I have a question for any Christian here.

[alicewonders]

That's a pretty interesting idea to me because I'm inclined to believe what a lot of scientists are starting to believe, which is that we are probably not the only universe in existence, and that there may be many countless billions of other universes. I think the reason a lot of scientists are probably starting to believe that is they can't think of another logical explanation for the Big Bang and the creation of our universe. I know a lot of people would then come to the conclusion "Well, it must be God" yes, but the way I see it is even God appears to follow the physical rules He put in place for our universe. Finding out there were in fact other universes would only convince me even more that God exists.

That goes back to that whole "God is order, evil is chaos" thing.  God DOES follow the physical rules in place for our universe!  He is the Master Scientist. 

[DCPatriot]

.....He is the Master Scientist.

 

[alicewonders]

Perhaps God's real interest in mankind is in the species itself?   Not the individual life.

While I certainly do believe in the power of prayers, I'm not naive enough to know for example, that should Adam and Trigger been citizens of Uganda and not the USA, things may not have turned out the way they did.

Why does a loving God allow little children to be butchered over their belief system?  Or their 'bad luck' to be born to a minority clan?

Why does a priest say that a child's death could be part of God's larger plan for the family and parents?  He would actually allow that carnage to teach a broader lesson?

Let me be clear that I do find comfort and peace in praying to a higher power.  But sometimes I wonder if that's tantamount to taking deep breaths to stop a pounding heart...or quiet an adrenaline rush.

At the risk of being ridiculed, I do lean toward a POV that man is the result of intelligent design.  But 'that' intelligence is also mortal.

'They' return every now and then...perhaps thousands of years in-between.  If they don't like what they see...they wreck the place and start over...and keep on until WE get it right.   

In that sense, living on earth is our own purgatory/limbo.  Or hell.

When Adam and Eve ate from the Tree of Knowledge, they set in motion the next phase of Man's development.  With knowledge, God was saying that he leaves us mostly on our own - we are responsible for our actions and life isn't always fair.  If he interfered in every little thing - we wouldn't learn our lessons, would we? 

Just like a parent, it's all done in love.

[DCPatriot]

When Adam and Eve ate from the Tree of Knowledge, they set in motion the next phase of Man's development.  With knowledge, God was saying that he leaves us mostly on our own - we are responsible for our actions and life isn't always fair.  If he interfered in every little thing - we wouldn't learn our lessons, would we? 

Just like a parent, it's all done in love.

I like that take, Alice.  Thank you.

It also helps explain, to me anyway, why children inherit the same propensities and/or addictions as their parents.  Speaking about alcoholism, drug addiction, gambling, reckless behavior.   I am a firm believer that it's a form of "garbage in-garbage out".

[massadvj]

I find it hard to believe that we are the only intelligent life forms in the universe.  What I'm going to say now will cause a lot of disagreement with me - but I'm going to state MY opinion and I don't really care to argue about it:

The Bible does say that when God created us he said, "Let us create man in OUR own image".

So I believe that the form we are as humans is in the image of God. 

it wouldn't shake my faith not one little bit to find out that our universe was just part of a larger galaxy of universes - maybe even each with their own God.

We being created in God's image could very simply mean we are designed in a way similar to God.  For example, if I say I created a computer in my own image, does that mean the computer must look like me; or would it suffice to say that the computer has a short-term working memory like I do, a long term memory like I do, an electricity-based neural system, a cooling system and so forth?  Broadly interpreted, "in his image" could simply mean that, like God, we consist of atomic matter.

I think the idea of God as looking like man is a sticking point with evangelicals, but I don't think modern science and the bible can be reconciled unless the bible is seen to be at least somewhat allegorical.  Even as allegory, it is astounding how much the bible gets right.  "Let there be light," for example, sounds an awful lot like the Big Bang.  And although the bible gets the order of things a bit wrong, the idea of the universe being created in an orderly and predictable way over time is certainly consistent with our current understanding.

It could very well be that God reveals Himself within the context of man's capability to understand Him at any moment in history.  Even with all of our sophisticated technology, we are today incapable of truly understanding infinity, omnipresence and omnipotence.  We are programmed to seek all of these things.  We want to live forever, be everywhere at once and have power over everything.  Maybe we are created "in His image" in that sense.

These, and many more, are the questions the agnostic seeks answers to.   Or at least this agnostic does.  I have no doubt that when the rubber meets the road and I am confronted with my own fallibility, I will gravitate toward faith and embrace the Christian God.  Within the context of Christianity, even within the context of my native Catholicism, there is plenty of room for differing interpretations.  In the meantime, I think keeping my mind open to all possibilities gets me closer to the truth than blindly following one particular doctrine.

I know who I am, and if there is a God, I think I know what He expects of me, given how I have been programmed.  In my case, he has made my life mostly an individual journey as opposed to a collective one.  If and when I find him, I'll have to emulate Frank Sinatra and "Do it My Way..."

[alicewonders]

I like that take, Alice.  Thank you.

It also helps explain, to me anyway, why children inherent the same propensities and/or addictions as their parents.  Speaking about alcoholism, drug addiction, gambling, reckless behavior.   I am a firm believer that it's a form of "garbage in-garbage out".

Yep.  Sooner or later - one way or another - we all reap what we sow.  If not today, next year or next generation.  If we were taught early on to learn that, maybe a lot of us would have made some better decisions - I like to think I would have.

[EC]

Perhaps God's real interest in mankind is in the species itself?   Not the individual life.

While I certainly do believe in the power of prayers, I'm not naive enough to know for example, that should Adam and Trigger been citizens of Uganda and not the USA, things may not have turned out the way they did.

Why does a loving God allow little children to be butchered over their belief system?  Or their 'bad luck' to be born to a minority clan?

Why does a priest say that a child's death could be part of God's larger plan for the family and parents?  He would actually allow that carnage to teach a broader lesson?

Let me be clear that I do find comfort and peace in praying to a higher power.  But sometimes I wonder if that's tantamount to taking deep breaths to stop a pounding heart...or quiet an adrenaline rush.

At the risk of being ridiculed, I do lean toward a POV that man is the result of intelligent design.  But 'that' intelligence is also mortal.

'They' return every now and then...perhaps thousands of years in-between.  If they don't like what they see...they wreck the place and start over...and keep on until WE get it right.   

In that sense, living on earth is our own purgatory/limbo.  Or hell.

My friend - one massive can of worms, you opened there!

You know how protective we are of children. Someone threatened your Adam, he'd stop breathing in a second, and it wouldn't bother you in the slightest. Just remember - I'm probably a lot faster. 

You know how many suffering kids I have seen. The only reasonable explanation I got was from Sister T - she said someone has to get the shit end of the stick.

[alicewonders]

We being created in God's image could very simply mean we are designed in a way similar to God.  For example, if I say I created a computer in my own image, does that mean the computer must look like me; or would it suffice to say that the computer has a short-term working memory like I do, a long term memory like I do, an electricity-based neural system, a cooling system and so forth?  Broadly interpreted, "in his image" could simply mean that, like God, we consist of atomic matter.

I think the idea of God as looking like man is a sticking point with evangelicals, but I don't think modern science and the bible can be reconciled unless the bible is seen to be at least somewhat allegorical.  Even as allegory, it is astounding how much the bible gets right.  "Let there be light," for example, sounds an awful lot like the Big Bang.  And although the bible gets the order of things a bit wrong, the idea of the universe being created in an orderly and predictable way over time is certainly consistent with our current understanding.

It could very well be that God reveals Himself within the context of man's capability to understand Him at any moment in history.  Even with all of our sophisticated technology, we are today incapable of truly understanding infinity, omnipresence and omnipotence.  We are programmed to seek all of these things.  We want to live forever, be everywhere at once and have power over everything.  Maybe we are created "in His image" in that sense.

These, and many more, are the questions the agnostic seeks answers to.   Or at least this agnostic does.  I have no doubt that when the rubber meets the road and I am confronted with my own fallibility, I will gravitate toward faith and embrace the Christian God.  In the meantime, I think keeping my mind open to all possibilities gets me closer to the truth than blindly following one particular doctrine.

I know who I am, and if there is a God, I think I know what He expects of me, given how I have been programmed.  In my case, he has made my life mostly an individual journey as opposed to a collective one.  If and when I find him, I'll have to emulate Frank Sinatra and "Do it My Way..."

"Broadly interpreted, "in his image" could simply mean that, like God, we consist of atomic matter."

Atomic matter is God's modeling clay.  So, yes.

If you created a computer that thinks like you, you would say, "I created a computer that thinks like me." 

If you created a computer that looked like you, you would say, "I created a computer that is my image."

"It could very well be that God reveals Himself within the context of man's capability to understand Him at any moment in history."
Just like with an infant, we have to learn to eat baby food first. 

[massadvj]

My friend - one massive can of worms, you opened there!

You know how protective we are of children. Someone threatened your Adam, he'd stop breathing in a second, and it wouldn't bother you in the slightest. Just remember - I'm probably a lot faster. 

You know how many suffering kids I have seen. The only reasonable explanation I got was from Sister T - she said someone has to get the shit end of the stick.

What does God (if He exists) seek?  I think the best answer we are able to come up with given our limited and fallible capabilities is: perfection.

Is an experiment in perfection -- one that relies on rational, free-thinking, self-absorbed beings to find it as opposed to it being given to them from on high -- likely to be successful without survival of the fittest?

[alicewonders]

What does God (if He exists) seek?  I think the best answer we are able to come up with given our limited and fallible capabilities is: perfection.

Is an experiment in perfection -- one that relies on rational, free-thinking, self-absorbed beings to find it as opposed to it being given to them from on high -- likely to be successful without survival of the fittest?

You just hit it out of the park Victor!

If you were amassing an army or something like that, you would take only the best. 

[massadvj]

"Broadly interpreted, "in his image" could simply mean that, like God, we consist of atomic matter."

If you created a computer that thinks like you, you would say, "I created a computer that thinks like me." 

"It could very well be that God reveals Himself within the context of man's capability to understand Him at any moment in history."
Just like with an infant, we have to learn to eat baby food first.

Yes, but in the example I gave the computer does more than think like me.  It also has a neural system like me and a cooling system like me.  So to say "it thinks like me" would be less accurate than to simply say I created it in my image.  The latter encompasses a multitude of traits the computer has that are like mine.

[alicewonders]

Yes, but in the example I gave the computer does more than think like me.  It also has a neural system like me and a cooling system like me.  So to say "it thinks like me" would be less accurate than to simply say I created it in my image.  The latter encompasses a multitude of traits the computer has that are like mine.

That's certainly a possibility.  For me, I like the image of God in a shimmering robe with a long white beard, it is comforting to me in the way that he looks like me.   

[massadvj]

That's certainly a possibility.  For me, I like the image of God in a shimmering robe with a long white beard, it is comforting to me in the way that he looks like me.   

I have no question that the man in the white beard and robe you find so comforting is the exact reason that particular phraseology was used.  What makes the Bible such an endearing -- and enduring -- book is its capability to accommodate so many different interpretations.

[alicewonders]

I have no question that the man in the white beard and robe you find so comforting is the exact reason that particular phraseology was used.  What makes the Bible such an endearing -- and enduring -- book is its capability to accommodate so many different interpretations.

Yes, I agree.  The genius of the Bible is that the same verse that can be taken and chewed on meaningfully like baby food to an infant - that same verse can be interpreted on a much more advanced level of thinking and be just as meaningful to someone who is a life-long scholar of the subject.  There is always something more that can be interpreted.

[mountaineer]

One aspect of God creating human beings in His own image is that we - like Him - are communicative beings. We need relationships. God wants us to have a relationship and be in communion with Him.

[massadvj]

Our universe is born, it expands and becomes more complex, and then it begins to create consciousness. Eventually it grows old and dies, but it passes on its remains to be redistributed back into the mix. Sounds familiar to me.

There are plenty of Christians who think this way.  It's not necessary to call oneself an agnostic to have this point of view.  And yet, I call myself an agnostic, mostly because I am not certain as to the existence of a creator or an all-encompassing, omnipresent intelligent force.  Simplistic definitions such as "God is Love' bore the hell out of me.  They are meant to appease the doubtful, but they shed no light on the mystery.  Of course God is Love.  By the definition I am familiar with, God is Love... and everything else.  So to pick out one thing and say God is this or God is that is true as far as it goes, but not very enlightening.

I think it is possible to practice Christianity within the framework of most Christian religions and not even believe that God has to be intelligent.  God can simply represent nature; an omnipresent, all-encompassing force that makes laws that are irrefutable and that none of us can control.  Who would deny that nature exists?

This is why I cannot call myself an atheist.  In my mind, atheists deny nature itself.  That just doesn't make any sense.  Most atheists I know deny nature because they are angry at nature, and they are angry at nature because they are angry at themselves. 

[DCPatriot]

Thank you all for a fascinating thread.

It's comforting (here I go again) to read the comments on this topic from people who I've admired on the forum over all these years.

Feel lucky and blessed. 

[DCPatriot]

My friend - one massive can of worms, you opened there!

You know how protective we are of children. Someone threatened your Adam, he'd stop breathing in a second, and it wouldn't bother you in the slightest. Just remember - I'm probably a lot faster. 

You know how many suffering kids I have seen. The only reasonable explanation I got was from Sister T - she said someone has to get the shit end of the stick.

EC...et al.  I am truly sorry if I gave that impression.   It's just that I'm still haunted by the gore and horrific deeds that ISIS has wrought on innocent people and children.  I cannot and will not ever reconcile a God that allows that to happen.  Nor, can I condone a country like ours to let it go unanswered.

If it were President Bush in the White House, those bastards would already be room temperature.

How can God permit such carnage to individuals.  Saying God gave us free will to sin and delve into depravity against others doesn't work for me.

So I choose to believe the Bible means "man" in a collective sense. 

Looking back, wish I'd stayed off this thread. 

[Bigun]

One of the things that never seemed to make sense to me was God condemning people to eternal suffering in Hell for not accepting His teachings.

God does not condemn anyone to anything. We do that, or not, to ourselves! In fact that is the sole reason we are here on this earth in the flesh!

[EC]

EC...et al.  I am truly sorry if I gave that impression.   It's just that I'm still haunted by the gore and horrific deeds that ISIS has wrought on innocent people and children.  I cannot and will not ever reconcile a God that allows that to happen.  Nor, can I condone a country like ours to let it go unanswered.

If it were President Bush in the White House, those bastards would already be room temperature.

How can God permit such carnage to individuals.  Saying God gave us free will to sin and delve into depravity against others doesn't work for me.

So I choose to believe the Bible means "man" in a collective sense. 

Looking back, wish I'd stayed off this thread.

Nah - you raise good points. God neither permits nor denies anything. He gave us free will for a reason. In retrospect it was a bit of a dumb idea, but hey - He knows what He's doing (I hope!).

[Luis Gonzalez]

The best word (or set of values) that I can use to define my ever-shifting set of beliefs on religion is "pantheism".

God is the Universe, and the Universe is God. Everything is then part of that immanent being we call God, and all realities and being and worlds and everything are extensions and modes of that being.

I believe that man created God (the God of the Bible) based on the only image that our minds could embrace at the time. To believe that the Creator looked anything but exactly like us would make us, His creation, less than worthy of Him.

I don't hold the view of a micromanaging God, but rather one through which things can happen, so as the Universe is created events unfold that lead to both creation and destruction. We are created and we in turn create in accordance to the gift of free will. Creation can in fact be destruction, and that is what we call "evil".

The Biblical teachings and the words of Jesus of Nazareth hold up to light even outside the realm of religiosity. To live life as a good human being and in accordance to the teachings of Jesus of Nazareth is in and of itself the reward.

I pray as a Catholic, basically because those are the religious values instilled in me, but I don't so much pray to ask for anything, but rather because giving voice to those things that I wish to pray about brings me solace and comfort.

[alicewonders]

The best word (or set of values) that I can use to define my ever-shifting set of beliefs on religion is "pantheism".

God is the Universe, and the Universe is God. Everything is then part of that immanent being we call God, and all realities and being and worlds and everything are extensions and modes of that being.

I believe that man created God (the God of the Bible) based on the only image that our minds could embrace at the time. To believe that the Creator looked anything but exactly like us would make us, His creation, less than worthy of Him.

I don't hold the view of a micromanaging God, but rather one through which things can happen, so as the Universe is created events unfold that lead to both creation and destruction. We are created and we in turn create in accordance to the gift of free will. Creation can in fact be destruction, and that is what we call "evil".

The Biblical teachings and the words of Jesus of Nazareth hold up to light even outside the realm of religiosity. To live life as a good human being and in accordance to the teachings of Jesus of Nazareth is in and of itself the reward.

I pray as a Catholic, basically because those are the religious values instilled in me, but I don't so much pray to ask for anything, but rather because giving voice to those things that I wish to pray about brings me solace and comfort.

Nice, Luis.  I agree with you on prayer.  I've ceased praying to God like he is Santa Claus and I have a wish list.  I pray for God to give me strength to deal with challenges that come my way - and it's like talking to a therapist, it does help to talk things out with God.   

[DCPatriot]

I pray as a Catholic, basically because those are the religious values instilled in me, but I don't so much pray to ask for anything, but rather because giving voice to those things that I wish to pray about brings me solace and comfort.

That is excellent, Luis.   Essentially what I was trying to express. 

[EC]

I have two prayers.

One where I give thanks - that happens daily, at sunrise if at all possible.

The other is for work. Basically boils down to "You coming, or what?" The Lord and I have an odd relationship. 

[DCPatriot]

I have two prayers.

One where I give thanks - that happens daily, at sunrise if at all possible.

The other is for work. Basically boils down to "You coming, or what?" The Lord and I have an odd relationship. 

Actually laughed out loud reading that, EC. 

Of course, that was when I realized your expertise entailed a different type of 'healing'.