The God of the Old Testament is arguably the most unpleasant character in all fiction: jealous and proud of it; a petty, unjust, unforgiving control-freak; a vindictive, bloodthirsty ethnic cleanser; a misogynistic, homophobic, racist, infanticidal, genocidal, filicidal, pestilential, megalomaniacal, sadomasochistic, capriciously malevolent bully. - Richard Dawkins

Saturday, May 5, 2012

Universalism

The Universalist concept of God is far more palatable to me than the traditional Christian one. So why am I not a Universalist? Because even this concept of God is faced with an insurmountable conceptual problem; the presence of evil in the world. I cannot sit here and avow the existence of a totally benevolent, totally powerful ruler of the Universe, while all around me at this very moment, the earth is covered with the tears of sentient beings, groaning under the weight of suffering, pain, sickness, starvation, disaster, violence, fear, loss, grief, and inevitable death. These things do NOT belong on the resume of an all powerful, all good being. Surely such a being could come up with a better plan than this. I could perhaps accept the existence of an imperfect God; a God who is essentially good, but lacks control over some aspects of the Universe. I might even be inclined to offer such a being my worship, if there were any credible evidence that such a being existed. But the fact is, there is no such evidence, other than that concocted by the vivid imaginations of believers. The simplest explanation by far, is that this Universe APPEARS to be without a God, precisely because it IS without a God.

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