Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP
Path: utzoo!linus!philabs!cmcl2!seismo!think!mit-eddie!pez
From: pez@mit-eddie.MIT.EDU (Paul Zimmerman)
Newsgroups: talk.religion.misc,net.religion.christian
Subject: Re: From Fig to finding a Candy Man
Message-ID: <3455@mit-eddie.MIT.EDU>
Date: Mon, 13-Oct-86 16:18:00 EDT
Article-I.D.: mit-eddi.3455
Posted: Mon Oct 13 16:18:00 1986
Date-Received: Thu, 16-Oct-86 07:40:33 EDT
References: <5369@decwrl.DEC.COM> <1150@cybvax0.UUCP> <251@prometheus.UUCP> <262@prometheus.UUCP>
Organization: M.I.T. EE/CS Computer Facility, Cambridge MA
Lines: 50
Xref: linus talk.religion.misc:512 net.religion.christian:4866

In article <262@prometheus.UUCP>, pmk@prometheus.UUCP (Paul M Koloc) writes:
> In article <3306@mit-eddie.MIT.EDU> barry@mit-eddie.UUCP (Mikki Barry) writes:
> >Sounds to me like the "Sure, I *could* have done that...I just didn't want
> >to" you probably heard when the neighborhood pompous ass was cornered as
> >a kid.  You really believe in a god like this?
> 
> I've got it, you want God to prove that He can be a Candy Man,
> and make you a "Snicker bar tree".  Least that's one of my favorites!

	What I find consistently disturbing is the flagrant rationalization
for God's behavior. If God is as you you describe Him, all powerful and
benevolent, then we have every single right to absolutely demand whatever we
want from Him. It's certainly no skin off his nose, and certainly the
capability exists for Him to do so. If He is less than all powerful, then why
does He tell us that He IS all powerful and demand that WE whorship HIM?
Mikki's statement seems a very likely conclusion about the type of entity that
God really is: a pompous ass. Look at His boasting and bragging about how
powerful He is, followed by His excuses for not doing all He can to bring
about what we need and want in this world. The claim that ``if you're good
you'll get it all in the next world'' is fatuous; if He was truly what He said
He was, why hasn't He built it so that we ALL get it ALL right here in this
world? Who is He to ``test'' us? Is He so perfect? The Bible shows that He is
not, that He gets angered and takes it out on human beings, that He is selfish
and greedy, and that He is a scurrilous liar. When WE act in this way, we are
considered ``sinners'' worthy of eternal hell. Why isn't God deserving of
exactly the same treatment?

	Paul questions our ``right'' to demand that God do the diametric
opposite of His regular behavior, that He give rather than take, that He
cooperate rather than dictate. He makes it seem through his words that those
who dare to see things in this way are like children looking for a ``candy
man.'' It seems to me quite clear that those who attempt to sway us to see
things in that way lack any real foundation for their assertions about God,
as they seem to feel they must resort to such crude emotionally manipulative
tactics as labelling their opponents as ``children.'' While that might
certainly satisfy their own egos in that they have ``justified'' their
dismissal of the opponents' viewpoint as the ``ravings'' of a child (to
themselves), they have failed to actually say anything substantial that
proves their opponents wrong. I say this only because even with those who
do start trying to discuss this whole issue in a rational fashion, it almost
always (with few exceptions) deteriorates into ``you must be paranoid/crazy''
or ``your words sound like the ravings of a child.'' What's ironic is this
is the same sort of thing that is told to people who rebel in totalitarian
countries. The points made about the nature of the cruelty of the despot
are undeniable, so the response is that ``this is the way it is, you are
being childish/insane if you oppose it.''
---
Be well,

Paul Zimmerman (pez@mit-eddie.UUCP, pez@unirot.UUCP)