Uvalde and the Problem of Evil
BY PGF2 years, 5 months ago
If there is no God, there is no baseline of fact from which right and wrong are delineated and defined. You end up with 300 plus million definitions of good and evil, each according to a sin-filled human and their self-righteousness. Under this humanism, peace among men will never be achieved.
The central assumption of leftist thought is that if you control the society, you can also control the character and conduct of every person who has been raised in it. Every leftist policy flows from this idea. Government becomes god and can, given political omnipotence, give us utopia.
All we have to do is give up our individuality, our rights, and our faith in anything else.
[…]
The problem of evil is an old one. It can come from many directions. But our society is particularly vulnerable because its elites can no longer even grapple with the concept.
They’ve created a society in which evil thrives because they are incapable of recognizing it.
Source: Borrowed
On June 2, 2022 at 9:07 pm, Chris said:
Wow..That first paragraph is so spot on.
Even a dunce like myself Comprehends and Understands it.
On June 2, 2022 at 9:41 pm, X said:
Well, the United States of Anal Sodomy is a communist, ungodly country in which the government is god, and white male Christian gun owners are “evil” and enemies of the people. White male Christian gun owners are a bunch of Hitlers, you see, and when they have all been liquidated the LGBTQI+/pansexual/two-spirit/genderqueers will live in paradise, just like Karl Marx predicted, and they will be able to have an abortion every day and twice on Sunday.
On June 2, 2022 at 10:37 pm, Frank Clarke said:
“What is hateful to you, do not do to your fellow. That is the whole Law; all the rest is interpretation.”
— Hillel
(30 B.C.-10 A.D.)
Source: Talmud
Hillel here delivers his own take on The Golden Rule, the categorical imperative. True, Hillel has the Old Testament as his base, but says here that one doesn’t need the OT to know what’s right and what’s wrong. The point probably holds equally for the NT.
On June 3, 2022 at 1:09 am, Plague Monk said:
I’m curious as to whether the writer has seen Professor David Skrbina’s The Jesus Hoax? On the Z-Man’s site, I saw a comment about it, and I picked up a copy at Amazon. The sub heading is “How St. Paul’s Cabal Fooled the World for Two Thousand Years”.
I’ve shown the book to a few clergy and my wife, who is still a believer. Not one of them has been able to refute Professor Skrbina’s thesis.
I’m genuinely curious, and I’m restraining my normal tendency to be very snarky. As an engineering designer and history buff, I’m used to dealing with things that can be verified, such as 2 + 2 = 4. To me, it appears that the evidence for the bible uses circular reasoning, and Skrbina delves into this in depth.
On June 3, 2022 at 8:36 am, luke2236 said:
plague monk, Jesus and the Bible are verifiable, and you know it. Either you are just trying to justify your own behaviour -as most do – or are playing at being SO intellectual and edgy. Neither is gonna cut it.
In the HIGHLY unlikely event that you are indeed serious – and please forgive me if you are – then the answers are readily available. I just find it amusing that so many people go to such extraordinary lengths to try and disprove the obvious; including those who now say 2+2 does not necessarily equal 4…
and Frank Clarke, the talmud was not written until some hundreds of years AD, not when Hillel was anywhere near alive. The talmud has no relation to the Old Testament, tho occasional bits of common wisdom may have snuck in. remember too that the talmud condones paedophilia , lying and murder of non-jews… (((they))) follow it to this day, NOT the Bible.
On June 3, 2022 at 10:01 am, Furminator said:
The Pagan Christ by Tom Harpur takes a tack that the Jesus myth derives from older religions out of Egypt, which as I recall derive from even older ones. Not unreasonable when you acknowledge the pagan origins of Christmas and Easter.
Yes man is imperfect and God is the way of redemption. But (rhetorical question only) what makes the Bible the only right answer when all religions claim a monopoly on The One True God and preach “This time it’s different”?
On June 3, 2022 at 10:41 am, Herschel Smith said:
@Furiminator,
Given that I have been trained in seminary, I tend to chuckle when people tell me Jesus or the Scriptures are a myth. I am too steeped in apologetics, systematics and the Scriptures to do much else.
However, I do understand that some people do not believe, and thus I need to be more patient and understanding than I usually am.
I would suggest first of all that you go to YouTube and listen to a debate between Dr. Greg Bahnsen and Gordon Stein on “Does God Exist?” Unfortunately it was only captured in audio format, but if you listen closely it’s a fascinating debate.
Next, you have to read the Scriptures and a good, systematized explanation of the doctrine contained therein (I would suggest reading the Westminster Confession of Faith and Larger and Shorter Catechisms). Without something like this, people tend to make up things about what they read.
The general “Warp and Woof” of the Scriptures, the consistency of the parts, the witness of the whole, the witness of the Scriptures themselves as to what they are (here see “Inerrancy” edited by Norman Geisler), and on and on I could go.
As I said, much of this is discussed in the WCF which would be a good starting point for you. The logical consistency (consistency of the parts) is very important. True religion (classic Christianity) is the only faith that can make that claim and be right about it.
Without Christ, there is no true religion. There is no Christianity, and there is no redemption.
Jesus isn’t a “myth.” That’s a silly notion, and I would be able to pick apart whomever’s book you cited very easily.
I couldn’t care less about what someone thinks about the origins of some particular holiday or other. That has absolutely nothing whatsoever to do with anything I have said.
And BTW, every other faith is a knock-off, a fake facsimile, to the one true religion. Not vice versa.
On June 3, 2022 at 11:40 am, Furminator said:
Thank you for taking the time to make your suggestions. Some people find religion, Scripture, and “a good, systematized explanation of the doctrine” helpful in building a relationship with God; in my case it stands in the way.
I do not believe God hides from anyone. I see and feel the Presence of God in my life at all times and in that experience I strive to be Christ-like. And yet I lack your religious training or Christian faith.
On June 3, 2022 at 2:42 pm, Herschel Smith said:
No offense, but the value of systematizing what you believe is that you ensure that it is all consistent (logical, the “consistency of the parts”).
Otherwise, what you believe may just be some random assortment of illogical stuff.
Remember, in order to have a “faith,” it must include who you are and why you’re here and where you came from (ontology), a theory of knowledge (epistemology), and doctrine of ethics, and so on. It must be comprehensive.
On June 3, 2022 at 8:06 pm, Fred said:
@Chris, delineation has two definitions. The second is, to draw a boundary between.