Quickly, with a show of hands, how many here have seen the TV ad for "miracle spring water?" Get a free sample and you will enjoy a miracle. With testimonies from those "real" people who did so and got unexpected checks in the mail for $1k's or some such nonsense. You know it is some king of scam, yet there are those out there who will step into it, and whoever is behind it will con some big bucks.
It's similar to Carny side show with the hands on healing with fervent shouts of Hallelujah. From the rear of the tent a man rises with a twisted arm shouting "Please God, Heal Me! Please make my arm like my other one!" over and over as he stumbles down the aisle to the stage. Suddenly there's a crack of extremely loud thunder and to the shock and awe of the audience, both of the man's arms are now twisted.
And there is the crux of the problem, the inevitable hucksterism that comes with religion. The personification of deities to satisfy the egos of men, because the gods resemble men and the behaviors of men. Worse, all too often religion has become the excuse for behavioral controls. Impugning the "natural" freedoms of mankind. Use for political purposes of just campfire tales as night descended on the scary world outside the caves where men found shelter. More evil has been conducted in this world than good by religions and those who use religion for their own agendas. We all know that. Right?
However, throughout history, known and unknown, religions have provided social structures, regardless of how we today look back at the effects of those social structures, and their success or lack thereof. And religions have provided believers with solace for the pains of the living, and joys for the celebration of belief. There cannot be denial of these attributes, even if one disapproves of the results, the misuse, and adheres to basic belief of atheism, "we are born, crap happens, and we die." Game over. Nothing else. Life is just an accident of colliding molecules.
It is very easy to come up with arguments rejecting religions, and in turn, the existence of a being, omniscient and omnipotent, a somewhat personification of all humanity and the universe as we know it. On the other hand, the internal search for meaning of life demands some sort of beginning point. And that is where godhood rests, in explaining, no matter how unacceptable we find that explanation, the reasons for life and existence. Ultimately a choice between accident and purpose. Not to be justified by any logic mankind devises, but a question of belief. Can't be proved or disproved. And as separated from the inherent confusion of religion created by man, more difficult to accept, perhaps. Perhaps, a wonderful word. Perhaps we need to step back and accept some questions cannot be answered within the confines of the human condition? And therefore knowing god an impossibility within the human condition.
I choose to believe a god exists who created life. I choose to believe there is a meaning for life. No one can prove me wrong. And that is the only logic for the existence of god. No one can reject my belief other than me. It is no one else's possession to reject.
