What is the worst thing for apologists to defend?

[_The Nehor]

Has it ever occurred to you that the way the world seems to be working happens to fit exactly with the way you might expect it to if it were run only on naturalistic principles, and there wasn't really a God to intervene at all? In other words, with all that's going on in the world, how would this look any different if there really weren't a God up there? If the answer is "it wouldn't", then DING DING DING you're on to something!

The world doesn't seem to work that way to me at all. Too much coincidence. Too much prophecy. Too much revelation. Too many miracles. I can see though how those who do not interact with God as much would be able to explain things more naturally. I can't.

[_The Nehor]

1. Priesthood Ban

Up at the FAIR conference yesterday Darius Gray was there. He's a long time black member who is quite well known. Been around the block a few times and has had interaction with the 1st Pres. He shared an "authorized" piece of information with us. He said that the priesthood ban was not of God. It was "allowed" (his words) by God.
[...]

Oh, please oh please, I hope this gets put up on FAIR soon. I am so tired of getting "smacked" when I say that it wasn't of G-d.

Oh, what a blessed day this is.

Can I just say.....WOOO HOOOOO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[_beastie]

Ummm...yeah, if prophets said what they did then in turn that would entail God "allowing" them to do so. I think though that if Darius Gray is any indicator...and those that work with him in the Genesis group, many people in the church are moving beyond the "haunting" you refer to. It may not be too many more years before the only ones that will remain "haunted" will be those critics that have never been able to let go of the blacks and the priesthood issue. It is interesting that there are many African Americans that are able to let go of past issues because of their testimonies of the gospel, and yet there are those that would just as well keep them chained to the past.

It's not just those you view as critics of the church - but outsiders who know anything at all about the church.

See, Nehor, how it works? Here's why the world WITH the God looks exactly like the world WITHOUT God.

Using the LDS paradigm - world WITH God

1 - God "allowed" prophets to work under the racism of their contemporary culture without intervention, and "allowed" them to say cruel, racist things that many members interpreted to mean that blacks were less worthy in the pre-existence, and made the church slow to accept civil rights

2 -God "allows" people to be jackasses and perform outrageous acts of cruelty on other human beings

3 - God "allows" natural acts to cause horrible, pointless suffering as some sort of "learning" experience

World WITHOUT God

1- Leaders of any church are the products of their own culture and usually express the same racism their culture expresses since there is no God to tell them otherwise

2 - Some people are cruel jackasses who enjoy harming others for no reason because there is no God engineering humanity, and it's just part of evolution

3 - Natural acts are the inevitable consequence of biology and nature, nothing but perhaps scientific progress can stop that


See what I mean? You refer to miracles and prophecies and state that there's no way to explain these things away when the reality is that miracles and prophecies are always in the eye of the believer and easily explained away by nonbelievers.

The world with God looks exactly like the world without God. Believers know this, but find ways to rationalize it, and mentalgymnast gave us an example above. In fact, MUCH of religion consists of human beings trying to explain why the world with God looks just like the world without God. God has more people writing alibis for him than imaginable. Believers turn themselves into pretzels just to excuse God for being completely and utterly invisible in terms of the way the world works. I understand some people like you think they've seen God, but plenty of people in this world have also claimed to see bigfoot, aliens, leprechauns, ghosts - and not one claim has ever been reliably validated. It's all a claim we're supposed to just accept without one shred of evidence.

[_barrelomonkeys]

Nehor, what do you think the world would be like if God did not exist?

I have no idea. This may be like asking an atheist what the Universe would be like without Hydrogen. I don't even know where to begin.

That's fair enough. He is everything and everywhere for you?

I was sort of hoping for more than just a one liner.

[_mentalgymnast]

Ummm...yeah, if prophets said what they did then in turn that would entail God "allowing" them to do so. I think though that if Darius Gray is any indicator...and those that work with him in the Genesis group, many people in the church are moving beyond the "haunting" you refer to. It may not be too many more years before the only ones that will remain "haunted" will be those critics that have never been able to let go of the blacks and the priesthood issue. It is interesting that there are many African Americans that are able to let go of past issues because of their testimonies of the gospel, and yet there are those that would just as well keep them chained to the past.

It's not just those you view as critics of the church - but outsiders who know anything at all about the church.

See, Nehor, how it works? Here's why the world WITH the God looks exactly like the world WITHOUT God.

Using the LDS paradigm - world WITH God

1 - God "allowed" prophets to work under the racism of their contemporary culture without intervention, and "allowed" them to say cruel, racist things that many members interpreted to mean that blacks were less worthy in the pre-existence, and made the church slow to accept civil rights

2 -God "allows" people to be jackasses and perform outrageous acts of cruelty on other human beings

3 - God "allows" natural acts to cause horrible, pointless suffering as some sort of "learning" experience

World WITHOUT God

1- Leaders of any church are the products of their own culture and usually express the same racism their culture expresses since there is no God to tell them otherwise

2 - Some people are cruel jackasses who enjoy harming others for no reason because there is no God engineering humanity, and it's just part of evolution

3 - Natural acts are the inevitable consequence of biology and nature, nothing but perhaps scientific progress can stop that


See what I mean? You refer to miracles and prophecies and state that there's no way to explain these things away when the reality is that miracles and prophecies are always in the eye of the believer and easily explained away by nonbelievers.

The world with God looks exactly like the world without God. Believers know this, but find ways to rationalize it, and mentalgymnast gave us an example above. In fact, MUCH of religion consists of human beings trying to explain why the world with God looks just like the world without God. God has more people writing alibis for him than imaginable. Believers turn themselves into pretzels just to excuse God for being completely and utterly invisible in terms of the way the world works. I understand some people like you think they've seen God, but plenty of people in this world have also claimed to see bigfoot, aliens, leprechauns, ghosts - and not one claim has ever been reliably validated. It's all a claim we're supposed to just accept without one shred of evidence.

Beastie, if God didn't allow people to make jackasses of themselves as the Nehor expressed, how would that world work? How would you expect to see God's intervention in the world so that people wouldn't be jackasses? What would this world look like? Do you think everyone would walk in lockstep fashion to God's disallowing anyone to exercise their "thinking" and "reasoned" choice to be a jackass?

Regards,
MG

[_beastie]

Beastie, if God didn't allow people to make jackasses of themselves as the Nehor expressed, how would that world work? How would you expect to see God's intervention in the world so that people wouldn't be jackasses? What would this world look like? Do you think everyone would walk in lockstep fashion to God's disallowing anyone to exercise their "thinking" and "reasoned" choice to be a jackass?

Of course not. But in a world WITH God, he would find a way to "allow" people who would really want to help to prevent needless acts of wanton cruelty, and often pray to be able to do so.

For example: God could have alerted the people who are supposed to be his mouthpieces and helpers that Hitler was getting ready to commit genocide and, together they could have worked to prevent it. Or maybe God would just listen to all the people who pray to soften the hearts of the jackasses and actually, you know, touch and soften their hearts. He's God, isn't he? He can change hearts and all that. Why is it all this little game with God? Like a game of "mother may I"?

Take another example: God, if he existed, certainly could have warned all his followers that terrorists were going to target NY on 9/11. Then all those followers could rise up and say, hey, did you get this message from God? I did, let's get together and do something about it!! Think about how many people believe in God and pray to God every single day. What would it take for God to give them all the same warning? You may be able to ignore one person as a nut who says God warned him to tell the airlines not to let certain people fly that day, but if all of God's followers were getting the same message? You couldn't ignore that.

It's not hard to figure out how God could manifest his existence. Believers normally respond that God doesn't want to manifest his existence so plainly because then people wouldn't need faith. (not that why faith is so needed has ever been adequately explained) This is how it works, mg. If God made himself MANIFEST, then believers wouldn't have to explain why he DOESN'T make himself manifest in order to "test" for FAITH.

This is why it's obvious, if you think about it, that the world with God looks exactly like the world without God would look like. If it didn't, people wouldn't have to have FAITH in the first place.

To me, of course, who has never heard a convincing argument about why the need for FAITH would Trump all else, inserting God into a world that would look exactly the same without God is an unnecessary, extraneous, and complicating factor.

[_barrelomonkeys]

For example: God could have alerted the people who are supposed to be his mouthpieces and helpers that Hitler was getting ready to commit genocide and, together they could have worked to prevent it. Or maybe God would just listen to all the people who pray to soften the hearts of the jackasses and actually, you know, touch and soften their hearts. He's God, isn't he? He can change hearts and all that. Why is it all this little game with God? Like a game of "mother may I"?

Take another example: God, if he existed, certainly could have warned all his followers that terrorists were going to target NY on 9/11. Then all those followers could rise up and say, hey, did you get this message from God? I did, let's get together and do something about it!! Think about how many people believe in God and pray to God every single day. What would it take for God to give them all the same warning? You may be able to ignore one person as a nut who says God warned him to tell the airlines not to let certain people fly that day, but if all of God's followers were getting the same message? You couldn't ignore that.

Beastie, don't you know God is on the important matters of finding car keys, kittens, and making sure middle class Americans can make their next mortage payment?

[_beastie]

Beastie, don't you know God is on the important matters of finding car keys, kittens, and making sure middle class Americans can make their next mortage payment?

You know, I have noticed that phenomenon. :P

[_Tarski]

Has it ever occurred to you that the way the world seems to be working happens to fit exactly with the way you might expect it to if it were run only on naturalistic principles, and there wasn't really a God to intervene at all? In other words, with all that's going on in the world, how would this look any different if there really weren't a God up there? If the answer is "it wouldn't", then DING DING DING you're on to something!

The answer is, I wouldn't expect people like The Nehor to receive revelations which include useful information and thus helps verify, at least to them, that the revelation is genuine instead of internal.

But it doesn't verify it. Think through the math of coincidence and selective memory. What if a certain "quixotic brain" generates guesses about what will happen but that these guesses are presented to the conscious self as revelations. Then imagine that only the ones that do happen are remembered and counted in the long run.

Then there is always the possibilty just being wrong about having known in advance. Internal subconscious confablulation happens in normal people but some people are just immersed in it. Just like with deja vu, the fact that I think I knew someting in advance doesn't mean I really did.

To see what's really going on we have to look at the big picture; what is going on with populations of people who think they have such experiences.
The track record of those who claim to get knowledge by supernatural means looks dismal to me; exactly what one would expect if none were real.

[_The Nehor]

It's not just those you view as critics of the church - but outsiders who know anything at all about the church.

See, Nehor, how it works? Here's why the world WITH the God looks exactly like the world WITHOUT God.

My knowledge of revelation, prophecy, and the reality of God does not rely on the Prophets of the Church. That stuff is all at least second-hand if not more. I'll take the first-hand stuff.