Why would God include carnivory, parasitism, and disease in creation?

[PRmerger]

].Yet “martyrs” continue to place themselves in prominent danger, or fly planes into buildings, or blow themselves up in public places. As Einstein said, “Insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results.”

Except that the blood of Christian martyrs is the seed of the Church. So our results were quite good, yes?

Guilt exists as a motivator to change our behaviour. If we can just get rid of it by heaping it on a goat or on another human (even one claimed to be divine), then it can’t do its job.

Certainly we can get rid of our guilt by “heaping it on a goat or on another human.” This would eliminate the guilt. Except for the fact that we sin again.

Such as? I mean, let’s say I’m responsible for the welfare of a group of children, or frail elderly people, or people with severe disabilities - people who, in other words, are not able to provide effective care for themselves. In what way would my death help them, that would not be better served by my remaining alive in order to render continuing support? It might make for a dramatic gesture, but not a particularly useful one.

Yes, your death would not be helpful to them.

But if you used your suffering redemptively, then it could help them immeasurably.

 

[Gaber]

Except that the blood of Christian martyrs is the seed of the Church. So our results were quite good, yes?

That is a matter of spin and perspective, as well as some cleared understanding of martydom and specific instances of it beyond what piety might wish for.

Certainly we can get rid of our guilt by “heaping it on a goat or on another human.” This would eliminate the guilt. Except for the fact that we sin again.

That is kind of built in, and perhaps not the way it is so cut and dried by our Church. And it is a matter of teleology, as well. And as Irma Bombeck said, “Guilt is the gift that just keeps giving.” I can thing of no more useless or debilitating thing than most guilt, especially that as displayed on here by poor overly scrupulous innocents one here. What a power tool guilt is!

Yes, your death would not be helpful to them.

Even in the Bible it says “Agree with thine enemy while in the midst thereof.” For my part I coud agree with you poinjt by point on important doctriine and mena something radically different in terms of my own experince than the publicl or “book” understanding of those, and not be alone in that.

But if you used your suffering redemptively, then it could help them immeasurably.

How exactly do you understand this “suffering redemptively?” And how does it “help them immesurably?” That is a sincere question; I’m not attacking your position on this, butI don’t like to simply dismiss such ideas by saying, “oh, it’s grace, of course.” I always prefere knolwedge to the arbitrariness of faith. And I say “arbitrary,” because in my instance I might easily have been of another religion, or without one, save for circumstance.

 

[tonyrey]

Yes, the point being that God is not the result of a line of logic, or of emotion, or of sense perceptions, and cannot be either the object of such, nor contained in such. That said, the kind of IQ that is often measured is of a prticular variety and usually culturally biased. So “reason” doesn’t include other intelligences that may pretain. And there is the factor that God is transcendent, so if there is a way to perceive God, it must be beyond the mind as we ordinarily “use” it. So proofs are pius attempts, at best, to get someone to pay attention to something you believe, and not know. As Walt Whitman said, And I am sure this is a very close quote: “I and mine do not convince by argument, similes or rhymes. We convince by our presence”

In other words, to attempt to “prove” Diety by cold dry logic is to present a dead body in the place of the Ineffable. The notion that God could be demonstrated as a matter of logic is a root of anthropomorphism, something rampant in the minds of many religious anyway. I would not encourage that by attempting a futile “proof.”

“Ineffable” is the key word. Rudolf Otto referred to the “mysterium tremendum et fascinans”.

 

[Gaber]

“Ineffable” is the key word. Rudolf Otto referred to the “mysterium tremendum et fascinans”.

Fom Encyclopaedia Britannica:

On the basis of their religious experiences, the mystics of Christianity of all eras have concurred in the belief that one can make no assertions about God, because God is beyond all concepts and images. Inasmuch as human beings are gifted with reason, however, the religious experience of transcendence demands historical clarification. Thus, in Christian theology two tendencies stand in constant tension with each other. On the one hand, there is the tendency to systematize the idea of God as far as possible. On the other, there is the tendency to eliminate the accumulated collection…and on and on for 126,772 words

Yes, RO has coined, if it is original with him, a useful phrase. As one man said “The search for Reality is the most dangerous undertaking. it will destroy your world.” That is why there is such timidness, I’m sure, to undertake those prayerful ways which might well lead to an experiencial encounter that would put an end to so much contentiousness that takes place in the complexities of discursive minds. Such an experiential conclusion as mystics, and better, contemplatives, point to, are the foundations of understanding only shadowed by faith. With such understanding, the OP question is thrown into a completely different light, rendering it quite useless, other thatn as a matter of entertaining speculation until a more fundamental understanding is accomplished.

That is why there is, on the part of some, "…the tendency to eliminate the accumulated collection (of, I’m sure, interprative writings, especially of “proofs!”.) But how Zen is that!? There are in that tradition, and others, direct and active mind boggliing answers that bypass the kind of mentality that uses subject/object linearity to arrive at its limitations. So burning the Sutras, knoking over a full glass, and innumerable other gestures that stop one;s investment in limitations are utilized. Similarly to using brain coding to reduce in a few minuteso psychological situatins that would take conversationla psycholgy weeks or even years to deal with, such methods bypass the ordinary discursive prayers ordinarily used in devotion.

Yet all the writings are important, as long as they are understood as a pointer to the experience of an interior reality not sharable other than by getting there, and then using whatever language might indicate that something significant was seen. By that means, some few might be encouraged to look bveyond their argumentations and look to see what it is that allows the appearance of argumentation to happen. And I’m not even saying everyone ought to do that, but just that it ought to be acknowledgesd that the Saints and Sages are qualitatively different than the ordinary faithful in their means of preception. Then there might be som hope of more discovering insights of significanxce.

 

[ReapReason]

Why would God design some animals to painfully kill and eat others? Why would he design animals to live inside and on other animals and leech their nutrients until they die slowly and painfully? Why would he create killer viruses and bacteria that cause so much death and pain?

He wouldn’t. God did not design anything in the temporal sense of the word.

 

[ReapReason]

Those thing come from the Devil. That is why the Devil is also called “The Lord of the Flies”.

??? No, they evolved; that’s were they came from.

 

[ReapReason]

So the Devil has the power of creation?

No he does not.

 

[ReapReason]

You have it backward. Man did all that by desiring to become like gods. God allows it - He does not create it.

So you believe the fall is the reason why there are carnivores in the world!!!

 

[ReapReason]

No they did not. Viruses, predatory behavior, and parasites were here long before man existed, hundreds of millions of years in fact.

:

 

[ReapReason]

You say that God does not view animal death and suffering in the same way as human suffering. Whether this is true or not, he certainly must view it negatively, no matter how much “less bad” it is. So why would an omnipotent being create a system that has any bad in it?

What do you mean by bad?

 

[jagger3320]

DIdn’t Yaweh curse the land and the flesh?? like people in general we have original sin, didn’t God also curse the land in the beginning of Genesis??

 

[tonyrey]

DIdn’t Yaweh curse the land and the flesh?? like people in general we have original sin, didn’t God also curse the land in the beginning of Genesis??

God is a loving Father who blesses what He has created because He knows it is good…

 

[BobCatholic]

Have you contacted the Samaritans?

Never heard of them.

Do you go to church? Do they have a newsletter where you can ask for advice?

Yes, and no.

There is also the St Vincent de Paul society. Sometimes voluntary work helps people to find opportunities for part-time work and at least free meals.

Volunteer work costs money in commuting costs. Money, the supply which is dwindling.

 

[PRmerger]

Yes, the point being that God is not the result of a line of logic, or of emotion, or of sense perceptions, and cannot be either the object of such, nor contained in such. That said, the kind of IQ that is often measured is of a prticular variety and usually culturally biased. So “reason” doesn’t include other intelligences that may pretain. And there is the factor that God is transcendent, so if there is a way to perceive God, it must be beyond the mind as we ordinarily “use” it. So proofs are pius attempts, at best, to get someone to pay attention to something you believe, and not know. As Walt Whitman said, And I am sure this is a very close quote: “I and mine do not convince by argument, similes or rhymes. We convince by our presence”

In other words, to attempt to “prove” Diety by cold dry logic is to present a dead body in the place of the Ineffable. The notion that God could be demonstrated as a matter of logic is a root of anthropomorphism, something rampant in the minds of many religious anyway. I would not encourage that by attempting a futile “proof.”

Well, yes and no.

As Catholic philosopher Peter Kreeft says, “Some people scorn apologetic reasoning [because] they decide with their hearts much more than with their heads whether to believe or not. The heart is our center, not the head. But apologetics gets at the heart through the head. The head is important precisely because it is a gate to the heart.” (bold mine).

As with most Catholic answers, it’s not either/or but rather the grand both/and.

 

[PRmerger]

That is a matter of spin and perspective, as well as some cleared understanding of martydom and specific instances of it beyond what piety might wish for.

I defy you to have been one of the pagans watching the 26 martyrs of Japan die horrific deaths with the joy of Christ on their lips and not convert.

 

[PRmerger]

That is kind of built in, and perhaps not the way it is so cut and dried by our Church. And it is a matter of teleology, as well. And as Irma Bombeck said, “Guilt is the gift that just keeps giving.” I can thing of no more useless or debilitating thing than most guilt, especially that as displayed on here by poor overly scrupulous innocents one here. What a power tool guilt is!

Guilt does indeed have its utility. Just like pain does. Imagine the horrors of what life would be like without either. I seem to remember a case of a woman who was unable to feel pain (some sort of somatic disorder) and it was imperative that someone follow her around so she didn’t injure herself. Without pain to serve as a warning she could very well kill herself.

However, unnecessary guilt, like unnecessary pain, is, of course bad.

 

[PRmerger]

Even in the Bible it says “Agree with thine enemy while in the midst thereof.” For my part I coud agree with you poinjt by point on important doctriine and mena something radically different in terms of my own experince than the publicl or “book” understanding of those, and not be alone in that.

Huh? Aren’t you starting a bit early for Happy Hour?

How exactly do you understand this “suffering redemptively?”

If you can understand the nature of the atoning death of Christ–how his suffering redeemed the world–you might be able to apply it to the redemptive suffering of humanity.

And how does it “help them immesurably?”

We can apply our suffering to the salvation of the world. The benefits, of course, which, we cannot measure.

 

[PRmerger]

Volunteer work costs money in commuting costs. Money, the supply which is dwindling.

Just curious–how do you pay for internet?

 

[tonyrey]

Never heard of them.

I was surprised to think they don’t exist in the US but then I checked up and found
Samaritans USA - and in Chicago:

Please email us at info@northshoresamaritan.org or call our confidential intake line (847-446-6955, ext. 20) and leave a message for our Clinical Director, Dr. Sue Priebe.

Samaritans serves every kind of person with every kind of problem, from the most benign and seemingly simple to those that are most immediate and potentially life-threatening. Our motto is: “Always there!”

wikipedia

 

[Sair]

Here I see “primitive” as synonymous with “infused with truth” and “pointing towards something greater”, and not as backwards and barbaric.

Even more primitive than sacrifice of domestic animals is sacrifice of fellow humans. Is this indicative of a greater awareness of the nature of the divine and of the value of human life? I hear these concepts bandied about in association with Christianity…

It does speak to the fact that sacrifice and worship are inherently linked— all of humanity has seen the need for this.

The resort to extreme measures such as sacrifice of children to pacify the gods speaks of extreme fear and extreme ignorance on the part of our distant ancestors. Yet with the advancement of knowledge has come a vast reduction in the notion of the need for propitiatory sacrifice. The Old Testament speaks of a god who enjoys the aroma of burning flesh. Is this something that has been - or should be - universally appreciated?

Well, Sair, there need not be an either/or dichotomy that you’re creating. Why not do both redemptively suffer and “actually do something”, if such a “something” is possible?

Undoubtedly it often takes effort and sacrifice and personal hardship to genuinely help someone - those who, for example, travel from affluent nations to developing nations to lend their expertise and/or their labour for various projects are most certainly putting in the hard yards for a good cause. But assuming that the mere act of giving up one’s life for no apparent benefit is somehow “noble” or “heroic” seems like nothing more than an exercise in glorifying futility.

Indeed. And that’s the great sadness about atheists suffering. It’s simply wasted. :sad_yes:

Wasted because we don’t believe in divine redemption? If there is indeed any value to be found in martyrdom for a cause, it is through temporal consciousness-raising. The only problem with self-conscious martyrdom is that it’s rather easy to see through. Those who genuinely work for a cause and happen to lose their lives in the process, at the hands of those they are fighting, really do deserve our respect. Just to name a couple of recent examples - Theo van Gogh, murdered by Muslim extremists for making a short film exposing the plight of women in Islamic societies; Ayaan Hirsi Ali, one of the most outspoken critics of the treatment of women under religious (especially Muslim) oppression, who, although still alive, leads the life of a fugitive, moving from safe house to safe house lest she be assassinated by the religious fanatics who have vowed to destroy her.

Don’t make the mistake of supposing that there are no atheists who die for their beliefs - whether these beliefs are in a political or humanitarian cause, or whether they are among the thousands of ‘infidel’ murdered in modern Muslim theocracies, just because they don’t conform to the “true faith”. If anything, they are making a greater sacrifice than religious believers - the latter consider themselves to be going on to paradise in the afterlife; the former are giving up everything they have. The other key difference is that no atheist rejoices in the fact that we live in a world where this kind of martyrdom is still possible.

You wouldn’t say that if you saw how children act before they have a sibling with a severe disability and the transformation of love that occurs afterwards.

If such direct and immediate experience of the suffering of others is required to induce compassion, that is a failure of empathy or of upbringing. Assuming that the disability of a sibling is necessary for the full human development of a child is rather akin to the idea of genetically selecting a child to have compatible organs for transplant into a terminally ill older brother or sister, and makes a mockery of the much-vaunted idea of human freedom. Not to mention that - in a world created by a perfect god - sympathy for the suffering of others would not even be necessary!

My friend was pregnant with a child with Down syndrome and was despondent over the news. Absolutely despondent.

Now, with her beautiful 18 month old baby she rejoices in his disability. Rejoices. Her suffering—daily, BTW–has also injected great joy and love into her family. Without this trial she would not have experienced this profound joy.

I would be very surprised if what she rejoices in is actually the suffering of her child, as well as her own; what would be cause for rejoicing is if her child is still able to enjoy life and accomplish goals despite his disability.