In The Blame Of The Father
God believers are performing all matter of mind contortions to rationalize their irrational belief in god with the massive death wake of the tsunami. A few words on that from Ron Rosenbaum, who first quotes Arts&LettersDaily's Dennis Dutton on the general idiocy of believers' thinking:
"If God is God, he’s not good. If God is good, he’s not God. You can’t have it both ways, especially after the Indian Ocean catastrophe."
And then Ron gets into one of the specifics I, too, find particularly annoying:
This is something I find particularly annoying: a God who can intervene to save a handful out of a hundred thousand and gets credit for all the goodness displayed in the aftermath of the havoc He wrought."Why this need to defend God?" someone (that would be me) finally posted on the Beliefnet comment board in response to the multiple alibis for God that others were posting. All so eager to rush forward and exonerate their version of God from any connection to the slaughter. It began to smack of "they doth protest too much": The disaster somehow gets transformed into a display of God’s wonderfulness. In a way, doesn’t this sort of thinking suggest a kind of Stockholm syndrome? He’s the only God we’ve got, He’s got us imprisoned in this hell of a world—so, after a while, we worship Him.
One of the most glaring instances of this sort can be found in a quote in a story the Post carried on Jan. 2.
It was the heartwarming story of a baby boy born prematurely while his mother fled upland from the waves as they hit the coast of India.
Yes, it was the heartwarming "MIRACLE OF LIFE" that the Post headline had it.
But then I have to admit that I cringed when I read the words of the baby’s father (who had given him the name "Tsunami"—I’m sure the parents of those who lost babies will think this is really cute).
But the thing that made me cringe was this quote from the father of Baby Tsunami: "It’s all God’s grace!" he said.
I can’t really blame the guy for saying whatever he says at a moment like that. He’s got his baby. But think of the implications. Either he believes that his family has special grace, and that the tens of thousands of other families who lost children suffered the torment of a lost child because they deserved it, because they lacked "God’s grace." Or he believes that God looked down and saw tens of thousands of imperiled children and decided that this one deserved the special intervention of his "grace" and the others didn’t.
If you believe that God intervened to save this one little life, you have to believe that He chose not to intervene to save the lives of all the other children. He wanted them dead.
Yes, all those evil little babies are being punished for the cars they might steal for joyrides when they're 15. Oh, but they have "original sin." Now there's a clever concept. You simply have to join the church because, before you've so much as teethed, you're an evil motherfucker.
"before you've so much as teethed, you're an evil motherfucker."
That's why babies who die before they're baptized go to Limbo. And, no, Limbo isn't a groovy dance club in Hollywood. It's an underground day care center where no one's diaper ever gets changed. Baby wet! Baby sad!
Lena The Free and Easy Atheist at January 6, 2005 3:53 PM
That's why you gotta have faith, which is a code word for "Shut the fuck up"
Todd Fletcher at January 6, 2005 4:33 PM
As the good folks say at the Landover Baptist Church (www.landoverbaptist.org), "God is Santa for Adults."
Lawaneke at January 6, 2005 4:55 PM
Don't ask questions. What do you think you are-- Jewish?
People looking to "find reason" after natual disasters-- or UNNATURAL disasters-- are without reason to begin with.
Deirdre B. at January 7, 2005 11:58 AM