Minette Posted January 14, 2014 Share Posted January 14, 2014 This week, I started my new college courses. I did what I always do; I went online and copied down the days, times, buildings, and room numbers down. For one of my classes, I went to the correct building on the correct day at the correct time only to discover that the room number doesn't exist. Mildly irritated, I pulled out my phone to call someone to instruct them on how to log into my college account to see if the mistake was corrected and the real room number was there only to see that my phone was dying and wouldn't let me make a call (my current phone doesn't have Internet). Moderately irritated, I sent my mother a text detailing what fun I'm dealing with and headed to the student resource building to get the REAL room number. She texted back saying that she'll say a prayer for me to help make things better. She's a Christian, I'm not but I tend to let it be when she says stuff like that. I know that's helping in her eyes, not that I expected help; I just wanted to complain about the wonderful job the Internet team does. I was waiting in the main office behind a new kid who seemed to have a plethora of questions and an employee who was too nice to ask him to step aside while I was helped when a teacher riding one of those motorized carts approached the door. I went to hold it open for her, she thanked me and we exchanged pleasantries while waiting in line. She heard why I was there and offered to show me to the room claiming it does exist. It doesn't exist, but she knew more about the classrooms so she was able to help me locate the right room. After this happened, I was hit by a realization. When I was a Christian, I would have claimed that God helped me. If I told my Christian family about this, they would claim that God helped me and answered my mom's prayer. Now, I see it differently. Now I credit finding the right room to myself for going to the student resource building and to the random teacher who offered to help. My attitude was different as well. Before, I would have been stressed and panicking and trying to call my mom for advice. This time, I was calm, composed, and I thought logically about what I can do to fix my situation. Before, I would have stressed, fretted, figured out what to do, and then denied credit to the people who REALLY fixed my situation to "give the glory to God." This all got me thinking about all the things that Christians give God credit for and got me wondering how Christian's differentiate between "the lord's work" and basic human intelligence/kindness. Why is something considered God's work and not something you fixed yourself or someone being nice? If the Christian god did exist and did answer my mom's prayer and somehow made that teacher lose her keys so she could come to that room and somehow influenced her to help me, why? Why not use his awesome influencing key-losing abilities to influence people to donate to end world hunger or make some criminal lose his keys so the cops catch him or some shit? Why help some random ex-Christian woman in the USA find her college classroom? 4 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
◊ crazyguy123 ◊ Posted January 14, 2014 Share Posted January 14, 2014 I would think that if a god helped you get to the correct room, he wouldn't have been so ambiguous as to have humans help you out, he'd have simply teleported you there. At least that is how I'd have done it if I was a god. 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
leopardus Posted January 14, 2014 Share Posted January 14, 2014 god works in mysterious ways.... mysteriously like random chance 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
WaitingInfinity Posted January 14, 2014 Share Posted January 14, 2014 When I deconverted I began to realize that good things happen...because good things can happen. It's all about placement, timing, and luck. I see this all the time now. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Super Moderator TheRedneckProfessor Posted January 14, 2014 Super Moderator Share Posted January 14, 2014 I always had problems believing that such things were the work of god, even as a christian. I would always think something like, "Why would god care if I got to the right classroom or not when just last week I prayed for Uncle Don to be healed of cancer and he still has it?" Then, of course, I'd be racked with guilt over doubting god's plan and such. The futility of prayer was probably the first and foremost factor in my deconversion. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
sdelsolray Posted January 15, 2014 Share Posted January 15, 2014 A secular humanist would say that we are all in this together and most of the time only we can solve our problems and issues. You had an information problem and took it upon yourself to solve it. Another human helped you solve it (other humans at the college could have done this too but the teacher helped first). Many theists have a frequent need to project such "help" upon their particular set of sky fairies, pretending that their imaginary friends solved the problem when the actual empirical evidence here shows it was a teacher at the college that helped you solve your informational error problem. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
LifeCycle Posted January 15, 2014 Share Posted January 15, 2014 God just loves to steal the credit for others work. It's a discredit to those who ACTUALLY did something to make the difference when you/we give credit to God. Plus, giving God the credit infers that he directed the outcome which interferes with the whole "free will" theology. He can't use others to complete his will, if so, we're merely puppets, right? So, crazyguy123 is right. Thank God when some crazy shit goes down. Like an impromptu teleportation. Outside of that, thank the real, observable people who actually made it happen. 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Blood Posted January 16, 2014 Share Posted January 16, 2014 A god who answered the prayers of college students lost on campus but ignored the prayers of people in desperate, life-threatened situations would actually be the most evil, sadistic entity in the universe. And since it can be proven that people in desperate, life-threatened situations do not often get their prayers answered, we must conclude that either there is no god, or it is as evil as I said. 3 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
seven77 Posted January 16, 2014 Share Posted January 16, 2014 I heard a lot about the "hand of God". I used to believe that God pulled the strings to some extent, that God was a masterful force of sorts. When I prayed, it was to sway events, to earn favor, to petition on my behalf or someone else's. I suppose I was praying to persuade Him to help me or someone else. Thing is, if my prayer changes his holy will, then God's will and God's plan itself are both totally fucking obsolete. Logically, this invalidates prayer as anything other than a self-soothing technique and a social grace. Once I saw that giant hole in God's armor, it became difficult for me to see him as anything other than a notion of protection and luck, bound with a certain sort of psychological and emotional terrorism. Maybe I'm being a bit OTT. I just don't think that God does anything. Hell, I've seen witches, wizards, and sentient robots on television that had more going for them than God. Most people do not know much about maths or sciences. They can't see or are unaware of probability, chance, causality, etc in their lives and the world at large. They misuse words like "random" and "miracle" and confuse the notions of probability and possibility. Add a little God-magic to the equation and there's the explanation for everything in Christianiverse. If you study maths, sciences, logic, history and philosophy, you begin to see that the world we live in is ruled by observable laws and that most (if not all) forms of spirituality and religion are little more than superstitious ignorance. Most of this ignorance is willful; the superstition is the hardest part to overcome. My battle with Christianity (and a big reason why I left it) was that I could not be willfully ignorant of the things I observed in life. I tried very hard to shut off my mind, but I never could. The superstitions are easy enough to absorb and that is where many of our battles lie as ex-Christians or semi-Christians who are on the path becoming ex-Christians. It's the little things, like everyday miracles (I prayed and found my keys. My sister send me a scripture and I felt this dark cloud lift off of me. So on and on...) that prove to be the most difficult to let go of. Long after you've said your good-byes to the divinity of Jesus, Biblical literalism, and most of your old friends, you still have these moments where you almost believe that prayer works. Or at least it can't hurt things if you've just slipped down the stairs or lost that money order that you needed to pay a late fee. Then you have to remind yourself that prayer is an empty gesture (think of it as spiritual masturbation, perhaps) and that God's character description usually reads something like this: Undependable lazy fuck. Usually takes the side of the bad guys in life. Expects a lot of grandiose ass-kissing. Acts like a pompous prick. Homicidal and genocidal. Unmedicated Multiple Personality Disorder. Do we really need this guy's help? I think not, but I am a pessimist. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ravenstar Posted January 16, 2014 Share Posted January 16, 2014 Ugh… when I moved from christianity to new age then it was all, 'synchronicity', and 'creating your own reality' ...and the universe responds.. etc.. same crap with another name.. it can MESS with your head.. because you start interpreting everything this way. Either way it's a symptom of ego.. the universe, god, whatever thinks you are SO special that it/he will bend the rules of the universe for your god damn parking spot. They're special, all right 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Burt_Lemur Posted January 16, 2014 Share Posted January 16, 2014 It may seem that Christians like to give God credit for doing everything humans do, but even more than that, they like to give THE DEVIL credit! Sometimes I think Christians are glorifying the devil character more than the god character. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
LifeCycle Posted January 17, 2014 Share Posted January 17, 2014 All one has to do is prove that God also doesn't take action to the Christian. Let's say God does exist. Okay, well, right now there's multiple kids dying of starvation. God is taking no action and these kids are going to die. So as you can see, God also does not take action. My question to the Christian is, we know God sometimes (all the fucking time) does nothing so how do you know he took action in your case? Because circumstances seemed to align in your favor? Listen, if it's unexplainable, thank God and most likely later down the road you'll figure out that it was coincidence or science will determine a perfectly natural answer to your situation. But if it's explainable, thank those who made it happen. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
chrisassaf Posted January 17, 2014 Share Posted January 17, 2014 God uses humans to help other humans. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
chrisassaf Posted January 17, 2014 Share Posted January 17, 2014 Someone once told me, "God only cares about Christians." Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Super Moderator TheRedneckProfessor Posted January 17, 2014 Super Moderator Share Posted January 17, 2014 God uses humans to help other humans. So do humans. 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Super Moderator TheRedneckProfessor Posted January 17, 2014 Super Moderator Share Posted January 17, 2014 Someone once told me, "God only cares about Christians." That person lied. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Super Moderator buffettphan Posted January 17, 2014 Super Moderator Share Posted January 17, 2014 Ugh… when I moved from christianity to new age then it was all, 'synchronicity', and 'creating your own reality' ...and the universe responds.. etc.. same crap with another name.. it can MESS with your head.. because you start interpreting everything this way. Either way it's a symptom of ego.. the universe, god, whatever thinks you are SO special that it/he will bend the rules of the universe for your god damn parking spot. They're special, all right Totally agree! I took that same new-age route too. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
◊ crazyguy123 ◊ Posted January 18, 2014 Share Posted January 18, 2014 God uses humans to help other humans. And that is an example of confirmation bias. When a person prays to a god for help and a human helps them out with this thing and their problem improves or goes away, the reason they come up with is "the human that came along to help had nothing to do with it because they were just a pawn that the god in question used to answer the prayer." I'm sure people who believe in different gods than you do the same thing when they pray to their gods. You could pray to a rock and get the same responses you'd get by praying to the god of the Bible. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
disillusioned Posted January 18, 2014 Share Posted January 18, 2014 I always find it very arrogant when people claim to have an received an answer to prayer. It's an odd sort of arrogance, because it goes in the guise of humility, but it is arrogance nonetheless. To give the glory for our successes to God seems to be a humble thing to do, because we are, after all, not claiming the credit ourselves. But what we are really saying is that the creator and master of the universe cares enough about me to fix some (usually) insignificant problem in my life. Meanwhile there are seven billion other people on the planet who apparently just don't merit this sort of favour, at least not if they happen to have a real problem, like, say, that they are starving to death. As Christopher Hitchens put it, "The man who prays is the one who thinks that god has arranged matters all wrong, but who also thinks that he can instruct god how to put them right." 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Super Moderator buffettphan Posted January 18, 2014 Super Moderator Share Posted January 18, 2014 I always find it very arrogant when people claim to have an received an answer to prayer. It's an odd sort of arrogance, because it goes in the guise of humility, but it is arrogance nonetheless. To give the glory for our successes to God seems to be a humble thing to do, because we are, after all, not claiming the credit ourselves. But what we are really saying is that the creator and master of the universe cares enough about me to fix some (usually) insignificant problem in my life. Meanwhile there are seven billion other people on the planet who apparently just don't merit this sort of favour, at least not if they happen to have a real problem, like, say, that they are starving to death. As Christopher Hitchens put it, "The man who prays is the one who thinks that god has arranged matters all wrong, but who also thinks that he can instruct god how to put them right." I so agree with you! In my experience, the common denominator among these people who claim to have answered prayers: It's all about meeeeeeeeeeee! 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
sdelsolray Posted January 19, 2014 Share Posted January 19, 2014 God uses humans to help other humans. Just not in any way you can demonstrate. Mere assertions don't get very far around here. Someone once told me, "God only cares about Christians." And….? 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Minette Posted January 21, 2014 Author Share Posted January 21, 2014 I always had problems believing that such things were the work of god, even as a christian. I would always think something like, "Why would god care if I got to the right classroom or not when just last week I prayed for Uncle Don to be healed of cancer and he still has it?" Then, of course, I'd be racked with guilt over doubting god's plan and such. The futility of prayer was probably the first and foremost factor in my deconversion. I agree. I never really saw the point of prayer. As a kid, I was always told that God has my whole life planned out and he knows my thoughts, he knows my heart, etc. I always thought, "What is prayer meant to do? God knows what I'm thinking so he knows when I'm thankful, he knows when I feel regret so he knows when I'm deserving of forgiveness, and everything that happens is part of his plan and happens for a reason. Why would prayer change anything?" Ugh… when I moved from christianity to new age then it was all, 'synchronicity', and 'creating your own reality' ...and the universe responds.. etc.. same crap with another name.. it can MESS with your head.. because you start interpreting everything this way. Either way it's a symptom of ego.. the universe, god, whatever thinks you are SO special that it/he will bend the rules of the universe for your god damn parking spot. They're special, all right That was one of my biggest issues with Christianity; the ego. God wants YOU; God loves YOU; God has a special job for YOU; YOU are special; YOU are unique; YOU are better than other groups; God died for YOU; God will answer YOUR prayers; God is calling YOU; YOU; YOU! Cripes, it's not healthy to think about yourself so much because it can and does mess with your head. I was taught these things as a child at an age when most people are already self-centered. Someone once told me, "God only cares about Christians." Oh? Then explain something to me. Why did I never experience God's presence as a child? Why did nothing amazing and "miracle-like" happen when I was a kid? When I was 5, I lost my pencil and prayed for God to help me find it and I found it. I thanked God for his help. (For the record, now I know that I found my pencil because I actually looked for it.) From that day onward, I got nothing. When I was being abused, enslaved, and molested, I got nothing. When I was molested and raped by someone I trusted, I got nothing. No one came to help me, no magical friend was there to comfort me, my mother prayed to God for guidance and we got NOTHING. My life never got better until my sister and I confronted my mom and forced her to make a decision; "him or us" and she chose us. So does God simply care more about missing pencils and incorrect college classrooms than abused children and raped women? Or maybe he is a weak god who can only fix small things? Or maybe he doesn't exist at all and things are fixed because people take the initiative to fix them? Which is is? Is God cruel, useless, or fake because I really don't see any other option. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ravenstar Posted January 21, 2014 Share Posted January 21, 2014 I take Carl Sagan's stance… why have a middle man? If humans help humans.. and the evidence is that this is the ONLY way it happens… why put god in there. Seems kind of redundant. I don't need a god to be nice and help people, or to be charitable, or anything like that. I do these things because it's the right thing to do. I'm sure as hell not giving an invisible and apparently non-existent being credit for my choices and actions. Screw that. When I do something it isn't 'god' doing it… it's me. (and I have to give my parents a little credit for raising me to be a decent person.. and NO, they weren't religious) 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Fernweh Posted January 21, 2014 Share Posted January 21, 2014 Here's an example of god's work that was revealed by a relative on FB this weekend. A few months ago his wife miscarried. They were, of course, devastated over the loss of the pregnancy but were sure god had a plan in store for them. Well, this weekend they announced god's plan was fulfilled because now she is pregnant with twins! Hallelujah, god aborted and killed off the first fetus to make room for two more! God had a plan for them all along. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Pantophobia Posted January 21, 2014 Share Posted January 21, 2014 Here's an example of god's work that was revealed by a relative on FB this weekend. A few months ago his wife miscarried. They were, of course, devastated over the loss of the pregnancy but were sure god had a plan in store for them. Well, this weekend they announced god's plan was fulfilled because now she is pregnant with twins! Hallelujah, god aborted and killed off the first fetus to make room for two more! God had a plan for them all along. I'm sure that they really wouldn't have loved these babies enough without first having experienced the devastation of a miscarriage. Right, God? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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