Apologist explains how to get prayer answered.

[unknown soldier]

If there's one issue that keeps apologists busy, it's the issue of unanswered prayer. Skeptics often point out that the hungry children who pray for food often die of starvation. If God exists, then why don't we see better results from prayer? Christian apologist Kyle Butt answers this question on pages 229-244 of A Christian's Guide to Refuting Modern Atheism. He explains that effective prayer must conform to the following:

1. Prayer must be "in the name of Jesus." That is, prayer must be in accord with Jesus' teachings and authority.
2. It is necessary for prayer to be in accord with God's will. God has a way of doing things that no prayer can change.
3. The person praying must believe she will receive what she requests. Otherwise, she won't receive what she requests!
4. The person praying must be a righteous person. So all you sinners, forget it!
5. Prayer won't work if the petitioner prays with selfish desires.
6. Persistence in prayer is important. One or two prayers might not be enough.

I'm eager to read what other members here have to say about these guidelines, but allow me to start out saying that if 1 is true, then anybody who is not a Christian won't benefit from prayer. I wonder if those non-Christians see that their prayers aren't doing any good.

Guideline 2 seems odd. It's like God saying: "I'll do anything you ask as long as I want to do it."

I'd say that 3 can result in a "snowball effect" which is to say that if a doubter's doubt can lead to a prayer not being answered, then the doubter might doubt even more!

Regarding 4, it seems to me that sinners need answered prayer more than the righteous.

Guideline 5 also seems odd because if you're petitioning God for something you want or need, then you are thinking of yourself, and what's wrong with that?

Finally, 6 doesn't explain why God can't just grant the petition with one prayer request, and neither does it tell us how many prayers it takes to succeed. Could it be that the person praying is praying for something that in time she'll get whether she prays or not?

[JoeyKnothead]

1C. Moral

P1. If God does not exist, then objective moral values and duties do not exist.
P2. Objective moral values and duties do exist.
P3. Therefore, God exists.

My point is that where you invoke torture as an objective moral value, we see your proposed god ain't got him no problem with it.

These are irrelevant. Assume your interpretations are correct and it does nothing against any of my claims. It would be relevant if I were arguing for the inerrancy of the Bible, but I’m not arguing for that.

Still waiting on you to present an example of an objective moral value.

Clearly torture aint it, cause I'll torture Hell outta those who bring mine harm.

[Goat]

1C. Moral

P1. If God does not exist, then objective moral values and duties do not exist.
P2. Objective moral values and duties do exist.
P3. Therefore, God exists.

My point is that where you invoke torture as an objective moral value, we see your proposed god ain't got him no problem with it.

However, since you are using this argument for the existence of the Christian god, let's look at that a bit more. Let's look at the bible, in specific, Pslam
137:9

These are irrelevant. Assume your interpretations are correct and it does nothing against any of my claims. It would be relevant if I were arguing for the inerrancy of the Bible, but I’m not arguing for that.

Not relevant at all.

How is it irrelevant? It directly concerns P2 of the argument and your disagreement with it. Support why you think something is irrelevant, like I did above, instead of just saying it is.

Well, let's ignore that.

Let's see you support that objective morals and ethics exist.

Can you? I already showed your emotional appeal to torture of children is contradicted by the bible.

[TRANSPONDER]

Unlike you, most believers don't view think of God as a slave that must use his unlimited powers to immediately satisfy their every desire.

Do you have evidence to support that claim?

We need look no further the religious texts on the subject. Gods are rarely presented at being at the whim and wish of their subjects The pagan gods, were depicted as being masters over humans not the other way round. Jupiter would kidnap humans for his amusement, Zeus had affairs with them and even though Hesiod's Theogony and Works and Days , and Homer's the Iliad and the Odyssey do depict gracious magnanimous dieties, they were always so from a position of power.

The bible likewise depicts a God vastly superior to humans that expects them to bow to his will and even though there might be sects that believe god unconditionally grants all requests, they would have difficulty surviving faced with the evident demonstration that He does not.

MATTHEW 26:39

Going a little farther, he fell with his face to the ground and prayed, "My Father, if it is possible, may this cup be taken from me. Yet not as I will, but as you will."

For more, please go to other posts related to...

PRAYER, GOD, and ....WORSHIP

Perhaps the point that's being made is misunderstood, or the wrong one; and that is because, as usual, the theist is thinking in terms of the Theist claims (prayer works) being true unless totally disproved, when actually it is seeing no good reason to believe Theist claims (about prayer) without better evidence.

Now, we have already done to death elsewhere the way the Gospels have a written guarantee that God will do some pretty crazy things if one with a small amount of faith asks it. That this is impractical means that God can't be held to this written guarantee is a less good explanation than the claim is yet more nonsense in a Book full of it.

Gods not being slave is of course not the point. It is even a strawman, because the Gospel guarantee is no more making a slave of the god than a contract to deliver your Christian rock DVD's makes Amazon your servant.

No, aside from that contract 'Whatever you ask in Faith', and just going with the excuse that there may be reasons why a prayer can't be granted (1) the actual argument , when putting burden of proof in the right scales, has the better explanation that best fits the facts if 'there are no gods, and we are on our own; prayers do not get answered, and that sometimes we get what we wanted is just coincidence'. And I reiterate the answered prayer that got me out of a big problem - except I am a lifetime atheist and wasn't praying.

(1) though it was the inexplicable death of his daughter that made Darwin a non -believer, not evolution -theory.

[The Tanager]

1A. Kalam
P1. Everything that begins to exist has a cause.
P2. The spatio-temporal universe began to exist.
P3. Therefore, the spatio-temporal universe has a cause.
P4. If the spatio-temporal universe had a cause, then that cause would have to be eternal, non-spatial, immaterial, atemporal, and personal.
P5. Therefore, the cause of the spatio-temporal universe is eternal, non-spatial, immaterial, atemporal, and personal (attributes of what we would call a ‘god’).

Cause "reasonably" is a subjective term.

Why do you think that?

Cause it is.

Why is it?

It's often used to imply those who disagree'runrasonable for not much more'n to be it.

Sounds like an objectively unreasonable thing to do. The ability for people to misuse a term says nothing about the truth of that term.

I have, by presenting the fact that your P2 is devoid of any way to prove to be true.

You shared your thought that this was so. I’ve responded. If you’ve nothing new to add, neither do I.

[The Tanager]

1C. Moral

P1. If God does not exist, then objective moral values and duties do not exist.
P2. Objective moral values and duties do exist.
P3. Therefore, God exists.

Still waiting on you to present an example of an objective moral value.

Clearly torture aint it, cause I'll torture Hell outta those who bring mine harm.

I didn’t offer that as my example. The example you need to address is torturing someone for the sole reason of believing a different worldview.

Well, let's ignore that.

Let's see you support that objective morals and ethics exist.

I’ll say it once again, then. Assuming you think torturing an innocent children isn’t wrong and akin to liking a different ice cream flavor, I still said the universal (culturally speaking, noting occasional abnormal individuals) human feeling that it is wrong and not akin to simply liking a different ice cream points to an objectivity to moral values and duties as the more reasonable choice.

I already showed your emotional appeal to torture of children is contradicted by the bible.

Which is completely irrelevant to my argument, as I said. You can agree with why I said it is irrelevant and drop it or argue why it is relevant, to move the discussion forward.

[benchwarmer]

I’ll say it once again, then. Assuming you think torturing an innocent children isn’t wrong and akin to liking a different ice cream flavor, I still said the universal (culturally speaking, noting occasional abnormal individuals) human feeling that it is wrong and not akin to simply liking a different ice cream points to an objectivity to moral values and duties as the more reasonable choice.

I know this isn't addressed at me, but feel the need to jump in as well here.

First, I think torturing a child is wrong because I was once a child and would not want to be tortured. That's my personal, subjective stance, not anything that is objective from outside of me.

There have been and still are groups of people that seem to have no issue torturing children. These are not the 'occasional abnormal individuals'. Often times it's systemic or cultural and shows that many people have no issue with it.

Tortured and cast out: Nigeria's 'cursed' children
https://www.dw.com/en/tortured-and-cast ... a-19336244

Stolen Lives: The Indigenous Peoples of Canada and the Indian Residential Schools
https://www.facinghistory.org/stolen-li ... -and-abuse

Ritual abuse torture
https://nonstatetorture.org/what-is-nst ... se-torture

Just in case you thought the Bible was safe:

Treating children as property
https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?s ... ersion=NIV

8 Look, I have two daughters who have never slept with a man. Let me bring them out to you, and you can do what you like with them. But don’t do anything to these men, for they have come under the protection of my roof.”

So, not even in the Bible do we find the clear objective moral that children should not be tortured.

[Goat]

1C. Moral

P1. If God does not exist, then objective moral values and duties do not exist.
P2. Objective moral values and duties do exist.
P3. Therefore, God exists.

Still waiting on you to present an example of an objective moral value.

Clearly torture aint it, cause I'll torture Hell outta those who bring mine harm.

I didn’t offer that as my example. The example you need to address is torturing someone for the sole reason of believing a different worldview.

Well, let's ignore that.

Let's see you support that objective morals and ethics exist.

I’ll say it once again, then. Assuming you think torturing an innocent children isn’t wrong and akin to liking a different ice cream flavor, I still said the universal (culturally speaking, noting occasional abnormal individuals) human feeling that it is wrong and not akin to simply liking a different ice cream points to an objectivity to moral values and duties as the more reasonable choice.

I already showed your emotional appeal to torture of children is contradicted by the bible.

Which is completely irrelevant to my argument, as I said. You can agree with why I said it is irrelevant and drop it or argue why it is relevant, to move the discussion forward.

It is precisely relevant to your argument. You brought up torture of children. This is an example of showing a situations where a religious text says it's ok to bash children on rocks, i.e. torture of children. This demonstrates that it is an emotional appeal, and not objective. Therefore your argument that says torture of children is objective has been falsified.;

[Goat]

1C. Moral

P1. If God does not exist, then objective moral values and duties do not exist.
P2. Objective moral values and duties do exist.
P3. Therefore, God exists.

Still waiting on you to present an example of an objective moral value.

Clearly torture aint it, cause I'll torture Hell outta those who bring mine harm.

I didn’t offer that as my example. The example you need to address is torturing someone for the sole reason of believing a different worldview.

Well, let's ignore that.

Let's see you support that objective morals and ethics exist.

I’ll say it once again, then. Assuming you think torturing an innocent children isn’t wrong and akin to liking a different ice cream flavor, I still said the universal (culturally speaking, noting occasional abnormal individuals) human feeling that it is wrong and not akin to simply liking a different ice cream points to an objectivity to moral values and duties as the more reasonable choice.

I already showed your emotional appeal to torture of children is contradicted by the bible.

Which is completely irrelevant to my argument, as I said. You can agree with why I said it is irrelevant and drop it or argue why it is relevant, to move the discussion forward.

It is precisely relevant to your argument. You brought up torture of children. This is an example of showing a situations where a religious text says it's ok to bash children on rocks, i.e. torture of children. This demonstrates that it is an emotional appeal, and not objective. Therefore your argument that says torture of children is objective moral value has been falsified.;

[JoeyKnothead]

Cause "reasonably" is a subjective term.

Why do you think that?

Cause it is.

Why is it?

Okay, we'll debate by questions, so I ask again...

Who decides what's reasonable?

It's often used to imply those who disagree're unreasonable for not much more'n to be it.

Sounds like an objectively unreasonable thing to do. The ability for people to misuse a term says nothing about the truth of that term.

I'm glad you feel that way, and ask you to put some truth to...

Who decides what's reasonable?

I have, by presenting the fact that your P2 is devoid of any way to prove to be true.

You shared your thought that this was so. I’ve responded. If you’ve nothing new to add, neither do I.

So you finally see that your P2 is an unconfirmed assumption.

I'd like one more response from you, please...

Who decides what's reasonable?

[TRANSPONDER]

'Reasonable' is part of the 'how do we know what we know?' package. Incorporating questioning the validity of logic. Even the validity of mathematics has been questioned. It's (for them) like language or a board game; the rules are made up by humans and have no empirical validity. Not like the laws of physics, which they will accept as existing outside of the opinions of humans and are therefore the laws made by God.

I won't get into the 'heads I win, tails you lose' argument whereby if Morality is the invention of Humans it has no validity but if God hath written it on our hearts, it is objective. Despite being one person's opinion. But. instead, I'll argue that mathematics, and indeed logic and for that matter morals are empirically valid, though I would concede that language and art are largely inventions of humans, though there is probably an Instinct as base.

We know that two pebbles and two pebbles make four pebbles. That is a fact and cannot be anything else. Take away two pebbles and you have two pebbles. This is the basis of mathematics and if it gets more complicated so it's like logic or language, the basics are empirical

I use as evidence for the validity of Occam's razor, the beautiful, really beautiful, story of the boulder and the bush. When walking along a road, an observer sees a boulder obscure a bush. Has the bush actually vanished or is it still there but we can't see it? Obviously less logical entities are required if we assume it is still there and we can check it by having a third observer:

"Yep, it's still there."

"But Satan made it vanish; and because he knew you were watching, he didn't do it this time." (you may laugh, but the 'Satan - or God - salted the fossils to mislead us' excuse or evasion is no better).

"Why the heck would he bother or care?"

*shrug* or deep Dive. But by then the denialist is looking pretty silly, probably even to other denialists.

Because what is more reasonable empirically, is that normal conditions apply, and that is what logic actually deals in: reasonable modes of thought. Which is why far - fetched undiproven possibilities are not compelling evidence, and only someone with a dogmatic axe to grind, would claim they are...while dismissing out of hand any other rival dogmatic axes. Which is why they think that arguments for a god work, because they automatically discount any other gods.