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To: FourtySeven; Carpe Cerevisi
God only forgives the truly contrite.
Actually, my original question (why not confess directly to God?) is moot because I don't believe God sees, hears or does anything.
I mean, where has He been during all the suffering by mankind since Day 1?
Look at just the the 20th Century alone ... WWI, WWII, the Holocaust.
The only God I can believe in is one who created the Universe, gave us free will, and has been hands off ever since.
This does not demean your religious beliefs by any means, but I just can't believe an "interactive" God stood by and did nothing.
19 posted on 12/23/2013 9:07:26 AM PST by oh8eleven (RVN '67-'68)
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To: oh8eleven
The problem of evil is indeed a difficult one and probably worthy of its own thread (actually whole books have been written on the subject, for example C.S Lewis' own The Problem of Pain comes to mind).

However if I may briefly state: God as Creator is just that, He is presently creating. It is not possible (in the Catholic religion) to believe God is some omnipotent "watchmaker" who at one time created everything and now sits back and watches with casual bemusement. Indeed, this would make Him out to be quite cruel indeed.

We believe He is constantly creating today, for many reasons but one among them is precisely because of the problem of evil. We believe He constantly creates so as to always bring out greater good from evil, this defeating it at every turn.

Again, that's a very brief treatment of the subject. The work by C.S. Lewis I mentioned earlier is very helpful in this regard. I shall keep you in prayer as you struggle with this issue.

24 posted on 12/23/2013 10:13:00 AM PST by FourtySeven (47)
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