What Benefits Are Only Available Through God?

OK, but God, as I understand Him, leaves you completely free to "create your own purpose". I am not suggesting that you have to involve any deity in order to do that.In some ways atheism leaves you freer to choose what I believe God wants you to choose which is that you live a life based on the sacrificial love of others and for all of creation. You aren't looking for a reward of any kind you are simply choosing to do the loving thing for its own sake.However, I would contend as a Christian that I am only able to choose the loving thing because God loved me first and that any loving thing I am able to do is just that I am reflecting God's love into the situation. I would also add that I strongly disagree that the point of Christianity is personal salvation. The point of Christianity is personal vocation. Yes, the Biblical message talks about the renewal of all things under Christ, but where you or I fit into that is God's business and not mine. Our vocation is simply to be loving stewards over creation. How can it make things worse for you. If I can assume that you are, or have been a loving parent in your life, then isn't it better that that act of love has a positive effect on creation both now and into an eternal renewal of creation, than simply the effect it has on your descendants for a few generations? I think that the argument can be made that many people, such as Tangle's friend, do find solace and comfort from the belief in a specific deity, in this case the Christian god. That is a benefit for many although not for you.Ultimately though it all boils down to Pilate's big question. What is truth. Is there a good and loving god? Did Jesus perfectly embody the wisdom and nature of God? Did that God resurrect Jesus? For me there is sufficient evidence from historical accounts; from my own observations of our world and my life in it; from my own life experience and even from reading books on the subject of physics, (even though it has only resulted in the tiniest basic understanding of the subject). If what I believe by faith to be true then there are benefits, including life itself, that are only available through God. Those benefits though are not subject to our beliefs about God. The rain falls on the good and the evil.Thanks Stile, I enjoy your posts.

I don't see it as being imposed. We can accept that the meaning of the hope for our world is that the fundamental characteristic of our world would be sacrificial love for one another and for all of creation. I think most of us here would sign on to that. However, it isn't imposed, we are completely free to reject that and live out lives based on self love and the gaining of personal wealth and power, and of course, everything in between. There's a good prairie illustration. I think that cows would find meaning in moo-ving on into a recreated world where the wolf lies down with the lamb, and by extension the cow.

It's a conclusive argument and you know it. If for no other reason than your book tells you that your god has created at least two paradises that don't include suffering - Eden and Heaven. And surely you must know that's utter shite. It can't make any sense at all even to you. This is Hitch's “Once you assume a creator and a plan, it makes us objects in a cruel experiment, whereby we are created sick, and commanded to be well,” Just logical nonsense. The last feature of a lost argument. You'd better hope you don't finish up like my relative - begging to die.

We may be capable of going down the wrong road, but we are also capable of resisting our baser impulses.Oregon passed its "Death with Dignity Act in 1997 and so far none of the things you worry about have happened.

That is only conclusive if you require that I agree with an inerrantist understanding of the Bible. Once again you are assuming a fundamentalist position. We are created with the freedom to make our own choices, good or evil - sick or well. I hope I don't too, and if it was legal at it would be a good thing for me in that case, but I still maintain that it would be a terrible thing overall for society.

We weren't "created sick," that's a common sort of ignorance though, which apparently described Hitch, despite his having a Christian brother. We were created perfect as was everything else. It was sin that brought sickness, suffering and death.

Yes, and most of us do, however, over time things become acceptable in society. As I said, with an aging population it will IMHO, become common for someone who is living in a home to be encouraged by medical people or even family; to encourage people to take that route. How would you know that? No one is going to admit that they had pressured someone in to allowing themselves to be euthanized. There will never be statistics on it. The only statistic that you might be able to get is to see how many people were euthenized. It certainly won't support anything that would back up your claim.In Canada for years now we have had palliative care for people near the end. At the end the often will up the level of morphine to ease pain and even cut of nourishment to facilitate the passing people painlessly. WE haven't needed a law on the books to deal with situations like that. Sure, it doesn't catch everyone, and people like Tangle's relative continue to suffer, but I'd venture to say that it catches the majority of people nearing the end.Totally off topic, I'd like to know what type of insect it is that you have pictured there. I was just out on the patio reading a book and one just like that landed on my book mark and I was wondering what it was. It looked just like that except that the tail, (or whatever you call that part), was red, and interestingly enough it was pulsing making it look like it had a heartbeat.

Didn't you ever see dragonflies when you were a kid?For that matter have you missed all of Tanypteryx's beautiful photos of dragonflies?But I'm sure Tanypteryx will know just what species that red "tail" identifies.
Edited by Faith, : No reason given.

Maybe it was a dragon fly. It just didn't look like any one I had seen previously.

My avatar is a dragonfly called Tanypteryx hageni. People are reporting a red one called Sympetrum illotum in BC right now. It is usually the first Sympetrum to be seen in the PNW in Spring. If you google the name you may be able to confirm that is the species you saw.The pulsing of the abdomen is breathing. Insects pump air in and out through holes in some segments called spiracles that are hooked to a network of tubes called trachea that facilitate gas exchange with all the cells of the body. So their respiriatory system is separate from their mouths and their circulatory system. In Oregon, the act specifies that the person must be under a doctor's care and terminal. We have advance directives and hospice care, but this gives a person control of their own body and destiny. The patient has to be able to communicate and make their wishes clear.We also allow an advance directive to dictate whether a patient can be revived or hooked up to medical equipment to keep them alive.If coercion is going to happen, it can happen just as easily without the Death with Dignity Act. Terminal patients commit suicide on their own without a doctor's care, so I don't think your reasoning is sound.This just gives an individual the option to make this decision rather than doctors or you or the government forcing them to hang in there no matter what.

That was definitely it. Beautiful little creature. Thanks so much. It all sounds very clinical and very reasonable and may well work for a while. Also, coercing someone to agree to being euthanized is very different than coercing someone to commit suicide.However, I don't believe for one minute it will end there. It is like so many other things. Look how things have advanced since making abortion legal.
Advocating for infanticide in US Nobody wouold have envisioned this initially. It too was a slippery slope.

You don't believe in heaven?Or that your god could end suffering and death if he so wished? Both those statement are false.We are obviously not free to choose to be sick or well and we do not have equal freedom to do good or evil (we are not born with equal genetic makeup, opportunity, propensity, environment or upbringing.) Good for you but others can't be trusted? That's no way to run a society. Nor is it Christian.

WE were not created perfect. WE are destined to suffer and die. The rest is a fairytale.

Not as our final destination. Going to a spiritual heaven is Platonism not Christianity. Actually I don't believe that He can in this life. In this life it would require the removal of free will, and entropy seems to be a consequence of 'the flow of time. However, I do believe that suffering and death are not part of the next life with the renewal of all things. I assumed that the way that your previous post read that you meant sick or well to be referring to our thinking. Of course we can't choose sick or well healthwise.Also of course there are numerous factors involved in our life choices when it comes to choosing good or evil, but no one always chooses the good thing and nobody always chooses the evil thing but we still have the freedom to make those choices. I agree though that it is certainly easier for some than others due to the factors you mentioned. We can go back again to choices. I might hope that it will be available for me at some point, but I contend that it is wrong for society so I would be making the selfish choice by campaigning to make it legal. Interesting that all of a sudden you are the one to decide what is Christian.

The point, of course, is that god, according to your belief, can create a place without suffering. So why build one with? So why not cut out the temporary suffering crap? What is the point of torturing people like this? And then claim to love them? It's all just a pointless lie. You're a giant bag of paradoxes! It's wrong but you'd campaign for it? I'm just as much a Christian as you are. I was baptised a Christian, I have Christian values and know what the book says about it. I just reject the god bit like you reject the Garden of Eden etc bit. I'm a cultural Christian.