The worst thing ever.

Originally posted by ckoh1965
Well, I understand a mother's instinct of not wanting to let go. But we all know that her daughter has gone through enough pain. My sister is fighting a losing battle. Prolonging the pain will not do any good. Oh how my heart breaks to see my niece like that; but it is even more painful to see what my sister is going through.

If god really is loving and ike that? How much longer will he torture my sister and her daughter? I hope it will end soon.

I too am sorry to hear about your niece. I too have lost a loved one in a similar fashion and have felt similar anger. One thing has occured to me after some of the pain has subsided over the years, however. Men and women of faith see the world falling apart around us going to hell in a hand basket just like the story you provided and think to ourselves, "What a shame". However, when something bad occurs to us personally we take it personally. We begin to ask, "Why me God, how dare you!", and begin to think that we must have done something to "deserve" such treatment. I think it just goes to shows how narsassistic our mind set often is. Perspective is a wonderous thing. In reality, we are all in the same basket, so to speak. We are all dying and suffering to various degrees. For me, realizing this has helped me to not take such suffering so personally and has also helped me focus less on my own little world and begin to reach out to those who are hurting just as I hurt at one time. It may sound strange, but experiencing such pain is somewhat a gift in that now I can relate to others in a similar predicterment. The Christian life is not promised to be "pain" free or "death free". In fact, we are gauranteed to encouter both suffering and physical death at some point. However, the Christian focus is to turn bad things into good things. This is what my faith has done for me.

Originally posted by ckoh1965
Well, I understand a mother's instinct of not wanting to let go. But we all know that her daughter has gone through enough pain. My sister is fighting a losing battle. Prolonging the pain will not do any good. Oh how my heart breaks to see my niece like that; but it is even more painful to see what my sister is going through.

If god really is loving and ...[text shortened]... ike that? How much longer will he torture my sister and her daughter? I hope it will end soon.

There are really no answers at some times in life. I come across people all the time that think that 1) they have done something wrong to deserve this 2) there must be a "purpose" in this suffering or 3) if they were better this would not have happened. The reality of life is that things happen which we have no control over and did not cause. And I'm not sure God causes them. It is just the reality of life as we know it.

I find it more helpful to me to invision God suffering with people in their pain.

Originally posted by ckoh1965
Quite an interesting coincidence that I see this question on here.

My niece--she's 22 years old--was diagnosed with a very aggressive cancer on her her cheek. This was about a year ago. She went to the out-patient section of the general hospital, was given some anti-biotics. After several weeks on numerous anti-biotics, they sent her to the dental depart ...[text shortened]... efore she collapsed).

Sometimes, death is a much better option than sufferring...

My wifes' mother died six months after being diagnosed with a fast growing tumor in her head. Just one month before her eldest daughter, my wife, gave birth to our son. It was a long six months.
But we rejoice to know that we will see her again.
There is far too much suffering in this world.

Originally posted by josephw
There is far too much suffering in this world.

Certainly if you believe in an omnibenevolent God there is.

Tell me, what did your mother-in-law do to deserve brain cancer? Perhaps a murderous spree in her youth? Maiming children perhaps? Ritualistic rape?

Probably none of the above.

And you try to tell me about God's "wisdom" and "justice".

Originally posted by scottishinnz
Certainly if you believe in an omnibenevolent God there is.

Tell me, what did your mother-in-law do to deserve brain cancer? Perhaps a murderous spree in her youth? Maiming children perhaps? Ritualistic rape?

Probably none of the above.

And you try to tell me about God's "wisdom" and "justice".

Probably environmental pollution.
Do people deserve to suffer?

Originally posted by josephw
Probably environmental pollution.
Do people deserve to suffer?

And God couldn't do anything about environmental pollution, if He so wanted to? Maybe your omniscient, omnipotent God didn't know it was going to happen.

And no. People don't "deserve" to suffer.

Originally posted by josephw
Probably environmental pollution.
Do people deserve to suffer?

It's not about deserving or otherwise.
The reality of life is that suffering exists.
We spend our lives avoiding it or dealing with it. Some of us do better at this than others. Some forms of suffering are worse of course.
For me, the worst type of suffering I can imagine would be the loss of one of my children. I can't imagine how I might cope. But my wife's parents lost their eldest son when he was 7 years old. They coped with it somehow and went on to raise three other children.
They did this without religion. Religious people would of course do the same.
When it comes to suffering, your label - atheist, christian, jew, buddhist, mulsim, whatever - doesn't really matter.

Originally posted by amannion
It's not about deserving or otherwise.
The reality of life is that suffering exists.
We spend our lives avoiding it or dealing with it. Some of us do better at this than others. Some forms of suffering are worse of course.
For me, the worst type of suffering I can imagine would be the loss of one of my children. I can't imagine how I might cope. But my w ...[text shortened]... g, your label - atheist, christian, jew, buddhist, mulsim, whatever - doesn't really matter.

I agree with you. My 6th child is 4 years old and the apple of my eye. If anything ever happened....

Originally posted by scottishinnz
And God couldn't do anything about environmental pollution, if He so wanted to? Maybe your omniscient, omnipotent God didn't know it was going to happen.

And no. People don't "deserve" to suffer.

As the story goes, God will fix everything! In his time of course.

Originally posted by josephw
I agree with you. My 6th child is 4 years old and the apple of my eye. If anything ever happened....

I'm right there with you ... although I've gotta give you the dues - 6! 2 was enough for me.

Originally posted by amannion
I'm right there with you ... although I've gotta give you the dues - 6! 2 was enough for me.

2 is good! Even 1. But then they get to be teenagers.

Originally posted by AThousandYoung
Absolutely. Death in itself is not necessarily bad at all.

“Death is nothing, and so nothing to fear.”

—Epicurus

Or:

“How silly for the flame to fear
annihilation in the fire.”

—vistesd

Originally posted by josephw
2 is good! Even 1. But then they get to be teenagers.

Teenagers I can cope with.
I'm a high school teacher and deal with that crap every day as part of my job.

Originally posted by amannion
Teenagers I can cope with.
I'm a high school teacher and deal with that crap every day as part of my job.

I once worked as a youth counseller at an inner city juvenile detention center. 400 of the worst. They did me in!

Originally posted by josephw
I once worked as a youth counseller at an inner city juvenile detention center. 400 of the worst. They did me in!

I can imagine.