Question :

Perhaps the question is not whether or not rational humanism remains reasonable, if divinity should exist, but whether or not it constitutes a rebellion against the decrees of heaven. Whether the decrees are just is another question.

Well, are you in rebellion?

If a shepherd should place a barbed wire fence in place, with barbs sharp enough to truly hurt any of his sheep, which member of his flock does his will - the one who decides that his master desires to see him hurt and walks into the fence, indifferent to its presence - or the one who responds to the deterrent that his master's fence represents and stays away from it?

The former is calling his master a fool, who does not know how to motivate him. Would a wise master not know of the instincts of those he leads, and construct incentives in such a way as to make best use of those instincts? By altering those instincts, in order to be lead to the goal that one assumes that his master wishes him lead to, the former acts as if the shepard's plan was so ineptly crafted that he who is lead, must patch it up for the shepard, fudging the very motivations that the shepard failed to understand, if he is to be effectively lead.

Few of us would be so foolish as that sheep imagines his master to be, though more than a few of us are as foolish as the sheep. Should each of us, though, not credit those we worship with as much sense as we would others to credit to us?

If the world, in its current form, is the conscious and deliberate creation of the god(s), then they have designed the world in such a way, as to make such worries as are reflected in our struggle with the hardships of life, inevitable. Thus, if we try to bury our fears deeply, and pretend that they are not there, to be dealt with, we act against their will, as expressed in their creation. While it is true that those misfortunes are part of their creation, so are we, and there is no less reason to believe that the actions our fears motivate, are any less a part of their plan, than the things we fear.

Quite the contrary. If our actions are part of their plan, then we can, however incompletely, understand their decision to allow suffering in the world, as possibly being an effort on their part, to give us challenges to overcome, so that we may grow, and so that our lives may be given meaning, by having the opportunity to accomplish something meaningful. As, for example, right now, the reduction of suffering in our own world.

One might take the point of view that the challenges offered by the hardships we seek to get past, offer us guidance as we grow in spirit. But if we choose to be indifferent to the hardships that we encounter, how is such guidance to be found? Do we not then become like the near sighted sheep who plowed his way through a barbed wire fence - without flinching as the spikes pierced his flesh - only to fall off a cliff on the other side, that he could not see?

As with our judgements, so with our thoughts in general. Much as any true god's commands would have to find expression in the incentives created through his intervention in the world, so his words to us would find expression in the experiences he lead us to, as we gained our vision of his nature through our thoughts about what we had seen.

Question :

But what if these sorrows are not things that we are meant to try to overcome, but merely things we are meant to endure?

And yet, they make them frequently avoidable, and leave us in a situation where a rational judgement based on what we actually know, would lead us to avoid them? These 'gods' that are being imagined, in this case, sound like the foolish shepard of a few paragraphs back.

If so, then the gods are just torturing us, to see if they can break our spirits, and get us to mind, and I can't believe that, for a second. Well, at least not at the moment. If they wanted to be sadistic, it would be easy for them to make life even harder than it already is.

Also, while prayers aren't always granted, it is hard not to notice that the response to them seems to be positive far more often than it is negative (nature just following its probable course being considered an indifferent response). While it doesn't prove the existence of a benevolent presence, the commonness of this experience does make one wonder.

Question:

But what of someone who has passed away? How has the kindness of the gods helped him, in your view? Or has it, at all?

We do not know. Maybe that's the point. If he is OK, having left mortality behind, we can't know, and we still have something that we must work for, given our uncertainty, while he is provided for, wherever he is, and whatever that would best mean, for him. It would seem likely, though, that in an eternity, there would be time enough for him to be reunited with those who care about him.

Question :

So, to get back to the point we segued away from - are you discounting the value of instinct in one's search for God?

No, merely denying that its use renders the application of one's critical faculties unnecessary. From instinct comes inspiration, without which logic is unable to even begin its work. But the suggestions of instinct, must be checked against the findings of logic, as applied to life experience, and the knowledge we acquire.

I'm not saying that anyone should silence that 'inner conversation' that we all, naturally, have within us. Just that they shouldn't lose hold of the reality, that the thoughts that arise, in opposition or support to something that they have thought, said or done, come from within themselves, and that "other presence" each of them seems to feel, may be nothing more than his own subconscious mind, which is no more infallible than his conscious one. Should they lose sight of that, they may go to some place, where they can't come back from, and really should not want to be, taking the rest of us with them in the process.

Question:

But who are we, sinful beings that we are, to lodge protest if the morally perfect God should cast us from His presence into torment, be it in this life or the next? How can we judge the morality of His conduct?

One might well ask what "moral perfection" is, if it is possessed by a being who would condemn an otherwise virtuous man to agony beyond our imagining for all eternity for even a single sin, no matter how small. If vengefulness is a sin in us, as almost all faiths teach, why would it fail to tarnish that moral perfection, that gives the Lord the authority to inflict such a punishment in the first place? Unless one truly believes that "might makes right", this would seem to be an indefensible double standard.

True, none is righteous in the eyes of an all just God, but who could be expected to be? Is there even one of us in possession of an infinite strength of will? No. Then how could it be justice to so harshly punish a being for doing that which it is incapable of doing by its very nature?

Question:

So, life ain't fair. That may sound cruel, but it's true. Why not just accept it?

Usually when I've been offered that bit of mangled grammar, in that context, it has meant that "Just because something is wrong, that doesn't mean that it is wrong." Let us open up our basic logic textbooks, and turn to the page on tautologies .....

I am not sure whether or not that is what some mean, as they ask this question, though.

Perhaps the answer to the question of why one should not simply accept such a thing, lies in the meaning of the word "should".

You can't have it both ways. Either a deity is just, or he is not. If you wish to assert that he is, then that is your judgement, and like the judgement of any man, it is subject to the examination of others.

We continue ...