thau said: "Why is that? Being given the gift of living forever in heaven bliss and peace with all those you were dear to is not good enough? You demand more here and now? FYI, yes, I most certainly not only believe in miracles I know they exist as evidence for God. Fatima is a miracle beyond doubt. So is when 250,000 Egyptians saw the Virgin Mary on 20 different evenings walking, floating and blessing the crowd on top of a Christian Coptic Cathedral in Zeitoun, Egypt in 1968. So are the countless statues of Jesus and Mary that weep human tears or tears of blood, including the one in a convent in Akita, Japan that did so on 101 occasions. The Shroud of Turin is without question a miracle and we can thank science for validating that. Lourdes has produced thousands of inexplicable healings to incurables. Miracles. The image of Our Lady of Guadlupe in Mexico from 1531 is totally unexplained by science. It remains a vibrant vivid image on a cactus tilma 500 years later. Padre Pio was a walking miracle in so many senses of the word beyond his bleeding stigmata wounds that persisted for 50 years. And so on! It is not just a matter of faith, as so many on these boards want to insist what Christianity is about, it is evidence that demands a verdict"
You have blind belief my friend. The Shroud of Turin is not proven to be scientifically authentic and there are so many criminals cashing in on bogus religious artefacts this will be just another one. As far as the Virgin Mary walking and floating they should be categorised as UFO’s. In fact there is more evidence for aliens than for the evidence of God even though many of the UFO sightings were bogus I expect the same rules apply with these and the other so called miracles. The dozens of bleeding and moving statues and the one that opens the eyes are obviously faked only to extort funds from the idiots who believe it. There are people who are actually claiming religious images within the Hubble Telescope pictures from space going to prove if you are indoctrinated enough and may I say stupid enough to actually believe these events are proving the existence of God you may as well believe in flying angels and talking snakes.
thau said:"I really do not care if some ancient Greeks or Romans or Chinese or Norse or Druids claim to have the “real God” on their side. It does not line up with the truth or with the facts, unless they want to produce some very compelling supernatural evidence? Evidence like what Christianity can produce. If the Judeo-Christian G-d can be demonstrated to be quite true, then game over, the others cannot exist."
With what truth and facts are you talking about and what very compelling evidence can Christianity produce? I don’t mean the bleeding statues or an old scripture either. The Judeo-Christian God cannot be “demonstrated to be quite true” and you should know this because then everybody would believe in God and there would be no argument and only then would it truly be “game over”
thau said:"Suffering is the result of sin. War is because of sin and so may be natural disasters. The innocents die along with the guilty, but the innocents are justified and heaven awaits. But suffering is not without its virtue. It just is not instantly returned for our pain. But a deeper reflection on the teachings and the revelations of saints and so on would reveal it. I will leave you with another commentary on why God allows suffering and puts us through trials."
OK am I reading this right, you believe everyone suffers sickness, injury and death through wars and natural disasters that are purposely created by God because God is putting us through trials? A child or even a wild animal dies slowly in agony during these trials so what normal person would be able to justify that?
thau said:"A marriage is arranged between you and the most adorable girl, one who is kind and delightful beyond all measure. But she is forced to be your bride, she is given no choice in the matter. Similarly, in a second scenario, this same girl by chance finds you along the path of life and instead of being obliged to be your bride, instead falls in love with you and desires you for herself. She makes many efforts to please you and willfully suffers for you, fails often but seeks forgiveness. Which of these two would give you the greater joy? Perhaps when God said He created us in His own image that is partially what He was referring to? He, too, prefers one who chooses to love Him and sacrifice for Him and take risks, as opposed to creating a being incapable of making free will choices to want to love Him. As given in Scripture, Our Lord says man is higher than the angels for this very reason of free will. Our earthly trials merit these greater virtues and are more pleasing to God."
No normal person would be happy in these relationships because we should be married as equals. The second one you describe is a one sided relationship, and in fact it is in this type of dominating relationship that often ends in physical and mental abuse. If you think this subservient relationship is acceptable because it is modelled after God’s image you should have a re-check of your morals.
thau said:"He, too, prefers one who chooses to love Him and sacrifice for Him and take risks, as opposed to creating a being incapable of making free will choices to want to love Him. As given in Scripture, Our Lord says man is higher than the angels for this very reason of free will. Our earthly trials merit these greater virtues and are more pleasing to God"
Well said you have described a sadistic personality. I get the message that the more pain a person suffers and keeps the faith of God the more he likes it and the Catholics seemed to support this self-abusive love through pain fetish in earlier times. A king demands his peasants bow before him to emphasise his power and importance and their subservience to him. Today a subject may bow to the queen as a mark of respect but not because she will have his head removed and take his lands. God has a very old and outdated system of controlling the masses by utilising the element of the unknown that is fear beyond death to demand love and respect and it is exactly what the writers of the bible knew to be the way of those times.
The conclusion is that we should not allow ourselves to enjoy life on earth because God may just decide to cut you down at any time. This life should not be taken seriously and it really should not be seen as important by yourself or family because God may randomly decide you die at 1 or 150 years of age. If you live long enough and decide to choose to worship God and pass his test you will go to heaven and enjoy whatever it is they do up there, however a dead child does not grow to become an adult and could be assumed they are the lucky ones because they are not tested by God or tempted by Satan so become automatic residents of heaven even though they are also born sinners.
How do we know this after-life in heaven is real? This is backed up by fantasy stories from a book penned by mortals many years ago and there is simply far more evidence that exists to indicate God and heaven are not real. I cherish my life on this planet obviously so much more than you could because my religiously unbound, clear and free mind can weigh up logical realistic events and practical scientific theories that account for my existence on this planet and I expect an eventual demise that I hope will be painless at an older age and I am humble enough to not expect the miracle of an afterlife.
