What do you think about Satan being allowed to influence?
Especially for the Christians on here, what do you think about Satan being allowed to influence and pervert outcomes of scenarios in our world? And also, that God just allows him to have his way for now instead of just destroying him or intervening to prevent him from influencing specific things in the first place? I mean, its one thing when you have something that is destroyed and there is insurance for it or it is repairable, but the bad stuff that Satan influences are irreversible and its too late to remove the damage. I grew up with parents who were Catholic but I started to question since I was a teenager.
I also want to know how Christians have the strength to be able to reconcile this scenario and the sadness and suffering felt from it with a God that is loving. The thing I gather is that God defines himself as good by definition, so he can pretty much act or not act however he wants to us and it doesn't matter how troubling our emotions are about it, our own emotions and our own logic standard don't matter to him.
Watch the last season of "The Good Place."
It highlights the need for tension factors in the human existence.
God gave humans free will. He is not responsible for the evils in the world simply because he does not stop them. I do, however, believe that prayer can mitigate them.
And then there is the whole big picture thing, where we don't always realize that what seems good is actually bad, and vice-a-versa. And so on.
_________________
Mom to an amazing young adult AS son, plus an also amazing non-AS daughter. Most likely part of the "Broader Autism Phenotype" (some traits).
"Chicago-area prodigy Akiane Kramarik made a name for herself
in the art world at just 8 years old when her painting of Jesus launched her career;"
However, She Painted the Green Eyed Kenny Loggins Version of Jesus Who Never Existed in 'Real Life.'
In Fact, It's an Artistic Tradition of Artists Painting Jesus to Mirror What The Artists Look Like.
Leonardo Da Vinci Was Reported to Wear His Hair Eccentrically Long in His Day Where
That Was Against the Tradition of Male Hair Styles Same as Long Hair for Males
Was Considered A Travesty for Males in the So-Called Days of Jesus Even
As Reported in the Bible; However, That Didn't Stop the 'Last Supper'
From Having A Jesus With Long Hair and European Fair Skin
Like Michelangelo Either; So, What Does this Have to Do with
"What Do You Think About Satan Being Allowed to Influence?"
Well, First oF ALL, iT's Worth Noting That Satan is Mostly Described
As Adversary in Many Parts of the Bible and by Jewish Tradition
More of An Accuser; The Horned Beast With A Tail is Generated By
Artists 'Liberally' Using Their Talents Using Pre-Recorded So-Called
'Pagan' Traditions Well Before Christianity that Depicted A Horned Tailed Beast That Way;
True, Humans in Their Rise to Apex Creature Only Through the Use of Tools Co-Created Were
Digested By More Than One Beast Before We Conquered Our "Superior's" ThiS Way With Tools We Co-Create.
And Of Course Those Tools Include Words; Those Tools Include ARTiFacts We Still Create in Ways of
Elevating Life and Death As Severe As Fears Of Nuclear Holocaust; Speaking of that i Had A Dream
of Darkness Last Night About Holocaust; And i only Woke Up Out of that Darkness God Yes Appreciating
Every Gift of This Existence Even More Real; Namely Love The Most As True i Lost the Ability of Feeling
That And Even the Feeling if i Ever Smiled in A Real Hell Within for 66 Months; And Speaking
Of Heaven (The Living Party or After Death Party) That Depends on Who is Doing the Sermon
or Homily At Church on Sunday or Whoever the Next Person You Chat With in the Pew Next to
You Has a Unique And at Least Slightly Different View too; As True in The Catholic Church i am
Raised in Before And Now Study as An Anthropology Participant Observer As Truly We
All Do Life This Way Day-to-Day As Life is Always A Changing Subject to Study Every
Breath This Way; Anyway, i Visit That Church Every Weekend And Yes Study it and
Take Detailed Free Verse Poetic Notes For the Last 109 Months; Currently, We Have A
Very Literal Thinking Head Priest From my Hometown Directing the Parish and A Haitian Very
Verily Metaphorically Thinking Priest Who Is Afforded only A Few Homilies to Bring likely Because
of His Thick Accent And Difficulty Some Folks Have Understanding Him And That's Not Really Surprising
As His View of Heaven is the Kingdom of God Within As Propagated By Luke 17:21 as Not 'Lo Over There'
Yet Within New Only Eternally Now to Seek and Find For Real; It's Easy to Feel and Sense A Mystical Experience
The Haitian Priest Ascends and Transcends the Ego Word Chatter Part of the Mind As He Presents A Celebration
of Mass; Indeed He Becomes An Essence of Deep Biblical Metaphors of Parables that Describe the Story of Jesus; As
Of Course That is A Cross-Cultural Experience that No One Religion or One Human Owns in Either Tradition Or Cover
Bound Book;
On The Other Hand,
The Literal Thinking
More Left Hemisphere Mind
Restricted Head Priest Literally
Believes the Stories of the Bible Actually
Happened and Has Much Difficulty it Seems
Understanding the Essence of the Mythological
Stories That Are Only Vehicles and Vessels of Metaphors
in Form That House Potential Much Deeper Mystical Meanings
Of Integration of DarK And LiGHT to Gain A Universal Faith of Love For All That Exists New Now
Where We Do the Verb of God is Love Creating This Reality of Co-Creation That Becomes Ours
Inhaling Peace Exhaling LoVE iN JoY oF LiGHT For ALL With Least Harm Giving Sharing Yes
Caring Healing ThiS Way
Where Love the Enemy
Means Love the Dark
Love The Night
Where Our Blindness
Allows Us to See Deeper
Within Than Organs of Eyes
And Ears Ever See and Hear Alone;
Indeed, Marry the Night Merry the Day
As Night Becomes Day And DarK Becomes LiGHT;
Love The Adversary of DarK Becomes LiGHT As Dear
Lord You Don't Have to Read A Bible to 'See' 'God' Within
Just Embrace the DarK NoW and Understand WHeRE LiGHT Comes From Newly Now;
Yes, True, Ironically It's Our Ego Our Word Thinking Mind That Believes it Must
Constrain Wind in A Jar And Control it Taking The Freedom of Spirit Away
in A Restricted Prison as Small as an 800,000 Word or So Cover Bound Book
That Insists it has the Last Word of 'God' No Different than the Quran And Other
Ego Based Religions that Makes God a Toxic Patriarchal 'He' Without Art For HeART
Without ART For 'sm'ART That Basically Brings A 'Sado-Masochistic' Flavored Religion
That Ironically Also So Much Reflects the Old Testament God; Yuck, 'the Color of Orange' in
Metaphor of Every Demagogue With Selfish Ego and Little Empathy And Compassion Relating
Joy May Be Found in Dashing the Little Children's Heads of Opposing Adversarial Tribes With Stones
Stone
Cold
Dead;
True On the Other NT Versus
OT Hand, They (We) LEarn How
to Marry the Night; Yes, Merry
The Day And Love the Enemy
Realizing that 'Satan' Creates God
As Much As 'Jesus' Does As DarK Will Become LiGHT As Adversaries SPRinG NeW
Dreams iN LiGHT iN FRUiTioN THiS WaY Indeed When We Learn to Actually Marry the Night
and Merry The Day Integrating Our Shadows With Our LiGHT As Without Shadow There is no Us
Without LiGHT There is No Us Without Sunshine There is No Us at Best Like The
Sun We Shine
On All The
DarK And LiGHT
Lest We Become
'Satan' Separated From LiGHT...
Yet You See i am Yet only One
View in the Wilderness of Human
Beings; Only One Set of EYes of God
in A Pew of Life Just Like All The Rest
And The Reason(S) Artists Portray Jesus in their
Own Likeness The Way they Do is the Same Reason
Most Every Person in Every Pew of All 45,000+ Global Christian Denominations
That and Who Paint Jesus And God And Love And Satan And All That Exists At
Least A Bit Different Depending on Who We Relate These Differences with Next...
So In Other WORDS,
if Jesus Returns
It's Gonna Have to Be
'You' As You Are Likely Gonna
Be The Only One Who is Gonna
Completely Agree of Who Jesus is And
The Same Applies to God And Satan And Love too
And Most Every Other Metaphor Humans Create
Solo And ToGeTHeR too as Basically All of Life
Is A 'Rorschach Test'
That as Neuroscience
Even Shows We Basically
Create as An Hallucination
of Existence Based on Hallucinations Before
That Only Approximate What Reality is Within
As Our Minds Continue to Co-Create Reality ThiS Way...
Truly Good News is We Have the Ability to Do A God of
Love For All With
Least Harm...
That's Naked
Enough Whole
Complete Enough for me
at least...
And on the Other Hand
my Metaphorical Thinking
More Right Hemisphere Focused
FRiEnDS uNDeRSTaND EVery Word
i Just Wrote; And Those Who Are
Most Restricted to A Literal More
Left Hemisphere Controlling Black
And White Mind May Understand Almost
Nothing of What i Wrote Before Here; Yet You See
DarK Makes LiGHT, Understanding This Requirement
of the Precipice of Hell and Heaven For the Most Potential
of Creativity There is Rarely A Day i Do Not Marry The Night and Merry The Day ThiS Way
We Need Anchors And Sails in Life; It's True It's The Tension Between DarK And LiGHT
That Makes
Creation
Possible at
All; Even According
to Atheist Scientists
Who Believe Everything LiGHT
Comes From Nothing DarK As
Even William Shatner Admitted
His Trip Out in the BLack of Space
Was His Greatest Grief in Not Previously More Fully Loving
"The Overview Effect" in Big Picture Right Hemisphere Ways
Appreciating This Real so Very Rare HeaveN ON EartH New Now;
Meanwhile, Elon Musk Wants to Colonize Mars What A 'Fool' And
'Tool' That Man is in Ignorance of Not Understanding The ONLY
REAL FULL Value Down Here As We aRe Only Birthed By
ThiS ONE EartH Only Sharing 'The Generalities' of the
Rest of Existence 'Up There' in The DarK With So
Many Hot And Cold Rocks;
i've Been to the
Void Within; Yes,
i've 'Danced With
The Devil in the
Pale Moonlight'
Like Shatner
Finally Really
Did too Yes
i Married that
Void And Now
The Night is Day So MerrY iN DeeD
As i Dance And Sing As The Wind Free SPiRiTinG HeaRT
SoUL Always New CoLoRinG NoW Never Trapped in Someone
Else's Pre-Made Jar...
iN A Word
AS Small
aS ONly
3 LetterS iNDeeD
iN True False Idol Worship That Way...
Again in Only my View And What THiS Truly
Means is While We aRE All Children of God We
aRe ALso All Only Children of God Too With Different Views
More Than Likely THiS iS WaY God Explodes Now And Then
Being
The
SaMe
With No
Change Truly 'Blows'...
And Is Very Lonely in Hell For Real...
True Been There And Already Did 'AGHOGDAY'
Just An Acronym For "Another Ground Hog Day"
in Billy
Murray
Style Forever
Now Yet Then in Hell...
Meh, Life iS A VEry BesTesT
Teacher And Bible For Real...
my Other MoraL oF A STory HeaR
is Don't Eat A Plate Full Of Mexican
Restaurant Left-Overs With A Ton of Salsa
Before You Go to Bed, if You Don't Wanna Have
Nuclear
Holocaust
Nightmares;
'God' Help Us;
Hope it Wasn't
Another God Damned
DarK Prophecy Dream STiLL
to Come True iN FRUiTioN;
True, The Odds of that Happening
Are not Nearly As Remote Now...
And Basically
That's What REAL Prophecies
Are aS Our Thinking Minds Real
Constitute About Half A Percent
of All of Who We Are according to
Science in the Deeper Parts Indeed We
Calculate Much
Larger
Pictures
to Both
Rise and Fall For Real;
Sort of Like Knowing You
Must Get Up at 6 AM And Without An Alarm Clock
And in the Total DarK of MinD Arriving Awake 'Right
On TiMe'...
As Once
Again Predictably
Night Generates Day..
Other Than That Most Any Northern
European In Origin Dude With A Beard
Might Pass For an
Illustration
Of Modern Jesus
Hehe Even me
Wearing A Beard
At Age 22 At the
Head of A Picture
of A Bay Bridge Race of Life Then too
Yet That Was 77 Pounds Ago at 170 Pounds And i No Longer
Nearly Look As Much Like 'A Slender Woman With A Beard' Hehe
And True THere is Not Nearly As Much Left of my Hair HAha; And Yes,
Here's Another 'Thing' About 'Sacred Text;' Humor is Mostly Generated
By the Right Hemisphere Parts of Our Mind According to Stellar
Scholar Iain McGilchrist And Other Modern Researchers too;
If You
Find Sacred Text
Without Humor
It May Be
Missing
Almost
Half of 'God Mind' Within;
And Other Than That i Can And Do
Make A 'Devil Face' That Would Verily
Scare 'Jack Nicholson' 'Dancing in the Pale Moonlight;'
It's Too Close to Halloween; i Don't wanna Scare Anyone Yet, HeaR..
_________________
KATiE MiA FredericK!iI
Gravatar is one of the coolest things ever!! !
http://en.gravatar.com/katiemiafrederick
Well for starters I tend to prefer evidence-based ideas about the nature of the world ahead of faith-based ideas. But I appreciate that you were asking within a Christian context.
I think the problem of evil makes it difficult to seriously entertain an omnipotent, omnibenevolent God. If a deity exists, it is either not all-loving, or not all-powerful.
I don't think God continuing to allow the Devil's existence is any more problematic than allowing, say, Josef Stalin's existence. Or, for that matter, the existence of literally any creature that is liable to hurt another.
I've said it once, and I'll say it again. God will always be more 'evil' than Satan in my opinion.
Christians used to burn people alive just for not belonging to their religion or for being suspected of witchcraft. I could go on forever about the cruel things God's worshippers have been doing for centuries but why bother when I know it always falls on deaf ears...
It appears satanists are atheists who believe there is mysterious supernatural powers operating in the universe.
So a satanist will say there is no god no devil no commandments from higher up do what you like and f**k everyone else, to put it simply.
I should imagine a satanist world would be very unpleasant especially for many of us disabled people that rely on the good will of society.
It appears to be unofficially the fastest growing religion given what I said above. I suspect many elite figures have a satanist approach to life.
Didn’t they say the greatest trick the devil pulled was making people think he didn’t exist?
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Church_of_Satan
_________________
"The reasonable man adapts himself to the world; the unreasonable one persists in trying to adapt the world to himself. Therefore all progress depends upon the unreasonable man."
- George Bernie Shaw
The only proof of satan existing that i can think of is the mark of the beast.
in the bible it says that people will need a mark on their hand or forehead to buy or sell.
we already have contactless and if someone had a barcode tattooed on them they could use it to buy & sell, or if they had an implantable microchip.
So if that starts to become a reality you know the devil is real.
techstepgenr8tion
Veteran
Joined: 6 Feb 2005
Age: 44
Gender: Male
Posts: 24,149
Location: 28th Path of Tzaddi
The term I think they're reaching for is 'Darwinian evolution', or ripping that down to it's constituent incentives and actions they're talking about the landscape of what are referred to as 'multipolar traps'.
Multipolar traps, 'Moloch', that pretty much covers it for me. There could be transpersonal parasites doing damage as well but they're just further utilization of the same principles.
_________________
“Love takes off the masks that we fear we cannot live without and know we cannot live within. I use the word "love" here not merely in the personal sense but as a state of being, or a state of grace - not in the infantile American sense of being made happy but in the tough and universal sense of quest and daring and growth.” - James Baldwin
if you are going to follow christianity at least look at it through the lens of the gnostics.
To the initiated, the nature of christ, the holy spirit, satan and god the father is within us all. They are just manifestations of our own nature. To understand the allegories in the bible takes your mind to some place of understanding and makes you a gnostic initiate (basically able to say you have gnosis or knowledge)
The satanic nature of humans is allowed to blossom, it is happening now, it has happened before and it will happen again.
To the initiated, the nature of christ, the holy spirit, satan and god the father is within us all. They are just manifestations of our own nature. To understand the allegories in the bible takes your mind to some place of understanding and makes you a gnostic initiate (basically able to say you have gnosis or knowledge)
The satanic nature of humans is allowed to blossom, it is happening now, it has happened before and it will happen again.
But then you say Jesus going on the cross is just an allegory...so then you dont believe
believing is all you have to do to get salvation.
A Free Spiriting Winging Visitor
Coming to my Sister's Home Deep
in A Forest And Real Garden of Eden
Next Door Yes Returning Now For 4 Years
to Spend October Through April Reliably Within
A Few Days of Return And Exit in A Life Span on
Average of 5 to 6 Years As She Also Reliably Feeds
The Hermit Thrush Bird She Names Herman Every Single
Day A Diet or Raisins Through The Course of Herman's Entire
6 Month Staycation At Her Home Again Deep in The Forest Next
Door to Our Real Garden of Eden too As Amazingly the Hermit Thrush
Travels Thousands of Miles to Return to the Same Home Each Year For
Four Years Now And What i Find So Sad Is Humans Who Believe They Must
Have Some Kind of Instruction and Lesson Book to Find 'God' When Yes That
Same Book Once Again As i've Already Clearly Identified Says The Only Place One
Will Find the Kingdom of God And Heaven is By Seeking And Finding This Real Place Within
And No WHere
Else Yet the
Temple of Our
Body that Truly
Houses This Free
SPiRiTiNG Innate
Instinctual Intuitive
Way of Inhaling Peace
Exhaling Love At Best Giving
Sharing Caring Healing For All
With Least Harm iN JoY oF LiGHT
Where Life Becomes A Staycation of Love
Real After All is Dancing And Singing God Is Love THiS Way For
Real This Greatest Force of Breath We Deliver to Others Free Truly
Yet Like the Story of Buddha Suggests Don't Bow to 'me' Don't Worship
'me' Rise Up Find God Within Yourself Like the Story of Jesus Per Luke 17:21 Relates
too and Don't Let Works of Jesus or Buddha or Lao Tzu Be Enough Like John 14:12 Dances
Sings Do Greater Works of LoVE iN Peace Than Jesus, Buddha, And Lao Tzu in Balancing Force of
Peaceful FLoWinG LoVE
And Wings
Will Be Yours
of Love to Fly Freer Higher
FRiEnDS With Gravity Indeed
Same Way Herman Does Life too
He finds His Way to A Home of Love
That Feeds Him Free Every Year Without
A Single Word of A Book To Find Nature of 'God' For Real...
Meanwhile Many So Called Christians Have a Book And a Revelation
That Describes an Adversary That Reflects The New Christian 'Mr. T'
Yes to A 'T' INdeed All 'Orange Flavored' And Sick When it Comes to
Anything Related
to Empathy,
Compassion,
And Love, And Truly
A Father oF All Lies For Real
And More Than Likely This Is Why Jesus in A Desert
Sought Out God Within To Become FRiEnDS
With the Adversary Shadow Within True too
Per Story at Least as Basically When Folks Try
To Fit the Nature of God that is the God of Nature
in A Book Those Abstract Constructs Inevitably
Are Twisted as Metaphors for the Next
Demagogue to Rule the 'Masses'
Who Have Become Verily Too
Ignorant By 'Pills of Books'
To Find Real God Within Nature
Naked Enough Whole Complete
Like Herman the Hermit Thrush of Course...
Salvation according to the Christian Religion
Means Being Saved From Missing the Mark
in Sin and Death Yet You See for Those Who
Have Truly Witnessed Enough Suffering in Life
Or Endured it Themselves They Understand The True
Blessing of Life And The Sacrament of Mercy Death Truly Is As
Much of A Gift
As Birth is For Life
So Meanwhile Folks Look to
Heaven in A Dirt Nap And Sadly
In So Many Cases Are Deterred From
Ever Truly Living in Peace And LoVE iN THiS LiFE
As They Separate Themselves From Nature Their Nature
And The Nature of Peace and Love of Others Globally True
As They Attempt to Own
Love in One God And One
Man And One Word Alone
And they Tend to Forget
That God is A Four Letter Word
For All With No Exceptions Free
As A Wing on A Bird Without A God Damned
Word Spirit of Love With Wings More Than Enough to Free...
A Worst Kind of Hell is the One That An Adversary Brings to
Subjugate Control And Master the Freedoms of Others in A World's Biggest
Lie That
the Kingdom
of Heaven and
And God is Anywhere
Else True Yet Newly Now Within our
Temples of God Nature With Wings or Not...
A Real God May Be Identified As Love As Long As It is Not A False God Indeed...
_________________
KATiE MiA FredericK!iI
Gravatar is one of the coolest things ever!! !
http://en.gravatar.com/katiemiafrederick
So a satanist will say there is no god no devil no commandments from higher up do what you like and f**k everyone else, to put it simply.
I should imagine a satanist world would be very unpleasant especially for many of us disabled people that rely on the good will of society.
It appears to be unofficially the fastest growing religion given what I said above. I suspect many elite figures have a satanist approach to life.
Didn’t they say the greatest trick the devil pulled was making people think he didn’t exist?
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Church_of_Satan
I know you’re deliberately simplifying but I want to pick up on a few things.
Firstly, Satanists don’t believe in supernatural forces. Satan is understood as a metaphor for natural processes like entropy and instinct.
Secondly, Satanists are not avaritionists who advocate for living a life of pure self-indulgence and self-preservation. They advocate for kindness to the kind and help for those who deserve it. I feel that’s unduly cynical (who can tell who “deserves” help?) but it’s a long way from “I’ve got mine”.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Church_of_Satan
You've described the Church of Satan's belief system. There are other kinds of Satanism too. See, for example, the Wikipedia article on Satanism.
These days the most energetic form of Satanism seems to be the Satanic Temple, which also is atheistic but otherwise has a very different worldview from the Church of Satan.
_________________
- Autistic in NYC - Resources and new ideas for the autistic adult community in the New York City metro area.
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