Is this God's plan

Shropshirelass Nostradamus predicted just about everything that could possible happen anywhere at any time, but he did it so obscurely that his predictions could be interpreted however the reader wished to understand them.

If an nfinite number of monkeys were given an infinite number of typewriters and allowed to tap at them for an infinite length of time, they would eventually type out the whole bible, Old and New Testaments plus Revelations.

Nonogran

Could our current C19 plague be the start of our annihilation Its not a plague, and probably not, seeing as how 99% of people recover and we already have vaccines and treatments.

The dinosaurs got wiped out so why not humans? That was a comet, not an illness. Lots of species get wiped out, and we're doing a sterling job of wiping out species at the moment, without any devine intervention. By the way, I was feeding the dinosaurs in my garden this morning. They didn't all disappear.

The world is significantly better place for most people that it was 100 years ago and the "tsumani of vile life" are more than balanced by the many many good people who are trying to make things better.

You may have given up on humanity, I haven't.

Nostradamus predicted many deaths not caused by war.

Call me deluded but I do believe that the world can become a “better place”. I think humans instinctively do care for one another, this is how we have survived.

I have seen many instances of this selflessness during the pandemic, so I do hope for a better future, and that we will learn from this.

The ten plagues of Egypt:

www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2442724/

There's plenty on the internet about how the world will eventually destroy itself by one means or another. I think it's in the Bible too.
Could our current C19 plague be the start of our annihilation? The dinasours got wiped out so why not humans?
I certainly don't think the world will ever be a "better place". There is a tsunami of vile life out there so who can turn that particular tide?
I'm sorry for the folk who strive to bring up decent children/grandchildren. I fear there is little hope that good in generations to come, will prevail. I don't think it's got anything to do with God.
Sorry to sound depressive. I'm just glad I won't live to see it but I'll watch from afar!

I believe we live in a very selfish society and this pandemic has brought it to the fore. People not obeying rules, looking for loopholes to get round them. It's a me, me ,me society and I find it very sad. God gave us the freedom to look after the world and what have we done? We are on the road to ruining it. I understand all your valid opinions and thank you for your answers. It's good that people can agree to disagree without any animosity

Pandemics are part of our existence. We may never accurately and fully know how this one began. I fear we will have forgotten all about how we let this one spread by the time the next one comes around...

The way I see it (as I don't believe in God) is that we brought it on ourselves. People are greedy and incredibly stupid. What other creature destroys it's own habitat?

Chinese subsistence farmers were forced off their land by commercial chicken 'farmers' (factories, really) and went further into wild forest land, invading the natural territory of creatures who carried the virus.

It was hardly a surprise, was it? We'd been expecting and planning for the next pandemic of some sort. It won't be the last, either.

Pretty much every religion in the world has ascribed natural disasters, such as earthquakes and drought, and death and disease, whether to humans, animals or crops, to being direct divine punishment for intolerable human misbehaviour. The definitions of this behaviour vary from culture to culture and from century to century, although there is a common thread of the god or gods being angry because they have not received enough adoration, attention and obedience.

keepingquiet I’m not a believer, but I really appreciate your explanation of your personal journey.

I am always slightly wary about pronouncements about what god would want us to do - they tend to be things that the speaker wants!

According to Darwin’s Origin of Species, it is not the most intellectual of the species that survives; it is not the strongest that survives; but the species that survives is the one that is able best to adapt and adjust to the changing environment in which it finds itself.

Megginson, ‘Lessons from Europe for American Business’, Southwestern Social Science Quarterly (1963) 44(1): 3-13, at p. 4.

Whether it is God or isn't God, He would want us to be flexible and adaptable.

Riverwalk

keepingquiet

I don't believe God interferes that directly into our petty human lives. I like to believe things happen so that we can enter more closely into His Divine life.

I like to believe things happen so that we can enter more closely into His Divine life.

Just what does that mean - in plain English?

Riverwalk- I know it seems like a different language. I don't quote chapter and verse but try to explain in my own terms and I'm new to this so please bear with me.
During this pandemic like everyone else I have gone very deep into my own beliefs. It has been a journey of realisation that we are all too busy trying to explaining God in human terms.
If I get in my car and it doesn't start I'm not going to blame God am I? I know there's something mechanical going on. If I try again and it doesn't start I might ask for divine help. If it starts does it mean God started it? Of course not. Therefore by the same reason I believe God didn't start the pandemic.
However, if by asking God for help with my crappy car, it helps form a relationship with something I have to believe might know how the car starts. I am changing my perspective. I am accepting the possibility that the act of asking, and not just the mechanics, helped start the car.
So, by asking God to help me deal with the awfulness of the pandemic I know I am not dealing with it alone. God is in the car and in the frustrations that I feel. I know this may not be the plain English you crave- but I want to get across the idea that if we go to God in our failures, He comes to us. That is just my experience.

Oh, I'm sorry NotSpaghetti! I misunderstood.

This pandemic has rather put me off God!

Sorry
That was in response to Alegrias

I was answering the original question.

do you think this coronavirus is part of God's plan to change our lives?

The corrupt are making sure they profit from the situation, anyway.

There is indeed fundamentally nothing new here. The world has always been plagued by an assortment of natural disasters.

We have always "plundered" our natural resources - that is what all creatures do in the interests of survival - e.g. beavers build dams that help them but that wreck homes for much other wildlife etc.

We are no different; we just have more sophisticated ways of fulfilling nature's inevitability: striving for personal survival.

Talk of “end times” and other things which have been with us since time began always amuse me. Think about history and the plagues, epidemics and wars which have gone before. Nothing new there.
I’m agnostic and tend to think, if there is a God, he or she, has gone on an indefinite holiday and has left us to it.

Mapleleaf

No, I think it’s a lot more to do with the way human beings live these days - travel to any part of the world is possible (in normal times), so that opens up the spread of diseases to a much wider area in a shorter space of time.

Also, as a species, we are destroying and exploiting our natural resources at an alarming rate, and wiping out other species without much thought in our ever increasing desire to destroy the rainforest, exploit the polar regions, intensively farm, and spread ourselves all over, etc, etc. Something has to give, so perhaps it’s natures attempt to try to balance things out a bit.

Having watched David Attenborough's documentaries on extinction and climate change, I'm afraid I have to agree with you Mapleleaf.
I don't think it has anything to do with God, we are doing it to ourselves.

Ah Riverwalk, plain English. I wish you well of that request!!

But I thought Jesus came to show a new way. A way of love and forgiveness. A Heavenly Father whose care noticed even the fall of a sparrow.

The old has passed away. Behold all things have become new.

polomint

Well the devil also has power, so is it the devil's work?

No. If God does not interfere in His creation than neither can the devil. I have been on a real spiritual journey during this pandemic and what I have learned is we cannot find any answers in outward things. The pandemic has natural or human cause (probably natural, but as others have pointed out people moving their germs around the planet hasn't helped.)
God wants us to find Him in our own hearts. There are no easy explanations as to why things happen but don't seek simplistic answers such as a) God is punishing us b) it is the devil's doing. God works through suffering, He doesn't cause it. We do, and thinking anything other just lets us off the hook.