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Although there is value in trying to removing pain when doing so would be ethical, this thread mentions many situations where there is pain but no possibility y

Although there is value in trying to removing pain when doing so would be ethical, this thread mentions many situations where there is pain but no possibility yet of removing or reducing it. In these cases, a long-term general solution is to continue research on these situations. But the short-term solution per person is to learn the meaning and value of suffering. It is frowned upon in intellectual forums to discuss religion, as if religion were incompatible with logic and reason. But Jesus came to teach us how to endure suffering without failing in our duties. That is what he did, what he showed us how to do, and what he gives us the power to do through the Sacraments, especially Holy Communion. Because this is true power: to endure suffering without failing. And evil means failure because it is an absence of power to do what is both good and proper; sin is simply a lack of power. You will not learn any of this in any philosophy or world-religions class, or intellectual discussions over caviar. You will only learn and understand this through experiencing it, which can only be started by a humble trust that Jesus came into this world to suffer and die for our sake, out of love for us, and he will teach us how to do good, even in the midst of suffering. He knows our pain better than we do. He suffered more than we ever could.

searine 7y ago
Jesus died on the cross in six hours. Let's see jesus crush a few vertebrae and live disabled for 40 years without pain meds, and then talk about suffering. Like I get it. Religion does help many, and it can take you away from pain, but suffering is real and don't shortchange people's misery who are dealing with it.
- sdegutis 7y ago
  I'm deeply sorry for your suffering. 40 years is a very long time, and it's not a coincidence that throughout history 40 has been the number representing trial and suffering. Jesus does know what you have gone through. He's not "some religion" but a person. He can help you. He's the only one who can help you.
- faissaloo 7y ago
  Jesus (PBUH) was never put on the cross, they crucified the wrong guy.
  - sdegutis 7y ago
    I am glad to find another religious person here! Think and pray more about Jesus and you will discover that he would not have allowed anyone to take his place, because as he said, "My soul is trouble, but what shall I say, 'Father save me from this hour?' No I tell you, for this purpose I have come to this hour." He would never escape it, and he would not allow anyone to take anyone from it.
    - faissaloo 7y ago
      My worship is directed towards God alone and we were given the Qur'an to clarify these matters among other things, read here if you'd like to understand the Islamic view of the crucifixion: https://quran.com/4/157-167 https://quran.com/4/157-167
      - sdegutis 7y ago
        Thank you friend for that perspective. I have read the Islamic perspective of these matters. We Christians also worship God alone, we have that in common with you. We just believe that Jesus was truly God, while being the Son of God also. This is why king David speaking by the Holy Spirit says "the Lord said to my Lord, sit at my right hand," calling his descendent Lord. This is the Trinity and we admit it is a great Mystery that we cannot ever fully comprehend. But our belief in this is founded on the Resurrection. How could over so many people, many of them who followed Jesus for 3 years straight, including his own mother, confuse Jesus with someone else? And more to the point, how could Jesus show up to all of these same people, totally over 500 people, with holes in his hands and feet and side, and them still believe he was crucified and yet glorified, if he wasn't both?
- tasty_freeze 7y ago
  I was going to make a similar comment, so I'll tag on here. Jesus was supposedly crucified for a few hours, which would be terrible, but he also knew what was waiting him, and that he would be remembered and revered. In contrast, my sister suffered through multiple rounds of chemo, then a divorce by a husband who was jealous that she was "getting all the attention". The cancer spread to her brain and spine and lungs, and towards the end even morphine couldn't stop the pain. She had to say goodbye to her sons without knowledge of what was to lie in store for her or them. When she died, she stayed dead, none of this "Tada! I died without the consequences of death" nonsense.
  - sdegutis 7y ago
    You assume you know just how much (or how "little") Jesus suffered, based on a physical description. I felt the same way for a few years. But his was physical, spiritual, emotional, mental, all at once, for almost a full day straight, and intensified beyond what you can imagine. He barely showed any typical signs, like screaming out in pain or cursing people, because he is all-powerful, and those come from a lack of power. But there are an abundance of signs that he suffered far more than an ordinary crucifixion, which was already excruciating by today's standards - in fact that's where the word comes from.
    - tasty_freeze 7y ago
      You are absolutely right -- I don't know how much he suffered. But then again, people who claim he suffered unimaginable pain because he accepted the sin of humanity have no idea how much it hurt (if you accept such a thing is possible). This is just typical having it both ways -- he was fully human and fully divine. That isn't some cosmic thing worth pondering -- it is just a contradiction. If you believe he is god and that it was unimaginably painful, then you should also accept as god he has infinite tolerance for pain and so it isn't so impressive.
      - sdegutis 7y ago
        He allowed himself to feel the fullness of that suffering to expiate our just punishments, and to merit for us a portion in his strength to overcome suffering, and so that nobody could ever say "God does not know what it means to suffer like I am."
WoahNoun 7y ago
lol
rjurney 7y ago
You and Jesus are assholes. May you suffer as I do and learn the value of suffering first hand.
- sdegutis 7y ago
  Jesus did not take away my suffering. I asked him three times, and three times he said no. He said his grace is sufficient for me, because his power is made perfect in my weakness. I now understand why Jesus said no. Because he did not come to take away suffering, but to teach us how to endure it without failing ourselves or others.
  - rjurney 7y ago
    The Fighting Jesus would mow your Jesus down with an AR. So spoke Bob Dobbs.
    - ozzmotik 7y ago
      the true way to remove pain is to acquire sufficient slack.
jraph 7y ago
I don’t think speaking about religion is a problem. Here's what I think, for what is worth: First, your message may give the impression that you are giving an unfounded lesson to some people here. “You will not […]” Second, you may be speaking a language to which not everyone is receptive. For instance, you are stating things about our duties, but people who don’t see a meaning or a goal in life (does it sound sad?), or don’t feel they have a specific duty may not fully understand your message. Some people here may also be seeking evidences for some statements you make because they are not obvious to them. For instance: how can you know that nobody will ever suffer as much as Jesus or more? Is there a study out there finding this result? Though I may also be doing the mistake you may be doing, that is, not speaking the right language to be understood (I may also have offended you by doing so and I'm sorry for that if that is the case). Quite like in the following copy-pasted joke: --- A religious women upon waking up each morning would open her front door stand on the porch and scream, “Praise the Lord.” This infuriated her atheist neighbor who would always make sure to counter back, “There is no Lord.” One morning the atheist neighbor overheard his neighbor praying for food, thinking it would be funny, he went and bought her all sorts of groceries and left them on her porch. The next morning the lady screamed, “Praise the Lord, who gave me this food.” The neighbor laughing so hard he could barely get the words out screamed “It wasn’t the Lord, it was me.” The lady without missing a beat screamed: “Praise the Lord for not only giving me food but making the atheist pay for it!!” ---
- sdegutis 7y ago
  Thank you for that wonderful joke! Your advice reminds me of what Ven. Fulton Sheen talks about here[1], and your great joke reminds me of his other videos[2]. Bless you friend and thanks again :) [1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zz0a3TSkHVU&t=8 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zz0a3TSkHVU&t=8 [2] https://sdegutis.github.io https://sdegutis.github.io
crispinb 7y ago
> a humble trust that Jesus came into this world to suffer and die for our sake 'humble trust' is a genuinely useful attitude to have towards reality, but impossible to achieve towards a description of the world one does not believe to be true. You have things backward - if you genuinely intend your prescription to be helpful you need first to offer your readers reasons to believe your specific supernatural claims to be true.
- sdegutis 7y ago
  There is an overabundant proof that the Catholic Church's teachings are true. The only reason people do not believe is because they do not want to. They choose to believe logical fallacies and pretend it's logically consistent rather than believe the truth.
  - crispinb 7y ago
    > There is an overabundant proof that the Catholic Church's teachings are true. Most people clearly don't accept this. Which leads us to: > The only reason people do not believe is because they do not want to What's your evidence for this? It's certainly counter to most non-Catholics' own statements. So they're either lying or deceiving themselves. Each option would need extremely strong evidence for a reasonable person to believe it. I'd be interested in your response to a bald statement like "There is an overabundant proof that Hindu/Buddhist/animist/Islamic/Gnostic/whatever teachings are true". No doubt the more extreme members of each of these faith communities will make such proclamations. What's a poor rational non-believer to do? Spend a lifetime assessing the claims of dozens of different religions? I guess you'd insist they should ignore the others and look only at yours. Why? > They choose to believe logical fallacies and pretend it's logically consistent rather than believe the truth. Do you really believe truths about the world can be deduced through logic? Would you put your children if you have them in an aeroplane that had been constructed out of a mind of a genius logician?
    - sdegutis 7y ago
      Logic can get us very far. Socrates was martyred because he taught that there is only one God, and there is objective morality that we must follow to be with God. He reached these conclusions by logic alone. But Divine Revelation is necessary for the fulfillment of human understanding and our perfection. Jesus crucified and resurrected is the start of this, because nothing any wise teacher or religious founder says matters unless it can save us from death. This is the only religion that can, because it's not a religion as much as a Living Being that we can encounter immediately, and who will save us if we only let him.
ozzmotik 7y ago
i certainly appreciate what you have to say, but as a somewhat ardent atheist i contend entirely the idea that you absolutely have to understand and trust that Jesus came to suffer and die for our sake in order to get started on the right path, if only because there are several other religions across the world with their own disparate belief systems that have nothing to do with Jesus and im pretty sure some of those people came to the same point without accepting Jesus' suffering. so, if they can do so without it, then I think there is more than one way to do it, and certainly a secular way that doesn't require one to accept extraordinary claims without the requisite extraordinary evidence to back them up. that being said, i would not ever want to try to convince someone who isn't interested in doing so to give up their faith, so please don't take this as a form of that. only trying to be intellectually fair and consider those outside of the situation you have represented.
- sdegutis 7y ago
  This is the most common cop-out of our day, and it's one I also used for many decades. But it is an intellectual cop-out. There is significantly more proof for Jesus's claims as represented by the Catholic Church than for any other religious beliefs. The only reason people do not believe it is because, at least deep down, they do not want to.
  - ozzmotik 7y ago
    is there something wrong with not believing because you don't want to? and what if the reason you don't want to is because you define belief as something that requires evidence in order to practice? i really don't appreciate what you're doing here. I was trying to simply say that everyone has their own path in life, but instead of trying to meet me halfway and understand that, you're telling me that there is an over abundance of evidence for the existence of Jesus (which I will agree, there probably was a guy named Jesus, but hell there were probably a lot and the character of the Christ was most likely a syncretic mix of all of them) compared to that of other religions, but that being said i clearly mentioned that I am an atheist, so the supposed lack of evidence of other religions (which I personally believe doesn't really matter because since when was religion entirely evidence based anyway? faith is the art of believing that which you have no evidence for!) doesn't really change anything in my case. I was more trying to defend other people that you were isolating by making such a claim, and by extension, stress the fact that there is no absolute guarantee that if one submits to Jesus that one will absolutely have a better life. I've met plenty of people who have done so who may pretend to have a better life on the surface but really just have an invisible guy in the sky to point to and say "well this must be your plan so who am I to question it?" anyway, i respect your right to believe what you want, but i think you're living in a really small bubble if you think that Christianity, and specifically the Catholic sect thereof, is the only way to find happiness and comfort in life. it's sorta poisoning the well by outright assuming some specific conclusion is already true and then arguing based on that conclusion without providing evidence to support it. if you have sufficient empirical evidence, maybe you should lead with that rather than suggesting that there is more of it than other religions. burden of proof, etc.

searine 7y ago

Jesus died on the cross in six hours. Let's see jesus crush a few vertebrae and live disabled for 40 years without pain meds, and then talk about suffering. Like I get it. Religion does help many, and it can take you away from pain, but suffering is real and don't shortchange people's misery who are dealing with it.

sdegutis 7y ago
I'm deeply sorry for your suffering. 40 years is a very long time, and it's not a coincidence that throughout history 40 has been the number representing trial and suffering. Jesus does know what you have gone through. He's not "some religion" but a person. He can help you. He's the only one who can help you.
faissaloo 7y ago
Jesus (PBUH) was never put on the cross, they crucified the wrong guy.
- sdegutis 7y ago
  I am glad to find another religious person here! Think and pray more about Jesus and you will discover that he would not have allowed anyone to take his place, because as he said, "My soul is trouble, but what shall I say, 'Father save me from this hour?' No I tell you, for this purpose I have come to this hour." He would never escape it, and he would not allow anyone to take anyone from it.
  - faissaloo 7y ago
    My worship is directed towards God alone and we were given the Qur'an to clarify these matters among other things, read here if you'd like to understand the Islamic view of the crucifixion: https://quran.com/4/157-167 https://quran.com/4/157-167
    - sdegutis 7y ago
      Thank you friend for that perspective. I have read the Islamic perspective of these matters. We Christians also worship God alone, we have that in common with you. We just believe that Jesus was truly God, while being the Son of God also. This is why king David speaking by the Holy Spirit says "the Lord said to my Lord, sit at my right hand," calling his descendent Lord. This is the Trinity and we admit it is a great Mystery that we cannot ever fully comprehend. But our belief in this is founded on the Resurrection. How could over so many people, many of them who followed Jesus for 3 years straight, including his own mother, confuse Jesus with someone else? And more to the point, how could Jesus show up to all of these same people, totally over 500 people, with holes in his hands and feet and side, and them still believe he was crucified and yet glorified, if he wasn't both?
tasty_freeze 7y ago
I was going to make a similar comment, so I'll tag on here. Jesus was supposedly crucified for a few hours, which would be terrible, but he also knew what was waiting him, and that he would be remembered and revered. In contrast, my sister suffered through multiple rounds of chemo, then a divorce by a husband who was jealous that she was "getting all the attention". The cancer spread to her brain and spine and lungs, and towards the end even morphine couldn't stop the pain. She had to say goodbye to her sons without knowledge of what was to lie in store for her or them. When she died, she stayed dead, none of this "Tada! I died without the consequences of death" nonsense.
- sdegutis 7y ago
  You assume you know just how much (or how "little") Jesus suffered, based on a physical description. I felt the same way for a few years. But his was physical, spiritual, emotional, mental, all at once, for almost a full day straight, and intensified beyond what you can imagine. He barely showed any typical signs, like screaming out in pain or cursing people, because he is all-powerful, and those come from a lack of power. But there are an abundance of signs that he suffered far more than an ordinary crucifixion, which was already excruciating by today's standards - in fact that's where the word comes from.
  - tasty_freeze 7y ago
    You are absolutely right -- I don't know how much he suffered. But then again, people who claim he suffered unimaginable pain because he accepted the sin of humanity have no idea how much it hurt (if you accept such a thing is possible). This is just typical having it both ways -- he was fully human and fully divine. That isn't some cosmic thing worth pondering -- it is just a contradiction. If you believe he is god and that it was unimaginably painful, then you should also accept as god he has infinite tolerance for pain and so it isn't so impressive.
    - sdegutis 7y ago
      He allowed himself to feel the fullness of that suffering to expiate our just punishments, and to merit for us a portion in his strength to overcome suffering, and so that nobody could ever say "God does not know what it means to suffer like I am."

WoahNoun 7y ago

lol

rjurney 7y ago

You and Jesus are assholes. May you suffer as I do and learn the value of suffering first hand.

sdegutis 7y ago
Jesus did not take away my suffering. I asked him three times, and three times he said no. He said his grace is sufficient for me, because his power is made perfect in my weakness. I now understand why Jesus said no. Because he did not come to take away suffering, but to teach us how to endure it without failing ourselves or others.
- rjurney 7y ago
  The Fighting Jesus would mow your Jesus down with an AR. So spoke Bob Dobbs.
  - ozzmotik 7y ago
    the true way to remove pain is to acquire sufficient slack.

jraph 7y ago

I don’t think speaking about religion is a problem. Here's what I think, for what is worth: First, your message may give the impression that you are giving an unfounded lesson to some people here. “You will not […]” Second, you may be speaking a language to which not everyone is receptive. For instance, you are stating things about our duties, but people who don’t see a meaning or a goal in life (does it sound sad?), or don’t feel they have a specific duty may not fully understand your message. Some people here may also be seeking evidences for some statements you make because they are not obvious to them. For instance: how can you know that nobody will ever suffer as much as Jesus or more? Is there a study out there finding this result? Though I may also be doing the mistake you may be doing, that is, not speaking the right language to be understood (I may also have offended you by doing so and I'm sorry for that if that is the case). Quite like in the following copy-pasted joke: --- A religious women upon waking up each morning would open her front door stand on the porch and scream, “Praise the Lord.” This infuriated her atheist neighbor who would always make sure to counter back, “There is no Lord.” One morning the atheist neighbor overheard his neighbor praying for food, thinking it would be funny, he went and bought her all sorts of groceries and left them on her porch. The next morning the lady screamed, “Praise the Lord, who gave me this food.” The neighbor laughing so hard he could barely get the words out screamed “It wasn’t the Lord, it was me.” The lady without missing a beat screamed: “Praise the Lord for not only giving me food but making the atheist pay for it!!” ---

sdegutis 7y ago
Thank you for that wonderful joke! Your advice reminds me of what Ven. Fulton Sheen talks about here[1], and your great joke reminds me of his other videos[2]. Bless you friend and thanks again :) [1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zz0a3TSkHVU&t=8 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zz0a3TSkHVU&t=8 [2] https://sdegutis.github.io https://sdegutis.github.io

crispinb 7y ago

> a humble trust that Jesus came into this world to suffer and die for our sake 'humble trust' is a genuinely useful attitude to have towards reality, but impossible to achieve towards a description of the world one does not believe to be true. You have things backward - if you genuinely intend your prescription to be helpful you need first to offer your readers reasons to believe your specific supernatural claims to be true.

sdegutis 7y ago
There is an overabundant proof that the Catholic Church's teachings are true. The only reason people do not believe is because they do not want to. They choose to believe logical fallacies and pretend it's logically consistent rather than believe the truth.
- crispinb 7y ago
  > There is an overabundant proof that the Catholic Church's teachings are true. Most people clearly don't accept this. Which leads us to: > The only reason people do not believe is because they do not want to What's your evidence for this? It's certainly counter to most non-Catholics' own statements. So they're either lying or deceiving themselves. Each option would need extremely strong evidence for a reasonable person to believe it. I'd be interested in your response to a bald statement like "There is an overabundant proof that Hindu/Buddhist/animist/Islamic/Gnostic/whatever teachings are true". No doubt the more extreme members of each of these faith communities will make such proclamations. What's a poor rational non-believer to do? Spend a lifetime assessing the claims of dozens of different religions? I guess you'd insist they should ignore the others and look only at yours. Why? > They choose to believe logical fallacies and pretend it's logically consistent rather than believe the truth. Do you really believe truths about the world can be deduced through logic? Would you put your children if you have them in an aeroplane that had been constructed out of a mind of a genius logician?
  - sdegutis 7y ago
    Logic can get us very far. Socrates was martyred because he taught that there is only one God, and there is objective morality that we must follow to be with God. He reached these conclusions by logic alone. But Divine Revelation is necessary for the fulfillment of human understanding and our perfection. Jesus crucified and resurrected is the start of this, because nothing any wise teacher or religious founder says matters unless it can save us from death. This is the only religion that can, because it's not a religion as much as a Living Being that we can encounter immediately, and who will save us if we only let him.

ozzmotik 7y ago

i certainly appreciate what you have to say, but as a somewhat ardent atheist i contend entirely the idea that you absolutely have to understand and trust that Jesus came to suffer and die for our sake in order to get started on the right path, if only because there are several other religions across the world with their own disparate belief systems that have nothing to do with Jesus and im pretty sure some of those people came to the same point without accepting Jesus' suffering. so, if they can do so without it, then I think there is more than one way to do it, and certainly a secular way that doesn't require one to accept extraordinary claims without the requisite extraordinary evidence to back them up. that being said, i would not ever want to try to convince someone who isn't interested in doing so to give up their faith, so please don't take this as a form of that. only trying to be intellectually fair and consider those outside of the situation you have represented.

sdegutis 7y ago
This is the most common cop-out of our day, and it's one I also used for many decades. But it is an intellectual cop-out. There is significantly more proof for Jesus's claims as represented by the Catholic Church than for any other religious beliefs. The only reason people do not believe it is because, at least deep down, they do not want to.
- ozzmotik 7y ago
  is there something wrong with not believing because you don't want to? and what if the reason you don't want to is because you define belief as something that requires evidence in order to practice? i really don't appreciate what you're doing here. I was trying to simply say that everyone has their own path in life, but instead of trying to meet me halfway and understand that, you're telling me that there is an over abundance of evidence for the existence of Jesus (which I will agree, there probably was a guy named Jesus, but hell there were probably a lot and the character of the Christ was most likely a syncretic mix of all of them) compared to that of other religions, but that being said i clearly mentioned that I am an atheist, so the supposed lack of evidence of other religions (which I personally believe doesn't really matter because since when was religion entirely evidence based anyway? faith is the art of believing that which you have no evidence for!) doesn't really change anything in my case. I was more trying to defend other people that you were isolating by making such a claim, and by extension, stress the fact that there is no absolute guarantee that if one submits to Jesus that one will absolutely have a better life. I've met plenty of people who have done so who may pretend to have a better life on the surface but really just have an invisible guy in the sky to point to and say "well this must be your plan so who am I to question it?" anyway, i respect your right to believe what you want, but i think you're living in a really small bubble if you think that Christianity, and specifically the Catholic sect thereof, is the only way to find happiness and comfort in life. it's sorta poisoning the well by outright assuming some specific conclusion is already true and then arguing based on that conclusion without providing evidence to support it. if you have sufficient empirical evidence, maybe you should lead with that rather than suggesting that there is more of it than other religions. burden of proof, etc.