I'm interested to hear other people views.

Personally I find it very hard to believe in a Benevolent AND Omnipotent God in a world filled with so much seemingly unnecissary suffering.

I DO believe in a higher power, but also I believe we ARE the higher power.

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We are left to our own devices as we have a free will. Omni just means all. The all powerful(omnipotent) all knowing, always present(omnipresent) God lets us run our own show. This is a sign of his benevolence.

He(she) could be such as a horrible parent and force us to obey by bribing us or he could teach us to obey.

I am not a religious person I believe in a higher presence. I am

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There's actually a pretty lengthy wikipedia article about this: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Problem_of_evil. I could buy that suffering of hunger and destitution (and stuff like that) is a result of people exercising their free will to be a jerk and not sharing and caring for their fellow man. War, same thing.

However, there are the examples of natural disasters, like forest fire or tornado, that cause suffering for godly people and innocent animals, etc. If we're talking about the New Testament/Old Testament God, then I don't know what purpose it serves. In Daoist thought, the evil balances out with the good. It's the natural way to have suffering ... required even.

Before this thread, I didn't realize that the Problem of Evil was a whole philosophical branch!

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Certainly as people we cause peoples suffering to be much worse. Good example, Letting cancer patients on chemo puke their life away(literal). Medical marijuana being prohibited.

Some suffer ans some chose to suffer. This is all suppose to be for the prize at the end of our crappy tangible bodies.

Don't you know someone that has created their own personal Hell?

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I think sometimes we see our own little problems as way too important in the big scheme of things...

Ever worried about erm, lets say leopard seals dieing of testicular cancer... I guess not...

Or the millions of organisms that had to die before you had soil good enough to grow weed on...

Allthough I don't believe in the bible in the traditional sense anymore, it works fine for those who do. In there it gives the solution for all human problems in 10 simple little rules. And it gives the alternative to following these...

Lets say we talk about love thy neigbour... if we did, you would know everyone in your street, you would know if they needed something, and helped where you could or connected them with other people in your network... Hell suddenly someone doesn't feel the need to steal to feed himself.

We humans took a long time to get theis sick, and we are going to take a long time to heal. But it is time to stand up for the full deal, the true democracy, not the 4 yearly popularity contests of the world, but a system where we ask the people what they want, and follow that. Not educate and brainwash them, but let them make desicions based on their daily experiences.