Stephen Fry on meeting God ...

I would reiterate what Ariadne has said TwiceasNice - I am glad that you have this comfort in your loss.

Thank you for your thoughtful and sensitive post, TwiceAsNice. You are telling us what you feel and believe, without any sense of, as you say "pushing it down people's throats." My respect, for what it is worth.

(I think the SF link is priceless. Thank you Grannyknot. I was going to share it on FB but didn't want to offend my Christian friends so I saved it. My SiL1 will love it)

I heard an analogy a while back:

An ant meets an elephant on a jungle track. It knows there's something there, but the something is so big, so enormous, it's beyond the ant's understanding. It simply cannot comprehend what the something is.

Made sense to me. I suppose that makes me an agnostic.

A simple definition of faith might be that you believe against the odds, without proof

I do believe in God anD have continued to do so despite my fair share of bad things happening to me including the painful loss of my son as a four year old child. BeLieve me it is agonising to watch your child die in pain, something died in me when I left that hospital. However at the time of him dying I felt an experience I cannot explain, a peace a beautiful feeling and I knew that Jesus was in the room with me and had come to take my son to Heaven and I believe he is there waiting for me and that he is ok. It is this belief, faith that has helped me to cope without him for 30 years and I could not have coped through the terrible grieving without it. I cannot explain the tragedies that happen but I do believe that my faith has helped me. In answer to why it happened to me and not someone else is what is so special about me that it should not happen, why would I be spared particularly. I still miss my son, it was his birthday yesterday he would have been 35 but I believe Christ looks after him and it comforts me. My faith is my own and I do not push it down the throats of others but it helps me.

Genesis 1:24. So god created toxicaria or whatever else this horrifying parasite is called. What has free will got to do with that? What purpose does this horrible parasite serve? I'm with Stephen Fry on this.

daisy how scary. So sorry for you, your daughter who lost her life and everyone around her.

Daisy- I am so so sorry about your daughter. Auto-immune diseases are an abomination in this world. Thinking of you at this really difficult time

And here is Stephen Fry talking about the Catholic Church:

youtu.be/I6sz8D411kE

That second part just doesn't sound right. Like Eric Morecambe and Andre Previn's" the right notes but not necessarily in the right order, "it doesn't sound like English!!!

Sigh. Magical thinking rears its ugly head again.

Your first paragraph is nice Elegran.

Second paragraph. They do happen to everyone. I dont think it would come to your surprise that I think that outcomes, can on occasion, be different.

daisy, so sorry to read about your daughter

Hear hear Elegran. Sensible as ever

Re thinking whether anyone is a believer or not. I certainly don't. I know many people who could or could not be believers - I have no idea, and what's more, I don't care. It makes no difference to my friendship with them, or how I treat them or they treat me.

It makes no difference to illness, misfortune, poverty, plane crashes, bereavement, tsunamis or any of the other nasties. They happen to everyone, and people react to them according to their personalities.

Daisy I am so very sorry you are having to deal with something I can only imagine as one of the worst things that could happen in my life

Dear Daisy - do not for one fleeting moment give credence to the idea that your very dear daughter's death has any connection whatsoever with your understandable questioning of your beliefs. We all examine these big questions; it is part of being human.

Daisy

Daisy. Obviously I dont know for sure, but I dont think that there is any connection.

Lilygran - SF was asked a hypothetical question and he responded appropriately to what he was asked. His only other alternative was to tell the interviewer it was a silly question - he chose not to do that and gave a voice to the many people concerned about suffering in the world.

He was not blaming god - he doesn't believe in god. He was entering into the hypothetical question he was asked and saying that if there were a god, these are the things that do not make sense to him (and many others) and that he would ask. He gave voice to the concerns of many people and did so with passion and eloquence.

If blame there is, where does it belong lilygran?

Lilygran. He was not blaming God for all the evils in the world. How could he when he doesn't believe God exists!

What he questioned was how is it possible for people to believe that their God whom they think created the world has no qualms about dishing out evil to his followers

He has already done more than you or I in raising awareness in two areas, mental health and homosexuality, at his own personal cost.

Regarding which carachters he chooses to play and to which audiences is of course only your opinion but one I disagree with.

Daisy - I have been wondering how things are going with you at this difficult time.

Giving up a belief in the afterlife must be hard after so many years of belief. As an agnostic of many years, my belief is that the love that we share with our friends and family does not die when they they do - that it becomes an integral part of us and is part of our very being - and thus remains in us - and we pass it on to others in the way we interact with them - that is my concept of eternal life: the continuation of love given and received. That cannot die - it is a constant.

I am sure that all the love that you shared with your DD is for all time.

Mishap, I am not sure what gave you the idea that I have not given evil a thought until now. I have thought about it since I was a young child.

And cant get how not thinking about whether someone is a believer or not is possible. The world does it, does it not. Not to mention God.

Christians are very aware of where evil originates from. And so have people from thousands of years ago.

Daisy nice to see you again.

I hope you're bearing-up since the death of your daughter and that life is not too grim for you right now

Are you back in the UK?