Evangelical Support Group

The good father feeds his children with knowledge instead of bread?

My Father provided plenty of bread but not so much knowledge. I was forced to find that on my own, though when a man has a full stomach he is not as desperate to find ways to earn his own bread.

The good father doesn't necessarily spoon-feed his children, either with bread or with knowledge. He encourages them to earn their own bread and seek their own knowledge.

I am an atheist.
On an unrelated-to-being-an-atheist note, I believe that each and every person that's-not-me has just as much right (perhaps more so) to judge me than any God that anyone has ever believed in.I have over 8 billion real, living, current judges judging me.
Constantly.
I have to talk to some of them each and every day.You have 1 judge judging you and you don't even have to look Him in the eyes until the end of your life?
Oh what I would give to have it so easy...

Expounding further...
I believe that God wants us to *need* Him. Assuming for a moment that God has human emotions and is governed by them...He is the ultimate egomaniac. The only One in the entire universe who knows that everybody and everything needs Him, and needs to need Him. Oh, some may imagine that they don't. They gleefully suggest that humans created God and now have no further need of Him. Or they gush on unabashedly how their "skydaddy" is their b*tch and had best give them stimulus checks for eternity.So the question could be better phrased. Why is God so petty as to need us? Surely He has better things to do. And if, after all, He created us to need Him, why not just make it a done deal? The Prime Minister should be ashamed of himself for *not* asking more of the public (who have lived awhile) for advice. And the guy on the corner? He needs your dollar more than he needs you.
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Are you saying that humans know each other better than God knows them? Most of them are too busy to give me a moment's thought. I suppose a case could be made for learned behavior. The fact that I see, however, is that since all of us are human and none of us are perfect, we dont so much collectively judge each other as hold each other to ever more difficult standards. And then we have guys like Putin who could care less about the planet or any other fellow human and set progress back a hundred years. Oh, but we have to look Him in the eye. His Spirit resides in some humans and if they look us in the eye, He effectively looks us in the eye!

Imagine if this "good father" someday sits them down and separates them into two groups. One group gets to divide the Father's inheritance among themselves. The other group gets nothing. Would that be fair?

OR... the people who made him up wanted him to have human emotions. You do understand that that's a bad thing, don't you? (Or maybe you don't. Maybe that's why you admire Trump so much, because you've created your god in Trump's image.) Wasn't it Thomas Paine who said that people know their own needs better than some goober on a throne an ocean away? Correction, NEVER needed him - at least since we stole fire from him, anyway. No, we give each other stimulus checks. We've been asking you that for a long time. The answer seems to be that you've created your god in your own image.(I note that YOU don't try to answer your own question.) I said he doesn't ask ME. I didn't say he doesn't ask the public.I'll tell you anecdotally why I have never voted Conservative: So it is the conservatives who are not consulting me.

A good father wouldn't do that.Why do you ask me questions with such obvious answers?

There are no "people" who made up God. God found us...we never invented Him. Next question? Trump has nothing to do with it. I swear that in your world there are only liberals (proper people) conservatives(bad and evil people) and Canadians.(Contrarians)I defend God as being an egomaniac with a bit of tongue-in-cheek humor but did it ever occur to you that God and God alone has a right to have a big head. You piss-ant Johnny-come-lately's are as insignificant to Him as pond scum, excepting Jesus. For God so loved the world that He gave His one and only son... So now God Himself is defined by ringo of Saskatchewan as another "goober"! And you claim that having a big ego is a bad thing? Wait until the guys at the office get a load of this! Reducing God, the Creator of all seen and unseen to an anthropomorphic invention of primitive people is dishonest. I don't even think we humans are even wise enough to imagine the greatness of God...if not for Jesus. Well, if you and your liberal ilk were even worthy enough to be noble people of the book, you would never mandate compulsive giving beyond the tithe. You would never try and throw God away. You would never legislate nor attempt to legislate morality. You would never give people the right to self-identify, as if they even knew what was best for them (and others) You would humble yourselves, pray to the Creator of this great and grand universe, and allow Him to give you wisdom, insight, and purpose. Instead, like lemmings falling off of a cliff, you attempt to help all of the people and will end up helping none of them, once our economy collapses, we have rioting and looting in city streets, and the world sits at the brink of destruction. Even then you won't pray. You will do the easy thing and blame the conservatives! First of all, who is this mystical *we*? It sure as hell isn't "we the people". At best it is "we the peanut gallery!" I said it earlier and it is quite simple. God created us long before we were evolved enough to imagine Him. Though I self-identify as a moderate, I will represent the non-Trumpian Conservatives and would gladly knock on your door any day of the week. I will even bring my own lunch and water. We can then walk to the library to talk.

Of course there are. You're a shining example of that. Your God has only the qualities that you cherry-pick for Him. We wouldn't need a "next question" if you'd deal with that one honestly. Instead of just denying, why don't you THINK? 1. I live in the second-most conservative Province in Canada. Almost everybody I know is conservative, so it wouldn't be practical for me to consider all of them "evil".
2. I am not a contrarian. You can assume that everything that occurs to you has occurred to me. Most of what occurs to you occurred to me fifty years ago. On the contrary, He has no "rights" at all. He doesn't need any if hHe's omnipotent. Now you're showing your true colors. Your (made-up) god doesn't want "communion" with us. We're scum. What do you mean by that? He loved us like pond scum? Make up your mind. YOUR made-up god is barely a goober.(And why do you keep calling me "ringo of Saskatchewan?") Having an exaggerated ego is a bad thing. Can you dispute that at all? How do you expect them to react? You're the one who has done that. And yes, it is blatantly dishonest to call him the "Creator of all seen and unseen" and then claim that he doesn't create evil. Evil is both seen and unseen.The god that YOU have made up is certainly comparable to " an anthropomorphic invention of primitive people". It's true that YOUR imagination has produced a puny Trump of a god. You'd be better of sticking to what the bronze-age sheep herders said. Again, what do you mean by that? Jesus was one of those "ilk", asshole. People of the book do what the book says. And I never have.It was Jesus who made it a mandate. What has that got to do with stimulus checks? And I don't. It's your conservative ilk that do that. *cough* abortion laws *cough* See Thomas Paine again. People know what's best for themselves more than some goober on a throne. You should buy a mirror, Mr. Holier-than-thou. We can get more wisdom, insight and purpose from the universe itself than we will ever get from your silly ranting about your made-up god. The world IS on the brink of destruction but it has nothing to do with helping each other too much.Honestly, you'd better hope your god ISN'T real because the way you spit on Jesus, you're gong to be struck down. That's a fittingly stupid end to a thoroughly stupid rant. "We" is the people who have been asking you that question. There is nothing "mystical" or even mysterious about it. And I didn't say it was. i said it was "we the people who asked the question." So you did know the answer all along. Why did you waste my time? The question was, "Why is God so petty as to need us?" You still haven't answered it. Tell that to tthe conservatives who know where my door is.

No - I don't even see how your response is related to my statement.
But I do think my statement was worded not-so-great, so I'll try again:I believe that people have a right to judge their peers.
I believe they have more of a right to judge their peers than non-peers.In putting "humans" as "peers" - I think humans have a right to judge each other that's equal (or possibly more than) God's right to judge humans.I would say that God, if He is "all-knowing" would know people better than other people would... and this is why God is not a "peer." He is all-knowing, and humans are not. Therefore, a part of "not knowing everything, but judging as best we can" is a part of being human, and something that God is missing and therefore isn't able to judge us in the way we can judge us. In that sense - God's judgement is lesser.Think of growing an ant farm.
Think of yourself as "the creator" of the ants and the farm... but they go about their business doing their thing.
You could use your full-data of the farm and the ants to judge them.
But the ants could use ant-available-data to judge themselves.There are ways where the "full-data" judging can be seen as better.
And there are ways where the "ant-available-data" judging can be seen as better (simply because it's from their perspective.)If I wanted to know "how I'm doing as a human" - God's judgement would be interesting, but other-human's judgement would be more informative. God may be able to know all the other-human's judgements and relay that information... but this would be "equal" to human judgement, and not greater.
If God's judgement is different... then it's not "how I'm doing as human" - it's more "how I'm doing in God's eyes" - which is an interesting question - but it is a different question and doesn't answer "how I'm doing as a human." Sure - but judgement from other people is obviously more "in your face" than judgement from God on a daily basis. I'm not quite sure what you're getting at here. Holding each other to ever more difficult standards comes from judging people. Yet you say it's "not so much judging" each other... when that's exactly what it is. It doesn't seem to make any sense.
Sounds to me like you're attempting to force words to mean something else to get away from some idea you're afraid to discuss in your mind. Once? At the end of my life?
Easy peasy.
Again - this is one single judgement at one particular time in my life.
I have tens, hundreds, thousands (possibly more) people judging me and my actions every day of my life.And you're attempting to say the single judgement at the end, that's not even in your face, and has no immediate consequences while we're alive... is harder to deal with? That's just... clearly wrong. It's so wrong the word "wrong" isn't enough to describe it.
It's like you're attempting to convince me that an inspector giving a 5 min. review of the building at the end of the build is going to be "more harsh" than an inspector that's glued to your hip and looking over your shoulder the entire 4 year build of the project. It's wronger than wrong.Even if the inspector at the end is all-knowing... he would only be able to be equal to the one over your shoulder the entire time, not "more harsh." And you have the benefit of only going through it once, instead of all-day every-day the entire time. Are you attempting to say that second-hand "effectively" anything is more direct than direct, first-hand things?How much wronger-than-wrong are you trying to get to?

I agree with everything you say and would only add that IF Jesus is God Incarnate that He is in effect one of the ants. God had to become an ant to understand ants.
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By that logic, He would have to become Canadian to understand Canadians.

I thought the dude was omniscient. So he is not omniscient? Do you not understand your religion?