For Those Who Are Skeptical About God's Existence

[bridgeforsale]

Actually, it does not show anything of the sort. The first right that we have is the right to exist. Liberty is meaningless if we cannot exist. TO hold that Liberty is more important than Life is silly

if you’re referring to abortion here … I disagree (albeit I think abortion is an unfortunate consequence of irresponsible behavior). I’m willing to discuss this issue, but I think it’s a bit off topic (it really is a monster of a topic that would probably derail the heck out of this thread).

The CC has not bowed to the enlightenment.

she certainly has. Separation of church and state is a hallmark of enlightenment thinking, and formerly (in many European countries immediately prior to the enlightement period) the church was the state (or they were so intermingled it was hard to tell the difference).

Today, the church sometimes defends separation very forcefully. This is only one of many examples.

IN fact, much of what has resulted from it is still as wrong as it was 1000 years ago.

the enlightenment didn’t occur 1,000 years ago (it happened only about 3 centuries ago). Anyway, America was one of the things that resulted from the enlightenment, do you think that was a bad result?

What the Church has done, and most of Western society with it, is seen all living humans as humans. Sadly, many outside of the Church are returning to a system where not all humans are seen as such.

Please don’t start claiming stuff like the CC built western civilization (my respect for your intelligence will evaporate quickly). Anyway, you would have to elaborate more here. Again, if you’re trying to segway into abortion, its probably better to take this issue to another thread (although from the looks of it this one is dying off, so it might not matter).

 

[ralphinal]

OK, but it seems to me (I could be wrong) that the CC held to an almost bizarre literalism (as late as the Galileo affair, where the scientist refuted a church reading of scripture the church believed enumerated a geocentric cosmology).

So whether or not there were alternative methods of interpreting the bible, doesn’t seem to have trickled down to lay Catholics (until quite recently).

There were three issues with Galileo. First, he was told not to teach his stuff until enough research had been done to establish if it was correct. That was minor. Second, he wanted to physically alter the text of some Bible verses to make it fit. That was MAJOR (and forgotten or ignored by most). Third, there was time needed to see what was really being said by him and by the Bible, to make our understanding fit. That part was unimportant.

I must have glossed over where you said “a relationship with man” (which indeed is not deistic). Nevertheless, the CC does (to my knowledge) preach the necessity of Christ (although I think their dogma has enough flexibility to grant that those from other faiths may potentially be “saved” as well … but I’m not an expert here).

And that gets into the nature of that relationship. You are correct, other faiths (even those who do not believe) may be saved.

Here’s where my objections tend to get stronger. First, to call the choice between eternal paradise and eternal damnation a choice at all smacks of absurdity. Moreover, atheists tend to be from the (I guess you could say) “intelligentia” – while the extremely religous tend to be from the lower rungs of life.

This gives the impression that gullibility is a factor.

I personally know some very intellegent agnostics and atheists. I also know some brilliant people of faith. The last two popes (though I do not know them) are very smart.

What you are showing is a level of egotism and arrogance that is really off-putting. Oh, the poor, gullible, uneducated theists with their little mythologies. I do hope you can see how that is insulting to so many people of faith.

I’m confident the claims made by Christiantiy (and all contemporary world religions) are false (at least insofar as their supernatural claims). I’ve seen the evidence (or better stated lack thereof), I’ve looked at the archeology, and I’ve seen the best logical arguments theistic apologists have … and none are persuasive in the least.

Not to you. Others disagree.

such as?

The Swat Pushkin come to mind first. Other groups, such as the Spartans, had a moral code that we would see as problematic as well.

First survival of the fittest is a little understood maxim (and probably a poor choice words by Hebert Spencer). Natural selection is also called adaptive evolution. The term survival of the species or sub-species that best adapt to its environment is more likely to survive. This has nothing to do with physical strength, intelligence, or any particular genetic factor we might associate with fitness, strength, or superiority.

Correct. But, a young organism that has a breathing problem should die off before the genetic code is passed along. It does work both ways. Those that are less able to survive do not

In industrial England moths that were blackened by the smog and soot emitted by factories survived (while their pale counterparts almost became extinct) simple because being darker allowed them to better hide from their preditors.

Secondly, there’s forms of eugenics happening today (i.e. designer babies). Many view this as fine (including theists). Moreover, many of my own secularist peers might view objection to this in a philosophical sense. However, I don’t think it’s been researched enough. I’m concerned because altering the DNA of future generations could have the exact opposite effect we’re looking for.

And I agree

Thus far nature has fine tuned itself through a random process of natural selection. So we have to step carefully before we tamper with its work (since it’s easy to conceive how such efforts might backfire). From a moral standpoint I also don’t think we’ve thought this thing through. Do we really want to include in the laundry list of advantages more affluent children have a genetic advantage (that those from poorer background won’t possibly be able to compete with)?

Agreed

I think we’d be better off with some other entity defending these morals (since when it comes from the CC people are less inclined to listen to it, not more inclined).

So, who should it be? THe government? The UN?

I have no particular goals or desires with regard to religion. It’s baseless, premised on myths, and I’m inclined to believe people are better off premising their world view on things that are real. Nevertheless, I’m also willing to concede that religion might temper some people (and it might serve some purpose).

continued …

TO YOU. To others, it is very real.

 

[ralphinal]

if you’re referring to abortion here … I disagree (albeit I think abortion is an unfortunate consequence of irresponsible behavior). I’m willing to discuss this issue, but I think it’s a bit off topic (it really is a monster of a topic that would probably derail the heck out of this thread).

That is one of the issues, but I do agree that it will derail this thread. It was more of a general comment that those who do not exist have no rights. That includes those who are starved by corrupt governments or killed by oppressive regimes.

she certainly has. Separation of church and state is a hallmark of enlightenment thinking, and formerly (in many European countries immediately prior to the enlightement period) the church was the state (or they were so intermingled it was hard to tell the difference).

Today, the church sometimes defends separation very forcefully. This is only one of many examples.

She defends it because it is a matter of survival. Over the next ten years, many people feel that Christian teachings may become considered hate speech by many.

the enlightenment didn’t occur 1,000 years ago (it happened only about 3 centuries ago). Anyway, America was one of the things that resulted from the enlightenment, do you think that was a bad result?

That was not what I am saying. What I am saying is that what was wrong 1000 years ago is still wrong today. Some of the off-shoots of the Enlightenment are wrong.

My native American ancestry would say, yes, it was a bad result. IN some ways, it is still an unfinished one. We will see if history shows it to have been good or not.

Please don’t start claiming stuff like the CC built western civilization (my respect for your intelligence will evaporate quickly). Anyway, you would have to elaborate more here. Again, if you’re trying to segway into abortion probably better taking this issue to another thread (although from the looks of it this one is dying off, so it might not matter).

Not the claim. My claim is that the Catholic Church has always taught that humans have certain rights. The problem was that the people in charge defined the word human in different ways as time went by. All of humanity has (and some still do). For example, Americans considered slaves to be 3/5 of a white man. Women could not vote. Native Americans were denied citizenship…

Different people in the Catholic Church have seen some heretics as being less than human, or Muslims as being inherently evil, etc.

 

[bridgeforsale]

What you are showing is a level of egotism and arrogance that is really off-putting. Oh, the poor, gullible, uneducated theists with their little mythologies. I do hope you can see how that is insulting to so many people of faith.

I hesitated before I said that … but it is true. There may be some really smart people of faith, but let’s face it, the world we live in today was built by religious skeptics. Virtually all of our most prominent founding fathers, virtually all of the most prominent enlightenment thinkers (with the one exception of John Locke), Thomas Edison, Einstein, Abraham Lincoln, Ernest Hemingway, Mark Twain, Bill Gates, Warran Buffet, Adam Smith, Andrew Carnegie, etc.

But for religious skeptics the world wouldn’t have: America, democracy, modern physics, freedom of religion, freedom of speech, liberty, electricity, usable computers, industry, free market capitalism, etc.

So, who should it be? THe government? The UN?

The same type of people it’s always been, great thinkers and leaders. In other words individuals. People are persuaded by good ideas, charasmatic people, and rational thinkers; but they’re repelled by organizations dictating things to them.

 

[bridgeforsale]

Not the claim. My claim is that the Catholic Church has always taught that humans have certain rights. The problem was that the people in charge defined the word human in different ways as time went by. All of humanity has (and some still do). For example, Americans considered slaves to be 3/5 of a white man. Women could not vote. Native Americans were denied citizenship…

at one time (in the 14th century I think) a pope issued a papal bull endorsing slavery, at other times the church burned people alive. So IMO to say the church “has always taught that humans have certain rights” is an empty statement. Anyone or any organization leads foremost by example.

Nevertheless, I don’t want to go down the road of a comparative examination of what Christians have done versus what secularists have done. There’s plenty of great accomplishments and blood on both sides, but I think we should agree that religion, or lack thereof, doesn’t inform ones views on unrelated matters such as political or economic philosophy.

 

[Trunicate09]

Yes, I believe in God.
This is very easy for me to believe, and was one of the few things from my former Catholicism which I was taught that stuck with me. Deists also believe in God, but not in the way Catholics do, however.

 

[ralphinal]

I hesitated before I said that … but it is true. There may be some really smart people of faith, but let’s face it, the world we live in today was built by religious skeptics. Virtually all of our most prominent founding fathers, virtually all of the most prominent enlightenment thinkers (with the one exception of John Locke), Thomas Edison, Einstein, Abraham Lincoln, Ernest Hemingway, Mark Twain, Bill Gates, Warran Buffet, Adam Smith, Andrew Carnegie, etc.

But for religious skeptics the world wouldn’t have: America, democracy, modern physics, freedom of religion, freedom of speech, liberty, electricity, usable computers, industry, free market capitalism, etc.

The same type of people it’s always been, great thinkers and leaders. In other words individuals. People are persuaded by good ideas, charasmatic people, and rational thinkers; but they’re repelled by organizations dictating things to them.

If people are persuaded by those things, where did Hitler come from?

What prevents another Hitler? Pol Pot? Stalin?

 

[bridgeforsale]

If people are persuaded by those things, where did Hitler come from?

What prevents another Hitler? Pol Pot? Stalin?

Christianity didn’t prevent them did it? Where was this god when six millions Jews were getting gased and put through the meat grinder? If anything I could make a perfectly good argument that the antisemitic environment in the Europe Hitler was raised in was caused by Christian bigotry, spanning back centuries (but that’s an unproductive discussion, and it never leads anywhere good; at least in my experience).

The only things that stopped these animals was a nation built by secular rational thinkers, and an agnostic fellow named Winston Churchill

Once again, a disbelief in something does not mean anything besides you don’t believe in that particular thing. There’s been plenty of theist tyrants (albeit they’ve lacked the machinery of a Germany … thankfully, so they couldn’t acheive Hitler’s level of horror). Moreover, we’re not really sure what Hitler was (I think the concensus is he held to very bizarre religious views, but atheist isn’t an unreasonable assumption either).

 

[ralphinal]

Christianity didn’t prevent them did it? Where was this god when six millions Jews were getting gased and put through the meat grinder? If anything I could make a perfectly good argument that the antisemitic environment in the Europe Hitler was raised in was caused by Christian bigotry, spanning back centuries (but that’s an unproductive discussion, and it never leads anywhere good; at least in my experience).

Going backwards, yes, it contributed. To deny that is to stick the head in the “sand.” However, one could argue that there are still Jews, so the evil did not reach it’s peak.

The only things that stopped these animals was a nation built by secular rational thinkers, and an agnostic fellow named Winston Churchill

And the Russian winter.

Once again, a disbelief in something does not mean anything besides you don’t believe in that particular thing. There’s been plenty of theist tyrants (albeit they’ve lacked the machinery of a Germany … thankfully, so they couldn’t acheive Hitler’s level of horror). Moreover, we’re not really sure what Hitler was (I think the concensus is he held to very bizarre religious views, but atheist isn’t an unreasonable assumption either).

I, for one, would not want Hitler to be an atheist. I prefer to think that he worshiped himself on some level.

 

[Dyonisus]

For anyone who is skeptical about God’s existence, this excerpt from “The Reason For God” might make you rethink what you believe.
books.google.com/books?id=-eUbFMEY49QC&pg=PA129&lpg=PA129&dq=The+Reason+For+God+contingent&source=bl&ots=n7lv3VYlNK&sig=Hppsu3McHXlNgM6lGg77OdSsfNY&hl=en&ei=oTYXS-ekNZ6ltgeDyeXjBA&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=4&ved=0CBcQ6AEwAw#v=onepage&q=&f=false (start on page 128 with “The Mysterious Bang” and stop at the section titled “The Cosmic Welcome Mat” on page 129)
I would like to hear your thoughts on contingency and if you think it could relate to the possibility of the existence of a god.

It is my view that this argument, if it works, says more about the mind of man than it does about whether God exists.

At its best, the argument establishes that accepting God is necessarily rational, in other words, that it is part of the human psychology, but not that God actually exists.

 

[Bob4BVM]

I think it’s possible that there are gods. I just don’t see them as particularly important or relevant to my life. Not to mention the fact that even gods have their problems.

I think it’s possible for gods to exist but as of now I act with them as I act with Bigfoot – Never seen it, never heard it, never interacted with it, so it’s not important to my life’s functions. The plausibility of such a being existing goes on to personal experience or empirical evidence – of which neither have occurred for me. Cheers.

---

No God, No Peace .
Know God, Know Peace .

---

 

[AJTheMan]

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No God, No Peace .
Know God, Know Peace .

---

I prayed to the gods once for peace. It didn’t exactly work.

As of now, though, my life really is not that hectic so I question the idea that we cannot live peacefully without a deity. Maybe you cannot live peacefully without the idea of a deity but there are plenty who live peaceful lives and do not need theistic help. (I don’t mean for that to come off as rude. I really do respect your beliefs)

Thanks.

 

[Bob4BVM]

I prayed to the gods once for peace. It didn’t exactly work.

As of now, though, my life really is not that hectic so I question the idea that we cannot live peacefully without a deity. Maybe you cannot live peacefully without the idea of a deity but there are plenty who live peaceful lives and do not need theistic help. (I don’t mean for that to come off as rude. I really do respect your beliefs)

Thanks.

Dear AJTheMan—
Thanks for your kind reply.
I have the feeling you are still searching tho…
this below was my closing in Post#32, pls take a moment to read that post and the discussion thru #42 or so…
"From my own experience, I can offer this much-
If you are wondering if God exists, try asking Him. (Serious inquiries only.)
If you really care to know, believe me, He will let you know.
If you really don’t care, don’t bother. He’s not kicking any doors down. "

---

 

[Bob4BVM]

QUOTE---------
""That’s one reason yes. I expect a god, who is now allegedly reading my mind, who can count the hairs on my head, who created our universe, existed eternally, can do anything, bla bla bla … to be able to transmit information a little more efficiently than feeding us copies upon copies of yet more copies of ancient manuscripts people have been quibbling about for the last 2,000 years. "
END QUOTE-----------

You obviously have not bothered to ask Him.
Believe me, He CAN “transmit information a little more efficiently”…

 

[AntiTheist]

My answer was originally going to be in jest, but the more I think about it, the more seriously I mean this…

Halftime at the Super Bowl. No…make it during the World Cup Final. Worldwide TV audience. Time is about to expire. Game tied. Everyone is on the edge of their seats. Suddenly, the sky is filled with deep purple clouds. There is a deafening thunder and a blinding flash of lightening. Everyone is filled with terror because they think it’s the end of the world. The Almighty assumes a form that we can see, sticks his head down through the clouds, and in a booming, terrifying voice yells, “YOU GUYS ARE REALLY STARTING TO **** ME OFF!!! I"M HERE. I"M WATCHING. WHEN YOU DIE, I’LL BE WAITING. YOU DO NOT WANT TO BE ON MY BAD SIDE!!! THE CATHOLICS (or the Jews, or the Muslims, or whomever) GOT IT RIGHT. FOLLOW THEIR TEACHINGS AND YOU’LL BE OK. IGNORE THEM AT YOUR PERIL.”

Now, before you start rolling your eyes and saying the God doesn’t operate that way, tell me…why not?? I go to mass with my wife every week and honestly, I look for a reason to believe. It simply isn’t there. But, if God were to make himself known in a grand manner that nobody could ignore, you could put a $1,000,000 bounty on atheists and no one would be able to collect…because there would BE not atheists.

Just my $.02.

I’ll do you one better. Have this god character announce to everybody on earth, individually, clearly, unambiguously, and audibly, in the primary language that each person speaks, that he exists. Then have him allow each person a window of about a minute or two in which to ask questions about the world outside of their minds and receive answers that they could later confirm.

If this happened, no one could deny that a god exists, and it would be all but impossible to be an atheist. It would be the biggest and most important thing that ever happened in human history. It would do absolutely nothing to interfere with “free will” because people would still be free to choose whether or not to worship this god. Christian mythology provides us with clear examples of beings who knew 100% for sure that this god existed and chose not to worship him (i.e. Satan and the fallen angels), so obviously, according to the myth, free will is not affected by knowing god’s existence.

So the real question is why this god character does not do this. He apparently likes playing a game of invisible cat and mouse, where the only way to detect him is to talk to yourself and assume that you’re conversing with something outside of yourself. If this god character really wanted people to worship him, you’d think that he would do a little more in the way of providing evidence that he actually exists and that he’s worthy of worship.

 

[Aboveallbereal]

The curiouskty about debates like this is their utter futility allied to their attraction.

Physical science cannot answer metaphysical questions. That simple truth is indifferent to all our argumentation. We can investigate the workings of a Ferrari to the Nth degree but we cannot in doing so tell why it is not a Maserati.

 

[Bob4BVM]

I’ll do you one better. Have this god character announce to everybody on earth, individually, clearly, unambiguously, and audibly, in the primary language that each person speaks, that he exists. Then have him allow each person a window of about a minute or two in which to ask questions about the world outside of their minds and receive answers that they could later confirm.

If this happened, no one could deny that a god exists, and it would be all but impossible to be an atheist. It would be the biggest and most important thing that ever happened in human history. It would do absolutely nothing to interfere with “free will” because people would still be free to choose whether or not to worship this god. Christian mythology provides us with clear examples of beings who knew 100% for sure that this god existed and chose not to worship him (i.e. Satan and the fallen angels), so obviously, according to the myth, free will is not affected by knowing god’s existence.

So the real question is why this god character does not do this. He apparently likes playing a game of invisible cat and mouse, where the only way to detect him is to talk to yourself and assume that you’re conversing with something outside of yourself. If this god character really wanted people to worship him, you’d think that he would do a little more in the way of providing evidence that he actually exists and that he’s worthy of worship.

So, what you are asking for is ‘personal confirmation’ .
You make a huge assumption if you figure this has never happened my friend .

The best evidence of all is the type of personal experience which you seem to assume does not exist.
As I have said earlier, He does not hide from those who earnestly seek to know Him.
Try spending some time with people who seem to have a ‘unreasonably firm’ trust in God.
Some of them will have experiences you will not be able to explain away

 

[Joseph_L_Varga]

So many errors. Painting Christians as un-enlightened simpletons or villains. It’s boring to keep correcting, but here are a few facts, to set the record straight. Just a few great statesmen and scientists, intellectuals who were devout Christians, off the top of my head:
-Emperor Constantine the Great, legalized Christianity in the Roman empire in the 4th century
-St. Benedict, established monastic life. After Europe was overrrun by pagan migrant peoples, monasteries saved civilization from total destruction. At the height of the middle ages, there were 30,000 monasteries in Europe (more than McDonalds today in the USA). Monks were experts in agriculture, industry, the medical sciences, and literacy, among others. They were the greatest innovators in such areas as the industry and agriculture, they were teachers, and took care of poor and sick people.
-St. Stephen, official canonized saint in the Catholic Church, established the kingdom of Hungary in 896 A.D.
-St. Vladimir, canonized saint in the Catholic and Orthodox Churches, established the kingdom of Russia in the 990s.
-several great kings and statesmen of the middle ages, incl. Charlemagne, St. Louis the king of France, etc.
-Dr Martin Luther King Jr, civil rights hero
-Lech Walesa, founder of Solidarity movement and President of Poland, hero of the anti-Communist fight
-President Ronald Reagan, another hero who defeated Communism
-President George W. Bush, liberated some 60 million people from the dictator Saddam Hussein in Iraq and murderous Taliban in Afghanistan; made a major and highly successful effort to fight infectious diseases including HIV/AIDS and malaria in Africa

-Nicolaus Copernicus, Catholic priest, heliocentric theory
-Johannes Kepler, formulated the laws governing the movement of planets, comets
-Galileo Galilei, Catholic, used by contemporary Catholic- and Pope-bashers. They only forget that he was nevertheless religious. Somewhat amusingly, he based his heliocentric theory on the wrong premises. Ignored Kepler’s law and his argument for the motion of earth, based on tides, was refuted. The Catholic Church forbade him to present his theory as a proven fact, he was not forbidden to present it as a hypothesis.
-Leonardo da Vinci, polyhistor
-Isaac Newton, established laws of classical mechanics, gravitation, mathematical methods of integral and differential calculus
-Rene Descartes, Catholic, mathematician, philosopher
-Blaise Pascal, physics (hydrodinamics), mathematics
-Andre Marie Ampere, physicist (electricity)
-Alessandro Volta, physicist and biologist
-Carl Linnaeus, the greatest botanist of all times, established taxonomy of plants
-Gregor Mendel, Catholic monk and Abbot of his monastery, who discovered the first laws of genetics and heredity (laws of segregation)
-Mendeleev, periodic table of elements
-Louis Pasteur, devout Catholic, microbiologist, developed first vaccine against rabies
-Maxwell, Faraday, Heinrich Hertz - the big trio who invented and experimentally proved electromagnetic theory and electromagnetic waves
-Robert Boyle, James Joule, Lord Kelvin - physicists (theory of gases, thermodynamics)
-Max Planck, physicist, founder of quantum theory
-Werner Heisenberg - physicist, theory of indeterminism
-Buzz Aldrin - one of the first three astronauts to land on the Moon, with Apollo 11, an Anglican who took the species of Christian Communion (bread and wine as instituted by Jesus Christ) to the Moon, and his first act on the Moon was to give thanks to God and take this Christian Communion.

A few words about the Popes:

-in the 15th century, during the colonization of Canary Islands, the Pope excommunicated those who would enslave the indigenous population
-in the 16th century, during the colonization of South America, the Pope excommunicated those who would enslave the Native American (Indian) population
-in the 19th-20th c., Pope Leo 13 and others repeatedly denounced Communism as incompatible with Catholicism
-before WW2, Pope Pius 12 denounced Nazism in an encyclical. During WW2, he took the path of behind-the-scenes actions to save Jews. He lifted the enclosure of monasteries and convents, allowing the monks and nuns to hide Jewish people in their religious buildings. Also allowed Catholic clergy to issue fake birth certificates for Jewish people, pretending they were Catholics. After WW2, the Chief Rabbi of Rome gave thanks to Pius 12 in a public radio address. Pope Pius 12 was pronounced “venerable” (first step to canonization) Dec 19, 2009.
-Pope Paul 6 - published the encyclical Humanae Vitae in 1968, instantaneously becoming Public Enemy No. 1 to the “enlightened” secularists and humanists. What did he do to earn their hate? He denounced artificial birth control, as something that will lead to sexual promiscuity, divorce, abortion, and euthanasia. He was exactly right! A great defender of human life and the sanctity of marriage! The premier civil rights issue of our times is the sanctity of life, especially pre-born babies and old/sick people, and Pope Paul 6 spoke out eloquenty on these issues.
-Pope John Paul 2, a modern polyhistor, fluent in 8 languages, a great mind in theology and the ethics of human life, marriage, sexuality. Defender of the sanctity of human life and marriage. Coined the term “culture of death”. Again, THIS is the real civil rights issue of our times: the DIGNITY OF HUMAN LIFE, ESPECIALLY IN ITS MOST DEFENSELESS FORMS. THE FIGHT AGAINST ABORTION, EMBRYO DESTRUCTION FOR STEM CELLS, EUTHANASIA. Played a very big role in defeating Communism in Eastern Europe. Poet and playwright. Avid sportsman - kayaking trips, skier, mountain climber.
-Pope Benedict 16 (our present Pope) - an accomplished theologian, university professor and dean at Regensburg and Munchen, one of the finest intellectuals on the planet.

Who tried to belittle Christians and their accomplishments?

 

[bridgeforsale]

So many errors. Painting Christians as un-enlightened simpletons or villains. It’s boring to keep correcting, but here are a few facts, to set the record straight. Just a few great statesmen and scientists, intellectuals who were devout Christians, off the top of my head:
-Emperor Constantine the Great, legalized Christianity in the Roman empire in the 4th century
-St. Benedict, established monastic life. After Europe was overrrun by pagan migrant peoples, monasteries saved civilization from total destruction.

It should be noted that the Roman people brought the barbarian invasions on themselves. The way they treated the German tribes was terrible; and by the time Italy finally sank into chaos they were so domesticated they didn’t even remember how to fight anymore (not a good thing to forget when your being overrun by Germans, whom your generals and armies, at least in some cases, trained to fight).

But yes, the monasteries did mitigate against a deeper downturn, although they no doubt helped shape the theocracy that emerged out of the middle ages. Nevertheless, history is what it is & any event or dynamic taken out of the formulation would have meant a different future for us (and there’s absolutely no way to predict what our society might have looked like, whether we’d even have a society at all, etc. if anything at all happened differently).

So honestly I take little stock in looking backwards for glory (I think perhaps too much nostalgia is one of the first signs of decay).

 

[Bob4BVM]

So, what you are asking for is ‘personal confirmation’ .
You make a huge assumption if you figure this has never happened my friend .

The best evidence of all is the type of personal experience which you seem to assume does not exist.
As I have said earlier, He does not hide from those who earnestly seek to know Him.
Try spending some time with people who seem to have a ‘unreasonably firm’ trust in God.
Some of them will have experiences you will not be able to explain away

AntiTheist–
Have you any reply to this ?
Are we communicating ?