Two atheist arguments that cancel each other out

[tonyrey]

Because you side-stepped both of my points in order to make unrelated ones.

Your first statement:

The same way you justify God’s omni-benevolence and omni-potence without having any experience of designing or creating a Universe.

My response:

I have experience of living in this world and recognise - and appreciate - the immense value of life - which is worthless and meaningless if it is a sheer accident which leads nowhere except to total oblivion.

Further explanation:

The immense value of life is most adequately and economically explained by an infinitely powerful and loving Creator rather than being due to a sheer accident which leads nowhere except to total oblivion.

Your second statement:

With the obvious difference that only your side is forced to change the definitions of words like “Love” and “Mercy” when you have to justify his allowing infants to drown helpless in their cribs.

My reply:

Please explain how every accident could be prevented without defeating the purposes for which life exists.

Further explanation:

Infants who drown helpless in their cribs are examples of inevitable accidents caused by the natural laws without which life would be impossible and which have to be constant if life is to survive and rational existence is to continue to be possible.

My question:

Or do you believe there is no point in staying alive?

No response!

 

[mgoforth]

Not really. I wasn’t asking why bad things happen to good people. I’m asking why Christians insist on calling these bad things, for which God holds ultimate responsibility, evidence of his “love” and “mercy.”

When you ascribe ultimate responsibility to God, that’s true but you’re missing the bigger picture. God gave us free will. One potential consequence of that gift is that we freely choose to harm each other. If God didn’t give us free will, we’d be robots…and I’m guessing that wouldn’t get your stamp of approval either right?

On one hand you say that, since our mortal existence is so insignificant compared to eternity, any suffering we endure is also insignificant in the grand scheme of things. I don’t think this meets my objection, really. Suffering is suffering, and some people are profoundly unlucky in this life. All other things being equal, is it really evidence of God’s love and mercy that such people endure so much pain, while others enjoy lives of relative peace and happiness? I wouldn’t ask for Heaven on Earth - intermittent unhappiness, pain, and inconvenience are basically unavoidable, even for the luckiest of us - but I would ask that we use words like Love and Mercy to mean what they’re supposed to mean.

God shows His love and mercy by promising that those who suffer profoundly in this life are prepared a special place in Heaven. For you, Heaven isn’t a factor so it’s easy to say that this promise doesn’t make up for the current suffering. But you also forget that extreme suffering is a powerful “training aid” that teaches us to love each other deeply. If we only had “intermittent unhappiness, pain, and inconvenience” there would be no people who devote their lives to helping others. Why would I ever be overly concerned about anyone else if I knew that their pain was only temporary and probably not very painful anyway?

Thank God that the world is the way that it is…pain and all. It gives us the opportunity to learn how God loves us, and to share in it as we freely give it to our fellow human beings who are suffering.

Leading me to your second point, that basically, we are God’s playthings, and he can with us whatever he wishes. I’m happy that you’re happy with this - though, I don’t see why this can’t be true without all the nonsense of pretending that everything God does is consistent with Love. God can have created the Universe, all of us within it, and exercise ultimate authority over what happens to us, and nothing about this need compel us to abuse language every time a child turns up with leukemia or a tsunami wipes out a city before breakfast.

What a sad concept of God you have, my friend. No wonder you don’t want to believe if that’s who you think He is. As I said in an earlier post, God is not a kid poking ants with a stick for the fun of it. Yes, God could have created a world with only minor evil in it. But how would that teach us that we need to choose God over the world? If we were all mostly happy here on Earth, we’d very quickly forget all about God…and when we died, we’d all go to Hell. How could a loving God allow that to happen? You propose trading temporary happiness in this life for eternal suffering…can you see how much less loving God would be if He allowed that to happen? Of course, you don’t believe in Hell, so I’m sure it’s hard to see my point.

Finally, as long as you’re conceding that, in the Catholic view, this life is only a blip on the eternal radar, do you think it’s possible that Catholics can stop insisting that it’s *they, *not I, who think this life has more value? I could certainly do without hearing this from now on.

This view is too simplistic. We do see life as having great value. It’s not a contest about who thinks life is more valuable. But we see the true reason that this life is so valuable, that you miss…it’s not for the happiness we might find here on Earth, but for the opportunity it gives us to choose God and gain eternal life. This life is a gateway, and therefore it is extremely important because it leads to something infinitely more important.

 

[Crescentinus]

gets popcorn and watches debate

 

[TheTrueCentrist]

1. I don’t agree that Lucifer had the Beatific Vision. We believe that angels had their own period of choice as well. Their period of choice is now over, just as ours will end at death. If you have some Church documents that support this idea, I’d be happy to read them.

ewtn.com/library/DOCTRINE/ANGELS.TXT
Here we see very plainly the convenience of the position. We define the beatific vision as something so coercive as to prevent anyone from ever sinning again, therefore anyone who sins must never have had it. I wonder, however, what is the basis for believing that seeing God is in fact so coercive?

1. I think it makes a great deal of difference. And “robot” is an inaccurate way of looking at it. I believe our free will is still functional in Heaven, we just have no reason to reject God at that point. Why didn’t you jump off a bridge this morning? At this point (hopefully) you have no logical reason to do that. In Heaven, all our wishes and needs will be provided (in the form of God Himself) so no rational being would ever choose to leave.

Indeed, I was merely using the OP’s terminology. However if you say that we actually do have free will, but that we always do good, then the OP’s phrasing of the atheist objection is a false dilemma. This, however, would lead into the question: “Why is free will in heaven different from earth?” or put another way: “If we can have free will and always do good, then why does evil exist at all?”

1. I started to write something different, but I mis-read your statement the first time. So what you’re saying is that God can’t exist because He didn’t ask your opinion on how the “rules” should be laid out? See response 4 below. Also, the way God is and the way Heaven, Hell and all of it work are not choices that God made. All of creation, including Heaven and Hell and this one-time choice we have to make are ultimately reflections of God’s nature. Since God’s nature is unchanging, then there’s no possibility that the “rules” could have worked any other way. It’s like asking whether God could have made something that isn’t true…a contradiction in other words. No, He didn’t create contradictions because they don’t reflect His nature, which is Truth.

I didn’t say that God didn’t exist. My point was that there are nuances to the atheist position that were left out of the original characterization. Indeed, I posted a link earlier which made the case that only philosophers can go to heaven or hell. Why? Because only philosophers can truly claim to accept or reject God. God does not give us an option of “I don’t know, let me think about it.” If we imagine people who go through life and are either never exposed to or never consider God or religion at all, can we really say that they are capable of making this final decision? What about people who are religious from birth, but never seriously consider or understand their beliefs? They would have no idea; they would enter into the eternal consequences of their choice in ignorance.

1. Considering our limited level of knowledge and wisdom vs God’s infinite level, I think we could safely conclude that the way He set up “the system” is correct and fair to everyone. What would you say to an amoeba who started arguing with you about how you’re raising your children? Well, saying we’re like amoebas is being infinitely generous when comparing us to God.

“If we have faith that everything is fine, then everything is fine.” That’s all well and good for people of faith, but it would be irrelevant to an atheist.

1. Yes, they had original goodness, but not the Beatific Vision. As I said previously, they were not created in Heaven. They had more direct evidence than we do that God exists, but still enough distance from God to allow them to consider rejecting Him. Even when Genesis talks about God “walking” with them or “speaking” to them…it was still limited. They never saw God’s true infinite form in Eden.

Hey I just realized…your questions 4 and 5 actually cancel each other out as well! Adam and Eve had much more direct access to God than we do…but they still sinned. There may be enough material for a book on this cancelling of atheist propositions…

No, they actually strengthen the atheists position. It is possible for God to give us more direct evidence that he exists without being so coercive as to limit our free will. The atheist claim we were discussing was not “If God gives us more direct evidence of his existence then we would not sin.”

 

[empther]

In my story Empress Theresa, Theresa has to land a Boeing 747 with no flight training experience and no radio communication with the ground. She does. Later…

I told Steve, “When I found out I had to land the plane without help I got angry with God. I asked Him what the heck the point of this was.”

“What did He say?”

“He said, ‘Look what you‘ve done. You can do anything. Don’t let people down.’”

 

[JDaniel]

It sounds like you’re not seriously considering the atheist position. Its not very hard to see the flaws here. In no particular order:

1. Lucifer had the Beatific Vision and still rejected God.

TTC:

The Catholic position on Lucifer’s lapse is as follows:

“With great wisdom St. Thomas has discarded every sort of motive for the angelic lapse that is not entirely spiritual, that savors more of imagination than of intelligence. He teaches with steady persistence that no spirit in his natural sphere can transgress or err in any way. But if the spirit be taken, so to speak, out of his natural order and placed in another, a higher order–the supernatural order–then there is the possibility of a refusal; the spirit may refuse to accept or to hold something that is above his order; he may, in fact, rebel against the order of God. This is the only tenable theological explanation of the fall of the angels, . . .” - The Teaching of the Catholic Church, essay VIII, The Angels, pp. 227, 1962.

Lucifer, more than likely had not seen God’s Face, as our teaching further says,

“Through the supernatural a spirit is taken out of his sphere into a higher one; but this higher sphere means essentially a community of life with all other spirits thus favored; it means a community with lower spirits; it means community with man himself. The higher grace is indeed the more excellent gift, but it is also the more universal gift. The natural greatness of the angel is a glory which has no equal; it is a singular perfection which is without rival. A spirit may thus choose to enter into communion with the supernatural or to remain entirely in his own sphere, preferring his own natural excellency to the communion of the universal family of God. St. Thomas says that some spirits chose the second alternative ; they preferred their natural glory in its isolation to the community of the supernatural charity; and this is the fall of the angels.” - ibid.

1. “Locking in” a choice is still a loss of free will. That you chose to become a robot doesn’t make you any less of a robot.

“Locking in” is not a loss of free will any more than a human choice, once made, removes thereby free will from him.

1. There is no choice to retain your free will when you die. We are have the free will to chose what sort of robot we will become, but the decision is forced upon us.

But, we do retain our free will upon death. Catholic teaching nowhere says that we lose it. But, consider this: if, as we believe, all spirits are endowed with the fullest knowledge of the universe, when a decision is taken, it is never rescinded. That would presume an imperfection in that knowledge. That’s quite different from your notion of it, and the above explanation by St. Thomas.

1. There are ways that God could reveal his existence outside of a Beatific Vision. “Beauty” and “feelings in our hearts” are subjective and not universal. He could, for example, answer prayers in a more reliable and tangible fashion.

And so He has. It’s strange, but it’s more than OK with most of us how God handles this, but not for the few! Is it us or, is it them?

1. Adam and Eve had “original goodness” but still managed to sin.

That is correct. They were tricked by their own excellent intentions, and by their impatient desire to unity with God. God gave them one simple command. How many of us have left our fingerprint on a newly iced cake left alone in the kitchen?

Thank you for your questions and the opportunity to answer them, as best I could.

God bless,
jd

 

[JDaniel]

That isn’t the argument, though. Non-believers aren’t arguing for God’s non-existence when they say this. Rather, they’re arguing against this assertion that God is omni-potent and omni-benevolent (“God Is Love”).

ASimon:

That’s interesting. It’s like saying, we have no problem with a God, we just don’t think that He’s omnipotent and omni-benevolent. Is that about it? Well, then, I presume you must be siding with “matter!” Yes, that inextricable emptiness possessed by point particles and the nothingness surrounding an atom’s nucleus, in which point particles exist?

It’s not our side that insists that God must be all these things, or that God’s existence, omni-benevolence, and omni-potence are all strictly contingent on one another. If anything, we’re simply pointing out that if God did exist, he’d be either be less than all-powerful, apathetic to some degree, wicked to some degree, or some combination of the three.

That seriously mis-characterizes Christianity. We don’t insist that God is Omnipotent and Omni-Benevolent. We deduce those determinants from a serious, multi-thousand year dialectic and demonstrative process. Imagine a deity that has either one, but not the other of them! Imagine a creator-God not being Omnipotent! Imagine an Omnipotent God that is not, simultaneously, Omni-Benevolent! Need I suggest that that which possesses neither, is not deity.

God bless,
jd

 

[JDaniel]

The same way you justify God’s omni-benevolence and omni-potence without having any experience of designing or creating a Universe.

With the obvious difference that only your side is forced to change the definitions of words like “Love” and “Mercy” when you have to justify his allowing infants to drown helpless in their cribs.

Absurd. That is the theory of one who raises earthly life to a position above Heavenly life. It is certainly a sadness for the parents, but not for the children. Heck, if nothing else, it spares the children from all of that horrible pain and suffering they will no doubt encounter in this world. Isn’t that much better?

God bless,
jd

 

[Partinobodycula]

gets popcorn and watches debate

Grabs a box of popcorn and takes a seat next to Crescentinus.

 

[atheistgirl]

Absurd. That is the theory of one who raises earthly life to a position above Heavenly life. It is certainly a sadness for the parents, but not for the children. Heck, if nothing else, it spares the children from all of that horrible pain and suffering they will no doubt encounter in this world. Isn’t that much better?

God bless,
jd

I don’t think it’s ‘‘better’’ that a child is killed or dies, rather than live it’s life. You don’t know what the death spares - who’s to say it will have a life full of ‘‘all that horrible pain and suffering’’? Who’s to say the child, had it lived or been allowed to live, wouldn’t have aided mankind by finding the cure for all cancers?

What’s absurd, is the language used to justify pain and suffering, the killing of the innocents, while a Deity, who loves them, stands by and does nothing.

Sarah x

 

[JDaniel]

Not really. I wasn’t asking why bad things happen to good people. I’m asking why Christians insist on calling these bad things, for which God holds ultimate responsibility, evidence of his “love” and “mercy.”

ASimon:

We hold them precisely because it is true. We humans have little or no providence. We believe that God has Infinite Providence. We are looking through a little hole, made by scrunching our fingers into a circle. He, on the other hand, sees EVERYTHING.

On one hand you say that, since our mortal existence is so insignificant compared to eternity, any suffering we endure is also insignificant in the grand scheme of things. I don’t think this meets my objection, really. Suffering is suffering, and some people are profoundly unlucky in this life. All other things being equal, is it really evidence of God’s love and mercy that such people endure so much pain,

Correct. That is not evidence of God’s love and mercy. That there are those who withstand it for the love of God, is.

Leading me to your second point, that basically, we are God’s playthings, and he can with us whatever he wishes.

And we might be such for all eternity, if God were devoid of Omni-benevolence.

I’m happy that you’re happy with this - though, I don’t see why this can’t be true without all the nonsense of pretending that everything God does is consistent with Love.

No “pretense.” God is what He is, not what you or I make Him out to be. If you think God is devoid of Love, I don’t think you have yet to imagine the horrors we might be plagued with, die, be revived and re-plagued with, die, be revived and be re-plagued with, etc., etc., ad infinitum.

God can have created the Universe, all of us within it, and exercise ultimate authority over what happens to us, and nothing about this need compel us to abuse language every time a child turns up with leukemia or a tsunami wipes out a city before breakfast.

Sir, I believe it is you who is abusing the language. What is “love” without the ability to expose it? How does one expose it without the other knowing what it is not? How does one expose “mercy,” without the other knowing what it is not? Why must (most) children stick their fingers into a flame in order to understand what it means to have that kind of pain? I should think these would be obvious. But, I guess not.

God bless,
jd

 

[mgoforth]

ewtn.com/library/DOCTRINE/ANGELS.TXT
Here we see very plainly the convenience of the position. We define the beatific vision as something so coercive as to prevent anyone from ever sinning again, therefore anyone who sins must never have had it. I wonder, however, what is the basis for believing that seeing God is in fact so coercive?

I’m sorry that the truth is convenient, there’s nothing I can (or would) do to change that. Your last sentence is a bit of a loaded question. I wouldn’t define the Beatific Vision as “coercive” the way that you do. Thus my response to your original point #2. We will still have free will in Heaven, but to choose to leave Heaven would be pure insanity.

Indeed, I was merely using the OP’s terminology. However if you say that we actually do have free will, but that we always do good, then the OP’s phrasing of the atheist objection is a false dilemma. This, however, would lead into the question: “Why is free will in heaven different from earth?” or put another way: “If we can have free will and always do good, then why does evil exist at all?”

I am the OP, and I don’t mind if you use my terminology. Not a false dilemma at all. I’m afraid that you’re just missing the crux of the argument…and you neglected to answer my question, BTW :tsktsk: : Why didn’t you jump off a bridge this morning? The logical answer of course, is that there was no sane reason for you to do so. Likewise in Heaven, you still have the option to leave…but why would you ever do such a thing? If you’re given perfect happiness, why would you say no and reject it?

The fact that free will in Heaven is different from free will on Earth is the whole point of this thread! It’s different because here on Earth we don’t see God face to face, whereas in Heaven we will. In Heaven we won’t really need free will anymore, and we’ll be perfectly happy to do only good and love God as he loves us…because doing so will make us perfectly happy!

Evil exists because WE create it. We could always do good if we put our free will completely in the hands of God. God gives us the gift of free will, but in order to use it properly we have to offer it back to God. A flawed analogy (but of course all our analogies for God are flawed) is when a parent gives money to a child to buy the parent a birthday present. Along with the money, the parent gives the child the implicit choice of what type of present to buy…and perhaps even to completely rebel and buy something for himself instead. The only way things will turn out well is if the child uses that money (life on Earth) in the way it was intended - by purchasing a present (believing in God) he knows his parent will like.

I didn’t say that God didn’t exist. My point was that there are nuances to the atheist position that were left out of the original characterization. Indeed, I posted a link earlier which made the case that only philosophers can go to heaven or hell. Why? Because only philosophers can truly claim to accept or reject God. God does not give us an option of “I don’t know, let me think about it.” If we imagine people who go through life and are either never exposed to or never consider God or religion at all, can we really say that they are capable of making this final decision? What about people who are religious from birth, but never seriously consider or understand their beliefs? They would have no idea; they would enter into the eternal consequences of their choice in ignorance.

I wouldn’t call what you just presented a nuance to the atheist position. But that’s semantics…either way, atheism is the belief that God doesn’t exist, and that’s what this thread is arguing against. You took the counter position with your questions, so I addressed them as I would address an atheist. Your description under Religion: “Yours” - while cute - doesn’t tell me enough about you to know if you’re an atheist or not.

Anyway, what you present above is a false dichotomy. You say we must know God perfectly and then either accept or reject Him, and that acceptance or rejection based on imperfect knowledge is impossible. It’s basically a restatement of argument #4 you presented originally. Namely, God should show Himself to us in a way that allows us to shake His hand and either say “Yes, I accept your offer” or “No thanks, I’ll pass”. That’s a total cop out.

You have a choice every single day whether to accept or reject God. Consider this passage from Matthew 25:

*“Then the King will say to those on his right, ‘Come, you who are blessed by my Father; take your inheritance, the kingdom prepared for you since the creation of the world. For I was hungry and you gave me something to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink, I was a stranger and you invited me in, I needed clothes and you clothed me, I was sick and you looked after me, I was in prison and you came to visit me.’

“Then the righteous will answer him, ‘Lord, when did we see you hungry and feed you, or thirsty and give you something to drink? When did we see you a stranger and invite you in, or needing clothes and clothe you? When did we see you sick or in prison and go to visit you?’

“The King will reply, ‘Truly I tell you, whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers and sisters of mine, you did for me.’

“Then he will say to those on his left, ‘Depart from me, you who are cursed, into the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels. For I was hungry and you gave me nothing to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me nothing to drink, I was a stranger and you did not invite me in, I needed clothes and you did not clothe me, I was sick and in prison and you did not look after me.’

“They also will answer, ‘Lord, when did we see you hungry or thirsty or a stranger or needing clothes or sick or in prison, and did not help you?’

“He will reply, ‘Truly I tell you, whatever you did not do for one of the least of these, you did not do for me.’*

See, we all have the basic moral law written on our hearts. We will at the very least be held accountable for how we treat each other. If we learn nothing else about good or evil during our time on Earth, if we never hear about God or Jesus, then the innate moral law is all we will be judged on. But as we learn more details about God, we’re held to ever higher standards. And that includes what you’re doing now BTW, learning about God on this website. You can’t say now that you’ve never heard of God or that you just want to worship Him in an indirect way by being nice to others. There’s no going backwards in this game. Now, in addition to basic human decency, you’ll also need to choose whether to believe in God Himself AND figure out the correct way to worship Him. I’ll give you that answer for free - it’s through the Catholic Church.

“If we have faith that everything is fine, then everything is fine.” That’s all well and good for people of faith, but it would be irrelevant to an atheist.

Hmmm, that’s really not what I said at all…I’m not even sure how you got that out of my response actually. Let me try again. Do you agree that if God exists in the form that Catholics claim, that He must be vastly more intelligent than us? If so, then it’s silly to argue that just because you or I don’t understand how things work, they must be wrong. You’re basically claiming to be at the pinnacle of knowledge and wisdom when you make an argument like that. No offense to you, but that description doesn’t fit any of us.

The atheist claim we were discussing was not “If God gives us more direct evidence of his existence then we would not sin.”

But sinning IS exactly what we’re talking about…this thread is discussing free will in terms of sinning (rejecting God) or not sinning (accepting God). Choosing not to believe in God is itself a sin. There’s no option not to play the game. So yes, my counter argument does fit.

It is possible for God to give us more direct evidence that he exists without being so coercive as to limit our free will.

Really? HOW?

 

[mgoforth]

I don’t think it’s ‘‘better’’ that a child is killed or dies, rather than live it’s life. You don’t know what the death spares - who’s to say it will have a life full of ‘‘all that horrible pain and suffering’’? Who’s to say the child, had it lived or been allowed to live, wouldn’t have aided mankind by finding the cure for all cancers?

What’s absurd, is the language used to justify pain and suffering, the killing of the innocents, while a Deity, who loves them, stands by and does nothing.

Sarah x

Well, Sarah…I wouldn’t say he does “nothing”. He welcomes them into the glory of Heaven, gives them every happiness their heart has ever desired and things that the heart couldn’t even dream of, AND they live in that perfect happiness and love forever. He actually does an infinite amount for them.

 

[ASimon]

JDaniel:

ASimon:

That’s interesting. It’s like saying, we have no problem with a God, we just don’t think that He’s omnipotent and omni-benevolent. Is that about it? Well, then, I presume you must be siding with “matter!” Yes, that inextricable emptiness possessed by point particles and the nothingness surrounding an atom’s nucleus, in which point particles exist?

Still not the argument. If this God were certain to exist, my problem with him would ultimately be irrelevant. If he were not omni-potent or omni-benevolent, that would simply be the reality of the situation, and I would have to deal with it on those terms. As it stands, though, my problem is still with the people who insist on worshipping and praising this being under such fatuous pretenses.

That seriously mis-characterizes Christianity. We don’t insist that God is Omnipotent and Omni-Benevolent. We deduce those determinants from a serious, multi-thousand year dialectic and demonstrative process.

And as I said, in order to deduce this conclusion, you need to, first, presuppose the existence of a spiritual world, then either completely mis-characterize the material world we’re living in, or completely abuse the common language we use to describe it. If I held the power of weather and disease in my hands, and went about randomly inflicting devastation and catastrophe on helpless people, based on nothing more apparent than what suited my whims at any given moment, would any sane person, for a second, think of describing me in terms of “Love” or “Mercy?” Even if I made sure to periodically dispense good fortune along with it?

Imagine a deity that has either one, but not the other of them! Imagine a creator-God not being Omnipotent! Imagine an Omnipotent God that is not, simultaneously, Omni-Benevolent! Need I suggest that that which possesses neither, is not deity.

You needn’t suggest this, because Epicurus beat you to the punch something like 2300 years ago. And as Epicurus implied back then, this is much more your problem than mine. I never had to worry about worshipping this being in the first place.

 

[atheistgirl]

Well, Sarah…I wouldn’t say he does “nothing”. He welcomes them into the glory of Heaven, gives them every happiness their heart has ever desired and things that the heart couldn’t even dream of, AND they live in that perfect happiness and love forever. He actually does an infinite amount for them.

That’s not the Churches position on every death of a baby or child, as I understand it, but if I’m wrong please correct me.

The Church says it simply doesn’t know what happens to the souls of those innocents that die by whatever means, and who haven’t been baptized. It trusts them to God’s mercy, but it does not declare them in heaven.

Limbo as a theological speculation has been dropped, but not before all those parents of babies and children went through the anguish of thinking their innocent baby was in Limbo and no in heaven, as taught by so many bishops and priests of the Church.

Sarah x

 

[mgoforth]

Still not the argument. If this God were certain to exist, my problem with him would ultimately be irrelevant. If he were not omni-potent or omni-benevolent, that would simply be the reality of the situation, and I would have to deal with it on those terms. As it stands, though, my problem is still with the people who insist on worshipping and praising this being under such fatuous pretenses.

And as I said, in order to deduce this conclusion, you need to, first, presuppose the existence of a spiritual world, then either completely mis-characterize the material world we’re living in, or completely abuse the common language we use to describe it. If I held the power of weather and disease in my hands, and went about randomly inflicting devastation and catastrophe on helpless people, based on nothing more apparent than what suited my whims at any given moment, would any sane person, for a second, think of describing me in terms of “Love” or “Mercy?” Even if I made sure to periodically dispense good fortune along with it?

You needn’t suggest this, because Epicurus beat you to the punch something like 2300 years ago. And as Epicurus implied back then, this is much more your problem than mine. I never had to worry about worshipping this being in the first place.

To the moderators…can we please get a “shaking the dust from our feet” emoticon to use in situations such as these?

 

[mgoforth]

That’s not the Churches position on every death of a baby or child, as I understand it, but if I’m wrong please correct me.

The Church says it simply doesn’t know what happens to the souls of those innocents that die by whatever means, and who haven’t been baptized. It trusts them to God’s mercy, but it does not declare them in heaven.

Limbo as a theological speculation has been dropped, but not before all those parents of babies and children went through the anguish of thinking their innocent baby was in Limbo and no in heaven, as taught by so many bishops and priests of the Church.

Sarah x

But it doesn’t declare them not to be in Heaven either. I can practically feel the anger you have toward the Church coming through the screen when I read that last paragraph. Care to share where that comes from?

 

[JDaniel]

Here we see very plainly the convenience of the position. We define the beatific vision as something so coercive as to prevent anyone from ever sinning again, therefore anyone who sins must never have had it. I wonder, however, what is the basis for believing that seeing God is in fact so coercive?

TTC:

“For God the creation and the final consummation of all things are ever present to his eternity. For men who exist in time, their creation and their consummation are separated by the slow sequence of change measured by many days, many years, and many ages. God created us by an act of thought; he willed, he spoke, and we were. We are, because he knows us. On the impossible supposition that we should ever pass out of his sight, we should instantaneously cease to be and sink back into nothing from which we came. Our creation meant that we entered into the sight of God, and our continued existence means that he keeps us in sight; our very being depends on his mind. Our consummation will be when we know God even as we are known, when we see him, who has ever seen us, and whose sight is our life. God knew us in order that one day we might know him; such is the alpha and omega, the beginning and end of all human history.” - The Teaching of the Catholic Church, essay, XXXV, Heaven, or the Church Triumphant, p. 1248, 1949.

I didn’t say that God didn’t exist. My point was that there are nuances to the atheist position that were left out of the original characterization. Indeed, I posted a link earlier which made the case that only philosophers can go to heaven or hell. Why? Because only philosophers can truly claim to accept or reject God. God does not give us an option of “I don’t know, let me think about it.” If we imagine people who go through life and are either never exposed to or never consider God or religion at all, can we really say that they are capable of making this final decision? What about people who are religious from birth, but never seriously consider or understand their beliefs? They would have no idea; they would enter into the eternal consequences of their choice in ignorance.

This is a consideration that has been made for centuries, at least in Catholicism (which makes total sense!). This has to do with our conception of “invincible ignorance.” So, your so-called nuanced atheist’s position is quite incorrect. (They must think that all modern readers have long since lost the capability of remembering. Thank you for pointing it out.)

“If we have faith that everything is fine, then everything is fine.” That’s all well and good for people of faith, but it would be irrelevant to an atheist.

Providing the atheist dies an atheist, perhaps. But, the Church has never placed a human being in Hell. It is quite possible that this life is enough to give us much to consider, not only during our lives, but also, immediately before corruption. Certainly atheists are people who, for the most part, constantly consider their position and the alternative to their position. I would imagine that they might carry that into their final moments. All it takes is an instantaneous moment of remorse. There is no unforgivable sin.

No, they actually strengthen the atheists position. It is possible for God to give us more direct evidence that he exists without being so coercive as to limit our free will.

He has given most of us more than enough evidence to believe in him. The very fact that regardless of that, there are those who reject him, is proof that we have free will. Unless one is arrogant enough to believe that only he is intelligent enough to “get” it.

God bless,
jd

 

[JDaniel]

Grabs a box of popcorn and takes a seat next to Crescentinus.

Hey! I’m a little hungry over here!

God bless,
jd

 

[atheistgirl]

But it doesn’t declare them not to be in Heaven either. I can practically feel the anger you have toward the Church coming through the screen when I read that last paragraph. Care to share where that comes from?

Oh my gosh.

There’s absolutely not a single drop of anger in my post.

Not one.

So I don’t know what you’re feeling, but it’s certainly not coming from me, and it’s certainly not anger.

If anything, it’s empathy with these parents, brought alive for me in a documentary I watched about what families went through in Ireland, with their babies buried outside the church graveyard as they were not allowed to be buried in consecrated grounds, as they were not baptized.

youtube.com/watch?v=uTudSo6s_VU&feature=relmfu

It was heartbreaking listening to some of those mothers.

So you couldnt be more wrong when you claim to feel anger coming from me.

I have nothing but the deepest heartfelt sympathy for these women and families.

And I’m relieved for them that the Bishops and Priests, to whom they looked exclusively in this matter, have seen fit to rebury some of the children in the grounds of the church, and bless the grounds where others were buried.

And that the Bishops and Priests have dropped this theological speculation that has caused these women and families so much anguish.

So you couldn’t be more wrong.

Sarah x