We live in a fallen world, unfortunately suffering and pain is the cost of that. But suffering and pain strengthens and forms bonds. I can never relate to someone in a true sense that has lost parent because mine are still alive, or a child, but I have watched how God has healed, and comforted those that have, and their ability to now be able to relate to others, and be a comfort to them.

Should read C.S. Lewis the Problem of Pain.

Can you name one other sect of people that when once ostracized from their land came back to rule it?

God witheld knowledge from us.

God punished Eve (who was deceived) and generations henceforth were crippled by God directly.

He confused the languages at Babel because people had enough of him killing the entire planet and worked together to flip him off in his face.

We do not know what we as humans are capable of. He's rigged the game so that we have to be reliant on him. Humanity is capable of a great many things in this crippled state.

**** your God, dead srs.

Damn right. Matter of fact, let me double down. You ain't seen nothing bro.

Jesus is coming aftet the 4 horsemen, the 7 trumpets are blown, after the 7 headed Satan wreaks havoc, after a different 7 headed ugly beast spits blasphemy, after the false prophet, after Armageddon, after the 7 bowls and aftet the 7 seals are broken. Then Jesus will come. Water will turn to blood, an earthquake that moves islands, faint sun before another trumpet that dims it completely, scorpians flying around stinging everyone, 666 on all your money, famine, disease, and Satan going ham on us before Michael the archangel saves your ungrateful ass. That's when your faith really gets tested. Don't fall for the false prophet. Judgement day will arrive after Jesus is here for 1,000 more years.

Now go cry me a river about how unfair God is.

These

Wrong.

When God created man, he did so in his image. Adam and Eve were created in this image. But along came Satan who tempted eve with sin, who then tempted Adam with sin. Why would God create Adam and Eve in hs great image but succumb to sin? Because God wants us to distinguish evil and not be oblivious to it.

Cool story, but none of this justifies your unhinged God and his "mysteries ways". lulzRead your Good Book.

Eve was deceived. It says it right there. Adam wasn't. It also says it right there.

Satan was right about the tree of knowledge. Their eyes were open and they saw themselves naked.

God wanted innocent drones that would worship him day and night. He is a selfish being, he is the demiurge.

Bruh put the pipe down. Srs.

I can picture a crazy dude screaming this on the sidewalk.

And in nature when animals tear each other apart with claws and teeth that only increase the pain of the prey they are eating alive, when the entire design of this place is things being killed so other things can eat them...in terms of pleasure and pain the animal being eaten experiences 100 times the level of pain than the predator experiences pleasure from eating. Suffering inherently outweighs pleasure massively in this realm. Did man also cause all of that suffering that is in nature? Did you ever think maybe the same design in nature is part of the same design that man lives under? Who created that and what for, where does all of this pain energy go to?

Why does your ******* god allow children to be born with terminal illnesses, and people be born into slavery and people be tortured?

Why does your ******* god allow his followers to block access to medical care for poor people in America? You christians act like the exact opposite of what Jesus said to do. If hell exists, you guys will be burning there

Nope.
Religion and Science is actually what makes America great. Development of the Scientific Method was lead by Christians, yes, God instructs us & gave us the ability to rationalize using our God given right freely to reason. Yet with all the progress we have made.
These are the accomplishments of a scope & scale that only the west can claim.

As western thought evolved it secured the rights of women, minorities, lifted billions of people out of poverty & invented most of the modern world. What's the proof..?
The world is overwhelming western & those that aren't aspire to be.. which is why China is implementing capitalists policies & growing rapidly because of them.

So why has the West been so successful? Surely if attributes like "theocracy" & "extremism" are in part to blame for America's inequality, we must never look to it for our success... right?
Well.. lettuce go back...The best place to start for why the west has been successful is from two ancient cities, Jerusalem & Athens.
Jerusalem represents religious revelation as manifested in the Judeo-Christian religion. The beliefs that a good God created an ordered universe & that this God demands moral behavior from his paramount creation..man.

Athens-Represents reason & logic as expressed by the great Greek thinkers like Plato, & Aristotle.

These two ways of thinking; revelation & reason, live in constant tension. Judeo-Christian posits that there are certain fundamental truths handed down to us by a transcendent being. We did not invent these truths, we recieved them from God. The rules He lays down for us are vital for building a functioning moral civilization & for leading a happy life..
"We hold these truths to be self-evident: that all men are created equal; that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights; that among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness."
Greek thinking posits that we only know truth by what we observe, test, & measure. It is not faith, but fact that drives our understanding & exploration of the universe.

Western Civilization & only Western Civilization has found a way to BALANCE both religious beliefs & human reason.
So how does the balance work?
The Judeo-Christian religion teaches that God created an ordered Universe & we have an obligation to try & make the world better (Love your neighbor bit). This offers us purpose & suggests that history moves FORWARD.
Most all other religions taught the opposite; that the Universe is illogical & random & that history is cyclical, just endlessly repeats itself. In which case.. why bother to innovate & create anything new?
Judeo-Christian religion also teaches that everyone is created in the image of God. Each individual's life is infinitely valuable. Seems self evident now, but only because we have lived with this belief for so long. The more natural belief is that the strong should subjugate the weak.. (see socialism).. which is precisely what every society did in all of history.
Only be recognizing the divine in others did we ever move beyond this amoral thinking towards the concern of human rights, democracy, & free enterprise.

Judeo-Christian religion alone didn't build our modern civilization. Greek reason taught us objective observation. Man had the capacity to search beyond revelation for answers. Natural Law- we can discover the natural purpose-the telos-of everything in creation by looking to its character.. (not identity politics.. as a certain group embodies). Human beings were created with the unique capacity to reason, therefore our telos was to reason.

Nowhere is this more perfectly expressed than the American Revolution. The founding Fathers took the best of the European enlightenment with its roots in Greek thought & the best of Judeo-Christian practices with its roots in the Bible and melded them into a whole new political philosophy. Without Judeo- Christian values, we fall into scientific materialism, the belief that physical matter is the only reality which results in nihilism... the belief that life has no meaning. We are dust in a cold universe.

Without Greek reason we fall into fanaticism. The belief that fundamentalist adherence to principles represents the only path towards meaning. Soviet Union, Communist China, & other socialist tyrannys rejected Faith & murdered 100million people in the 20th century.
Much of the Muslim world has embraced faith but rejected reason.

God allows free will, what people decide to do with that, they will be judged accordingly.

I used to think this way, but Jesus did that for us along with dying for our sins.

Hell was never meant for us, only Satan and fallen angels. But what do non-believers have in common with Satan so much? Pride. It is literally his main characteristic. Therefore you guys will get along perfectly together for all eternity.

Not everyone is called to be a street preacher. People see Jesus through our walk of the Christian faith. When they ask why we live so particular that’s our opportunity to share the gospel. That’s just one example. But still Street preaching has its place too.

But as a Christian I find a lot of street preachers are low key pharasies and are antagonizing people on the street often calling people names.
I watched a clip recently of a street preacher trying to engage an old woman. When she walked past him, he gave some mean spirited comment about how she doesn’t have much time left trying to use her as an example yet knew nothing about her… These types of street preachers arnt called to do this I’d argue some arnt even really Christian.

It's not those children's choice to get cancer. It's not people born into slavery's decision to be born as slaves.

Jesus would hate the Republican party. They do the exact opposite of what he said. Yet, all you bible thumpers seem to love everything Republican. Hypocrites gonna hypocrite

"The world is overwhelming western & those that aren't aspire to be"

Stopped reading here. The West is a minority of the world. No, many countries do not aspire to be Western. This is the thought distortion that led us to the catastrophic problems in the middle east and in Ukraine. Russia, China, India, Singapore, Iran, NK, Libya, and Syria are not trying to be Western. They have no desire to be Western, and they actively contest our notions of what is "the good life". But one thing that is very cool is all these civilizations, no matter how repressive or different, still agree on the fundamental value of science. Amusingly, even in the Islamic Republic of Iran, evolution is taught relatively unmolested in biology.

After all, everyone needs scientists. They are useful.

Perhaps the worst example of the stifling of science occurred in Russia with Lysenko. And they suffered a famine for it. That price showed Russians that the government cannot shape scientific truth. The science speaks for itself and always wins out. Science is universal, like math.

Can you explain to me how if I, in all my days, reject God. Every waking moment, for 70-80 years. Then I die.

How does that finite time equate to an eternity of torture in your eyes? Can you justify it? Or is it also a mystery?

Why would you want to live for eternity with someone you rejected here during your time on earth?

Animals have no souls. Let me put it this way, what's the main thing that distinguishes us from animals? Love. And all of love can be traced to a maker.

I love animals too, but yea, no souls.

Ah yes, animals have no souls and do not know love. Have you ever owned a dog? Why even have animal cruelty laws...God doesn't give a **** so why should we? Some God...

Funny you mention Iran. The revolution against the Western backed Monarchy was for two primary reasons. Both a secular rejection of the West's influence in the country, there was a loss of identity, but also the fundamentalist religious take which of course won that argument and that's where we are today.

It's for sure a very Anglocentric/Anglo-American take, that everyone wants to be us and really it shows how ignorant you are of the world if you genuinely think that.What point do you think I'm making?

Cope.

Not only that, but their god allows children to be born with cancer, and then his followers (Republicans) say that god doesn't want poor people to have access to affordable healthcare in the US. Fuk god and his fan club.

Elephants mourn. As do lots of other animals. And that's from our limited understanding of the animals we study.

lol @ love though, your God lacks it so I suppose he's soulless too? Is that right?

Yes, no one chooses to suffer, unfortunately we all chose to sin, and as a result, we suffer, and we have created a world that enables suffering for those that chose so or not.

The Republican Party is a mess..Most Christians are Conservative..and thus seek to "conserve" the ideas and policies our forefathers set upon when establishing this country. The Republican Party, as misguided as it is, is one that most closely aligns with Conservatives.

The left is so far gone that it is just a joke now.

Like I said, hell wasn't created for us. But man has outdone himself, and now he can go along with Satan. Is it justified? Depends, remember God is merciful. But for many, it's not. I'm not gonna go around behaving like I understand all of God's choices.

God is eternal, your soul is eternal, so existence is eternal.

False equivalencies.

Just because humans don’t choose terminal illnesses doesn’t mean we all don’t equally have a chance of getting one even at birth or a young age in this fallen world.

You’re trying to blame God for man’s actions of inslaving other groups of people? What logical sense does that make? If anything it points to your inherent God giving understanding of what’s right and wrong the difference between ideal perfect order and a broken world tainted by sin.

Common tactic of labeling everyone who claims to be Christian as Christian. Maybe you’re not aware but Jesus says in the Bible that we will know true Christian’s by their fruits of the spirit meaning their actions..

If someone claims to be Christian but has a mega church that doesn’t give back to the community and owns 3 private jets that’s bad fruit

If a Christian man has been living a life of service in Africa for over 10 years providing water for the needy could that be considered good fruit? Why don’t you guys ever bring up these Christian’s in your arguments?

Yep. In fact, Iran would have probably looked a lot like Germany or France in development or freedom today had we not carried out Operation AJAX and ousted their democratically elected PM at the behest of what became BP.

So you've got no justification for his madness.

Demiurge, like I said. He's a retarded child that created beings for his own selfish interests. If whatever it is exists, it doesn't care about you or any other human. It's a jealous, petty God and one that seems all too human.

In other words, you agree and are so insecure about the cheap sex as your only way of getting laid in the future that you're clinging to some counterproductive way of selling your soul instead of doing what is good for you because you think you cannot get laid without humiliating yourself

It's almost immaterial because you understand the forces we live under and how to navigate them in a healthy way.