Stephen T-B

I like this idea of god making a personal appearance.

How does he do it? A gigantic face peering down on New York city from the clouds? The inhabitants of Beijing wouldn’t be too impressed. So he peers down on Beijing, too. Here in Leeds I’d think “Hang on, what’s the matter with Yorkshire, then?”
So he peers down on everyone, simultaneously, all over the world, and when he’s got our attention, what does he say?
“I am the Lord your God. Mohammed is my prophet. Women who commit adultery must be stoned to death! Cut off the right right hands of those who steal!” etc etc.
Poor old Radorth.
Or: “I am the Lord your God. Jesus was my Son, He, I and the Holy Spirit are the Three in One.”
Radorth beams, but the Muslims, the Hindus, the Buddhists, and all the rest grumble and say: “It’s a hi-tech Christian hoax. We’re not going to believe that stuff.”
Then God says: “Sodomy is a sin and those who commit it will go to hell.” Half of Christendom, including President Robert Mugabe, beam, but the other half grumble and say: “It’s a right-wing American hi-tech hoax. We’re not taking any notice of THAT.”
And God goes on to say: “Adultery, however, is OK and I am perfectly happy with married people getting divorced and marrying again,” and most Protestants - especially those in Europe, Canada and Australia - beam, but the Roman Catholics grumble and say: “It’s a Protestant hi-tech hoax. We’re not taking any notice of that!”
And God goes on to say: “Masturbation is a sin for which you go straight to hell,” and 99 per cent of the World’s male population, and about 97 per cent of the World’s female population (or it might be 99 per cent, for all I know) grumble and say: “It’s an Alien hi-tech hoax. We’re NOT taking any notice of that!”

And it turns out that with every pronouncement God makes, at least half of humankind thinks it’s rubbish.
So God, who is very wise, never does make a personal appearance.

“Let ‘em guess,” he says. “Those that guess right can go to Heaven and those that guess wrong can go to Hell. That’s what’s so good about being God - you can do what you damn well like!”

Seraphim

By Lobstrosity

Come on now, how does having evidence that something exists equate to "accepting it blindly." By the very definition of the act there is no blind acceptance at all. I think what you meant to write was:
"It's like medicine ... the medicine (God) works better when you blindly believe in its effect rather than actually having a reason to believe in its effect."

My reply : Nope ... I think I didn't make a mistake here. You speak of evidence as if seeing God is enough to give a person faith. Sorry, it doesn't. It is rather what we know of God that gives faith.
For all we know, God can appear as a Man who appears out of nowhere and sit down with you in a park and talk like any other man, and you won't know He is God till you die and go up to meet him.

I guess I can understand this. Since there is no reason to believe and yet you still need to believe in order to get the desired psychological boost, you invent this requirement of "faith." That way you can still get the placebo effect from something that otherwise is the equivalent of a sugar pill.

My reply : Not sure about all this placebo stuff since the strongest I have ever taken is Panadol (equivalent to your aspirin). I guess having faith is simply believing in God like you put it.

Well that's silly. By those standards the Bible is depriving you of all your free will. You are now a mindless automaton who is simply acting out of blind faith (not that other good kind of Faith) in the Bible. I think if you're going to make these kinds of arguments it's essential for you to actually understand what the Christian concept of free will really is. Christian free will is the freedom to make our own choices based on what we observe around us. It is completely independent of what we take in as sensory input. Lack of free will is when God actually makes our decisions for us, not when God provides us with evidence for his existence. If he comes down to Earth, people still have the freedom to interpret for themselves what they're seeing and to then choose the course of action they want to follow. It is irrelevant as to whether the decision is an easy one to make--Christian free will still remains fully intact. The free will argument does not explain why faith is necessary. It actually fails miserably in this regard.

My reply : Here's the problem ... I'm not a Christian and I don't know about Christian's concept of faith and free will. Why don't you tell me about it?

To me, concept of free will is simply like an exam where the question is put forward. Exercise of free will is simply like writing the answer to the question in subjective (essay) form where we describe the answer by our own words (in term of faith, it should be by our own actions and conducts).

By Stephen T-B

And it turns out that with every pronouncement God makes, at least half of humankind thinks it’s rubbish.
So God, who is very wise, never does make a personal appearance.

My reply : Can't argue with that. Each group will say that they are right and the next person is wrong.
What God going to do? Come down and say that everyone is correct? everyone is wrong? Everyone drop everything and follow Him?