I have absolute proof that there is no God.

[seeker]

I've just seen in our local paper that a little girl who lives in our town has died. She has been the focus of much prayer since she was taken ill last year. Her parents were thoroughly good Christian people who trusted God absolutely.

The is no way that a loving, omnipotent, beneficent God who notes even a sparrow falling would not have answered these people's prayer.

So, if I had even a scintilla of doubt, it is now gone. There is no God.

Your posts are really sweet, amillion. Thank you.

I included superstition with 'spirit' because someone else did - technodad, maybe. It is, however, part of what I think of as spirit: like the pigeons in the story, we seek to find patterns that explain life's mysteries. If I wear my dayglo knickers (they were in a multipack ) and get an unexpected windfall, I'd be tempted to think the knickers bring good luck!

Since I'm capable of logic, I'll then eliminate the knickers as a possible cause of windfalls. Superstitious people might not. They'd put their dayglo knickers on whenever they needed good luck. Having already decided this is a useful strategy, they won't notice all the times they didn't have good luck while wearing their special knickers. Or they might think a stronger force, for bad luck, was in play. But when good things happen, they say "Hurrah! My lucky knickers did their magic " That's called confirmation bias.

If you swap god for lucky knickers, this example shows why we godless people say religions are superstitions.

seeker,8.25am
"surely you can see that a faith that cannot resist challenge is useless"
not sure what you mean by that.
To my mind,as I said before,faith is something that cannot be proven in a homan way.That is what faith is.
The gateway to christianity is Jesus.
The way to become a Christian is to say sorry for what we have done wrong in our lives[this does not mean having to list it all,most of us will never be able to remember it all,but God knows],and believing that Jesus was raisee from the dead.
Neither of these things can be proved or done by science.
So looking to science or archaeology for difinitive proof is looking in the wrong place.

It does fascinate me how God can be seen by different people as almost a parallel of how the other side does

1. A wicked enity, who puppet masters our life's, and hands out punishment with no discretion or reason. Often appears to target the weakest and most vunreable in the world. All that awaits us (if he is real)is burning hell.

Or

1. A loving entity who cares for our wellbeing, gives us the gift (and maybe curse?) of freewill, and offers hope of prayer and something waiting better for us after death.

(I realise that is black and white and there are many variations inbetween)

I can understand both paradoxes. I just find it fascinating how the same enity can utterly polarise our views.

Makes you think God doesn't set a very good example of how to be a loving Father doesn't it ? I think lots of/ some christians are in fact too strict and prone to physical discipline with their children.

Blimey this thread moves quickly.

Cote - you replied to me many posts ago even though it wasn't that long in time.

I disagree what agnostics and atheists are the same thing. You said yourself that atheists have rejected the God hypothesis on the grounds of lack of evidence. A true agnostic can't reject the hypothesis as a baseless belief because they don't know for sure that the belief is baseless. You can't claim to have no faith and to have rejected all arguments for there being a God, including the experience of those who trully believe and then claim that actually you don't know the answer and there is a possibility that there is a God after all. That sounds like having your cake and eating it if you ask me.

Technodad - I completely agree with your post of 13.57 about purpose of prayer. I have always thought that that is the essense of prayer anyway, which I posted about a couple of days ago in a more roundabout way. God doesn't answer prayers in the sense of doing something he is asked to do, he gives strength and heals. IMO you don't really have to have a faith in an outside force or being but if that is the focus of your meditation and the way you get strength and it helps then why not?

I think lots of/ some christians are in fact too strict and prone to physical discipline with their children.

It's interesting. In The US (not sure about the UK) most Christians are in favour of the death penalty. This is in spite of the fact that most of them are also pro-life (on the basis that only God can chose who lives or dies).

Never had a sensible answer as to how they manage to justify holding both positions.

Schoolworries, I don't think the wicked puppet master is a Christian construct, not to any Christian I know anyway, more what a non-believer sees as God. It strikes me as a means of justifying their belief that there is no God - they need to turn him into some sort of evil thing.

they need to turn him into some sort of evil thing.

We don't need to. The Bible does that for us. Have you actually read it?

Atheism & agnosticism are not the same thing, no one is saying they are. But they are not mutually exclusive. I explained more fully for you upthread :)

CrikeyOHara,God is a loving God to his children.He doesnt threaten as far as I know.He may warn several times.tbh I dont know much beyond that,as I tend to do what I think God wants me to,because I know that is the best thing for me,even if it doesnt look much like that at the time.

Gods punishments on the groups of people in the bible who repeatedly disobeyed him,rejected his laws multiple times,disobeyed his rules about the sabbath[the sabbath,meaning the day of rest, is very important to God]after many many warnings ,did include lots of horrible things.

Bigboobed

Thank you for your post

The idea of God either having planned your life or given us utter freewill seemed quite incongruous to me which is one of the main reason I decided organised religion was not for me.

When I explored some churches some Christians told me with certainty God planned everything in our lives, whilst some told me with certainty God left life choices to us.

I suppose then that leaves the question of the point of prayer if the latter is true? Why pray if God wont intervene anyway?

Amillionyears

I do feel a bit crap continually picking apart what you say. It's not personal. I get the impression that you're a lovely person.

However.....

Sorry, but does ignoring the sabbath justify sending a group into a village to kill all the men, children & old women, while keeping the young pretty virgins for themselves? This was God's command, quite specifically. He doesn't specify why he thinks the murders should keep the virgins for themselves, but I suspect it's not just to do the washing up for them, right?

And, yes, God/Jesus does threaten hell - and for the silliest of reasons sometimes (in this case calling someone a "fool"):

"But I tell you that anyone who is angry with his brother will be subject to judgment. Again, anyone who says to his brother 'Raca,' is answerable to the Sanhedrin. But anyone who says, 'You fool!' is in danger of the fire of hell" Matt 5:22.

And that's just for starters.

murderers

technodad.you are on the beach!!
enjoy your time there and whoever you are with.

I am trying to do posters in some sort of order.
Im beginning to feel I will be here on this thread all week.
So apologies if I am.
I felt physically tired and somewhat drained after last night,so I will post when I can.
Also,I sometimes have RL stuff which has to come first,so if people want me to carry on posting I will,but it may take me a while.

You're our very own missionary, amillion :)
Take your time, I think we all appreciate your efforts.

Thanks for your replies amillionyears and iggi. Iggi's version of God (who doesn't send non-believers to hell) makes more sense to me than amillionyears's (although overall i don't think I believe at all). Why would a loving, just, father punish his some of his children for eternity for not believing in him? He's offered no firm proof of his existence. Yes, apparently he left the bible, or if you are a muslim then he inspired the quran. So there are at least two (and probably many more) old books on the planet that specifically contradict each other, and say that believing in their own religion and no other is the only path. Why would God, or Allah, create a world where there were two contradictory books, and then send all the people who believed the wrong one to hell?

sorry amillionyears, I don't want to drain you. Don't worry if you don't have time to answer my posts, I'm just thinking out loud really.

or, thinking by pressing little buttons which make words appear on a screen

I've decided that I really shouldn't post on these threads any more. After the last time I did, I got myself into a dreadful state. I thought I was strong enough to post here. I'm not.

Before I go, I want to apologise to seeker . I took your OP too personally when it had nothing to do with me or dd. I lashed out at you. You are entitled to your opinion. I will hold on to mine mainly for my own sanity.

Cookierookie, if you're still around, I'm sorry you feel so bad, I kind of feel guilty that we're undermining something that means a lot to you. I hope you feel a bit better today.

"There was a plan, a reason, a purpose and now there's nothing."

I've never experienced what you're going through, as I never believed in the first place. Atheism/agnosticism can be lonely and bleak sometimes, but it also has beauty and purpose to it. It's wonderful and amazing that conscious life exists (although obviously if it didn't we wouldn't be here to notice it's non-existence ) and the fact that conscious life just happened to evolve as the product of billions of years of natural processes makes it even more precious. There is still love, still beauty, still happiness - these things are obvious, we can see evidence of them all around us.

I find a lot of religious people tend to thank God for all that is good in the world, but blame most suffering on free will. Without God, all the good in the world is that which we find and that which we make, and all the suffering in the world is that which we find and that which we make. When people are saved from horrible illnesses, it's not because of God's plan, it's because of the ingenuity and hard work of scientists, the work and compassion of nurses and doctors, the vision and passion of those who campaigned for free healthcare for all. When slavery was ended, it was because of the bravery of slaves who rebelled, the creativity and intelligence of writers, the dedication and compassion of abolitionists. Many used the example of Jesus to guide them, but in my opinion God didn't make it happen, just like God didn't make slavery happen: they did it themselves. I look around at the world and think "Bloody hell, it's up to us now. There is no plan, no one can fix this for us, but we can change the world ourselves." (Sorry for the swearing, but it's such a strong thought, that's the only way I can express it.)

Wishing you all the best, whatever you decide.

"there is no plan, no one fix us"

You see thats not a comforting thought for me personally. Thats probably why I will never decide either way if God is real or not.

At least that way there is still a small flicker of hope... Just incase. Or I find it all to bleak as well.

Im sure some will think me feeble minded, but thats ok. Im quite worn down by life, so maybe so.

You don't strike me as feeble minded, School. Can I ask, because I'm interested, what you mean when you talk about a "plan"? Do you mean an afterlife, or something like that? Or is it something that's hard to define?

Holofernesses posted " We expect that we should always be well. And we extrapolate from that basic assumption that if there is a God, he'd want the same thing too.".

If we're talking about the Christian god then there's enough clear verses in the bible for us to assume that thats what god wants too. The problem with saying that a desire for healing is solely a human construct is that it's clearly a biblical one too.

What appears to be happening here is one of the many events in what I like to call the 'Apologetics Olympics'. Bible says god will heal us but no evidence of that happening? Well it's our interpretation at fault. We just have to stop wanting to be healed. God doesnt actually want to heal us of physical ilness, its a metaphor for spiritual illness etc etc Problem with that is that by your assertion that Jesus didn't actually mean what he said or that he meant it in a different way is that then for the purposes of continuity and integrity you have to conclude that everything else he said is also probably not straightforward. Where does it end. Maybe eternal life didn't mean that? Maybe forgiveness isn't that simple. Maybe he wasnt sent from god and so on and so on.

@sciencelover

In Matthew 17:20, Jesus said the smallest amount of faith could move a mountain. Nothing would be impossible.

"He replied, ?Because you have so little faith. Truly I tell you, if you have faith as small as a mustard seed, you can say to this mountain, ?Move from here to there,? and it will move. Nothing will be impossible for you."

And

"Amen, I say to you, whoever says to this mountain, 'Be lifted up and thrown into the sea,' and does not doubt in his heart but believes that what he says will happen, it shall be done for him. Therefore I tell you, all that you ask for in prayer, believe that you will receive it and it shall be yours." (Mark 11:24-25)

And

"Ask and it will be given to you; seek and you will find; knock and the door will be opened to you. For everyone who asks, receives; and the one who seeks, finds; and to the one who knocks, the door will be opened" (Matt 7:7-8)

These are a few of many, many examples in the NT where Jesus expressly says that, if you believe in him, your prayers will be answered. Not just listened too - answered, no matter how impossible what you're asking is.

HeadinHands, I take your point re. how we interpret the Bible, but my point is that within the Bible itself there is plenty of evidence that the first Christians had a rubbish time, were killed, died nasty deaths, etc. So it's not a feat of bending the text to make it say what you want it to say, but rather, a recognition that the Bible, taken as a whole, offers a strange mixture of hope and warning that life will be hard, but that God will be with us. St Paul puts it well when he talks about all the crap that he's endured and then goes on to talk about 'carrying around the death of Jesus in our bodies' and also going on to live the risen, hopeul life of Jesus. That's how I read it, anyway.

Not in the Bible but I was thinking earlier about John MacMurray's distinction between 'illusory religion' and 'real religion.' He says that the maxim of 'illusory religion' is 'fear not; trust in God and he will see that none of the things you fear will happen to you', whereas the maxim of 'real religion' is 'Fear not; the things that you are afraid of are quite likely to happen to you, but they are nothing to be afraid of.' I know it's a bit trite in the aftermath of terrible tragedy such as the death of a young child, but I do like it.