Actually, he isn't looking for just a "healing." What he wants is a NEW LIMB REGROWN where an old appendage had been before. I'm not real sure why the restoration of a severed limb does not qualify, but he insists that a "healing" God would also be able to "grow" a new limb.
There are stories of restored body parts.
The first is Jesus restoring the soldier's severed ear in the garden of Gethsemene. My relative rejected that as not "regrowing a new ear." I'm not sure why healing a severed ear with an entirely new ear is necessary, but those apparently are the ground rules for this current athist obsession.
There is the story of St Winifred, but it, too, is restorative rather than regrowth.
St. Winifred Feastday: November 3 According to legend, she was the daughter of a wealthy resident of Tegeingl, Flintshire, Wales, and the sister of St. Beuno. She was most impressed by Beuno, was supposedly beheaded on June 22 by one Caradog when she refused to submit to him, had her head restored by Beuno, and sometime later, became a nun of the convent of a double monastery at Gwytherin in Denbigshire. She succeeded an Abbess Tenoy, as Abbess and died there fifteen years after her miraculous restoration to life. A spring supposedly springing up where Winifred's head fell, is called Holy Well or St. Winifred's Well and became a great pilgrimage center where many cures have been reported over the centuries. She is also known as Gwenfrewi. Her feast day is November 3.
Raising Lazarus from the dead doesn't count. Healing the blind doesn't count. Healing anything doesn't count.
All that counts is "regrowth."
That got me to thinking about the perfect healing of Lepers by Jesus. These had to go show themselves to the priest. They were declared clean.
Since lepers have their appendages fall off entirely irretrievable, and since these were declared entirely "clean" by the priest, does it make sense to see a "regrowth" in these healings.
I think so, but, of course, I cannot prove it. It is rational, though.
This author suggests artificial limbs as an answer to the amputation-obsessed anti-Christian variety of atheists. (Isn't that the only variety....if WE didn't exist, they would go out of business. :>)
I see his point, and I agree with him. These folks won't accept that, though. I know my relative would argue against it.
They want an appendage regrown and they're sticking with it.
“Actually, he isn’t looking for just a “healing.”
Luke 16:24-, “And he cried and said, Father Abraham, have mercy on me, and send Lazarus, that he may dip the tip of his finger in water, and cool my tongue; for I am tormented in this flame....Then he said, I pray thee therefore, father, that thou wouldest send him to my father’s house: For I have five brethren; that he may testify unto them, lest they also come into this place of torment. Abraham saith unto him, They have Moses and the prophets; let them hear them. And he said, Nay, father Abraham: but if one went unto them from the dead, they will repent. And he said unto him, If they hear not Moses and the prophets, neither will they be persuaded, though one rose from the dead.”
Saint Padre Pio and the healing of Giovanni Savino
You know they’d find another reason besides God for a limb that regrew.
Such arguments are childish, but I am amazed that atheists can seriously advance them. I advance the statement : If God were all good and all powerful, then he would restore Eden. And he will. There will be a new heavens and a new earth, and we shall all be witnesses of it. I shall never forget a scene in a movie, “The Robe,” in which a crippled woman, played by Betta St. John, is heard singing beautifuly by the hero, played by Richard Burton. And they have the most edifying conversation, played with great understatement by both actors. With great serenity she recounts her encounter with Jesus, he notes that she is still crippled. She responds that he had indeed healed her. Before bitterness ate at her heart; she was being devoured by it. But he knew what she needed and he gave it to her. Now she plays her role, singing of God’s mercy to those who would listen. I would invite these “freethinkers” really to open their minds and hearts, upstop their ears and listen. But they have to be still to hear.
“And while the crowds were thickly gathered together, He began to say, “This is an evil generation. It seeks a sign, and no sign will be given to it except the sign of Jonah the prophet.”
Luke 11:29
I do not think it is any better today!!
Probably Harris is quite aware of the futility of such an expectation. So he feels "safe" in demanding it as "proof."
You cannot reason with unreasonable people.
LOL! I've never found it particularly constructive to attempt to order God around. "Hey, God! You better do this or that or...or...or I WON'T ADMIT YOU EXIST!" I'm guessing He'd get a chuckle out of that one. Heck, I get a chuckle out of it.
Let's say a billion people pray and somebody's leg does grow back. Does that prove God exists or that a billion people praying can grow a leg back? I'm guessing these folks haven't thought this one through. Moreover, limb regeneration is not that far outside of human technology. When we solve it, does it prove that we're God or that we've managed to use the brains He gave us?
I'm probably asking the wrong people here... ;-)
Two thoughts:
1. In general, Christians don't do "noble" acts for rewards in Heaven, but out of a grateful response for what God has done for us.
2. Perhaps atheists perform noble acts for rewards on earth.