And yet another sincere question for theists...

[jimmygun]

Your explanation for evils in the world seem to be all rooted in God's allowing us to have free will.

God created free will. God wants us to have free will. God expects us to use free will. Yet every religious order is against its followers having any kind of free will at all. No choices, no decisions, no freedom of thought, no anything except blind obedience to the teachings of whatever sect you wish to name.

Question...Why?

 

[Iacchus]

Beause evil is the nature of the beast (666) and tends to show up in all our formalized institutions, especially religion?

 

[c4ts]

Of course you're free, says the fundie minister, free to do your own thing and burn in Hell for it.

Apparently the idea of "freedom" in free will is somewhat distorted. For some reason, it can't be absolute.

Anyway, not every religion is disposed to think of it this way. For example, Quakerism.

 

[Iacchus]

There's nothing wrong with establishing ground rules and the freedom to operate within those ground rules, but blind obeisance is not one and the same.

 

[KingMerv00]

Beause evil is the nature of the beast (666) and tends to show up in all our formalized institutions, especially religion?

Yup, it's all Satan's fault.

Now if I could only remember who created Satan. hmmm

 

[evildave]

After a fashion, freedom to foul up completely is a far more instructive thing to provide than jumping in and preventing mistakes.

Yes, it can seem cruel, but a child will sometimes learn better by burning themselves than having you grab them before they touch the hot thing you told them not to touch. Of course, the kid won't learn much of anything if they overturn a vat of burning oil on themselves. All a matter of degree.

I happen to like learning from other people's examples better than my own, though my own mishaps have occasionally been more instructive.

The problem I have with a 'hell' that lasts forever, as certain theists believe (and not others) is that it belies teaching. You don't learn from eternal suffering. That is a punishment. If life is to teach, then there has to be something to learn from life's lessons. If life is not to teach (from an afterlife-exists POV), then what could it be for?

From an afterlife doesn't exist POV, learning and PASSING ON useful knowledge is simply good, positive practice.

There are thousands of Christianities alone before you add in other religions, possibly as many as there are churches, temples, mosques, etc. and every one of them differs from the others in small and large ways. Certainly most of them are not logically consistent, but logical consistency does not always agree with reality, nor does seeming inconsistency make something false.

 

[c4ts]

There's nothing wrong with establishing ground rules and the freedom to operate within those ground rules, but blind obeisance is not one and the same.

Only if you think in terms of a social contract.