God can write straight with crooked lines.

[bill4long]

That’s true, and I’ve often wondered if that is why people leave God completely when they leave the LDS church. A trust has been broken...

No, when someone says they don't believe in supernatural entities, saying their disbelief must be due to a "broken trust" is like saying the reason you don't believe in Santa Claus as an adult is because Santa Claus failed to bring you a pony when you were 12. He betrayed you!! So your response is to turn your back on him.

I don't believe in a god because, regardless of the stories I learned in my youth, the evidence does not support the existence of supernatural entities. End of story.

Imposing reasoning that implies disbelief is caused by a 'betrayal' of some sort is a story a believer might create but it sounds like nothing more than the believer imposing their position onto the nonbeliever. That may not be your intent, but it comes across that way.

Nicely put

[bill4long]

I'm not sure that we can say that we "get a God who can redefine evil as good", rather that we get a God whose standards of evil and good are not the same as ours.

One of the points that apologists make when critics claim that "god" would or would not want something or another is that we are not entitled to make these claims, because "god's ways are not our ways". Of course, the apologists expect the critics to accept their claims about what their god wants. I seem to recall having - or attempting to have - a conversation about this point a couple of months ago, and being (in my opinion) blown off at the end.

A very important point. But they only do this after the fact, like MG, right? At first, the lines are as straight as they come. God is literally our father, and much like a perfect version of an earthly daddy, and we even have a mom. We're all brothers and sisters and the afterlife is one big family reunion. Everything is straightforward and intuitive, we just believe and keep a few commandments and be decent folk. MG has just described heaven in comprehensible, meaningful terms to the average lowly human.

Until polygamy or some other thing is brought up, and then suddenly, God's ways are not our ways. They are never "not our ways" before the fact. The emphasis is always on simplicity until they get caught red handed, then it's really complicated and above our paygrade.

But, I think it is possible for God's ways not to be our ways before the fact. What would that be like? Well, it's quite possible that some super advanced alien species has no obvious equivalent of what we think of as morality. I mean, we don't go around judging fire ants by our morals. Some super advanced alien may be no more bothered by human on human violence than we are by all the violence of plants and animals against each other in the Amazon.

However, the implication of "God's ways aren't our ways" is that God is not a personal God. You can't have it both ways. If God is personal, and can give a moral lecture on right and wrong and how to treat people, then his thought world isn't incommensurable with ours the way ours is with fire ants, and it shouldn't be that hard to explain "his ways" to us. But a non-personal God -- who knows what we amount to. Perhaps all the "evil" in the world does make sense, but it's more like to such a being, reality isn't cut up in a way that registers as the word "evil" does to us.

Nicely put

[bill4long]

That is where faith comes into the picture. Some got it, and some don't.

The problem with "faith" is that it's non-falsifiable, contradictory among believers, and has no demonstrable worth as evidence beyond getting you through your life, or getting you through the night when things get really challenging, as John Lennon sang.

I'm not against it at all, but I think ones should be clear about what it really is: it cannot be demonstrable as anything more than a psychological trick to help you sleep at night. And one should never impose it on others by force or coercion, or make collective/government policy based on it.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6lFTD9O-XMw

[Gadianton]

Concerning the personal vs. non-personal distinction, I'm not sure that we even need to consider it.

While Mormonism portrays Mormon god as working for the benefit of mankind - presumably in terms of what we humans expect our "benefits" to look like, I contend that we have no right whatsoever to believe that. God's ways and purposes may be as far from our expectations as are the shepherd's purposes from the expectations of the sheep. Mormon god may be fattening us up for consumption at a godly feast,

Maybe your point is that the theory doesn't matter because we have no way of knowing what God really wants? We have no way of knowing when we get to heaven that it's really heaven, and not an elaborate farm. This is true, and yet another problem. Interestingly, believers have tried fix this. Descartes entire program was rooted in getting certainty about God to block considerations like these. It didn't work, so here we are.

Travis Taylor said on Skinwalker Ranch that an alien visited Joseph Smith. I mean, I have to hand it to him, if gold plates really were given to Joseph Smith by a being that can float in the air and pass through walls, then Mormonism was far more likely to have been started by an alien for whatever reasons than by "God".

[I Have Questions]

That is where faith comes into the picture. Some got it, and some don't.

Plenty of people had faith in Bernie Madoff, Emma Smith had faith that her husband meant his wedding vows, the SEC had faith that the SLC LDS Church would file truthful reports, Shades had faith that you wouldn’t link and run anymore. Unrewarded faith is a sign you’re in an abusive relationship and the person or thing that you have faith in is taking you for a mug.

[Gadianton]

When you say that believers are "caught red handed" when things move beyond the center point of 'simple faith' towards the gray areas and the outer edges of faith it might be helpful to refer back to examples where the scriptural canon hits this head on. Book of Job and Paul's mentioning of "seeing through a glass darkly" for starters. Modern day G.A.'s have been teaching the concept of not giving up on what you don't know for a fact, for what you believe you do know, or have a pretty good grasp on in the realm of faith.

Job is interesting, it's a good suggestion as "crooked line" but I'm not sure it qualifies as there is really no ambiguity about what Job is supposed to do. Everyone agrees I should suffer if it be God's will. But, should I do it as a Mormon, JW, or Catholic, or Muslim? Should I allow my spiritual guide to abuse me or my family because God revealed his will of it through the perp himself?

Of course the GAs have a few premade answers. You know that joke about the teacher who starts their class by writing the classroom rules on the board? Rule number 1 is that the teacher is always right. Rule number 2 is that if the teacher is ever wrong, see rule number 1. Your suggestions are right in line with simplistic authoritarianism of the most laughable kind, not a world of actual depth with intellectual or spiritual staircases.

When you're commenting on concerns you have with the "God's ways are not our ways" concept it might be helpful to remember that His knowledge and purposes may exceed ours, in somewhat the same way that a parent's moral understanding exceeds a small child's.

Yes, we get that MG. What you don't seem to consider is that your justification can be used by anybody for anything. Example: Mormons often laugh at how silly the idea of a literal hell is, complete with devils with pitchforks and literal fire, and for ever and ever. BUT: God's ways aren't our ways. Just because you don't understand it, doesn't mean it's not true. You must believe in a literal hell with devils with pitchforks because you can't give up on what you don't know for a fact.

We may fail to give God credit for being smarter than we are. Even smarter than Ivy Leaguers and those that belong to Cassius University.

You also fail to give God credit for being smarter than you are, except in the exceptionally narrow case that God confirms what you already wanted to believe. Unless you hold it as a real possibility that Mormonism is wrong, then you can't say these kinds of things with a straight face.

Your concern that God might look at us as a "fire-ant deity" simply doesn't make sense on its surface to me. We have too many instances where God remains the kind of Being who identifies with victims, calls cruelty sin, and commands mercy. Trying to turn Him into an amoral God is just ludicrous, in my opinion anyway.

Your coherence radically breaks down at this point and neither this nor the rest of your post is worth considering.

[Philo Sofee]

That is where faith comes into the picture. Some got it, and some don't.

The problem with "faith" is that it's non-falsifiable, contradictory among believers, and has no demonstrable worth as evidence beyond getting you through your life, or getting you through the night when things get really challenging, as John Lennon sang.

I'm not against it at all, but I think ones should be clear about what it really is: it cannot be demonstrable as anything more than a psychological trick to help you sleep at night. And one should never impose it on others by force or coercion, or make collective/government policy based on it.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6lFTD9O-XMw

J. R. R. Tolkien would say that faith is not meant to replace evidence or force belief on anyone. For him, faith is about trust in meaning, goodness, and purpose, not about winning arguments or proving things in a lab. He believed that stories, beauty, and moral truth point to realities that science alone cannot measure, but that still shape how people live and choose. Faith, in his view, is not a trick to help people sleep, but a way of seeing the world that helps people act with hope, courage, and mercy even when proof is incomplete. And he would strongly agree that faith should never be imposed by force, because belief only has value when it is freely chosen.

[Philo Sofee]

That is where faith comes into the picture. Some got it, and some don't.

Plenty of people had faith in Bernie Madoff, Emma Smith had faith that her husband meant his wedding vows, the SEC had faith that the SLC LDS Church would file truthful reports, Shades had faith that you wouldn’t link and run anymore. Unrewarded faith is a sign you’re in an abusive relationship and the person or thing that you have faith in is taking you for a mug.

Once again, however, I think one of my favorite heroes, J.R.R. Tolkien's take is helpful in situations such as these. Tolkien would agree having blind faith in people who abuse trust is dangerous and wrong. However, he would also say faith isn't gullibility or ignoring evidence when people are harming you. In his stories, true faith is always paired with humility, moral testing, and the freedom to walk away when something proves false or corrupt. Characters are never praised for trusting lies forever; they are praised for choosing what is good even when it costs them.

So far as I can grasp it, to Tolkien trust itself isn't meaningless. But it can be misused. People can misuse love, authority, or belief, but that doesn’t make those things illusions. The fact that some leaders deceive does not mean all trust is abuse any more than counterfeit money means real money doesn’t exist. For Tolkien, real faith is proven by whether it leads to truth, mercy, courage, and responsibility. I don't believe it ever ended up like happens in Mormonism of having loyalty to someone, or to something taught no matter what evidence shows up proving it mistaken.

[Limnor]

Job is interesting, it's a good suggestion as "crooked line" but I'm not sure it qualifies as there is really no ambiguity about what Job is supposed to do. Everyone agrees I should suffer if it be God's will. But, should I do it as a Mormon, JW, or Catholic, or Muslim? Should I allow my spiritual guide to abuse me or my family because God revealed his will of it through the perp himself?

I agree with this—using Job to prop up an authority structure seems off to me. I think the story of Job is similar to that of Abraham—not as a template or example for how intermediaries should “speak for God,” but a story that warns against doing so. In fact, the book spends a lot of time dismantling that approach.

The irony is that over the past couple of days I’ve worried that I’ve been sliding toward that the same error.

[I Have Questions]

When you say that believers are "caught red handed" when things move beyond the center point of 'simple faith' towards the gray areas and the outer edges of faith it might be helpful to refer back to examples where the scriptural canon hits this head on. Book of Job and Paul's mentioning of "seeing through a glass darkly" for starters. Modern day G.A.'s have been teaching the concept of not giving up on what you don't know for a fact, for what you believe you do know, or have a pretty good grasp on in the realm of faith.

Job is interesting, it's a good suggestion as "crooked line" but I'm not sure it qualifies as there is really no ambiguity about what Job is supposed to do. Everyone agrees I should suffer if it be God's will. But, should I do it as a Mormon, JW, or Catholic, or Muslim? Should I allow my spiritual guide to abuse me or my family because God revealed his will of it through the perp himself?

God allows Satan to destroy Job's life not because of any sin Job committed—God himself calls Job "blameless"—but simply to win a bet and protect His own "ego". It’s a terrible example of how to behave. Job is more an example of what we now call Stockholm Syndrome, rather that faith. And God’s behaviour in the tale is that of a narcissistic abuser. Great example MG, thanks for bringing it up.