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I saw this on Facebook today:
Some of God’s greatest gifts are unanswered prayers
What a convenient, seemingly never-ending gift-giver God is.
Filed under: Misc | Tagged: God, Thought of the day |
For the Sake of Science 
It goes along with the gifts of irrationality and intolerance that are ingrained in religion.
I’m struggling to see the crazy here, and I just can’t. What am I missing?
Is this not the same thing as being thankful your parents didn’t give you every single thing you ever asked for? I don’t see how that’s crazy, so I can’t see how this is. Sorry.
Sometimes I can see what you are trying to get at, this isn’t such a time.
It is the same as your boss not paying you or an organization not allowing you to join or your car not starting. Since there never have been answered prayers, theologists make this shit up to pacify the mssses. All smoke and mirrors; illusions.
Reality would be an intrusion.
Oy yes, I forgot- lets all be thankful for the holes in donuts.
You are stretching it pretty far, I’m thankful my parents didn’t give me everything I ever asked for.
I’m just thinking there are many many, much seemingly crazier things Michael or yourself could winge about than someone being thankful they haven’t been given everything they ever asked for.
The problem here is that the game is being rigged. No matter what happens – whether our
wishesprayers come true or not – it’s all thanks to God. There is no way something can not be due to God given such a mindset.Oh is that the problem. Well that makes so much more sense. Seriously, there are much better things to go on about, to discuss. This one is completely reasonable by any number of standards.
I think there is a song all about this, where the guy meets an old girlfriend while out with his wife, realizes that had his prayers come true, he wouldn’t have the life he has now. In the end he is grateful things didn’t turn out how he wanted.
Whether there is actually a God or whether God is purely a cultural construct or coping mechanism, there is nothing weird or crazy about the quote you have above.
None of Nate’s statements on this post appears to connect with reality – way to go to totally miss the point: “No matter what happens – whether our wishes prayers come true or not – it’s all thanks to God” and then try to divert to utter trivialities.
The whole thing is an utter triviality, and you with your donut holes have a lot to say about being trivial.
This is a fundamental way in which believers attribute every little thing to their god. It demonstrates a lack of critical thinking – “I got into a fender bender, which made late, which made me miss the collapse of the bridge. God is so great to have done that.” Except it wasn’t God. It was chance and coincidence.
Even a nincompoop can see that the thanks for unanswered prayers are trivial and equivalent to favoring donut holes.
Nate, you are so clueless and your defense of religious dogma is laughable.
Michael patiently explained it several ways. I guess a dozen more explanation are needed. Michael – stop using big words like demonstrate.
Yes Michael, stop doing that. Bob is asking nicely and I have to assume that’s because he doesn’t understand big words like demonstrate.
I understand what you are saying Michael, I just think this is a crappy example and that there are better ones, even if I do believe in God.
I guess Nate needs to grow up to attain the status of Nincompoop before he even understands a paragraph. What a tool you are Nate – always wrong and never admits it.
Wrong about? You took a jab at me and I took pretty much the same one back at you, I don’t see what you are going on about now.
You never understand anything. Whatever
Whatever.
Nate,
If answered prayers are evidence of God, and unanswered prayers are also evidence of God, then God’s action or non-action can be distinguished from random events because _____________.
Help us out.
That’s not even what I’ve been arguing here. I wasn’t aware that this was about God existing or not.
However, I have no idea how one would distinguish actions or lack thereof from independent random events, assuming God exists. I’m just saying that people are thankful for things they wanted but didn’t get all the time, in many other situations. It’s not crazy to extend that to God as well, assuming you believe in such an entity.
If you want to make this an argument about the existence of God, than there are much better examples to debate, this is an awful one. Awful because its so like what people say without regard to a God or gods.
I’m leaving for two weeks in a bit, so don’t assume I’ve fallen off the face of the earth if I don’t respond.
The problem is that people say these things in a way that reinforces their beliefs. But nothing has happened to justify such a reinforcement. They may as well thank fairies.
From a discussion at Jerry Coyne’s blog about ‘sophisticated’ theology from John Haught. This is a comment from someone that shows how perverted theists think:
“Andrew B. says:
August 12, 2011 at 11:32 am
Creationist God: How imaginative God must be to have designed every individual lifeform on the planet!
Theistic Evolutionist God: How wise of God NOT to design every lifeform individually but rather ingeniously design the process which generates the variety of life we see! A much more economical approach!
Wise God: He’s wise! Swell!
Foolish God: How amazing that even with his limited capacity, he could create such a stunning universe!
Benevolent God: He’s the source of all Goodness!
Malevolent God: He sometimes deprives us of essentials, but only to deepen our appreciation for what we already possess! How thoughtful!
Sociable God: He cares about our feelings and wants a relationship!
Noncommunicative God: He knows that our minds are unable to comprehend his wisdom, so he doesn’t speak with us. If he did, we would be confused by his depth and deepness and deepityness and think less of ourselves! How considerate to ignore us!
God is swell. Just swell. Even when he isn’t, he is.”