State-Church Separation

[ActRaiserTheReturned]

A god who knows everything and has unlimited power created the universe and everything in it. There he creates a paradise for some fuck off race of creatures he made in his image, complete with having the sewage system networked into the entertainment and procreation system. Then he creates an impossible to pass test, and creates a seducing monster in the guise of a beautiful angel, then is shocked when it betrays him despite already knowing it would. Snake thing then talks to dirt man and rib woman and after failing the impossible test they are damned forever, all their children are damned forever, and so on.

You're taking me way too literally.

[Brovo]

ActRaiserTheReturned said
You're taking me way too literally.

No. I'm taking the bible literally. And you apparently can't come up with a counter argument for why your loving, omnipotent, omniscient god, would unleash the most horrifying of evils on the very things he loves when he has the power to empower them with whatever he wants them to learn immediately and without pain, making the pain itself absolutely pointless. Which is good.

[ActRaiserTheReturned]

Brovo said
No. I'm taking the bible literally. And you apparently can't come up with a counter argument for why your loving, omnipotent, omniscient god, would unleash the most horrifying of evils on the very things he loves when he has the power to empower them with whatever he wants them to learn immediately and without pain, making the pain itself absolutely pointless. Which is good.

There's a difference between not being able to reasonably defend your argument and failing not to be confused by someone who constantly asks "Why"?

[Brovo]

ActRaiserTheReturned said
There's a difference between not being able to reasonably defend your argument and failing not to be confused by someone who constantly asks "Why"?

What's wrong with asking why? I am a skeptic. This is a legitimate question. Wouldn't you ask why? Wouldn't you ask what the purpose of a test that has no meaning is?

[ActRaiserTheReturned]

Brovo said
What's wrong with asking why? I am a skeptic. This is a legitimate question. Wouldn't you ask why? Wouldn't you ask what the purpose of a test that has no meaning is?

The Gospel is like sowing seeds in a field. Although supernaturally a seed can grow instantly (conversion), it more often than not takes time to grow. If you just constantly ask "why"? It's not the same thing as me failing to address an issue. Also, it gets tiring taking too long to do more than my job by answering different questions with no end to the conversation.

To give a more concise answer, it's not wrong to ask why, or even ask, necessarily, too many questions, as long as you aren't just pretending as if I've been caught in some kind of a trap by getting tired.

[So Boerd]

Brovo said
No. I'm taking the bible literally. And you apparently can't come up with a counter argument for why your loving, omnipotent, omniscient god, would unleash the most horrifying of evils on the very things he loves when he has the power to empower them with whatever he wants them to learn immediately and without pain, making the pain itself absolutely pointless. Which is good.

Because He doesn't. He can't change your soul. He can speak with you, explain to you, but cannot make you learn or more importantly understand anything, as making you understand takes away your free will. Jesus had to physically suffer every pain so he could understand it.

[ActRaiserTheReturned]

So Boerd said
Because He doesn't. He can't change your soul. He can speak with you, explain to you, but cannot make you learn or more importantly understand anything, as making you understand takes away your free will. Jesus had to physically suffer every pain so he could understand it.

As I understand the Crucifiction, Jesus already understood, but to experience it and to become one with his decision, as it were, he had to go through with it. He understood it, but. . . he could not make the lawful change of others without his death and resurrection.

[Brovo]

ActRaiserTheReturned said The Gospel is like sowing seeds in a field.

Why bother though? Why bother with the whole faith act? Why does he need that? Why did he even create evil? Why create a religion that tells you not to think or question God in any way if he gave us this capacity in the first place?

ActRaiserTheReturned said Although supernaturally a seed can grow instantly (conversion), it more often than not takes time to grow.

He created everything, including time, what is the point of a time test to a being that is immortal and who gifts you with immortal happiness or immortal damnation?

ActRaiserTheReturned said If you just constantly ask "why"? It's not the same thing as me failing to address an issue.

Yes it is, you're failing to answer a very basic question about your God's morality. He created evil, he created suffering, and all for a test that in the end is arbitrary and predecided based on how he made you. How is that even remotely moral? What is even the point of it? So he can watch people suffer horribly?... What kind of loving god does that?

ActRaiserTheReturned said Also, it gets tiring taking too long to do more than my job by answering different questions with no end to the conversation. To give a more concise answer, it's not wrong to ask why, or even ask, necessarily, too many questions, as long as you aren't just pretending as if I've been caught in some kind of a trap by getting tired.

Well, you can answer later, any time you like. It's just that every time I've asked why, I've never gotten an answer. It's always been "God works in mysterious ways" or some other way of saying "I don't know why". And I don't know is a fine answer. It really is. Just don't pretend that God is unquestionable, or that God is moral, when the very book written to worship him throughout it displays his depravity and callous nature towards his own creatures. Remember: He created the heroes, the prophets, and so on, but he also created the rapists, the villains, the child sacrifices, and so on... And he meticulously programmed them to fail from day one, then did nothing to stop it.

The whole narrative falls apart on that notion alone if we take it as a fictional work, which is one thing I am actually good at it.

[ActRaiserTheReturned]

Brovo said
Why bother though? Why bother with the whole faith act? Why does he need that? Why did he even create evil? Why create a religion that tells you not to think or question God in any way if he gave us this capacity in the first place?, what is the point of a time test to a being that is immortal and who gifts you with immortal happiness or immortal damnation? Yes it is, you're failing to answer a very basic question about your God's morality. He created evil, he created suffering, and all for a test that in the end is arbitrary and predecided based on how he made you. How is that even remotely moral? What is even the point of it? So he can watch people suffer horribly?... What kind of loving god does that?Well, you can answer later, any time you like. It's just that every time I've asked why, I've never gotten an answer.

You've gotten answers you don't understand.

[Brovo]

ActRaiserTheReturned said
You've gotten answers you don't understand.

Oh no. I understand them quite well enough. I'm just too skeptical to believe that a God who endowed me with reason would then wish me to forgo their use... Or, maybe, just maybe, the bible was written by fallible humans, and like the 99% of other religions that turned out to be just fiction... Mmm... Maybe this one is too.

[So Boerd]

Let me clear up Omnipotence. There are laws upon God even He cannot violate. Also, time existed before God. Let's say there are 2000 powers that exist. I have two, God has all 2000. But there are some powers which do not exist, and He does not have those.

[ActRaiserTheReturned]

Brovo said
Oh no. I understand them quite well enough. I'm just too skeptical to believe that a God who endowed me with reason would then wish me to forgo their use... Or, maybe, just maybe, the bible was written by fallible humans, and like the 99% of other religions that turned out to be just fiction... Mmm... Maybe this one is too.

Or maybe, you don't know and think you do. Or maybe, you DO know and just have thought you don't.

[Brovo]

So Boerd said
Let me clear up Omnipotence. There are laws upon God even He cannot violate. Also, time existed before God. Let's say there are 2000 powers that exist. I have two, God has all 2000. But there are some powers which do not exist, and He does not have those.

Then he's not truly omnipotent, as omnipotence is defined as being, literally, "all powerful". If he's not all powerful, why call him God? Or, better yet, why worship him?

And if he's not all powerful, how did he create everything? How can he see the future? Make predetermined things?

Or, do you have a different interpretation of God?

ActRaiserTheReturned said
Or maybe, you don't know and think you do. Or maybe, you DO know and just have thought you don't.

No. I'm fairly sure I do. There's no answer grounded in logic, reason, or otherwise for why God would want to torture people, except one: The bible is fictional, and written by fallible people, who back when it was originally authored, probably still fucked their cousins, and were terrified every time there was a lunar eclipse because the moon turned red.

[So Boerd]

Brovo said
Oh no. I understand them quite well enough. I'm just too skeptical to believe that a God who endowed me with reason would then wish me to forgo their use... Or, maybe, just maybe, the bible was written by fallible humans, and like the 99% of other religions that turned out to be just fiction... Mmm... Maybe this one is too.

Is it the mark of foolishness to admit one does not know something? There are secrets in this universe that elude you, there a secrets of religion which elude him. I will answer all your questions I have answers for.

[Brovo]

So Boerd said
Is it the mark of foolishness to admit one does not know something? There are secrets in this universe that elude you, there a secrets of religion which elude him. I will answer all your questions I have answers for.

I'm not calling him foolish, or any names in particular. In fact I'm using the utmost respect for him. Remember: I'm questioning the source material, not the person who believes it. I don't know Act or his life really, I'm not inside his head, I can't tell you if he's foolish or not. I'm not omniscient.

But, go ahead, I would be pleased to engage in civil philosophy.

[So Boerd]

Then he's not truly omnipotent, as omnipotence is defined as being, literally, "all powerful". If he's not all powerful, why call him God? Or, better yet, why worship him?

And if he's not all powerful, how did he create everything? How can he see the future? Make predetermined things?

Or, do you have a different interpretation of God?

All those powers you listed exist, and He has. No, He is not truly omnipotent.

As to why worship him, He offers me the best chance at happiness. That is all. So I am duly appreciative.

[Brovo]

So Boerd said
All those powers you listed exist, and He has. No, He is not truly omnipotent. As to why worship him, He offers me the best chance at happiness. That is all. So I am duly appreciative.

So he can create all things, see through time, and easily interfere in stopping the very evils he created in man which he created so that he can save them from the damnation which he created...

...And he chooses, not to.

... By all definitions, this is not a moral character (speaking from a fictional PoV). Add in that he wants people to worship him so badly that his first four out of ten commandments are ones about worshiping him, and that even referring to him by a typical male pronoun requires one to capitalize it so as to show proper respect for Him... He's arrogant. Now throw in that he literally drowned the entire world, women and children included, and you have a genocidal, arrogant god.

From a moral standpoint, I can't worship him in the same vein that I can't worship Hitler. Even if he did exist, I would have to decline any invitation to his heaven on the principle that some of my closest friends would be burning for eternity because he programmed them to inevitable burn. I couldn't, in good mind, enjoy paradise while other, completely innocent people, burned because of his malicious wrath and deep rooted jealousy problems.

[So Boerd]

Because evil has to exist. Recall where I said He cannot empower you with understanding? Evil had to exist, and it came from free will. Had we not this understanding of the concept of evil, we might have committed evil after He made us gods as well, which is obviously a giant problem. Who knew Stan Lee was such a theologian? "With great power, comes great responsibility." This life is basically a giant background check before we become gods, that if we pass, we understand evil and will not commit it.

[Brovo]

So Boerd said Because evil has to exist. Recall where I said He cannot empower you with understanding? Evil had to exist, and it came from free will. Had we not this understanding of the concept of evil, we might have committed evil after He made us gods as well, which is obviously a giant problem. Who knew Stan Lee was such a theologian? "With great power, comes great responsibility." This life is basically a giant background check before we become gods, that if we pass, we understand evil and will not commit it.

Except that evil doesn't have to exist. He created everything and knows how everything is going to play out for everyone.

And how can he not empower you with understanding? That makes no sense. He created you. He created your brain. He created how your brain works. If he cannot empower you with understanding, it's only because he chose not to design your brain with the capacity for it, which in turn, still puts the ball in his court: He could easily fix the problem. And he doesn't.

Free will does not exist in a universe where everything is created and planned out by a creator deity, especially if that creator deity can also see into the future, and program exactly who and what you are. It's like claiming that an AI in a video game has free will: No it doesn't. I programmed it. I know exactly what it will do, and if I want it to do something else, to be smarter, to be less aggressive, to be non-violent, and so on, I merely have to change a few lines of programming to do that. At any time. Any time I wish. The only reason I wouldn't is if it suited my whimsy.

Ergo, free will as an argument is void, unless god is either...
A. Not programming humans, in which case his need to exist is entirely erased.
B. Is unable to see into the future, in which case he is not a god and not worth worship.

We don't need to be gods to be happy.

Philosophy =/= Theology.

I can understand evil and still commit it anyway, and god's definition of evil is immensely flawed: Not believing in him is sufficient punishment to be sent to hell even if you're a girl scout supporting nurse who sacrifices everything to save babies. Don't believe in god? Go to hell. Again, immoral. Again, not worth worship, even if he did exist.

Not to mention, after I became a god (I thought we became angels, or cherabim, or were simply spirits in eternal paradise?), what is stopping me from being evil afterwards anyway?

... And, again, why did god have to create evil? He created man. He created the impulses within man. The impulses to commit evil, like greed, or rage, or so on, were made by God.

If he didn't make those things, then he didn't make everything, and he's not the creator of everything, which would go against the core of his own mythos.

So to summarize: God still created evil. Why?

[So Boerd]

Simple misunderstanding. My brain is not, at all, me. Destroy my brain, I still exist. He can alter the brain, not the soul.