Is Satan to blame?

[RCIAGraduate]

For suffering,pain and sin; yet aren’t other factors liable such as the weakness of humans due to inherit imperfection,nature’s tribulations or simply the statistics and probability of life.

May all of you have a wonderful day.

 

[ngill09]

5 I am the Lord, and there is none else, there is no God beside me: I girded thee, though thou hast not known me:

6 That they may know from the rising of the sun, and from the west, that there is none beside me. I am the Lord, and there is none else.

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

 

[Bonnie]

For suffering,pain and sin; yet aren’t other factors liable such as the weakness of humans due to inherit imperfection,nature’s tribulations or simply the statistics and probability of life.

May all of you have a wonderful day.

One of Terry Pratchett’s characters, a demon, said he didn’t have much to do because humans think up a lot of evil on their own. (In Good Omens?)

If one believes in free will, we can’t blame the devil for much of anything - not even natural disasters, because he’s not in control. Unless you like Flip Wilson’s famous excuse: “The devil made me do it!”

A favorite quote of mine from St. Teresa of Avila (which I’ve posted on other threads) is: “I do not fear Satan half so much as I fear those who fear him.”

And another, Matthew 5:44-45: “But I say to you, love your enemies, and pray for those who persecute you, that you may be chilren of your heavenly Father, for he makes his sun rise on the bad and the good, and causes rain to fall on the just and the unjust.”

 

[SachieWhitby]

No. The devil can tempt people all he wants but ultimately, it’s our own choices and willing to act upon those choices that results in us to doing evil things.

If we go around thinking that humans don’t have the free will to act as we want to the extent that the devil can make us do things we otherwise would not, then it’s only logical that God could also tug at those same invisible marionette strings to make us go to confession and Sunday mass to the extent that anyone living within God’s friendship and grace are not acting of their own free will either. Personally I think this video game I’ve been playing [which often has me feel like I should go to confession just for playing it] got it right when a character said in it that “God values humanity’s free will” as an explanation for why evil things are just permitted to occur.

 

[Charlemagne_II]

ngill

Your quote from Isaiah:

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

The USCCB translation of the Bible reads:

I form the light, and create the darkness, I make weal and create woe; I the LORD, do all these things.

Which translation did you use?

 

[ngill09]

ngill

Your quote from Isaiah:

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

The USCCB translation of the Bible reads:

I form the light, and create the darkness, I make weal and create woe; I the LORD, do all these things.

Which translation did you use?

King James.

 

[Charlemagne_II]

ngill

**King James. **

Biblical experts agree that the King James Bible is replete with translation errors, despite its beauty. Most Protestants know this, which is why there are so many other Protestant translations in existence.

In 1763 *The Critical Review *complained that “many false interpretations, ambiguous phrases, obsolete words and indelicate expressions…excite the derision of the scorner”.