Please explain
Will Bill O’Reilly or anyone else who saw the hand of God in the safe landing of US Airways Flight 1549 this January please explain why God chose not to save Continental Connection Flight 3407, which plunged into a house outside of Buffalo last night, killing all 49 people on board and a resident on the ground?
Among the explanations which will not be accepted: “humans cannot possibly fathom God’s mysterious ways.” Oh yes they can, apparently—when something good happens. Having found proof of God’s love in the safe conclusion of US Airways Flight 1549, believers cannot now turn around and claim that God’s ways are veiled just because something disastrous happens. If it’s legitimate to infer beneficence from a happy outcome, it is equally plausible to infer malice or at least indifference from a negative outcome. You can’t pick and choose the actions in which you find God’s will transparent.
By the way, Jesus has a nice answer to your question if you are interested:
There were present at that season some that told him of the Galilaeans, whose blood Pilate had mingled with their sacrifices. And Jesus answering said unto them, Suppose ye that these Galilaeans were sinners above all the Galilaeans, because they suffered such things? I tell you, Nay: but, except ye repent, ye shall all likewise perish. Or those eighteen, upon whom the tower in Siloam fell, and slew them, think ye that they were sinners above all men that dwelt in Jerusalem? I tell you, Nay: but, except ye repent, ye shall all likewise perish. He spake also this parable; A certain [man] had a fig tree planted in his vineyard; and he came and sought fruit thereon, and found none. Then said he unto the dresser of his vineyard, Behold, these three years I come seeking fruit on this fig tree, and find none: cut it down; why cumbereth it the ground? And he answering said unto him, Lord, let it alone this year also, till I shall dig about it, and dung [it]: And if it bear fruit, [well]: and if not, [then] after that thou shalt cut it down. (Luke 13:1-9)
In other words, shit happens.
@Heather Mac Donald
I don’t know that prayer always involves the sort of attitude you suggest. A lot of believers pray for the purpose of seeking communion and connection to their God, rather than asking for things. Or for more ephemeral things such as forgiveness (from God) or strength to help them get through some event.
It’s just worth noting that there are all sorts of theological ideas about what prayer is and is supposed to achieve: praying to alter event on Earth is just one of these concepts. There might be good lines of criticism against them all, but they are probably not all subject to the same complaints.
Bad: Praying for divine forgiveness or personal strength still assumes a responsive God who interacts with human beings. The ubiquitous invocation “God bless America” is either meaningless boilerplate or else presumes that God can in fact confer protection and blessings on the country.
@Brian
You do realize that you haven’t answered, or even acknowledged, the actual questions at hand, do you?
@Heather Mac Donald
I quite agree. I’m just pointing out that not all of these things fall under the same attacks.
Strength is either unfalsifiable, or found in the act of prayer itself. And forgiveness isn’t even about responsiveness in this world.
@Brian
You do know that you can’t really take the Bible (especially the New testament) as evidence of what Jesus said and as “The Word of God”. Go take a college-level class on the testament, and then come back to this website.
Good men never rejoice at a tragedy, averted or not. But don’t we all understand the risks we take in modern everyday living? Behind the wheel of a car or behind the cockpit of a jet, we consensually take risks.
Is it God’s duty to prevent us from the possible consequences of our actions? Regardless of your theology, isn’t it a conservative notion that we are accountable for our decisions?
“. . . that’s when you begin to suspect divine intervention.” Devine intervention would mean that the birds went through the engines without so much as a bump, and the plane flew on undamaged. So, I guess God saved them to shake them up or what?
I once read part of a book that was given to me titled “When Bad Things Happen to Good People.” When I put the book away to never be opened again, I soon realized that someone should write a book called “When Good Things Happen to Bad People.”
I think they are stupid questions, hence my sarcastic response. Perhaps I should have preceded my reply with a . Would that have helped?
To Bad,
That should have said preceded my reply with a sarcasm note and ended it with a /sarcasm.
@Sean
Gee. You pegged me as a fundamentalist. How quaint.
Let me spell it out for you in simple terms that even you may understand: My point of quoting St. Luke’s Gospel is that this question is not unique to this age and its answer is not different either. Is that better?
By the way, should I go to the same university where you got your degree in etiquette?
@Kevembuangga
If I felt I could give the time I would quote written history all day with you giving you examples of what group killed another in the name of their belief system. It is not exclusive to Christians or any other group with or without an organized name to have a history of violence (Or continued).
I have no doubts in my Faith. I was pointing out that beyond Faith the only true way to know what is beyond this life is to move to the next.
Very well put. Faith is nothing but the blind leading the blind. A just God does not exist nor an unjust one. The only god is chance. Now stop worrying and go and smell a flower.
@AngryHank
I could give the time I would quote written history all day with you giving you examples of what group killed another in the name of their belief system
This is not what I meant, you didn’t read carefully enough.
This was the case of a senior churchman acting in office, who killed HIS OWN coreligionists (interspersed among others, bad luck…) relying on God mercy and insight to “sort them out”.
You may notice that Islamist suicide bombers also apply such a policy since they quite often blow up “good muslims” around beside the bomber himself.
BTW, if Heaven is such a lovely place and God “all goodness” why is death still such of problem for true believers?
@Brian
“I think they are stupid questions, hence my sarcastic response.”
Ah, to be three again, wherein it suffices to merely run around calling things “stupid” and thus avoid the necessity of reasoned thought or response.
lmao, this.
God, who is all knowing, all powerful and all good, just can’t stand those damn gays, can he? Did he screw up when making them, maybe?
Why, what is he going to do, must be something bad, because the sentence is definitely a threat. So god is capable of giving me pain and punishment now is he?
And I thought someone somewhere said he loves everyone, even if you turn your back on him.
Bloody hell, make up your minds x-tians…or better open your minds to the fact your religion reeks of contradictions.
Perhaps there was one on the plane which god wanted to smite, and since he has never mastered the art of the Surgical Strike he had to kill the many to get the one.
I heard that he only wanted to kill one person in the Great Flood, but as usual he screwed it up and took out almost everyone including all the innocent animals except a handful.
I recommend anger management courses God, or failing that FPS video games to improve your aim. Get it done asshole!
@Kevin
jesus said to peter, “peter go fetch me some beans” why didnt peter go fetch jesus beans? he had ADD
Let’s first prove god exists or… prove god doesn’t exist.
What’s the point of arguing until we know for sure ?
Those Jesus Freaks
Well, they’re friendly but
The shit they believe
Has got their minds all shut….
The Meek Shall Inherit Nothing
-Frank Zappa
@Laura
Hey Laura, who do you think created the devil?
I take it that you still believe in the tooth fairy
The other day in NYC, 3 people were killed by the wind in “freak accidents.” Two women were killed by falling tree limbs and one construction worker by a collapsed wall.
Why are low-probability events with bad outcomes called freak accidents and long-shot happy endings called “miracles?”
Isn’t it true that Jesus watches over us all, like a Good Shepard, keeping us safe from harm, until we’re fat enough to be butchered?
Heaven needs angels. How else is The Holy Spirit going to get us up to Heaven if we keep avoiding death?
Maybe it isn’t a miracle when you narrowly miss being smote by Yahweh. Maybe he just missed.
“Is God willing to prevent evil, but not able?
Then he is not omnipotent.
Is he able, but not willing?
Then he is malevolent.
Is he both able and willing?
Then whence cometh evil?
Is he neither able nor willing?
Then why call him God?”
Epicurus – Greek philosopher, BC 341-270
Let’s see if we can clear it up for you.
Why would God “tolerate evil”? For the same reason he separates the light from the darkness. One cannot appreciate one without the other. It is only by some experience with the nature of evil that one learns to appreciate the alternative offered by God. Thus evil is subordinated to his purpose. Part of the nature of God, as revealed by Christ, is mercy, so when people give thanks for having been spared a calamity they are simply acknowledging that their deliverance may have been a act of divine mercy, not definitively asserting that it was.
Answer. God does not miss.
Although God does not create bad things, he does have the power to stop them. There is a reason for our suffering and one of them is to remind us that this world is temporary. Our suffering is caused by being separated from God. For believers, we believe we will all join him in eternity and for those who don’t believe, they will be separated from God forever and the suffering we feel here on earth will be nothing compared to an eternity of complete separation from him. I think the burning in hell inferno is a term man came up with as a metaphor to describe an eternity without God in erms we can understand here on earth. Souls may or may not literally burn in hell, but that might be the only way we, as mortal humans, can imagine the suffering of being separated from God and all he created forever. If you don’t believe, your free will is being exercised and in the end, the way you spend eternity is in your hands.
It is utterly CHILDISH to think that God or the Universe or whatever else, personified or not, cares for puny humans stranded on a backyard planet in the middle of nowhere on a remote suburb of this peculiar galaxy.
Wake up you delusional morons.
No rhyme, no reason. So it goes.
Its the same kind of storys I use to read all the time in the newpapers down in Florida. A man would lose his wife, daughter, son and his legs in an accident on the interstate and then say God must have been riding with him that day – that’s why “he” is still alive. You could find story’s of this type all the time in the papers.
You guys have it all wrong. Because people are sinners, Satan made the plane crash and God had to let it happen in order to punish us……
Because there is no god; get over it. God was invented by early homonids who’d consumed psychedelic drugs like peyote and shrooms, which unlock the mind. Which is also why they’re illegal. The only legal drug, aside from tobacco which only causes addictiveness and death (I quit smoking on Feb 4th 2009 after starting when I went to college in the fall of 1995) is alcohol, which does not grow but is ‘fermented,’ that is, it is the result of rotting fruit. Alcohol makes you stupid, that’s why it’s the only legal drug. because the government doesn’t want you THINKING, they want you DRINKING.
You religitards baffle me, fighting to protect your stupidity.
@Kevin
If god really did exist as the majority imagines I’d kill myself
@Cat
I am one of those ’seperated from god’…it was a messy divorce, but I am over it now. After the way god treated me for so many years, and with all my friends telling to just leave him…I finally did it – and I haven’t looked back!
@Jane
Atheists- Winning since 33 A.D.
Haha, that was at the bottom of the poster, I had to add it.
And Phil E. Drifter, you are my hero. I couldn’t agree more with you!
@pat harwin
Atheists aren’t proclaiming that this somehow makes me evil. They are merely saying that there’s no purpose to assigning me to either of the plane crashes, because I don’t exist.
and they make a good point.
@Machine Gun
Well, then, tell me what was before god…
@hanmeng
Werent religious enough! That BS!! Religion is for people that cant think for theirselves and need to feel special and fit in
RE: Comment by Laura #24:
“I’m a believer and believe that God does not create evil. There are tragedies that occur that are out of our control. God does not make them happen.”
Perhaps you should read these passages from your “holy” book.
Lam 3:38/
Out of the mouth of the most High proceedeth not evil and good?
Amos 3:6/
Shall a trumpet be blown in the city, and the people not be afraid? shall there be evil in a city, and the LORD hath not done it?
Is 45:7/
I form the light, and create darkness: I make peace, and create evil: I the LORD do all these things.
Want to rethink your comment now over your silly superstitious beliefs?
If people actually read their own mystic books they would soon realize for themselves just how idiotic their childish beliefs are.
Shopped. I can tell by the pixels.
It’s so comforting to feel god’s love… to bad it’s all in your head. There’s absolutely no proof of any supreme being. That’s reality folks. Not wishful thinking or superstition AKA religion. Once again s Derb has written, “If god exists, he may as well not.”
They didn’t have time to pray and besides they were probably all gay abortionist drug using atheists.
Not sure how crashing a plane into the water could be considered anything other than a great loss.
Heather Mac Donald: Among the explanations which will not be accepted: “humans cannot possibly fathom God’s mysterious ways.” Oh yes they can, apparently—when something good happens.
It’s beyond human comprehension. The Bible does say blessing is reserved for believers. Something good happening may not be God’s will, but His permissive will. Why do the wicked prosper? It isn’t God’s will. To believe something good that happens is God’s will is also presumptive.
Scott: After the way god treated me for so many years
What did God do to you?
Jeus’s weapon was “thunder”
Similarly modern day Gods use “birds” and shoot them at Plane’s Engine
I just find it completely fascinating that US Airways is applauded for their crash landing… and the pilot celebrated.. for doing.. HIS JOB. They are, after all, specifically trained to deal with the situations that may arise while in the air. Congratulations to him for paying attention in pilot school, and taking special note in doing the right thing. It’s just really grating to see everyone reward a staff so blindly over doing what they’re supposed to.
Atoms, friends. Atoms and quarks and elements.
If there is a God, he does not care about us. At best, he created us and left us. These two plane crashes just happened to end the way they did. You all will believe the way you do. Do not waste your time arguing with each other.
Wow…..
no wonder the rest of the world hates americans.
Obviously, the plane that landed on the Hudson was touched by the Flying Spaghetti Monster’s Noodly Appendage. Anyone can see that. If you don’t believe this, then you will miss out on the beer volcano when your soul departs this Earthly plane.
@Kafir
I’m with Kafir, God wanted to punish the guy in the house and, unfortunately for the people on the plane, it was the closest thing at hand.
“It’s just really grating to see everyone reward a staff so blindly over doing what they’re supposed to.”
We’ve become so conditioned to expect incompetence that, when confronted with an example of competence exercised in a way that we approve of, it seems almost heroic.
The correct answer is: There is no God.
HERE HERE. I couldn’t have said it better myself. These stupid logical fallacies have been what is continually perpetuating religious beliefs.
@leo
You’re not being serious are you?
Im with steve
I seems clear that many of you are taking this as a joke. But in reality those people have died and their families are devastated. I am from buffalo and my father had a ticket on that flight but ended up switching to an earlier flight amazingly. My views on God are not very strong because I don’t necessarily understand religion, but if God exists- that day was when he existed to me.
@Machine Gun
If your answer is god created the Big Bang, then you will end up in the endless loop of:
- who created god?
- god wasn’t created, god was the beginning.
then one bright dude might say, well Big Bang wasn’t created! Big Bang was the beginning. You call it god, I call it Big Bang! At least I’m not claiming that Big Bang secretly talked to a messenger and told him to go tell everybody else …
J, for what it’s worth, I think that everyone here understands that this really was a terrible thing. The very fact of its terrible-ness is what all of the joking is drawing on – some see it as absurd, and comical in a rather morbid way, that there are people who can see the hand of an all-loving God in the fact that, sometimes, people don’t die in plane crashes.
I don’t think anyone means to make light of the deaths of these people; the humor is found in the beliefs of certain other people. The comedy is in imputing horrific but absurd beliefs (“God wanted to punish the guy in the house…”) to certain Christians as the logical result of their way of thinking about plane crashes that don’t kill people. In many ways, the jokes are meant to point out that the joker is the one that actually understands the tragedy here, whereas the religious explanation doesn’t confront it directly.
@Machine Gun
What a stupid remark. Of course there are atheists in foxholes (http://www.atheistfoxholes.org/).
@Kevin
Ahahaha. I like this one.
To be absolutely honest, though, I find this reason to be the main flaw of religion. There seems to be little logic in believing in an invisible man who kills and saves at will, yet claims to be all-loving etc.
This thread simply makes me laugh. The fact that every single person who is completely ignorant to the idea of God’s existence or non-existence has something posted on here is so entertaining. God, with the assumption that God exists, does not have an omnipotent hand in every act that is ever carried out on Earth. It is very possible that it all came down to the circumstances of the two crashes. One pilot was able to make something of it, while the other pilot just did not have the experience or maybe even the ability to fully control the airplane enough to bring it down somewhat safely. If God did have a hand in both situations or even just one. The reasoning would, more then likely, go beyond anything any of us could comprehend, even if we were told.
Good job missing the point, buddy.
just to clarify the big bang thing. (it is not actually certain, just the theory with the most evidence). think of a set of numbers that has one way in which they continue. we don’t know what this is yet. However we can make guesses as to which number comes next and we can make logical guesses at which numbers came before. We can make guesses at when this sequence began (if it ever did). Making logical guesses based on what we see. Not all of them will be right, only one or two, but if we keep them all open to query we will find one that works eventually. But suppose someone says that the first number was in fact ‘a’ a letter, not a number at all, not even from the same realm as numbers, and proclaims it is the start because the number they see at that time makes them think of the letter ‘a’. They also decide they are right and that all other ideas preceding it (or even succeeding it) are wrong. This logic is flawed. If you can’t see why, then i have no means of helping you
Simple, There is no god.. He wouldnt have allowed 9/11
J writes:
I am from buffalo and my father had a ticket on that flight but ended up switching to an earlier flight amazingly. My views on God are not very strong because I don’t necessarily understand religion, but if God exists- that day was when he existed to me.
With all respect to J, what I remain puzzled by is the following, which is true of all such claims of God’s intervention: If God kept your father off that plane; if you attribute your father’s extraordinary good luck to God’s concern for him–and I am sure that your father would deserve the solicitude of any humane God–why didn’t God keep the other passengers off the plane as well, since they were also wonderful people whose loss has devastated their families and friends? If you say that you can’t understand this, then it seems to me that you or anyone else also have little reason to attribute a positive outcome to God.
I wonder if the proprietors of this site are satisfied having generated comment threads like the one above. Is this what you intended to elicit from us conservatives? A gang blog to make public our private doubts about faith? To what end? To let off some steam?
The post that caused this bumper crop of snark was as simple-minded as the straw man Ms. Mac Donald invokes. You spend your energy battling superficial notions generated by tabloid TV show hosts, notions held close to the heart of those without the wit to represent their inherited position in the ancient debate of theodicy, and yet notions that provide comfort to many. To what end? Are you satisfied with your yield?
This “Secular Right” niche, and the aggressive impulse that launched this site, will likely fade into the thrice-removed nihilism that provided its initial enthusiasm. I get it — you thought you needed a pressure valve. You wanted a place to let loose your frustrations. Welcome to the internet. But your arguments are thin. They’ve been asked and answered, insofar as they can be, by superior minds whose work you are not sufficiently acquainted with. At least that’s my presumption. Why don’t you redirect your frustrated energies to study instead? Isn’t that what conservatives are supposed to? Look to the past, the best that has been thought and said? Rather than Bill O’Reilly?
For the man on the street to presume that God took a hand in affecting a good outcome is the same as expressing, “God is good.” For someone to presume God was absent in the causation of a bad event is like saying, “God is good.” How clever to emphasize the inconsistency. How dishonest to discount the principle animating the inconsistency.
But what if God isn’t good? What if he doesn’t exist at all! You haven’t even mastered the intricacies of such existential mysteries. What do you expect the man on the street to do with them? What is the point of spreading your peculiar confusions to the likes of Bill O’Reilly’s audience? I mean, maybe there are good reasons to make every Tom, Dick, and Harry deeply conversant in theological controversies — but was that really your mission in starting this blog?
I am a conservative who appreciates that people who otherwise cannot express their ineffable gratitude for the good persist expressing their gratitude in simple enough ways for Ms. Mac Donald to logically dissect in a blog post. This whole niche movement is vicious.
“Always be ready to give a defense to everyone who asks you a reason for the hope that is in you.” The great religious traditions give everyone a defense, no matter what his reasoning capacity, even if it comes out as, “Just because!” or “‘cuz God says so!” If you are satisfied dueling with the Just Because crowd, your entire effort here is in vain. But know that their Just Becauses are backed by centuries and millennia of rather brilliant, accumulative wisdom that swallows up this “SecularRight.org” twaddle like an acid droplet in the ocean.
I saw God’s hand in both flights. I also saw human volition, human weakness and human virtue. That is the tragic condition we all inherit in relation to all things, both tragic and heroic, on this mortal coil. Goes with the fabric of our being. I’m sorry that Ms. Mac Donald will “not … accept[]” those of us who attempt to “fathom God’s mysterious ways” in fear and trembling. I can only presume her fathoming of the infinite is a more pleasant and more successful experience than mine (and most of the world’s) has been.