Monson uses 9/11 to berate Americans

[_stemelbow]

"We felt the great unsteadiness of life and reached for the great steadiness of our Father in Heaven"

Where was the great steadiness of our Father in Heaven for those who were suffering and dying in the towers that day?

Did you suffer and die that day? How would you know if God has not planned a wonderful fully repaid and then some gift for them?

[_stemelbow]

That's the part that doesn't make sense to me. Our "Father in Heaven" didn't offer steadiness. He sat back and watched the planning and execution of the 9-11-01 attacks. Where is the steadiness that he provides?

The steadiness that he's speaking about is the steadiness the believers look to and rely on. That's not to say God can't or didn't supply the sufferers with eternal rewards that far outweigh their suffering.

[_Buffalo]

Did you suffer and die that day? How would you know if God has not planned a wonderful fully repaid and then some gift for them?

That's a cop out, Stem. How would you know if God had not planned further agony for them in Hell? You don't. All we know is what actually happened.

[_Scottie]

Did you suffer and die that day? How would you know if God has not planned a wonderful fully repaid and then some gift for them?

I'm still trying to figure out why you worship a being that has to devise pain and suffering as a means to instill fear so that people worship him.

Even deeper than that, why do you worship a being that requires worship in the first place??

When you become a God, are you going to force your subjects to worship you, or else send all sorts of calamaties that will FORCE them to worship you out of fear?

[_stemelbow]

That's a cop out, Stem. How would you know if God had not planned further agony for them in Hell? You don't. All we know is what actually happened.

And since you don't believe in God, you also have created yourself a cop out. If God, then we simply don't know what He has done or can do for them. We're all speculating, and the negative speculatin' that fits your paradigm sticks for you. It doesn't for me. I have my beliefs.

[_jon]

The steadiness that he's speaking about is the steadiness the believers look to and rely on. That's not to say God can't or didn't supply the sufferers with eternal rewards that far outweigh their suffering.

That's exactly the logic with which fanatics recruit suicide bombers.

[_stemelbow]

I'm still trying to figure out why you worship a being that has to devise pain and suffering as a means to instill fear so that people worship him.

I don't worship that being. That would be more of a traditional Christian thing. The God I worship did not devise pain and suffering at all. According to LDS understand, God didn't create out of nothing, thereby causing the end by creating. We are eternally existing characters. And, if'n He wants to provide us more than we have, via the plan of salvation, then it stands to reason we were less, and are less, than we will be. Suffering was always part of it for us.

Even deeper than that, why do you worship a being that requires worship in the first place??

I'll simply put it, for me, our purpose is about love, loving each other, and committing to love each other. That by so doing we learn and grow. the more we give the more we get. Understanding is enlightened by God, as He sees fit, often based on our sincere purpose of heart. If we seek goodness we can gain. Unity plays a big part too. What is it that keeps us from love? Enmity. How to do away with enmity eternally? Binding people together--uniting people for purpose. How to do that? Why that's God's power. He brings it about. We must unite ourselves with Him, ultimately. If that is the caes, then its not so much that He requires our worship but that He deserves it. The requirement only comes in, in that we have to rely on Him. Without relying on Him, we don't get where we need to.

When you become a God, are you going to force your subjects to worship you, or else send all sorts of calamaties that will FORCE them to worship you out of fear?

Let's not pretend I even understand it all, Scottie. I don't know how that all works quite yet. But that doesn't keep me from enjoying what I hold as true religious belief.

[_stemelbow]

That's exactly the logic with which fanatics recruit suicide bombers.

Oh how wonderful it is that folks here will go the route of, "you're like a suicide bomber, killing innocent babies and women with your beliefs". Doesn't the wonderful charitable conversation here just lift up and ease?

[_Darth J]

That's a cop out, Stem. How would you know if God had not planned further agony for them in Hell? You don't. All we know is what actually happened.

And since you don't believe in God, you also have created yourself a cop out. If God, then we simply don't know what He has done or can do for them. We're all speculating, and the negative speculatin' that fits your paradigm sticks for you. It doesn't for me. I have my beliefs.

Stemelbow---

A person's failure to find arguing from ignorance to be persuasive is not a cop-out.

Your own statement is that "we simply don't know what He has done for them or can do for them." Since you concede that you don't know, speculation that God sent the 9/11 victims to an eternity in Hell is on equal footing with speculation that God sent them all to a special happy place.

You are not addressing the problem of evil; you are compounding it. Not only are you admitting that you don't know why a benevolent and omnipotent God would allow something like 9/11 to happen in the first place, you also admit that you don't know what---if anything---God is going to do to make it up to the victims.

Don't feel too badly that you have absolutely nothing insightful, meaningful, or interesting to say about it, though. As demonstrated by the banal platitudes of his op-ed piece, neither does your purported prophet.

[_Buffalo]

That's a cop out, Stem. How would you know if God had not planned further agony for them in Hell? You don't. All we know is what actually happened.

And since you don't believe in God, you also have created yourself a cop out. If God, then we simply don't know what He has done or can do for them. We're all speculating, and the negative speculatin' that fits your paradigm sticks for you. It doesn't for me. I have my beliefs.

No, the "negative speculatin'" doesn't fit my paradigm. I was just demonstrating how much your speculation was worth - nothing. All we know is what actually happened, which was senseless, horrible, painful death.