Comment on The Birth of Atheism
Lovstuhagen@hilariouschaos.com 4 months agoIt is not good enough that heaven exists for the innocent and the faithful - it must exist for me, raight now.
Comment on The Birth of Atheism
Lovstuhagen@hilariouschaos.com 4 months agoIt is not good enough that heaven exists for the innocent and the faithful - it must exist for me, raight now.
fjord_monkey@hilariouschaos.com 4 months ago
Nah I’m saying that if a parent subjected their kids to these trials of faith, CPS would remove their kids before you could say pedophile priest. If there is a god (massive if), then god’s abusive and unworthy of acknowledgement let alone worship. If a being so powerful as to be able to create a universe from nothing with a snap of their fingers allows suffering to happen in their creation, then torture is the point of the system. Not cool. Either god’s an asshole or he doesn’t exist.
Lovstuhagen@hilariouschaos.com 4 months ago
All suffering on earth is a means for us to repent and improve ourselves, since we are actually created imperfect.
fjord_monkey@hilariouschaos.com 4 months ago
Do you know how unhinged that sounds to someone who grew up without religion? Do you give your pets regular beatings to cleanse their soul? Put gravel in your kids shoes so they’ll become a good person? Self flagellation doesn’t make you a good person, it makes you insane (or kinky I guess ). Punishing someone for their imperfections doesn’t make you loving, it makes you an asshole. Please explain why allowing someone to die slowly from cancer while vomiting their guts out from the chemo makes god a cool dude?
Lovstuhagen@hilariouschaos.com 4 months ago
We believe that spiritual advancement is impossible without humility, and the greatest reminder of humility is our own mortality. This is why my uncle, an alcoholic, who spent his last year unable to keep food down and vomiting his guts up, who died quite painfully over the course of his last months, was perhaps able to convert. It was able to reduce his life back to the objective perspective of it: a mortal in a weak husk doomed to give up the ghost.
Which is why in Catholic & Orthodox traditions it is thought that a prolonged death is desirable and a sign of divine mercy, while a quick, instantaneous death that does not provide a chance for reflection and penance is considered undesirable.
One of the more important things to understand about this, IMO, is also that non-physical suffering is a great teacher. Even enduring the unjust slander given to you is a sort of penance and opportunity for self-improvement and spiritual awakening.
It is also the case that the suffering of others provides much opportunity for reflection - many people around the world come to a pacifism through observing the results of the Ukraine and Gaza conflcits.
Many people become vegans just by encountering a single suffering animal.
Perhaps that is enough text for now - tell me, what do you think about this idea?