Why doesn't God just not create the bad people to keep them from going to hell

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If God gave us free will than we have free will, complete free will, it is that simple.

If God Is Omniscient, than God Is Omniscient, it is that simple, there is no such thing as “partial omniscience”.

Even tho it is beyond our finite minds that we can have free will and God can know absolutely everything we do before we do it, this doesn’t denigrate our mental abilities, it just points out that we have our limitations and that God is “Bigger” than we can imagine and I don’t mean “Bigger” in a physical sense.

Rather than “denigrate our mental abilities”, it points out that we have “mental abilities” to think/ponder about more than just what our natural senses convey to us.

If there is a God Who created us than we have free will or we are “puppets on a string”, God’s string, there is no middle ground for the simple reason that “partial free will” is no free will at all.
 
It’s not “parsing” anything. It’s establishing clear distinctions between Creator and His creatures.

Such clear distinctions are sorely lacking in common discourse.
I see. Well, here’s the thing. I notice this happens here a lot…that some people attempt to explain things using terminology that they believe will intimidate someone into thinking they are conversing with a high mind/superior intellect who is out of their league, meanwhile disguising the fact that they don’t know what they’re talking about. (Reminds me of kids writing essay papers). It’s even more noticeable when someone asks for clarification and the language gets thicker.

I reckon if someone truly understands something, they can say it straight and simple.

Not saying you’re one of those…I don’t really keep track of people on here or what they’ve posted before. I just respond to a given post. SO…I will assume for now that you are a high mind and out of my league, and that you do understand what you’re talking about.
As long as it makes sense to you, it’s fine.
 
If God gave us free will than we have free will, complete free will, it is that simple.

If there is a God Who created us than we have free will or we are “puppets on a string”, God’s string, there is no middle ground for the simple reason that “partial free will” is no free will at all.
That’s the way I see it.
Pretty straightforward.
👍
 
That’s the way I see it.
Pretty straightforward.
👍
A third vote here. Planned is not free…and it is much worse when the planner has foreknowledge of the “choices” that will be made.
 
A third vote here. Planned is not free…and it is much worse when the planner has foreknowledge of the “choices” that will be made.
It is highly presumptous for a creature with very limited knowledge and intelligence to impose limits on divine goodness, power and wisdom…
 
A third vote here. Planned is not free…and it is much worse when the planner has foreknowledge of the “choices” that will be made.
Aye…that would smack of evil…
A sadistic God is terrible to contemplate.
 
It is highly presumptous for a creature with very limited knowledge and intelligence to impose limits on divine goodness, power and wisdom…
You call it presumptuous, I call it logical. What I see from the Abrahamic/Christian God doesn’t qualify as goodness or wisdom in my book…just raw, vicious power.
 
It is highly presumptous for a creature with very limited knowledge and intelligence to impose limits on divine goodness, power and wisdom…
That is a very true general statement.
But I can’t quite work out how you are applying it specifically here.
Are you saying that about people who presume God gives us free will but still pre-sages everything we do, and we act according to His will…or about those who presume that when He gave us free will, He really did give us free will?
Or did you just throw it out as an unrelated general statement (like “hey, the sun comes up every day”)
:confused:
 
You call it presumptuous, I call it logical. What I see from the Abrahamic/Christian God doesn’t qualify as goodness or wisdom in my book…just raw, vicious power.
Do you really believe the loving Father revealed by Jesus is “just raw, vicious power”?

It was raw, vicious power that scourged and crucified His Son…
 
That is a very true general statement.
But I can’t quite work out how you are applying it specifically here.
Are you saying that about people who presume God gives us free will but still pre-sages everything we do, and we act according to His will…or about those who presume that when He gave us free will, He really did give us free will?
Or did you just throw it out as an unrelated general statement (like “hey, the sun comes up every day”)
:confused:
It was a reference to the statement “planned is not free” which implies that God is incapable of creating independent persons in His own image.
 
You call it presumptuous, I call it logical. What I see from the Abrahamic/Christian God doesn’t qualify as goodness or wisdom in my book…just raw, vicious power.
Do you believe God is directly responsible for the atrocities being committed in the world? If so the deist god is no less culpable because it is regarded as creating everything. If it doesn’t know what it’s doing then there is no reason to believe in it at all. It’s just a word that doesn’t make sense.
 
It was a reference to the statement “planned is not free” which implies that God is incapable of creating independent persons in His own image.
Actually, I don’t think it implies anything of the sort.
“Planned is not free” was a statement about whether or not God gave man free will.
Some here seem to think that He fore-ordained us to act a certain way (in fact, isn’t that the gist of this whole thread?).
If he pre-ordained our behavior, that pretty much negates the whole idea of free will.

It says nothing about whether he CAUSES things to happen to us, as you have also implied. That’s a whole 'nother question. It only addresses whether our choices are truly ours to make or not, given what does happen.

Frankly, I think a God who would tell us we have free will but really everything was pre-ordained (or planned) would be pretty capricious, pretty sadistic, in fact. Toying with us. That is Not the loving God I believe there is, who allows us to make our own choices, knows how flawed we are, knows we’re going to mess up, but hopes that we wake up and find him.
 
ve
Actually, I don’t think it implies anything of the sort.
“Planned is not free” was a statement about whether or not God gave man free will.
Some here seem to think that He fore-ordained us to act a certain way (in fact, isn’t that the gist of this whole thread?).
If he pre-ordained our behavior, that pretty much negates the whole idea of free will.

It says nothing about whether he CAUSES things to happen to us, as you have also implied. That’s a whole 'nother question. It only addresses whether our choices are truly ours to make or not, given what does happen.

Frankly, I think a God who would tell us we have free will but really everything was pre-ordained (or planned) would be pretty capricious, pretty sadistic, in fact. Toying with us. That is Not the loving God I believe there is, who allows us to make our own choices, knows how flawed we are, knows we’re going to mess up, but hopes that we wake up and find him.
If we take "“Planned is not free” at its face value it means that we are not really free if everything is planned. Yet oldcelt claims we do have free will, thereby apparently contradicting himself. Perhaps he will enlighten us…

He may mean that nothing is planned - which would fit in with his belief that God created everything and takes no interest in His creatures (which I find incoherent).
 
ve
If we take "“Planned is not free” at its face value it means that we are not really free if everything is planned. Yet oldcelt claims we do have free will, thereby apparently contradicting himself. Perhaps he will enlighten us…

He may mean that nothing is planned - which would fit in with his belief that God created everything and takes no interest in His creatures (which I find incoherent).
Tony…I do not believe in the God of the bible, so, no contradiction. We have free will because He does not exist. I also do not believe that God created everything…just jump-started the process and allowed it to evolve as it did.
I mean precisely that nothing is planned. To me, it is the only scenario that allows for anything but an enemy god.
 
Tony…I do not believe in the God of the bible, so, no contradiction. We have free will because He does not exist. I also do not believe that God created everything…just jump-started the process and allowed it to evolve as it did.
I mean precisely that nothing is planned. To me, it is the only scenario that allows for anything but an enemy god.
There’s a question that I’ve always wanted to ask a deist out of curiosity. Do you think the Problem of Evil could be addressed if multiple gods with contrary goals were manipulating earthly events? Evil doesn’t seem particularly organized in the world, so that may be an argument against an evil monotheistic god, but what about a mixture of good and evil gods?
 
oldcelt, here is something to ponder. And it certainly can’t be answered by a god who dosen’t give a care.

forums.catholic-questions.org/showthread.php?t=735495
I thought I’d put an edited version of the link in the op. It starts at a Catholic Charismatic healing service:

(Praying the Rosary) I had already made up my mind that I wasn’t going to volunteer to go to the front for special prayers or anything. Then something strange happened; I felt this wonderful peace come over me. It was as if all the unhappiness of the years of suffering through this disease suddenly disappeared.

Returning home that evening, I vowed to improve my spiritual life.

By the end of that year the paralysis was in both legs and my arms. … my legs became severely deformed, and the bones began to bow. My right knee became completely displaced because of the spasticity of the leg; the knee-cap came off and slid over into the interior of the leg. Also, there was now no feeling left at all. … It was time to face up to the fact that I was handicapped — and to begin life in a wheelchair. …

Then, one night in June this year, as I lay in bed finishing my rosary, I heard a voice say, Why don’t you ask? I don’t know why, because I had never asked before to be healed. … So I asked with all my heart for her to ask her Son to heal me of whatever I needed to be healed. At that moment I felt a bubbly feeling go through me, and I don’t remember anything else as I fell asleep.

the next morning… I had a Scripture class …My husband helped me into our van which was equipped with hand controls for me, and he placed my wheelchair in the van as he always did. (Once there) there was always someone to help me and get me to class.

Suddenly, as I sat there studying with the rest of the class, I began to experience a feeling of warmth in my feet and legs and an intense itching. But there was no way this could be happening, as I had no feeling in my feet and hadn’t for several years. Then I looked down at my feet and not only were they itching, but my toes were wiggling!

I didn’t remember another thing in the class; in fact, I don’t even remember leaving the class and getting into my van.

As I arrived at my house, I remembered that there was no one home. … They did leave my crutches at the bottom of the three steps leading into our house. If I needed to get into the house, I could do it with the crutches. But it took a great deal of difficulty.

I sat there in the car for 15 minutes, waiting. Then, I had to go to the bathroom. My handicap also included bladder and bowel dysfunction, and I had been in class all morning. . . . so I had to get in and get in right away!

I stretched out of the car and got the crutches. I could not, however, lift my leg with the heavy braces on them. I stood there for a few minutes and then thought that if I could feel my feet—maybe I could also lift my leg. I tried it, and it went up the steps with no difficulty. My heart was pounding!

Once in the house, I unlocked my braces, I looked down at my legs. I thought they looked kind of funny; then it hit me that my right leg was completely straight! I had had two surgeries on it to attempt to straighten it, but neither had been successful. In fact, they had finally released the kneecap (surgically) to let it go with the rest of my knee, stating that was all they could do with it. A severe valgus deformity had resulted from the years of spasticity and muscle imbalance.

As I looked now, it was straight. The kneecap was where it was supposed to be. My legs were perfectly straight!

At that point, I completely flipped out and began screaming that my legs were straight. I kept saying, “Thank you Blessed Mother! Thank you Jesus!” But it still had not sunk in that I was healed. Shaking, I took off the braces and stood up on my legs, unassisted, for the first time in years. I looked down again; they were like anyone else’s legs! Finally it struck me that something very wonderful had happened.

I walked down the hallway. . . walked down the hallway, with my crutches under my arm. When I got to the base of the stairs, I thought: well, if I’m really healed, I can run up those stairs. So I dropped my crutches and did it — and then ran back down and up again. And I just kept shouting “Thank you!” over and over. I went a little hysterical, weeping and laughing at the same time. . . .

I called a good friend who also taught at St. Gregory’s. I remember I was standing in the middle of the living room floor, jumping up and down when she arrived; soon we were both jumping up and down as she realized what was happening.

My friend calmed me down some and said we needed to find my family so that we could tell them. (Arriving back at home after finding her family had left where they’d been) my friend ran in to get Ron who came out, white as a sheet. He thought something must have happened, because my car was still there and the braces and crutches were in the house, and that an ambulance must have come and taken me to the hospital.

continued
 
I jumped out of the car and ran to him. My oldest daughter just stood there in tears and completely dumbfounded and choked up. She’s twelve and my other two daughters are ten and seven. They had never known me any way other than handicapped.

My oldest was crying, the middle one just stood there with her mouth open, and my little one said, “Oh, goody! Now we don’t have to do housework anymore!” She followed that with, “You look silly, Mom!”

The next day… we were finally able to contact my doctor.

We told him what had happened, and he kept saying, “That can’t be! That can’t happen; it’s impossible!” He asked us to come to the hospital right away.

My doctor thought it was a joke, saying I must be Rita’s twin sister. After exhaustive tests, all he could do was hug me and cry and ask me what did I do? I told him all I did was ask. How many times? Once, I answered him, but many people have been praying for me for years. He then asked, did I use up all the prayers, or were there still some for him?
  • Rita Klaus
 
If we take "“Planned is not free” at its face value it means that we are not really free if everything is planned. Yet oldcelt claims we do have free will, thereby apparently contradicting himself. Perhaps he will enlighten us…).
No contradiction that I see.
Planned is not free. It’s one or the other. I think he claims it’s the other (free).
If it’s already planned out, then we really aren’t acting freely are we?
He may mean that nothing is planned - which would fit in with his belief that God created everything and takes no interest in His creatures (which I find incoherent).
You took that a bit far. Not speaking for OLDCELT, but a person might believe God created everything, gave us free will , and is NOT disinterested in what we do with it.
 
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