How can I believe a God is real?

[filter2700]

When I see videos like this? I am so absolutely disturbed, by the death, and by the helplessness these people went through. Their lives were cut so short, as are most. But this was planned. Regardless if our government did it, or if it was terrorists, someone planned this. This could have been avoided, this could have been stopped; our government knew there was going to be an attack and they let business continue as usual, they were informed.

youtube.com/watch?v=JzKI9TBR-XQ

I see these people fall from this building, they look like ants. We are so, so, so small, and when I look realistically at life and death throughout nature, how can we really believe we’re special, made in “Gods” image? I hate this, I hate the unnecessary suffering of life. I am no sinner, I did not get to choose this life, I did not get to choose to be born. Two people, who I’ve never met really get to dictate the nature for all of humanity? EVERYONE is a sinner because of the actions of two others? How can I believe that…

I hear about this loving God, but I never see him, I never experience him. He" loves us so much," but can’t help those who want to experience this love. Why must I jump through hoops to feel this love? If my heart is fully open, and I want to know God, why can’t I experience his love immediately? If we are such spiritual beings, God should know my heart, he should know I’m sorry for my wrong doing, and that I want to know him; and yet many people who search feel nothing.

And these people who jump from the buildings, they had no other option. It was either die burning to death, choking to death from smoke miserably, or ending it quickly in a few seconds. And having to make that choice, how difficult that must have been. KNOWING you’re going to die, you can’t call your parents, can’t call your children, can’t call your brothers and sisters one last time and just tell them you love them, you’re sorry for everything, any hurt and make last restitution. It isn’t fair it ended so soon, and then they probably cried to God, pleaded for some help, and maybe God told them to jump.

I’m not attacking Catholicism, I just feel so sad, lost and depressed for humanity when I see things like this. I lose all hope in some God, some afterlife when I see how quickly life is snatched away from humanity in this physical universe. We are just so tiny in the vastness of everything, and I’m just supposed to believe this God is here, who never interacts with me in any way that I can perceive.

I try turning to God, my heart is so open, more open than most, but I don’t feel anything, I don’t see any change in my life. Why did it have to be this way, why couldn’t God create us like angels, or pure spiritual beings? Why give us physical bodies knowing their is a possibility we will rebel and “choose” sin? How can I believe in God when there is so much suffering in this world, so much unfair death, so much helplessness that humans experience? None of us chose to be born, we didn’t choose to be sinful beings; I was forced to exist by God, and then when I ask for some guidance I feel, hear, and see nothing.

 

[DavidFilmer]

Two people, who I’ve never met really get to dictate the nature for all of humanity? EVERYONE is a sinner because of the actions of two others? How can I believe that…

I presume you refer to Adam and Eve. We inherit their sinful nature (just as we inherit everything else about ourselves from our ancestors - our race, facial features, etc). Why should we inherit our physical attributes from our ancestors, but not our spiritual attributes?

But God offers us a way to overcome this inherited (original) sin - namely Christian Baptism.

Too bad we cannot overcome acne as easily.

I just feel so sad, lost and depressed for humanity when I see things like this. I lose all hope in some God, some afterlife when I see how quickly life is snatched away from humanity in this physical universe.

OK, you perceive the death of these people as a bad thing. But if there IS a God, and there IS an afterlife (which is very, very good and far better than this life), wouldn’t you think that the (earthly) death of these people was mostly a good thing? Christians believe that the righteous who die are in a much better state than in life.

We are just so tiny in the vastness of everything, and I’m just supposed to believe this God is here, who never interacts with me in any way that I can perceive.

How do you know that God did not “interact” with you by prompting you to post this question, or with me by posting my reply?

 

[accesscatholic]

How can you not believe in God? Pose the question to yourself and spend a week thinking about it. You might be pleasantly surprised if you open your heart in prayer. This is a fallen world and no where does God say earthly existence will be easy. The eternal is the goal.

 

[jayla221]

Dear Filter,
Please keep searching for your answer to this important question. This is one of the oldest questions of mankind and many catholic theologians have documented their findings. Read Peter Kreeft’s book entitled, “Making Sense out of Suffering.” If you are not satisfied after that, keep reading. Many of religions most intellectual thinkers have found satisfying answers.
Our Creator gave us humans free will. If He constantly intervened, our will’s would not be free. However, this life is not the end of the story. There is an afterlife which will provide rewards and consequences.
Jesus is always with us to enable us to endure whatever we must suffer in this life. He was God’s own son-and God. He came to earth and suffered a horrific death. He could have stopped it but didn’t because of the ultimate payoff. He is our example to follow.
Please also read about the martyrs. They were all human and yet because they called on Jesus-He provided them with enough grace, courage, and trust to give up their lives. Often their deaths were horrific and anything but quick. Yet because they had Him, they chose it. They could have stopped the violence by denouncing God. They fully trusted without seeing.
Those who suffer innocently will be given a greater reward hereafter. God is a JUST God. Ask Jesus to help you with your unbelief. That is what Saint Paul did and he went from murdering Christians to being a Saint and making it as a headliner in the Bible. I will be praying for you. Your soul is very important to Jesus.
Jayla

 

[RPRPsych]

But God offers us a way to overcome this inherited (original) sin - namely Christian Baptism.

Too bad we cannot overcome acne as easily.

I know this is a serious thread, but at that one!

And to the OP, you’re raising a very important, and old problem - the problem of human evil, and how it fits into God’s plan.

Discussing this will take quite a while, but remember: those people who suffered and died, suffered and died because of the willed actions of a group of (human) terrorists. God did not command them to perform this act; they did it of their own free will.

It’s been fairly well demonstrated, by philosophers, that one cannot have free will in this world without having evil.

God gives us a chance at change in this world, and salvation in the next. That’s something we can never afford to reject, regardless of the evil deeds of particular humans.

 

[Bravo_6]

Inability to comprehend every detail in the universe does not prove that there is no God, but merely the limited capacity of the finite human mind. However, the human mind can propose certain principles which go a long way towards the removal of difficulties.Firstly, evil is really the negation or privation of good, and if there is evil in the world, there is also much good which can be accounted for only by the existence of God.Secondly, the fluctuations of this mutable life cannot affect God’s existence. I mean that you cannot have God when things seem to be all right, and annihilate Him when things seem to go wrong. If God exists before things go wrong, He still exists despite the unhappiness of an individual. And note that word individual. Viewing the race as a whole, we find that life is a mixture of comfortable and uncomfortable things.When we are happy, others are suffering. When we are suffering, others are happy. And we cannot say that God is existing for the happy ones, and simultaneously not existing for the unhappy ones. We must not take local and individual views only, but a universal outlook.

Satisfactory explanation could scarcely be given, were this life all. But it is not. God permits these things only because He knows that there is a future life where He will rectify and compensate all inequalities. In the meantime He draws good out of these miseries, for they teach men not to set their hopes entirely upon this world as if there were no other, and help to expiate the sins of mankind. If we cannot be entirely happy here, let us at least make sure of being happy in the next life.

Because God is Love, He asks the freely given love of man, and not a compelled love. Because He is just, He will not deprive man of the free will which is in accordance with his rational nature. Nor is this against the omnipotence of God, for even His power does not extend to contradictory things. Man cannot be free to love and serve God, without being free to reject Him and rebel against Him. We cannot have it both ways. Even God, if He wants men to be free, cannot take from them the power to choose evil. If He enforces goodness, He takes away freedom. If He leaves freedom, He must permit evil, even though He forbids it. It is man’s dignity that he is master of his own destiny instead of having to develop just like a tree which necessarily obeys natural law. Men, as a matter of fact, misused their freedom, and sin and brutality resulted. But it was impossible to give man the gift of freedom and the dignity of being master of his own destiny without risking the permission of such failures.

 

[wanabesaint]

two that prove God is , science and the human brain
Science to that creation of the Universe, science itself comes down to this all started from a Big Bang for no better word, to which a minute if nothing suddenly boomed into all we see.
add the element of, LIFE, to which we Know God is the giver of all life.
and to that is the science of Humans, the brain which is the most complex and fasinating single thing knowen to Man in the entire universe. The brains ability to reason, to express love, and to create and to act in Charity that is what God wants.

another set of elements, is Faith, Hope, and Awe to the wonders of God…
as the Faith of the story of the young lad who was leading the blind Priest on the Mission of seeking lost souls. they entered the field of great boulders, and in setting down the young lad suddenly arose and annouced to the Priest that a great mulititude of people had arrived . Ferverently the Priest preached to the stones, and in the end with a final prayer he in ending of the sermon. The stones called out, AMen, Amen, AMEN!
The frightened child fell to the feet of the Priest in admittance to pulling prank, yet in fear of the stones calling out in Praise of God , Amen, Amen, AMEN!
the Priest said, my child, do you not know, if mans hearts come to be of stone, then the stones will still praise God, and if God so wished, God will make stones into children of Abraham… and their you have it.

 

[Proceedings]

When I see videos like this? I am so absolutely disturbed, by the death, and by the helplessness these people went through. Their lives were cut so short, as are most. But this was planned. Regardless if our government did it, or if it was terrorists, someone planned this. This could have been avoided, this could have been stopped; our government knew there was going to be an attack and they let business continue as usual, they were informed.

youtube.com/watch?v=JzKI9TBR-XQ

I see these people fall from this building, they look like ants. We are so, so, so small, and when I look realistically at life and death throughout nature, how can we really believe we’re special, made in “Gods” image? I hate this, I hate the unnecessary suffering of life. I am no sinner, I did not get to choose this life, I did not get to choose to be born. Two people, who I’ve never met really get to dictate the nature for all of humanity? EVERYONE is a sinner because of the actions of two others? How can I believe that…

I hear about this loving God, but I never see him, I never experience him. He" loves us so much," but can’t help those who want to experience this love. Why must I jump through hoops to feel this love? If my heart is fully open, and I want to know God, why can’t I experience his love immediately? If we are such spiritual beings, God should know my heart, he should know I’m sorry for my wrong doing, and that I want to know him; and yet many people who search feel nothing.

And these people who jump from the buildings, they had no other option. It was either die burning to death, choking to death from smoke miserably, or ending it quickly in a few seconds. And having to make that choice, how difficult that must have been. KNOWING you’re going to die, you can’t call your parents, can’t call your children, can’t call your brothers and sisters one last time and just tell them you love them, you’re sorry for everything, any hurt and make last restitution. It isn’t fair it ended so soon, and then they probably cried to God, pleaded for some help, and maybe God told them to jump.

I’m not attacking Catholicism, I just feel so sad, lost and depressed for humanity when I see things like this. I lose all hope in some God, some afterlife when I see how quickly life is snatched away from humanity in this physical universe. We are just so tiny in the vastness of everything, and I’m just supposed to believe this God is here, who never interacts with me in any way that I can perceive.

I try turning to God, my heart is so open, more open than most, but I don’t feel anything, I don’t see any change in my life. Why did it have to be this way, why couldn’t God create us like angels, or pure spiritual beings? Why give us physical bodies knowing their is a possibility we will rebel and “choose” sin? How can I believe in God when there is so much suffering in this world, so much unfair death, so much helplessness that humans experience? None of us chose to be born, we didn’t choose to be sinful beings; I was forced to exist by God, and then when I ask for some guidance I feel, hear, and see nothing.

I was there and saw the second plane hit. We got a call from a coworker who called in sick that day, then we all went up to the top of our building and seen the second plane hit, the buildings fall and the huge debris cloud that went through the city like a tsunami. It is the result of free will, the continuing choice of Adam and Eve, and there always those who choose evil, that day it was the terrorists. And there are those who chose good, like my friend Ralf Pascarrella who volunteered to work at ground zero as the health and safety director, and eventually died at a young age from the contaminants he was breathing in. Another friend of mine Mark Gajewski who volunteered there died about two years ago from cancer. In the end, all will be judged, God will separate the sheep and the goats, evil on one side good on the other.

The only site I seen that make sense of all this is:

ArguingWithAtheists.com

 

[Scottgun]

We inherit their sinful nature (just as we inherit everything else about ourselves from our ancestors - our race, facial features, etc). Why should we inherit our physical attributes from our ancestors, but not our spiritual attributes?

Perhaps think of it this way. If your parents deplete all their bank accounts and then die, it doesn’t matter how innocent you are because every time you stick your parent’s card in the ATM machine, it comes back “NSF”. The consequence of the Fall is that man is born without sanctifying grace. The kicker is God does not owe you sanctifying grace just by the mere fact that you were born.

 

[filter2700]

All of that makes sense except this: I’m forced into existence though. Even if God made me, I wasn’t given a choice to live. He knew there is a chance I would reject him, so if he loved me so much why even give such a fallible, limited creature the choice in the first place? That’s what I struggle with, how two people can ruin it for everyone, when everyone is forced to exist.

 

[EricFilmer]

All of that makes sense except this: I’m forced into existence though. Even if God made me, I wasn’t given a choice to live.

Of course, we can’t make choices unless we first exist. God brings us into existence because God is goodness and love, and goodness and love has the natural desire to share itself. So God’s very nature motivates him to create. He could not make us gods, because divinity is, by definition, eternal, and therefore uncreated. Therefore, humans are necessarily imperfect.

He knew there is a chance I would reject him, so if he loved me so much why even give such a fallible, limited creature the choice in the first place?

We are created to love God and one another. Love is a wonderful thing (when done in accordance with moral law), even if it is done in a limited, fallible way. Moreover, God gives us his revelation to teach us the way to love properly, and he gives us the grace to empower us to do the same. His grace perfects our human limitations.

That’s what I struggle with, how two people can ruin it for everyone, when everyone is forced to exist.

The Garden of Eden represents gifts from God which were to be passed down from generation to generation: immortality, peace, and freedom from strife, pain, fear, etc. These gifts were meant to be our inheritance so, in a manner-of-speaking, Adam and Eve “blew our inheritance.” Christ, however, comes as the New Adam who pays the price of sin (death) on our behalf, and restores our inheritance. Through baptism we are inheritors of heaven itself.

Until then, we spend time in this world where living virtuously is often difficult. We struggle with things such as faith, hope, charity, love, chastity, patience, etc. But God intended this not to be a perfect universe, but a moral universe. In this life, we are called to be champions of virtue, which involves (with the help of God) engaging in spiritual warfare and overcoming these struggles. God showed us this when he, himself, took on our flesh and dwelt among us the greatest of the champions of virtue. There cannot be any champions in world where there are no battles.

 

[fhansen]

When I see videos like this? I am so absolutely disturbed, by the death, and by the helplessness these people went through. Their lives were cut so short, as are most. But this was planned. Regardless if our government did it, or if it was terrorists, someone planned this. This could have been avoided, this could have been stopped; our government knew there was going to be an attack and they let business continue as usual, they were informed.

youtube.com/watch?v=JzKI9TBR-XQ

I see these people fall from this building, they look like ants. We are so, so, so small, and when I look realistically at life and death throughout nature, how can we really believe we’re special, made in “Gods” image? I hate this, I hate the unnecessary suffering of life. I am no sinner, I did not get to choose this life, I did not get to choose to be born. Two people, who I’ve never met really get to dictate the nature for all of humanity? EVERYONE is a sinner because of the actions of two others? How can I believe that…

I hear about this loving God, but I never see him, I never experience him. He" loves us so much," but can’t help those who want to experience this love. Why must I jump through hoops to feel this love? If my heart is fully open, and I want to know God, why can’t I experience his love immediately? If we are such spiritual beings, God should know my heart, he should know I’m sorry for my wrong doing, and that I want to know him; and yet many people who search feel nothing.

And these people who jump from the buildings, they had no other option. It was either die burning to death, choking to death from smoke miserably, or ending it quickly in a few seconds. And having to make that choice, how difficult that must have been. KNOWING you’re going to die, you can’t call your parents, can’t call your children, can’t call your brothers and sisters one last time and just tell them you love them, you’re sorry for everything, any hurt and make last restitution. It isn’t fair it ended so soon, and then they probably cried to God, pleaded for some help, and maybe God told them to jump.

I’m not attacking Catholicism, I just feel so sad, lost and depressed for humanity when I see things like this. I lose all hope in some God, some afterlife when I see how quickly life is snatched away from humanity in this physical universe. We are just so tiny in the vastness of everything, and I’m just supposed to believe this God is here, who never interacts with me in any way that I can perceive.

I try turning to God, my heart is so open, more open than most, but I don’t feel anything, I don’t see any change in my life. Why did it have to be this way, why couldn’t God create us like angels, or pure spiritual beings? Why give us physical bodies knowing their is a possibility we will rebel and “choose” sin? How can I believe in God when there is so much suffering in this world, so much unfair death, so much helplessness that humans experience? None of us chose to be born, we didn’t choose to be sinful beings; I was forced to exist by God, and then when I ask for some guidance I feel, hear, and see nothing.

Look at it in terms of God’s own excruciating pain and suffering and death during the passion and crucifixion. God is with and in us, every one of the billions who’ve ever lived, whether we believe or not. The bottom line take home message of the Incarnation, life, death, and resurrection of Jesus is that, through the best and the worst, existence is good- love somehow resides at the very foundations of the universe-it’s all worth it in the end.

 

[JamesATyler]

Jesus was not spared from suffering and death. He is the son of God. It appears that no one is spared from suffering and death. In a way we are all carrying our cross to Golgotha.

As for how to believe that he is real, I would suggest patience. God is real and he knows what you need.