(response may be somewhat disjointed and out of order. It is what it is)
There is no all-powerful cabal.
Also, your theological understanding is pure ignorance.
God used the flood when every single person had only evil in their hearts continually. He saved the only people who were good. Then He promised to never do it again, and never did.
Satan doesn't make you do it. Sorry. In reality, people do bad things because we are all bad people. On one side good, on the other evil. We are not perfect beings.
One guy says God should smite sinners, the other guy says He shouldn't because that's "mean". Maybe, just maybe, neither guy's opinion matters and only the opinion of the being that created everything does. My ego is big, but it's not so big that I think, even on a purely conceptual level, that my opinion is more important than that of a being that allegedly created us (is that a neutral/secular enough presentation for you?).
And I can not believe there are still people out there who think the "problem of evil" is a problem for anyone other than intellectually challenged Atheists (sorry if this is harsh, but it's where I'm at). It actually baffles me. Not imposing on free will is more important than God going on the selfsame Holy Crusade that you would call evil if some would-be King tried it. God didn't make us robots, and we get ample time in our lives to repent and strive to be good. You seem to think that evil people are just evil and unsavable.
Now the real juice: Entropy disproves an endless universal cycle that always was. Something needs to exist outside of it to reboot it each time, and the minute you go outside of the universe you're no better off than someone who claims God, evidence-wise (at best, in reality you're worse off).
Matter can't be created by nothing. Nothing doesn't explode. You have no evidence. You have a faith and religion, just like we do. Or maybe more accurately, you have a philosophical presupposition just like we do. Yours that everything can come from nothing, ours that there must be an intelligent creator with a will.
And hold up, "since the beginning of existence itself"? So it's not endless. Sounds like a contradiction to me.
"Muh God is just another link in the chain", I hear you say...
No He's not. God can actually always exist because He's not bound by physics. And if you insist on it, sure, this is a faith claim. But so is anything you can claim on the origins of the universe.
(response may be somewhat disjointed and out of order. It is what it is)
There is no all-powerful cabal.
Also, your theological understanding is pure ignorance.
God used the flood when every single person had only evil in their hearts continually. He saved the only people who were good. Then He promised to never do it again, and never did.
Satan doesn't make you do it. Sorry. In reality, people do bad things because we are all bad people. On one side good, on the other evil. We are not perfect beings.
One guy says God should smite sinners, the other guy says He shouldn't because that's "mean". Maybe, just maybe, neither guy's opinion matters and only the opinion of the being that created everything does. My ego is big, but it's not so big that I think, even on a purely conceptual level, that my opinion is more important than that of a being that allegedly created us (is that a neutral/secular enough presentation for you?).
And I can not believe there are still people out there who think the "problem of evil" is a problem for anyone other than intellectually challenged Atheists (sorry if this is harsh, but it's where I'm at). It actually baffles me. Not imposing on free will is more important than God going on the selfsame Holy Crusade that you would call evil if some would-be King tried it. God didn't make us robots, and we get ample time in our lives to repent and strive to be good. You seem to think that evil people are just evil and unsavable.
Now the real juice: Entropy disproves an endless universal cycle that always was. Something needs to exist outside of it to reboot it each time, and the minute you go outside of the universe you're no better off than someone who claims God, evidence-wise (at best, in reality you're worse off).
Matter can't be created by nothing. Nothing doesn't explode. You have no evidence. You have a faith and religion, just like we do. Or maybe more accurately, you have a philosophical presupposition just like we do. Yours that everything can come from nothing, ours that there must be an intelligent creator with a will.
And hold up, "since the beginning of existence itself"? So it's not endless. Sounds like a contradiction to me.
"Muh God is just another link in the chain", I hear you say...
No He's not. God can actually always exist because He's not bound by physics. And if you insist on it, sure, this is a faith claim. But so is anything you can claim on the origins of the universe.