The Pastor of my Old Church Tried to Re-Convert Me Yesterday

by cofty 2596 Replies latest jw experiences

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  snare&racket

  Humans invented gods to sway the universe in their favour in exchange for sacrifices, children for rain, animals for fertility, money for thetan exorcism...

  Now the universe is understood more, we recognise there is no control, no sway, no influence, no random acts of SUPERNATURAL intervention.

  Yet people want to hold onto the possibility of the hand of god, whilst stammering through an explination of it being invisible to humankind.

  What are they getting out of believing in a god that won't save you from the water if he could?

  That is no personal relationship, that is no friend, that is CERTAINLY no father.

  Worse than this YOU KNOW that he actually willfully drowned his children in anger according to the bible.

  What sickens me most is the scripture where it states, how wrong would it be for a father to say no to his child asking for bread? What about praying that your family don't drown on a new years holiday on a beach? Or trapped in a car, seat belted in? These verses are not evident at all, as again YOU KNOW. We have all been Jw's we have all spent decades with unanswered begging for bread.

  Seriously people. This invention does not deserve your loyalty, time, attention, devotion or love. It doesn't deserve it over the love and affection of your children. Parent will die loyal the the god of the bible, nose deep in her bible, whilst they forgoe their pained ageing children. For a god hat would drown his own children. I don't be;oieve any god exists at all. But if you STILL think one does, SHOULD you worship a god like this? Just because he says you should? I would die fighting such a human dictator, being loyal not to a dictator but to higher morality in defence of the value of human life.

  For those that think you have to worship a god you believe exists, because he made you. Does his title as inventor and builder give him the right to such immoral activity, even if you believe it does as many do, are you REALLY going to get on your knees and bow to such a dictator?

  Go ahead. I won't anymore.
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  adamah

  Cofty, no offense, but I'm not wasting any more time on this thread (as flamegrilled seemingly decided not to do), since you've shown a willingness to flip-flop (AKA moving goalposts) as it suits your purposes, arguably right up there amongst the worst theist offenders (and I was willing to cut them some slack for them, but you? You know better, and it's hard to imagine it's not intentional....).

  Where's my evidence of that, you ask? I'm not wasting time searching for and pulling your exact words from 93 pages of posts, but throughout the thread you've said 'the problem of evil' isn't an issue for deists (since the deist viewpoint doesn't contain a loving God, but an impersonal one who couldn't give a flyin' flip about human lives), and you've admitted it's not a problem for the theist (like jgnat) who's willing to sacrifice God's trait of omnipotence (since God lacks the power to intervene).

  But suddenly you can't understand the need to consider the theists' basic tenets (which, depending on their denomination, includes a particular-customized theology, eg a Xian Presbyterian is obviously going to have a different approach to theodicy than a JW would, and you'd need to adopt the POV of THEIR belief system to convince them of the errors in their various theodicies).

  But to save face, you spew irrelevant dismissive stuff like this:

  Cofty said- If JWs have got science and geology worng then too bad for them.

  So keep "moving those goalposts", and maybe some won't notice, but I'm allergic to ALL flavors of delusions and irrationalism, whether it's the JW kind, or those who'd topple NOT just the JW's, but dream of toppling ALL Xian theists at their supposed Achille's heel....

  (And even worse is this thread is on an ex-JW forum, when it's even-more questionable to take on JW theodicy, since you ironically pick the very 'selling feature' that accounts for their success to date: it's the part of their beliefs that is the most-logical (in an area where the logical barrier to acceptance is already incredibly-low), most-loving for humans, and not coincidentally, the one most-seductive to the emotionally-vulnerable survivors who long desperately to be reunited with their lost loved ones in the New System, to be able to share an eternal life on a paradise Earth with them. Hell, if I didn't know what I know about the Bible and JWs, I'd love to be able to believe in that fantasy, too!).

  Adam
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  Apognophos

  Even if we play along with the creationist fairy story it is dishonest. The bible is full of stories of god intervening in human affairs to make life better for his buddies. JWs pray constantly for everything that they want. You can't have a deist god when there is a tsunami and a theist god when you need a new job.

  The JW answer for that is that JWs do not expect God to give them everything they ask for or to "put up a hedge about them" -- the JWs like the ones in that "God of Parking Lots" thread, who think God is going to constantly dote on them, are a bit wacko and other JWs look askance at them. Most JWs believe that God will allow bad things to happen to everyone, because that's the cost of our imperfection.

  Sometimes he will do favors for his servants, whether it's helping them get a job to provide for their family or fit in with their field service schedule, or occasionally even saving their lives, but the account of Job shows that he can't do that all the time or he leaves himself open to Satan's accusation that humans serve God out of self-interest. Just because Jehovah might seem to answer their prayers once in a while, that does not contradict the fact that he also has to let bad things happen. That is the core lesson that JWs derive from the book of Job, and they bang that gong fairly often, so you should remember this.

  tl;dr: Just because God helps some people some of the time, he is not obligated to help everyone all the time.
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  Viviane

  Sounds like you don't like a conversation where you can't bully people, Adamah. I warned you there were people here just as smart as you that you couldn't push around or bamboozle with walls of text like Tec tried to do.
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  Twitch

  this outta be good...

  ;)
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  humbled

  Twitch,This outta be good----

  It will be good it we all dig in to search--if that's what we're doing here. and do it with good will.

  In terms of logic the record for God being powerful and loving remains undetermined unless anyone reading this will concede that my husbands terrier who sleeps by the fire and has never to this date caught a single rat (although he has killed our favorite chicken)is the finest hunter and the most energetic, obedient dog in the history of the universe.

  I have heard nothing to make me listen to Paul's sacred secret of salvation any more.
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  THE GLADIATOR

  snare&racket “What did god do to people he didn't like?

  What did god do to people that did not obey?

  What did god do to those that broke his laws?

  He..... KILLED them. God did not look down on the flood and pour water on babies, children and all but 8 of mankind out of LOVE, it was in anger and as a PUNISHMENT.

  So even the bible, communicating the activity, words and thoughts of god makes clear that death is not just a BAD thing, but a PUNISHMENT.”

  An excellent post. However, may I remind you that the new generation of Christians has become very slippery and openly declares that the bible is not the word of their god. Personal revelation is now back in vogue.

  Only selected bible passages taken from a friendly translation, that fits in with carefully chosen beliefs promoting Jesus’ kindness, are permissible in any discussion about all things spiritual.
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  cofty

  I'm not wasting any more time on this thread - Adam

  Thta's the best news I have had for a long time.

  You are the master of the strawman fallacy. You just did it again by ignoring the main point of my response to the JW theodicy for the second time.

  Also I did not "move the goalposts". If you go all the way back to the OP you will notice that in my conversation with Pastor John I objected to his whacky geology and appeal to the fall. If people's theodicies depend on flat earth science then too bad for them, we don't make allowances for stupidity or ignorance. If we can also show that theor theodicy has internal contradictions - and we have - then so much the better.

  Your contributions to this thread can be summarised as 1) This thread is a waste of time. and 2) Nobody is intelligent anough to comment on this thread apart from Adam.
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  cofty

  I would like to flag up Agpognopos' post above...

  I would like to add the JW theodicy to the summary list but it needs more work.

  I still think their confusion over whether god is deist or theist is a strong argument. You can't have a god who leaves humans to their fate but then spends the entire bible doing the opposite and answering daily prayers of JWs.

  JW theodicy can probably be summed up in three parts...

  1. Universal sovereignty - do humans need god?

  2. Human obedience - Job and do some humans serve god with good motive

  3. The resurrection

  Many of the points in the summary can be applied to these but I would like to look at them more specifically.
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  Laika

  Since this thread is fond of analogies the JW theodicy is kind of like the prodigal son story except the Father is so outraged at his son's rebellion he sends him out without his inheritance (removing perfection and cursing the earth) and then says 'I told you so' when the son has no choice but to come home.