Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Posting-Version: version B 2.10.1 6/24/83; site oakhill.UUCP Path: utzoo!watmath!clyde!burl!ulysses!unc!mcnc!decvax!genrad!mit-eddie!think!harvard!seismo!lll-crg!mordor!ut-sally!oakhill!hunter From: hunter@oakhill.UUCP (Hunter Scales) Newsgroups: net.religion.christian Subject: Re: God and suffering Message-ID: <541@oakhill.UUCP> Date: Wed, 25-Sep-85 18:48:12 EDT Article-I.D.: oakhill.541 Posted: Wed Sep 25 18:48:12 1985 Date-Received: Sat, 28-Sep-85 06:35:38 EDT References: <389@decwrl.UUCP> <2203@sdcc6.UUCP> <351@pyuxn.UUCP> <328@uwvax.UUCP> Reply-To: hunter@oakhill.UUCP (Hunter Scales) Organization: Motorola Inc. Austin, Tx Lines: 39 In article <328@uwvax.UUCP> planting@uwvax.UUCP (W. Harry Plantinga) writes: > >(1) it is only possible for an omnipotent being to do things which are > logically possible. For example, an omnipotent being can't create a > round square, because there just ain't no such thing. >(2) It could be that God could eliminate evil in the world, but not in > way that people would still have free will, for if he prevented them > from sinning, they would no longer be free. That is, it is possible > that it is logically impossible and therefore impossible even for > God to create free creatures who never sin. >(3) It could be that in God's opinion, it is a greater good to have > free people, some of whom choose to do good, than to have no sin > in a world where people are not free. > >Thus, the argument that if God is omnipotent and wholly good, then he >would eliminate all evil fails: it assumes premisses which may be >false, such as that God can do anything and that if a good God saw >any evil, he would eliminate it. > > Harry Plantinga This line of thinking might hold for "evil" such as murder, rape, etc. How does it apply to letting innocent children die from starvation, disease, storms, earthquakes etc? Or are these children not christian and so are not "innocent" ? A fundementalist once tried to convince me that people who had never heard of Christ would nevertheless be damned to eternal hellfire!! Is it logically impossible to create a world without disease or at least create human beings who are immune to viruses and bacterial infection? I think it is possible and, further that man will eventually create just such a world. This is the difference between an optimistic but rational person and one who is besotted with a basically negative religion. -- Motorola Semiconductor Inc. Hunter Scales Austin, Texas {ihnp4,seismo,ctvax,gatech}!ut-sally!oakhill!hunter (I am responsible for me and my dog and no-one else)