What has my mother done to deserve a death at age of 45?
While this is pitiful that your mother died at such young age, you might look at it from another point of view, she's now in the better world with God. And she's probably praying for you to rejoin her eventually. There are questions of why some people die earlier than others, and while most of the time the reasons behind this are unclear, if we take all the preceding events as "the process of death", say why a person got cancer or why he was in the wrong place at the wrong time, etc, some of the reasoning was unravelled. Say, Antonietta Meo, aged 6.5, got bone cancer at 4 and was bound to the bed by her sickness. She wrote a series of letters with help from her mother, as she was not able to write while that young, and her mother wrote some of her sayings in the meantime. In one of the last records Antonietta said "I will be out of this world in less than 10 days. I should have been here for more, but St.Theresa of Child Jesus interceded for me, saying I have suffered enough."
So God made up some rules for us, but he is not supposed to follow them because nobody is going to punish him if he breaks them? That would fit in the human definition of a sickening and coward hypocrite.
Hmm. Literally correct, but such a definition is human-based, and can only be applied to humans.
I don't think anyone should suffer, if God was all-good he would let every soul enjoy their selves as much as they deserve it, but not eternal torment.
Well, let's say there's a child who tries to dabble in things unknown, while his dad says "don't do that, you'll get hurt". He continues to try, and eventually his dad lets him through so he will feel what does the dad mean under "get hurt". Depending on what the child did, this harm may be unseen at first, and develop later into addictiveness for example, sometimes the kid gets hurt right here right now, a blister or a cut, and he starts to cry. Then the dad can come and say "I have warned you, yet you continued. Now, see what you have done." It's about the same with God and us, while us being children. So people suffer from some people's sins as disobedience, we don't know who did wrong so we have to suffer, but all of the suffering is fruits of sins. So, if we will make efforts to sin less, we will make the world a better place, even if we might not see it becoming one.
And do i deserve to perish in hell for all eternity because God 'betrayed me'?
Hmmm, a hard thing to say to anyone, but sometimes God deprives us of something we depend on, if that dependance strays us from relying on God. Say, Gloria Polo was too dependant on money, even up to the point of worshipping money, so God made it so she went bankrupt, and then revealed this to her so she may tell others, as she did. There is some story where a poorman ended up in Purgatory because he was too attached to the only cat he had, despite a rich man entering Heaven because he wasn't attached to anything he had. About feeling "betrayed by God" - this thing is even harder to withstand, and I have yet to experience anything similar... I think if you look at the source of such a feeling, it can disappear if you find whatever good is hidden under the initial layer of sorrow. Still, AfterBurner0 said better than me, as he felt something like what you feel.
Funny how religion tries to shove down your throat that you're evil and that you HAVE to follow them or else you will be punished eternally. Sounds like a scare tactic to me.
Funny how an atheist takes the letters apart and finds lines and curves, and says "I HAVE to write like this or no one will understand me" and calls scary tactics. You Kasic seem to remain on the relationship level of "obey or be punished" with everyone around, not just religion. So you have to grow up yourself first, before you will be able to encounter benefits of mutual trust.
in my opinion a bad deed is something that hurts other people (if it has no reason). not believeing in god and many other "bad" things in the bible arent in my definition of bad.
Yesterday I have encountered an interesting interpretation of "eating from the tree of knowledge of good and evil", that is "
ossessing and altering what's good and what's evil". You are clearly naming something good and naming something bad, and judging yourself on your own merits. Sure enough, if one sets up the merits himself, he will be good in his own eyes, but God does not look at people depending on their views of life, good and evil, God has set out what's good and what's evil, and since He is the creator of the universe, He knows that for us, what is good and what is evil. Contradicting this definition will never do good.
The Bible is not proof. You can't use the thing claiming something as it's own proof.
Now. Let's use your logic. By this logic you don't exist. You haven't displayed enough proof for me to believe you exist. You saying "here I am" is no self-proof of you existing. Others say you exist, but I don't believe them as well. I have never seen you, you have never given me proof that you exist, so why should I bother with you?
That just sounds completely ridiculous and would seem to go against any free will argument put forth
Huh? You have the ability to judge, but have no right to judge. This does not touch free will at all. And about "ridiculous", go debunk me of you not existing by the very same argument I put forth right above your quote.
And if you don't accept Christ, but still do good deeds because it's a good deed your chances of going to hell are slightly lower than going to Heaven? I find that idiotic.
Well... You have to get the basis of what's good and what's bad from somewhere first, if you are driven by the correct settings of good and evil, and are not trying to pervert them in any manner, then you will likely accept the source of that morale if presented fully. While this presentation is highly personal, it's there. It's a great mystery of what happens with a human's soul at the verge of his death, but several people report of what is called NDEs that involve meeting with God and being asked for acceptance God as their God, in different forms but same sense. I believe that everyone will be granted a chance to accept God in His fullness, before being actually judged, however, this belief might not be common or official... I'm yet young as a Christian.
Well, it's called taking a leap of faith; pardon the horrid pun.
Actually, a leap of faith is EXACTLY this, and no pun is actually made.
