What kind of God would....

[Leananshee]

I have long thought that it is morally reprehensible to do "good" out of fear of punishment or hope for reward. I've also found it repugnant to think of God as some being that passes out blessings and punishments, likened more to Santa Claus, to be loved or reviled for that which we have been given or denied.

I thought of this as I read these responses in another thread here, but started this one since it's on a different topic:

I do not believe in god. When my oldest daughter, with two babies, died of breat cancer, I offrered myself up, prayed as a sinner, to "god" all my sins if he would spare her. She died in agony and any tiny little faith I had, died too.

Every time a child is murdered or taken advantage of by some sexual pervert I put another check mark in the " there is no loving God " box.

I felt my mom leave when she died, I was 19, helping to care for her. My grandmother felt it too, all the way on the other coast in Oregon. And I felt it when my grandmother left, too. Yes, Mom suffered, but it was the deep, abiding feeling that she went somewhere better that I held and hold on to. The military chapel wouldn't even do her service, because Dad had just retired. It was a little Universalist church I went to that did it. Lots of things I could think are unfair, in my life and those around me, but I stopped asking God for things long ago, and measure the divine in the connections I make.

Back in high school, Einstein and Teilhard de Chardin became two people whose writing started to formulate how I thought about God, or in a sense, didn't. See what you think.

Einstein's God | "Religion and Science" by Albert Einstein [Speaking of Faith® from American Public Media]

Teilhard de Chardin: The space-time continuum is a cone, and humans, via evolution and collective consciousness, rise to Christ - Beliefnet.com

tim :eek

 

[Peter Parka]

Well I could go and rescue someone I know but didn't really like from a burning fire. Some people might say that would make me a hero, I dont think so. I still say it would make me better than an all powerful god who just decides to turn his back even though he could save them with a click of his fingers.

 

[GuesSAngel]

Well I could go and rescue someone I know but didn't really like from a burning fire. Some people might say that would make me a hero, I dont think so. I still say it would make me better than an all powerful god who just decides to turn his back even though he could save them with a click of his fingers.

maybe that makes you god. i know some nights i call out gods name...it's usually tim on top of me :ninja

 

[RedRyder]

God is a busy God. He gave us the knowledge to save one from a burning building and the desire to do so..... He's watching how we're doing. Whether we run inside and save one.... or simply pick up the phone and dial 911.... we each do whatever we are able to. As for the onlookers/gawkers.... well..... that's a whole nuther thing.

 

[RedRyder]

maybe that makes you god. i know some nights i call out gods name...it's usually tim on top of me :ninja

Funny.... I usually yell out Tim! Oh.... wait.... not that it's your Tim.... I'm just sayin'.....

Coinkydink, eh?

 

[GuesSAngel]

Funny.... I usually yell out Tim! Oh.... wait.... not that it's your Tim.... I'm just sayin'.....

Coinkydink, eh?

hahah wow weird!

 

[Anie]

Life is unfair, god made it that way

 

[RedRyder]

hahah wow weird!

Yeah.... I get that same comment from Sally when I tell her about yelling out Bob. And then there's Mary with her man Dave.... and Rhonda with Joe. Huh! :ninja

 

[Anie]

Classy....

 

[RedRyder]

Classy....

Depends how you read into it, I suppose.

 

[Leananshee]

So what if God is simply the collective motive force that gets someone to rescue another from a burning building, that those we call "evil" are simply disconnected from, and "fairness" was never a factor in our existence in the larger sense?

tim :eek (Yeah, yet another Tim!!!)

 

[Peter Parka]

So what if God is simply the collective motive force that gets someone to rescue another from a burning building, that those we call "evil" are simply disconnected from, and "fairness" was never a factor in our existence in the larger sense?

tim :eek (Yeah, yet another Tim!!!)

Sounds like a very flimsy, cop out, to me, to explain why a perfect gods creation is so fucked up.

 

[Leananshee]

OK, presume God is everything and in everything. If we're imperfect then how can God be perfect?

tim :eek

 

[Peter Parka]

OK, presume God is everything and in everything. If we're imperfect then how can God be perfect?

tim :eek

He cant, which is my point exactly. :thumbup

 

[Leananshee]

Mine was not longing for a God that's like Santa. Why would God even have to be perfect? What if what we call God is evolving as creation is, perhaps a function of or even a product of it rather than the reverse?

tim :eek

 

[Peter Parka]

If there is a god and he isn't perfect, then it proves most religions, the Bible and the Koran are wrong seeing they teach that. :thumbup

 

[Leananshee]

It would certainly mean they were wrong about that one thing, keeping to the logical argument. For many in those faiths, that would mean the whole house toppling as one of cards, which is why it's easy to see in all of them those who cling to dogma so fiercely. But religion has evolved over the centuries, which is always likely to produce a few throwbacks.

tim :eek

 

[Zorak]

There's a brilliant book by Kurt Vonnegut called Sirens of Titan, that explains a religion that goes by the thesis of the following:

"Take Care of the People, and God Almighty Will Take Care of Himself."
"I was a victim of a series of accidents, as are we all. And Luck is not the hand of God."

 

[Azazel]

 

[alice in chains]

I have long thought that it is morally reprehensible to do "good" out of fear of punishment or hope for reward. I've also found it repugnant to think of God as some being that passes out blessings and punishments, likened more to Santa Claus, to be loved or reviled for that which we have been given or denied.

I thought of this as I read these responses in another thread here, but started this one since it's on a different topic:




I felt my mom leave when she died, I was 19, helping to care for her. My grandmother felt it too, all the way on the other coast in Oregon. And I felt it when my grandmother left, too. Yes, Mom suffered, but it was the deep, abiding feeling that she went somewhere better that I held and hold on to. The military chapel wouldn't even do her service, because Dad had just retired. It was a little Universalist church I went to that did it. Lots of things I could think are unfair, in my life and those around me, but I stopped asking God for things long ago, and measure the divine in the connections I make.

Back in high school, Einstein and Teilhard de Chardin became two people whose writing started to formulate how I thought about God, or in a sense, didn't. See what you think.

Einstein's God | "Religion and Science" by Albert Einstein [Speaking of Faith® from American Public Media]

Teilhard de Chardin: The space-time continuum is a cone, and humans, via evolution and collective consciousness, rise to Christ - Beliefnet.com

tim :eek

What you should realize is that it's only the atheists that see a god as a Santa Claus type figure...