Posts by Greenpalmtreestillmine

71

Stupid questions require stupid answers

by Norm in

christians always tell us how loving, caring and just god is, how he never ?forgets?

they also claim that god is omnipotent and everything that happens is his will and that it has a ?purpose?.

lets pay attention to what the watchtower say next as we will come back to it later:

Greenpalmtreestillmine

Hillary_Step,

At this stage I think we can assume that you have not just lost the argument but also your faith.

I'm afraid you misunderstood me. When I said I suppose sometimes God doesn't give a damn I did not mean that in a negative sense at all. Sometimes we ourselves can hear of such awful things committed by some groups that we can easily say in our hearts, "I don't give a damn about those people." If God sometimes doesn't give a damn I don't blame him in the least. We are really awful bastards sometimes and downright evil other times. My faith is intact, thank you.

Why is that that the more committed a person is to their religious ideology the harder it becomes for them to say, "I just do not know the answer to that question"? Don't you think that this is a more honest station from which to defend a God?

I said, "Well, I suppose the answer to all of the above is: God sometimes just doesn't give a damn, Norm." If you will please note, that was a suppostion. It also was a sarcastic answer to the very tiring habit some have of constantly whining about God. Why does God allow this? Why doesn't God fix that? Yada, yada, yada..... You know I'm a Christian and all but after a while I too get a burr up my ass sometimes and that whining stuff is just the thing that does it.

Well, have a happy day and all, HS.

Sabrina

P.S. Thanks for not ridiculing my lack of reasoning ability and/or any other personal fault I surely have.

71

Stupid questions require stupid answers

by Norm in

christians always tell us how loving, caring and just god is, how he never ?forgets?

they also claim that god is omnipotent and everything that happens is his will and that it has a ?purpose?.

lets pay attention to what the watchtower say next as we will come back to it later:

Greenpalmtreestillmine

AlanF,

Sabrina, it's obvious that your powers of reasoning are small, and there's no sense trying to discuss anything intelligently with you.

If it makes you feel good AlanF to insult another person's intelligence go right ahead. Feel free to massage your ego whenever you get the urge to do so. You must get a jab in cause if you don't you'll die or something. Let me not be the cause of your ego death, go right on with your insults it's mother's milk to you.

Sabrina.....of the really, really hurt class.

71

Stupid questions require stupid answers

by Norm in

christians always tell us how loving, caring and just god is, how he never ?forgets?

they also claim that god is omnipotent and everything that happens is his will and that it has a ?purpose?.

lets pay attention to what the watchtower say next as we will come back to it later:

Greenpalmtreestillmine

Norm,

Does this mean that God could have stopped 9/11 and the Tsunami disaster?

Yes.

He obviously didn't, why didn't he?

Why didn't he stop the Iraq war? Why didn't he make Saddam be a good boy instead of a bad one? Why didn't he prevent the Spanish Influenza? World War I? Why doesn't he make people stop having unprotected sex? How about the hungry children? Why doesn't he make the big fat corporations of the world feed them? Why didn't he stop the Florida hurricanes? Why doesn't he just make all religions behave really, really good. And make all governments do the same? How come he doesn't make the U.N. be the best it can be? Why didn't he stop those Catholic priests from molesting children? How about Bill Clinton, why didn't he stop him from making a fool of himself and the office. Why didn't he stop Europe from trampling here and there colonizing and taking over practically whatever they wanted? Why do planes crash? Why doesn't he stop parents from killing their children and children killing their parents? Why doesn't he stop up all volcanos?

Hey, why doesn't God make us all just get along and stop fighting altogether. Why didn't he make the oceans more resistant to pollution? Why didn't he make the atmosphere much more self-cleaning so we wouldn't have to be so careful with our emissions? Why didn't he make us like the animals who forage for their food and are naturally better equipped than we are to cope with the seasons and the weather? Why did he make it so damn hard to get a man in space? Why did he allow the Dark Ages? Why did a teen who lost her whole family in the Tsunami suffer a gang rape afterwards? Why are some of the so called untouchables in India being put out of shelters and not given their fair share of the Tsunami relief by their upper caste fellow Indians simply because they are untouchables? Why is child trafficking already occurring in the Tsunami area?

Well, I suppose the answer to all of the above is: God sometimes just doesn't give a damn, Norm. Is there some reason why he should? Mankind is the most filthiest of creatures. I really don't think we deserve to complain, Norm.

Sabrina

26

C'mon were going to be late!!

by Released in

......for field service........ .

ahhhhh......the memories.

nothing like facing regecton early on a satirday morn

Greenpalmtreestillmine

THANKS FOR THE MEMORIES! NOT!

Sabrina

71

Stupid questions require stupid answers

by Norm in

christians always tell us how loving, caring and just god is, how he never ?forgets?

they also claim that god is omnipotent and everything that happens is his will and that it has a ?purpose?.

lets pay attention to what the watchtower say next as we will come back to it later:

Greenpalmtreestillmine

Narkissos,

I don't think God is limited to staying out of our affairs because of a freewill thing. He does what he wants. No, he does not cause all things. Yes, he can stop all things. The rape example was in the God does not cause all things category, but that does not mean God limits himself or in other words always allows the will of others to take precedence over his purposes.

If a Dad does not break up a fight between his two sons that does not mean the Dad has limited himself to always allowing them to fight it out. It just means that sometimes he allows it and sometimes not. The Dad is not limited, he does what in his opinion is necessary at the time.

If I'm misunderstanding your meaning please be patient with me.

Sabrina

27

Do you have a humanocentric worldview?

by Norm in

you are out with your child in a field of beautiful flowers, you ask the child what purpose the flowers.

serve.

the child tell you that one of the techers has told the class that the flowers are there to make it pretty for us humans, so we can enjoy their beauty.

Greenpalmtreestillmine

A Backyard Goldfish Pond:

Goldfish One, "Hey! Our food god has just rained down some great stuff!"

Goldfish Two, "What food god? I see no food god. Food happens that's all don't be stupid."

Goldfish One, "I'm not stupid. Don't you know the food god made this pond just for us? Everything here is just for us."

Goldfish Two, "Prove it."

Goldfish One, "Everything here is just right, it's so beautiful and we're the only ones here that can enjoy it. I mean, the plants can't really enjoy it and this food keeps raining down just when we need it. Faith you got to take it on faith."

Goldfish Two, "Uh, yeah whatever. Look this pond has been the same for eons and we have shown that eons before that this pond was just a puddle of water filled with worms. Science has proven that those ancient worms evolved into other species and then finally the top of the line: us. There's no food god only us here and you'll be a lost fool until you accept that.

Goldfish One, "So just take your word on it then? You say there's no food god and that's the way it is? Well, I don't buy it, this pond was made for us and our food god gives us everything because to him we are everything.

Goldfish Two, "Look, you like your ignorance? Wallow in it for all I care. I'm going over to feed on the naturally occurring food stuffs produced by this naturally occurring pond in which we are nothing but naturally occurring living organic matter. I'm finished trying to educate you!"

In the backyard:

"Daddy, I fed the goldfish!"

"Great honey, do you like your goldfish pond?"

"I love it Daddy. It's the best present you ever gave me."

"Thanks honey. Now remember to feed them the same time everyday and also remove any dead plants and leaves from the water. Okay?"

"Oh, yes Daddy! I want to keep my goldfish healthy and pretty because you gave them to me."

"No honey, I brought them here and built the pond for them but the truth is it was God who gave us the goldfish."

"But Daddy, my friend says there is no God!?"

71

Stupid questions require stupid answers

by Norm in

christians always tell us how loving, caring and just god is, how he never ?forgets?

they also claim that god is omnipotent and everything that happens is his will and that it has a ?purpose?.

lets pay attention to what the watchtower say next as we will come back to it later:

Greenpalmtreestillmine

Narkissos,

1. Is that limitation (to God's being the cause of events) the only one?

I spoke of no limitations that is your assumption. There are no limitations with God.

1.1. If so, what about natural catastrophes etc. (cf. Bradley's last post?)

Time and unforseen occurrences befall both man and beast. Or should man, the more intelligent creation, be coddled when he refuses to live according to the nature of things and goes so far as to recklessly live on known faultlines and to allow his fellow to live in shabby houses prown to earthquake damage and he refuses the expense of Tsunami warning systems but not the expense of war? If we wish to live as free men we must be responsible. If though, we wish to live as children being told how to eat and walk and live then we should all be JWs or cats and dogs.

Additionally, it is ironic that man who fails to raise all his own children to be productive and honest citizens not because he is incapable but because he is unwilling to spend the time and money, should at the same time fault God for man's own ills. Man's glass house is not God's fault it is man's.

2. Is that limitation absolute (God never has overruled any human will and never will?)

Again, God has no limitations.

2.1. If not, how is the limitation limited?

Again, God has no limitations.

3. Why does that limitation to God's causality exist in the first place?

Please see the answer above.

Sabrina

38

The Great Tribulation............When??

by ScoobySnax in

apologies if this has been asked before, but.... when i was growing up into the fabulously handsome critter i am nowadays, i always remember talk of the great tribulation that would not only befall mankind but overtake this system of things in the near future.

in fact one of my earliest memories was standing in a queue that seemed to go on for miles (i was only 7) outside with my mum and aunt/cousins at a cinema to see starwars, so i reckon it must have been 1977 and listening to them talk of it.

anyway i digress, what and when exactly is the "great tribulation" according to jw beliefs.

Greenpalmtreestillmine

I believe the Watchtower now teaches that the Great Tribulation is yet in the future. This is, though, like so much of their "light" a change from their previous "light" which I believe was that the Tribulation started sometime in the early 20th century and was interrupted allowing the sheep and goats to be sort out. But in the 90's that was all put to ashes and came out a new bird.

Sabrina

71

Stupid questions require stupid answers

by Norm in

christians always tell us how loving, caring and just god is, how he never ?forgets?

they also claim that god is omnipotent and everything that happens is his will and that it has a ?purpose?.

lets pay attention to what the watchtower say next as we will come back to it later:

Greenpalmtreestillmine

Narkissos,

I never said he should be. I just said you can't avoid the question.

Okay.

You answered he shouldn't be. All right. But to the "why?", you just answered by one example (rape). Which I would translate in more abstract terms: "Because there are other wills involved." Do I interpret you correctly?

Yes, if I am understanding your statement.

AlanF,

The people who blame or ridicule God for such events do so because they don't believe he exists.

Do agnostics ridicule God? Yes, I think some do.

It's a completely different group of people who deride those who claim that God causes such events, because such people are believers and want to defend their God.

No, that is not always the case. Those that ridicule claims of God's acts are not always people who are as you say, "believers and want to defend their God." Many of them are simply non-believers who are attempting to ridicule what in their view is a ridiculous statement. You know this already.

Sabrina

71

Stupid questions require stupid answers

by Norm in

christians always tell us how loving, caring and just god is, how he never ?forgets?

they also claim that god is omnipotent and everything that happens is his will and that it has a ?purpose?.

lets pay attention to what the watchtower say next as we will come back to it later:

Greenpalmtreestillmine

Logan,

So do you think that God should stop all crimes and all wars and what? Treat mankind like he's a dog or something too stupid to be responsible for his own actions? Either we are human and responsible for what we do or we are not. Would you really prefer a world where God tells you what you can do and what you can't? Come on. We all treasure our freedom to do what we will but when some bastard acts out his own evils should we then blame God for not keeping him in line? Whose scale should we use to determine a wrong? Some people think adultery is wrong, should God stop adultery?

What we do we do. We are are own man, Logan.

Sabrina