Posted on 11/04/2001 10:27:45 AM PST by Sungirl
I'd like to ask this question to Freepers to get some answers. A friend of mine will often say she doesn't believe in God....but, I think she is fishing for a reason TO believe. Today she sent me a note from her other friend who states the theory of evolution and that people who believe God put us here are 'brainwashed'. She tells her.... 'Evolution has PROOF...where is the Proof of God?'
Personally, I think evolution has made man evolve....but I also think that the earth and all its resources are not here without a reason and a purpose. There are just too many coincidences to think that it is not planned. Just my thought.
Right. See #180.
I think what it comes to is whether or not you believe that things happen for a reason. It's hard to say no to that. Irony is powerful on this little world. Coincidence is everywhere. Do bad things happen to good people? Yes, but I think alot of the time bad things build carachter in good people.
Once you have convinced yourself that things do happen for a reason...ask yourself this question:
Do you want the force of reason to be something different than the will of good? There you will find God.
I always like to review Romans 1:20-32
Ro. 1:20 For since the creation of the world God’s invisible qualities
— his eternal power and divine nature — have been clearly
seen, being understood from what has been made, so that
men are without excuse.
Ro. 1:21 For although they knew God, they neither glorified him as
God nor gave thanks to him, but their thinking became futile
and their foolish hearts were darkened.
Ro. 1:22 Although they claimed to be wise, they became fools.
Ro. 1:23 and exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images
made to look like mortal man and birds and animals and reptiles.
Ro. 1:24 Therefore God gave them over in the sinful desires of their
hearts to sexual impurity for the degrading of their bodies with one another.
Ro. 1:25 They exchanged the truth of God for a lie, and worshipped
and served created things rather than the Creator — who is for ever praised. Amen.
Ro. 1:26 Because of this, God gave them over to shameful lusts. Even
their women exchanged natural relations for unnatural ones.
Ro. 1:27 In the same way the men also abandoned natural relations
with women and were inflamed with lust for one another.
Men committed indecent acts with other men, and received in
themselves the due penalty for their perversion.
Ro. 1:28 Furthermore, since they did not think it worth while to retain
the knowledge of God, he gave them over to a depraved
mind, to do what ought not to be done.
Ro. 1:29 They have become filled with every kind of wickedness, evil,
greed and depravity. They are full of envy, murder, strife,
deceit and malice. They are gossips,
Ro. 1:30 slanderers, God-haters, insolent, arrogant and boastful; they
invent ways of doing evil; they disobey their parents;
Ro. 1:31 they are senseless, faithless, heartless, ruthless.
Ro. 1:32 Although they know God’s righteous decree that those who
do such things deserve death, they not only continue to do
these very things but also approve of those who practise
them.
XeniaSt
Me too Xenia
Not to mention science!!
This is right on target. There is no such thing as a theory of evolution or a theory of Creation. They are both scientific models; not theories!
So if you accept either God or Evolution you do so on the basis of faith, not science.
Just because they are not theories, it does not follow that one cannot make a reasoned decision in the Creation v. Evolution debate. The fact is, evolution (macro) has been soundly defeated. Behe's Darwin's Black Box and his argument for irreducible complexity eliminates evolution as an explanation for life as we know it. If not evolution, what are the alternatives besides Creation/intelligent design. There are none, so creation/intelligent design must be the default conclusion until another model is proposed that is supported by observation or can withstand the scrutiny better than creation/intelligent design.
I do NOT define love as a physical process.
Technology does not define anything. People define things, technology implements these definitions. Human thought has been unable to define or prove concepts like "love" without using similarly scientifically vague terms like "affection," "appreciation," etc..
One is not well advised to lay on the grass, gaze up at a starlite night sky, and ask: What? Why? And expect an answer, if taken too far.
The next progressive step is to lay on the grass, look up at the blue sky, stare at the sun, and go blind.
Why bother, if you can't see it all around you, then you already are blind.
By claiming that there is no God, one exalts themself to be equal with God. In reality no one really knows with absolute certainty that God does not exist. One can think that God does not exist, one can wish that He does not exist but that is merely subjective or wishful thinking. There is always the doubt, the possibility that God does indeed exist.
The reality of God lies within the doubt. If I claim that God does not exist, then in order to do so with any degree of certainty, I would have sincerely and thoroughly investigated the matter before making my claim. If I make a claim on any matter before doing an honest and thorough investigation, then I am doing so out of blind ignorance and I make myself out to be a fool.
Unfortunately those who claim that there is no God do so out of mortal ignorance.
Carl Jung was asked late in his life if he believed in God. He answered the question something like this: "My answer to your question would have to be no, because to ask if one believes in something implies doubt. No I don't believe there is a God, I know there is a God".
The basic reason most people don't believe in God is because they don't want to have to think that they are going to be held accountable for there actions, they don't want to think about eternity and they want to do what they want to do. God forbid if someone were to spoil their precious plans.
240 Posted on 03/08/2001 15:46:00 PST by slimer
A lot of belief or disbelief goes to motive, if you can figure that out then you can judge quickly if you can help them, or if it belongs in God's hands.
If you run into questions, post them, there is almost always one or more good and thoughtful answers.
The current expansion of the universe also gives them a problem. Into what is it expanding. It cannot logically be expanding into nothing since "nothing" is both symbolic and therefore non-existent. The unfortunate materialist who believes only matter and its motion has a problem. Since the universe cannot expand into nothing, it must expand into something. That something is outside the universe. Since there is something outside the universe the logical materialist must abandon his position and the thinking atheist must become an agnostic while he reconsiders his quandary.
LOL! My word, but you do have a chip on that shoulder.
God has given all of the evidence necessary, we cannot blame Him that some men have constructed their own empirical hoop that they demand God jump through. All one needs is a true desire for faith and access to the Gospel.
If you have the Gospel, the choice is yours. Do you accept Him or do you turn away? God doesn't damn people to hell. They choose to do it themselves by turning away.
I read somewhere that St. Thomas devoted a whole book to the question of the eternal existence of the universe. I think he concluded that it is logically possible for the universe to be eternal, but only if it is co-extensive with God.
But since the Bible clearly states that God created "the world," and since the Catholic Church teaches "creation from nothing," Catholics accept "creation from nothing" on the basis of divine revelation.
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I am saddened by the way that these profound eternal questions are treated in our society. We see ourselves as so much smarter than the medievals, but our leading, popular intellectuals know nothing in comparison to great Christian philosophers and even great pagan (Greek) philosophers.
(I think it was C.S. Lewis who called it "chronological snobbery.")
This is especially true with regard to notable materialistic scientists like Hawking and Gould.
I also highly recommend ARN
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