If you believe in God, what's the best reason you would give for your belief.

If you don't believe in God-the same, what's the main or most significant reason you don't .

I don't believe because there is overwhelming suffering in the world, and i can't believe there's a god, at least a god who loves and cares for us who created and maintains the universe.
Humans and animals suffer in various ways-of that no one can seriously doubt, but why does a fatherly god let his children suffer -if i had omnipotence, and was all loving i would create a world where humans and animals do not suffer.
Of course it's possible that a god who doesn't care or love us, or is not all powerful exists, maybe that's the case. But that kind of god is not a theistic god, as in Christianity, Judaism or Islam for example. The major religions claim god is all loving and all powerful-it doesn't compute, just look at the world it's hardly a recommendation for a divine caring being.

BT, can i just say that you come up with some great debate topics :ok:

I don't believe that there is one god who has power over everything. I don't believe in organised religion either. I'm not entirely sure why not - because i think that people shouldn't have to live their lives according to some book, but according to some innate moral code. But i do believe there's something out there - that there is a power. i also believe in fate and allowing the world to send you in the direction it wants to - kind of, that everything happens for a reason? Why do i believe that - because of experience.....

does that make any sense whatsoever??

Thanks D Jo
I think rationally it's hard to construct a convincing argument for God's existence,
i've never heard any reason that was utterly convincing.
But i'm a bit like you, while i don't believe as such, i can't help think that there's something or power that lies behind all this-it's just a hunch, that live and human existence and consciousness can't just be some vast cosmic accident.
There's an old philosophical question 'why is there something rather than nothing' it's profound, and ultimately a question that can't be pushed to one side.

You see i never used to believe that there was anything out there at all. I was a staunch athiest - i'd never seen any evidence to the contrary. i'm quite a scientific person in some ways and until someone could prove to me that God exists then i was never going to believe it. and the bible never seemed enough proof to me......

but then a few things happened in my life, and i started to wonder if there was a big plan out there, and started to believe in fate - that things were happening to me for a reason. it just slowly started to change my view - i'm still not sure what i believe, maybe i'm just sure that i do believe.....

I'm with both of you on this one.

I'm not one for organised religion although my father was and my brother still is, a staunch Christian - they had/have faith and that's important to them, I just can't get my head around the whole thing.

I like some of the Eastern philosophies around reincarnation and do struggle with the whole life essence bit - where do 'you' go when you die, that central core of being that is 'the soul'? I don't go with the whole pearly gates and kindly chap with a long white beard bit.

I also have a leaning towards the Mayan philosophies where the earth has natural cycles of destruction and rebirth. I'm not sure about their claim that 21st December 2012 will be the end of our civilisation, but with natural disasters seeming to be on the increase - floods, earthquakes etc.. who knows?

Guess we don't have long to wait though :unsure:

I could not give a better answer than that.

Carl G Jung (even better than the other Swiss)

"but why does a fatherly god let his children suffer -if i had omnipotence, and was all loving i would create a world where humans and animals do not suffer."

A very good point but The Bible teaches us that God did create such a place, but right at the start mankind through Adam & Eve decided using their free will, to disobey God and as such they were given the independence they wanted along with the consequences....including aging & death.

Sadly many problems and EVEN natural disaster have their roots in man's mismanagement of the Earth and resources.

I can remember someone asking why God didn't stop the boxing day Tsunami if he had the power, which is a valid question....but i replied that if God stopped all the things that he disapproved of then many peoples weekends would be very different eg. no drunkenness, casual sex...and the list could go on, and the person said they had never thought of it like that.

People seem to want God to step in and help , but equally not meddle too much in their day to day lives.......

..And it is equally as hard to disprove God's existance.

Now it is such a bizarrely improbable coincidence that anything so mind-bogglingly useful [as the Babel Fish] could have evolved purely by chance that some thinkers have chosen to see it as a final and clinching proof of the non-existence of God. The argument goes something like this:

"I refuse to prove that I exist," says God, "for proof denies faith, and without faith I am nothing."

"But," says Man, "the Babel fish is a dead giveaway isn't it? It could not have evolved by chance. It proves that you exist, and so therefore, by your own arguments, you don't. Q.E.D."

"Oh dear," says God, "I hadn't thought of that," and promptly vanishes in a puff of logic.

"Oh, that was easy," says Man, and for an encore goes on to prove that black is white and gets himself killed on the next zebra crossing.

...Douglas Adams - truly a god of literature :bow: :bow:

actually, there was a brilliant speech given by Douglas Adams about the existance of an artificial god. It's far too long to put here, but here's a link to it.

It is very interesting reading, and quite humourous too :)

Douglas Adams' speech at Digital Biota 2

Always cracked me up that did....... roflmao roflmao

I'm a Christian. I totally accept the argument about suffering etc and I do find that really difficult to get my head around. I do find myself questionning various other aspects but I think that can only be a good thing!

When I started uni a few years ago I absolutely hated it and was thinking about leaving but I went along to a service for students and this preacher guy was saying that God was looking after us and that uni would work out and then suddenly I felt this warmth on my shoulders. I can only describe it like the blue hug thing from the cup of soup adverts(lol!) and from then on I loved uni! I'd always gone to church etc before then but that was the moment when I really thought that there was a God.

Apologies for the ramble, I'm not one of these people who is going to try and convert you all and quote passages from the Bible but I just thought I'd share one of my reasons behind believing in God! :D

Certainly an interesting question to ask of people... and I am sure that people could bring in many arguments for and against but, like its been said before, you cant prove or disprove the existence of God.

I dont follow an organised religion, I dont have anything against anyone who does, and at the end of the day, I have my own kind of belief in an higher existence, being and the thought of someone, someplace that we trot off too when we move on from this plane.

The reason, well its kinda personal and comes from traumatic moments, but its something which has helped me through tough times and brought me comfort when I needed it and if it turns out to be hogwash at the end of it all, it still gave me what I needed, when I needed it. And for me thats what its all about, its something personal to each and everyone and gives them what they need. Whether thats a code to live to in their day to day living, or just a sense of comfort in a more general way. For those who dont believe either, than thats perfectly fine too - it works for them and why should they believe any different?

I dont know that you can go down the route of 'if there was a God, why would he let...' because I am not sure I have ever heard that God was there to stop all the bad things happening and not allowing us to make our own minds up. I may be wrong - I have never studied the bible in great detail, which is why I shy away from such arguments. But for every line you could find in there which suggests he should be doing that, I bet someone else could find a line to suggest he wanted us to find our own way and its what we do here that determines what happens next. :shrug:

As always a well written post Pebs...

wow! That's pretty much mine in a nutshell too Pebs. If folks choose to follow a certain way of life, then it it works for them and they aren't constantly trying to make me follow it too, then let them be..

From what I remember of the Bible, God was always smiting the other guys and causing death and destruction anyway :shrug:

Not always Lex..... ;)

i have issues with the fact that religion can cause so much hatred and violence, when it's supposed to be something beautiful and spiritual :( but on a personal level, i'm quite happy with whatever anyone else chooses to believe, so long as they respect my choice to not believe. I also find it interesting to understand about other people's belief systems, so long as they don't try to push them on to me (hence my severe loathing of scientology :angry: )

Has anyone bothered watch the clip I posted. Jung talks about "death and belief".

I like when he says "they are confinements of our psyche that are not constrained by time and space"

This somehow answers lots of questions.

"If folks choose to follow a certain way of life, then it it works for them and they aren't constantly trying to make me follow it too, then let them be.." -Lex

"so long as they don't try to push them on to me" -DJ

Right i'm going to post a link, please nobody take this the wrong way, but the 6th question down shows why we call on people......

Not trying to push just explain.....

http://www.jw-media.org/beliefs/beliefsfaq.htm

stef, you're a jehovah's witness? that's brilliant - we got called on by some jehovah's witnesses in France and it sparked a big debate about what they actually believe, and none of us knew. How are jehovah's witnesses any different from Christians?

I've sent you a PM, as we're kinda drifting off subject and i don't want to be seen to be pushing my beliefs onto everyone.....

:ok:

religion is politics made sacred.

I happen to believe theres something in the idea of spiritualism,life after death etc . Some of my family are Christians and while I agree with some parts of it I dont go to church or fit into the stereotype of a 'religious' person . (I drink too much for starters ) But as one or two people mentioned , its certain experiences in life especially involving relationships with people that make me think that there must be something behind it all . But as Carl Jung said in that excellent clip , I dont blindly believe (or not) with out reason or experience , nor do I accept without question what someone else tells me . I dont wait for absolute proof though .If any of that makes sense :shrug:

The point about Adam and Eve is a good one-we were given paradise but we chose freewill and thus man was excluded from paradise.
But the point is that the very nature of Adam and Eve was created by God, when an all knowing God created Adem and Eve he must have known that they would reject the garden of Eden, it was never a real choice at all-they were merely being human-their characters, their very essence was given by god in the first place-God must have known they'ld reject the garden.
Since an all powerful all knowing god could not fail to know the path they would take out of paradise, the very idea man living in paradise is an illusion-it could never be sustained because of the nature of man.
If god created us as we are, our path out of Eden was Gods doing, not mans, God chose the path for us when he made us.

Part of your post deals with what i call the 'free will' issue. You claim that many of the problems of the world are routed in man's mismanagement of the events
you say 'Sadly many problems and EVEN natural disaster have their roots in man's mismanagement of the Earth and resources'
While i could say that the nature of man is itself a creation of god, and thus we can trace even man's mismanagement back to god, i'ld rather make a more down to earth point about the nature of suffering.
At an early age most humans recognise they will die-this is an unavoidable truth about existence. Even if you believe in God, the process of death can often be long painful and traumatic-and may leave loved ones grieving, or vulnerable.
We are condemned to this fate by God alone, no matter what course of action we take in life-God condemns us to suffer, both for the loss of others and our own demise.
The point i'm making is that even if we accept for the sake of argument that some suffering occurs because of the actions of man, most isn't and is the result of how god has created the world-and the creatures in it.

"But the point is that the very nature of Adam and Eve was created by God, when an all knowing God created Adem and Eve he must have known that they would reject the garden of Eden, it was never a real choice at all-they were merely being human-their characters, their very essence was given by god in the first place-God must have known they'ld reject the garden."

BT given that the first humans were perfect and had the choice of obeying God and thus living forever within the paradise that they would have helped create, or to listen to the words of Satan via the serpent the choice was theirs to make.

God could have created robot like humans, but dignified us with free will, but along with that came the consequences of the choices we make...

By having free will it did not guarantee rejection of the garden, they could have stayed faithful under test as many have done since....

"Even if you believe in God, the process of death can often be long painful and traumatic-and may leave loved ones grieving, or vulnerable."

No argument there, but we were never MEANT to die.

We are condemned to this fate by God alone, no matter what course of action we take in life-God condemns us to suffer, both for the loss of others and our own demise."

Adam and Eve chose to disobey God and thus became imperfect, began to age and eventually die and this was passed on to their offspring, and as such yes we do suffer now, but it was never meant to be that way originally.

I agree.

We all have our moral codes and belief systems, but it seems more acceptable to debate and criticise politics than religion. For example it seems acceptable to pick apart Communism where the ideology came from real people, but criticise an ideological system with an unproven divine figure behind it and people get offended and sensitive. Nothing should be above question and criticism, if it is then it is not founded on the tenents of freedom and truth and could be being used to brainwash people for an ulterior motive fo the organiser rather than the good of the followers. Political ideologies have been guilty of the same also, but somehow they get found out and collapse like Nazism. Making ideologies 'sacred' is rather scary and dangerousand seems to lead to an awful lot of trouble in the world.

I think the bigger question is not what we believe, but WHY we BELIEVE and our motives for believing. In the past religion has been used as a form of social and moral control. In crude terms, brainwash the masses into behaving in the 'right' way - as in a way that removes any threat to social order that they might pose - and they will put up with anything and won't cause trouble. Religion has been used even more crudely to discriminate against certain memebers of society and 'alter' their behaviour. Look at so called Christians in I think the 16th C - women who were not 'safe' as in unmarried and living alone or had a brain and spoke up for themsleves own were murdered in cold blood - deemed to be witches and burnt at the stake. And the scariest thing is that the masses thought this was right. In Victorian times religion was used to keep moral order and reinforce social and gender roles - women and the working classes being oppressed, women being owned by their husbands after a Christian marriage ceremony. If people beleive because they are brainwashed then they do not believe freely and with an open mind. Marx was spot on when he called religion 'the opiate of the masses" - a drug that kept them quiet, compliant and controlled.

People do not just beleive wrongly because they are brainwashed - some believe because they need to have something to believe in, they may be desperate, they made need comfort, something to get them through a miserable life or time, something to stop them fearing that it is all over when they die - and I beleive there was an element of this in Marx's famous words. And if you've read Huxley's Brave New World, the rather amoral society involved gives everyone drugs to keep them happy. So we might beleive through fear, to make sense of the world or to escape reality. And these motivations worry me greatly and I do believe that these are behind many people's beliefs.

I'd like to say that I am not an over rational person and am not 100% sure what I bleieve in in terms of the existence of other forces, dieties or whatever else is out there. I don't beleive in miracles though or thing being done through divine intervetion as I don't believe I've seen either or heard enough evidence of either. Supernatural forces? yes because I've seen more evidence of this and feel something must exist on the other side - but is this because I WANT to believe this? Maybe. I beleive in the forces and power of nature, which i respect and I hope that if I look after that it will look after me - but that's a hope, it's not concrete. And I think a lot of our religious beliefs are based on hope to, as are many political ones. And I beleive in Socialism, which is similar to Christainity in many ways in it's moral principles, and I beleive in this because I feel it is fair and just to the greater good. However, an element of hope is there because in the past human nature and greed has screwed it up.

Just make sure you believe freely and know why you beleive - that is the main thing - and that your beliefs are good for you and others. :)

Very good post SB!

I'm not religous as you know, although I used to go to Church years ago. I do find all these arguments fascinating - I may have it wrong but a crux of the debate as to God's existence seems to involve two sides of an argument -

1. people saying God does not exist as he is allowing too many horrid things to happen - if he existed he would use hsi divine powers to intervene and stop this for the good of man and woman kind.

2. those that beleive in God saying that he gave us free will and that we have to learn form our own mistakes and therefore we are responsible for disasters and must learn ourselves and put this right.

I see both sides, they are both equally convincing. However, I fall bewtween the two stools as I find both arguments a bit simplistic. What I do feel though is that where people are good, follow God and don't do any wrong to others - he should intervene there. And he should punish bad people - he should not be treatign everyone the same and should reward his followers on earth, not just in heaven. What woudl happen if we all believed and waited for our place in heaven and then foudn there was none? Sorry but that is a possibility and I'm not going to put all my eggs in one basket and then find I've been had. How do people manage this belief? I could not.

Thank you Styeffo :)

It took me a while to say what i wanted to say, but I think I got there in the end.

I was a bit thrown off by BT's wording in the opening post, giving "reasons" for faith seems to suggest a fundamental misunderstanding of what having faith is.

But perhaps you meant for people to explain perhaps why they follow a faith? Or what sort of things lead someone into developing faith....

For myself, as a practising Christian, I was brought up into the faith which is a large part of it. But as I grow up, my understanding of faith, what it is, and to what extent I follow it is something that is ever changing.

As to what reasons I could give for my belief, well what I was getting at in my first point is that faith is far too complex to pin down into reasons.

I simply believe because I think it makes sense. Part of it is I want to believe there is a higher power, because it is comforting. Not because Im afraid of being alone, but because I just think it would really be a frightful mess if we humans really are at our own mercy. Part of it is ethics, I think there are some things that are essentially at their core, good, in a moral sense. I don't think ethics can be subjective, which imo they would be if there was no god of any sort.

Think how bad things are now, but think how worse things would be if there was no foundation of what is good and right in the world. Every religion (that I know of) has a moral code that makes clear what is good and what is not. And most major religions don't conflict ethically. There is a general consensus of what is good in the world. So even IF religion does cause wars and suffering, it's not all bad, I think it's important we remember that.

Also relating to Viva's post. There are two parts to it, sure there's the organised aspect of relgion, the dogmatic side, which you could argue is "sacred politics." A nifty little phrase that :lol: But there is also the faith aspect which you shouldn't overlook when you talk about religion. Faith and relgion are inclusive terms.

And what if God was made of good and evil like us? What would he do to rid Himself of the negative side?

The human race seems like a work in progress and suffering is its main incentive to learn and evolve.....unfortunately.

I think "work in progess" is a brilliant way of putting it.

Only God (if you believe in him/her) knows the end result, so surely it's inevitable that there are lots of things we wouldn't understand and would seem strange to us :shrug:

The idea of God perhaps having a darker side is absolutely fascinating Tenez, and it makes for the most high philosophical debate possible.

Thanks Serena.

For me the question has never really been whether I believe in God or not but rather trying to define God Himself.

Is it pure energy? Mother Nature? we can see both have a good and bad side (from the human perspective anyway). Good and evil is inherent to matter/energy. We on the other hand have almost a choice to it. Or have we?

This is a fascinating point, but many theists will not even consider it-Christians, Jews and Muslims will allow that god does things we may not understand and that seem cruel (Job's suffering in the bible for example) but will not allow that God himself my be evil, in some respect.
It's also quite scary too, the implications of it are obvious-if god has an evil side, the possibility that he may take pleasure in suffering cannot be discounted.
Or as the Cathars (an unorthodox religious group mainly in France around the
12 century) believe that this world was created by the Devil.
Looking at the world today, it's not madness to envisage such possibilities, although belief in such things hardly mitigates life's wows.

Even more fascinating BT that you come up wih Job's story. So appropriate here. Job's friends who he talks to don't question God's dual nature but Job I think does very much so. He does not say it but clearly questions God's nature over his.

Then at the end God says something like we are human and do not understand His ways. (this is why I mention "good and evil in the human eye”).

I personally think the way God is described in the Old Bible is very dualist. Full of Wrath, choosing people over others, eye for eye etc….By the Christ time, it seems He has already “mellowed”.

"This is a fascinating point, but many theists will not even consider it-Christians, Jews and Muslims will allow that god does things we may not understand and that seem cruel (Job's suffering in the bible for example) but will not allow that God himself my be evil, in some respect"

The Bible shows that in Jobs case, Satan challenged God that Job was only serving Him for what he could get out of it, and if Job was to undergo a reversal of circumstances (as he was a very wealthy man) that he would stop....so in order to prove it either way he allowed Satan to inflict the woes upon Job but would not let Satan KILL Job.

Job for all that happened showed that an imperfect man COULD remain faithful under the worst pressure and calamity, and Job answering his wife who said he should "curse God and die." said that we should not just accept what is good from God but also what is bad" (although this was NOT being caused by God, but Satan).

Very true, God does seem to mellow as he makes his way through the bible-In the beginning we get booted out of paradise, but by the end we have the promise-through jesus of returning to paradise! :rolleyes:

Job's story shows to me that a rather "perfect" man can still suffer God's wrath (be it through Satan or else). And that I think is a feeling experienced by most of us.

"Job's story shows to me that a rather "perfect" man can still suffer God's wrath"

But it wasn't God's wrath...It was merely the way that God could show Satan to be wrong or not.

Did it really matter for Job? :D