Will definitely be looking through these as this is a daily if not hourly struggle for me. I do believe that suffering can be eliminated- what is blocking it is god’s unwillingness to remove it. If god created everything and wrote the whole story before the beginning of time then everything unpleasant that happens in the world is intentionally scripted by god, and if god is all powerful he can make the world a realm of pleasure and euphoria. The fact that he doesn’t shows me that god is in fact an evil entity who hates humanity.
Even the “benefits” of suffering only exist BECAUSE of suffering. Compassion means sitting with another in our impotence to fix a problem- remove bad things and there is no need for compassion.
This is a really interesting perspective. I went through a period of time where I thought that God either A.) didn't care about our suffering or, more likely, B.) didn't exist, because I was suffering A LOT. One thought experiment that started to change my mind was to try and imagine myself as God, eliminating all the worst things: no more cancer, genocide, rape, child abuse, etc. But once those things were eliminated, wouldn't something else just become the worst thing? Like if there's no cancer, maybe we start treating diabetes as the worst thing?
Anyway, I don't know if that's helpful or even if you're looking for alternate view points, but if you are interested in this topic, I found the book really helpful. Thanks for sharing your ideas!
I missed this installment! I am totally on board for a month of discussing suffering! Lol! I also believed that being a good Christian avoid could suffering. I remember after my first miscarriage I was devastated because we had being trying a long time and I thought that was the suffering I was enduring to refine my faith. Gosh some of the ideas I was taught were so messed up looking back. I definitely doubled down on declaring God as good, I avoid/deny as long as I could. It was only the beginning of suffering that nearly pushed my mental health to breaking but the church teaching 100% made it worse. Sorry for the long response- it's pretty therapeutic to write this out!!!
Please, write away! That's what the comments are for! That's really interesting what you said about believing a good Christian could avoid suffering. I think a lot of churches make fun of the prosperity gospel while also touting a watered-down version of it, like if you pray hard enough or avoid sinning, God will give you victory over all your problems. Finding out that's not true is such a harsh wake up call.
Will definitely be looking through these as this is a daily if not hourly struggle for me. I do believe that suffering can be eliminated- what is blocking it is god’s unwillingness to remove it. If god created everything and wrote the whole story before the beginning of time then everything unpleasant that happens in the world is intentionally scripted by god, and if god is all powerful he can make the world a realm of pleasure and euphoria. The fact that he doesn’t shows me that god is in fact an evil entity who hates humanity.
Even the “benefits” of suffering only exist BECAUSE of suffering. Compassion means sitting with another in our impotence to fix a problem- remove bad things and there is no need for compassion.
This is a really interesting perspective. I went through a period of time where I thought that God either A.) didn't care about our suffering or, more likely, B.) didn't exist, because I was suffering A LOT. One thought experiment that started to change my mind was to try and imagine myself as God, eliminating all the worst things: no more cancer, genocide, rape, child abuse, etc. But once those things were eliminated, wouldn't something else just become the worst thing? Like if there's no cancer, maybe we start treating diabetes as the worst thing?
Anyway, I don't know if that's helpful or even if you're looking for alternate view points, but if you are interested in this topic, I found the book really helpful. Thanks for sharing your ideas!
I missed this installment! I am totally on board for a month of discussing suffering! Lol! I also believed that being a good Christian avoid could suffering. I remember after my first miscarriage I was devastated because we had being trying a long time and I thought that was the suffering I was enduring to refine my faith. Gosh some of the ideas I was taught were so messed up looking back. I definitely doubled down on declaring God as good, I avoid/deny as long as I could. It was only the beginning of suffering that nearly pushed my mental health to breaking but the church teaching 100% made it worse. Sorry for the long response- it's pretty therapeutic to write this out!!!
Please, write away! That's what the comments are for! That's really interesting what you said about believing a good Christian could avoid suffering. I think a lot of churches make fun of the prosperity gospel while also touting a watered-down version of it, like if you pray hard enough or avoid sinning, God will give you victory over all your problems. Finding out that's not true is such a harsh wake up call.