Seriously? God doesn't give a fuck mate.

[MajGenl.Meade]

Cheers mate!

When has it been demonstrated that any prayer has any effect on god?

I am not surprised that your real issue was the effect or otherwise of prayer on god's actions but that wasn't what you wrote. In the context of the Pope praying for victims and their families, you wrote: "How can people believe that the Pope's utterances make any difference?" This I queried narrowly, difference to whom and to what? As Big RR indicates, some people derive comfort both from the act of praying and being prayed for. It makes a difference to them.

I can truthfully tell you that after years of failure, I gave up trying to quit smoking. I spoke rather rudely to God and said "If you want this done; you do it. Because I don't want to quit and I won't". It was about 7:25 a.m. on December 11, 2001 in a driving snow-storm and I was huddled on my front door stoop in my dressing gown, sick with 'flu and puffing away at the first of the day. And I never smoked again.

Was that answered prayer? I suspect that I changed God's mind about nothing at all but instead fell into step with where he was taking me all along.

When god sent down himself as his son so that we could kill him in order for him to forgive us, did he not know that his method of telling us his desired conduct for ourselves, which was written 60 + years after the event by people who were not there, in a semi-literate society, would lead to all the bloodshed and killings in his name?

In terms of desired conduct, love your neighbor as yourself is from Leviticus which was written over a very long period before its final shape was in place some 500-300 years before Jesus was born. It's fairly typical of 20th/21st century persons who cannot themselves produce anything as good as a Psalm to look down on ancient civilizations on the grounds of "semi-literacy" when those same civilizations produced very literate works. Not only produced but also analyzed, taught, discussed and written about. "What God wants" is quite clear - that mankind is capable of it is another thing entirely.

Of course God is/was aware of all things but it's odd that you blame God's method of communication (what method is that exactly?). I'm shocked at your statement that all this horrible human warping of his will for us only began around AD 90! Mankind has been doing that and will, I expect, continue to do so whether in the "name" of God or "Allah" or ethnic cleansing or the triumph of Nazism or communism or any other ism there may be. Humans are, as the Bible tells us, not righteous - not even one. WW1? not about religion; Stalin? nope!; WW2 not a bit of it; Korea, Vietnam, Cambodia, Rwanda.... race, land, hatred, oil, etc. etc.

The many terrible things done in the name of "religion" amount to less than 10% of the death, destruction and horror perpetrated by humans in the name of something else. (No actual fact-based estimates were injured during the typing of that sentence). Given the overwhelming number of non-religious atrocities and killings between 1914 and 2014, I begin to wonder whose is the semi-literate society, if by that we mean to indicate relative ignorance.

[RayThom]

"Point/Counterpoint"... and in the end does any of this deep, intellectual discourse make a difference?

When it come to any of the 4200 religions in the world (or lack of same,) "you know what you know." In days of yore when ignorance was rampant, maybe someone by their preaching, sermonizing, demonization, or even writing, could flip a person's religious beliefs, but those times are long gone.

We now live in the age of information where there is so much data available on everything -- good, bad, indifferent -- that allows us to become independent thinkers, "true to ourself" individuals, even. So, who is right, who is wrong? Especially when ideas and concepts we hold dear can change on a daily basis.

If I'm going to a mythical, eternal prison called Hell after I die for my atheist beliefs, and for my life's values, then so be it. But that's for me to decide, and to worry about. No one who pretends to know more about what's "out there" is in no position to tell me otherwise.

Dominus Vobiscum... Pax.

[ex-khobar Andy]

I quit smoking because I became unemployed and looked for places I could economise. Yes it was hard and yes I sneaked one of my wife's ciggies from time to time but I never asked God to help me.

Your explanation is anecdotal (and of course you know that: you're not stupid) and it's as good an expkanation as any other.

It sort of reminds me of the time I was out of town on business and told my wife in a phone call that I had indigestion - normally I would blame that rare (in my case) occurrence on travel, odd eating hours, etc. She told me to drink some aloe. As a scientist I like to think that we have all the answers (for example I know how Pepto Bismol works as an anti-inflammatory and an antacid) so I sort of pooh-poohed the idea that some unscientifically verified plant would help. Nevertheless I had a swig of some aloe vera drink and an hour or so later I felt much better. Now I have no idea whether that was a normal leave-it-alone-and-it'll-take-care-of-itself cure or whether the aloe actually helped. But I usually have a bottle of some aloe in the fridge and it works for me.

And BTW if you think that religion played no part in WW1, see the book below. And I know that you know a thousand times more than I do about the War Between the States, but Jeff Davis certainly thought that he had God on his side.

[Big RR]

Andy--this may help in understanding why aloe worked:

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4103709/

[Bicycle Bill]

True Gob, people make mistakes, always have, always will. but they can (or at least many can) learn from their mistakes.

So jesus was sent to preach the gospel of love and tolerance and the golden rule ...

Is there any reason you capitalized Gob's name, but neglected to do so for Jesus?  You may not believe he is the deity (and hence did not capitalize "God" ... and I'm cool with that), but it's only common courtesy to capitalize the given name of any person — me, Gob, Jesus, Moses, Mohamed, yourself, or anyone else.

-"BB"-

[Scooter]

Did the possibility that it's an unintentional typo even occur to you?

[Joe Guy]

Big RR doesn’t make typos...

[MajGenl.Meade]

No one who pretends to know more about what's "out there" is in no position to tell me otherwise

Now THAT I can agree with

As to your beginning question, I ask "a difference to. . ." who or what? If you mean "through discussion does anyone expect either Gob or Meade to change his mind?", I'd guess it's unlikely. However, it's not clear to me that debate on any subject is valuable only if one of the parties converts to the views of the other.

Ideas such as "Prayer doesn't work" (not a quote) seem to demand as much rigorous examination as "Prayer does work". For the first to be received in silence while the latter is invariably cried down is an act of cowardice and bias. Anyone stating the first proposition needs to be clear on what they mean by "work".

For example, if the person alleges that God has decided that X will occur and that no amount of prayer will persuade him to change it to Y, then I agree. But by what authority does the person assume that a working prayer involves God changing his mind? [I ask the same question when Christian friends affirm that prayer does work. What do they mean by "work" and do they assume it means changing God's decision?]

I suppose if the supreme rule of the board is for everyone to bleat the same tune and agree on all things, then it is all rather pointless.

[Gob]

True Gob, people make mistakes, always have, always will. but they can (or at least many can) learn from their mistakes.

Agreed.

So jesus was sent to preach the gospel of love and tolerance and the golden rule, and it ended up with those he was preaching to killing him. And a religion was founded on those teachings, one which many perverted and turned into an excuse for blood shed. But some have learned and tried to practice those teachings and spread that word, and some of them have accomplished much good form establishing hospital at a time when there were none, to caring for the poor, to any means of charitable works. Certainly the perversion of the teachings and of religion in general could e seen, but what would you have god do--become a powerful ruler striking down those who do not live up to his teachings? That's pretty much the same attitude of many that participated in the bloodshed over the centuries (that and self enrichment or acquisition of power). Just as a parent has to let a child learn from his/her mistakes, so must god--at least if the lessons are to be retained.

Surely god would have known this?

As for prayer having an "effect" on god, maybe that effect is actually within ourselves. Just as meditation permits us to examine things within ourselves, so does prayer.

Very nicely put mate, and agreed.

[Big RR]

Surely god would have known this?

sure, but maybe it was the best plan among the alternatives--maybe we have to learn for ourselves. We can get prompts from teachers and others, and their teachings may well be perverted, but if some learn perhaps that will spread. And, as painful and wasteful as that is, I think it is what god wants; the change is not to be imposed on us, but to come from within.

[MajGenl.Meade]

Gob: nice response to Big RR (he is such a reasonable chap, eh?).

Surely god would have known this?

A rhetorical question? Although Big RR might argue against it, the doctrine of God (official Christian ) includes that God is omniscient. I sense you imply some sort of problem with his answer, based on God's foreknowledge, but is it possible to clarify what the issue is?

In addition to his note that prayer may change the pray-er, to which you assent, I have suggested prayer as the means by which a person "aligns" with what God has already known and determined. It's a clumsy way of putting it but will have to serve.

In many ways, I think the conflict of ideas between Calvin and Arminius is of interest only in an intellectual sense rather than a matter of faith. Both believe in the same God, the same Christ etc. but disagree on a particular mechanism by which salvation occurs. Do we freely choose enabled by God's grace to believe as Arminius and Wesley would have it? Or has God already predetermined who is saved and who is not?

Rather as with Genesis (hard fact or illustrative myth?), does it matter which is the case? Provided, of course, that no one kills anyone over the matter

[Big RR]

Touche. I backhanded "compliment" to which no response can be given. I salute you.

[rubato]

“Religious suffering is at one and the same time the expression of real suffering and a protest against real suffering. Religion is a sigh of the oppressed creature, the heart of a heartless world and the soul of soulless conditions.”

KM

Humans invent Religion for the ailments we have not invented penicillin for.

yrs,
rubato

[Crackpot]

Should I point out the hat humans didn’t “invent” penicillin l?

[Econoline]

Sure, point out any hat you want.

[rubato]

Should I point out the hat humans didn’t “invent” penicillin l?

Only if you want to make a tiresome point. Humans discovered penicillin and then invented a way to manufacture it in useful quantities. Many other antibiotics are synthetic-wholly invented.



yrs,
rubato

[Bicycle Bill]

Should I point out the hat humans didn’t “invent” penicillin l?

OK, humans didn't 'invent' penicillin any more than they 'invented' opium, morphine, or warfarin.  They merely recognized their usefulness under certain conditions.
And according to my religion, God created all of it ... opium poppies, mold (the original source of both penicillin and what we now know as warfarin), and humans.

-"BB"-

[Econoline]

My favorite word in the English language is “Amen” because when I hear it I know you’re finally done asking Me for stupid shit.
— God@TheTweetOfGod 27 Mar 2018

[MajGenl.Meade]

Touche. I backhanded "compliment" to which no response can be given. I salute you.

If you mean me, then actually the backhand was intended against myself - implying that a reasonable person deserves a reply while some nutter doesn't!

[Big RR]

OK, understood.

Re your point

Do we freely choose enabled by God's grace to believe as Arminius and Wesley would have it? Or has God already predetermined who is saved and who is not?

Do you really think this is just an intellectual exercise? I think it goes to the fundamental idea of what free will is, whether god is or is not omniscient. From wat I recall of the teachings of Calvin, man's redemption can only occur to those to whom god offers grace, and that offer of grace is predestined to only those who will be saved (as the grace is irresistible). Wesley and Arminius argue that god's grace is available to all and can be accepted or rejected. This seems a bit more than an intellectual argument; in the case of Calvin I am either destined to be saved or not (much like I can walk if I am born with two legs, but not if I am born with one), to Wesley, I can accept or reject the offered grace. Squaring it with free will is tougher, and best left for another thread, but I have to disagree with your view of the interpretation of Genesis being similar.