Question for those who are religious...

[Mental]

OK, this is based on my observations of many Christians and other faiths, so apologies if you do not think this way.

But I've noticed that whenever something bad happens in the world, nobody ever says "it's God's doing". They just say "humans are imperfect and can be evil" bla bla bla. Like with the 9/11 attacks. Never once credited to God, except by that extremist Christian church in Kansas USA, Westboro Baptist Church, in which I somehow congratulate them for, because at least they are consistent.

But when a good thing happens. For example a doctor finds a cure for a disease, or a poor man wins the lottery, or someone saves someone else, people credit these good doings to God, or say "God works in mysterious ways".

So why is it that God cannot be somehow responsible for the bad things, and humans can't do anything good without some kind of "assistance" from God? There is inconsistency here.

[DaretoFallup]

I believe everything happens for a reason. This reason may be unknown. I, for example am not totally religious, but am in the same sense. I believe god has a reason for everything, everything that happens, is his doing, to shape the society. It may be absolutely ridiculous. But, that is what I believe.

[bluestarkidd]

Your post reminded me of the following quote i read a few months ago. I don't remember where I found it or who wrote it, but I saved it because it made me think and question things...


The President of the United States summons the nation to church on Thanksgiving Day to give thanks to "Almighty God" for the abundant harvest and all other blessings. But what has Almighty God -- I have no desire to appear irreverent -- what has Almighty God as a personal being to do with the harvests? If it is he who produces our crops, then being Almighty there should never be a failure of crops. But since crops frequently fail, it follows that there is no Almighty person in charge of them -- unless he brings failure purposely. Therefore, if God is to be thanked for large crops, he must be blamed when the crops are a failure. . . . If God sends the rain and the sunshine which develops and ripens our wheat, who sends the storms and the insects which destroy much of it? And if he sends both, then why not thank him for one and blame him for the other?


And those "christians" model themselves after "their" perfect God which is probably why they are the ones always pointing the finger when something happens to someone of a different faith...

And people wonder why the world is going to hell in a hand basket...truly amazing...

[2D]

This is so true. And I'm ashamed of it. I never try to give my faith a bad reputation. Which is why I don't have bumper stickers supporting anything, because I'm a terribly angry driver and giving anything that kind of reputation is not beneficial in any way.


To answer the question though, I believe humans are to blame. We are always willing to take credit for something or to give credit to our God when something good happens, but when something bad happens such as 9/11; we all run away and hide blaming other men.

It's all down to the fact that we're not perfect and we don't like to admit it. Or at least that's my interpretation.

[Sugaree]

So why is it that God cannot be somehow responsible for the bad things, and humans can't do anything good without some kind of "assistance" from God? There is inconsistency here.

Being a Christian myself, I don't believe that God helps everyone. Of course, that's not to say that God IS doing some good in the world. Everything happens for a reason. What that reason might be, no one will know. But when it comes to this, I think that people are more prone to say that something good is of God's doing, while everything bad is our fault.

I've come up with my own little (and somewhat obscure) theory as to why this is. Firstly, most people (and by people I mean those who are older) were raised to believe that God does everything good in the world whilst us humans do everything bad in it. This leads many people to believe that the good act of one human being can be credited to God, while if that same person does something bad then it's his fault.

Secondly, it's our choice to do something good or bad. Example, the hijackers of 9/11. Did they know that the actions they were to perform were wrong? Possibly. Did they ever reconsider as to why they were going to perform the acts? Maybe not. If a person does something like save someone who was in a bad car accident. They pull the person from the damaged vehicle and start to administer CPR. Why do they do that? Because they care for the well being of the others around them. But people credit it to God because He does everything good in the world.

Really, there is no excuse to give God credit for the actions that a human being did. If a person does a good action, give credit to him not God. If a person does something bad, you blame them and not God. It's all a matter of choice if you ask me.

[The Joker]

I believe everything happens for a reason. This reason may be unknown. I, for example am not totally religious, but am in the same sense. I believe god has a reason for everything, everything that happens, is his doing, to shape the society. It may be absolutely ridiculous. But, that is what I believe.

This.

[INFERNO]

OK, this is based on my observations of many Christians and other faiths, so apologies if you do not think this way.

But I've noticed that whenever something bad happens in the world, nobody ever says "it's God's doing". They just say "humans are imperfect and can be evil" bla bla bla. Like with the 9/11 attacks. Never once credited to God, except by that extremist Christian church in Kansas USA, Westboro Baptist Church, in which I somehow congratulate them for, because at least they are consistent.

But when a good thing happens. For example a doctor finds a cure for a disease, or a poor man wins the lottery, or someone saves someone else, people credit these good doings to God, or say "God works in mysterious ways".

So why is it that God cannot be somehow responsible for the bad things, and humans can't do anything good without some kind of "assistance" from God? There is inconsistency here.

There are probably many reasons to it but I'll list one: people believe god is all about love and blessing, and so when something bad happens, god couldn't have done it but when something good happens, god is of course all about love and he did it. Another reason why people may thank god may have to do with tradition. For example, when someone sneezes, people tend to say "bless you". This depends on the context of the event in question though. In line with tradition, when one hears something said and trusts it to be true, such as trusting what a priest declares, then one continues to believe that whatever was said is true and may apply it to other events. Furthermore, when something good happens for a reason one doesn't understand, pointing out that a god has done it is the easiest way to get a reason for the event. If the event happened merely by random chance, then that serves to reason there is just as likely of a chance that you can get the disease but when the disease is said to be cured by a god, then it removes the notion of random chance and makes one feel safer. Lastly, depending on one's religious faith, bad events that occur in others can be explained by their lack of belief in a god that you do believe in. It's a face-saving explanation in that it re-assures you that you have belief in the "correct god". I'm sure there are other reasons but those were the first 4 that I think are quite prevalent.

In my view, there is always a reason for something as there are always many factors at work although sometimes one has to sit down to think about them. For example, if I get into a car accident but live, sure I can say god saved me but then again I can think about the airbags, about my seatbelt, about the speed of the two vehicles, about the response time of the ambulance and any good-hearted civilians, about the angle of impact in relation to where I am in the car, etc... . Which factor would have the most effect on me? Well that's sometimes hard to say but I'm fine with that, there's no need to put unnecessary weight on a factor.

When it comes to praising god for something, all the weight gets put on the one factor, god. To me it's not a suitable one because I want to learn and understand. By separating the various factors that would have had a decent weight, I can understand why something may have happened, to understand the mechanisms. When I associate god to having done all of it, I don't know what the mechanisms were and to me that's useless.

[Perseus]

What I find funny is how in the Bible, it says God doesn't intervene with humans because he doesn't want us to be his puppets...

[ThatDude93]

So why is it that God cannot be somehow responsible for the bad things, and humans can't do anything good without some kind of "assistance" from God? There is inconsistency here.



God gave us free will. We go out and live our lives. Humans can do plenty of good things with out "heavenly intervention", and we can do bad things too with out temptation. God doesn't go out and control out lives, we aren't his puppets. But GOd loves us, and if we need him, he will be there for us.

[Mental]

God gave us free will. We go out and live our lives. Humans can do plenty of good things with out "heavenly intervention", and we can do bad things too with out temptation. God doesn't go out and control out lives, we aren't his puppets. But GOd loves us, and if we need him, he will be there for us.
Yet, God gets given credit for every good thing that happens in this world.
If the weather is right and lots of crops grow, or it snows.. people "thank God".

But lets say a natural disaster happens, Hurricane Katrina in 2005 or there is a drought, people never seem to think that it's God's doing? Because it certainly wasn't any human misuse of free will.

[Perseus]

Yet, God gets given credit for every good thing that happens in this world.
If the weather is right and lots of crops grow, or it snows.. people "thank God".

But lets say a natural disaster happens, Hurricane Katrina in 2005 or there is a drought, people never seem to think that it's God's doing? Because it certainly wasn't any human misuse of free will.

Most Christians don't read the Bible. I skim through it when I'm bored during service, and I saw that it said in the Bible that God doesn't want to make humans his puppets, like I said in my previous post. So I mean, I don't really think he really affects anything in our world today, he might, but I don't know. (Read this as a Christian perspective, otherwise it makes look like I'm saying that everyone believes in God).

[ThatDude93]

Yet, God gets given credit for every good thing that happens in this world.
If the weather is right and lots of crops grow, or it snows.. people "thank God".

But lets say a natural disaster happens, Hurricane Katrina in 2005 or there is a drought, people never seem to think that it's God's doing? Because it certainly wasn't any human misuse of free will.

Hurricane Katrina was a natural disaster...God made the earth, the Earth "lives"...disasters will happen. That doesn't mean it is toe work of God. Good things happen too, people do thank God for stuff, stuff he isn't messing with. It is just considered a good thing to thank God. After all, we wouldn't be here without him...at least not in my views. :)

Most Christians don't read the Bible. I skim through it when I'm bored during service, and I saw that it said in the Bible that God doesn't want to make humans his puppets, like I said in my previous post. So I mean, I don't really think he really affects anything in our world today, he might, but I don't know. (Read this as a Christian perspective, otherwise it makes look like I'm saying that everyone believes in God).

I read my Bible every night. I do more than skin too, I analyse what I read.

God watches over us(IMO), but he doesn't control our lives, so yeah we aren't his puppets.