Chemotherapy got rid of the cancer, not prayers...and I'm guessing the cancer levels went down far enough to where they were not detected, but nevertheless was still there. Now it's back. So much for that miracle, eh? So much for them failed prayers eh? As I have seen on a billboard and had it personally happen to me countless times(which is why I am no longer a believer) "Nothing Fails Like Prayer."
A miracle's efficacy is not impacted by a return to a disease years later, nor is its efficacy impacted by eventual death. Everyone who has had a miracle eventually dies.
It sounds like you base the efficacy of your own personal prayers when you were a believer based on whether or not you got what you wanted?
It was actually one of the many reasons why I am no longer a believer. That, coupled with the fact that I have found many many inconsistencies in the Bible, along with disgusting passages, nonsense passages, lies, etc.....Not only that but religion can and does cause harm. Fred Phelps was a good example of that. Protesting funerals in the name of God. How sick is that? Good riddance he's now dead!
Do you think the Jews were praying during the holocaust? Of course they were! Did it help them any? Of course it didn't! How about before the 9/11 attacks? Of course there were. Didn't help any. Not too long ago, a couple of idiot parents that had a sick child and they decided to pray away this illness instead of taking the kid to the doctor. Guess what happened? The kid died. No miracles happened there. No prayers were answered there! The parents were eventually charged with withholding care for the kid. Why didn't this kid receive a miracle from God? The cardinal supposedly got one. Looks like Jesus doesn't "love the little children" as much as he loves the cardinal.....
I'd be more open to returning to the church(I was once Catholic) should I have more solid, weighty, credible evidence that God exists.
I've encountered several people on here who said they stopped believing because of unanswered prayers. Garth Brooks figured it out - some of God's greatest gifts are unanswered prayers. Does that mean it makes sense to us in the short term when someone dies or is sick or something bad happens - no. Faith wouldn't be faith if science could point to God. But science can't prove God, so that is why there is such a thing as Faith - belief even when something isn't provable with science. I don't know what else to tell you.
Some of the early scientists were priests, but then Satan did quote scripture in asking Jesus to jump off a temple. In general, though, good homily, although I believe that the new fashion amongst New Atheists is to deny that any evidence could convince them of God, in which sense a wicked and adulterous generation does not seek for a sign.
Sadly, what many people, including many Catholics, think is prayer is really superstition. As the Catechism puts it:
"2111 Superstition is the deviation of religious feeling and of the practices this feeling imposes. It can even affect the worship we offer the true God, e.g., when one attributes an importance in some way magical to certain practices otherwise lawful or necessary. To attribute the efficacy of prayers or of sacramental signs to their mere external performance, apart from the interior dispositions that they demand, is to fall into superstition."
When one regards prayer as magic, yeah, I don't believe it either. As Mike Nelson put it when riffing on a Harry Potter movie, "Magic is either evil or stupid."
One might as well put up a billboard saying, "Nothing fails like hugging your wife."
So tell me Scott, how many times does prayer work? 100% of the time? 75% of the time? 50% of the time? 25% of the time? If it supposedly does work, how do you know it was "God" that answered the prayer and not the result of something else?
Is an amputee the worst case of suffering you can think of? Of course suffering is a great mystery, but not a mystery in the sense that we can't understand anything about it.
The Church's teaching certainly makes sense to me as a person who has experienced suffering in my life - God allows suffering in the world. God doesn't do the punishing, but he allows suffering to happen because through suffering somehow we are made better because of the experience. Certainly this teaching is easier to understand if you a) recognize that God suffered on the cross in a much more intense way than you or I will ever suffer b) are open to this possibly being true and then check it out for yourself and see if the Church's understanding of suffering bears fruit in your life or not.
Or you can sit around thinking this is all just a big accident from a big bang and we're all just waiting for the clock to expire
Good one, Father!
ReplyDeleteSome Sunday I'm going to drive down to your parish so I can hear your homilies in person! This was a really, really good one. Thank you so much!
ReplyDeleteChemotherapy got rid of the cancer, not prayers...and I'm guessing the cancer levels went down far enough to where they were not detected, but nevertheless was still there. Now it's back. So much for that miracle, eh? So much for them failed prayers eh? As I have seen on a billboard and had it personally happen to me countless times(which is why I am no longer a believer) "Nothing Fails Like Prayer."
ReplyDeleteA miracle's efficacy is not impacted by a return to a disease years later, nor is its efficacy impacted by eventual death. Everyone who has had a miracle eventually dies.
DeleteIt sounds like you base the efficacy of your own personal prayers when you were a believer based on whether or not you got what you wanted?
It was actually one of the many reasons why I am no longer a believer. That, coupled with the fact that I have found many many inconsistencies in the Bible, along with disgusting passages, nonsense passages, lies, etc.....Not only that but religion can and does cause harm. Fred Phelps was a good example of that. Protesting funerals in the name of God. How sick is that? Good riddance he's now dead!
DeleteDo you think the Jews were praying during the holocaust? Of course they were! Did it help them any? Of course it didn't! How about before the 9/11 attacks? Of course there were. Didn't help any. Not too long ago, a couple of idiot parents that had a sick child and they decided to pray away this illness instead of taking the kid to the doctor. Guess what happened? The kid died. No miracles happened there. No prayers were answered there! The parents were eventually charged with withholding care for the kid. Why didn't this kid receive a miracle from God? The cardinal supposedly got one. Looks like Jesus doesn't "love the little children" as much as he loves the cardinal.....
I'd be more open to returning to the church(I was once Catholic) should I have more solid, weighty, credible evidence that God exists.
I've encountered several people on here who said they stopped believing because of unanswered prayers. Garth Brooks figured it out - some of God's greatest gifts are unanswered prayers. Does that mean it makes sense to us in the short term when someone dies or is sick or something bad happens - no. Faith wouldn't be faith if science could point to God. But science can't prove God, so that is why there is such a thing as Faith - belief even when something isn't provable with science. I don't know what else to tell you.
DeleteSome of the early scientists were priests, but then Satan did quote scripture in asking Jesus to jump off a temple. In general, though, good homily, although I believe that the new fashion amongst New Atheists is to deny that any evidence could convince them of God, in which sense a wicked and adulterous generation does not seek for a sign.
ReplyDeleteSadly, what many people, including many Catholics, think is prayer is really superstition. As the Catechism puts it:
ReplyDelete"2111 Superstition is the deviation of religious feeling and of the practices this feeling imposes. It can even affect the worship we offer the true God, e.g., when one attributes an importance in some way magical to certain practices otherwise lawful or necessary. To attribute the efficacy of prayers or of sacramental signs to their mere external performance, apart from the interior dispositions that they demand, is to fall into superstition."
When one regards prayer as magic, yeah, I don't believe it either. As Mike Nelson put it when riffing on a Harry Potter movie, "Magic is either evil or stupid."
One might as well put up a billboard saying, "Nothing fails like hugging your wife."
So tell me Scott, how many times does prayer work? 100% of the time? 75% of the time? 50% of the time? 25% of the time? If it supposedly does work, how do you know it was "God" that answered the prayer and not the result of something else?
DeleteWhy hasn't there been any miracles of amputees miraculously getting their limbs back? Why won't god heal amputees?
ReplyDeleteIs an amputee the worst case of suffering you can think of? Of course suffering is a great mystery, but not a mystery in the sense that we can't understand anything about it.
DeleteThe Church's teaching certainly makes sense to me as a person who has experienced suffering in my life - God allows suffering in the world. God doesn't do the punishing, but he allows suffering to happen because through suffering somehow we are made better because of the experience. Certainly this teaching is easier to understand if you
a) recognize that God suffered on the cross in a much more intense way than you or I will ever suffer
b) are open to this possibly being true and then check it out for yourself and see if the Church's understanding of suffering bears fruit in your life or not.
Or you can sit around thinking this is all just a big accident from a big bang and we're all just waiting for the clock to expire
Science can't disprove Superman, Batman, the tooth fairy, Thor , or Zeus either, your point is?
DeleteAh yes, the "suffering is a great mystery" answer .
DeleteThat science can't disprove superman, batman nor the tooth fairy is my point
Delete