www.incontinentsupport.org

It is interesting to see this discussion. One off the subject of incontinence /diapers/etc. I am enjoying it. Intellectual exchange of ideas is an uncommon experience, unfortunately, in todays world. My own thoughts on this subject are these; I was raised Catholic, had 8 years of religious schooling. Nuns. My first serious encounter with God and reality came at nine years old, my mother died. After the funeral I returned to school and my teacher (we had one teacher only for an entire year) greeted me with a warm hug and kind words. Trying to explain what had happened she said "I do not know why God took your mother from you. But HE must have wanted her up in heaven with Him." I immediately stopped crying and the shock of her words (meant to help me I am sure but I was too young to understand that till much later) angered me. I went to my seat. She next had us pull out our catechisms and go over the commandments while she prepared the days lessons. The little girl next to me leaned over and asked "What did sister say to you?" I looked at her and said "God killed my mother!" She actually wet her self, and also never talked to me again. I looked at the commandment that said "Thou shalt not kill." Next to it I wrote "Except mothers." Years later acting as an alter boy in Vietnam on a hill we had taken saying mass on an alter we had built from boxes of live artillery rounds, a tad sacrilegious, the priest in his message said "I don't know why God takes so many young men in war..." I almost walked away. "except friends I thought" But the final blow came when my late wife and I sat with the parish priest and after she told him she had cancer said "I don't know why God gives us these burdens" She knew how I felt and why, she looked at me as I was about to go over the table and said, "Would you feel better if you left?" I walk out and sat in the church as she sought some religious help with dealing with he condition. The next time I sat in that church was at her funeral. (Except mothers, friends and wives) My belief now, what there is left of it, goes like this... The only way I can come close to believing is to accept that we have all the rules and commandments and what we do or do not do with them is our own choice. If there is a heaven, getting there or not getting there depends on our actions. God sits back and watches and neither causes or prevents the good and evil in this world, we do that.
Papa

Agree with Papa.

Reality has it's own way of punishing for evil or bad deeds. While the bad dog may not be punished in ways we conceive or wish for, reality may be that the dog falls out of favor with master. Whatever it is, it's also an issue of humility. I believe we alone are not important or brilliant enough to understand the complexity and intricacies of reality when it comes to rewards, being held in high esteem, punishments, or being considered anything less than trustworthy and good.

You may think I'm a few crayons short, but the way I see it is suffering builds character and can be an invaluable learning tool. If that's just part of the gift of life, I think I will strive to cherish it anyway

Nah, you've got all of your crayons like the rest of us (or marbles if you prefer). We're all just missing a box for them. Lol.

Sure, suffering builds character, after a fashion, but that raises more questions, than it provides answers.

A patent might wish for their child to learn some hard lessons. It steels them for the harsh realities of life. Children go out into the world in their own. One day you'll be gone. They need that character to be able to deal with things on their own.

Back when I was Christian, I was always taught that God is always with you. Nothing happens that isn't part of God's plan. The whole footprints in the sand story, where when you're too weak to walk, Jesus carries you.

If that were true, there is no reason for suffering. You don't need to build character. God is supposed to be there to pick you up when you fall. You aren't supposed to ever have to face things alone, because God is always there. God is portrayed as an eternal parent. One whom is always watching, always looking out for you, and will never be gone one day.

Why should you ever need to suffer to build character? It's justa post hoc rationalization for the way the world is, instead of the way it should be if God were real.

Quite so Spartan!

Of course, in saying that nothing happens unless god wills it means that all the dreadful stuff that happens in at god's choice and he must choose for it to happen! That isn't much of an explanation, when you think of it. I think I prefer the JW idea that Satan is ruling over the earth as an explanation - even if it is so obviously false given the amount of action o god in the OT.

My faith was shook a bit when my dad died last summer. When I was done blaming God I appropriately realized that my dad's lung cancer wasn't the result of God being a dick or not existing but actually the culmination of decades of not taking care of himself and smoking for 60 years. He quit but he quit too late. Not God's fault. Suffering is no more proof of God's absence than pleasure is proof of his existence.

I'm not super religious but I do have faith. Life literally has no meaning and morality is nothing but a fool's way of self limitation in the absence of a "divine designer". I could wax philosophical for hours on this topic but I'd never change anyone's mind.

Thanks, everyone, for your input. I appreciate the insight. However, I respectfully disagree with the comment "Life ... has no meaning and morality is nothing but a fool's way of self limitation...." I think life most certainly has meaning when we interact positively with others, and I interpret the remark as to morality to mean that it's okay to be a "dick" in order to make sure that we're not holding ourselves back in any way.

W.

Meaning has to come from something. It needs a source. With nothing divine, the cosmos is simply a massive collection of atoms and energy. Any action is nothing more than the rearranging atoms. Even killing someone is still nothing more than rearranging some atoms, disrupting a otherwise self limiting but long running chemical reaction, which biologically is all people are. Nothing more. Your feeling and thinking that life has meaning is just part of that chemical reaction. Without a God, the whole cosmos is just "stuff" randomly blinked into existence for no purpose and with no design. How do you tease "meaning" out of that. Whether you're good or bad, when you die, if there's no god, none of it will have mattered. A divine designer rectifies that problem.

The morality remark isn't entirely original. But yeah that's what it's saying. It's Nietzsche's though on the matter of religion. Morality arouse out of religion, specifically Judeo-Christian religions as a manifestation of resentment by the have-nots against the haves.....Those with money and power were unconstrained by any sense of morality and free to trample the have-nots. In doing so they accumulated wealth and power and thus more comfortable lives than the peasants. Out of resentment, these religions were formed and moralities codified. The have-nots would hold themselves back, unnecessarily, but convince themselves they were living a "richer" moral life than those who were literally living richer. When everyone dies and there is nothing, the religious or moral have essentially wasted their lives. If you've never read Nietzsche, you mind find it interesting. I don't agree with him, but he's a fascinating figure.

IMHO, meaning comes from intangible things, like interaction with others, beauty in nature, "making a (positive) difference" globally and where I live, etc., more so than from the concrete, material things that we amass to advertise our "success". I can't respect myself if I walk on someone's face to get something that I don't need to survive.

W.

I agree with you...I don't agree with Nietzsche.

Why we agree that the moral life is more worth living is where we differ I think. My faith points me to a transcendent purpose. I was just trying to point out that without a god, I'd probably have a more nihilistic view, akin to one degree or another, to Nietzsche's.

Some might argue that beauty in nature are signals of transcendence. Not the strongest argument in the world, but an interesting read from Peter Berger.