Every now and then I visit an atheist forum. Not long ago atheists raised the old question “Why does God not cure amputees?” and I responded as follows to at least 3 atheists on this forum.
I would appreciate if you let me know what you think.
ATHEIST 1
Of course, there is always the famous question that needs asking.
Why does God hate amputees?
ATHEIST 2
Everyone else apparently gets Lourdes miracles - cancer sufferers, the lame, gout patients, itchy skin, chronic sneezers, and so on. But for some strange reason God never grants amputees their wishes. No miracles for them.
Of course there is also the obvious fact that healing amputees is verifiable, difficult to fake, and immune to the placebo effect.
ATHEIST 3
why hasn’t God cured any amputees?
Why does God not cure amputees? The Lourdes cures are always of diseases that sometimes go into spontaneous remission. Amputees never get remission. So why does God ignore them? They flock to Lourdes; it’s not like he lacks opportunity.
RESPONSE
Here we go with the old amputees argument again!
Now what are amputees?
Man inflicted loss of limbs! Isn’t that what amputate means?
It is a stale argument if one man causes injury or otherwise to another man, why doesn’t God heal the victim/patient.
Why doesn’t God intervene in every piece of suffering?
Have you caused suffering to another?
To fix the problem are you suggesting that God removes all those who cause suffering?
The many diseases that are cured miraculously (such as those at Lourdes) are not man inflicted.
ATHEIST 1
The “old” amputee argument is old because it has not been successfully countered. You have apparently decided that God only heals “non-man-inflicted” conditions (hmmm, someone needs to tell the amputees that troop to Lourdes that they are wasting their time then). So let’s drop the word “amputees” and include ANY person missing a limb, even congenital birth defects (not thalidomide babies: man-inflicted).
RESPONSE
I haven’t tried that hard and I see you have already had to make a concession on your expectation of God.
By definition, if science can NOT explain how it was cured then
• it was a lucky accident
(which is the atheist explanation of the Big Bang. You and I are the result of an accident)
OR
• it was a miracle.
No one tells the amputees that they will grow a limb at Lourdes.
Why do you say that and hide behind such throw away lines?
So do I now assume that a birth defect (which now appeals to mans view of perfection) is your reason for not believing in God?
In other words are you saying “Today, I don’t like autism, tomorrow downs syndrome. I will keep adding to or changing my list as I see fit.”
ATHEIST 1
Why doesn’t God ever replace missing limbs?
Why does he work only in the very fields of “miracles” that might NOT be miracles (i.e. that might be a rare - but not unknown therefore not miraculous - spontaneous remission) and avoid the field where it clearly WOULD be a miracle: limb re-growth?
I base my beliefs on evidence: if the evidence suggested limbs were being re-grown, I would believe the evidence.
RESPONSE
What if an amputee gets healed, would you believe then?
I will answer for you – NO.
You would explain to all of us that the photo’s were doctored, the witnesses are not credible, it was one of those rare spontaneous re-growth events etc…
ATHEIST 1
But you are darn right I would want the photos and witnesses examined very closely! It is simply much more likely that someone has arranged a hoax than that the laws of the universe have been bypassed.
RESPONSE
But what if you couldn’t find a flaw in the evidence? You will be at a fork in the road my friend!
