So I recently attended church over the holidays with the extended family and noticed every prayer was started with the words "our dear and kind heavenly father..."

I can't seem to get past the word "kind"...

How can anyone who believes in a heavenly father that allows kids to starve, natural disasters to occur, and requires a person to wear fundie undies to get back to heaven to be addressed as dear and kind?

I guess he is kind since after all he did provide us with the plan of salvation! And we can't forget agency or as they use to say, free agency!

I think it needs to be changed to "our dear and kind of crazy heavenly father..."

It's like having an invisible friend. They can be whatever you want them to be.

What bothers me is when my friends say they attribute every good thing in their lives to him. They don't ever acknowledge their own courage or their own accomplishments.

It's all due only to this invisible friend.

Of course the bad stuff is all due to the invisible enemy.

Thing is they think they are dealing with all the big problems in the world. tithing is supposed to go to that. It dosent and most get lost in the numbers but thair hearts are in the right place. Unfortunatly that just means it's quicker to rip it from thair chests.

If they term God as being kind, perhaps he will give them a break.

It's about kissing ass, afterall they have been blackmailed and bullied to do it all their lives. God is kind by definition and nevermind acknowledging that he's a big crazy bully because then his "wrath" (kind wrath??) may come upon you!

Insanity!

All I remember was prayers starting out with "heavenly father bla bla bla".

I wonder when the prayers were changed ?

Sounds like increased groveling.

"our dear and kind heavenly father..."

Reminds me of the North Koreans referring to Kim Jong Il as their "Dear Leader".

Nice gift from a kind heavenly father. Absentee father at that.

If they say it like it's so then maybe it will be. Or maybe these are people whose lives have rolled along pretty peacefully and they think "heavenly" "father" is just that nice to everyone. Either way, it's a pretty magical use of the word kind...and "father"...

I also remember people throwing in words like "gracious". I wish I would have let myself think about it at the time, but geesh, the Mo God must be one vain dude if he requires people to talk to him like that. Especially since none of those words apply: gracious, dear, kind, heavenly, or father.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 12/30/2010 02:34PM by Apatheist.

But isn't that what kind and loving parents do?

Children screaming in terror, torn from their mother's arms as the floods destroy their villages. Choking to death, their lungs filled with muddy water, or battered to death by the debris flows.

Such a beautiful story, doesn't it just fill you with the joy of God's love?

And he couldn't be happy with just murdering all his children. He had to drown all the kittens, and puppies, and chirpy little birds, and every other form of live.

Choke them, batter them to a bloody pulp, let the survivors starve to death.

This reminds me of the old joke

"What do you call a gorilla with a machine gun?"

Answer "Sir"

They feel like they have to praise and appease him or else he will do something horrid to them.

"...please, oh please don't beat my ass with your belt when you come home drunk tonight! I've been good all day! I swear I have! Please don't beat me ... oh please, don't beat me..."