God's Plan for our lives

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woodss82 is apparently a youthful healthy middle class first world stoic.

Subotai asks some very good questions that are quite relevant as to one's choice of religion. If the person who started this thread had been raised in India, we'd probably be reading about how wonderful and true Hinduism is compared to other religions. If in Pakistan, Islam would be praised, and so on.

The 20th century philosopher and entertainer Alan Watts said more than once that it is impossible for anyone to be an impartial judge of all the world's religions as to which is best or most "true", because all of us were raised within a culture that is dominated by one or the other of them. This means we have basic assumptions about what is real, what is good, etc. that are programmed into us by our society and even by the very language we think in. For most people these assumptions are unconscious ones, that is, they don't even know they have them because they are so deeply conditioned. It is like a fish being in water, so totally immersed that it doesn't even know it is in water because it has been there all its life.

So if someone raised in a Christian culture wants to decide whether Jesus or Buddha (for example) was a more profound spiritual teacher, that person will make his judgment based on the hidden world views and assumptions of the Christian culture. Alan Watts compared that to if you were in a court of law and the judge and the advocate were the same person. You wouldn't want that if you were in a court of law, but people make decisions about their faith in such a manner without even realizing what they are doing and why.

After many decades studying comparative mythology, I am pretty sure that all the world's religions teach much the same, and at their core they are more similar than most people realize, but each religion is expressed in the language and terms of the culture it arose in. It is also difficult if not impossible to communicate spiritual truths using words. One can try to paint a picture with words, hint at the teaching, but direct experience cannot be communicated by language alone. Once spiritual teachings are put into words, people start arguing about different interpretations of what they mean. Spiritual teachings become polluted and diluted by cultural artifacts until it is difficult (but not impossible) to see what the teachings are.

I make no claims of absolute knowledge. I am just sharing my perspective from decades of study and prayer on this subject.

It is beyond me to know ... but I think the traditional concepts of "heaven" are likely just as screwed up.

I think there is much truth there, and I first heard about that from a Hindu who just happened to be the one who helped me take the Twelve Steps ... and at that time, he had no more trouble categorically dismissing Christian doctrine that I had in expounding it. We had quite different conceptions of "God" at that time (and we likely still do), yet we still had no problem at all in talking/learning about and practicing spiritual principles. Christians typically have plenty to say about that, of course, yet they never had anything helpful to suggest or offer back in the days when I was still coming to church drunk while yet looking for relief.

Personally, I ultimately began at the Hebrew experience of deliverance from bondage ... and here we all are now.

You're probably right about that last one. I try not to get any preconceived notions of what it IS, but we can draw some very general conclusions based on what is written about it.

It seems to me that, assuming that God is merciful, loving, and just, that He would instruct those who believe in Him to obey His commands to include how one may become rescued from sins only to take back His promise by forcing them to live an eternal existence with those who never believed contradicts His nature. I have no problem with welcoming sinners with open arms in heaven, because I'm a sinner myself. It just doesn't make sense that God would provide a path to salvation and suddenly change His mind to decide that what was done really wasn't that important anyway. If it isn't important, why bother creating salvation in the first place? And if so, why even bother as human beings to follow any kind of morality at all?

Further, if it was God that unbelievers rejected, why would God condemn them to an eternity in His presence? If they wanted all their lives to escape God, does it not make better sense that God would allow the same in the next life?

AND...

If God would allow you to live beyond His presence, beyond any provision for physical or spiritual needs, what kind of existence/non-existence would that be? Does it not make sense that whatever one's vision of heaven in the presence of God, the absence of God would be the polar opposite?

Because we're conditioned by nature to be moral, and it feels good to be moral and help others.

Did you really think you have moral standards because of God? No, it's because of who you are by nature.



What if I just want to rest in peace when I die. No heaven and no hell. If your god can't accept this, then f*ck him.

I do not make as many assumptions as you seem to be making there. In my own mind, not torturing people for eternity does not equate with/into forcing others to put up with them after having first been told they (the obedient) would be treated better. However, I would still personally have no complaint even if one of my own enemies ended up being assigned to my personal cloud and cluster of grapes. Like in the parable of the workers called to the field throughout the day, my own deal did/does not include how others will be paid.


In my own experience, only the preacher tries to point people toward heaven by trying to scare them away from hell.


Salvation might keep people from hell, but salvation still has a much higher purpose of its own.


For the same reason: a much higher purpose.


I do not speculate He would.


If you invite people to a party and some decide not to come, do you then punish them with something beyond having missed your party?


For me, that would be like "hell", whatever hell is.


Yes, it does ... and I suspect "eternal flames" are merely representative of that.

Last edited by leejosepho on 18 Apr 2011, 8:57 am, edited 1 time in total.

God managed to f**k up something as simple as giving me a working, functional vagina and uterus. I don't think I'll be following such an incompetent fool's plan for my life, particularly after the whole "Only a tiny fraction of my life has not involved torture, crippling guilt, self hate, depression or abuse" thing.

... then I suspect you are likely going to be greatly disappointed.

How did you come to believe that is/was His fault?

Cooooooooolll...

I don't. But if a god did exist, it would be the culprit.

If god dislikes evil but allows it, god is evil.
If god dislikes evil and stops it, why is there still evil?
If god dislikes evil but can't stop it, god is not omnipotent, violating the bible.
Give me bulls**t about freewill if you like, but even a mere mortal like myself can find ways to reduce suffering without influencing free will.

If the Christian god exists, it is the lowest of scum.
Why would I follow the whims of such a hideous, callous, immoral being?

Then why do you blame Him?

Why do you assume God is male?

I do not, and I am only trying to find out why someone is saying "God managed to f**k up something" even though s/he says it was not God's (His/Her/Its) fault.

I believe she meant that she cannot sensibly place blame on the imaginary. But if one subscribes to the idea that god created it all, then he is indeed responsible for whatever imperfection exists.