Post your tough questions in here regarding Christianity

KittyKatz, will attempt to hit the target in this attempt within the borders of your rules. The purpose of the universe is not to be morally or physically perfect, but to provide a place where spiritual beings can choose to love or reject God, to live with Him forever in a new, perfect universe, or reject Him and live apart from Him for eternity. It would not be possible to make this choice in a universe in which all moral choices are restricted to only good choices. One can not choose between good and bad if bad did not exist. It is very logical, if all evil was eliminated, we are bound to partial free will by where our choices have a predestined outcome. If humans could only make good choices, is this really free will, or just the creation of robots, like computers.

Do you think the atheist who loves his wife, who would never be unfaithful in falling to the temptation of sleeping with her closest friend, if the situation presented itself, would stand down from his absolute free will within the confines of his personal ability to have the choice. With a decison and full responsibility of choice, by not falling to temptation, is not the atheists love for his wife greater by not committing a evil act against her that she may never discover occured. The latter is analogous to changing the laws of the universe to restrict the exercise of evil. There is no way to eliminate all evil through changing the laws of physics, since it originates within the human mind. So, the only way to eliminate all evil is to actually restrict the functioning of the human mind, in other words, restrict free will. So, all claims that God could prevent all evil choices, but allow free will are specious. Though, it seems  God designed the laws of the universe so that human beings are unable to exhibit unlimited amounts of evil, or we would have destroyed ourself by this point in time. The tuning is optimal for the restriction of most temporary, bounded evil, while still allowing free will. If you want to create eternal-perfect designs, you must understand thermodynamics in where one of the laws would need to be removed, which would make the universe completely different. There would be no stars, no electromagnetic radiation (including light), and no way to design machines (including biological ones) that depend on heat/energy flow. This means that creatures would not be powered by food or metabolic processes. Creatures designed for such a universe could never die a natural death, since death is dependent upon the operation of the second law. However, the description of this hypothetical universe corresponds almost exactly to the bible's description of heaven.

The problem about heaven is that there is no ability to choose good versus evil, since there is no evil. This lack of choice is the reason that God instituted a two creation design, the first in which free will beings could make choices, and the second to reward those beings who choose to be with God in His second creation. In the sum of all things, Adam was commanded not to eat of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, in the middle of the garden. Sometime after Adam was placed in the garden, Eve was created  and the scene was set for Adam and Eve to obey or reject God. God had to give Adam and Eve a choice. Without free will to choose, Adam and Eve would have been mere puppets. Did the fruit have magical powers, or was it just the fact that they went against the orders of the commander in chief because satan used the oldest ploy in his playbook of deceit, God is a cosmic killjoy who is trying to keep something good from you. The presence of evil is due to the spiritual component of our nature, something that animals do not possess. A false assumption is that love allows the object of that love to do whatever he or she wants. However, this permissive kind of "love" isn't really love at all. A parent or not, you will recognize that allowing children to do whatever they want to do is not loving at all, right.

As for the application of prayer, its not the adoration, confession, thanksgiving but the supplication you are directing your question towards. In making specific requests on Gods to-do list, its pray  for other first, then yourself. The scenario where a Christian (Jehovah's Witness) decides that prayer is the way that their child should be healed, so he forsakes medical treatment and the child dies, is just blind faith parenting. Miracles are rare and have a specific purpose, any claim for one on the basis of faith is no reason to call off inquiry, declaring it a miracle.

You asked if God heals the sick, though you really have to be giving legitimacy to medicine as a healing art. Prayer is not a soliloquy, it is a dialogue between man and God and is objective as well as subjective. We should be able to agree that intercessory prayer provides no scientific evidence either confirming or negating the healing effectiveness. Though self request prayer would not be so inconclusive, for it is therapeutically in its association with a positive mind set. Obviously this would work for SJD, though not yourself.

The healings of Jesus were given as a sign of the legitimacy of His claim of Messiahship, since the O.T said that the Messiah would heal the blind and the deaf. God didn't create diseases, though, He did create a system they could come to be, though, thats an entire thread alone. Could open your eyes to medicine and make you question why the corporate industry are driven to providing treatment, not cures. We put ourselves in many medical positions, and God shouldn't be a saftey net. To quote Rostos; "God is not some personal genie".

With your Island scenario, wouldn't God have clearly revealed Himself in nature and in the hearts of people. People would be responsible to God for what God has already revealed to them (I give you ClubDirt, can see God, but doesn't know him by name). This island scenario fits the explanation for the minority of the worlds population that have down syndrone, isolated tribal community e.c.t. Though KittyKatz, since a non-eternal universe implied that it must have been caused. Maybe Genesis 1:1 is correct. Not to be dismayed by the facts, you have invented some metaphysical "science" that attempts to explain away the existence of God. Hence, most atheistic cosmologists believe that we see only the visible part of a much larger multiverse that randomly spews out universes with different physical parameters. Since there is no evidence supporting this idea (nor can there be, according to the laws of the universe), it is really just a substitute "god" for atheists. And, since this "god" is non-intelligent by definition, it requires a complex hypothesis, which would be ruled out if we use your Occam's razor, which states that one should use the simplest logical explanation for any phenomenon. Purposeful intelligent design of the universe makes much more sense, especially based upon what we know about the design of the universe. Looks like I missed rush hour.

Why does God allow evil in this world?

Freedom of choice is the Creator's great gift to the human race. "I call heaven and earth to witness against you today, that I have set before you life and death, the blessing and the curse. So choose life in order that you may live, you and your descendants" ---Deut. 30:19

Sin originated in man, not in God. God prevents sin's dominion. ---Romans 6:14

God has, at His own cost, provided a remedy. Our Lord Savior Jesus Christ said, "I am the way, and the truth, and the life; no one comes to the Father, but through Me. ---John 14:16

Praise the Lord Almighty!!

 The presence of evil is due to the spiritual component of our nature,

This is your statement , which is true. Religion causes good people to do evil and wicked things. For example,circumcision, to circumcise  a child at birth is mutilation, a perverted sickness. It does not help against hiv. It is a custom that the voters of San Francisco must vote on this November and stop the insanity.

Does a person with schizophrenia unable to take care of himself....or a person with severe mental retardation have free will?

Already asked, buried and ignored somewhere.

I even take it one step further (which is probably not productive considering our counterparts) - and it has to do with the inequity of peoples ability to have free will.

If you are retarded, borderline retarded, or a genius - certainly those three people have differing abilities to reason.  If the correct answer is to accept Jesus as your personal saviour, how can those three be seen equally?  Now throw in their life experiences, and it becomes exponentially worse.

The problem here is the same problem throughout the bible and christianity - the idea of absolute laws.  You MUST accept Jesus to go to heaven.  Oh yeah?  What if I am retarded and grew up in Afghanistan?  How can that rule be applied equally to a person who grew up in Kansas?  You MUST obey your father and mother, you MUST not steal. 

The whole idea that morals are absolute are truly religions downfall. 

BTW - if you are retarded here, what are you in heaven?  If you are literally born in a vegetative state, what are you in heaven (forget the question of why people are born this way to begin with)?

God permits evil because if He didn't, it would mean the end of our free will. !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

no evil.....no freewill........an insane thought from an insane man

God created human beings with conscience that 1) tells them when they do wrong and 2) tells them that God exists. When we violate our conscience (something that all human beings have done), we know that we have sinned. Those of you who have never sinned can stop reading now. Christianity says that all have sinned and, therefore, fall under the judgment of God. In order to be fair, God must judge all sin.Therefore, in order to be fair, God should condemn all people to hell.However, the Christian God is not fair, since He chooses to save those who accept His mercy. Those who want to experience the fairness of God will receive just that - God will judge them fairly.

For the rest of us, who prefer mercy to fairness, God will save us, whether we be Hindus, Buddhists or whatever. Those who haven't heard the gospel will be judged on the basis of the information they were given and how they responded to it. It doesn't take a rocket scientist to figure out whether or not you are doing what your conscience tells you to do.

Thats a good experiment.

If i had to put money on it, People will find God.

Harry Potter books have fulfilled prohecies in them dont they?

So the more we understand about ourselves and the universe should mean a less and less requirement for the existence of God as there would be less gaps for God to fulfill? Is that right?

Prior to technology, many people thought the universe was eternal (always existed), therefore no need for God. As technology allowed us to understand that the universe is NOT eternal and had a beginning, This has led for a pathway to God and forced atheists into a corner into believing something can come from nothing in this natural world.

So this argument falls on deaf ears, in this case, the more we know, the more it has led to beliefs in God.