The May 2010 Euthanasia Prevention Coalition Newsletter can now be found at: http://www.euthanasiaprevention.on.ca/Newsletters/Newsletter108(May2010)(RGB).pdf Bill C-384 was soundly defeated by a vote of 228 to 59. Check how the Members of Parliament voted at: http://www.euthanasiaprevention.on.ca/HowTheyVoted.pdf On June 5, 2010, we are co-hosting the US/Canda Push-Back Seminar at the Radisson Gateway Hotel at the Seattle/Tacoma Airport. The overwhelming defeat of Bill C-384 proved that we can Push-Back the euthanasia lobby in the US and Canada and convince people that euthanasia and assisted suicide are a dangerous public policy. Register for the Seminar at: http://www.euthanasiaprevention.on.ca/2010SeminarFlyer(RGB)(LetterFormat).pdf The Schindler family are being attacked by a Florida television station and Michael Schiavo. The Euthanasia Prevention Coalition is standing in solidarity with the Schindler family. My blog comments: http://alexschadenberg.blogspot.com/2010/05/att
What leaves me unsatisfied with this argument is that it is typical of the one I have with my earthly Father. Both he and George Jonas say that God only exists because people feel a need to have a belief in Him. Rather than accept that God created us *with* that yearning desire to find & believe in Him.
ReplyDeletePeople do NOT turn to religion because life's too short for science. They turn there because, after looking at all the other options, they, like St. Peter, have to ask where else they will go . We are made by God to live with Him for all eternity...He is incarnate in each us and for some the search is longer than others.
ReplyDelete"incarnate in each us"
ReplyDeleteThe Bible teaches that God is omnipotent and there is no place we can hide to escape from God. While the Bible says man was created in the image of God, I am not sure He is in non-believers in the same sense as He dwells in christians. The problem that non-believers have is they are separated from God by their fallen corrupt nature and need to be born again by the Spirit.
To be born again one must believe that Christ died for him personally. We cannot claim our own righteousness or anything we did as satisfaction for our sin. Only Christ's righteousness can satisfy for sin. (Romans ch4 and Hebrews) HE is the lamb of God.
"An atheist thinking of dethroning God must be prepared to take his place."
ReplyDeleteThat is so whacked out, I can't believe he actually wrote it!
As I said before, Tim, this is apostate thinking. An atheist wouldn't waste his time trying to "replace" something that doesn't exist!
If you believe in a god or gods, it or they will exist for you. If you don't, they won't.
It's that simple.
What makes it complicated is that, for every believer, that god or those gods is/are different from the ones that belong to every other believer. NO ONE believes in the same dieties as anyone else.
the reason it is unsatisfying is that it is the tired old "god of the gaps" argument. Inevitably, as the gaps get fewer and smaller, god faces unemployment.
ReplyDeleteI have two objections to Jonas’ argument:
ReplyDelete-“God is an idea, like liberty.” Uh uh. Ideas are mind-dependent, whereas to be ‘real’ means, by definition, to exist independently of the mind. To put it another way, one sign of a bad argument for God’s existence is that if you replace ‘God’ with ‘Santa Claus’, the argument has equal effect. Whatever ‘existence’ might involve in God’s case (and we do not know what it involves), it does NOT mean being the product of human intelligence (or lack thereof).
-Jonas argues that religion is a shortcut to where science is going. He is making a category mistake. When religion is doing its job well, it is not trying to do what science does. As a cardinal in Rome said many centuries ago, “Science tells us how the heavens go; religion tells us how to go to heaven.”