Oh, good. I'm glad you wouldn't. So, you are tolerant of people with supernatural beliefs as long as they treat other people well?

Like some might argue that...
Is belief in the supernatural an intelligent person’s game?
given that it implies you think belief in the supernatural means one is not intelligent
is not tolerant of people who believe differently that you do and doesn't fit that list the other posted regarding the qualities of Gnostics.

I want to bring good news to their egos and minds by improving their thinking, not bad news that their god is dead. If dead, he will just be replaced. Let him live as an example of evil. — Gnostic Christian Bishop

He might as well be living, per the believers' beliefs, and it's tough to replace dogma.

Per the OP:

We search for 'God', high and low, here and there,
Far and wide—He's said to be ev'ry where;
But no omens are found: quasars abound;
So, He hides out or He's truly nowhere.

"I come to heal" :halo:

Medice, cura te ipsum !

We search for 'God', high and low, here and there,
Far and wide—He's said to be ev'ry where;
But no omens are found: quasars abound;
So, He hides out or He's truly nowhere. — PoeticUniverse

how did you search?

I cannot appreciate a moral mind thinking that a good god-- sarcasm --- should be forgiven for genocide and infanticide. — Gnostic Christian Bishop

I'm in one of those situations which would greatly benefit from divine intervention. I've been thinking about God for the past 5-6 years and I still haven't found a solution to the problem of evil.

Personally I don't think good should be rewarded because that would vititate the very essence of goodness i.e. selflessness. Also evil shouldn't be punished because I believe what Socrates said "no one is knowingly evil". I wish God was like that but unfortunately he seemed to have created heaven and hell. He shouldn't have done that.

So, you are tolerant of people with supernatural beliefs as long as they treat other people well? — Coben

Absolutely. That is the best way to be. Right?

not tolerant of people who believe differently that you do and doesn't fit that list the other posted regarding the qualities of Gnostics. — Coben

Gnosis has little to do with my opinion on the supernatural. Rejecting the supernatural is just adult common sense.

You are trying hard to brand me. Forget it.

Regards
DL

He might as well be living, per the believers' beliefs, and it's tough to replace dogma. — PoeticUniverse

More like hard to replace the insecurity that has people believe in idiocy instead of just growing up.

Regards
DL

solution to the problem of evil. — TheMadFool

??

Evil is good and not a problem if you look at the bigger picture.
.
Take evil out of our evolution and we go extinct.

It's a long story. This was written for a theist.
-------------
Can you help but do evil? I do not see how. Do you?
And if you cannot, why would God punish you?

Christians are always trying to absolve God of moral culpability in the fall by putting forward their free will argument and placing all the blame on mankind.
That usually sounds like ----God gave us free will and it was our free willed choices that caused our fall. Hence God is not blameworthy. Such statements simply avoid God's culpability as the author and creator of human nature.

Free will is only the ability to choose. It is not an explanation why anyone would want to choose "A" or "B" (bad or good action). An explanation for why Eve would even have the nature of "being vulnerable to being easily swayed by a serpent" and "desiring to eat a forbidden fruit" must lie in the nature God gave Eve in the first place. Hence God is culpable for deliberately making humans with a nature-inclined-to-fall, and "free will" means nothing as a response to this problem.

If all do evil/sin by nature then, the evil/sin nature is dominant. If not, we would have at least some who would not do evil/sin. Can we then help but do evil? I do not see how. Do you?

Having said the above for the God that I do not believe in, I am a Gnostic Christian naturalist, let me tell you that evil and sin is all human generated and in this sense, I agree with Christians, but for completely different reasons. Evil is mankind’s responsibility and not some imaginary God’s. Free will is something that can only be taken. Free will cannot be given not even by a God unless it has been forcibly withheld.

Much has been written to explain evil and sin but I see as a natural part of evolution.

Consider.
First, let us eliminate what some see as evil. Natural disasters. These are unthinking occurrences and are neither good nor evil. There is no intent to do evil even as victims are created. Without intent to do evil, no act should be called evil.
In secular courts, this is called mens rea. Latin for an evil mind or intent and without it, the court will not find someone guilty even if they know that they are the perpetrator of the act.

Evil then is only human to human when they know they are doing evil and intend harm.

As evolving creatures, all we ever do, and ever can do, is compete or cooperate.
Cooperation we would see as good as there are no victims created. Competition would be seen as evil as it creates a victim. We all are either cooperating, doing good, or competing, doing evil, at all times.

Without us doing some of both, we would likely go extinct.

This, to me, explains why there is evil in the world quite well.

Be you a believer in nature, evolution or God, you should see that what Christians see as something to blame, evil, we should see that what we have, competition, deserves a huge thanks for being available to us. Wherever it came from, God or nature, without evolution we would go extinct. We must do good and evil.

There is no conflict between nature and God on this issue. This is how things are and should be. We all must do what some will think is evil as we compete and create losers to this competition.

This link speak to theistic evolution.

http://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/pope-would-you-accept-evolution-and-big-bang-180953166/?no-ist

If theistic evolution is true, then the myth of Eden should be read as a myth and there is not really any original sin.

Doing evil then is actually forced on us by evolution and the need to survive. Our default position is to cooperate or to do good. I offer this clip as proof of this. You will note that we default to good as it is better for survival.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HBW5vdhr_PA

Can you help but do evil? I do not see how. Do you?
And if you cannot, why would God punish you?

Regards
DL

Absolutely. That is the best way to be. Right? — Gnostic Christian Bishop

Absolutely. Hence insulting their intelligence, amongst other things, might be best avoided. Right?

Gnosis has little to do with my opinion on the supernatural. Rejecting the supernatural is just adult common sense.

You are trying hard to brand me. Forget it. — Gnostic Christian Bishop

If the intolerance disappears, it'll be really easy to stop noting it. And then you'll fit that description of Gnostics you said you had no problem with. And it is relevent of course, since part of your well justified concern about certain religious people is their intolerance.

This link speak to theistic evolution.

http://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/pope-would-you-accept-evolution-and-big-bang-180953166/?no-ist

If theistic evolution is true, then the myth of Eden should be read as a myth and there is not really any original sin. — Gnostic Christian Bishop

"God is not a magician" is the beginning of the downfall of 'God' for the Catholics, it demonstrating that the Bible contains fairytales.

Hence insulting their intelligence, amongst other things, might be best avoided. — Coben

Insults, like all dialog, have a use.

If you are to think, you chance insulting others.

The obtuse fall hard. Poor things.

Regards
DL

"God is not a magician" — PoeticUniverse

True but he can make moral people call his immoral ass good.

That is power.

Regards
DL

it demonstrating that the Bible contains fairytales. — PoeticUniverse

They have always known this. Religions are not really about beliefs. They are about assuaging insecurity. Peer pressure and fellowship are there as well.

Regards
DL

rue but he can make moral people call his immoral ass good. — Gnostic Christian Bishop

Believers tremble in fear of the Big Bad Boss,
His immorality untrusted not to cause loss—
Insanity hidden in ‘mysterious ways’;
They accept, so He them into Hell doesn’t toss.

Yep yep.

Regards
DL

Peer pressure — Gnostic Christian Bishop

Big indoctrination, from which not so many can recover.

Life’s cruelty satisfies all repentance,
So this credit give me when Thy sentence,
While here, too, I sin to cancel Your debt,
And away from the holy mosque jump the fence.

The Christian God is vengeful, demands of,
And tortures us with threats of Hellish shove.
Well, if I were a God and ruled above,
You could remove all my powers but love.

There’s no external creative deity.
Don’t worry, this verse has no impiety,
For we are the creative principle;
Intuitive strength is our propriety.

Omar-inspired:

When Allah mixed my clay He knew full well
My future acts, and could each one foretell;
Without His will no act of mine was wrought;
Is it then just to punish me in Hell?

The idol house is as the mosque, a shrine.
And chime of striking bells service divine;
Gueber’s belt, church and rosary and cross,
Each is in truth of worshiping a sign.

Why would the All Knowing, Loving Expert
Compose with Power His designed Concert,
Then decompose His meant Magnificat?
Because there’s none Such beyond the turret.

The sky, a vault, spans our worn lives below;
Jihun a course from our strained eyes aflow;
Hell is a spark struck by our vain distress;
Heaven but an instant when content we know.

How long of temple-incense, mosque-lamp tell?
How long of Heaven’s rewards or pains of Hell?
See, from all time ‘What is to be, will be!’
The Lord of Fate did on the Tablet spell!

I drown in sin—show me Thy clemency!
My soul is dark—make me Thy light to see!
A heaven that must be earned by painful works,
I call a wage, not a gift fair and free.

In Heaven, they say, dwell dark-eyed Houris fair,
And that pure wine and honey will be there;
If wine and woman we love here, ’tis right
Since all the same’s the end of the affair.

In Paradise, they tell us, Houris dwell,
And fountains run with wine and oxymel:
If these be lawful in the world to come,
Surely ‘tis right to love them here as well.

as always, shifting the issue.
re:tolerant

Absolutely. That is the best way to be.

Evil is good and not a problem if you look at the bigger picture. — Gnostic Christian Bishop

Oh ok. I think we need to understand a few things here. Evil is a problem for God. One thing that strikes me as really odd is the magnitude of evil. It seems disproportionate and excessive - do we beat our children senseless to make them understand a point?

You're a non-believer so I can understand why you think "evil is good". In biological terms pain is necessary to maintain a healthy state of mind and body. Leprosy destroys pain sensation and that results in injury that patients can't sense ultimately resulting in disfigurement, the hallmark of the disease that results in social ostracism.

Evil is a problem for God — TheMadFool

One would think so, yet 'God', whether the invented one or a 'good' one, lets evil spirits run free, blah, blah, blah.

It seems disproportionate and excessive - do we beat our children senseless to make them understand a point? — TheMadFool

Or do we torture them with flame? There goes the believers' unequal argument comparing God's discipline, and as such to be allowed, blah, blah, blah.

No need to be greatly annoyed, for the believers, as all of us, have to do what we do, whether silly or intelligent, as l luck would have us. Learning is out for the deeply indoctrinated, and so any progress is out, they being stuck.

Can you help but do evil? I do not see how. Do you? — Gnostic Christian Bishop

So when the religious people enact homophobic speech or worse, or control women, or do any of a number of things that one might consider evil, it is really good?

TheMadFool — TheMadFool

You say that there is a disproportionate amount of evil, while I see the opposite.

You are not looking at the big picture and do not seem able to read stats correctly.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_ADgh3yCSdM

Check any stat for evil that you like and you will see that it is likely at the best position we have yet to enjoy. Not the eco system of course.

Regards
DL

it is really good? — Coben

Is it? I don't think so but you go ahead and think that if you like.

Regards
DL

You say that there is a disproportionate amount of evil, while I see the opposite.

You are not looking at the big picture and do not seem able to read stats correctly.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_ADgh3yCSdM

Check any stat for evil that you like and you will see that it is likely at the best position we have yet to enjoy. Not the eco system of course.

Regards
DL — Gnostic Christian Bishop

I disagree. The usual stats don't reflect facts accurately. Evil needs more weight age than good. I mean a hundred charities can't balance one murder. We see that in the courts - no matter how good you are if you kill someone you go to jail.

if you kill someone you go to jail. — TheMadFool

Yes but the thing is, we do less killing.

Ignore the stats and you ignore reality.

Regards
DL

Yes but the thing is, we do less killing. — Gnostic Christian Bishop

Makes sense only to those who aren't killed. Actually it makes a whole lot of sense - high precision bombs, etc.

I disagree. The usual stats don't reflect facts accurately. Evil needs more weight age than good. I mean a hundred charities can't balance one murder. We see that in the courts - no matter how good you are if you kill someone you go to jail. — TheMadFool

Unless you're rich.

Unless you're rich. — Coben

Yes, we can't forget that money seems to break the laws of nature.

Yes, we can't forget that money seems to break the laws of nature. — TheMadFool

??

You mean it shows the laws of nature and how we let our insecurities lead our thinking.

We all want to be close to power, even if it is power used for evil.

Note how many idolize a genocidal and infanticidal prick of a god.

Regards
DL

I thought all religions were in the comedy genre. But religions have to have a super being or something to worship, so the gnostic cannot be atheist as you stated before. Or are you confused about it. — Sir2u

Man is god and we are legion. — Gnostic Christian Bishop

Somewhat like Buddhism and other religions that put man above god thanks to knowing that all gods are man made. — Gnostic Christian Bishop

I can't see where the confusion came from, haha. Still sounds like a sarcastic atheist to me.