FWIS3

What's happening to the religiously fervent these days? I read that the train that crashed in Spain killing 80 was filled with pilgrims to some religious festival in Spain. Yesterday it was a busful of teens returning from a church camp that ran off an exit ramp killing 3 and injuring several more. Today it's a busful of religious pilgrims in Italy that crashed killing several. It looks like a bad summer to be a Christian.

Not Jesus, Jehovah is the vengeful one. He smites the sinner and the wicked! Sometimes there is an innocent caught up in the smiting. That's called collateral damage.

Dude, it's always tough being a Christian, having to justify varied and sundry mishaps/accidents/disasters/et al as good things, according to God's will.

I remember reading somewhere when someone said it was God's mercy that individual X survived 911 -- and one of the first things I thought of was, what did the other 3000 people do that pissed Him off so bad?

God blessed those who lived because he didn't kill them.
Praise be Jebus.

No offense, please... but am I the only one who feels that this thread is in rather poor taste?

It would be if we were making fun of the dead people or their families. But we're mocking the notion that "Jesus looks out for good Christians," because that statement implies that "Jesus allows bad people to die." It's a ridiculous thing to say (and is what is truly in bad taste here, if you ask me). It is rightly mocked, especially by asking "what made these people who died so bad?" as a way to undermine it.

Agreed re the Christian notion of karma. Nonetheless, I guess I feel that two instances of bad taste don't serve to cancel each other out. Or something like that.

Gullible Jones wrote:Agreed re the Christian notion of karma. Nonetheless, I guess I feel that two instances of bad taste don't serve to cancel each other out. Or something like that.

You are a noble soul. or to quote Peanuts; You're a good man Charlie Brown.

Gullible Jones wrote:No offense, please... but am I the only one who feels that this thread is in rather poor taste?

I agree with TSC's take on this. Not to cast aspersions on gethen's original post, but I've seen Intertubes news items on two of the three accidents
mentioned, and while the religious aspects of the victims were not the main points of the articles, they were cited, as they were legitimate background facts of each of the stories.

That being said...I can guaranbloodydamntee ya that there will be those of some religious persuasion that will be saying that Gawd's tender mercies
were involved here somewhere.

And I sortakinda agree with you, GJ -- this thread could be seen as in questionable taste, although as far as the incidents are concerned that started this
conversation, there is no good side to them that I can see.

Gullible Jones wrote:No offense, please... but am I the only one who feels that this thread is in rather poor taste?

I can't answer whether you're the only one, but I don't feel that way. Why do you think it's in poor taste?

What geonuc said.

I certainly did not mean to make fun of the horrible deaths of innocent people. I only made the original post because it struck me that of the three tragedies recently in the news, all three involved Christian groups on "religious" trips. As noted by Charlie, it is almost to be expected that any Christian who survives a major disaster will attribute his or her good fortune to the intercession of Jesus, so that this string of tragedies, in my mind, has a certain irony.
Sorry if it offended you GJ, or anyone else.

No problem, this is probably just me being thin-skinned.

back OP: the interesting thing about real honest religious faith is that they often feel benign providence is involved when there is a disaster and you survive. i.e. A plane with 150 people on it and 5 survive. The instant thought is "thank the lord, he spared 5 people". Why? Well, for one there is a sort logic that implies that if the crash were that horrible then all 150 people should have died. Since 5 people survived then it must be a "miracle" and miracles are the province of deity.

Of course, there are contrarian folks who think... "what a horrible deity. He killed 145 people. What sort of deity does that?"

So what does a religious person think when it is people who are especially affiliated with religion who are called home to Jesus in these tragedies? Did Jehovah get lonely for righteous people to keep him company? That is certainly one of the implications when people comfort the family with "The lord has called them to be with him". Of course, this implies that Heaven (or the afterlife) must be pretty empty if God is getting lonely. Perhaps there are only just so many souls in circulation so they have to be recycled to keep the system running?

One phrase that is often used to comfort the religious and the family is "the lord had need of them in other works". This is actually comforting on some level because it implies that God has multiple projects which need tending. Of course, if God were a better project manager and forecast his needs better perhaps he wouldn't need to reassign people on such short notice. On the other hand, if this is an almost infinite universe, and there are a limited quantity of energy bundles (henceforth referred to as souls) to perform all these tasks then it might make sense. Especially if some of this involves crisis management. i.e. The Great Adversary is winning on Epison Eradani... Quick send a regiment of good souls to turn the tide!

It is not unusual to be angry at one's deity for allowing the abrupt departure of those we care for. Typically, we try to see logic or a rationale for why our deity chooses to allow what we believe is a premature departure. It would really be bad for business if it were revealed that God has tantrums and occasionally breaks things (including souls) that must then be repaired.

The above is Fisher's way of saying.... "Shit happens".... He's just trying to tell you HOW to build the clock....

Jesus isn't angry... If he were alive today... he'd be disappointed in the way that some of his believers act "in his name", but I don't believe that he would actively kill people or cause people to be killed to force others to believe... that's bull shit.

Angry? no.... Just a lousy shot

All his torture victims died and he needed new ones to play with?

Ikyoto wrote:Angry? no.... Just a lousy shot

You just reminded me of another of those extremely poor taste jokes I am so fond of.....

SciFiFisher wrote: Of course, if God were a better project manager and forecast his needs better perhaps he wouldn't need to reassign people on such short notice.

I wonder if Heaven is ISO9000 compliant?

Well, Robin's favorite expression was always "Holy ______, Batman".

Jebus wuvs you... his old man thinks you're an asshole.

bear in mind that for many life on earth is, at best, a dress rehearsal. it's the afterlife that's important. i remember my friend ursula, a devout, kind and caring born-again, telling me that she was ok with the idea of dying. she'd miss her friends and relatives but she'd be with G_D forever. (i said that since it would be forever then i wished that she'd stay here as people loved her and needed her.) one of the pastors who spoke at her memorial service talked about how she was enjoying fellowship in heaven. and she wasn't in her earthly body with its problems but in her perfect resurrection body!

I like Bible stories.
It's an good insight into the workings of sexually frustrated and oppressed young men that had little to do other than stay alive and dream about revenge on the people that treated them badly and fantasize about shagging their sisters.
Kind of like a teenagers wet dream fantasy about the ultimate payback.
It does get boring though, after the first two or three hundred letters...as in the letters of the alphabet.

Of course now day's we get things like Twilight.
Unfortunately the more things change the more they stay the same, so there are also people who run around thinking that they are vampires and they have special powers.

Then there are those of us who openly acknowledge free will and the laws of physics, and know that shit happens.