HOLY SH*T. Just realised that 'prayer' is a massive contradiction to religion

DUDE

>Go on then, please enlighten me.
if u don't get it u never will bcuz god is perfegd lmao xD

BRUH

Why do people think God/structure of the universe is somehow perfect?

Undergrad is giving this shitpost too much credit.

Aaah, so you don't even really need to believe in God, you can just meditate.

Sad!

Praying is more about faith desu. Like trusting that there's a larger order when life is fucked up and stupid and evil. It's actually a normal reaction when you think about it. There isn't really anything to "realize". This is all just a mean-spirited lie.

So yeah, just about creature comfort then.
>hush little baby don't you cry
>there's a magic daddy in the sky

We're reaching levels of reddit that shouldn't even be possible...

Right. The person who gave their soul to you and wanted you to live, they aren't dead and gone forever, like a rotten pile of fish. They're in "heaven".

The word "reddit" is not an argument. Someone should have told you that by now.

>He doesn't understand the power of positive affirmation.
/r/facesofatheism

>what is "free will"
>what is "personal responsibility"
>what is "god helps those who help themselves"
>what is "not being an obtuse redditor who intentionally misinterprets religious texts at every level of analysis in order to feel S-M-R-T on a laotian sign language learning center"

Sooo, what are you trying to argue?

I threw a pretend fish toy in the garbage today because it was mouldy. Still for a millisecond, as I let it go and closed the lid, I stung. This death shit runs deep...

Have you heard of The Secret! You'd dig it man.

Oh! So God gave free will as part of his test, knowing some would fail. How silly of me, and evil of him.

>Its another bitter, negative, cynical atheist who resents people who aren't pieces of shit like him episode.

Yikes.

OP would rather make the most basic, literalist, low-effort "observations" (if you could even call them that) of the Bible he can muster than acknowledge the fact that he doesnt understand what he's talking about. This not only makes him a faggot, it puts him on the highest level of faggotry currently attainable to humanity.

Seriously, if your honest approach to deciphering and understanding something as hyper-complex and symbolically dense as the Bible is to take the most cursory glance at it and think "well it meant that in the most literal way possible and clearly that sky daddy stuff is just wrong!", go the fuck home back to your video games and never open a god damn book again. This thread is the Veeky Forums equivalent of "i dont wanna be a bodybuilder i just wanna get TONED!"

Dude, as an atheist you are still faithful to the idea that God doesn't exist. Life and consciousness cannot have possibly come into existence without a divine being making such a thing happen.

>>The underlying premises that God is absolutely perfect, omnipresent, omnipotent etc must be true. God has to be perfect for God to be God.

The entity receiving Christians' prayers is not God though.

OP here, I personally believe in God though...

I also like the Bible because biblical stories are excellent ways to conceptualise God. The only point I tried to make that religious interpretations of it are contradictory in this sense (the OP). The stories in the Bible, literally speaking, aren't completely true or scientifically accurate. But the ideas, morals and lessons underpinning the Bible are quite universally true and many interpretations of it either individually or through religion violate the premises that God is perfect, omnipotent etc.

The implication is not that the magic daddy isn't real. It's that he is Evil.

Remove the autism reactor from the back of your skull and, if your aspergers-riddled mind is capable, think about this pragmatically:
>person has problem
>person retreats to peaceful, quiet place and thinks deeply and meditatively for a certain period of time
>person spontaneously figures out a potential solution to his problem
>person applies the solution to the world and the problem is alleviated, leaving himself and likely those around him better off

What did this person just partake in? What label would you give that process?
From whence did that solution to his problem come?
Why does it bother you so terribly that the person walks away from that scenario thinking that the solution to his problem was the answer to his "prayer" which came from a God?
Why are you so hell-bent on dismantling a value system which has been an immeasurably large net gain for human civilization as the foundation of western society, even with the tremendous pitfalls and loss of life caused by corrupt institutions which tried to administer it?
Why are you such a fucking queer?

The narrative according to which someone is perfect and all of the suffering that results from his interaction with an other is always said other's fault is the narrative of the psycopath.

God can't be evil because God is perfect.

You idiot.

Christian thinking is so weak that there's no way to tell if this is an honest attempt at a rebuttal or deadpan sarcasm.

>Not knowing what a rebuttal looks like.
>Not rebutting what is clearly a rebuttal.

>Aaah, so you don't even really need to believe in God, you can just meditate
no stupid

Wrong. Fuck off, stupid adolescent. You understand nothing
>
First premise is fine albeit reductionist
>
No, it does not imply that. Read the fucking Bible you stupid fucking cunt. Or a few thousand years worth of theology. Fucking hell, just read Job.
>
Wrong, what God creates is not perfect. His goal was not perfection. Because He is perfect, He can do so.
There are no 'laws of the universe', also.
>
No, it is not hypocritical or contradictory, you fucking idiot, you're just theologically illiterate. No, God does give 'preferential treatment'.
Prayer is not meaningless, in public or in private. Holy fucking shit, you are a joke.
He sounds like a damn high schooler. No one sincerely going through a philosophy degree is this stupid. They all drop out.
Suffering is God's doing, brainlet.

Prayer is not done for God you fucking brainlet, it's done for oneself. In addition, it causes one to focus themselves onto God and ignore distractions.
Nonsense, God is not magical or in the sky. Go back to /r/eddit. He is the source and cure of suffering. He is so often anything but comforting, but so often comforting also. He is an awful God.

>arguments are good because my autism sed so

>applying your reddit 'morality' to God, a being beyond possible comprehension
What a cop-out. Why are you so afraid of theology?

God is good and evil, and beyond good and evil.

>Go back to /r/eddit.
>He is an awful God.
how could somebody be so retarded? it is almost impressive

Back to /r/eddit, illiterate child.

>There are no 'laws of the universe', also.
Gravity is just a theory bro!
Mathematical proofs don't real bro!

>He is an awful God.
God cannot be awful because God is perfect, moron.

Back to /r/eddit, illiterate child.

It's not a theory, it's an irrelevant meme.
Proof doesn't exist, it is also an irrelevant meme.
You don't know what 'awful' means, clearly. Back to /r/eddit

Cogito ergo sum my friend. You can prove you exist, therefore proof exists.

>awful
>awe-ful
Your attachment to social connotations rather than etymology will present substantial barricades to reasoning in your life.

>the problem of evil: ramble edition

What makes you think I'm bitter or resentful?

What other kind of morality could I apply to God other than one a human imagined? Or did God tell you what is right and wrong from his point of view directly?

So what do you get out of prayer that you can't get out of meditation, if it's done purely for yourself?

Y tho?
Still nothing.
We're reaching levels of non-argument etc.

You do know about the fall of man, do you not?

Woah guys, I just realised that, in the bible, humans sacrifice things to god right?

But god doesn't NEED sacrifices!!! He's all powerful!

That does not make sense! Why would an all powerful god who created the sacrifices and the sacrificers need you to sacrifice animals for him? He could just do it himself!

The only way this makes sense is to consider God as a representation of all reality (i.e., the "other" side of alterity), not a personified being within or in control of reality.

Is this not blasphemous to most Christian denominations?

If you would just read the Bible (or hell, even Paradise Lost) your entire "argument" would fall to pieces because it's based on false assumptions and general ignorance of Christianity.

Also, who do you think is qualified to decide if God's creations are perfect? Isn't that completely subjective and are we not all fallen?

That doesn't even address the same issues as the user you were responding to, so I'm just going to try and rebut you.

I'm gonna refer to /co/, because that's probably where you are mentally. Eternity exists in Marvel Comics as a representation of all reality, and also as a personified being within the universe. Pic related should make this clear. If the sort of mouth-breathers who read comics are capable of understanding that duality, why can't you?

>Suffering is God's doing, brainlet.
Prove it. And especially prove how suffering is undesirable (ie not part of the road to union/atonement).

You're just a brainlet stirring up the brainlets OP. Study for a few more years and not just theology. Bad job bad effort.

>Also, who do you think is qualified to decide if God's creations are perfect? Isn't that completely subjective and are we not all fallen?
Did he not himself declare it Good? And would this not also include the Fall? So why redeem?

>So why redeem?
It's almost as if Christ 'for us men, and for our salvation, came down and was incarnate and was made man'.

So what's the problem?

I love the irony here in insinuating that comics are immature but that you are sure they can teach the Christian concepts in one panel. Is there a comic form of the Bible?

Anyway, I think it does address the other user's post.
>But god doesn't NEED sacrifices!!! He's all powerful!
Which is true, so like prayer the sacrifice is for your own benefit. Delaying gratification or literally being able to give up something good to get another thing is a way of "winning" against the other player in the cosmic game, i.e., the environment and circumstances you face. But I am asking: Is this view of the moral/practical teachings of the Bible not shunned by most traditional denominations of Christianity? Do they literally see sacrifice as an offering to a personified being ala Eternity?

So God fucked up and then tried to fix it? Or the whole story of Fall and Redemption was what he was after all along?

The problem is that God doesn't seem to think there is a problem, but I do.

>that pic
>heroes represent Stirner egoism, even against God

I want to read this. Even if it is laughable, no one wins against death.

Honest questions, how much theology have you read?
I'll assume none.

If God has to make you a better person, then you're not a better person.

You have to make yourself a better person for it to be worth shit.

Course he already knows. You aren't a naughty child trying to hide shit from his Father. You're a person, admitting to reality that you've not worked in accordance with natural law. Not so reality can forgive you, but so that you can be better next time.

Why are you even discussing this here? You have at most a first-year undergrad understanding of this issue. Go read something before you start giving me these fedora-tier arguments.

You are painfully stupid. I am not your friend. I would throw you under a bus if it meant keeping my big toe undamaged.
Right and wrong are only known to God. You're projecting, you heretic.

Well that makes sense, considering you're fallen.

You should look into the theory of "fortunate fall" or something similar. Consider that by falling we are now given the opportunity to rise to a more perfect state of happiness than if we had stayed in Paradise. Your current misery brings your potential happiness to new heights.

Meditation is for heathens (nu-males, pagans, etc.)
I am not to focus on killing le ego XDDDDD, I am to focus on God.
Still no argument from you, redditor. Arguments are not good, argue otherwise f'dora.

>The underlying premises that God is absolutely perfect, omnipresent, omnipotent etc must be true. God has to be perfect for God to be God.
Sure.
>People who pray for God to make their situation better, help poor people, those starving, to end conflicts, improve health etc implies that God is not perfect because he has allowed such things to occur in the first place.
God being perfect does not mean that he can't allow people to suffer. God is perfectly good but that does not mean he is "good to everyone" or that he does not have other facets of his being.
>The only things God has created are those that are perfect.
Wrong.
>I'm not fully research in this area, but from my knowledge they are things such as; the laws of the universe, freedom of will, our consciousness or the life that powers our consciousness, etc. Such things you can't make more perfect.
I don't know why you would think that. Human life decays and ends, for example. Freedom of the will doesn't exist.
>Asking for for help from God therefore is hypocritical and contradictory; both in the sense that it is implied he is not perfect and that to grant your prayers at the expense of others would be preferential treatment - which is not an attribute of a perfect God.
Yes it is. God treats people preferentially. You're taking the term "God" and using it to say something that people don't actually mean when they say "God." God chose the Jews. God chose to save those who follow Christ. God loved Jacob but hated Esau, even before Esau was born. Et cetera.
>Also: as an additional point. Jesus expressly condemned man to call other men their master; to engage in meaningless incantations and rituals; worship in churches and services, but rather in spirit and in private; and violence, imprisonment, judgement etc.
This is getting silly.

No you fucking idiot, God doesn't need sacrifices anymore post-Christ. He was exactly that final sacrifice, that He created and sacrificed Himself.
Before that, sacrifice was to be pious, not to 'feed' Him as Pagans did with their icons.

>Why are you even discussing this here? You have at most a first-year undergrad understanding of this issue. Go read something before you start giving me these fedora-tier arguments.
You don't HAVE to engage with them, user. You are delivering completely contradictory messages by saying to fuck off but also responding with useful information.
>If God has to make you a better person, then you're not a better person.
But isn't the whole notion of Grace that it is God and only God who ultimately has the power to "lift you up by your bootstraps"?
>You're a person, admitting to reality that you've not worked in accordance with natural law. Not so reality can forgive you, but so that you can be better next time.
Sounds like cognitive-behavioral therapy to me.

Suffering is not undesirable, it is highly desirable.
>prove it
It is evident to any Christian.

>Right and wrong are only known to God.
What about Moses and the Ten Commandments?
>Consider that by falling we are now given the opportunity to rise to a more perfect state of happiness than if we had stayed in Paradise.
How can something be more perfect than Paradise?
You're sidestepping. What does focusing on God do/give/accomplish that meditation does not?
Got it, so we no longer need to sacrifice. Noted. Are you sure this is right?

Stop trying to apply human logic and psychology to God. You cannot even see that you are fallen, that is why you do this. You cannot even begin to grasp God, yet you forget that.
Christians realize that God is both so far beyond yet so close. We may not comprehend Him, and by realizing this we begin to comprehend Him.

You are not good. No one is good without God. You are the undergrad here, child.

I was simply using the idea of Eternity to demonstrate that there is no inherent contradiction in God being both "a representation of all reality" and "a personified being within or in control of reality".

You're understanding of sacrifice as being beneficial due to abstinence is best expanded through the sacrifice of Isaac(Genesis 22). The fundamental conflict in a religion is that it needs to provide both a structure for society, and a source of spiritual fulfillment. In the case of sacrifice(or fasting in the case of Christianity) it's the act of giving something up in exchange for fulfillment. It just happens to be easier to rationalise if you're claiming(including to yourself) to make the sacrifice for religious reasons. These ideas (and accepting the contradictions within)are inherent in the acceptance of the role of religion in a well functioning society(we're still operating under ingrained Christian values today to ensure we don't kill each other).

I'm pretty sure the source is the infinity war tpb, it's pretty good desu(certainly among the best the artform has produced). Thanos is egoism taken to the extreme.

>What about Moses and the Ten Commandments?
Guidelines, incredibly simple ones at that, derived from Jewish laws. These are not 'right and wrong', but what is to be done to avoid a life of sin.
>What does focusing on God do/give/accomplish that meditation does not?
Everything you stupid fucking pagan. One involves experiencing even an Augenblick of God, while the other is narcissism.

>You are painfully stupid. I am not your friend. I would throw you under a bus if it meant keeping my big toe undamaged.
Woah. So this is what an argument looks like.

*your not you're

Fuck off, GAYmer.

Arguments are irrelevant.

>How can something be more perfect than Paradise?
You need to experience a low point to enjoy a high point. That's how humans work.

Heaven is more perfect than Paradise. When Adam and Eve lived in Paradise they no knowledge of their happiness because they had no knowledge of misery, death, sin, etc. Just like you can't have day without night, something without nothing, light without darkness, and so on, you can't have true perfect happiness without experiencing misery.

>We may not comprehend Him, and by realizing this we begin to comprehend Him.
No, all you comprehend is that comprehension is not possible. What do you gain from this?
>it's the act of giving something up in exchange for fulfillment.
This sort of metaphor doesn't need actually God to literally exist, which is why I made my earlier point about it not actually being in line with traditional Christianity. Right? The Bible is just metaphor for pragmatic ways of living, and some people NEED to believe it to engage with those behaviors, but it's not strictly necessary. We can move into secular humanism seamlessly, right?
>One involves experiencing even an Augenblick of God, while the other is narcissism.
Ooooh, sounds fancy. How do you tell the difference?

Ah, sounds like Zen. So is Heaven a place where evil does not exist? Then how could one be happy there?

You're illiterate, good job.
God does literally exist. No, the Bible is not a metaphor, it is literal. Stop perverting it to fit your disgusting humanist ideology.

Reading some of the shit in this thread is embarrassing.

"no"
Not an argument. So do you disagree that the point of sacrifice is about the lesson of giving something up in exchange for fulfillment? Is it actually an appeal to God?

>I'm pretty sure the source is the infinity war tpb
>Thanos is egoism taken to the extreme.

I hope the Avengers arc of MCU doesn't end with a deus ex machina. Probably gonna be some Gollum-on-the-precipice moment where he destroys himself.

>I'm better than all of you but I'm not going to say why or how.
I bet that felt nice for you, user. We all love a good wank!

>Arguments are good becuz i sed so
Fuck off, Pagan, I have no reason to deal with you trash.

>What do you gain from this?
Around as much as you gain from Plato describing the unknowability of the forms.

>We can move into secular humanism seamlessly, right?
If you can solve the problem of onboarding every single person into a belief system where every human has value, without the supernatural soul, then we sure can. Until then, we're stuck with religion, and Christianity seems to do a pretty good job of ensuring each human has value(and encouraging art, there was a good thread on that recently).

>How do you tell the difference?
One is for gratification, the other is for fulfillment.

If you're genuinely interested in understanding this idea, read The Last Battle(yes, Narnia).
>And as He spoke, He no longer looked to them like a lion; but the things that began to happen after that were so great and beautiful that I cannot write them. And for us this the end of all the stories, and we can most truly say that they all lived happily ever after. But for them it was only the beginning of the real story. All their life in this world and all their adventures in Narnia had only been the cover and the title page: now at last they were beginning Chapter One of the Great Story which no one on earth has read: which goes on for ever: in which every chapter is better than the one before.

>t. evangelical

Since Dr Strange showed they're never going full mystical, I think we're fairly safe from a deus ex machina. Squirrel Girl ex machina wouldn't surprise me tho.

>won't
More like "can't". Whatever floats your boat, captain.

>If you can solve the problem of onboarding every single person into a belief system where every human has value
You honestly think Christianity is doing this properly, even now? I don't see evidence for that, and especially not the hope of global conversion. Ah, but that's the other guys fault, right? Not the belief system itself?

The Narnia stories are sweet, but doesn't really address the metaphysical contradiction here:
>Just like you can't have day without night, something without nothing, light without darkness, and so on, you can't have true perfect happiness without experiencing misery.
>in which every chapter is better than the one before.
So presumably they are going through bouts of intense misery before each upscale of happiness then?

What can you say? OP talks about Jesus while saying God doesn't treat people preferentially. How do you respond to something like that?

>How do you respond to something like that?
Why did you want to respond at all? What bothers you about those positions? If you can't be bothered going into it, fine. But then why post what you did? You wanted all the benefit of superiority without any of the effort.