You can use the Bible to justify pretty much any model of God that you like. Puritans didn't think God was terribly "fun loving," or the Crusaders or Inquisitors. Moreover, I reject the idea that something as infinite and beyond human comprehension that anything called "God" must be is capable of possessing such prosaic traits as "fun-loving" (I have this delightful mental image of God on a roller-coaster with a beer in one hand and his girlfriend by his side)

I wasn't talking like I was condemned, I was simply trying to impress the idea that there are, or will be, people condemned to Hell according to your belief system. This is not something I can love or respect. I'm incapable of it. So, the point that I was trying to get across is that according to Christianity, God created me with certain traits, among them a skeptical nature and a profound dislike for religion. Why would he create me, knowing my future, knowing the path I would take and the person I would become, only to send me to Hell in the end? Free-will is a cop out. If God knows everything he knew I would reject Christianity, thus I was created with the predestined destination of Hell. And even if I were to convert back, there are others out there who did not or will not. This isn't about me, this is about everyone. To quote Mark Twain, "Frankenstein took some flesh and bones and blood and made a man out of them; the man ran away and fell to raping and robbing and murdering everywhere, and Frankenstein was horrified and in despair, and said, 'I made him, without asking his consent, and it makes me responsible for every crime he commits. I am the criminal, he is innocent.' ... [That's exactly] the case of God and man... God made man, without man's consent, and made his nature, too; made it vicious instead of angelic, and then said, "Be angelic, or I will punish you and destroy you." But no matter, God is responsible for everything man does, all the same; He can't get around that fact. There is only one Criminal, and it is not man."

"A perfect God must eventually require a perfect universe."

A better question is, how is can a perfect being create an imperfect universe? If God is the source of all things, he is also the source of evil, chaos, disharmony, entropy, and what you would call the Devil. If God is omniscient, he saw it coming. Thus, it would make sense to say that in a universe that contains "evil" with an omniscient creator, it logically follows that that Creator must either not care or be capable of caring about such prosaic matters as good and evil, or he grants evil sanction.

• Part I -Satan was the first to question Gods motives. - duordi - November 2, 2004 - 22:52 UTC
  • Meh - stormcrow - November 3, 2004 - 02:15 UTC
    • God does not cheat. - duordi - November 4, 2004 - 14:00 UTC
      • That doesn't really answer anything - stormcrow - November 5, 2004 - 16:24 UTC
        • You are underestimating God. - duordi - November 10, 2004 - 07:04 UTC
          • Hrmph - stormcrow - November 18, 2004 - 23:21 UTC