Is God a good parent?

[Solmyr]

Of course, given that none of us is able to create animals…

Oh, we CAN create new “animals”… they are called children. And yes, it is our duty to give them as good an environment we can, feed them, educate them, protecting them from illness, etc… Of course we are all quite “impotent” to create a “perfect” environment, devoid of pain, hunger, diseases… but we MUST do our best. Where are the signs of God’s benevolence?

 

[MPat]

Oh, we CAN create new “animals”… they are called children.

No, we do not “create” the children. We create chairs and novels, palaces and operating systems, and the process we use there is completely different.

And it looks like you do say we have no duties to those things we actually create. That makes the claim that God has such duties rather questionable, based on little more than wishful thinking…

Where are the signs of God’s benevolence?

So, no actual proof that they do not exist? Only a “trick” “Give me examples and see me stay unpersuaded.”? I’m pretty sure we can skip that part (some examples have been given in this thread, and they did not persuade you) - I can grant you the assumption that you will stay unpersuaded whatever I say. So, what are you going to prove with this assumption?

For remember, your claim is that God does nothing. That’s what you must prove (or reword). Proving that you do not see any such signs is not nearly enough.

 

[Solmyr]

No, we do not “create” the children.

Of course, silly of me. Children are delivered by storks, directly from the cabbage patch.

 

[Graceful_Lamb]

You are headed in the right direction, but stopped way too soon. Sure, we must do what we can. But it is not enough. We cannot provide the rain in drought-stricken area. We cannot reach the trapped miners to rescue them. We do not have the information to develop the necessary drugs to cure diseases. Maybe we could do more… but at least we do something.

What does God do? Nothing! The principle is: “let everyone do whatever his capabilities allow”. God has “infinite” capabilities, and yet… does NOTHING. I am sure one of the resident simpletons will be itching to “argue”: “So you want utopia? You want everything presented to you on a silver platter?”… or something equally inane. Like people in despair are more likely to turn to God, so let’s spread misery to “help” them. The slogan is: “The beatings will continue, until the morale improves!”.

The father-son analogy is nice to point out the problems. But it can be presented in a simpler, more neutral fashion: “The creator is always responsible to create as good an environment for its creation as he possible can.” And, of course God could have created every one of us directly into heaven. And none of this would be an issue.

God DOES a lot! If it weren’t for Him, we wouldn’t be here. He answers prayers, etc. God may not answer you (general you) the way you want Him to.

Humans have free will. That free will can create poverty conditions and many other less than ideal situations.

 

[MPat]

Of course, silly of me. Children are delivered by storks, directly from the cabbage patch.

I see… Nothing of substance related to the subject (that’s caused by the failure to get the point), little entertainment value (at least, more imaginative insults might have it, if not anything else)… And the position in question has already been made to look bad (otherwise it wouldn’t have to be defended in such way). I guess there is little more to gain from this conversation…

 

[Aloysium]

:twocents:

God as He has been revealed through Christianity is a Trinity.
There are three Divine Persons who make up the Triune Godhead.
As such, God is relationality, in the perfect form of Divine Love.
He is Love in Himself as the Father giving all that He is to the Son who returns the Love in filial obedience.
Father and Son are united in one Holy Spirit, which proceeds from each.

The Son is the Word of God, the Logos.
Scripture is a revelation of the Word from the beginning of time, Genesis, to its fulfillment in His incarnation in Jesus Christ.
The Father is revealed through the Son, by the grace of the Holy Spirit.
A living dialogue, not mere ideas, but loving communion is established enabling us to know God.

Each of us is a unique and individual expressions of one humanity,
separated by sin and joined in love.
We are here and now being brought into existence by Compassion itself,
which is the whereby we know of our own existence and
because of its relational nature, of everything that is other to us.

There is much suffering in this world, happening to each and every one of us.
The problem comes in abstracting it out there.
The reality is that it is always in here, sort of defining oneself as the one who actually feels the pain.
Who is this I and what is pain that it really, really can hurt so bad.
We could get into all the nociceptor and neuronal pathways talk, but it doesn’t begin to touch the ultimate existential reality that life hurts.

Religion is the human attempt to reconcile the blissful reality that is the Ground of our being with suffering, to reach out to God, who calls us Home.

Cravings emerging from ignorance is the Buddhist response and
its solution lies in the realization of our true nature rooted in the Divine,
an awakening bringing all our desires for transient illusory pleasures into the perspective of eternal universal being,
the unknowable Supreme Identity, who knows all.

Christianity sees the cause as sin and the solution as love.

A human hand reaches out to a tree
to appropriate what is God’s
in an act of prideful disobedience;
to become gods without God,
our hand in Adam condemns us

A human hand is nailed to a tree.
God in His mercy, humbles Himself,
taking upon Himself and conquering sin’s reward, death.
God becomes one of us.
Our hand in Christ, the Way,
through love, we are saved.

If the OP were all powerful, he would not allow us to continually brutalize one another. He would interfere with our free will.
All I can say is that taking away my free will abolishes any possibility of giving myself to what is other, to my neighbors and to God.
Seeing that it is in the giving that we commune with the Divine, I would argue that the OP’s vision is nothing but some bovine paradise.

Sorry, too long; got carried away. Could go on. Maybe another time.

 

[laocmo]

:
God as He has been revealed through Christianity is a Trinity.
There are three Divine Persons who make up the Triune Godhead.
As such, God is relationality, in the perfect form of Divine Love.
He is Love in Himself as the Father giving all that He is to the Son who returns the Love in filial obedience. Father and Son are united in one Holy Spirit, which proceeds from each.

The Son is the Word of God, the Logos. Scripture is a revelation of the Word from the beginning of time, Genesis, to its fulfillment in His incarnation in Jesus Christ. The Father is revealed through the Son, by the grace of the Holy Spirit.
A living dialogue, not mere ideas, but loving communion is established enabling us to know God.

Each of us is a unique and individual expressions of one humanity,
separated by sin and joined in love. We are here and now being brought into existence by Compassion itself, which is the whereby we know of our own existence and because of its relational nature, of everything that is other to us.

There is much suffering in this world, happening to each and every one of us.
The problem comes in abstracting it out there. The reality is that it is always in here, sort of defining oneself as the one who actually feels the pain. Who is this I and what is pain that it really, really can hurt so bad. We could get into all the nociceptor and neuronal pathways talk, but it doesn’t begin to touch the ultimate existential reality that life hurts.

Religion is the human attempt to reconcile the blissful reality that is the Ground of our being with suffering, to reach out to God, who calls us Home.

Cravings emerging from ignorance is the Buddhist response and its solution lies in the realization of our true nature rooted in the Divine, an awakening bringing all our desires for transient illusory pleasures into the perspective of eternal universal being, the unknowable Supreme Identity, who knows all.

The above reads like a bunch of gibberish. It needs some serious analysis.

1. God as He has been revealed through Christianity is a Trinity.

Revealed implies it is an absolute truth told to the people. Should read, God as He has been defined by Christianity is a Trinity. There is no proof that this is a truth. Except that we believe it.

1. There are three Divine Persons who make up the Triune Godhead.

Again Catholics think there are three Divine Persons….etc. They have no proof.

1. As such, God is relationality, in the perfect form of Divine Love. He is Love in Himself as the Father giving all that He is to the Son who returns the Love in filial obedience. Father and Son are united in one Holy Spirit, which proceeds from each.

This paragraph basically makes no sense at all. Sounds like a bunch of pious words thrown together. Sounds profound but has no real world meaning.

1. The Father is revealed through the Son, by the grace of the Holy Spirit. A living dialogue, not mere ideas, but loving communion is established enabling us to know God.

The Father was revealed in the Old Testament. Jesus talked of Him but He was already revealed. A living dialog, not mere ideas, etc. etc. Again this makes no common sense whatever.

1. Each of us is a unique and individual expressions of one humanity, separated by sin and joined in love.

Just what is this supposed to mean?

1. We are here and now being brought into existence by Compassion itself, which is the whereby we know of our own existence and because of its relational nature, of everything that is other to us.

Again undecipherable gibberish. Write this so it could be understood by a typical educated Catholic.

1. There is much suffering in this world, happening to each and every one of us.
   The problem comes in abstracting it out there. The reality is that it is always in here, sort of defining oneself as the one who actually feels the pain. Who is this I and what is pain that it really, really can hurt so bad.

The first sentence is true. The rest more meaningless verbiage.

1. We could get into all the nociceptor and neuronal pathways talk, but it doesn’t begin to touch the ultimate existential reality that life hurts.

More nonsense.

1. Religion is the human attempt to reconcile the blissful reality that is the Ground of our being with suffering, to reach out to God, who calls us Home.

More nonsensical accumulation of important sounding words.

1. Cravings emerging from ignorance is the Buddhist response and its solution lies in the realization of our true nature rooted in the Divine, an awakening bringing all our desires for transient illusory pleasures into the perspective of eternal universal being, the unknowable Supreme Identity, who knows all.

Meaningless words

 

[Aloysium]

That one’s attempt to convey some of the deepest truths comes across as a jumble meaningless words is very sad. I don’t think I can do better. I console myself with the fact that the bottom line has to do not with what we think, but what we do. You and I may find agreement in recognizing the importance of caring about our neighbours and the need to put ourselves out for them when we can.

 

[laocmo]

That one’s attempt to convey some of the deepest truths comes across as a jumble meaningless words is very sad. I don’t think I can do better. I console myself with the fact that the bottom line has to do not with what we think, but what we do. You and I may find agreement in recognizing the importance of caring about our neighbors and the need to put ourselves out for them when we can.

Perhaps you should not try to convey “truths” that to you are so deep as to be describable only in pious sounding words that make no sense to anyone but your self. I’ve tried to have friends read your latest and they could make no sense of it either. I’ve given up trying to express these things a long time ago. I agree completely with your statement, “…the bottom line has to do, not with what we think, but what we do.”

 

[HelenRose]

Good parents, who love their children, would hardly let them grow up continually fighting one another, much less so, horribly torturing, maiming, and killing each other. So how do we excuse God for doing that? He, who is supposed to love all his children, has let them do exactly that for thousands of years? Do you realize that today’s child welfare organizations would take them away from him for allowing that? Don’t excuse him by his not wanting to interfere with the child’s free will. A good parent would intercede in a heartbeat if the bad exercise of a child’s free will was harming others.

God is the Creator. You are trying to reduce Him to benevolent white haired old sugar daddy. I won’t even go there.

The fact that He loves His creation and He loves me enough to die for me, is beyond my comprehension. People can wallow like a whining two year and wail, “It’s not fair.” to their hearts content if they want to.

 

[PumpkinCookie]

What follows is not a Catholic answer

I think it is impossible to believe that God is a good father unless one has a strong belief that God will “sort it out” some day.

If we are to judge God and his fatherhood, and all we have to go on are our own experiences and understandings, we will undoubtedly come to the conclusion that he is indeed negligent or possibly malicious. This seems obvious to me, unless we live a narrow life of privilege, blind to the intense suffering of others.

However, I have hope that God is good and does exist. I have a belief that he will “sort it out” some day. What do I mean? I believe everyone will get what they deserve and the moral universe will be harmonized in the “World to Come.” Most of us are guilty of moral evil to some extent or another, and most of us are victims of natural and moral evil to some extent or another. God will rectify this, because we all know it does not happen in our limited existences.

So, does it seem to us that God is a “good parent” in the here and now? I doubt it. But, the “here and now” is not all there is, I hope! In the there and then, all will be right, I hope!

I believe he is a good father, but we are still becoming his children.

 

[Gorgias]

The above reads like a bunch of gibberish. It needs some serious analysis.

Oh, trust me… that’s not all in this thread that needs serious analysis…

Revealed implies it is an absolute truth told to the people.

Perhaps that’s your definition of what ‘revealed’ means, but that doesn’t mean that it’s the single incontrovertible definition of ‘divine revelation’. After all, Christ didn’t say, “I have come to tell all truth in a mode that is held absolutely by all people” – rather, He said, " I have come to set a man ‘against his father, a daughter against her mother, and a daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law; and one’s enemies will be those of his household.’" (He’s quoting Micah 7, here, in case you’re wondering. )

Should read, God as He has been defined by Christianity is a Trinity. There is no proof that this is a truth. Except that we believe it.

1. There are three Divine Persons who make up the Triune Godhead.

Again Catholics think there are three Divine Persons….etc. They have no proof.

By this, I take it, that you mean that you do not view the Gospels as ‘proof’? If so, there’s not much common ground upon which for us to base a discussion; if not, then we simply have to look to Jesus’ description of Himself as God, the Father as God, and the Holy Spirit proceeding from God, and His assertion that He and the Father are One.

1. As such, God is relationality, in the perfect form of Divine Love. He is Love in Himself as the Father giving all that He is to the Son who returns the Love in filial obedience. Father and Son are united in one Holy Spirit, which proceeds from each.

This paragraph basically makes no sense at all. Sounds like a bunch of pious words thrown together. Sounds profound but has no real world meaning.

You’ve never been in love, then, I take it? After all, in the throes of young love, didn’t you look at your beloved and know that you gave your all to them and received all their love in return? God is the perfection of that kind of intense love. I’m really sorry that ‘intense love’ has no real world meaning to you. :sad_yes:

1. The Father is revealed through the Son, by the grace of the Holy Spirit. A living dialogue, not mere ideas, but loving communion is established enabling us to know God.

The Father was revealed in the Old Testament. Jesus talked of Him but He was already revealed. A living dialog, not mere ideas, etc. etc. Again this makes no common sense whatever.

Now you’re just being obstinate. Jesus doesn’t reveal anything new about the Father in the Gospels? C’mon, now… if you want us to think that you’re making any common sense, you need to deal with the subject matter at hand. Otherwise, we’ll understand that you’re just raving for the sake of getting all your anger off your chest…

1. Each of us is a unique and individual expressions of one humanity, separated by sin and joined in love.

Just what is this supposed to mean?

Stop a minute, take a deep breath, and think. It means only that we’re all in this together, as human beings. Is that so difficult a concept?

1. We are here and now being brought into existence by Compassion itself, which is the whereby we know of our own existence and because of its relational nature, of everything that is other to us.

Again undecipherable gibberish. Write this so it could be understood by a typical educated Catholic.

Would that be you? 'Cause you’re not showing much evidence of being an ‘educated Catholic’…

In any case, if you need it in smaller words, here ya go: God’s love is what makes the existence of all of creation possible. By recognizing that He is our Creator, we recognize why and how we exist, and therefore, we recognize that we’re all related, since we’re all His creations.

1. Religion is the human attempt to reconcile the blissful reality that is the Ground of our being with suffering, to reach out to God, who calls us Home.

More nonsensical accumulation of important sounding words.

Again, let’s make it easy for you to grasp: God is the answer to the so-called ‘problem of evil’.

1. Cravings emerging from ignorance is the Buddhist response and its solution lies in the realization of our true nature rooted in the Divine, an awakening bringing all our desires for transient illusory pleasures into the perspective of eternal universal being, the unknowable Supreme Identity, who knows all.

Meaningless words

Nah. But, maybe you don’t know much about Buddhism, either. That’s ok. We can make this one easy to understand, too, if that helps. Buddhism asserts that there isn’t ‘reality’ in creation, and that the things that we crave are as illusory as physical existence itself; in other words, we ‘crave’ because we’re ignorant that the things we crave for in this world aren’t even real. But, that’s not the answer: the real answer is that we really are children of God, and when we ‘crave’ something here, it really just points to what we really what – the ‘ultimate good’ that we all search for, if you will.

See? That wasn’t that hard… was it?