Did you need to hear their death agonies to know your omnipotence?

Why would an all powerful benevolent god allow so much suffering? This unanswerable question is summarised in the following clip from the series Deadwood, where a doctor prays for a minister who is suffering from the tortuous effects of a stroke. I find the argument that "god works in mysterious ways" to be hollow, since an omnipotent god could necessarily achieve his ends by any means, and therefore must be choosing these horrific means out of infinite alternatives.

Transcript:

"If was a more adaptable primate or one of your regular petitioners, I suspect I wouldn't feel this pain. I guess I — I'd have a wad of cartilage covering the patella, protecting me from this—this discomfort.

Jesus Christ.

Jesus Christ, Just please, God.

Take that Minister.

What conceivable Godly use is his protracted suffering to you? What conceivable Godly use? What conceivable Godly use was the screaming of all those men? Did you, did you need to hear their death agonies to know your—your omnipotence? Mama! Mother find my arm! Mommy! Mommy! Mommy they — they shot my leg off it hurts so bad. It hurts so bad.

Admitting my understanding's imperfection, trusting that you have a purpose, praying that you consider it served, I beg you to relent. Thy Will Be Done, Amen."

Category:

Education

Tags:

• god
• prayer
• christ
• christianity
• suffering
• evil
• benevolence
• omnipotence

[ivarbt]

What is the name of this film? Is that the guy from Lord of the rings, btw?

[theinquisitor]

Yeah he's in Lord of the Rings, the actor's name is Brad Dourif. The clip is from the TV series Deadwood.

[daveheet]

Im sure these words will be hollow to you also, but the truth is that God allows these things because we have to deal with the consequences of our own actions and others actions from the past as well. We glorify God when we give him praise even through tough times, and not lose faith in Him and who he truly is.

And not to say that our times here are pointless, but the pain we experience here on Earth is nothing compared to the greatness of living in the one true God's presence forevermore.

[theinquisitor]

daveheet, what about when the suffering is not a result of one's own actions? Like when a child is born with AIDS and addicted to heroin? What actions did that child take to deserve that? The fault is the mother's, but the child is completely innocent. Surely you can see that not all suffering is a result of our own mistakes. How do you explain the suffering of children born into poverty and disease and starvation and abuse, as being a result of the actions of those children?

[baggieboy83]

Only a perfect, almighty, wonderous god that is full of love for his children could rejoice in the suffering of millions. When jewish babies burnt in ovens, what did your god do then? What sin had the babies committed to deserve that?

Your god is a dead idea, shaming you and all your fellow 'justifiers of suffering'.

The only things working in mysterious ways are the believers who can twist their fragile minds to fit ANYTHING into their delusion where robotic answers become a reflex.

[Clausfarre]

Great... another religious nut doing serial commenting. Leave the fairytale world behind in kindergarten where it belongs.

[IYAMNI]

First time I saw this I scanned back and watched it twice again. One of Deadwood's finest moment... hell, one of TV's finest moments.

[tyrannicoystercult]

indeed. i feel sad for whatever circumstances of deprivation or intoxication that bring any individual to this intense level of need, even worse that it's passed on in a cyclical way. its almost like a class struggle topic, removing the real undeniable pain that gives the belief a 'dense' core to attach to, and the confusion or idealistic view of the supernatural can be turned away from without psychological 'consequence'. i fear for people in bad situations who have their faith broken harshly

[theinquisitor]

Perhaps the reason for arguing against a personal god is because that is such a widely held conception of god. Many Christians talk about their "personal relationship with God" and wouldn't recognise the distant god that you refer to you.

The point is that a loving all powerful personal god in a universe where there is so much suffering is a conundrum that requires explanation. The much simpler explanation is that no such god exists. It's a major factor in many people's religious deconversion

[tyrannicoystercult]

you're personifying god far too much as most people do. you can't just forget about the major aspect of almost all religions including christianity, that faith is a mystery and all that potentially lies beyond the material universe as we see it is mysterious, motives, purposes, everything. you can't disprove god in an ontological sense or even on christianity's own terms just by saying 'he' is cruel and distant, a moral failure of a god. there are much better reasons to come to the conclusion.

[thefakeyeti]

"Otherwise, if there is no God and you dont believe, why would you cry out to him and be mad?"

When we say "why would god allow this" we aren't saying that we believe in god, but believe he is evil..

We are simply asking, if he did exist, why would he allow this?

And so far, I think the most logical conclusion is that nature is simply indifferent to us.. and there is no god.

Otherwise, there is to much mental gymnastics.. "God allows it because..." all speculation, no PROOF.

[WillSKB88]

"Otherwise, if there is no God and you dont believe, why would you cry out to him and be mad? It is smply part of the cosmic evolution."

No, it's because A) we're constantly told there is a God, therefore when something happens we want someone to blame. I would bet that if we believed in 20 gods, 3 of whom were pain gods then we'd cry to them. B) We cry about the injustice of it all and by shouting it relieves our pain very slightly. C) Sh**t happens.

[WillSKB88]

daveheet:

The problem is *You* don't think everyone's going to hell... I bet I could whip up 100 people who say that everbody except the purest are not going to hell, or only the ones who pray in a certain direction. In the end it's completely subjective, so coming on here and saying "he'll be alright" doesn't help the argument in the slightest.

[WillSKB88]

Haha well said!

@

Clausfarre

[enyawix]

lol