Comments on: Wisdom

By: Rita

Rita — Sun, 09 Jan 2005 16:22:13 +0000

I read your sermon this morning and now feel that I've had my "church" experience for today, as I prepare to leave San Diego for San Francisco. For that, thanks. As to your content, how can I disagree? I can say that I remember exactly my first words upon learning of Ryne's horrible accident. I put my head down and said, aloud, "Don't take my son". I didn't ask, I told. As you know, from that day we have walked in the Valley of the Shadow with him, and we have found our God every step of the way, providing us with evidence of His care for us in the way He has returned our son to a livable life, and still continues to do so. I cannot fathom the tragedy in the lives of so many people, nor do much to relieve their suffering except give money and some meditative thoughts, but I can never deny the actual presence of Gods love and light in my own life after all that has been done for me and mine. Why doesn't everyone recognize this "presence"? It is a huge mystery because, to my way of thinking, we have done nothing special to deserve any of it. I, also, don't think of myself as a Christian, but I know that there are wonderful surprises and love awaiting us all in the life (or lives) to come. I will spend this life trying to live a life that honors all that has been given to me and others. After all, Tim, there is a God and She does provide.

With Love, Rita

By: Mike Luoma

Mike Luoma — Fri, 07 Jan 2005 17:29:26 +0000

I Newton, you must have misread me. Like my brother Tim, I understood your point entirely, but perhaps you are unwilling to see or consider ours. And, may I add, blind, dogmatic belief in “Science” is as much a leap of faith as belief in God. Science is but another of man’s attempts to explain the “why” of human existence, as is religion. I don’t find the two to be mutually exclusive, nor either more compelling or comforting. The comfort you draw from “Science“‘s ability to “explain all the tragedies as well as our fortunes” is as fragile a thing as the comfort some draw from their faith in God. Substituting one blind belief for another is not progress, nor is it truly scientific. Ah… too much digression. I Newton, you seem to draw your comfort from the fact that science will explain these natural disasters, and that’s good. The question remains for those who draw their comfort from God: How does a God of Love allow mass destruction of life like we’ve seen? What sort of God lets this happen? Two final points for pondering: Nicholas Kristoff in the New York Times this week pointed out that deaths from Malaria in the “third world” dwarf the current death tolls from the Tsunami, but without the media spotlight, no one is appalled by that kind of mass destruction of life, it isn’t leading most people to question their faith… why is that? Secondly, Indonesians are flocking to their mosques to ask for Allah’s forgiveness, for they must have strayed from His path badly to deserve such punishment… we want explanations even when the explanation offers no assuagement of pain, because there’s more comfort if there’s a reason for it, evidently, than if it’s just chaos and indifference. “Stuff” Happens isn’t good enough… why is that? (Even I Newton draws comfort from his scientific explanations for these events…)

By: TjL

TjL — Fri, 07 Jan 2005 04:14:58 +0000

I understood your point. My point in writing this was not to answer the "Is there a God?" question, but to give my thoughts as one who believes that there is to others who believe similarly.

Yes, I allow for the possibility that I'm wrong. That's why they call them beliefs instead of proofs :-) and I'm comfortable with that.

By: I. Newton

I. Newton — Fri, 07 Jan 2005 03:54:36 +0000

TjL: Thanks for your polite response and yes, I did understand your point; however, much like ML's read of my opinion, you may have failed to understand my point; I'll be brief:

If one, if only for a fleeting moment, makes a leap of faith and argues the point that there isnt a god (forgive the pun), then all the hype posed by op-ed summons such as yours (albeit well written however flawed) seem self serving and fodder for the sheep you may propose, need a shepherd.

If science can, or someday will, explain all the tragedies as well as our fortunes, then why continue the myth of a god less to continue to fool the people who call these events wonders, take their easy route and say these events are caused by some god instead of taking the time to learn the facts of why rain falls, why the tide ebbs and why when tectonic plates translate and cause sea swells, that then kill thousands of humans who are only too ignorant and construct their million dollar houses on a California fault line then seek divine guidance again?

Thanks for the free speech box youre at least a good sport.

By: Friedrich

Friedrich — Thu, 06 Jan 2005 22:39:30 +0000

Up front, I must admit I didn’t read the sermon (and I’m no christian), but wanted to say something about all the media coverage (which you are part of, Tim) about this huge tragedy: People die every day, every hour, every second. Jan Egeland, UN’s Emergency Relief Coordinator, said that every day, more than a thounsand people die of cureable diseases and lack of money for humanitarian help. This amounts to one Tsunami catastrophe every four months - since years. Most people (me included) who are shocked by this recent disaster forget that many many more people have died and still die in other regions of the world, and that these people deserve our help just as well. If you ask yourself “how can god let something terrible like this happen?”, well, how can he let all the pain, the suffering and dying happen every day? I don’t say this to “bash” god (sorry for the poor choice of words, I’m not a native speaker), I just think we all should see what happened in the context of what happens every day on our world - and our world is so big that we cannot grasp it all, the sheer number of people on this planet means that something terrible just HAS to happen every day (which is not to say we shouldn’t strive to make the world a better place to live for all).

By: jquinby

jquinby — Thu, 06 Jan 2005 17:30:08 +0000

Of late, there have been some interesting discussions of theodicy (that is, the defense of God as omnipotent and loving in the face of disasters or evil) on several other religion blogsites that I follow (namely, GetRelgion and Mere Comments).

The thread on Mere Comments was initiated by a WSJ column written by David Hart, an Eastern Orthodox theologian.

Original column:

http://www.opinionjournal.com/taste/?id=110006097

Subsequent discussions (which actually begin about halfway down the page):

http://merecomments.typepad.com/merecomments/2005/01/hartbythe_num.html

But mostly, I wanted to use the word 'theodicy' correctly in a sentence this week.

By: paul

paul — Thu, 06 Jan 2005 05:32:48 +0000

I found your site by doing a Google search on dual boot of all things! However, I would like to comment as I too wonder about God and this disaster. First, we have something in common, a child. I have a 3yr old boy who my wife and I love very much. He is amazing to say the least and words don’t describe what he means to us. I am sure you feel the same way about your child. Now, back to the mystery of life. Outside of our cocoon of Earth lies cold,dark, endless space filled with stars, planets, moons and galaxys. The vastness of space, the amount of stars and galaxy’s and the great distances the represent the space between us and everything else is just way beyond the comprehension of myself and any other human for that matter. The point is we just don’t know the answers, the reasons, the questions, the TRUTH of what life is all about. No religion can begin to explain what is really going on “out there”. I am holding out till the truth comes. From God or otherwise………….

By: Mike Luoma

Mike Luoma — Wed, 05 Jan 2005 19:15:23 +0000

Wisdom is a good name for your contemplation here, Tim (read the first response… he musta skimmed your introductory comments…). But the question remains: how do we believe in a loving God and make that jibe with the destruction of life we’ve seen on an epic scale in the wake of the tsunami?I think it may be a question of expectations.., what are we expecting from God when we enter into a relationship with Him? Nowhere does he say follow me and I’ll make everything hunky dory, no worries, mate. Jesus says God is Love, but then says He (Jesus) came to put son against father, mother against daughter… no promise of an easy life there. Your last poster assumed a “mature person” cannot believe in God. I disagree. But I do believe natural disasters on this scale are most challenging to the faith of those believers whose faith is more “immature”, whose belief is more Deist in outlook, those who believe God is a big guy who looks like Charlton Heston and sits on a big throne in the sky. You know the ones, always asking favors from God with their prayers akin to “adult letters to Santa Claus”. I believe God IS Love, not a guy in the sky controlling the weather at His whim. I believe it is incumbent upon us as believers to embody, engender and, yes, incarnate that love. The responsibility is ours, not God’s.If we attribute natural catastrophes to God’s Will, we make him no better than the animistic nature gods of the polytheists. I don’t believe God sent AIDs to punsh gay people, I don’t believe a “Christian” nation is any more favored than any other, and I don’t believe God uses the weather to dispense his justice, or lack thereof. The true measure of our faith is in how we react to these catastrophes: by just being there, as you say, or contributing, or helping somehow to let these people surviving in that hellish aftermath know that they are not alone. That is God in action in the world, when we come together so that someone on the other side of the globe can hear Him say, “You are not alone. You are loved. We care.”

By: TjL

TjL — Wed, 05 Jan 2005 14:08:54 +0000

I won't delete the comment. As I state, I generally only do that when someone posts either total nonsense (along the lines of "i iz cool d00d, shout out ta all my homies in da land") or clearly just trying to get a link to their website to seel someone products for "natural enhancement" or videos of that poor, misunderstood Par1s Hi1ton.

That said, your comment does seem to miss the issues that I was attempting to deal with, issues that people of faith have been struggling with for millenia, namely, why doesn't God (in whatever name they call God) prevent such things from happening.

As I alluded to in my prefatory remarks, those were the folks who are the intended audience. Of all the explanations available to them, I doubt that a cold scientific explanation would bring them any further comfort or understanding. I don't begrudge those who are able to look at the world with that type of analytical thinking, but it's not a trait I've been given.

By: I. Newton

I. Newton — Wed, 05 Jan 2005 05:50:08 +0000

When "natural" events that are well understood in the scientific world such as rainfall, tidal action, seasonal changes or more severe events such as landslides, hurricanes and now, a tsunami, when these events are cloaked as something due to a higher authority, these explanations show mature humans the pomposity of organized religion: a set of rules divined by a few for use on fearful people to somehow invoke more fear in their lives and further perpetrate the myth of a superior power that somehow has its rapture on us.

When natural events occur, when forces are exerted, then subsequent reactions come to bear. This is a simple fact and no other super-natural explanations are necessarythat is unless you have a personal reason to exploit others for the fear they dont need now.

The above is not hysteria but based in emperical truths so if you believe in your request, to allow postings of honest feedback, you will leave for all to read. If you're like the rest, I'm sure it will be gone in a moment.

I. Newton