Convince me.

[imjustagirl]

For the Christians on the board,

Tell me there's a reason I should believe in a god who would take an amazing woman. Who would give her cancer, rob her of her life. Who would rob her family and friends of the most inspiring woman I've ever known.

She's fought this cancer hard. She's fought it with everything she's got. And she NEVER got angry, or bitter, or pissed. She just looked for what's next, and focused on that. And now she's in hospice care.

Tell me why that would happen. Tell me. I need to know.

I considered myself agnostic before today. Now? I consider myself an atheist. I spent 10 minutes this evening praying to whatever might be up there, begging him to explain himself to her family. To make them understand why they had to lose her. And I don't know why it had to happen.

 

[outofplace]

IJAG and I may have had the occasional...disagreement, but I'd also like to hear a response to this from a believer in any faith.

IJAG, I'm sorry to hear you are going through the loss of somebody who is obviously very important to you. I won't get into my similar story except to say that since it happened. I haven't set foot in a synagogue unless I absolutely had to be there. By that I mean a family wedding, funeral, Bar Mitzvah or Bat Mitzvahs.

I do hope if somebody does respond, they realize that "The lord works in mysterious ways" doesn't cut it.

 

[Alma]

I don't know why it had to, either. I can't give you a good reason. I'm sorry. I have nothing to offer but my deepest, greatest sympathy for her, you, everyone there. I would also say **** cancer for all the people it hurts.

 

[imjustagirl]

Alma,

Why would you want to **** everyone that cancer hurts?

IJAG

 

[WriteThinking]

Sure, it's only the toughest question in all of life (or death), but I'm actually going to try to give some kind of an answer to this.

It's a question/concern that others more intelligent, more knowledgeable, and, yes, both more, and less, faithful than I am have attempted to tackle all through the ages. But here's my humble take on the matter -- or at least what I can think of at this time of the night while posting on a message board.

As hard and as dissatisfying as it is, there is no totally knowable answer to your questions as you're stating them. If there were, and if it was up to us, well, then why would anybody die, or "have to" die, ever?

It's not always a question of why something has to happen; it just does happen-- same as the good things that go on.

We really do have to take the good with the bad. They go hand-in-hand, just like, oh, life and death.

I use my faith to lean on as a way to go through life, a way to approach it, and deal with it, when it does happen, and not as a way to necessarily solve all problems or get everything (or even anything) that I might want.

And, actually, it sounds as if your loved one has done the same.

May I ask, why is your loved one the most inspiring person you've ever met? Does it have to do with the way she has met the challenge that cancer has presented? If so, then perhaps even this terrible thing is integral to the answers to your questions.

Despite the popular phrasing, life isn't all good. But living is our only option this side of... well, dying.

Answering your questions -- and the building of faith in general -- is usually a process, and not something that can just be done, to the satisfaction of most people, on demand, or in a moment, or in a post. And that is what you want, as evidenced by the short and succinct heading of this thread.

That's why there is such a thing as growing in faith. Paradoxically, such beliefs are often strengthened, particularly, when things may be at their worst, when people have less than they've ever had, and need more than they ever have.

Unfortunately, praying and turning to a god tends to be what people do only whenever they don't know what else to do. In that, it's really the antithesis of faith.

You're not ready to be convinced, and you won't be , unless you get exactly what you want, right now, and that's not belief, or faith, by any measure.

I've found my faith to be a companion, a comfort and a way to care and hope that I find infinitely more satisfying and empowering than non-belief.

To me, it is very real, and something that was built up during what I consider to have been the darkest time of my life (this was several years ago). My faith in God has since been enhanced and enriched by both a couple of personal spiritual encounters and by more generic, everyday life experiences along the way to this point.

Your experience might be different. But I'd submit that your experience is still evolving.

This isn't the answer you want or are seeking, I'm sure, and I'm sorry for this explanation's shortcomings. But perhaps it will at least get a dialogue going.

 

[93Devil]

Look at everything around us. Look at all the amazing **** in the world and the entire size and scope of the universe. No way this **** just came about out of nothing. Something created everything. What that is, I don't know? But it's something.

We fit in someplace, I just don't think we are meant to understand where, yet. But I don't think it is over for your friend. She has just gone on to the next step, what ever that might be.

 

[Boom_70]

Why would you want to **** everyone that cancer hurts?

Cancerfelia

 

[outofplace]

Look at everything around us. Look at all the amazing **** in the world and the entire size and scope of the universe. No way this **** just came about out of nothing. Something created everything. What that is, I don't know? But it's something.

We fit in someplace, I just don't think we are meant to understand where, yet. But I don't think it is over for your friend. She has just gone on to the next step, what ever that might be.

That bit about not understanding fits under the "works in mysterious ways" heading. I'm sorry, but it's an excuse, not a help. If I understand IJAG even a little bit, I think she will feel the same way.

Maybe you are right. Maybe there really is a plan. Did you ever stop to consider that it might not be a good one?

I'm not sure about IJAG's feelings on the subject, but my faith seems to change depending on when I am asked about it or when it comes to mind. Most of the time, I believe G-d exists. I even try to follow the rules as best I can, though I admit I fail far too often in this regard. Perhaps it is because most of the time, believing there is a supreme being in charge of all this is more disturbing than comforting given the state of the world and the suffering I've seen those I care about endure.

I get WriteThinking's point that we all have to die. I'm not arguing that one. I can accept that it is part of the nature of life. But we don't have to die in pain or in fear, as so many of us do. When my family suffered a loss that turned me away from religion, it wasn't the death that left me so bitter. It was the way she died, going through an extended period of physical and emotional pain. I'm sorry, but there is just no possible way that could have served some greater good. None. No matter how hard I try to justify it, or how badly I want to rebuild my faith, I can't make that work in my mind. I can't trust in a supreme being who let that happen to a good woman. especially when I know so many other good people endured even worse.

 

[Alma]

Alma,

Why would you want to **** everyone that cancer hurts?

IJAG

A mistake in writing. For all the people it hurts. I'm sorry I wrote it the wrong way.

 

[WriteThinking]

Two other important things to remember:

1): For Christians, life is not supposed to be about ourselves at all. It's about God, what He wants, needs and plans, and it's about serving others -- loving God with all your heart, and loving others as yourself, and all of that.

And 2): This life is all about the next life.

Neither of those has anything to do with things necessarily going exactly as we would hope, or plan.

 

[Mizzougrad96]

First of all, my deepest sympathies for your loss...

One of my closest friends from high school, one of the nicest people anyone would ever meet, has her husband in hospice with pancreatic cancer. Awful, awful stuff... They have an adorable 3-year-old and I just can't imagine that girl having to grow up without a father.

I remember being at a funeral 15-16 years ago for a woman who died in an accident and the priest said, "She's where God wants her to be..." and I wanted to jump up and say, "Really, because when I see those two crying kids in the front row, I tend to think she'd be a lot better off being here with them..."

It's awful, and it's perfectly natural to question God when something this tragic happens.

I go to church every Sunday. I always have for the most part, but the difference now is I actually enjoy going and I never in a million years thought I would ever say that. I always saw going as a chore. Now, because the place we started going is so positive, going makes me feel good. I'm not trying to convince everyone or anyone that it would have the same impact on them, but that's the impact it has on me.

Questioning God when something like this happens is perfectly natural and probably a healthy way to look at it.

Again, so sorry for your loss... Hang in there...

 

[Songbird]

... the most inspiring woman I've ever known.

Take her inspiration and inspire others like she does you.

 

[YankeeFan]

... the most inspiring woman I've ever known.

Take her inspiration and inspire others like she does you.

If there's answer, I think it's this.

Seeing how someone else deals with illness, and approaching death, can be inspiring. It makes us appreciate what we have, want to do more.

And, if there is a God, I'd like to think he doesn't give us more than we can handle. As sad as it is, the way your friend has handled this shows how strong she is.

 

[SixToe]

I have had three close relatives, including my mother, and several friends die from cancer.

I trust in God, believe in God, have faith. I question and wonder about things. I don't get answers like something popping out of the sky in a Monty Python movie thunderbolt or a ghostly figure imparting wisdom or a saying in a fortune cookie. I ask, seek, pray and, ultimately, I maintain my faith while talking with others at church or on the road with other friends who are believers.

No one can give a flat-out, great, acceptable answer to "Why does a loving god do or allow these things?" because there is not one that would suffice. Humans, especially non-believers, want something cut and dried. An abiding faith and trust in God doesn't work that way. It is, sometimes, one of the toughest things to understand or comprehend but that's how it is.

I'm sorry for the loss of your friend. Songbird had a good suggestion - use your friend's inspiration, love and kindness to do the same for others, and remember the good times you had with her.

 

[Dick Whitman]

For the Christians on the board,

Tell me there's a reason I should believe in a god who would take an amazing woman. Who would give her cancer, rob her of her life. Who would rob her family and friends of the most inspiring woman I've ever known.

We've gone round and round about this here, had several threads locked over it, I think.

The philosophy I've settled on, which probably has room for both a god and bad things happening to good people:

(1) There is probably a "god";

(2) I prefer to think of this entity as more of a First Cause than a deity as we typically think of one, i.e. as someone we owe fealty and worship;

(3) As it is pretty much unknowable, this entity is not a part of my every day life, nor, in my opinion, the world's every day life. I mean, it might be. But I can't know that. Hence, I waste no time contemplating it. It factors into neither my morality, my "purpose," nor my understanding (well, more like lack thereof) of the universe.

I believe in god. I don't believe in Alma's god, though. I am going to try to tackle Jesus at some point. I think you could realistically remain on the agnostic side by adopting my philsophy. Well, not mine. I didn't invent it. But I have found that, of all that I've exposed myself, too, because I've thought about this a lot, as well, this makes the most sense.

 

[imjustagirl]

First off, I obviously wasn't in a good place when I posted this last night. And so it wasn't worded in the nuanced way it probably should have been. I apologize for that.

However, all the "It's impossible to convince you and that's obviously what you're asking for" condescension? Not my favorite thing.

Like I said, I've been agnostic my whole life. I ask questions. I talk to people. Some of my closest friends are extremely religious. It's not like I'm coming into this blind. I guess my poorly worded request was to help me understand how those of you who are Christian and believe in a benevolent god can reconcile it with what you see every day around you. Because I'm lacking in faith in just about everything ... I can't do things without facts and numbers and visual verification. But I'm really lacking the ability to put my faith in someone or something who seems to have such a random view of who deserves to succeed and who deserves to suffer.

 

[nmmetsfan]

Nobody is going to convince you. Faith is a deeply personal thing. What do you feel deeply personal about that came from being convinced? No condescension implied.

There is a feeling that can come with faith in a being that is much bigger than you, bigger than anyone, with the hope that this life isn't for nothing. There has to be something more, right?

It's something you will have to experience yourself to believe. The only thing you can (maybe) be convinced of is to keep an open mind. That's understandably difficult to grasp for people with a cynical or analytic outlook on life.

Sometimes it takes losing someone to truly understand and appreciate the impact they had. I know that's not particularly comforting. It also probably doesn't do anything to convince you, but I don't think you're in a state of mind to be convinced of much right now. I'm sorry for your situation and I hope you are able to find peace and comfort somehow.

 

[imjustagirl]

You're not just born with faith. You learn about it. You have parents who taught you, or took you to church. My parents didn't do that.

So if someone can't explain faith, or how they came to know about it, that seems weird to me.

 

[RickStain]

Faith is a choice. At a very fundamental level, you can choose to see the world that way or you can't, but I don't think explanations are necessarily the route to understanding.

 

[imjustagirl]

But I don't understand how to choose to see the world that way. That's all I'm trying to say. It's such a foreign concept to me, it's not even real. So apparently asking people to tell me how they have faith, or what they believe, is weird?