo!

What is this humility, this faith, this patience, this obedience, this compassion that You show us, infinite God! We are proud, stubborn, untrusting and wayward, yet Your mercy remains open to endless human insult, for within time it is always subject to our personal acceptance or rejection. Repeatedly, You reiterate Your love and mercy in our hearts and through other persons. You reiterate them through Scripture and ministry of the Church, source of grace, sacrament and wisdom established by the Son to fulfil His promise to remain always with us.

Our God, who are You who so loves His ungrateful, ignorant, unworthy creatures! Behold the humility of eternal, infinite God, to love and desire us who are enmeshed in egoism that alienates us from each other and You! We begin to suspect the smallness of our vision, the confusion of our understanding, and the flawed nature of our enthroned Reason, with its inability to cope with these unfathomable, paradoxical truths.

Should we, in contemplating such things, wonder at human suffering! We begin to appreciate Jesus’ warning that unless one becomes as a little child one cannot enter God. We also begin to understand some of the causes of difficulties within our human condition, of the conflicts and miseries of our world, and of the corruption of our society in social and personal injustice and discord.

continued

 

[Trishie]

We may regret or resent these global difficulties and evils, and our personal sufferings. We seek to evade them and to avoid discipline of our sensuality and materialism that bind us from the Spirit of God in our lives. We cling to our bonds although we are created for the freedom of eternal union with You our almighty Creator, despite the redeeming anguish, love, humility and submission of God incarnate in His forging of our bridge to You.

Yet should we not welcome that where You permit, we are tested in faith, labour and suffering to loosen excessive attachment to our limited mortal existence! Our need of You is often diverted into search for material satisfaction that increases our frustration and confirms our failure to love others and You truly.

When we choose against God, we curtail the working of Your grace in our lives. This choice draws disaster upon us in the form of injustice, intolerance, loneliness, immorality and war. If we then resent and blame You, we mock ourselves, because You owe us nothing, but offer all. Should it surprise us that sin brings retribution? Should we wonder why we endure natural disasters, when we betray the Creator of all things?
*

We are often aggrieved at the suffering of innocents, but answer lies in the racked body of the sinless Saviour. Jesus hangs dying in grief and pain to expiate the offences of all human persons for our eternal salvation. Through Jesus, lead us into childlike faith and cheerful daily acceptance of our vocations with their satisfactions and their difficulties.

Give us the spirit of the child whom You wish each to be as we say, “Here I am. Your will be done in and through me. Through Your Son, lead me beyond myself, beyond all created things, into Your infinite, loving self, in union with the communion of saints.”

Our God, as the consecrated bread is the infinite Son of God, yet is brittle, mutable wafer, so let me be one in You despite my frailty and unworthiness. Great God, Creator of all things, thank You for Your gifts of creation and existence, and for the mercy that restores Creation and eternal blessedness to Your difficult human creatures.

Have mercy, our God, for our limited understanding, our misconceptions, our pride and our self-doubts, along with the stark realities and sufferings of this world, frequently lead many of us to falter in faith or to abandon it completely.
We believe Lord God. Please increase our faith.*

 

[Trishie]

And some more:

Meditation on eternity and conversion

**Eternal God, we cannot view existence in concepts other than in time or its cessation. The prospect of eternity seems always mysterious, sometimes unreal and occasionally alienating—unless we base our contemplation of eternal happiness in childlike trust alone. **

**Please strengthen our faith, for we may confuse our inability to comprehend Your realities, as absence of the realities themselves. Then, embroiled in the occupations and joys of our lives, or discouraged in life’s disappointments and losses, we may come to trust only in temporal reality. **

When we live only in the present reality, we cannot believe in our Creator as loving Parent, as Redeemer, or as guiding Spirit, with intimate relevance to our individual lives. Yet it appears even to the goldfish in his bowl, that his observation and response to his environment and experience is absolute. Clearly, he also is mistaken.

In abandoning faith, we betray our souls that long for union in Your love. We lose true joy, love and liberty in faith—receiving a stone, a scorpion, a snake, instead of living Bread and Water. Give us faith to penetrate confusion that envelops even some dedicated souls. Only Your gentle, loving mercy can make us the little children of Your Kingdom that Jesus knows we must be.

Our God, the wonder and beauty of Your Creation, from the universe itself to some exquisitely simple life form, may lead the astonished mind to You, yet also away. Our perceptions are fallible and subjective even in the summit of scientific and poetic response, and may be guided by whim, personality, or circumstance. Let us cherish Your works and cease to abuse them at a physical, technological, or spiritual level. Let them serve to give us appropriate recreation and wholeness as individuals who are both body and spirit.

God, we do not want to remain separate from You. Please fortify our faith so that trials become impetus for our growth. You love and educate us tenderly and patiently, however wounded, disobedient and impatient we are. Even chosen souls may dilute Your truths or limit Your offered gifts of service. Please grant healing and endurance so we may share the richness of Your love with many others.

Yours are the thoughts and ways of almighty God who creates in slow evolution. Your Spirit’s action is often indiscernible in our lives and in the lives of others. You nevertheless use each moment of effort and peace, of faltering and repentance, together with each act of mercy and faith, to mold each willing soul to Your intended image of it. We place our whole existence, with our sinfulness and failures, our gifts and achievements, into Your care.

If we drift from Your ways, however deep our error, please restore us quickly through Your indwelling Spirit, with the teachings of Jesus, His merciful forgiveness, and the encouragement of others. Preserve us from rejecting You through unbalanced devotion or attachment. Grant us genuine prayer and conversion despite temptations that assail us.

God, please give us faith to accept mysteries beyond human experience and reason. Give us hope that endures beyond repeated crises and losses, and love that continues to live in a broken heart. Let us experience Your love for us, and grant others to find Your loving-kindness in us. Silence our distractions and anxieties. Overcome in us the tyrannies of sin, temptation and addiction. Lead us into the way and truth of Your divine Son, who took upon Himself our nature and raised it to Your life that we may become Your children beside Him.

Please fill us with overwhelming desire for Your loving will. We trust and hope in the promise of Your Son—that those who hunger for Your life will be filled. By His promise, we know that the Spirit will transform us, preparing us for the communion of Saints and Angels in fulfillment of Your will. Eternal God, grant us to respond fully to Your will, in the name and Spirit of Your Son.

“The actions of every creature are before Him, there is no hiding from His eyes; His gaze stretches from eternity to eternity, and nothing can astonish Him. You must not say, ‘What is this? Why is that?’ All things have been created for their proper functions.” [Ecclesiasticus 39:19-26]

 

[Trishie]

The only thing an atheist can say with honesty and authenticity is that they don’t believe there is a God. But someone who says “there is no God” can never really prove it. Or are they prepared to say they know absolutely everything?
In honesty, atheists should call themselves agnostics
It is a huge arrogance that they cannot support to say, there is no God.
And many things can indicate the presence of God.
And there are indeed miracles of God’s action and grace that show His reality, aside from the wonder of the universe!

I can tell you some I personally have seen, but that is my experience, and apart from the fact that it isn’t permissible to share such personal experiences in this forum, why should you believe me as you don’t know me.
However many people can attest to miracles of God’s grace in their lives and in others.
You have not been wrong. God exists, and our faith is true.

And there are not a multitude of truths, only a multitude of opinions, only God’s truth is the ultimate truth.
Your friend’s so-called truth is ‘opinion’ and even if all the world have a wrong opinion that they thought was truth, they would be wrong if their opinion did not agree with God’s Truth.

You are vulnerable and you are better to cut off this friend if he is a threat to your peace. Jesus spoke of cutting off what is harm to the soul.

May God bless you.

 

[Pfaffenhoffen]

Long story short, we were discussing the topic of “truth” via Skype. It all began with that I said that i think its wrong that so many people in my home country Sweden practices fornication. To that, he replied something like: “Who are YOU to judge people? Would you like it if I were to rule your life? Is fornication really that bad?”

To that, I answered something like: “Well, actually I’m no one to judge anyone. But if you were to know better about something, and you knew that your knowledge is the right one, it certainly would be better if you told me what is right and what is wrong. What if my view on fornication is the right one? There can not be ‘my’ truth and ‘your’ truth. If there would be multiple truths, they wouldn’t be true anymore. There can only be one single truth, regardless of what people think.”

That’s when the discussion started about what is true and what is not.

Then my atheist friend continued: “I could say that I am an the only true god, with the goal of making life hard for people. You wouldn’t be able to prove me wrong?”

I didn’t know what to say, so I said:

• “There is no evidence that it would be so.”
• “Then how will you prove me wrong?”
• “Is that even relevant? In that case, you have not done so well.”
• “Or have I? I may have driven you away from the true path, in a big practical joke against my creator.”
• “If you are someones creation, there are someone higher than you, which would mean that he had good intentions.”
  “Do you see how much I can go on to claim that I am the one true god, and make it impossible for you to prove that it is not so?”
• “It’s not impossible. It’s about what is rue and what is not. Some people may think that you are right, while other will know that you are wrong. Those who know that you are wrong therefore knows the truth.”
• “So the people who doesn’t believe in my divinity, despite the impossibility of proving me wrong, possesses the truth?”
• “Yes.”
• “You have just thought like an atheist!”
• “But do you know that you are right?”
• “Well, I am the true god, am I not? You can’t prove me wrong, yet you say that I am wrong.”

Now I really regret ever talking to him. I have always been 100% sure that my faith is the truth and that God exists. I still want to believe so, but after this discussion I feel unsure. What says that Catholicism is the truth and that God exists? How can we know for sure? I certainly need help with this so that I can return to God, fully believing in Him. It’s a strange feeling: One side of me tells me that I do indeed possess the truth, the other side tells me that I can’t be sure that I do.

I feel terrible for even thinking like this, I feel lost. I used to have a really strong faith, and I let an atheist persuade me because I’m not good at arguing.

Remember: you are not good at arguing. So, you are easily defeated. That does not mean you are wrong. It means that the other is good at arguing.
Remember: you never lose. Your Faith is the Right one. OK? You simply lost an argument.
Remember: if you take your time, you will find a good argument for everything in the Roman Catholic Church. A good or a better argument than anybody else.
Remember: you are in rock solid foundation. Come here with every argument and you will find good help.

His argument is easy: you cannot prove anything to anybody. If somebody does not want to accept something, he can find arguments till the end of the world. That is what your atheist friend did.

I tell you, I can prove that I do not exist
I can prove that you do not exist.
I can prove that the Earth is a cube and not a sphere.
Anything stupid I can prove, because I can bring any stupid argument I want, like saying that I am god. Or that I have got 4 legs (2 invisible) and 5 arms (3 invisible!)

I let you with my favorite. Somebody says “All is relative!”. It is very common this argument, though I cannot say it well in English.
Then, if everything is relative, then this sentence “All is relative!” is also relative ! Maybe it is nor true. So, if it is not true, not all is relative. But i said so.
And so on…

 

[1ke]

Why did his nonsensical statement devastate you?

He claims to be God, yet has not one attribute of God. If he is God it is up to him to prove his claim, not up to you to disprove it.

Jesus claimed to be God. He raised the dead, cured the blind, lame, possesed, and ill with a command, calmed a storm with a wave of his hand, transfigured before his Apostles, and rose from the dead. Let’s see your friend do any of those things.

 

[Leegal]

The only thing an atheist can say with honesty and authenticity is that they don’t believe there is a God. But someone who says “there is no God” can never really prove it.
You are vulnerable and you are better to cut off this friend if he is a threat to your peace. Jesus spoke of cutting off what is harm to the soul.

May God bless you.

I agree here. What your friend said has no proof – he does not believe in God, but he wants you to refute that he is not God, so he sticks you with an argument that is invalid. He used circular logic to tangle you up and get you confused. He tried to force you to prove a negative – something that is impossible. When he said “prove that I am not God”, you should have cut it off there because a negative cannot be proven. Of course, we know he is not – but for debate the “not” cannot be debated.

I also agree here and with others – do not let tempation lead you astray. This may be a test. I would not discuss this further with this “friend” – if he is one. A friend would not do this to you – try and harm you in your faith. He would respect it – not challenge it - as a friend.

God Bless.

 

[VeritasLuxMea]

Why did his nonsensical statement devastate you?

He claims to be God, yet has not one attribute of God. If he is God it is up to him to prove his claim, not up to you to disprove it.

Jesus claimed to be God. He raised the dead, cured the blind, lame, possesed, and ill with a command, calmed a storm with a wave of his hand, transfigured before his Apostles, and rose from the dead. Let’s see your friend do any of those things.

And that has to be proven, too! Silly!

 

[cerad2]

Jesus claimed to be God. He raised the dead, cured the blind, lame, possesed, and ill with a command, calmed a storm with a wave of his hand, transfigured before his Apostles, and rose from the dead. Let’s see your friend do any of those things.

I don’t understand your point. I too am god. I raised some dead last week. Before that I cured some blind folks. I not only fixed up some lame people but, unlike some divine beings that I could name, I even restored some amputee’s limbs.

Not convinced? Too bad. I’m god and I’m not under any obligation to prove anything to you. And best of all, you can’t prove that I’m not.

 

[1ke]

And that has to be proven, too! Silly!

Of course it has been, he did so before witnesses.

 

[Charlemagne_II]

No atheist can say anything that should devastate you. The atheist has only faith that there is no God. He has no proof whatever. Match your faith against his. There are many more reasons to believe in God than to set yourself up as God, which is the main argument of atheism: knocking god down so that you can be the supreme judge of who is right and who is wrong.

 

[cerad2]

I wonder if you might be able to convince a handful of willing friends to follow you around and be on your team. Then they will tell others about you! And so on, and so on.

And why would I want to do that? I don’t crave attention or demand worship.

 

[Julian0404]

Long story short, we were discussing the topic of “truth” via Skype. It all began with that I said that i think its wrong that so many people in my home country Sweden practices fornication. To that, he replied something like: “Who are YOU to judge people? Would you like it if I were to rule your life? Is fornication really that bad?”

To that, I answered something like: “Well, actually I’m no one to judge anyone. But if you were to know better about something, and you knew that your knowledge is the right one, it certainly would be better if you told me what is right and what is wrong. What if my view on fornication is the right one? There can not be ‘my’ truth and ‘your’ truth. If there would be multiple truths, they wouldn’t be true anymore. There can only be one single truth, regardless of what people think.”

That’s when the discussion started about what is true and what is not.

Then my atheist friend continued: “I could say that I am an the only true god, with the goal of making life hard for people. You wouldn’t be able to prove me wrong?”

I didn’t know what to say, so I said:

• “There is no evidence that it would be so.”
• “Then how will you prove me wrong?”
• “Is that even relevant? In that case, you have not done so well.”
• “Or have I? I may have driven you away from the true path, in a big practical joke against my creator.”
• “If you are someones creation, there are someone higher than you, which would mean that he had good intentions.”
  “Do you see how much I can go on to claim that I am the one true god, and make it impossible for you to prove that it is not so?”
• “It’s not impossible. It’s about what is rue and what is not. Some people may think that you are right, while other will know that you are wrong. Those who know that you are wrong therefore knows the truth.”
• “So the people who doesn’t believe in my divinity, despite the impossibility of proving me wrong, possesses the truth?”
• “Yes.”
• “You have just thought like an atheist!”
• “But do you know that you are right?”
• “Well, I am the true god, am I not? You can’t prove me wrong, yet you say that I am wrong.”

Now I really regret ever talking to him. I have always been 100% sure that my faith is the truth and that God exists. I still want to believe so, but after this discussion I feel unsure. What says that Catholicism is the truth and that God exists? How can we know for sure? I certainly need help with this so that I can return to God, fully believing in Him. It’s a strange feeling: One side of me tells me that I do indeed possess the truth, the other side tells me that I can’t be sure that I do.

I feel terrible for even thinking like this, I feel lost. I used to have a really strong faith, and I let an atheist persuade me because I’m not good at arguing.

www.thereasonforourhope.com get a copy of the CD “TRUTH” by Father Larry Richards

 

[cerad2]

If you were the kind of God who wanted to convince others that you cured the blind and lame…and if you were the kind of God who wanted attention and demanded worship…gathering a dozen faithful followers might be a good place to start!

But I’m not trying to convince anyone of anything. Merely pointed out what I have done. Gathering followers? What a strange notion. Whatever would I need a follower for?

 

[Arizona_Mike]

I don’t understand your point. I too am god. I raised some dead last week. Before that I cured some blind folks. I not only fixed up some lame people but, unlike some divine beings that I could name, I even restored some amputee’s limbs.

Not convinced? Too bad. I’m god and I’m not under any obligation to prove anything to you. And best of all, you can’t prove that I’m not.

In the words of famous atheist, what is advanced without evidence can be dismissed without evidence. Accordingly, your argument is without merit or relevance to the arguments for God’s existence.

Your ability to advance an argument without any evidence does not obligate me to consider it, anymore than I need give serious consideration to the ravings of any mentally disturbed person on a street corner. Accordingly, your assertion, or the maniac’s assertion, does not in any way diminish the arguments for the existence of God.

This is a common argument among young atheists on the Internet, by the way (google “I am god” + “you can’t prove I’m not!” and see how many hits you get.) I can only ascribe this to the decline in critical thinking skills taught to the young in the Internet age.

 

[CEM5]

Long story short, we were discussing the topic of “truth” via Skype. It all began with that I said that i think its wrong that so many people in my home country Sweden practices fornication. To that, he replied something like: “Who are YOU to judge people? Would you like it if I were to rule your life? Is fornication really that bad?”

To that, I answered something like: “Well, actually I’m no one to judge anyone. But if you were to know better about something, and you knew that your knowledge is the right one, it certainly would be better if you told me what is right and what is wrong. What if my view on fornication is the right one? There can not be ‘my’ truth and ‘your’ truth. If there would be multiple truths, they wouldn’t be true anymore. There can only be one single truth, regardless of what people think.”

That’s when the discussion started about what is true and what is not.

Then my atheist friend continued: “I could say that I am an the only true god, with the goal of making life hard for people. You wouldn’t be able to prove me wrong?”

I didn’t know what to say, so I said:

• “There is no evidence that it would be so.”
• “Then how will you prove me wrong?”
• “Is that even relevant? In that case, you have not done so well.”
• “Or have I? I may have driven you away from the true path, in a big practical joke against my creator.”
• “If you are someones creation, there are someone higher than you, which would mean that he had good intentions.”
  “Do you see how much I can go on to claim that I am the one true god, and make it impossible for you to prove that it is not so?”
• “It’s not impossible. It’s about what is rue and what is not. Some people may think that you are right, while other will know that you are wrong. Those who know that you are wrong therefore knows the truth.”
• “So the people who doesn’t believe in my divinity, despite the impossibility of proving me wrong, possesses the truth?”
• “Yes.”
• “You have just thought like an atheist!”
• “But do you know that you are right?”
• “Well, I am the true god, am I not? You can’t prove me wrong, yet you say that I am wrong.”

Now I really regret ever talking to him. I have always been 100% sure that my faith is the truth and that God exists. I still want to believe so, but after this discussion I feel unsure. What says that Catholicism is the truth and that God exists? How can we know for sure? I certainly need help with this so that I can return to God, fully believing in Him. It’s a strange feeling: One side of me tells me that I do indeed possess the truth, the other side tells me that I can’t be sure that I do.

I feel terrible for even thinking like this, I feel lost. I used to have a really strong faith, and I let an atheist persuade me because I’m not good at arguing.

Doubt about God comes from the Father of lies. This person you had the discussion with didn’t really use logic in my opinion. IF he were ‘god’ or ‘a god’, where are his Godlike qualities? What true miracles could he demonstrate? Could he create something from nothing as God did? Could he die then resurrect himself with a new glorious immortal body as God, in the person of Jesus, did? Could he create new life from nothing as God did? Planets, stars, lifeforms, etc?

There is your “proof” that he is NOT a god nor is he God. God did all the above and much more, and became one of us through the incarnation, in the second person of Jesus, to show us the way and teach us the way to eternal salvation (life in heaven with Him).

When you “judge” another, you are not judging whether that person is going to heaven or hell: you are corrrectly judging (as God adjures us) that the actions are sinful (wrong), and EVERY human is governed by “rules” - either societal laws, religious laws, or both. Without laws (telling us what is “right” and what is “wrong”) societal chaos would ensue.

Your friend is governed by societal laws which lay down the law of what is right and what is wrong. If he breaks any of those laws, he will be “punished” by those who enforce those laws regardless of whether he thinks those societal laws are “right” or “wrong”. We are forbidden to steal, to murder, to hurt others, and so on.

Fornication is wrong for it damages not only a person’s psyche over time, but the health of the body as well, as has been medically proven.

God bless,
CEM

 

[Cat_Herder]

Then my atheist friend continued: “I could say that I am an the only true god, with the goal of making life hard for people. You wouldn’t be able to prove me wrong?”

I didn’t know what to say, so I said:

• “There is no evidence that it would be so.”
• “Then how will you prove me wrong?”
• “Is that even relevant? In that case, you have not done so well.”
• “Or have I? I may have driven you away from the true path, in a big practical joke against my creator.”
• “If you are someones creation, there are someone higher than you, which would mean that he had good intentions.”
  “Do you see how much I can go on to claim that I am the one true god, and make it impossible for you to prove that it is not so?”
• “It’s not impossible. It’s about what is rue and what is not. Some people may think that you are right, while other will know that you are wrong. Those who know that you are wrong therefore knows the truth.”
• “So the people who doesn’t believe in my divinity, despite the impossibility of proving me wrong, possesses the truth?”
• “Yes.”
• “You have just thought like an atheist!”
• “But do you know that you are right?”
• “Well, I am the true god, am I not? You can’t prove me wrong, yet you say that I am wrong.”

Well, let’s replace “God” with “justice” and see how it goes.

• Your hypothetical interlocutor says, “I am a just person.”
• You reply: “Considering that you support fornication, there is no evidence that you are a just person.”
• “Then how will you prove me wrong?”
• “By comparing you to people who are just.”
• “Well then, what is justice? Does it even exist?”
• “If there are laws, and the laws are oriented towards justice, then justice must exist.”
• “Do you see how much I can go on to claim that the laws are not just, and make it impossible for you to prove that it is not so?”
• “It’s not impossible. It’s about what is good and what is not. Some people may think that you are just, while other will know that you are unjust. Those who know that you are unjust therefore knows the truth.”
• “So the people who doesn’t believe in justice, despite the impossibility of proving me wrong, possesses the truth?”
• “Yes.”
• “You have just thought like an atheist!”
• “But do you know that you are right?”
• “Well, I am a just person, am I not? You can’t prove me wrong, yet you say that I am wrong.”

The dialogue is presupposing that justice is subjective, that is, that whether a law is just depends on how one perceives it. But we all know that “I don’t think this law is just” is not a valid defense in a court of law. The whole concept of laws and government depends on justice being objective, that is, that we can make a “justice scale” …

… and say with certainty that some actions are universally more just than others, with such conviction that we would be convicted in convicting someone of doing an unjust act and sentencing them to jail on account of it.

But you’re dialoguing with an atheist, not a defendant, so what does justice have in common with God? Well, no one has ever seen justice. You can’t see, perceive, or touch justice. Sure, there’s the scales in the courtroom but they don’t really work as an empirical laboratory device to measure justice. So your lab equipment is the jury, who you rely upon to decide what’s just and what isn’t. Then you hold that jury to substantive law and rules of evidence to ensure that the result is just… but those rules are also made by men, legislators and judges, so you are relying on humans all around, because only humans can perceive justice.

Hence the argument of your interlocutor that God, or justice, is a subjective abstract concept of the human mind. But if that is the case, why do we see systems of justice in every human culture, and similar laws in every place, from the most deserted and isolated native tribe to the biggest industrialized nation? Every culture has laws proscribing murder, embracing marriage, forbidding theft, and so on. If justice was arbitrary and subjective, why does every human society come up with the same basic laws? In the laboratory of life, objective justice comes up in the experiment with repeated validity. Any scientist who observes the same result again and again in a controlled experiment must conclude that the result exists. (Just ask the priest who invented this whole science thing.)

Therefore we know that objective justice exists, and just as power companies build their power plants to generate objectively more electricity over time, we build our societies on the premise of being objectively more just than the society that came before us. But we have not yet achieved perfection: there is always room for improvement, room for making our society more just. That tells us something else about justice: although only humans can perceive it, our perception of it is limited. It is as if we see justice through a glass in a dark manner, yet the image becomes more clear; thus we must admit it is possible to see justice face to face.

How can we see justice face to face if we cannot directly observe justice? We observe justice in the same way that we observe God: through its/His effect on the world around us. That is, after all, the scientific method: conduct an experiment, observe the result, and conclude causality. Enact the animal cruelty laws and see the murder rate drop. Observe Theresa of Avila, Therese of Liseux, Mother Teresa, and Teresa Benedicta, and the fact that many women are very happy to forego fornication (and other sins) to live like these, and are in fact happier than those who do engage in fornication. That leads you to a conclusion concerning God and justice regarding fornication: that it is objectively, empirically offensive to both, and the necessary predicate conclusion that both God and justice exist.

 

[CEM5]

I don’t understand your point. I too am god. I raised some dead last week. Before that I cured some blind folks. I not only fixed up some lame people but, unlike some divine beings that I could name, I even restored some amputee’s limbs.

Not convinced? Too bad. I’m god and I’m not under any obligation to prove anything to you. And best of all, you can’t prove that I’m not.

oh really? You are as much of a god as Satan is.

Today, God still shows us His existence: Miracles still happen, and these are authenticated by actual dcoumented facts that cannot be explained by worldly means. Many prestigious witnesses attest to this as well.

Your above statements reak of of the stench of sulfuric lies.

 

[Cat_Herder]

Having sex without being married makes you physically sick? You say this is medically proven somewhere?

Well, see for yourself.