Comment by Richmond on March 15, 2011 at 4:43pm

Interesting.  There are more God-fearing people in Haiti then you can shake a stick at and look at what happened there.   So much for God looking after his people.

Comment by greengeekgirl on March 15, 2011 at 4:45pm

Stuff like this makes my teeth itch.  What I don't get is--why on earth would you love and worship a deity that is so cruel? Who gives us a choice and then punishes us so severely for choosing the wrong thing? If it were true, we would all be in therapy to battle this dysfunctional relationship.

 

Re: the "super moon" theory, maybe they think the "super moon" is God changing around things in the universe to punish us.. ha.

Comment by Richmond on March 15, 2011 at 4:49pm

Greengeekgirl if it does exist, which it doesn't, this diety is not held to high standards.  People who do believe spend their time begging for his help all the time.  They treat it as an abusive parent.  Spending all their time trying to gain favor all the while flinching hoping not to get beat.

Comment by Scarlette Blues on March 15, 2011 at 5:24pm

"Why on Earth would you love and worship a deity that is so cruel?"

That is something I cannot fathom. When I was a Christian, I only knew what I was told in church and by family. When you really get down to the dirty parts in the Bible, it is utterly unbelievable. I could not worship a god that give eternal punishment for simple acts. I surely wouldn't worship a deity who would take the lives of others in place of those who deserve the punishment.

 

@Richmond- I agree with you that Christians treat their god as an abusive parent. If a person was to commit the same acts seen in the Bible, there would be uproar from the Christian community condemning that person to hell.

 

There's just way too many contradictions in any religion.

Comment by Heather Spoonheim on March 16, 2011 at 12:04am

I think natural disasters are exactly the type of thing that gods were created for.  Passing through childhood, the world becomes less random as you learn the rules of your society.  Eventually you learn to take part in the development of these very rules and realize that someone had actually designed them to protect you.  It's only a natural desire, then, to want to apply this same process to your environment as well.  Imagining that there is another level, a level of deities, administering another level of rules removes the fear of living in a 'random' universe.  People call out to these deities, just like children calling out to parents.  - that was a wonderful concept for tens of thousands of years, but now we have science.  It will just take a little longer for people to embrace our new understanding of the rules.

Comment by Richmond on March 16, 2011 at 12:10am

heather I have always said that.  Religion was a logical way to deal with a world that was a total mystery.  How can this object, a child all of a sudden breathe?  Why is this person all of a sudden lifeless?  If I feed the lion god he won't eat me.  There is nothing more human than the Gods they invented to deal with the atrocities of life.  Why does the wind whistle?  Religion made all the sense in the world and in many ways and for many it still does.

Comment by Heather Spoonheim on March 16, 2011 at 12:25am

Yes, and in that way Deism isn't repugnant to me at all.  The problem comes with the conversion of Deism into Theism; The conversion of imagined ideas of how the universe works to into dogma.

Comment by Richmond on March 16, 2011 at 12:37am

Having said that religion makes sense to many, I still don't believe there is any supreme being.  To me Deism makes no more sense than Theism.

Comment by Heather Spoonheim on March 16, 2011 at 12:50am

Love doesn't make sense either.  Deism is really just a rather romantic notion, and in that there might be found some beauty.  I will admit, however, that although Deism lacks dogma, it is still guilty of being a form of emotional escapism - although likely less harmful than mood altering substance ingestion.

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