What is our purpose in your religion?

cloudyday2 said:

There is infant mortality, childhood cancer, etc. Any religion that claims to know the purpose of our lives needs to address the fickleness of fate.

So what is our purpose in your religion?

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We all suffer the same fate, we all get sick, we all age everyday. Then we all die. I am not sure that any person's fate is different to anyone else.

Is fate fickle? Not really.

cloudyday2 said:

Can you give an example to clarify what you mean?

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I'm picturing the temporal existence of all of mankind through out time as a supernatural book sitting on a shelf in the realm of the eternal, that when you read it you live it from beginning to end.

hedrick said:

None of this defines a persons purpose. The idea of purpose suggests that something exists to accomplish something for someone. I’m not convinced that people have that kind of purpose. I would think God likely created us for fellowship or simply because he loves life. In that case he would value us as ourselves, not as instruments to accomplish something.

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Thanks for the post. I'm not saying we accomplish anything other than being who we are. But I define our purpose ultimately as what the Maker intended to accomplish when he conceived of everything His Word spoke into being.

cloudyday2 said:

There is infant mortality, childhood cancer, etc. Any religion that claims to know the purpose of our lives needs to address the fickleness of fate.

So what is our purpose in your religion?

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The effect of sin is death. Sin entered the world; the world was not created with it. Our purpose is aside from sin, we were made with a purpose before there was sin. Sin corrupts absolutely.
I think it is incorrect to judge the created world by looking at the fallen world, but you would have to share my Christian beliefs and have faith for my answer to even make sense.

cloudyday2 said:

How about the high infant mortality rate that has been the norm until the last 100 years or so?

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Are you talking about abortion?

We have no purpose other than that which we choose for ourselves.

eleos1954 said:

Are you talking about abortion?

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No. Actual infants. This was a big issue until fairly recrntly. But actually, death of children beyond infancy looks like it was an even bigger problem. Mortality in the past – around half died as children

cloudyday2 said:

So what is our purpose in your religion?

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The purpose of my religion is two fold.
1. To become a more human, Human Being.
2. To have God as my reality in life.

cloudyday2 said:

Hmmmm. Very interesting. So I am actually not me? Instead, I am a supernatural being reading a book about a natural being (cloudyday2) and becoming so absorbed in the story of cloudyday2 that I think I am him?

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You are always you, but you tend to forget "who" you are, so the book would be like a reminder where you fell from and where you were delivered from.

So what is the purpose?

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I believe that in the eternal we gradually forget how to be thankful. And also this keeps us humble by exposing a blindness to our own vanity.

(Of course it is a book of fiction from the perspective of the supernatural reader.)

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I think this is where the rubber meets the road so to speak. It's not fiction. The problem is that it is difficult to articulate eternal things with temporal terms. I wouldn't say one is more real than the other.

cloudyday2 said:

There is infant mortality, childhood cancer, etc. Any religion that claims to know the purpose of our lives needs to address the fickleness of fate.

So what is our purpose in your religion?

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Our purpose in life, according to early Buddhism, is to find nibbana - the unending peace/bliss/happiness.

It is the most reasonable answer to me, because the answer literally addressess all volitional activity in life.

OldWiseGuy said:

If God's ancient laws are to be believed there is/was a solution for that.

Deuteronomy 7:12-14 King James Version (KJV)

12 "Wherefore it shall come to pass, if ye hearken to these judgments, and keep, and do them, that the Lord thy God shall keep unto thee the covenant and the mercy which he sware unto thy fathers:

13 And he will love thee, and bless thee, and multiply thee: he will also bless the fruit of thy womb, and the fruit of thy land, thy corn, and thy wine, and thine oil, the increase of thy kine, and the flocks of thy sheep, in the land which he sware unto thy fathers to give thee.

14 Thou shalt be blessed above all people: there shall not be male or female barren among you, or among your cattle."

Even during their captivity/sojourning in Egypt the Israelite women were very fecund, with easier childbirths than the Egyptian women. It might be well for our women to copy their vigorous, physical lifestyle.

Exodus 1:19-20 King James Version (KJV)

19 "And the midwives said unto Pharaoh, Because the Hebrew women are not as the Egyptian women; for they are lively, and are delivered ere the midwives come in unto them.

20 Therefore God dealt well with the midwives: and the people multiplied, and waxed very mighty."

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So children are just replaceable? Sounds oddly like the same rationalization of death being just a minor inconvenience because God can just give you more children even if you lose all of them and remain the only survivor as Job suggests.

cloudyday2 said:

But wouldn't you agree that there is still a purpose even after the fall of the world? Fundamentalist Christians might say the purpose is to have faith in Jesus and become born again and then become more like Jesus by loving your neighbors and so on.

One problem is the many infants who die, but many Christians believe the infants automatically have salvation. But then we need to ask why can't we all die as infants? Am I here because I need to learn something while the souls of those who died as infants were a little smarter than mine?

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I'd have to shamelessly copy and paste this: Mark 12 something (sorry, recovering from stroke)
"One of the scribes came, and having heard them reasoning together, and perceiving that he had answered them well, asked him, Which is the first commandment of all? And Jesus answered him, The first of all the commandments is, Hear, O Israel The Lord our God is one Lord: And thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind, and with all thy strength: this is the first commandment. And the second is like, namely this, Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself. There is none other commandment greater than these"
It's not necessarily a purpose, as we define one. But God's love is much different than how society understands love, isn't it.

cloudyday2 said:

How about the infant mortality issue? Some people have long lives with plenty of quiet time to practice meditation while other people die before their first birthday.

Here are several possibilities:
(1) reincarnation - our soul spans more than one life
(2) one with the universe - our soul spans more than one person
(3) phony people - not all people have souls

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Wouldn't you agree that the infant mortality question - like any other question - is rooted in our perception of suffering, and that we seek answers to resolve that suffering & to attain the unending peace/bliss/happiness?

In this case, people die early or later in life because of a confluence of causes which resulted from other prior causes. For example, an infant can die early because its parents failed to do due diligence in ingesting the proper nutrients during their pregnancy, and so they all suffer the consequence. Or, they could've been druggies. Or, physically ill. Etc.

It's all about causes & effects, aka the Law of Kamma. The Law of Kamma, as applied to lifespans, is known specifically as the Law of Rebirth.

cloudyday2 said:

How about the infant mortality issue? Some people have long lives with plenty of quiet time to practice meditation while other people die before their first birthday.

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Here some information.

Infant Mortality | Maternal and Infant Health | Reproductive Health | CDC

muichimotsu said:

So children are just replaceable? Sounds oddly like the same rationalization of death being just a minor inconvenience because God can just give you more children even if you lose all of them and remain the only survivor as Job suggests.

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Having more children after the death of an infant isn't 'replacing' the lost child. It's moving on with your life and family plans.

cloudyday2 said:

But wouldn't you agree that there is still a purpose even after the fall of the world? Fundamentalist Christians might say the purpose is to have faith in Jesus and become born again and then become more like Jesus by loving your neighbors and so on.

One problem is the many infants who die, but many Christians believe the infants automatically have salvation. But then we need to ask why can't we all die as infants? Am I here because I need to learn something while the souls of those who died as infants were a little smarter than mine?

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Although children are sanctified by believing parents, there is some question about their spiritual fate if they die as unconverted children. My guess is that they will come up in the second resurrection, not the first.