The Truth of Christianity vs. All Other Belief Systems

[Ladewig]

God still answers prayers but lots of them are no's.

The problem with your assertions are that the God of the Bible answers prayers successfully in the exact same proportions as Allah answers prayers. If a child is dying of cancer and the doctor predicts a 50% chance of recovery, then when a Christian parent prays to God, He saves the child 50% of the time. When a Muslim parent in the same circumstances prays to Allah, He saves the child 50% of the time.

If you are pressed for time, I'd rather you respond to post #1306 than this one.

 

[Roadtoad]

Communication is the challenge here as many do misread or misunderstand what some are trying to state. I guess communication is a good thing to always try to impove on for all of us.

As for Mr. Randi's evidence, I am not convinced. When it comes to matters of the supernatural man, many of you do not have clear understanding of it. The supernatural cannot be disproved just because someone cannot see the supernatural realm. You can deny it all you want, but you cannot prove the supernatural doesn't exist.

And this is the primary weakness of your beliefs. They are based upon your rather narcissistic view of the world. No, you can't disprove a negative, but in order to believe there is a supernatural realm, most of us need evidence to show it's possible for it to exist in the first place.

(Sorry, gotta keep this short. I'm sitting in the sleeper in the parking lot of the Pilot Truck Stop in Castaic, CA, and I'm roasting. California's Air Resource Board and their f***ing no idle rules...)

 

[Foster Zygote]

(Sorry, gotta keep this short. I'm sitting in the sleeper in the parking lot of the Pilot Truck Stop in Castaic, CA, and I'm roasting. California's Air Resource Board and their f***ing no idle rules...)

So? Just drop a brick on the throttle and when they complain say "I ain't idling. Hell, I'm about to throw a rod".

 

[kurious_kathy]

Thanks for the offer. A few pages back you said, "I do not know what I could ever say or do that could help you want to change your mind." Then I asked this question:



I didn't mean it rhetorically, I am serious. You must be aware that you have already alienated many if not all posters. Why don't you find people who need God's message AND are more receptive to God's message?

Don't worry Ladewig I plan to spend more time with people who do appear to be responsive than those who don't. But how could I know if someone here won't come to faith? There's no way for me to know that, only God knows. And I'm not saying it's because of me or my words, but perhaps the Lord has been speaking to a few here of jref and drawing them into know him because he is being lifted up? How could you know if God isn't doing something with these conversations?

 

[Monster Machine]

Kathy,

You have stated numerous times that people can only come to God through a supernatural event.

Why then do you feel the need to "preach" when this is the case?

Monster

 

[Ladewig]

Don't worry Ladewig I plan to spend more time with people who do appear to be responsive than those who don't. But how could I know if someone here won't come to faith? There's no way for me to know that, only God knows. And I'm not saying it's because of me or my words, but perhaps the Lord has been speaking to a few here of jref and drawing them into know him because he is being lifted up? How could you know if God isn't doing something with these conversations?

Once again, you miss my point. Once again, you show why you are the wrong person to preach here.
Your very words were "I do not know what I could ever say or do that could help you want to change your mind." You don't know how to present God's message here at this board.

While it may be possible for someone else to present this message in a more receptive way, you have dug yourself into a deep hole. You best chance for converting JREF posters or lurkers would be to go find someone else to do it. Here is a short list of reasons why you are not the right person to proselytize at the JREF board.

1) You don't know history as well as the posters on this board (e.g. your claim that "this ressurrection did indeed happen, and it is well documented historically with hundreds of eyewitnesses")

2) You are perceived as a liar (the book incident) and are unwilling to perform even the simplest of steps to correct that perception (i.e. read the book).

3) You are perceived as a bigot (e.g. "Obama doesn't look Christian").

4) You have admitted that there is no amount of evidence that could ever change your mind.

5) Your posts are often descriptions of your being frightened by things that may not happen (e.g. your fear that Obama might be the antichrist).

6) Your posts describe a version of reality that seems unstable (e.g. If Obama is assassinated and comes back to life then we will know that he is the antichrist).

7) ETA: there is no number seven

8) You have no understanding of why skeptics as a group have only one thing in common: they want to see evidence. Even if all the other points were magically removed, this one reason is strong enough that you should stop preaching at us.


I'll let other posters add reasons as they see fit.

 

[babbits]

To my question about prayers for sick children unanswered, CuriousCathy said:

"God still answers prayers but lots of them are no's."

My hunch is that most of them are no's. Here's is my reasoning:

(Addressed to the theist who believes in prayer, not only to Cathy.)

You would pray for something unlikely. You don't pray that the sun
will rise tomorrow morning (though some theists prayed for exactly that.)

You pray when you feel threatened, or when the outcome is hard to predict.

Unusually anxious persons feel threatened a lot of the time, so will pray a lot. Since their fears are unrealistic, their prayers will be answered a high percentage of the time.

"Each morning when my children go to school, I pray they will make it home safely. And god has always answered my prayers."

The odds are, they will. We live in a fairly safe society.

So your belief in prayer is confirmed. You might even tell people that god ALWAYS answers your prayers. Except for world peace.

But if you are realistic about risks, you will only pray for favors when you perceive a real risk:

"My gas gauge reads low. I will pray that the engine doesn't die before I find a gas station."

Maybe it will, maybe it won't. If it doesn't die, your belief that god answers prayers is confirmed. If it dies, you can conclude that god is teaching you a lesson: next time, fill up before the tank is nearly empty.

But for things you passionately, desperately pray for, such as to ease a sick child's pain if medical treatments aren't doing it, then when the prayer fails, somehow you have to convince yourself that a 'good' god would cause a helpless child to suffer, just to teach other people a lesson.

Most theists duck out by saying some nonsense like 'mysterious ways'. As if that justifies a child's suffering.

Or they deny the child was innocent, by some really weird concept that god punishes us for what our ancestors did - 'original sin'.

Yet a mother who would beat her child because the father had committed adultery would be considered cruel, irrational and abusive.

(Which, by the way, Christians use to justify the horrors they have visited on the Jews throughout the ages. And racial (Cain) and sexual (Eve) discrimination as well.)

Yet even the dumbest atheist knows that it's unjust to put the children in jail because their father is a thief.

But terror inhibits rational thought if one is powerless to take any preventative measures.

So the prayerful theist, who sees evil done to the innocent in spite of prayers, and concludes that it is god's will, is conceding that his god is a cruel, unjust monster.

I couldn't worship such a god. I'm glad I'm an atheist. The universe makes more sense without a god than with one.

What you do it up to you. But it might be better to figure out how you can help yourselves. You might be surprised what you can come up with, when you rely more on human initiative and waste less time on prayer.

After all, you already believe god gives you what is good for you, right?

 

[joobz]

How could you know if God isn't doing something with these conversations?

How do you know that you aren't some dupe for satan driving people away from christianity?

 

[yy2bggggs]

How do you know that you aren't some dupe for satan driving people away from christianity?

Good question... I'm going to hijack it because it glues into what I've been trying to get through to KK for weeks.

KK: There are some people--the ones you believe to be Christians who have gone astray--who really do pray to God, believe with all of their hearts, etc, but they don't quite believe in the kind of salvation you believe in. Satan has fooled them into thinking otherwise, and his deceit is very strong.

It's scary how strong Satan's ability to deceive is. You want to avoid it.

But by symmetry... if those Christians can be so convinced that they are right... what... exactly... stops YOU from being that sort of person? How do you know that your beliefs are actually true, as opposed to you yourself being subject to a very vast conspiracy of Satan to keep you astray?

I repeat... it's scary how strong Satan's ability to deceive is. You want to avoid it.

Watch yourself very carefully as you answer this. If you know for the same reasons the other guy thinks he knows, chances are that Satan's using the same old tactics on you that you think he's using on the other guy.

This is what I've been trying to get through to you for some time. You place so much emphasis on belief that you completely forget that the point is for these things to actually be true. But I want evidence that the truth is more important than your attachment to your belief, and all of the evidence I'm getting goes completely counter to this.

(Incidentally, don't worry... Satan doesn't really exist. But since you think he does, you should treat this very seriously--as if your eternal soul depended on it!)

 

[Wally]

The problem with your assertions are that the God of the Bible answers prayers successfully in the exact same proportions as Allah answers prayers. If a child is dying of cancer and the doctor predicts a 50% chance of recovery, then when a Christian parent prays to God, He saves the child 50% of the time. When a Muslim parent in the same circumstances prays to Allah, He saves the child 50% of the time.

If you are pressed for time, I'd rather you respond to post #1306 than this one.

Your problem is you don't know how to interpret statistics.

In your example:

If you pray to God he saves the child 50% of the time.
If you pray to Allah, God let's the child die 50% of the time.

You see???? There's logic you can't argue with!!!

 

[Paulhoff]

only God knows.

Which you still haven't shown to exist. Why do you need a big daddy in the sky, cut the cord, stand on your own two feet.

Paul

 

[Moochie]

Oh my, this ridiculous anti-conversation is still going on? Guess I just bumped it. Sorry. I'll go back to my evil ways now. Bye.


M.

 

[Profwag]

We are strugglng this year with an unanswered prayer too or a no, but we are waiting on God just the same. I'm sure God has a job for my husband, but this year we have had nothing but big set backs because my hubby lost his job. Maybe this isn't life or death but I really do not want to lose my home and have to move. California is getting really tough though and I hear many are being forced to leave Calif. to find work. We may have to make some big changes soon but I am still praying God comes through with an open door for my hubby to get employment.

First off, I hate to see anyone out of work that actually wants to work. My heart goes out to you and your husband.

Now, I'm just "kurious" though, has your husband been out and about honestly looking for work or does he spend his time praying that someone will knock on the door and offer him a job? And if he gets a job, will that be the result of your prayers or the result of his diligence in trying to obtain work? And finally, if he gets picked over someone else who may not have prayed for work, does that mean the other person didn't pray enough or that the other person didn't have as good qualifications as he did?

 

[Safe-Keeper]

If you pray to God he saves the child 50% of the time.
If you pray to Allah, God let's the child die 50% of the time.

Seeing they're the same guy, that does make sense.

As for the "He answered no" copout, what you're essentially saying is this (borrowing from the YouTube vid): when one prays to god for, say, $100, one of three things will happen:

1. He or she receives $100 (bill found on street next day).
2. He or she does not receive $100 right (unexpected raise at end of month).
3. He or she does not receive $100.

Essentially, either you receive $100 or you don't. But the problem with the cop-out is that first of all, this is also true of prayers to every other god or object, from jugs of milk to Odin to the town fortune-teller.

In order to prove that I get something out of praying to God, you must prove that there's a statistical increase in success rate when praying to Yahweh. Problem is, several people and organizations, including Christians, have carried out such tests, and none of them, not even the Christians, have proven that there's a benefit to praying to Yahweh that you don't get from, say, Mazu, Loki or Feronia.

 

[six7s]

If you pray to God he saves the child 50% of the time.
If you pray to Allah, God let's the child die 50% of the time.

Seeing they're the same guy, that does make sense.

What would happen if Schroedinger prayed for the children?

 

[Hokulele]

What would happen if Schroedinger prayed for the children?

They would turn into kittens?

 

[six7s]

Or...

 

[Profwag]

Safe-keeprs post made me think of a question for Xtians: Let's say you are down to your last dollar and have no food, so you pray for help. Later that day, you find a rolled up wad of $20 bills in church. Do you, a: take it as a sign from god that your prayers were answered and keep it or b: turn it in to the pastor?

 

[wollery]

Safe-keeprs post made me think of a question for Xtians: Let's say you are down to your last dollar and have no food, so you pray for help. Later that day, you find a rolled up wad of $20 bills in church. Do you, a: take it as a sign from god that your prayers were answered and keep it or b: turn it in to the pastor?

More interestingly, if you turn it into the pastor, do they stone you for being a witch?

 

[Ethnikos]

What you do it up to you. But it might be better to figure out how you can help yourselves. You might be surprised what you can come up with, when you rely more on human initiative and waste less time on prayer.

After all, you already believe god gives you what is good for you, right?

You need to ask God, anyway. It is more for our own benefit than anything, that we pray for what we need. Take a look at the Lord's Prayer. Give us this day, our daily bread. Don't you think God knows you need to eat every day? By asking God to fill our needs, we acknowledge God as the One who gives us life.
Praying is not a waste of time by being a failure to do something useful. Sometimes there is nothing else that can be done by a person concerning a specific situation. For example, someone far away who needs long term encouragement.
"Withal praying also for us, that God would open unto us a door of. . ."
"Ye also helping together by prayer for us, that. . ."
"For I know that this shall turn to my salvation through your prayer,. . ."
"Brethren, pray for us."