If God exists, why does he allow a lot of suffering and harm to afflict people? My dad says he is hard to understand sometimes. If he is hard to understand, then why doesn't he make it easier to understand? Your thoughts?
I’ve thought about this a lot. I was active in church when I had my first stroke, active when I had my second stroke, active when I had my third stroke (all at age 25!), active when I bled out of my butt and was hospitalized for four days, and active when my first child was stillborn.It was my daughter that gave me the courage to talk to my pastor. “I’ve had such bad luck,” I remember saying through my tears, “and I don’t want to pass that on to my kids. DH and I don’t know if we should try again.” I just stared at the carpet; I didn’t look up.“Kathy, please look at me. God didn’t cause this to happen. If he had, do you think I would be here every week telling people what a wonderful guy he is?“Use some four-letter words when you talk to him. Let him know that you’re mad! He can take it; I promise. Preserving the relationship is far more important than hiding your anger.“I like to think of Jesus as crying *with* me when stuff like this happens,” he said. This has led me to a very powerful image: I’m at the beach, kneeling at Jesus’ feet. Jesus is sitting on a giant piece of driftwood. And I’m dripping snot all over his white cloak— his beautiful white robe. He doesn’t care about that. Instead, he’s holding my head and crying quietly, both for sorrow over Annie and because he can’t magically fix it and make me feel better.There is a book called “When Bad Stuff Happens to Good People” by Rabbi Harold [can’t remember his last name — maybe Kushner?]. I strongly recommend that you read it! It’s out of print; track down a copy. Allow me to share one story from the book before I wrap this up, though:A boy, a tweenager, finds some ‘magazines’ (it’s an old book), enjoys them, and stores them under his bed. The following day, he goes to school to discover that it’s vision test day — and lo and behold, he discovers he needs glasses. He comes home and cries, thinking that God is punishing him for reading those magazines with pictures of naked women in them by making him nearsighted.Everybody knows that the boy isn’t to blame for needing glasses. That lots and lots of people need glasses and the magazines were just a coincidence.Likewise, God isn’t punishing me for being me by raining down a hail of strokes, GI bleeds, and dead babies. God doesn’t do stuff like that! I mean, couldn’t Mrs. *Hitler* have been cursed with a stillborn baby instead? ;) God doesn’t prevent crap from happening, but instead helps you deal with the crap in your life.Hope that helps!
World Famous Leaders : Mahatma Gandhi. May I know some special details which so far never heard?
Friend, Mahatma Gandhi was then fighting against British , to make them Quit India .(it was not Quit India movement I am referring). At the early stages before Babu Rajendra Prasad , the would be first President Of Independent India, has not yet joined Mahatma Gandhi. Rajendra Prasad ji approached Mahatma and said '' I am interested to join in the freedom movement, and join hands with you.Please accept my services and allow me to take part .'' Mahatma Gandhi was not that a simple man to accept any one readily . So he asked Rajendra Prasad ji,'' So you sincerely want to join in freeing India from the Shackles of British?'' ''YES'' was an affirmative answer from Rajendra Prasad ji. Mahatma replied '' Then you will have to do a thing I say you to do , for six months, whatever the work I allot,'' (this happened in the Gandhi ji`s aasram.) "" Yes, I will do , with whole heart.'' was the reply. Then Mahatma Gandhi said to Rajendra Prasad ji , '' From tomorrow onwards for SIX MONTHS you remove the night soil from the leprosy people ward in the ashram .Will you do it?'' '' With pleasure , I serve"" was the reply.( I feel, probably a test whether he loves all humans equally who ever they are and whatever condition they are in ) Rajendra Prasad ji did whole heartedly this work of removing the night soil from Leprosy patient ward , and dumped it out manually , for SIX MONTHS .Mahatma was observing , and he made no comments. After six months Mahatma got the confidence in the WILL POWER and CHARACTER of Rajendra Prasad ji and his commitment.He was convinced. So then he called him then and , from then on they were busy in the freedom struggle. ( This tells us the Commitment and determination and personality of Rajendra Prasad ji and his love for all humans and country, and Mahatma testing Six months before accepting him as a close member in the freedom Struggle against the British.) This I read very long time back, and can not remember the exact name of reference. My Guru too narrated it about a year back.Perhaps we may find in Auto biography of Gandhiji, I hope. Or a YA member who read it may kindly give exact reference , for the benefit of all and I will be highly thankful. I think many have not heard this.
Was Shakespeare anti-feminist?
He certainly didn’t write his female characters as well as his male characters. It’s kind of absurd how much bs his female characters go through, even in the “comedies”The Taming of the Shrew is basically a woman getting domestically abused while her sister is quibbled over by men like a piece of meat— oh, the hilarity.Much Ado About Nothing centers around a man slutshaming his future wife at their wedding, apparently causing her death, then being told it wasn’t real, at which point he repents, not to her, but to her father, and when it’s revealed she’s alive, she basically forgives him without getting an apology and it feels like he didn’t actually learn his lesson (I recommend the Joss Whedon Much Ado to demonstrate this).Measure for Measure ends with its strongest female character literally saying nothing as the Duke of the city, who knows full well she wants to be a nun, proposing to her, almost immediately after he helped her avoid getting raped by his deputy.The Tempest treats Miranda as a pawn in her father’s games, taking away any agency she might have in her dopey little love story with Ferdinand.Rosalind in As You Like It seems to have more than a little internalized misogynyOphelia endures abuse from basically everyone in Hamlet except her brother and Gertrude, including Hamlet, who allegedly loves her.Lavinia in Titus Andronicus is the quintessential woman in a refrigerator. This play also includes a Yo Momma joke.Yes, the last two are tragedies, but still. Ironically, I think Shakespeare’s most feminist play is Love’s Labour’s Lost, where the Princess and her ladies not only continuously outfox their suitors, but choose not to marry them, and instead basically put down tests for them before returning to France for the King’s funeral. The play ends on a bit of a question mark, but it still has a surprising amount of agency.Yes, Shakespeare lived in a significantly more patriarchal time than we do today, but he could have oddly progressive moments in his text, enough that there’s a whole subsection of scholarship on the feminist merits of his work.He’s also pretty racist and anti-Semitic. Unfortunately, that was also pretty par for the course back in the 15/1600’s.