beastie wrote:God answering someone's prayer about lost car keys and yet ignoring the prayers of others in dire circumstances is just one of many examples of how it all makes sense only if there is no god in the first place.
It's kind of like trying to work through the Mormon controversies when still a believer. Why did God allow Joseph Smith to marry other men's wives? Why is there no archaeological evidence for the Book of Mormon? Why does the Book of Abraham papyrii not match Joseph Smith' "translation". You keep beating your head against a wall trying to find a way for all of this to make sense within the context of "the church being true", and suddenly one day you realize that only context that allows it all to make sense is if the church is NOT true.
There are many of us (some far more intelligent and rational than us both) who have found ways to sensibly answer the "problem of evil" (in its various forms--such as the lost keys vs starvation in Africa disparity bantied about here), and who have found faith-retaining, sensible answers to the questions you just posed about the Church.
OK, then, what are the "faith-retaining, sensible answers" to the questions?
Why was it OK for Joseph Smith to marry other me's wives?
Why is there no archeological evidence for the Book of Mormon?
Why does the Book of Abraham papyrus not match the "translation?"
Why does DNA evidence indicate that all the American Indians came from Asia, not the Middle East?
Where did the steel come from?
Etc. Etc. Etc.
I would really like to hear how you can rationalize this in your mind.
I accept the reasonable answers (not to be prejudicially confused with "rationalize") to these questions by the reasonable and still faithful folks at FARMS and FAIR. If you don't think them reasonable, that may be because of what I suggest below.
In other words, rational people can rationally differ (in diametrically opposing ways) on these issues.
Now I realize that soliptic thinkers (those that believe their reasoning to be the only reasoning that is sensible) may balk at the very thought. But thanfully the rest of us are not bound by that articificial limitation. ;-)
dartagnan wrote:I don't see this as justification for making kids go up and bear a testimony they don't have.
Our youth and our struggling missionaries are counselled that "a testimony is found in the bearing of it". How can anyone stand behind that methodology?
Because it works.
Could you honestly say that this methodology has no relation to self indoctrination or brainwashing?
Maxrep wrote:What hubris it is to emphatically make a statement to another person, assuring them of the statements reliability and truth, all the while not having the foggiest clue yourself.
I note the paradoxical irony of this emphatic statement. ;-)
1. If we are constrained in what we can ask for, in our prayers, our agency is the victim. Pray for world peace, and then do something to make it happen. Pray to end world hunger, and then do something to make it happen. Pray to find your car keys, and then look for them! I've never heard of anyone having their car keys appear in their hand after they prayed about it. Even finding car keys requires action.
2. If finding lost car keys is important (can't get to work, can't take children to school, missed plane so didn't go to training so got fired so family is now homeless) then I don't see why asking for a little help is such a bad thing. Who are we to judge what is important in each life?
3. Just because we live in a place where we don't have neighbors who go to war against us doesn't mean we all have an easy life. The consequences of our choices follow us, no matter where we live. Those who live in Africa and have unprotected sex with multiple partners are quite likely to catch AIDS. That is a consequence of their choice. That the resulting children also have AIDS is a consequence of the parents' choice. Why should God remove the consequence of the parents choice? To do so would negate their agency. Is the child worth more to God than the parents? Blame the parents, not God. Same goes for the warring tribes. It's their choice to go to war, their choice to attack children with machetes. Blame the tribesmen, not God. Were he to take their agency away, he could do the same to us.
God is no respector of persons. Therein lies the greatest blessing he could give us. The rain falls on the rich and the poor alike. We are required to care for our brothers, love our enemies, comfort the grieving and feed the poor. Do we? Or do we expect God to do it for us? Do we give what we have freely, or do we complain that we are made to feel guilty because we only grudgingly give it away? People are dying in Africa, yes, and everywhere else around the world. They always have. They always will. It is the nature of life. The only thing we can change is How. The choices we make in life is what determines the how of our death. Does the African tribeman choose to weild a machete in order to steal another's land and home? Or does he choose instead to be a healer, a peacemaker, a leader of his tribe in more modern ways? He chooses his own path, just as we choose ours. God will not take the agency given to anyone, not even those who do evil or whose choices mean dire consequences for others.
All of the suffering in this world is caused by men, not God.