Evidence of God in the world?

Dave RP · Oct 25, 2018

As an Atheist one of the main reasons I cannot believe in God is the total absence of any evidence that he has any current involvement in the world.

I see appalling wars in various parts of the world, with prayers in every church for peace, which never comes. Oppression of Christians in various parts of the world, predominantly the Middle East, prayers unanswered, famine in Yemen, prayers unanswered.

On a UK radio station I heard that UK Christians had a day of prayer to reduce the increasing amount of gun and knife crime - fat lot of good that did.

OK so occasionally someone who is ill recovers after prayer, but atheists, Muslims, Jews and Buddhists all sometimes make seemingly miraculous recoveries from illness.

Natural disasters kill thousands, climate change is leading to extinctions of species, the insect population world wide has fallen by 70% in 30 years -prayers unanswered.

So my question is - what evidence of a "living God" do Christians see, is any evidence needed and why is the God at work (if there is one) the Christian God and not the Muslim or soem other God?

Dave G. · Oct 25, 2018

There isn't anything un-Biblical in the signs you consider as no evidence of God, because the Lord said in the latter times all these things would increase. He is keeping His word exactly. Life as we know it, one day is going down, the planet itself is going down. So no surprises here at all. To look for the evidence of God in these types of things is quite shallow actually but yet the proof is right there in front of you..

Our walk with God is about something that takes place in our hearts, it's not looking for evidence or if you will, proof. It's about faith. We come to Him in faith and He meets us. But at that, if you lose the evolution idea and accept creation then suddenly all of everything seen and unseen is evidence, the earth, the stars, the wonders of the universe,every living thing, for God is life, even the millions of cells making up one flower has an order beyond coincidence. God is in all of these things, the creator of it all.. Scripture says He knows the number of every hair on your head and every grain of sand on all the beaches of the world. God is awesome beyond our comprehension. Meanwhile He has a plan and it's going off exactly on schedule and always will. As insignificant as we are He still values one soul above all the world. That's right, one soul has more value than every single thing on earth and even the earth itself.

Prayer is something hoped for of God, we don't get to direct Him . Some things are meant to be and they are going to be, period. As a multi church member and part of a world wide outreach I personally have seen God working, we have seen answered prayer, I personally have seen things take place in my 40+ years of Christian life that for me over time has left me with 0 doubt of the existence of God ( Father, Son, Holy Spirit). Many things have come by the Word Of God ( scripture) but also in real world events. It starts from a leap of faith in accepting God and more so the second person of the trinity, Jesus Christ. It's useless to try and describe this to any non believer but to say that you first have to take your own leap with any tiny piece of faith you might have been given. As we mature as Christians we are given more evidence.

Mountainmike · Oct 25, 2018

Not total absence of evidence : indeed a lot more than you think.

First to say Christians are Not obliged to believe in so called miraculous phenomena, indeed that is not the basis of faith. But as a scientist and having studied many phenomena , I say the evidence is much and compelling.

Since it features elsewhere in threads I have written of late, I will list a few of those.

1/ Fatima - the prophecy not the apparition.
Months before an apparition said come on Oct 13 - 1917
and "God will perform a miracle that all will see and believe!"

On that day, in that place, 100000 witnesses many sceptics, including professional witnesses and authorities who wanted to wipe out religion and debunk it , and a secular press , ended up confirming it. Both prophecy and fulfilment.

The sun danced, emitted bands of colour and was seen to fall. Torrential rain earlier caused mud which dried instantly. It wasn't mass hysteria, it was witnessed from miles ( furthest was 20) and by those distant who had not heard of the prophecy. Including by many skeptics.

Sceptics focus on rationalising the phenomenon. They miss the point. It was extraordinary, not seen before or since, in Portugal, and happened exactly when and where it was prophesied. No explanation is possible.

2/ Same lady prophesied in 1917 that " God is offended, and unless man changed his ways , " know that an unknown light will herald a worse war". On Jan 25 1939 curtains of red light were witnesses across much of the northern hemisphere , reported in all national newspapers. Reported as an aurora, which are normally green and limited, this was red , across many countries as far as Africa and far more similar to noted nuclear weapon aurora.
This was within days of Hitler threatening Poland and Stalin deciding to join the war.

Same lady predicted that Russia ( which had yet to become a functioning state, let alone the threat it became) - would spread its errrors over the world. How could the children who witnessed the lady make that up?

But there are masses of others..
I referenced in Portugal
3 - the controlled trial certified inedia of Alexandria da costa
4 - the extraordinary behaviour of doves at bombarral
5 - the scientifically analysed statue of Akita weeping, and the worrying messages associated. Same lady now predicts a worse war still.
6 - the forensic analysis of Eucharistic miracles at tixtla, sokolka, legnica, lanciano and buenos airies. Life and flesh where there was none.
7 - the forensic analysis of the statue of Cochabamba,
8 - the prophesied and analysed and filmed stigmata of Katya rivas. The almost instant healing of wounds as much a medical mystery, as the stigmata,
9 - the writings of stigmatic Therese Neumann gramattically flawless in ancient languages apeasant can never have known. Indeed Katya Rivas writings, the witness speed and continuity no author can match,
10 - the medical mystery that is incorruption of such as bernadette.
11 - indeed the forensic investigation of shroud and sudarium, and the impossible to explain image on it,
Forget the junk RC testing, long disproved.
12 - the impossible to duplicate real image apparition at zeitoun, even now science cannot duplicate it, and never will with conventional science. Witnessed by millions, of all faith and none, all walks of life, over years.
13 the vision of a mediaeval bedridden nun in Belgium, that led to locating a site in turkey, the house of Mary " panaghia capouli" , describing it as it was 2000 years before,on,y because of the vision was it found, abs only by digging was the foundation revealed in exact correspondence with the vision.
How was consciousness achieved of 2000 years before?

In many cases, These are serious forensic labs reporting, whose voices in criminal trials are accepted as fact.

No Christian is obliged to believe the above.
As a scientist used to analysing data, I find them hard to discount and impossible to explain. Now or future.

Need I go on?

Dave RP · Oct 25, 2018

Dave G. said:
There isn't anything un-Biblical in the signs you consider as no evidence of God, because the Lord said in the latter times all these things would increase. He is keeping His word exactly. Life as we know it, one day is going down, the planet itself is going down. So no surprises here at all. To look for the evidence of God in these types of things is quite shallow actually but yet the proof is right there in front of you..

Our walk with God is about something that takes place in our hearts, it's not looking for evidence or if you will, proof. It's about faith. We come to Him in faith and He meets us. But at that, if you lose the evolution idea and accept creation then suddenly all of everything seen and unseen is evidence, the earth, the stars, the wonders of the universe,every living thing, for God is life, even the millions of cells making up one flower has an order beyond coincidence. God is in all of these things, the creator of it all.. Scripture says He knows the number of every hair on your head and every grain of sand on all the beaches of the world. God is awesome beyond our comprehension. Meanwhile He has a plan and it's going off exactly on schedule and always will. As insignificant as we are He still values one soul above all the world. That's right, one soul has more value than every single thing on earth and even the earth itself.

Prayer is something hoped for of God, we don't get to direct Him . Some things are meant to be and they are going to be, period. As a multi church member and part of a world wide outreach I personally have seen God working, we have seen answered prayer, I personally have seen things take place in my 40+ years of Christian life that for me over time has left me with 0 doubt of the existence of God ( Father, Son, Holy Spirit). Many things have come by the Word Of God ( scripture) but also in real world events. It starts from a leap of faith in accepting God and more so the second person of the trinity, Jesus Christ. It's useless to try and describe this to any non believer but to say that you first have to take your own leap with any tiny piece of faith you might have been given. As we mature as Christians we are given more evidence.

Thanks for the response. What I don't understand is why pray for god to change his plan. If god knows all this is happening and he is happy with the grief, destruction, savagery and mayhem we see in parts of the world, what is the point of praying to change it. God was either going to allow it happen, or not.

Or are you saying that god has a plan which he shifts dependant upon the prayers he receives?

The other day I was listening to Voice of Islam radio in London and they were celebrating how Allah had listened to their prayers and as a result the target sum of money needed for their new building was now reached - good old Allah answered their prayers, or maybe the new or upgraded Mosque was always in gods plan?

I understand what you mean about god being in your heart, I am dating a Christian and she tells me she feels god deeply inside, I'm sure she feels something (of course I will say it is not god!) so I understand your point there. I'm afraid though that the god of the bible and of religious dogma eludes me.

Dave RP · Oct 25, 2018

Mountainmike said:
Not total absence of evidence : indeed a lot more than you think.

First to say Christians are Not obliged to believe in so called miraculous phenomena, indeed that is not the basis of faith. But as a scientist and having studied many phenomena , I say the evidence is much and compelling.

Since it features elsewhere in threads I have written of late, I will list a few of those.

1/ Fatima - the prophecy not the apparition.
Months before an apparition said come on Oct 13 - 1917
and "God will perform a miracle that all will see and believe!"

On that day, in that place, 100000 witnesses many sceptics, including professional witnesses and authorities who wanted to wipe out religion and debunk it , and a secular press , ended up confirming it. Both prophecy and fulfilment.

The sun danced, emitted bands of colour and was seen to fall. Torrential rain earlier caused mud which dried instantly. It wasn't mass hysteria, it was witnessed from miles ( furthest was 20) and by those distant who had not heard of the prophecy. Including by many skeptics.

Sceptics focus on rationalising the phenomenon. They miss the point. It was extraordinary, not seen before or since, in Portugal, and happened exactly when and where it was prophesied. No explanation is possible.

2/ Same lady prophesied in 1917 that " God is offended, and unless man changed his ways , " know that an unknown light will herald a worse war". On Jan 25 1939 curtains of red light were witnesses across much of the northern hemisphere , reported in all national newspapers. Reported as an aurora, which are normally green and limited, this was red , across many countries as far as Africa and far more similar to noted nuclear weapon aurora.
This was within days of Hitler threatening Poland and Stalin deciding to join the war.

Same lady predicted that Russia ( which had yet to become a functioning state, let alone the threat it became) - would spread its errrors over the world. How could the children who witnessed the lady make that up?

But there are masses of others..
I referenced in Portugal
3 - the controlled trial certified inedia of Alexandria da costa
4 - the extraordinary behaviour of doves at bombarral
5 - the scientifically analysed statue of Akita weeping, and the worrying messages associated. Same lady now predicts a worse war still.
6 - the forensic analysis of Eucharistic miracles at tixtla, sokolka, legnica, lanciano and buenos airies. Life and flesh where there was none.
7 - the forensic analysis of the statue of Cochabamba,
8 - the prophesied and analysed and filmed stigmata of Katya rivas. The almost instant healing of wounds as much a medical mystery, as the stigmata,
9 - the writings of stigmatic Therese Neumann gramattically flawless in ancient languages apeasant can never have known. Indeed Katya Rivas writings, the witness speed and continuity no author can match,
10 - the medical mystery that is incorruption of such as bernadette.
11 - indeed the forensic investigation of shroud and sudarium, and the impossible to explain image on it,
Forget the junk RC testing, long disproved.
12 - the impossible to duplicate real image apparition at zeitoun, even now science cannot duplicate it, and never will with conventional science. Witnessed by millions, of all faith and none, all walks of life, over years.
13 the vision of a mediaeval bedridden nun in Belgium, that led to locating a site in turkey, the house of Mary " panaghia capouli" , describing it as it was 2000 years before,on,y because of the vision was it found, abs only by digging was the foundation revealed in exact correspondence with the vision.
How was consciousness achieved of 2000 years before?

In many cases, These are serious forensic labs reporting, whose voices in criminal trials are accepted as fact.

No Christian is obliged to believe the above.
As a scientist used to analysing data, I find them hard to discount and impossible to explain. Now or future.

Need I go on?

I'm sorry and I don't wish to appear rude, but the things your quoting are all either unsubstantiated, the result of mass hysteria, superstitious utterances, folklore or a combination of these. It is impossible to credit bizarre visions to god.

In the Fatima event there were thousands who saw one thing, thousands who saw another and many thousands who saw nothing at all.

In 1939 Hitler and Russia had signed a non aggression pact and later they carved up Poland between themselves. At the height of the first world war, when Portugal had just sent its first troops to the front, it is hardly surprising that war and destruction would be on the minds of children.

If god exists he'd surely be ale to something a bit better than the bizarre instances you point out?

Mountainmike · Oct 25, 2018

I suggest you study them first. Then decide.
Good order

The refusal to look at evidence is the reason you say there is no evidence.
A lot of the investigations were done by skeptics
eg the report and investigation into alexandrina da costa was a controlled trial by skeptical doctors done in a hospital - extended when they couldnt explain it -still they couldnt explain it! - so they reported what they witnesed and left it "unexplained, inexplicable". I can dig out the report by them if you wish.
So who are you to contest what sceptical medical doctors concluded from a controlled trial?
They were actually there, you are not! Ill wager their medicall qualifications trump yours!

A lot of this is forensic lab verified. The lab that analysed tixtla eucharistic miracle was a national forensics lab, whose day job was convicting criminals. Their procedures are validated to good practice, they have to be. Their forensic reports are contained in such books as Castarnons on tixtla. You would trust them implicitly on a criminal trial. Why not this? Doyou even know what the eucharistic miracles are, what actually happened, the science done? Before discount them?
I doubt it.

And contemporary state service operative interviews - put a new light on Stalins intentions. Long before he actually acted. The interest is when he decided, not what he did. And regardless of Stalin look at wiki for january 1939 -

Afew days before jan 25 - hitler demanded poland give up territory, they refused. A few days after he said "or else" - they still refused. He then obliterated poland. When did he actually take the decision? somewhere between the two.

NOBODY can contest, that the war began with that decision, and the extraordinary light occurred at the same time within days or hours, reported in many national newspapers from witnesses in many contries even in Nature magazine and had never been witnessed before or since on anything like the scale, or that a lady predicted such in 1917.

So study it.
Its your apriori beliefs getting in the way, not the evidence.

You cannot say theres no evidence, without studying the evidence presented!

Anyway. You asked for evidence, I gave you a list.
Your comment on it was your belief about it, not a comment on the evidence.
Thanks would be nice. Happy to discuss them if you wish.

Dave RP said:
I'm sorry and I don't wish to appear rude, but the things your quoting are all either unsubstantiated, the result of mass hysteria, superstitious utterances, folklore or a combination of these. It is impossible to credit bizarre visions to god.

In the Fatima event there were thousands who saw one thing, thousands who saw another and many thousands who saw nothing at all.

In 1939 Hitler and Russia had signed a non aggression pact and later they carved up Poland between themselves. At the height of the first world war, when Portugal had just sent its first troops to the front, it is hardly surprising that war and destruction would be on the minds of children.

If god exists he'd surely be ale to something a bit better than the bizarre instances you point out?

Dave G. · Oct 25, 2018

Dave RP said:
Thanks for the response. What I don't understand is why pray for god to change his plan. If god knows all this is happening and he is happy with the grief, destruction, savagery and mayhem we see in parts of the world, what is the point of praying to change it. God was either going to allow it happen, or not.

Or are you saying that god has a plan which he shifts dependant upon the prayers he receives?

The other day I was listening to Voice of Islam radio in London and they were celebrating how Allah had listened to their prayers and as a result the target sum of money needed for their new building was now reached - good old Allah answered their prayers, or maybe the new or upgraded Mosque was always in gods plan?

I understand what you mean about god being in your heart, I am dating a Christian and she tells me she feels god deeply inside, I'm sure she feels something (of course I will say it is not god!) so I understand your point there. I'm afraid though that the god of the bible and of religious dogma eludes me.

First I would just reiterate my last sentence or two in my last post. My prayer for you is that your Christian friend is not a chance encounter in your life and that she can influence your pathway towards God.

As to answered prayer, God has a provision for us that we communicate to Him in prayer and to answer prayer. The answer just isn't always yes . The answer when it is yes, sometimes is blatantly clear as to leave no doubt and at other times is veiled or not exactly as we envisioned the answer to be..

If you think of God as a heavenly Father, did your living father when you were a child always give you what you wanted ? Or was there a larger house hold plan often times ? Did he not answer at all sometimes but just kind of groan ? And still other times you maybe got that new bike, maybe not today but next week or next year ?

There are more scientists who as they discover more and more of the universe and it's order who are coming on board and proving if to no one else but themselves that not only is it probable that there is a God but that there "must be". God absolutely works in science and is not a magic show. He is in every finite detail of everything. But more importantly, no one as yet has been able to prove that there is no God. Even some of the greats in science can't quite make that statement. They may not believe but they can not prove there is no God either. And some who set out to prove it ended up coming to the opposite conclusion.

inquiring mind · Oct 25, 2018

Dave RP said:
As an Atheist one of the main reasons I cannot believe in God is the total absence of any evidence that he has any current involvement in the world.

I see appalling wars in various parts of the world, with prayers in every church for peace, which never comes. Oppression of Christians in various parts of the world, predominantly the Middle East, prayers unanswered, famine in Yemen, prayers unanswered.

On a UK radio station I heard that UK Christians had a day of prayer to reduce the increasing amount of gun and knife crime - fat lot of good that did.

OK so occasionally someone who is ill recovers after prayer, but atheists, Muslims, Jews and Buddhists all sometimes make seemingly miraculous recoveries from illness.

Natural disasters kill thousands, climate change is leading to extinctions of species, the insect population world wide has fallen by 70% in 30 years -prayers unanswered.

So my question is - what evidence of a "living God" do Christians see, is any evidence needed and why is the God at work (if there is one) the Christian God and not the Muslim or soem other God?

There has always been wickedness, trouble, and hardship as a result of man’s fallen state, and when we use poor judgement it’s usually the innocent that pay. So, why blame God for the damage inflicted by life or man in this condition? And questioning Him because of unanswered prayers, as we have determined appropriate for each situation based on our limited understanding, is just vanity.

God has never told us that there will be no suffering or death in this fallen world. Regarding your question about prayers, maybe instead of trying to direct the outcome ourselves they should just be for Him to handle the situations according to His will and understanding, not ours, and to give us the wisdom to accept the outcome whatever it is.

If we’re not careful, everything seems to boil down to our vanity, even deciding what religion, if any, we think is best for us, through evaluation. So, if you’re evaluating or looking for evidence of God, instead of sincerely ‘seeking Him from the heart, confessing your sins, asking for forgiveness, and accepting Christ as your savior’ for your part in this world, however big or small, it's just more vanity... and I doubt much divine guidance will ever be revealed to you in that state.

Dave RP · Oct 25, 2018

Dave G. said:
First I would just reiterate my last sentence or two in my last post. My prayer for you is that your Christian friend is not a chance encounter in your life and that she can influence your pathway towards God.

As to answered prayer, God has a provision for us that we communicate to Him in prayer and to answer prayer. The answer just isn't always yes . The answer when it is yes, sometimes is blatantly clear as to leave no doubt and at other times is veiled or not exactly as we envisioned the answer to be..

If you think of God as a heavenly Father, did your living father when you were a child always give you what you wanted ? Or was there a larger house hold plan often times ? Did he not answer at all sometimes but just kind of groan ? And still other times you maybe got that new bike, maybe not today but next week or next year ?

There are more scientists who as they discover more and more of the universe and it's order who are coming on board and proving if to no one else but themselves that not only is it probable that there is a God but that there "must be". God absolutely works in science and is not a magic show. He is in every finite detail of everything. But more importantly, no one as yet has been able to prove that there is no God. Even some of the greats in science can't quite make that statement. They may not believe but they can not prove there is no God either. And some who set out to prove it ended up coming to the opposite conclusion.

Thanks again for the response.

My partner is a very committed Christian, she brought up 2 girls on her own after her husband abandoned her when the youngest was a baby, they are now young adults. She says she prayed to meet a man who she would have a relationship with, and god sent me....... As I'm an Atheist, it may have been the devil who sent me though.......

Seriously, I am very supportive of her faith, it is a personal thing, but I have told her that whilst I respect her faith I don't share it. We are both happy with the situation.

No one can prove that mythical things don't exist, this has been the subject of frequent debate - I am unable to prove there are that fairies do not exist at the bottom of my garden, nor that at night when no one is watching the Wombles of Wimbledon Common go out and clean up our litter. I've been to Wimbledon Common many times, never seen the Wombles but they are secretive and only make themselves known to a select few.

I think you're mistaken with regards to scientists coming to the conclusion that there "must be" a God, science cannot explain everything in the universe, maybe the explanation will be forever out of our sight, but I don't know of any scientists who say "well I can't explain that phenomena, so therefore it must be gods work". I'm pretty sure someone would ask him the entirely logical question - "where did god come from and how does he do all this stuff"?

As for my father sometimes giving and sometimes not, sorry but that doesn't work for me - my father, really good bloke that he was, was constrained by many things but mostly by his humanity and his own prejudices. God is supposed to be perfect, he is not like a human father, he is a god. making him sound human wont change that.

Dave RP · Oct 25, 2018

inquiring mind said:
There has always been wickedness, trouble, and hardship as a result of man’s fallen state, and when we use poor judgement it’s usually the innocent that pay. So, why blame God for the damage inflicted by life or man in this condition? And questioning Him because of unanswered prayers, as we have determined appropriate for each situation based on our limited understanding, is just vanity.

God has never told us that there will be no suffering or death in this fallen world. Regarding your question about prayers, maybe instead of trying to direct the outcome ourselves they should just be for Him to handle the situations according to His will and understanding, not ours, and to give us the wisdom to accept the outcome whatever it is.

If we’re not careful, everything seems to boil down to our vanity, even deciding what religion, if any, we think is best for us, through evaluation. So, if you’re evaluating or looking for evidence of God, instead of sincerely ‘seeking Him from the heart, confessing your sins, asking for forgiveness, and accepting Christ as your savior’ for your part in this world, however big or small, it's just more vanity... and I doubt much divine guidance will ever be revealed to you in that state.

Maybe you're right, I don't see it as vanity though, I have a logical and enquiring mind and look for evidence - that's how I'm made.

Dave G. · Oct 25, 2018

Dave RP said:
Thanks again for the response.

My partner is a very committed Christian, she brought up 2 girls on her own after her husband abandoned her when the youngest was a baby, they are now young adults. She says she prayed to meet a man who she would have a relationship with, and god sent me....... As I'm an Atheist, it may have been the devil who sent me though.......

Seriously, I am very supportive of her faith, it is a personal thing, but I have told her that whilst I respect her faith I don't share it. We are both happy with the situation.

No one can prove that mythical things don't exist, this has been the subject of frequent debate - I am unable to prove there are that fairies do not exist at the bottom of my garden, nor that at night when no one is watching the Wombles of Wimbledon Common go out and clean up our litter. I've been to Wimbledon Common many times, never seen the Wombles but they are secretive and only make themselves known to a select few.

I think you're mistaken with regards to scientists coming to the conclusion that there "must be" a God, science cannot explain everything in the universe, maybe the explanation will be forever out of our sight, but I don't know of any scientists who say "well I can't explain that phenomena, so therefore it must be gods work". I'm pretty sure someone would ask him the entirely logical question - "where did god come from and how does he do all this stuff"?

As for my father sometimes giving and sometimes not, sorry but that doesn't work for me - my father, really good bloke that he was, was constrained by many things but mostly by his humanity and his own prejudices. God is supposed to be perfect, he is not like a human father, he is a god. making him sound human wont change that.

I wasn't trying to make God sound human, it was a simple analogy is all. It wasn't intended to be dissected, the message was simplistic and in analogy form..

Well, as I said, the experience a believer has with God can not be explained to a non believer in any way that they will grasp it. So I'm not surprised at all by your conclusions of every message sent your way. It's predictable and expected. Your heart has not been prepared to see it any other way at this time.

Dave RP said:
Maybe you're right, I don't see it as vanity though, I have a logical and enquiring mind and look for evidence - that's how I'm made.

Well as Christians we hold out hope that something illogical will take place in your heart and somehow it will then make perfect sense at that time. Meanwhile your heart hasn't been opened to that and only God can do that part.

Mountainmike · Oct 25, 2018

Dave RP said:
Maybe you're right, I don't see it as vanity though, I have a logical and enquiring mind and look for evidence - that's how I'm made.

Then why discount the evidence I suggested before look at it?

I have a logical enquiring mind. Im a postgrad physicist - that was science director at one point. I am used to and trained to look for useful needles in haystacks of evidence and chaff..

For sure there are pious frauds. Many of them. Some have been outed as such. And it doesnt help having to wade through nonsense. However, one or any amount of forgeries doesnt make a true painting a forgery.

It equally doesnt help wading through the even worse nonsense of skeptics - built on straw men and non seqiturs. Skepdic , and similar sites are fanciful nonsense, that make it even harder to know what is worth researching. And they lead to "knee jerk" rebuttals in absence of research as yours was.

One of the problems is atheists misrepresent their beliefs as somehow supported by science, which starts with a misunderstanding of what science is at philosophical level. B ut also it manifests a lack of knowledge of how strange the beast of science is they hold up as a god of truth. I have shown elsewhere, that the very presumption of a deterministic causal , and objective universe - which is the atheist explanation on the origin of alll, even science says is an illusion!
So where does that leave arguments based on it? Study quantum models. All the paradoxes disappear when you realise science is just an observation model. It doesnt underly the universe. It attempts to model how it behaves.
"shut up and calculate" is now the accepted wisdom in quantum mechanics.
They have given up on finding philosophical answers on how it can be, if it is areality not just a model. But that leaves the explanation of "what is" rather than "what does it normally do" up for grabs. there is no "explanation" other than conformance to a model.

I assure you, you will find it hard to discount the evidence I suggest you look at.

By analogy - I point out for example the statistical significance of telepathy is a slamdunk meta stats done by credible people. Sadly many of the guardians of science try to debunk it simply because it offends their world view - regardless of the evidence. (Dawkins for one - who frames what is science by whether he "likes" it - using Sagans well known folly "extraordinary claims need extraordinary evidence" which is the anithesis of science. All claims need the same. Extraordinary is subjective. In Dawkins case he is wedded to the idea that consciousness is a chemical process, therefore cannot be linked to others. He puts his conclusion in front of the evidence!

Have you looked at any of the evidence yet?

Dave RP · Oct 25, 2018

Mountainmike said:
I suggest you study them first. Then decide.
Good order

The refusal to look at evidence is the reason you say there is no evidence.
A lot of the investigations were done by skeptics
eg the report and investigation into alexandrina da costa was a controlled trial by skeptical doctors done in a hospital - extended when they couldnt explain it -still they couldnt explain it! - so they reported what they witnesed and left it "unexplained, inexplicable". I can dig out the report by them if you wish.
So who are you to contest what sceptical medical doctors concluded from a controlled trial?
They were actually there, you are not! Ill wager their medicall qualifications trump yours!

A lot of this is forensic lab verified. The lab that analysed tixtla eucharistic miracle was a national forensics lab, whose day job was convicting criminals. Their procedures are validated to good practice, they have to be. Their forensic reports are contained in such books as Castarnons on tixtla. You would trust them implicitly on a criminal trial. Why not this? Doyou even know what the eucharistic miracles are, what actually happened, the science done? Before discount them?
I doubt it.

And contemporary state service operative interviews - put a new light on Stalins intentions. Long before he actually acted. The interest is when he decided, not what he did. And regardless of Stalin look at wiki for january 1939 -

Afew days before jan 25 - hitler demanded poland give up territory, they refused. A few days after he said "or else" - they still refused. He then obliterated poland. When did he actually take the decision? somewhere between the two.

NOBODY can contest, that the war began with that decision, and the extraordinary light occurred at the same time within days or hours, reported in many national newspapers from witnesses in many contries even in Nature magazine and had never been witnessed before or since on anything like the scale, or that a lady predicted such in 1917.

So study it.
Its your apriori beliefs getting in the way, not the evidence.

You cannot say theres no evidence, without studying the evidence presented!

Anyway. You asked for evidence, I gave you a list.
Your comment on it was your belief about it, not a comment on the evidence.
Thanks would be nice. Happy to discuss them if you wish.

alexandrina da costa was a woman paralysed for life who, from what I read, apart from being bed bound for decades was not at all remarkable.

tixtla eucharistic miracle was investigated by a catholic friendly "scientist"

Lights in the sky..... sorry nope - not evidence of anything apart from your incredulity in my opinion.

Don't Catholics still believe that they eat the ACTUAL body and blood of Jesus at the Eucharist, or was that dropped?

Mountainmike · Oct 25, 2018

Then your ability to research is appalling
So it is not surprising you reach the conclusion you do.

What set Alexandrina aside was inedia.
Ie not eating or drinking but maintaining bodyweight

Castarnon wrote the book on tixtla. The forensic reports are there in his book - the lab is not in question. Find them. Read them
And the forensic reports of lanciano, buenos aires and sokolka and son on. Lots of slides , pathology reports and test. That show real flesh ( heart myocardium) . real blood. Even white cells indicating life. The evidence supports the catholic assertion.

Study them.

And so on...

If you care about evidence you will read them.
If you simpy care about shoring up your apriori position, why waste others time asking for evidence?
etc

Here is what they concluded of Alexandrina.
Skeptical doctors controlling a trial.
NOW READ IT

<We the undersigned, Dr C. A. di Lima, Professor of the Faculty of Medicine of Oporto and Dr E. A. D. de Azevedo, doctor graduate of the same Faculty, testify that, having examined Alexandrina Maria da Costa, aged 39, born and resident at Balasar, of the district of Povoa de Varzim ... have confirmed her paralysis.... And we also testify that the bedridden woman, from 10 June to 20 July 1943 remained in the sector for infantile paralysis at the Hospital of Foce del Duro, under the direction of Dr Araujo and under the day and night surveillance by impartial persons desirous of discovering the truth of her fast. Her abstinence from solids and liquids was absolute during all that time. We testify also that she retained her weight, and her temperature, breathing, blood pressure, pulse and blood were normal while her mental faculties were constant and lucid and she had not, during these forty days, any natural necessities.>

The certificate continues:

<The examination of the blood, made three weeks after her arrival in the hospital, is attached to this certificate and from it one sees how, considering the aforesaid abstinence from solids and liquids, science naturally has no explanation. The laws of physiology and biochemistry cannot account for the survival of this sick woman for forty days of absolute fast in the hospital, more so in that she replied daily to many interrogations and sustained very many conversations, showing an excellent disposition and a perfect lucidity of spirit. As for the phenomena observed every Friday at about 3 p.m. (i.e. her ecstasies), we believe they belong to the mystical order.... For the sake of the truth, we have prepared this certificate which we sign. Oporto, 26 July 1943.>

A hundred thousand witnesses including sceptic reporters, sceptic officals professors police and so on testify to Fatima 1917. It is all over the sceptic newspapers of the time. What makes it remarkable is not the phenomenon but the prophecy fulfilled.

I was not the witness of lights in the sky. So my credulity is not in question. Read nature articles from Jan 1939, and newspaper reports from many places in the northern hemisphere. Read wiki to see the Key dates in hitlers attack on poland, and the testimony of 1917 that is the prophecy. As I have done. I have a dozen books and papers on fatima. I have reprints of nature and other journals on the red "aurora" of Jan 25. How many books and papers are you judging on? None?

Ditto alexandrina, sokolka, zeitoun, panaghia capouli, Neumann, cochabamba etc.
So which one of us has an enquiring mind, based on searching for evidence?

I thought you claimed an enquiring mind.
Not. Obviously.

You are welcome to believe what you will.
But dont confuse belief with lack of evidence when you wont even look at it.

Happy to have a dialogue. Only if you study the facts.

Dave RP said:
alexandrina da costa was a woman paralysed for life who, from what I read, apart from being bed bound for decades was not at all remarkable.

tixtla eucharistic miracle was investigated by a catholic friendly "scientist"

Lights in the sky..... sorry nope - not evidence of anything apart from your incredulity in my opinion.

Don't Catholics still believe that they eat the ACTUAL body and blood of Jesus at the Eucharist, or was that dropped?

bcbsr · Oct 25, 2018

Dave RP said:
As an Atheist one of the main reasons I cannot believe in God is the total absence of any evidence that he has any current involvement in the world.

I see appalling wars in various parts of the world, with prayers in every church for peace, which never comes. Oppression of Christians in various parts of the world, predominantly the Middle East, prayers unanswered, famine in Yemen, prayers unanswered.

On a UK radio station I heard that UK Christians had a day of prayer to reduce the increasing amount of gun and knife crime - fat lot of good that did.

OK so occasionally someone who is ill recovers after prayer, but atheists, Muslims, Jews and Buddhists all sometimes make seemingly miraculous recoveries from illness.

Natural disasters kill thousands, climate change is leading to extinctions of species, the insect population world wide has fallen by 70% in 30 years -prayers unanswered.

So my question is - what evidence of a "living God" do Christians see, is any evidence needed and why is the God at work (if there is one) the Christian God and not the Muslim or soem other God?

In terms of the existence of God, the evidence should be intuitively obvious. I've written on both the subjects of proof concerning God's existence and of proof of the validity of the Bible at Proof

Tinker Grey · Oct 25, 2018

bcbsr said:
the evidence should be intuitively obvious

The fact that you need to write about it is in itself indicates that the evidence is NOT "intuitively obvious".

Silmarien · Oct 25, 2018

The evidence that I see is Western civilization itself and the interesting ways that the Christian Gospel has promoted moral progress both in the overthrow of the classical world, in the various corrections within the Christian world, and in interactions with the rest of the world at large. For a handful of examples, the first fullblown critique of slavery came out of the Christian worldview (Gregory of Nyssa, 4th century AD), the role of women was initially improved in the Greco-Roman world by its Christianization, lots of intellectual progress was made throughout the medieval period, and more recently, Christianity raised its head again as a driving force behind Rev. Martin Luther King and the Civil Rights Movement, and interestingly enough, was a powerful influence on Mahatma Gandhi. (I do find it very intriguing that some of the most intriguing figures in other religions are known to have had brushes with Christianity. The Islamic mystic Rumi is another one.)

I'm a pretty committed progressive (formerly secular, but it falls apart if you look at it too closely), so it's really interesting to me that the sorts of things that we take for granted today (like that slavery is wrong) really weren't even on the table in antiquity. I think the moral improvement that has taken place over the last 2000 years is real and not just changing norms, and I cannot really divorce that from the influence of the Christian Gospel. The ancient world was just too alien with the types of things that it valued--I mean, not even peace was something they cared about all that much at all.

The powers of the world still hold sway, of course--even Christianity has been creeping forward in spite of itself for most of the past 2000 years, but the transformative power of its message is pretty clear to me. I think we have been left to figure things out on our own, and that we're not particularly good at that, but you could make a pretty decent argument that a beacon was lit 2000 years ago, and the way that it has guided people and civilizations in the time since is actually really intriguing.

I don't think Christianity requires much in the way of divine intervention in everyday events to make sense. It doesn't really paint the picture of an interventionary magician god who is micromanaging everything. What we have is the claim that God entered history at some point and redeemed it from within, basically initiating a new way of viewing everything... and there's very good historical argument to be made that this actually happened. Even our modern concept of a person apparently didn't show up until people started to make sense of the idea of the Trinity.

bcbsr · Oct 25, 2018

Tinker Grey said:
The fact that you need to write about it is in itself indicates that the evidence is NOT "intuitively obvious".

It's not intuitively obvious to those who intuition has become corrupted.

bling · Oct 25, 2018

Dave RP said:
As an Atheist one of the main reasons I cannot believe in God is the total absence of any evidence that he has any current involvement in the world.

I see appalling wars in various parts of the world, with prayers in every church for peace, which never comes. Oppression of Christians in various parts of the world, predominantly the Middle East, prayers unanswered, famine in Yemen, prayers unanswered.

On a UK radio station I heard that UK Christians had a day of prayer to reduce the increasing amount of gun and knife crime - fat lot of good that did.

OK so occasionally someone who is ill recovers after prayer, but atheists, Muslims, Jews and Buddhists all sometimes make seemingly miraculous recoveries from illness.

Natural disasters kill thousands, climate change is leading to extinctions of species, the insect population world wide has fallen by 70% in 30 years -prayers unanswered.

So my question is - what evidence of a "living God" do Christians see, is any evidence needed and why is the God at work (if there is one) the Christian God and not the Muslim or soem other God?

There is a good logical reason for God not making Himself obvious to every skeptic on earth, so if that is what you are looking for it will not happen in this life. It helps those not wanting to believe and it helps those willing to believe with their earthly objective.

True Christians have the indwelling Holy Spirit as their personal guarantee/assurance, but the indwelling Holy Spirit within me is not to be your evidence.

As a Christian we also have the world around us which perfectly fits man’s and God’s objective, but you have to understand the objective to understand how this messed up world is the best it could be.

I will try to address you logically, but there is a base we need to establish:

The problem is there is no quick answer.

I will address this “generally” and then you can ask specific questions.

Generally:

Without getting to philosophical: “Something has had to always exist since it is illogical to think something comes from nothing. Now some atheists have tried to get around this by saying nothing is really “something” and there is no such thing as really “nothing”, but that is just a word game. The bottom line is there has always been something. Now did that something at least include intelligence or was it just mass/energy/time (change)/space? The problem with “excluding” intelligence is there appears to be a huge amount of intelligence that went into the design of this universe and life that makes it virtually impossible to happen by random “luck”. If there is one thing we have learned it is: “the more we know the more we realize we do not know”, so that means an ever increasing complex universe and the more complex it is the more random chances you need to make the right conditions without intelligence and the more likely scenario is there was intelligence involved.

Something than has always existed, we know since energy exists today it must have always existed, but intelligence also exists today, so would it not have to always exist? To say the “something” was only energy, then energy would have to produce intelligence which does not seem logical or rational and is less likely then energy and intelligence producing human intelligence. If energy over infinite time can product intelligence, why are you the first and if you are not the first then an infinite amount of time ago intelligence was created by energy progressed to super intelligence and thus could produce human intelligence and that is more likely then man being the first intelligence.

It would take more “faith” to believe everything started with only energy than it would be to believe everything started with at least energy and intelligence.

If there is this eternal intelligence it would be at the epitome of the best it could be and not in the process of improvement. It would be the ultimate bad or good but not somewhere in-between. Why be bad when He can be good just as easily? The ultimate “good” would be what is called Godly type Love (to be defined later) and is totally unselfish type Love. Since this God would be able to direct our thinking, why would He have us think of him as being totally bad, when He could make us think bad was good and thus He would be worthy of praise? If God were bad and we praise a “Good God” than we are not glorifying Him.

The reason you have free will is because it is required for you to complete your earthly objective.

This messed up world is not here for your pleasure, but it is the greatest help you can have to become like God Himself in that you have the unique, unbelievable Godly type Love (God himself is Love).

God has created beings to shower them with the greatest gifts possible, the greatest being having a Love like His.

If there is this Creator of the universe out there, His “creations” could not really “do” anything for Him, so this Creator would have to be seen as a Giver (Unselfish Lover) and not trying to “get” something from His creation.

Tinker Grey · Oct 25, 2018

bcbsr said:
It's not intuitively obvious to those who intuition has become corrupted.

If I grant what you say, it proves my point ... it's not intuitively obvious.

Evidence of God in the world?

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