Why pray?

[FutureAndAHope]

Those were nice stories.[/font][/color] But anecdotes are, unfortunately, unverifiable. Now, if you could cite a source supporting divine intervention, that'd be something else.

Unverifyable means "I want to keep on sinning I refuse to see the evidence", there is a thing called trust when some one says, I heard or did this you can trust them, even if some one says I had a God experience. Christians are not allowed to lie.

A gift? Prayer is something anyone can do. Why does God only listen to the prayers of a select few (this John Mellor, for instance)?

Because you have to be submitted to God's will. A Christian who has sin in their life, or are unrully can not be used for healing, only a truely submitted person can. You said give me a source supporting divine intervention, look at johnmellor.org there are heaps of people saying they have been healed. Open your peepers, and have a squiz.

I will tell you straight all your science mumbo jumbo does not fool me, you are just a man with your eyes closed to the truth. I hate it when people read those stories of mine and say they are "nothing" because I know they are hardened to the truth, and poisionous to every thing good.

 

[Chesterton]

I do not...

You do not forgive me? Or you do not see how laughable that is?

However, it raises further questions (namely, why pray for things in the first place?).

Because we have wants and needs, and sometimes He answers. Because there may be many, many situations where God has leeway to answer particular prayers without interfering with the ultimate plan.

Hardly. If God interferes in any way with the 'natural' running of the world, then free will has been interfered with. That Christians claim that God sends hurricanes and other disasters to befall mankind (I've seen hurricane Katrina attributed to homosexuality in the USA ) shows how little God cares for free will.

No, events don't interfere with human wills. Events are one thing, and people's choices of how they react in the face of events are another thing. (And the only people who'd say that about Katrina are people who've never been to New Orleans. )

Personally, I would gladly give up my capacity to sin if it would halt the suffering of even one child

Well giving up the capacity wouldn't actually be giving up anything, right? But if you give up sin itself while retaining the capacity, I think you will lessen suffering in the world.

(honestly, just how valuable is this 'sinability'?)

It's as valuable as love. "Sinability" is being able to choose between virtue and vice, obedience and disobedience, love and rejection. They're inextricably related because you can't have one with the capacity to choose the other.

Why indeed!

Because our sin precludes that. There once was a garden, and it was paradise, but we messed it up. And heaven cannot have sin in it. God could make us happy, contented puppets, or make us real, sentient, choosing beings, but not both at once.

You don't understand why it is, but it still makes perfect sense?

Yes, by process of elimination, I suppose - no alternative anyone can conceive of makes any sense at all. Of course God could have created a toy cosmos, but nothing important could happen in a world of toys or puppets. Asking for a world without bad as well as good is like asking for a real world which isn't really real. C.S. Lewis once tried to imagine a world where wood remained a solid object when you wanted to use it for something good, like make a chair, but acted like soft, flexible material when you went to hit someone on the head with it. God could arrange that, but then why allow free will at all if it's capacity is rendered unusable? Might as well not have free will.

But God is:

• omnipresent, so doesn't have to wait for the child to die to enjoy its company. After all, isn't that the main purpose of prayer?
• omnipotent, so doesn't have to employ such brutal methods to be with his children, or have to wait for their death. He manifested as Jesus, didn't he?
• omnibenevolent, so wouldn't be so astonishingly selfish as to put his children through excruciating agony just so he could be with them. Every father has to let go, no?
• omniscient, so knows how to do the whole "life, death, afterlife" thing without causing agony and suffering, if he so chose.

It sounds to me like you've severely limited God.

I think it's us, and creation, which is limited. Likely it is our sin natures which limit it. Or maybe God limited Himself by choosing to create, but that was His choice, His will. But now you're raising the "problem of evil" I think, related, but a different subject.

We pray to ask for things the same as children ask their parents for things. Because we want and need things, as simple as that. But as Bob said above, we always remember that God doesn't owe us, that He's in control and knows best, and that His will trumps all other considerations. I know I have had prayers answered. I know I've had prayers unanswered, and later in life came to be thankful that they weren't answered. I've also had prayers unanswered but I still wish they could be, and I don't know why they're not. But God's sovereign decision-making is not understandable by the scientific method.

There's a famous poker player over here named Phil Ivey. He plays in a lot of televised tournaments. I once heard him say "Whenever you play poker on TV, you're going to look like an idiot sometimes." The guy is a genius player, probably incapable of actually making a stupid play, so I didn't know what he meant at first. But, the TV viewer will judge each playing decision based on the information the viewer has. But the player has different information. The player might make a decision based on the slight glance of an eye that the TV viewer never saw, or on some past years' behavior of his opponent, or a dozen other things. Point is, to accurately know whether any decision was good or bad, you have to know exactly what the decision was based on, and not just what you think it may have been based on, or what the result was. In poker you can make exactly the right play, and still lose due to luck, so the analogy breaks down there, but still, if the rationale is true for assessing a poker player, how much more true would it be with trying to assess God's actions? We just don't have enough information.

This life is very short, and eternity is forever. That's not very consoling to someone who's lost a loved one, or who has a loved one who is suffering, as I currently have. But I truly believe that God is good, and that all things will work together for good. It doesn't lessen the pain much now, but I believe one day I may understand that my unanswered prayers were unanswered for good reason, toward a good end.

 

[Wiccan_Child]

I would say "yes," but again only so long as that "Thy will be done" is implicit.

Then what purpose does it serve to pray from something, if you make your request null and void by the "thy will be done"? Presumably, God gets whatever he wants (his will is always done), so one's request is only fulfilled if it just so happens to coincide with God's will. That is, praying for something doesn't make it more likely to happen

I do not know if this is relevant to your question; but will pass it on for your consideration. I do not have a source for it.

There was once a man named Sam, and he had done his best to devote his life to serving and obeying God. Under no illusions of perfection, he daily prayed for forgiveness of his sins; and did his best to identify what they were. As can happen with someone who takes this kind of inventory, he indeed became a better man and was looked on as righteous by his neighbors. His prayers were for others and for God's will, he never asked anything for himself until, aged and in the economic straits a good many of us are these days, he prayed, "God, I've never asked anything for myself but you know the hard times I'm going through. Could I please win the big lottery?"
Alas, when the winning name was drawn, it was not Sam's. And though he renewed his prayer as the next drawing approached, again he was not drawn. Now even older, now even poorer, as the third drawing drew near he struggled to his knees to begin his plea and, just as his mouth opened to begin, the clouds parted, the sun shone, and a voice boomed from above: "Sam!...buy a ticket!"

Haha .

 

[Wiccan_Child]

I pray because my prayers are always answered in some fashion.

I pray because my prayers help me and help others.

I pray with others, and I pray for others, and they too have their prayers answered.

It's these prayers that I'm particularly interested in, so could you elaborate on these, please?

 

[Wiccan_Child]

Why not? What sort of relationship would it be if I didn't talk about my needs, desires, worries,...? Not that praying for stuff for myself makes up much of my prayers.

Again, it's one thing to talk about your desires, but another to directly request them. There's a difference between, "God, I hope my child survives" and "God, please let my child survive".

The whole concept of a double-blind study - of adjusting one's pattern of prayer to suit a researcher - is antithetical to the concept of prayer.

They do not. The researcher gives them the relevant information (name, age, affliction, etc), and asks the group to pray for them to have a speedy recovery. I am aware that a few studies have a set script, and I agree that these open the door to error (though I don't see why a set script, which would be mutually agreed upon, would cause the prayer to go unanswered).

Not to mention a contravention of "you shall not put the Lord your God to the test". Any such test of prayer is intrinisically and irretrievably flawed.

So God deliberately ignores prayers if they're part of a study?

Who said he wouldn't anyway? I don't pray because I think my prayers are necessary to make it happen. It would be more correct to say my prayers are part of God's will to make it happen. You assume a mechanistic effect that simply out of kilter to what prayer is about on a heap of levels.

No, I don't. I don't assume anything about how prayer works, only if it does work. Either there is a statistical significant increase in a person's recovery if they are prayed for, or there is not. The mechanics of how prayer works (be it the 'good thoughts' of the prayer-er that heal them, or if some deity only heals those who are prayed for, or whatever).

As others have said, not everyone who's prayed for gets healed. But this implies that there are some who are healed because they were prayed for. There are countless stories of people who had miraculous healing after they go to Church, or are witnessed to, or are prayed for, or whatever. These would show up on numerical studies.

 

[Wiccan_Child]

Unverifyable means "I want to keep on sinning I refuse to see the evidence",

"Unverifiable" means "cannot be shown to be true". It has nothing to do with sinning. If there is evidence, then please, present it.

there is a thing called trust when some one says, I heard or did this you can trust them, even if some one says I had a God experience. Christians are not allowed to lie.

There's a reason we call someone trustworthy: they are worthy of trust. They have earned trust. But many people deliberately lie, or unknowingly tell falsehoods (e.g., Chinese whispers). This includes Christians (ever heard of Creationism? It's a sordid pit of liars and charlatanism, Kent Hovind being a prime example).

Because you have to be submitted to God's will. A Christian who has sin in their life, or are unrully can not be used for healing, only a truely submitted person can.

All are sinners, FutureAndAHope, so by your logic, there are no Christians that can be used for healing.

Question: why must one have to submit to God's will to be given the gift of healing? Doesn't healing the sick intervene with God's plan (e.g., God's plan requires a given person to die, or to suffer to "build character")?

You said give me a source supporting divine intervention, look at johnmellor.org there are heaps of people saying they have been healed. Open your peepers, and have a squiz.

Again, this is just testimony. There are no details besides their own subjective opinions, and I have no reason to believe that he didn't just make them up.

I will tell you straight all your science mumbo jumbo does not fool me, you are just a man with your eyes closed to the truth. I hate it when people read those stories of mine and say they are "nothing" because I know they are hardened to the truth, and poisionous to every thing good.

You just proved everything I said about trustworthiness. Kudos.

 

[Wiccan_Child]

You do not forgive me? Or you do not see how laughable that is?

Both .

Because we have wants and needs, and sometimes He answers. Because there may be many, many situations where God has leeway to answer particular prayers without interfering with the ultimate plan.

Ever heard of chaos theory? A tiny change has unimaginable consequences down the line (the clichéd butterfly causing a hurricane, for instance).

No, events don't interfere with human wills. Events are one thing, and people's choices of how they react in the face of events are another thing. (And the only people who'd say that about Katrina are people who've never been to New Orleans. )

How people react, what people believe, is very much determined by local events. The anti-Semitic and eugenics beliefs of the German people in WW2 came about because of the events around them: propaganda, Hitler's charisma, mob mentality, peer pressure, etc. Had these not occurred, they wouldn't have believed what they believed, or done what they had done.

Well giving up the capacity wouldn't actually be giving up anything, right? But if you give up sin itself while retaining the capacity, I think you will lessen suffering in the world.

And direct intervention by an omnipotent, omnibenevolent deity would lessen it even more. But it looks like we're on our own when it comes to the suffering in the world.

It's as valuable as love. "Sinability" is being able to choose between virtue and vice, obedience and disobedience, love and rejection. They're inextricably related because you can't have one with the capacity to choose the other.

Why?

Because our sin precludes that. There once was a garden, and it was paradise, but we messed it up.

How?

And heaven cannot have sin in it.

Why?

God could make us happy, contented puppets, or make us real, sentient, choosing beings, but not both at once.

Why not?

 

[Chesterton]

Ever heard of chaos theory? A tiny change has unimaginable consequences down the line (the clichéd butterfly causing a hurricane, for instance).

Unimaginable to you and I, not to omniscience. (But to be on the safe side, I maintain a kill-on-sight policy toward all butterflies.)

How people react, what people believe, is very much determined by local events. The anti-Semitic and eugenics beliefs of the German people in WW2 came about because of the events around them: propaganda, Hitler's charisma, mob mentality, peer pressure, etc. Had these not occurred, they wouldn't have believed what they believed, or done what they had done.

Yes, but now you're arguing for the teachings of Christ. We're supposed to resist being influenced by local events. It's not intuitive, and it's not easy, but Christ calls us to ignore "contemporary bias" in favor of eternal truths. Christ saved a woman who, according to the times and the law, should have been stoned to death. If those Germans of that time allowed Social Darwinism to hold more sway in their minds than eternal truth, they'll certainly have to answer for that.

And direct intervention by an omnipotent, omnibenevolent deity would lessen it even more. But it looks like we're on our own when it comes to the suffering in the world.

By and large, yes, we're on our own, but perhaps not 100 %. (I guess that goes to your OP.)

Why?

By fiat? Perhaps for the same reason that in the game of chess, the bishop can only move diagonally - the Creator of the game decreed it be that way. Or perhaps a deeper, more meaningful reason - we cannot know.

How?

By disobedience borne of pride (maybe with a dash of scientific curiousity mixed in? )

Why?

By definition. Why can pure gold not have lead in it? Because it wouldn't be pure gold. Or, if someone spit into a glass of fine cognac, we would no longer call it a glass of fine cognac.

Why not?

Because one state of being precludes the other - contradiction. Why can't light be made of water, why can't water be made of light? They're different things.

 

[ebia]

Again, it's one thing to talk about your desires, but another to directly request them. There's a difference between, "God, I hope my child survives" and "God, please let my child survive".

One can draw a sharp divide, but I don't and I don't think it's true to the nature of prayer to do so.

They do not. The researcher gives them the relevant information (name, age, affliction, etc), and asks the group to pray for them to have a speedy recovery. I am aware that a few studies have a set script, and I agree that these open the door to error (though I don't see why a set script, which would be mutually agreed upon, would cause the prayer to go unanswered).

One is being asked to pray for particular people (and implicitly not another set ofpeople) not through particular concern but for the purposes of testing.

So God deliberately ignores prayers if they're part of a study?

or evens out the prayers equally, or some other option.

No, I don't. I don't assume anything about how prayer works, only if it does work.

I don't mean you are assuming a particular set of mechanics, but that you are assuming that its a pretty straightforward cause-and-effect relationship that will then show up as a statistical correlation.

As others have said, not everyone who's prayed for gets healed. But this implies that there are some who are healed because they were prayed for. There are countless stories of people who had miraculous healing after they go to Church, or are witnessed to, or are prayed for, or whatever. These would show up on numerical studies.

In my experience 'miraculous' healings are pretty scarce. Even if those were to be theoretically testable one would need a huge study to find them.

 

[Wiccan_Child]

Unimaginable to you and I, not to omniscience. (But to be on the safe side, I maintain a kill-on-sight policy toward all butterflies.)

Yes, having thought this over, I'm going to cede this point. There is leeway in which divine intervention could still go with The Plan™.

Yes, but now you're arguing for the teachings of Christ. We're supposed to resist being influenced by local events. It's not intuitive, and it's not easy, but Christ calls us to ignore "contemporary bias" in favor of eternal truths. Christ saved a woman who, according to the times and the law, should have been stoned to death. If those Germans of that time allowed Social Darwinism to hold more sway in their minds than eternal truth, they'll certainly have to answer for that.

My point is that you can't resist being influence: all we are is the sum total of our experiences.

By fiat? Perhaps for the same reason that in the game of chess, the bishop can only move diagonally - the Creator of the game decreed it be that way. Or perhaps a deeper, more meaningful reason - we cannot know.

Then why assert it? Do you have any reason to believe that we can't have the capacity to love without the capacity to sin?

By disobedience borne of pride (maybe with a dash of scientific curiousity mixed in? )

Heh. But I was getting more at the details: how did we mess it up? How did "disobedience borne of pride" mess up paradise?

By definition. Why can pure gold not have lead in it? Because it wouldn't be pure gold. Or, if someone spit into a glass of fine cognac, we would no longer call it a glass of fine cognac.

So heaven is defined as a sinless place?

Because one state of being precludes the other - contradiction. Why can't light be made of water, why can't water be made of light? They're different things.

Why do you think that being happy, content, and a puppet, are qualities that real, sentient, choosing beings cannot have? Why does happiness preclude moral agency?

 

[Wiccan_Child]

One can draw a sharp divide, but I don't and I don't think it's true to the nature of prayer to do so.

Then what is the true nature of prayer, such that these distinctions are moot?

One is being asked to pray for particular people (and implicitly not another set ofpeople) not through particular concern but for the purposes of testing.

So God only heals people if a) they're prayed for, and b) the prayer-ers are emotionally attached to them?

or evens out the prayers equally, or some other option.

Why? Is he so frightened that our worldly wisdom might demonstrate his existence and convert the masses to Christianity?

I don't mean you are assuming a particular set of mechanics, but that you are assuming that its a pretty straightforward cause-and-effect relationship that will then show up as a statistical correlation.

Again, a cause-and-effect relationship is not the only thing that would show a correlation: any relationship between prayer and healing, mechanical or otherwise, would show a correlation.

 

[ebia]

Then what is the true nature of prayer, such that these distinctions are moot?

So God only heals people if a) they're prayed for, and b) the prayer-ers are emotionally attached to them?

"Thou shalt not put the Lord your God to the test."

Why? Is he so frightened that our worldly wisdom might demonstrate his existence and convert the masses to Christianity?

19"There was a rich man who was clothed in(W) purple and fine linen and(X) who feasted sumptuously every day. 20And at his gate(Y) was laid a poor man named Lazarus, covered with sores, 21who desired to be fed with(Z) what fell from the rich man’s table. Moreover, even the dogs came and licked his sores. 22The poor man died and was carried by(AA) the angels(AB) to Abraham’s side.[f] The rich man also died and was buried, 23and in(AC) Hades, being in torment, he lifted up his eyes and(AD) saw Abraham far off and Lazarus(AE) at his side. 24And he called out,(AF) 'Father Abraham, have mercy on me, and send Lazarus to dip the end of his finger in water and(AG) cool my tongue, for(AH) I am in anguish in this flame.' 25But Abraham said, 'Child, remember that(AI) you in your lifetime received your good things, and Lazarus in like manner bad things; but now he is comforted here, and you are in anguish. 26And besides all this, between us and you a great chasm has been fixed, in order that those who would pass from here to you may not be able, and none may cross from there to us.' 27And he said, 'Then I beg you, father, to send him to my father’s house— 28for I have five brothers[g]—so that he may warn them, lest they also come into this place of torment.' 29But Abraham said, 'They have(AJ) Moses and the Prophets;(AK) let them hear them.' 30And he said, 'No,(AL) father Abraham, but if someone goes to them from the dead, they will repent.' 31He said to him, 'If they do not hear(AM) Moses and the Prophets,(AN) neither will they be convinced if someone should rise from the dead.'"

Again, a cause-and-effect relationship is not the only thing that would show a correlation: any relationship between prayer and healing, mechanical or otherwise, would show a correlation.

Not if that relationship is being directly manipulated by the constraints of the study.

If you try to test for the exact position of an electron you can't. Your act of testing is in conflict with the inherent uncertainty of the position of an electron.

 

[Wiccan_Child]

"Thou shalt not put the Lord your God to the test."

Why not?

19"There was a rich man who was clothed in(W) purple and fine linen and(X) who feasted sumptuously every day. 20And at his gate(Y) was laid a poor man named Lazarus, covered with sores, 21who desired to be fed with(Z) what fell from the rich man’s table. Moreover, even the dogs came and licked his sores. 22The poor man died and was carried by(AA) the angels(AB) to Abraham’s side.[f] The rich man also died and was buried, 23and in(AC) Hades, being in torment, he lifted up his eyes and(AD) saw Abraham far off and Lazarus(AE) at his side. 24And he called out,(AF) 'Father Abraham, have mercy on me, and send Lazarus to dip the end of his finger in water and(AG) cool my tongue, for(AH) I am in anguish in this flame.' 25But Abraham said, 'Child, remember that(AI) you in your lifetime received your good things, and Lazarus in like manner bad things; but now he is comforted here, and you are in anguish. 26And besides all this, between us and you a great chasm has been fixed, in order that those who would pass from here to you may not be able, and none may cross from there to us.' 27And he said, 'Then I beg you, father, to send him to my father’s house— 28for I have five brothers[g]—so that he may warn them, lest they also come into this place of torment.' 29But Abraham said, 'They have(AJ) Moses and the Prophets;(AK) let them hear them.' 30And he said, 'No,(AL) father Abraham, but if someone goes to them from the dead, they will repent.' 31He said to him, 'If they do not hear(AM) Moses and the Prophets,(AN) neither will they be convinced if someone should rise from the dead.'"

So people who don't "hear Moses and the Prophets" won't be convinced by any miraculous display? What does that mean, in plain English?

Not if that relationship is being directly manipulated by the constraints of the study.

And what constraints would those be?

If you try to test for the exact position of an electron you can't. Your act of testing is in conflict with the inherent uncertainty of the position of an electron.

Actually, you can: if you know exactly where an electron is, you can't know anything about its momentum.

 

[ebia]

Why not?

I can think of a number of possible reasons depending on the perspective, but for the purposes of this conversation I think it's sufficient to say "because he said so".

So people who don't "hear Moses and the Prophets" won't be convinced by any miraculous display? What does that mean, in plain English?

In this context I posted it to say people who examine this kind of stuff are either trying to prove what they already know, or will continue to interpret the data within their framework. When studies do appear to show that prayer works people (quite rightly) start looking for flaws in the study and/or naturalist explanations. When studies show that people who pray cope with stress better people (quite rightly) look for naturalistic explanations - not jump up and down saying "God did it".

The naturalistic assumption of science is very robust - it has to be.

And what constraints would those be?

I think I've outlined some possibilities.

Actually, you can: if you know exactly where an electron is, you can't know anything about its momentum.

By all means pick up by lazy inaccuracy, but either choose to work with the analogy or don't. I could have worded it much better and precisely, but the point is still there.

This isn't a debating forum - either you're interested in working with the answers to understand them or not, but debating or looking for an argument is not what "Exploring Christianity" is for.

 

[Chesterton]

My point is that you can't resist being influence: all we are is the sum total of our experiences.

The first part is very right; we cannot fully resist influence, and Christians have expressed that for a long time with the old phrase: "the world, the flesh and the devil". And by "local events" I'd even include original sin (since we're on Earth, and have been for a relatively short time). This is what we are to resist, in attempting to adhere to superior, eternal truth.

But are we the sum total of our experiences? I don't know, but our experiences don't include ideas, and the idea implicit in Christianity (and perhaps even to an extent in Wicca or any good religions) is that we should not be. We should be something more and higher, because there is more to reality than our temporal experiences. Christianity gives you a telescope where you can see beyond our experiences - past the zeitgeist, past your parents, past your country; you look beyond to what is real truth.

Then why assert it? Do you have any reason to believe that we can't have the capacity to love without the capacity to sin?

Even it were purely by design, it's still axiomatic and true, that's why I'd assert it. If we cannot willingly sin, we cannot willingly obey. And I suspect you're operating under the rather recent modern idea that love is merely a spontaneous feeling?; but for Christians, love is an act of the will, so therefore must be done willingly, and obviously, the only way something can be willed, is if there exists the possibility that it cannot be willed (or that its opposite, i.e., indifference or hate, can be willed).

Heh. But I was getting more at the details: how did we mess it up? How did "disobedience borne of pride" mess up paradise?

By "Falling". I don't know, you're getting into a question which is deep, and beyond my pay grade. But I know this: that "the Fall of Man" is something we sense almost every day of our lives - when we hear of a murder or a war, when we hear of a man being beaten by thugs because he is homosexual, when a Wall St./Fleet St. trader rips off a senior couple for their life savings, and we think "how could anyone be that way?; how could we humans do this to each other?", we are acknowledging that we think we should be better/other than we are.

I don't know if there was a real Adam and Eve, and I don't know if the TOE is factual. But I believe humanity cut itself off from communion with an all-good God at some point in history. My screen-namesake once noted how prehistoric art gives us no indication of a popular stereotype - the caveman hitting the cavewoman over the head with a club and dragging her off by her hair to become his property. It's an entirely fabricated image; there is no evidence of that. Historic text and art describe wars and conflict. Pre-historic art does not; it only paints animals and men hunting animals. I can't claim that's solid evidence of anything, but it does suggest something to me.

So heaven is defined as a sinless place?

No that's not a full definition, but yes, sinlessness is an attribute of heaven.

Why do you think that being happy, content, and a puppet, are qualities that real, sentient, choosing beings cannot have?

I don't say we cannot have it, but just that we don't have it. Perhaps we can have happiness, but we don't choose it because we are sinners.

Why does happiness preclude moral agency?

It may not strictly preclude it, but it does de facto, because we misuse and abuse our agency. Show me humans who are perfectly happy and content, I'll show you humans who properly execute their moral agency.

 

[Wiccan_Child]

In this context I posted it to say people who examine this kind of stuff are either trying to prove what they already know, or will continue to interpret the data within their framework. When studies do appear to show that prayer works people (quite rightly) start looking for flaws in the study and/or naturalist explanations.

You say that like it's a bad thing. If there are flaws in the study, then rigorous peer review will find them. If there aren't, then such review won't find them. This isn't because of some aversion to spirituality (why else would they be investigating it?), but a desire to uncover the truth.

When studies show that people who pray cope with stress better people (quite rightly) look for naturalistic explanations - not jump up and down saying "God did it".

The naturalistic assumption of science is very robust - it has to be.

Personally, I don't think science makes that assumption. But then, I reject the distinction between 'natural' and 'supernatural', 'normal' and 'paranormal', 'physical' and 'spiritual'.

By all means pick up by lazy inaccuracy, but either choose to work with the analogy or don't. I could have worded it much better and precisely, but the point is still there.

I was simply clarifying an error. I know it was an analogy, but a misconception is a misconception.

This isn't a debating forum - either you're interested in working with the answers to understand them or not, but debating or looking for an argument is not what "Exploring Christianity" is for.

I'm not looking for an argument. I'm looking for answers to my questions, and sometimes those answers garner follow-up questions, if only because I didn't understand it the first time around.

 

[ebia]

You say that like it's a bad thing.

Hardly. That's why I said 'quite rightly'. But it refects and inherent limitation. Scientific study relies on a presumption of naturalism. If you do find a correlation you don't say "so there is something supernatural going on" you say "so we check for flaws and then we look for a naturalistic explanation". That's how science works; must work. That's why it's not satisfied with "Lightning is Thor throwing stuff around" as an explanation.

Personally, I don't think science makes that assumption. But then, I reject the distinction between 'natural' and 'supernatural', 'normal' and 'paranormal', 'physical' and 'spiritual'.

I agree with you 100% there, but they are convenient shorthands at times. But while I agree with from a philosophic standpoint, I don't think the scientist can from a practical standpoint.

I was simply clarifying an error. I know it was an analogy, but a misconception is a misconception.

Okay. So long as you get the point I was trying to make I'm happy for you to pull me up on the technical details.

I'm not looking for an argument. I'm looking for answers to my questions, and sometimes those answers garner follow-up questions, if only because I didn't understand it the first time around.

Sometimes that's what it looks like, and sometimes one gets the feeling you are looking for holes to dig at. I'll take your word for it that that is just my misreading of the situation - it's hard to tell in a text only forum sometimes.

 

[Wiccan_Child]

Hardly. That's why I said 'quite rightly'. But it refects and inherent limitation. Scientific study relies on a presumption of naturalism. If you do find a correlation you don't say "so there is something supernatural going on" you say "so we check for flaws and then we look for a naturalistic explanation". That's how science works; must work. That's why it's not satisfied with "Lightning is Thor throwing stuff around" as an explanation.

I think it's more that the 'Theory of Thor' doesn't stand up to falsification, and doesn't lend itself to testing, in quite the way naturalistic explanations do. I think it's that 'spiritual' explanations are, by and large, very hard to make predictions with.

If studies showed that, of all the various religious groups, only Catholic prayer correlated with a significant rise in healing, how could we explain that naturally?

I agree with you 100% there, but they are convenient shorthands at times. But while I agree with from a philosophic standpoint, I don't think the scientist can from a practical standpoint.

Well, I think that there are many things which are well within the scope of scientific inquiry that would have, in ages past, been considered 'spiritual':

So while the distinction between 'natural' and 'spiritual' may be blurred and ill-defined, I don't think science cannot probe the latter, or even that it is impractical to do so.

Sometimes that's what it looks like, and sometimes one gets the feeling you are looking for holes to dig at. I'll take your word for it that that is just my misreading of the situation - it's hard to tell in a text only forum sometimes.

An, the nuances of language. I think it is partly my fault, though: I spend most of my time here in the debating side of the forum, and am relatively new to this part. This place is disarmingly... civil .

 

[Wiccan_Child]

The first part is very right; we cannot fully resist influence, and Christians have expressed that for a long time with the old phrase: "the world, the flesh and the devil". And by "local events" I'd even include original sin (since we're on Earth, and have been for a relatively short time). This is what we are to resist, in attempting to adhere to superior, eternal truth.

But are we the sum total of our experiences? I don't know, but our experiences don't include ideas, and the idea implicit in Christianity (and perhaps even to an extent in Wicca or any good religions) is that we should not be. We should be something more and higher, because there is more to reality than our temporal experiences. Christianity gives you a telescope where you can see beyond our experiences - past the zeitgeist, past your parents, past your country; you look beyond to what is real truth.

Unfortunately, I have never seen any indication that what is 'seen' through Christianity, Wicca, or any of the 'good' religions, is actually true. Who knows, maybe one day I will. But I think we're drifting off-topic .

Even it were purely by design, it's still axiomatic and true, that's why I'd assert it. If we cannot willingly sin, we cannot willingly obey. And I suspect you're operating under the rather recent modern idea that love is merely a spontaneous feeling?; but for Christians, love is an act of the will, so therefore must be done willingly, and obviously, the only way something can be willed, is if there exists the possibility that it cannot be willed (or that its opposite, i.e., indifference or hate, can be willed).

I don't think that one necessarily requires the other: I can 'will' myself to stay rooted to the ground, but I can't 'will' myself into the air. I'm also curious as to how one can 'choose' to love, since I've never encountered this before. This might also be related to the anti-gay sentiment found in some Christian circles.

By "Falling". I don't know, you're getting into a question which is deep, and beyond my pay grade. But I know this: that "the Fall of Man" is something we sense almost every day of our lives - when we hear of a murder or a war, when we hear of a man being beaten by thugs because he is homosexual, when a Wall St./Fleet St. trader rips off a senior couple for their life savings, and we think "how could anyone be that way?; how could we humans do this to each other?", we are acknowledging that we think we should be better/other than we are.

But that doesn't mean we ever were better than what we are. It's the "is/ought" dilemma all over again .

No that's not a full definition, but yes, sinlessness is an attribute of heaven.

Why?

I don't say we cannot have it, but just that we don't have it. Perhaps we can have happiness, but we don't choose it because we are sinners.

How does one 'choose' to be happy?

It may not strictly preclude it, but it does de facto, because we misuse and abuse our agency. Show me humans who are perfectly happy and content, I'll show you humans who properly execute their moral agency.

But why are they related? How does properly executing one's agency make one perfectly happy?

 

[Aibrean]

All are sinners but not all have received God's grace.

Proverbs 15:29
The LORD is far from the wicked, but he hears the prayer of the righteous.

Romans 8:26-2
Likewise the Spirit helps us in our weakness. For we do not know what to pray for as we ought, but the Spirit himself intercedes for us with groanings too deep for words. And he who searches hearts knows what is the mind of the Spirit, because the Spirit intercedes for the saints according to the will of God.

1 Thessalonians 5:16-18
Rejoice always, pray without ceasing, give thanks in all circumstances; for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus for you.

The Bible tells us to pray. We are following in the footsteps of Christ as well. If it's good enough for Jesus...

My Father, if it be possible, let this cup pass from me; nevertheless, not as I will, but as you will.

It was not answered because it wasn't in God's will. That's why when we pray it's always God's will be done (as in the Lord's prayer).

The book of John is full of Jesus talking about praying to him.

The hour is coming when I will no longer speak to you in figures of speech but will tell you plainly about the Father. In that day you will ask in my name, and I do not say to you that I will ask the Father on your behalf;