Originally posted by Alliance
More Americans beleive in angels than evolution.
Probably because there is more real-world evidence for them. 😬
Whilst angels appear to people and save them from time to time, evolution looks foolish when carbon dating says that a living snail is 3,000 years old....
Or when there should be millions of fossils of present, past, and in-between versions of all the creatures on the earth, but there aren't.....
Or when statistics show that there is less than 1% chance the world, with all its self sustaining systems, it's position next to the sun that a few miles one way or the other would burn us to death or freeze us, and our human bodies could be formed by "nothing and time"....
And then an angel appears to them as they pray when in a trapped car about to explode, and pulls them out.... (or some such thing happens to a trusted friend or family member)
And you wonder why they would believe in angels more.
I like to believe that there is an afterlife. It gives me a little hope in this more than hopeless world. But to be honest I have no real evidence for it. I haven't been visited by a dead loved ones. I've had surgery but no out-of-body experience. I've had a couple of dreams with the devil burning my family but not since I was like 7 or 8 after seeing The Exorcist for the first time.
Originally posted by sithsaber408
Probably because there is more real-world evidence for them. 😬
I return after holidaying up and down the Australian coast and this is what I find...
Sorry, but I must admit I laughed hard. So very hard. I know I, for one, have never seen any "real world evidence" for Angels. I know there are people who attribute every good thing to Angels, but honestly, that is like me attributing every good thing that happens in the world to my amazing mental powers, while every bad thing is due to my bastard land lord who steals my newspaper every morning.
And technically "An Angel turned up and pulled Bobby Jon from his burning pickup" is not really "real world evidence."
This is not a testI have been asked this question many times and I have given many answers but I saw this on House last night and I think it is one of the best answers that I have heard. He was asked that if you die that is it and that there is no after life and he said that he would rather believe that life is not a “test”. Your thoughts?
No, I don't believe life is a test. First if I were to except God is even a little "all knowing" it would make the concept of a test rather absurd and pointless - why go through the testing process if the result is already known?
Likewise, I question fairness - in our mortal world our entire future rarely rests on a single test. I know for some it feels like it does, and failing some high school test is disheartening and they wax "I failed" etc. but it is rarely that bad. I'd have to question the logic of a test one can not question deciding what is going to happen in some infinite after life.
And besides, I prefer to think this life is the vibrant height. It would take away from the importance, the potency of it to think, for me anyway, "this is just a test to prepare me for my real life." There are certainly testing things in the life, chalanges, tribulations, but they only shape and define my path through this life. They are not somehow defining what will happen when I shuffle of the mortal coil. One life, best to make it count, not merely consider it as a stanging ground were a person merely has to meet some criteria and then "BANG!" the real fun begins.
In my family, each time that a bad thing happen, my mother said: God tests your faith in him!
I also asked: and after the life? it always says: there is death!
And death, it what?
Never answer!
My vicar has great theories on the life after death, but he never says what I want to hear!
I bthink that the life after death, it is with each one to imagine it, most beautiful which is!
Originally posted by FatimaTo live?
umm , if the life is not a test then what is the purpose of our life ..
This sort of mentality is both perplexing and frustrating. If you fail to derive any meaning from life, besides serving your deity, then I feel a great swell of pity for you.
Life is not a prelude.
I never said that you shouldnt enjoy your life , or just serve your deity .
But all these purposes are passing ones .All tese purposes come and go , pass up and down .Money comes and goes .Sexual activities cannot continue forever .Health comes and goes .All thse lusts for money ,food and sex cannot answer the individual s questions to himself :
So What ?
Then What ?
Originally posted by FatimaYou reduce the complexities and intricacies of living a full and fulfilling life, to seem as if it's insufficient. What exactly do you want?
I never said that you shouldnt enjoy your life , or just serve your deity .But all these purposes are passing ones .All tese purposes come and go , pass up and down .Money comes and goes .Sexual activities cannot continue forever .Health comes and goes .All thse lusts for money ,food and sex cannot answer the individual s questions to himself :
So What ?Then What ?
If you are defining a "purpose" as some sort of overarching preconceived intentions for the human species. There is no grand purpose of humanity, nor does there need to be. We're but small part of a big universe, paradoxically infinitely insignificant to it's greater workings but integral to our own existences.
If you define "purpose" in the sense of personal aims and ambitions, a personal meaning to one's life. Then "god" is not it for myself and many others.