Don't confuse nature with God. Bacterial and viral infections, disease, cancer, birth defects are part of nature. That being said after watching my mother die of cancer I would end my life before reaching the terminal stage of cancer. I would say my goodbyes and notify my family of my intentions but there is no reason to stick it out until the end.
If you are talking the Christian God, God created NATURE. God created heaven, earth and all the creatures on it.
Then again, God created man and woman SUSCEPTIBLE to cancer. The God or creation could have created humanity impervious to disease of all sorts, but did not.
If there is a God of creation, I most certainly can blame all the suffering on that God, because God created everything, nature, and man. God created nature in such a way that it was capable of all the suffering we see in nature, God created mankind susceptible to all sorts diseases that inflict all sorts of suffering.
Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 09/19/2010 04:17AM by MJ.
“Is God willing to prevent suffering from cancer, but not able? Then he is not omnipotent. Is he able, but not willing? Then he is malevolent. Is he both able and willing? Then whence cometh the suffering from cancer? Is he neither able nor willing? Then why call him God?”
I lost my best friend to cancer when I was 14-- my dog. That's right, cancer is not just for humans.
I have also lost many relatives to this horrible thing that we seem to know so little about.
Here is the thing. If there was a God, why would he invent such a thing? It makes no sense. I guess that was my point in my OP. Why wouldn't God simply just make death a natural soft cloudy occurrence, like going to sleep. Yet here we have this terrible treacherous painful long drawn out torturous, horrible, merciless, I can't think of enough adjectives to describe what a terrible way to die it is.
The only rational explanation is that there is no God. There is no magical sky daddy out there. There is no magical entity that is there to take care of me. We are completely on our own. We can only look out for each other.
The only thing we can do to battle cancer is to learn as much as we can about it during our short duration on this life, cramming our tiny brains with information based on the knowledge gained by the geniuses of previous generations, and hope that this information is retained and passed on to our children's children.
It seems so futile and inefficient. Every once in a while, someone smart enough to actually make a difference and expand our knowledge is quickly taken away. An entire lifetime dedicated to a particular field of research poof just like that gone in an instant.
If God initiated the universe, and that lead to the creation of life on earth, then cancer was just part of the eventual package. Everyone has to die of something, chronic old age health issues are not the easiest way to die, either.
quoth0raven0nevermo Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > If God initiated the universe, and that lead to > the creation of life on earth, then cancer was > just part of the eventual package. Everyone has to > die of something, chronic old age health issues > are not the easiest way to die, either.
But a God of creation COULD have created the universe in a way that death did not involve suffering EVER. God could have created life in such a way that we always died peacefully in our sleep without suffering, but God did NOT.
If God initiated the universe in such a way that it evolved to allow such suffering than God is responsible for such suffering.
Again:
“Is God willing to prevent suffering from cancer, but not able? Then he is not omnipotent. Is he able, but not willing? Then he is malevolent. Is he both able and willing? Then whence cometh the suffering from cancer? Is he neither able nor willing? Then why call him God?”
Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 09/19/2010 05:19AM by MJ.