Could/should God have prevented the Russian school massacre?

[Mister Emu]

As I stated in a previous post, the old "God works in mysterious ways" excuse just doesn't cut it. Nor do the preposterous excuses you have presented.

I am sorry that you deny the fact that God sometimes works in ways beyond your comprehension, yet just because you wish to deny it, does not make it any less true.

There is a reason that those more than 350 people were slain, or it would not have happened.

I do not know this reason, and my "preposterus excuses" were just thrown out to give some form of an idea as to why this tragedy might have occured.

 

[retrorich]

I am sorry that you deny the fact that God sometimes works in ways beyond your comprehension, yet just because you wish to deny it, does not make it any less true.

And just because you wish to believe it does not make it any MORE true.

PEACE

 

[Mister Emu]

And just because you wish to believe it does not make it any MORE true.

You have it backwards, it is true so I believe it

 

[retrorich]

You have it backwards, it is true so I believe it

Or I could say, "It is NOT true, therefore I do not believe it."

 

[painted wolf]

face it, it happined because people suck... The terroists should never have stooped so low as to take children hostage and the Russian government should never have used its disasterous KGB tactics in 'solving' the hostage situation. If Russia hadn't already bungled the last hostage situation and killed more of the hostages than the terroists did than perhaps I'd have more simpathy for the governments tactics. As it is I just feel bad for the familys of the victims.

IMHO god had nothing to do with situation, it was human error through and through.
Its time for humanity to take responcibility for its own stupid, self-distructive actions and stop pawning everything off on 'gods will'

wa:do

 

[Ardhanariswar]

does everyone agree that sept 11 was a humongous tragedy?

well what happened after? the country became more unified. we were joined by this tragedy. i think God wants us to feel that. to feel we need to good in this world, or else crazy nut cases will kill anyone.

that is how i think. i find lessons and morals to be learned from bad things. its called being optimistic. yet at the same time, im realistic. we cannot change reality, but we can change our attitude.

 

[Mister Emu]

Or I could say, "It is NOT true, therefore I do not believe it."

You could but you would be wrong

 

[retrorich]

You could but you would be wrong

I saw that one coming. I'll let you have the last word and the last laugh.

PEACE

 

[Mister Emu]

I saw that one coming. I'll let you have the last word and the last laugh.

Yea it was pretty obviously coming

Hope you have a good day

 

[Mr Spinkles]

If I desire money does that mean that I lack money?

Yes, it does. If you desire money, it means you do not currently have enough money to satisfy your desire. A perfect God shouldn't desire anything.

There is one difference between you and God,

I didn't know we were that much alike

God does not grudge you your life simply because He knows that you don't love Him or even believe in His existence.

So you're saying that God creates every person He has the ability to create, despite what choices they will make when created? There are three problems with this:

1)Being all powerful, God has the ability to create an infinite number of humans, so by what you said above, God will make an infinite number of human beings for all eternity, despite the fact that some of them will be evil.

2)You are putting desires on God. You are saying He desires to give imperfect humans life, suggesting God is not perfect.

3)You are giving priorities to God that are not consistend with an All-Good God: you imply that God desires to give an infinite number of human beings life no matter how evil their choices will be, which would mean that God values creating things more than He values goodness/the absence of evil. That would mean God is not All-Good.

Yes God could have stopped it.

No, God should not have stopped it, for reasons obvious to Him that we don't know.

Could God have accomplished His reasons without allowing the massacre, or was this beyond His power? Or was massacre itself one of His reasons?

 

[Hope]

does everyone agree that sept 11 was a humongous tragedy?

well what happened after? the country became more unified. we were joined by this tragedy. i think God wants us to feel that. to feel we need to good in this world, or else crazy nut cases will kill anyone.

that is how i think. i find lessons and morals to be learned from bad things. its called being optimistic. yet at the same time, im realistic. we cannot change reality, but we can change our attitude.

Amen--I totally agree!

 

[Hope]

Yes, it does. If you desire money, it means you do not currently have enough money to satisfy your desire. A perfect God shouldn't desire anything.

I have to disagree with you here. I believe that desire in and of itself is not a bad thing, and to say that because God desires this, or wants that, means He is lacking in some way and therefore imperfect, is a supposition based on imperfect human desires. If one desires money even though one has plenty already, this does not mean that the person is actually lacking (as you said I think), but rather means that his desires come from flawed thinking and flawed judgment. His desire is very misplaced. If I had a million dollars I would hardly know what to do with it; however, to those where money becomes an obsession, it wouldn't matter how much they actually had, they would never truly be satisfied.

God is the source of all perfect desires. And just because He wants us to love Him, does not mean He will be imperfect or incomplete if we don't. He doesn't need us at all! His self-esteem is not based on whether we love Him or not. He is perfect and complete without us. And the fact that He doesn't need us, and yet still chooses to love us, and give us opportunity to love Him in return, says a lot to me. I think desires speak more about who we are and what our nature is, than about whether we are lacking or not. For instance, I love horses. I desire to have my own horse some day. Does the fact that I do not have a horse now mean I am imperfect or incomplete or lacking until I do have one? No, not at all. I am just the same with one or without one. I don't feel less of a person, or worse or better than anyone else, just because this one desire of mine is not fulfilled yet. The desire simply speaks of something deeper in my heart, a part of my nature. Desires and wants are only wrong when they are misplaced, or turned into addictions or obssessions.

Anyway, I know this is a bit off the original topic, but I wanted to clarify my views on this subject.

 

[retrorich]

A related topic: http://www.religiousforums.com/forum/showthread.php?p=27150#post27150

 

[Mr Spinkles]

Hope-- I'm not saying desires are bad, just that a perfect being should not desire anything. Your lack of a horse does not make you "bad" but it does mean you are not a perfect being.

I think the most important question here is the title of this thread: Could God have acheived any good He wanted without allowing a massacre? If God is all-powerful, the answer should be "yes". However, if God could have acheived the same good that supposedly came from the massacre without allowing a massacre, and yet He still chose to allow the massacre, that implies God is not All-Good. The only option is to redefine that which is "good" to "anything God wants or chooses to allow" (which, come to think of it, would solve a lot of problems with the genocides of the Old Testament). Still, by that definition, Satan and demons and murder and rape would all be "good" and "evil" would not even exist.

Whenever I discuss the Problem of Evil with others, the image I get of the Judeo-Christian-Islamic God is one who much more perfect than we are, much more powerful than we are, and (on some levels) much more good than we are--but not infinitely so. If God was infinitely perfect, infinitely good, and infinitely powerful, everything should hypothetically be perfect and good, all the time, period.

 

[Ardhanariswar]

if you desire too much, it makes you suffer, because you are just soo unhappy with what you already have that you feel unsatisfied.

you may desire God because God is everwhere and is the most blissful peace available. money can only bring more suffering. really. you can do good things with money, you can donate it to an orphanage or to an effort, but in reality, it perpetuates suffering of the mind in this world of maya (illusion).

 

[Yerda]

I'm sorry if someone has already made my point, I haven't been around for a bit and missed most of this thread. Right, I believe the disaster in Russia could and should have been prevented, by RUSSIA. The treatment of the Chechens and others in the region by Russian forces for years now has been deplorable. I condemn all violence, as it only leads to more violence, whereas brutality leads to terrorism it seems.