Stephen Fry on meeting God ...

So you are a christian?
But I dont think I have seen you agree with anything in the bible. Which translation of the bible do you read, if you read any?

No soontobe I do not believe you have heard me comment favourably or otherwise on the Bible, what I do dispute would be some of the interpretations of it you choose to post.

Soutra. I think I read somewhere that you said that you are a christian.
Yet you seem to dispute a lot of the bible. So I am left confused by that.

It is not indiscrimate to believers.

To non believers, yes indiscriminate. Most of it from the devil.

If there is an omnipotent being that humans call God/Allah etc. then that being is having a laugh at human expense. God/Allah etc is a sadistic being as having the power to give & take life they create disease,drought, flood and famine etc. which causes indiscriminate suffering to believers and non-believers alike. That is not a deity I can respect.

I believe that the majority of humans , if they found they had that kind of power, would use it to eradicate those natural catastrophes. I am not sure why God/Allah etc would choose not too.

Sometimes you just want to scream that it is so unfair, Grannyknot.

Best wishes to all your friends who are going through these illnesses

However, I will just say that, although I sound like an unbeliever (more an agnostic), many years of indoctrination (for want of a better word) has made me pray instinctively to the BVM and those things I prayed for have come about.

soontobe, things happen to people.
Some of those things are within man's control and are rooted in evil, even when the perpretators claim to be doing it in the name of their religion.
Some of those things are outwith our control -but sometimes insurance companies find it expedient to designate those "acts of God" however no one in their right mind believes that he sends these disasters to "punish" mankind or "test" their faith.
Your assertion that indiscriminate things happen to (only) non- Christians would be laughable were it not so offensive .

I think that if Stephen Fry is an atheist he just needed to say that he will not be meeting God as he does not exist.
But it would not have been such an interesting interview!

eloethan I understood what you meant. I just wanted to clarify that my intention was not to hurt or insult. I do need to rail at fate at the moment, and seeing that helped.

So indiscriminate things happen to non-christians?
I will tell my vicar friend that, he is still grieving the unexpected death of his dear wife.

granjura I don't see why inflicting pain and suffering on an adult is any more justifiable than inflicting it on a child.

soontobe Is the "devil" responsible for earthquakes, plagues, droughts, etc.? And why would a god create a devil to wreak such terrible, cruel things on the world if that god has the power to create a safe, peaceful and happy world?

Why not just say that good and bad events occur in life and it is purely arbitrary as to whom those good and bad things happen to, rather than, as in the example granjura gave, saying "I was saved because God looked after me".

Interesting point Ana - I agree that a supreme being could not be held responsible for all the ills of the world, but there are plenty of ills in the basic blueprint that cannot possibly be assigned to human action.

Soon - I have to be honest that I find your last post beyond all possibility of comprehension. Some of your posts are kind and thoughtful and appreciated I am sure, but this is quite beyond the pale. I do not usually criticise others' posts even if I disagree with them but this is a step too far. I think you must inhabit a different planet.

When a relative of mine was going through some very difficult circumstances, a well-meaning christian told her to read the Book of Job.
That book is the story of god allowing the devil to do all sorts of vile things to Job, including killing off all his family, in order to prove that Job would still not lose his faith in god.
Indeed, Job did not lose his faith and explained to his friends that it is not possible for mere mortals to understand the ways of god, that vastly superior being who created all that exists.
God rewarded Job by supplying him with new lands, animals and family (!) so that was all right wasn't it?
My relative did not find that a useful story.

Quite right, Mishap. That was an arrogant attitude. What was so special about him any more than many of the other equally special people who died?

Who is to say that the gods in which (whom?) the Greeks fervently believed were any less real? Or the Romans, or any other religion?
Why should a god send suffering to a little child to test it's parents' faith?

If you believe it to be true then it will be true to you, no matter how irrational.

The more posts I read on christianity the less I believe.

Oh for goodness sake!! You cannot discriminate between suffering experienced by Christians and that by non-Christians and somehow imply that God is partial!! I have never heard such unmitigated tosh! Were I Jewish with grandparents or parents who died in the Holocaust, or Aztecs massacred by the Conquistadores or an atheist whose entire family had been wiped out by a natural catastrophe I would take personal exception to this suggestion soontobe, but as it is all I can say is echo John McEnroe "You cannot be serious?"

I remember a televised interview with a survivor of the tsunami. He had lost all his family and thousands had died, and he said that he thought it had happened because god was testing his faith. Blimey! - kill thousands to test one man's faith - it almost felt arrogant, though I did not feel one could criticise how someone might rationalise the unrationalisable.

Reconciling innocent suffering and a world that is predicated on kill or be killed with a loving god is a step too far for many people. Certainly for me.

I'm not getting into this any further, other than to say that it's no wonder people are turned off religion in any shape or form if they're fed the sort of rubbish that granjura was as a child.

One can believe in a God or Supreme being without blaming him/her/it for all the ills of the world.

What about Christian children- should they have to suffer so, to test the faith of their parents? What sort of Father would do that to little children?

The things that happen to non christians are indiscriminate I think. I can post a link if anyone wanted me to.

speaking for myself ....

I dont understand what you are saying dj?

I've known children die of the most awful diseases that made their little lives so miserable and painful. But about all the children who are beaten, raped, starving, diying of Ebola without the soothing and touch of their mothers. Is that not more than they can bear- why those children and not mine. What is this all about?

If God wants to test adult Christians, I don't mind- that is fair enough.

The number of times I've heard people who escape a disaster say 'God was looking after me that day'- and I just want to scream and say 'what about all the others who died, or are maimed forever, or ...?' why them- why not me. I am absolutely and totally with Stephen Fry on that one- it is just too cruel and indiscriminate.

*Grannyknot" I'm sorry - I wasn't suggesting that you were trying to hurt or insult religious people, I was just speaking or myself and Stephen Fry's views very much accord with my own.

Come on, soontobe. Why should god expect all the good publicity but not the bad?

God does allow some suffering to happen to people who are christians. But not more than they can bear [which can be at the outer edges of how much they can take sometimes]. And to help them become more christlike.
But that is a different thing to what your vicar seemed to be saying.