In about 300 B.C., Epicurus eloquently summed up the problem of the existence of evil. It has come to be known as the Riddle of Epicurus or the Epicurean paradox. It was translated by David Hume in the Dialogues concerning Natural Religion:
If God is willing to prevent evil, but is not able to
Then He is not omnipotent.If He is able, but not willing
Then He is malevolent.If He is both able and willing
Then whence cometh evil?If He is neither able nor willing
Then why call Him God?
Karl writes:—"Those are your words describing what you interpret concerning the actions and motives of the god you claim to know all about."
I know nothing about him, as he does not exist. One cannot know much of anything about something that does not exist.
I do know what people have written about him and what they describe, were a human to act that way, is amply covered by fickle, cruel, arbitrary, and despotic. Since I believe all gods, including this one, are creations of men, the description is apt.
And as such, the events described around the tower of Babel can only be taken as elements in a story. Since no such event happened, it is pure fantasy. God had no purpose in doing that because he does not exist. And since, as I said, language divergence happens as a natural aspect of language development, what is being described is clearly a fairy tale to explain to children why everyone has a different language.
I find it funny that you accuse me of freely interpreting, since your little spin on the reason for Yahweh's "plan B" after Noah's kids failed to "fill the earth" is marvelous bit of free interpretation. Putting plans in god's mind, are we?
As to the blessing/curse dichotomy you assert—no. What you see is what you get. It is what it is. No Yahweh, no plan, no blessing, no curse. Just people muddling through.
Anyway, Karl, stimulating, as always.
Karl, really? Have you never taken a course in linguistics, or history of languages? Common language is no more a bond than different ones are a barrier. The bloodiest wars are generally from within a shared culture. Nations of differing languages have often unified into grand empires with only nominal military intervention.
Americans are curiously mono-lingual, and therefore fertile ground for this idea. An idea seen as a simple folk tale in older nations. Babel is a charming just-so story to explain different languages from before the time that diligent far-reaching scholarship proved how languages are evolving.
The modern English of the KJV didn't exist in Dante's time, much less in the times of Mohamed or Moses. Was there another tower built and destroyed later to create all the languages that came after the time of the Byzantine Empire (when the Old Testament was anthologized)?
Karl, Your claim is that "lack of interest" is how adolescents in Babel times avoided their duty to multiply?
Have you met a teenager?
Do you think teenagers have changed in that respect anywhere between Australopithecus and today?
Granted, un-forbidding the passion fruit (so to speak) does seem to have a palliative effect on human mating behavior. That's why full-blown sex education works three times better than abstinence enforcement. But I doubt enough to actually slow the birth rate by much back in the Bible days, when a risky abortion was the only effective contraception.
What a fun thread!
(sotto voce: it unnerves the religious when we know more about their sacred texts than they do)
Mark states,
"Were a human to act that way, is amply covered by fickle, cruel, arbitrary, and despotic."
That is exactly where the analogy breaks down.
In a "free" society people are allowed to participate in behavior that is contrary to what many would call "moral or good." If it is from within the individuals that "evil" is determined by some democratic consensus it will be possible to call even the most virtuous human you know a fickle, cruel, and arbitrary despot if their values simply don't match yours.
That is human evil in its simplest form, stating that another is crooked and perverse when you know they are not. This is why what is written in the "good book" is really considered just stories to be written off from reality.
BTW, I didn't bring up the Babel story Mark did. I just wanted to state my take on the matter.
There are a few criminals that are thankful for the mercy of a judge when they are caught out right in criminal activity.
However, I would venture to say that the evil response to the attempted training and corrections upon humans of this world are met with the arrogant response of, "why me," or "that Judge or Jury is simply biased and nothing close to honest and fair in their decision."
BTW there is much that is recorded in the Bible that God never condoned as good, moral and upright.
Like when Noah cursed his grandson Caanan and all of his posterity.
Much of what is recorded is from flawed human authors, whose perspectives could not have been considered God's perspective as they were clearly not acting with pure motives.
Johan is also a classic example.
Those who seriously read the Bible try to really determine the moral character of God from the imperfect behavior of the people who recorded their "stories" for us.
Dan, Lets try this again!
I never said the problem was lack of progeny. The blessing given by God to Noah and his offspring was with the assumption that they would also spread out and cover the habitable regions of the world. They weren't interested in moving out of the cultural malaise that they were forming.
They could have done almost "anything," but the anything was not merely building a tower of cut stones, it would eventually become the flat out rejection of the value and dignity of any human life itself. The ruling class would have been directing the affairs of human existence.
It seems obvious to me anyway that part of man's patterns throughout history is to gather into collective groups with similar values, similar mindsets and similar social mores that become vehicles for aggressive/selfish leaders to aggrandize themselves.
The continuing saga of man's lifetimes on this planet go something like this.
Groups of like minded people set out to begin societies that begin as democratic/socialistic cloisters that grow into unmanageable arrogant forms of government when a strong leader (or leaders) decides for, or flat out deceives, others that he/she for "good" purposes can seize control of the powers that were suppose to be present to protect the society from both its internal and external outsiders. Said leader or leaders then go on conquests of aggression towards perceived enemies that consolidates a continuing need for these strong leaders. Then new perceived enemies are needed one after another until voila, the known world is at their beck and call.
The USA was very isolationist until it was seen that they had no other choice or soon they would also be either fighting a war on their homeland and/or speaking a different language.
You describe slight military action as though one culture can easily be forced to give up their heritage and culture. This is not the case and you know it.
No one will ever be successful in an Afghan campaign until the women of the nation are educated and able to either fend for themselves as part of the government or else become able to form their own armed militias against the men who oppress them.
The way a society treats their female children is one of the surest sign of how virtuous that society really is.
Whence cometh evil, look at how a society treats female children and you'll have your answer.
Epicurus' blast of wisdom from 300 BC is my favorite bit of this whole thread. You people are arguing about fictitious characters in an ancient novel– an engaging cognitive exercise I'm sure, and hopefully executed in good humor and not edgy dogmatism. The Bible seems like a weird mix of H.P. Lovecraft, Grimm fairy-tales, and watered down Deepak Chopra. It does end on a literary high note with the magnificently horrific, blood spattered swagger of 'Revelations'. Genuinely spooky and ghoulish!
I never said the problem at Babel was a lack of progeny.
The blessing given was with the assumption that they would also spread out and cover the habitable regions of the world. They weren't interested in moving out of the cultural malaise that they were forming.
They could have done almost anything, but the anything was not merely building a tower of rocks, it would eventually become the flat out rejection of the value and dignity of any human life itself. The ruling class would have been directing the affairs of human existence.
It seems obvious to me anyway that part of man's patterns throughout history is to gather into collective groups with similar values, similar mindsets and similar social mores that become vehicles for aggressive/selfish leaders to aggrandize themselves.
The continuing saga of man's lifetimes on this planet go something like this.
Groups of like minded people set out to begin societies that begin as democratic/socialistic cloisters that grow into unmanageable arrogant forms of government when a strong leader (or leaders) decides for, or flat out deceives, others that he/she for "good" purposes can seize control of the powers that were suppose to be present to protect the society from both its internal and external outsiders. Said leader or leaders then go on conquests of aggression towards perceived enemies that consolidates a continuing need for these strong leaders. Then new perceived enemies are needed one after another until voila, the known world is at their beck and call.
The USA was very isolationist until it was seen that they had no other choice or soon they would also be either fighting a war on their homeland and/or speaking a different language.
Dan describes slight military action as though one culture can easily be forced to give up their heritage and culture. This is not the case and you know it.
Dan also describes Australopethicus as though he were one of his non controversial ancesters.
National Geographic may be great on pictures but they have espoused some very controversial matters as though they were the ultimate in what science has proven.
No one will ever be successful in an Afghan campaign until the women of the nation are educated and able to either fend for themselves as part of the government or else able to form their own armed militias against the men who oppress them.
The way a society treats their female children is one of the surest sign of how virtuous that society really is.
Whence cometh evil, look at how a society treats female children and you'll have your answer.
If He is able, but not willing
Then He is malevolent.
this is the false statement. to control automatonic robots would be malevolent. what one does with free will should not be blamed on God. i think there is a colony of stoned teens posting these little amateur philosophy snippets
maybe He isn't controlling automatonic (not a word) robots, but should have the power to intervene on true evil being done to truly good people (genocide, world hunger and the such)
This is that puzzle thing about God and all that. I have tried to understand it before, has anyone cracked it yet?
bloggy wrote: "what one does with free will should not be blamed on God". Karl, too, seems to imply that there are two separate forces in the world: there is god, and there is the "free will" of humans.
The problem with this is as follows: how can god be completely good if he created free will, which in turn created evil?
As an example, consider this: if I were to build an army of robots with versions of artificial intelligence which occasionally allowed them to perform horrible acts, should I release these robots into the world? Surely I would be more moral if I modified their AI to give them strong urges not to do evil, or refrained from building them in the first place, would I not?
This argument, however, will never be won, as God is an abstract amorphous concept which can be shaped around pretty much any obstacle.
There is no such thing as evil. There is no god. Humans are as depraved as they are creative in their descriptions of that depravity.
Why did God create humans if he knew, given his omniscience, that we would defy him and choose sin?
That is an excellent question, one that cannot be grappled with lightly, though I will attempt to do so here on many levels.
If one chooses to prescribe to the traditional Christian ideal, God created Man because he needed an object onto which his Love could be directed. God was alone in the universe. I assume he therefore became lonely. (Can a perfect God be lonely? Is it acceptable to allow the all perfect creator of the cosmos all to human emotions?)
Why, then, give Humans any free will at all? Could God not have created Man to be unthinking automatons whose sole purpose was to follow the instruction of God?
Well, that would quite effectively defeat the purpose of the creation. If you were the last man on earth, and just so happened to be a robotics engineer, and you created a robot to fulfill that loneliness, would you not soon become aware that an unthinking mass of metal would do nothing to appease that emotion? God wanted His creation to love him back. That is why he instilled free will in Humans. He loved Man so much that he created in him the mind to reason on his own, and sought that man would choose God over Self.
Question question question. I find it humorous how the atheist extremist will stop at nothing to poke holes in the METAPHORICAL story of the evolution of human cognition in the universe. God represents the singularity, the meaning of the universe, the knowledge of all things AND MOST IMPORTANTLY, the understanding that human endeavors and depravity are meaningless and that true meaning is derived by the human progression towards a more perfect unity with one another and with the universe. Man's quest since our first breath has been to reunite with a more perfect understanding of reality, and that is what the story means.
That is who God is.
And I say reunite, because if one studies reality thoroughly enough one will discover that there is no past present or future. Everything is an everlasting loop which progresses infinitely forwards and backwards through time and space ad infinitum. A very real Ouroboros. :p
I find a couple of other constant atheist statements also quite humorous. For one: "If God were so powerful, then he can just 'poof' tell us what the meaning of the universe is, and stuff?"
Really, could He just do that? What, exactly, would that mean? It would mean that at this very moment the universe would simply cease to exist. That all humans everywhere would simply BOOM be aware of the ultimate reality and be reunited with God. No purpose to be here on earth, back to the singularity.
What, then, is the purpose of life? Why exist? If God would just do that whenever then what was his purpose in even creating man in the universe anyway?
Another:
"If God is so darned powerful why does he allow evil to exist? Can't he, you know, point His finger and BAM the evil people are gone?"
Indeed, He could (theoretically) do that. But, again, read above. Purpose?
Andandand, did not Yahweh punish evil countless times in the Old Testament. The prophets warned the evil-doers, the people prayed for God to punish them, and guess what, punishment came…
Karma is a real witch, right?
I want to, once again, specify that all of these stories are allegorical. However, I also want to make clear that their historical and scientific inaccuracy does NOT mean God DNE.
Its just what some choose to believe given their perfunctory glance of important Biblical scriptures.
I like to think of "God," were He to actually exist IRL like a happy, wise, rich grandfather. He has been there done that, he knows what you are going to do, he knows that you are gonna spend that money he gives you on delicious chocolates. But he is your grandpapa and he WUVS you. If he is as wise and knowledgeable as mine is, then he will instruct you on the ways of the world, but will step back and let you do your own thing. If you F up, and Karma bites you in the ass, he might be there to say I TOLD YOU SO. And if you are a rotten child you may very well blame all of your horrible life dilemmas on him, simply because you dare not blame your selfish self.
But, ultimately, grandpapa still loves you, is still there for you, and once you have grown up, you can sit down with him for a nice chat over coffee about the fabric of reality.
Yay life.
Blah boring analogy but it conforms with my view of the world, which is the only one that matters. Right? 😉
I tried to use that exact arguments with a bible basher and he punched me in the crouch.
Congratulations, Sean! You did it! You have successfully figured out the final answers to some great mysteries that great scholars and philosophers have been debating for thousands of years. Would you be so kind as to consult your Ego, or Infallable Book, or Fountain Of Ultimate Knowledge on my behalf? I'd like to know if there is life outside of our Solar System. This pesky mystery has been confounding me for some time now and I'd like The Answer. I'm looking for a hard Aristotelian Yes or No…not an irritating Maybe.
Thanks, I await your Final Proclamation.
Thinking Man wrote:—"Really, could He just do that? What, exactly, would that mean? It would mean that at this very moment the universe would simply cease to exist. That all humans everywhere would simply BOOM be aware of the ultimate reality and be reunited with God. No purpose to be here on earth, back to the singularity."
Really? Why would that be the case? That's a pretty big assumption. What would constitute evidence that this would be the case.
The "allowing evil to exist" thing is an old, hoary bit of sophistry. What is actually more interesting is that if there is a god and he is responsible for the creation of good and evil, then we do not have the ultimate responsibility for either. Can't take credit for the good or blame for the evil. Which is absurd. People are responsible. The fact that they are responsible for both means they are the originators of both. You can't blame Hitler on god any more than you can thank him for Martin Luther King, which is an argument in the "god's irrelevant" column.
The question is more pertinently, would it make any difference if god exists or not? If we would be the same bunch of screwed up, struggling, sapient primates in either case, then the answer is no, and therefore the question of his/her existence is moot.
Steven420: I can lay claim to the same experience coming from a believer. I suggest the fact that this person's being a ignorant asshole trumps his (or her) thoughts on the existence or nonexistence of a deity.
Mark Tiedeman wrote: "Really? Why would that be the case? That’s a pretty big assumption. What would constitute evidence that this would be the case."
Well of course there is no verifiable evidence that would assert this claim as I was making a sarcastic statement about what could happen based on what religious scholars and "science of mind" proponents would claim. Clearly no one knows what would happen should God choose to reveal himself to mankind (unless, of course, you have read the Book of Revelations and believe the story as literal fact).
Mark also wrote: "The question is more pertinently, would it make any difference if god exists or not? If we would be the same bunch of screwed up, struggling, sapient primates in either case, then the answer is no, and therefore the question of his/her existence is moot."
If God did indeed exist and the purpose of our existence would be to follow his ideals the best we can and evolve beyond our screwed up sapient selfish and sinful minds then how would the fact that we are indeed still made of flesh and blood and prone to weakness of the mind mean that God's existence is moot? We are going to have the choice between good and evil regardless. If god exists and we chose good, then we are rewarded eternally, if we chose evil we are punished, eternally. If god does not exist and we choose good then that's good, but there is no ultimate meaning. If we choose evil, that's not so good, but again, no point. Might as well do what we please. So that argument does not logically follow its premise.
And how does it logically follow that, because in humankind there is a tendency for both good and evil, therefore God is irrelevant. Surely, if He/She/It did or did not exist, the events of human history and our future would not have changed. Life goes on, humans still do good and evil. We are all still screwed up. But, again, this does not mean that God's existence is therefore disproved.
Consider it like this. I have a tendency to do good and evil. I was born without knowing my father. Of course we all know that I could not possibly exist without a father but I do not see him, to me he is dead, non-existent, removed from my view since birth up to my adult years. Whether or not my father is alive doesn't change much on how I would act, especially considering that I had no contact with him that his influence would direct my courses throughout my life. However, if I actively sought out my father, and attempted to discover to the best of my abilities the type of man that he was, or is, and modeled myself either in his image or as its opposite (considering I discovered my father to be a very evil man,) then that would be a different story altogether. If I chose not to seek him out and instead carved my own path in the world, then clearly it wouldn't matter whether he was alive or not. Though, being a human, there would still be that part of me that would wonder…and if he was still alive I would hope that he was proud of the accomplishments of my life, or depending on my upbringing, I may purposefully spite his ideals and develop an altogether nasty demeanor. If he were dead, then the man that I came to be would be of my own making, and the lessons of life that I learned would be learned on my own. But that would not change the fact that there would still be the psychological figure upon which I would establish my idealized concept of what I should be.
Perhaps the analogy is not the most succinct, however I still stand by my claim that essentially God is a psychological concept that people either chose to follow or dismiss. Nevertheless, there remains a subconscious battle between good and evil in the hearts and minds of every human being, and that is why religion has become so important.
Humans as a species have conjectured as to the existence of some supreme, supernatural prime mover as a means to explain the universe and good and evil in human hearts. Now whether this is indeed a supernatural perception of something we do not yet understand or simply the misfiring of an imperfect primate brain is debatable (and has been debated constantly here and elsewhere). However, humans attempted to model themselves after some sort of moral code, and named the creator of those precepts "God."
So, I think it is a very important question as to whether God exists. However I think that too many people confuse actual physical existence with an "idea" of God. That is to say, that if enough people believed wholeheartedly in the good nature of the story of the Bible or some other Holy book, and followed moral codes and actions as best that they saw to follow a more "good" moral character, then in essence that "God" is indeed all too real.
Perhaps God really is just a human concept. Just like a meme. Our thoughts and our ideas are, essentially, not really "real." Indeed, philosophers have conjectured into the true meaning of "reality" in general. What does it mean to exist? What is really "real." Are humans, with our intelligence though still comparatively limited age and scope compared with the vast ancientness of the universe, the final word on what reality is?
I would submit that we are not. There are many things that we do not know. And anyone is free to chose what they wish to believe. "God" is more than just a physical man sitting on a cloud. I, for one, think that the concept is much more complex and contains much more depth than humans are even capable to realize now or, maybe, ever.
I still find it quite silly that so many people assume that because Evil exists and God has done nothing about it then that must therefore mean that God does not exist or is irrelevant. We are not yet even equipped with the understanding to fully realize the wholeness of the universe despite our grand claims of ultimate knowledge. It's just simply conceited to believe that because you don't get everything you want when you want it and that science clearly so far has a lot of answers that humans are the be all end all of universal understanding and therefore there is no need for a God.
Believe what you will, but I am of the belief that until there is absolute 100% verifiable proof that God (whatever the concept might actually mean) cannot possibly exist, then there is no reason for me to accept the hypothesis that he is irrelevant or nonexistent. I would prefer that we still try to figure out what God means, rather then trying to prove or disprove his existence/validity.
Ivan, I commend your comment but did God (according to the Bible I suppose) not first create the world void of sin of humans with one exception. That exception being do not eat fruit from the tree of knowledge. That fruit from the tree of knowledge leads to the creation of "evil".
With that said, I recommend a clause to your story. You should build robots completely perfect with a shiny red button that says danger. You should tell those you sale to that if they press the danger button their robot may attack them and should only be used when needed. So, when the button is misused, is it your fault?
I'd like to read the other thoughts on the subject but don't have time. ThinkingMan and Mark Teidemann seem to have good stuff. Of good and evil, all points are mute because we never really know the outcome of a situation until long after the judgement is passed. A friend of mine was sick and missed his tour of Virginia Tech, the same day they had a shooting. Of God and evil, he/she/it (of the Bible) promises heaven which has no evil, so why would a believer (of the Bible) expect no evil on earth. God gives free will but that doesn't mean your future hasn't already been written. So why does God allow people like Hitler? He doesn't in Heaven.
So I ask you all. Your first grader takes a quiz and fails. Should you have taken the quiz for him so he would make a 100 or allow him to take it himself so that he may learn from his mistakes. Which builds the child's future and which takes away. A child's mind compared to yours is no where near God's mind compared to yours. He/She/It knows whats right and allows you to make the decision.
Don't believe in God? Well there isn't a way to prove or disprove that as of yet; if there were what would faith be. I'll say this, it was difficult to learn what little I know of Physics, Chemistry, and Engineering but it was no where near as difficult as the original discovery. So consider the creation. Not the acknowledgement of a quark but the creation with the knowledge of exactly what it is capable of and that it would one day be able to create the Eiffel Tower or be part of a piece of dust on Mars. I know, I know, that implies intelligent design and not evolution and pre-destination from the big bang. Where does the energy come from before the big bang is all I ask. Some things are to perfect to be left to chance.
Anyway, the fact that people are still pondering this 1700 years later aids to the fact the we are not as smart as we think. But a civilization that has the time and ability to ponder things such as this must not be over consumed by evil. In the words of Jesus, Ghandi, Dr. King, Boethus, Paul, John, Paul, George, Ringo and countless others, All We Need Is Love.
I paraphrased a little
Brett: Thanks for the thoughtful comments. In law there is a concept called "attractive nuisance" that seems to capture your robot issue. http://dangerousintersection.org/2006/05/12/gods-…
I don't believe in a sentient God, so I don't actually struggle with why "He" acted the way "He" acted. But the "problem of evil" does suggest to me that there is something intrinsically wrong with the idea of a perfectly good God who is both omniscient and omnipotent.
Ditto Thinking Man!
But I would add that Christians, that is evangelical Christians, believe God has clearly chosen to do something about the problem of evil, just as individual people can as well.
It is not only the collective cooperative organizations of this world that do something about evil, it is also part of the decision process of every man and woman, everyday of their lives.
The ThingMan writes:—"And how does it logically follow that, because in humankind there is a tendency for both good and evil, therefore God is irrelevant. Surely, if He/She/It did or did not exist, the events of human history and our future would not have changed. Life goes on, humans still do good and evil. We are all still screwed up. But, again, this does not mean that God’s existence is therefore disproved."
Well, not to put too fine a point on it, but I said moot, not disproved.
You make some very good arguments. As to "meaning"—well, obviously, we have that, whether we believe in god or not. Surely you don't mean to suggest that atheists feel they have no meaning in their lives? And if they have meaning, where would they get it? To some, the answer is "from god, whether they acknowledge it or not" but from my perspective "god" is simply the manifestation of the human ability to invent meaning. Just having this debate here is a result of two people acting upon perceived meaning over an issue of some moment.
My own conception of god is that it is an emergent property of human endeavor. Which complicates the question magnificently. How do you prove an idea doesn't exist? You absolutely don't—what's more, the instant you conceive the idea which existence you intend to disprove, you have failed, since it's there.
But that puts the whole thing firmly in the mind and that's where—taking a purely epistemological approach—god actually is.
Speaking for myself, the problem I have with god and religion is simple: if someone says to me "You will cover your women head to toe and not teach them to read because god decrees it" that is not from god but from him—but he BELIEVES it. So what difference does it make in the world what the actual source is? To my mind, he is doing evil, but he does it in the belief that his god sanctions it as holy. Is he evil? Not by his standard. By god's standard? Since his conception of god includes this absurdity, it is impossible to demonstrate to him that what he does is evil. The only thing left to me is to deny that his god has any agency and take pains to prove that his belief is wrong.
It is what happens in the world as a consequence of such belief where I come down as opposed to that belief.
Make it closer to home. Some says to me that he will work to exclude certain things from public education because those things run counter to what he//she BELIEVES god intends, even though what he/she claims can be shown to be wrong, I can only tell him/her that the god they believe in is either false or not there in order to remove their justification for damaging the body of hard-won knowledge.
Now, you may well argue—and I would agree with you up to a point—that such people do not understand god or the message consequent upon accepting this god, but you would be as hard pressed to demonstrate that their god is not the same as yours as I am to prove this god doesn't exist at all.
So I maintain that, given all this, the question of god's existence is moot. As you say, we are all free to believe what we want, but a claim of belief is not verification of reality.
Oh, and thank you for a first-rate post.
Brett writes:—"Some things are [too] perfect to be left to chance."
Really? By what standard? What, in this instance, does "perfect" mean? The fact that something works the way it's supposed to? But if it didn't work, it wouldn't be there, so perfection is the functional equivalent of existence?
Physics tell us (I'm simplifying) that energy cannot be destroyed, only transformed, so the question of where the energy came from before the Big Bang is the wrong question. It was always there.
Why is it we have a hard time accepting a concept of timelessness (i.e.—eternity) without a sentient component?
Anyway, good comments.
There is nothing wrong with protecting a woman who desires to be protected. There is everything wrong with saying I will do what is customary to protect woman and call it the inerrant word of God.
In the same way, there is nothing wrong with believing that God has solved the evil/sin problem through the life, death and resurrection of Jesus Christ.
However, there is everything wrong with saying that I will do what ever is necessary to somehow convince my neighbors that the evil/sin problem requires them to do such and such or be doomed to hell.
I can state what I believe and why I believe it, but I have no business calling these beliefs the inerrant word of God for others since they do not understand the problem the same way. For those that do not view the sin/evil problem the same way as I, I am still called upon to treat them with respect, dignity and care as Jesus did.