What's your biggest beef with God?

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   emichaelposted 11 years ago

   I'm in the midst of researching for a new hub article, and I would like some feedback from you.
   
   There are some very impassioned individuals both for and against God in the religious forums on Hubpages, and I want to hear from both of you.
   
   As a believer, what are some characteristics of God that you have the most trouble coming to terms with?
   
   As a nonbeliever, same question. What makes belief in God impossible for you?
   
   And please, keep the discussion civil.

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      jomineposted 11 years agoin reply to this

      The fact that "he" is unwilling to "exist"!

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         emichaelposted 11 years agoin reply to this

         Interesting. I'm assuming you mean the apparent lack of evidence or perceivable interaction between God and humanity?
         
         Can you elaborate a little?

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            jomineposted 11 years agoin reply to this

            Sure,
            I have no trouble imagining "god" as an old man with a beard. What I can't understand is how he is a creator, when matter and space is eternal, how he is omnipotent, or omnipresent while these words are oxymoron.
            I also have trouble with his location.
            If you strip him of "creator", "omnipotence" and "omnipresence", what is left?

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               emichaelposted 11 years agoin reply to this

               I still don't know that I am understanding the issue. You are saying matter and space are eternal as in they had no definite beginning and so could not have had a creator? Also, explain how omnipotent and omnipresent are oxymorons.

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                  jomineposted 11 years agoin reply to this

                  Time is a concept. Our reality is present. Only with time, comes this beginning and creation... What we have is matter in eternal motion. Space is our conceptualization of "nothing". Nothing need no creation.
                  Omnipotence? Can god create a stone, he can't lift? Either way he'll not be omnipotent. If you add omniscience, can god change the future he omniscient-ed?
                  Omnipresence? Means present everywhere, or in laymen language occupying all available space. Then the all world will be solid block, we won't be able to move around.

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      Cagsilposted 11 years agoin reply to this

      Sure.
      And exactly what do you want to know. If you're referring to the title of your thread? Then I would like to point out two things (a) I'm not nor do I have a beef with a god and (b) the word itself.
      I was once a believer. I no longer hold any belief on the subject.
      Answered above.
      (a) there's no rational probability that a god is needed to exist (b) the highest authority any one individual can have is self. It's each person's actions(includes doing nothing(no action is still an action) lead them. Those actions are based on the psychological makeup of your brain(right and left sides). You have a conscience that informs you when you are not being honest either with yourself or others. Yes, people can look past their own conscience and still act, it's done all the time. What's not being done is enough people looking past ego, before acting. Too much dishonesty is destructive. Now just for comparison sake- 66% or more of the world's population hold same or similar beliefs about a god, heaven, hell and their understanding of life and yet the world is where it is. It's the majority doing the most damage.
      Civil? Discourse expected? That's a negative aspect. Do you see things like this often? Hmmmm.....just a thought.

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         couturepopcafeposted 11 years agoin reply to this

         Cags - I think you're dead on about ego overriding many decisions.  Behaving in 'self-preservation' mode is the norm for most, however unnecessary it may be.  Our 'learned behaviour' has become just that.  Allowing ourselves to be vulnerable without becoming weak, being quiet instead of trying to be right, edifying others instead of being defensive - all these things can amount to a personal world where the Infinite and All Consuming Love becomes paramount and the rest dissolves into nothingness.

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            Cagsilposted 11 years agoin reply to this

            Thank you.

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         emichaelposted 11 years agoin reply to this

         Very interesting points.
         
         You say that "the highest authority any one individual can have is self." And then you also say that "people can look past their own conscience and still act, it's done all the time." True on that last point. Criminal behavior is an obvious example. And in those cases, we have systems in place to correct such behavior--authority that must be answered to for actions against our societal standard. So if the self is capable of committing acts that have been deemed by society at large as unacceptable, then there must be some authority higher than the individual. If he is accountable only to himself, how can we say anything he does is unacceptable.
         
         Am I just not understanding correctly?

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            Cagsilposted 11 years agoin reply to this

            TRUE on all points.
            Criminal? This is social term.
            This is untrue. You have laws in place to place consequences on those who don't live up to social standard.
            Untrue. If a person understood themselves and how to live within a society, lived honestly and held themselves truly accountable, then they are not likely to step over their conscience to begin with.
            You can say whatever you like, you have the right. The conscience knows what's right and wrong. Actions have consequences and a reaction. Someone stepping over their own conscience isn't being honest. Since it's done so often, there's a reason for social laws(consequences). Otherwise, it wouldn't be needed. Government isn't a higher authority? Government is consequence giver.

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               emichaelposted 11 years agoin reply to this

               This particular topic is getting a little off point from the original forum question. Really the only difference in our beliefs is that I believe conscience is created by God, you believe it is an innate characteristic of man. I have many problems with that line of thinking, but I don't want to go into them all here. I'd rather save them for the article. (I don't intend to be dismissive, there are just so many topics we could stray into, and I want to make sure this stays focused.)
               
               To go back to a comment you made in your first post, you said, "Now just for comparison sake- 66% or more of the world's population hold same or similar beliefs about a god, heaven, hell and their understanding of life and yet the world is where it is. It's the majority doing the most damage."
               
               I posed a similar quested in response to another post. Do you believe it is the actual tenants of religion that encourage negative behavior or the mistreatment of those tenants?

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                  Cagsilposted 11 years agoin reply to this

                  That usually happens.
                  We know when and where conscience came from. It came from the development of the human consciousness(self awareness).
                  Yes, that is true it could.
                  I don't believe and my beliefs are not your concern. However, I'm of the understanding that many of the world's religions only teach separation. It teaches people to avoid reality and grants them the supposed power of knowing everything. They claim to have all the answers to the mysteries of all life, but still yet claim that they don't know everything.
                  
                  World religions constantly put someone on the defensive and always has them fighting themselves and others who don't believe as they do.

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      Mikel G Robertsposted 11 years agoin reply to this

      My inability to use 'majik' (as my atheist friends call it). I have often thought:
      
      "if I could use magic, I could make the world perfect."
      "With magic I could make the world a place where everyone has everything they need."
      "If I had magic..."
      
      I have come to understand (after many many years) that If I had a magic ability what I would create would be a perfect world, for me. For everyone else it would be Hell. Not because I'm a sadist, not because I would conjure torture and pain for them. It would be hell for them because they would be slaves. Thier choices would not matter, thier desires would always be only second consideration.
      
      If I had magic and I granted that magic use to others we would simply have even nastier wars as people that could not agree would use thier 'majik' to remove those that opposed them.
      
      If everyone had 'majik' equally, then we would be in the exact same condition we are in today. So though I understand the reasoning behind denial of a majik ability. I still want it.
      
      That's my biggest beef with God.
      
      ***truly if you really think about it 'majik' does exist, it is just that we call it 'money'. Those that have more of it create the world the way they want, and everyone else's desires are secondary. Maybe that's my biggest beef with God.
      
      I'm re-thinking my answer... Infinite Diversity. God's love of Infinitly Diverse entities.
      
      I want things the way I want things (as do we all). God wants what I want to exist but also the exact opposite of what I want to be in existence to exist. Maybe that's my biggest beef with God. Good question.

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      Hollie Thomasposted 11 years agoin reply to this

      I do not have a beef with god, because I doubt that he exists, therefore, I cannot have a beef with something I do not believe to exist. In my experience, a non believer does not have a beef with God, because like me, they do not believe he exists. I think some non-believers, obviously I can't speak for them all, have a beef with believers who try to impose their values and belief system on non believers. This can come across as disrespectful and intolerant, particularly when many non believers just accepts that a person has faith and respects it, but does not try to convert.

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         emichaelposted 11 years agoin reply to this

         Maybe I should have phrased the question more specifically. Obviously if you don't believe in God, you can't have a problem with him. What I'm essentially asking is WHY do you not believe in God? Are there certain characteristics/aspects that you find particularly hard to come to terms with? Some people say things like, "I used to believe in God, but then..."
         
         I can understand taking issue with pushy/disrespectful believers. Perhaps that is your biggest problem with religion?

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            Hollie Thomasposted 11 years agoin reply to this

            Yes, I think it is better to separate religion from the big G, because for me, this is part of the problem. As a child, I was raised by secular parents, with odd beliefs. My mothers parents were Jewish and my fathers parents were Catholic. ( there was a hold of problems there but I wont go into that) My parents were married in a protestant church ( I wont go into that either) My grandparents claimed to be religious. My Jewish grandparents were not, they were secular and only celebrated high holy days out of tradition, not religion. My Catholic grandparents only ever became "religious" when they were judging others. I'm kind of getting to the point here, the bible and Torah, neither of which I'm too familiar with (perhaps out of rebellion) are the constructs of man, a means of social control. There is absolutely no definitive evidence to suggest that the big  G or Jesus existed. Only the evidence of man. I'm afraid I need more, however, I have no problem with believers as long as they respect my right not to believe, as I respect their right to believe, and do not try to present as some other wordly being with a message from the big G for me.

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               Jeramiposted 11 years agoin reply to this

               "There is absolutely no definitive evidence to suggest that the big  G or Jesus existed. Only the evidence of man".
               ==========================================
               me
               
                  And Yet;  If God were to present himself in such a way That every non believer here in these forums were to BELIEVE  because they say everything that they needed to se to become a believer;  It wouldn't take but a couple of generations before things returned to the way it was before God presented himself to YOU.
               
                   All that those next generations would have is YOUR word for it.
               
               
                  So, it would seem that God would have to constantly be parading around to keep everyones attention.
                  
                  My apologies for not expressing this so well.

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                  recommend1posted 11 years agoin reply to this

                  You express this fine.  However the point you make is not valid any more because the whole impossible thing would be recorded and commemorated, the reason nobody believes now is that we only have the word of a few old racist homophobic and probably bipolar individuals.  We know now that many of the biblical morals are flawed and why, we cannot find any evidence of any of the supposed events of the new testament, and no evidence of god anywhere.  And before you start in with everything is evidence, it is evidence of something but not the existence of a god.

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                     ediggityposted 11 years agoin reply to this

                     King James Bible (Cambridge Ed.)
                     Jesus said unto him, Verily I say unto thee, That this night, before the cock crow, thou shalt deny me thrice.

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                        recommend1posted 11 years agoin reply to this

                        Not a bad story - but the hero dies in the end.

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                           ediggityposted 11 years agoin reply to this

                           Exactly. 

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      paarsurreyposted 11 years agoin reply to this

      I am an Ahmadi peaceful Muslim; I don't have any trouble with any attributes of the Creator God.

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      A Troubled Manposted 11 years agoin reply to this

      So many Gods with so many promises can make it a very difficult choice to believe in any one of them.
      
      Unfortunately, there has yet to be a God that doesn't contradict those promises or teach it's followers honesty instead of hypocrisy.

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      ediggityposted 11 years agoin reply to this

      Don't have a beef with him. 

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   Randy Godwinposted 11 years ago

   Babe, Paul Bunyon's blue ox!

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      emichaelposted 11 years agoin reply to this

      That is helpful. Thank you

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   Emile Rposted 11 years ago

   Belief in God is difficult for me because of how the big three have handled belief. If he existed, why would he allow this hatred of humanity the religious display go unchecked?

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      emichaelposted 11 years agoin reply to this

      This, I find, is the biggest hang up people have. It is also the major topic of the hub I'm working on As much as I want to go into my views here, I need to save it for the hub. I hope to have it published soon, and then maybe we can have a more in depth discussion. I'd like to probe a little further into your question, if you don't mind. Do you feel that it is the tenants of religion that promote hateful behavior or religious individuals who misrepresent their faith?

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         Emile Rposted 11 years agoin reply to this

         I would chalk it up to tenets of faith. If you are religious, you probably can't see it.

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      ediggityposted 11 years agoin reply to this

      Free will.

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   couturepopcafeposted 11 years ago

   I have no beefs with the Universal One.  All good comes from knowing Love, seeking it every minute of every day, in spite of defeats, dissention, and defenses.  Within each of us is that spirit of which is spoken in the New Testament, the power to move objects and change our worlds. 
   
   Most don't seem to find the faith which would be powered by their own conviction.  Life is a dichotemy.  We must move it on our own but not without the insight of others.  We must believe of our own but cannot exclude the world around us.  We have the power within us but we give it away.  We are often too rigid or too maleable.  We have not taken to heart the great power which is God, Allah, the Universe, the Multiverse, the Holiest of Holies, the One and All Good...call it what you wish...it amounts to the same thing:  we can only gain the power of peace and fulfilment through Love in order to enable our worlds to betterment and perfection.
   
   I believe that the majority of Christians (not to the exclusion of other religions) don't get IT.  God is not someone sitting in heaven, having made all decisions for all time. Each of us is the embodiment of Creation, as in His Image and Likeness we are made, spoken of in the Christain Bible.  This does not mean we look like Him, it means we are Him, however misdirected we may be.
   
   With no disrespect intended, we are all matter and we are all eternal.  How we choose to live and direct our eternal matter is up to each of us.  I believe excluding the spirit on anyone's part is a grave mistake and to the detriment of all.  I also believe in collective consciousness, allowing for influence over others to some degree.

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   knolyourselfposted 11 years ago

   'Where's the beef?' God as statement or God as a question? A definitive God and a mystical one. My beef would be with the former.

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   Darrell Robertsposted 11 years ago

   I have no beef with God. I know what I want, and that is to have my own personal realm where I get to do excatly what I want when and how I want.  I am tired of wtching what goes on in this world.  I want my own world where it is my way and there is only fun and happiness,peace and love, because that is my way.
   All this pain and suffereing is just not cool in my eyes.

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   Grifterposted 11 years ago

   I've gone through several cycles of opinion of a God-like being.
   As a kid, the topic never came across my mind.
   As a teenager I thanked him in good times and cursed him in bad.
   Now more grown up, I think deeper about it. Is there 1 being? Are conscious beings a collective God? Coincidence often seems too good to be true. I don't go to church, religion has it's qualities, but is far outweighed by it's negatives.
   
   The creation of things is so baffling, with many arguments in the direction of science or religion. Neither really matter to me, I believe there is something behind it all, but right now it's definitely out of my understanding.
   
   I guess if you'd call it beef, I'd say lack of knowledge and I'm looking for it.
   Much more beef is to be had against mankind

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   Virgil Newsomeposted 11 years ago

   A red heifer.

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   Home Girlposted 11 years ago

   God versus Religion is like a nice fairytale vs reality. Fairytale is good, the one that reality - that hurts! Lots of beef with religion...

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    getitriteposted 11 years ago

    My beef with God is that He acts like an outright fraud!!!
    
    When will He stop the abject nonsense, and JUST REVEAL HIMSELF?!!!
    
    He behaves as if He is only imaginary.

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    paradigmsearchposted 11 years ago

    "What's your biggest beef with God?"
    
    He never answers the damn phone.

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    brotheryochananposted 11 years ago

    none whatsoever

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    SomewayOuttaHereposted 11 years ago

    'Why?'

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       Jeramiposted 11 years agoin reply to this

       ME ?  Why did I not express this as well as I wanted to ;...  or why apologize?
       
          I guess because I am not feeling as well as I thought I was going to when I got on here?  And I don't think I did justis to the point I wanted to make.
       
         So I think I'm going to get SomewhereOuttaHere.
         Good night.

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          SomewayOuttaHereposted 11 years agoin reply to this

          ...good night Jerami...peace...

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    emrldphxposted 11 years ago

    I'll have to state that my view of the Trinity is different than most traditional Christianity. I've studied apocrypha and other religions intensively at points in my life, and I believe God to be a being of pure love and joy, who is helping us to discover the path that leads to the same. In a nutshell.
    
    I also believe that He presents religion in different ways to different people. One reason I can think of is that it gives us all a chance to learn to be more accepting. Another reason is maybe you don't learn how to love the same way I do.
    
    That being said, I don't have any beef with God. The only beef I did have was being too sick to continue with humanitarian work in Brazil a few years ago, but if I had been in the US at the time, I probably would have died from the sickness. It was only the change in my diet that allowed us to find out what was wrong with me in time, so I went from being angry to grateful...
    
    I've accepted that He is wise, and I am not... I'm just a child and a student.

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    KC3Ladyposted 3 years ago

    You should have been here a few years ago during the mass exodus around the time of the Google Panda roll out. Hubpages management was trying to deal with Google, and there was at least one person in the forum, who appeared to be a satanist, just ranting and raging about God and Christianity.

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    Castlepalomaposted 3 years ago

    I miss alot of those interesting guys 8 years ago. The Religious topic are few now, They might of went over to agnostic or Atheists forums sites to share free and deep thoughts.

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