We can never truly know or understand God

[edhopper]

Except the most expansive institutions on the planet are predicated on knowing exactly what God has said and wants.

Do I have that right?

[PJMcK]

1. You've got it right

But the way, what is "God?"

[edhopper]

8. another good question

thatmost religions say is unknowable while telling us exactly what God is.

[Pope George Ringo II]

15. Which one?

We've invented a few thousand so far.

[PJMcK]

16. Maybe they're all the same thing?

Or maybe there is no such thing.

Who knows?

[edhopper]

21. Those two things

are not equal.

Maybe there are unicorns and leprechauns, maybe not.

The probability is vastly different.

[Major Nikon]

2. God's will is unknowable

...but let me tell you what he wants.

[marylandblue]

3. Well, to be fair to most religionists, they do say he told us what he wants

and we can get to know him. It's only in the DU Religion Group that I've heard of an inscrutable Creator, about whom we can know nothing, not even if he exists or not. We must be out of the loop here.

[trotsky]

13. Now that's not true.

Someone claims to know LOTS about said "Creator," but his claims aren't really claims so there.

[Pope George Ringo II]

14. Conversely

Others' non-claims actually are claims.

[trotsky]

17. Now you're getting how this works!

Much easier to debate issues when your position is completely unassailable while your opponents must justify calling the sky blue!

[marylandblue]

18. Well the DU Religion Group is its own special place

Where the clear is murky and the murky is clear.

[trotsky]

19. Well, one thing is definitely clear.

There are some who want every statement pertaining to gods or religious belief free of any criticism or questioning. Despite having MULTIPLE groups where this is exactly the policy, they instead obsess over the one particular discussion area where those things are not prohibited.

[MineralMan]

4. Of course we can. Here's a summary:

God created everything, but He made mistakes.
God hates you because He made those mistakes.
God won't eternally kill and punish you - if you do what we tell you He said to do.
God said you should do the following things:

God wants you to give us money.
God wants you to keep your questions to yourself.
God wants you to obey us, his priests and pastors, in all things.

[NeoGreen]

5. I'm more interested in knowing and understanding the mind of leprechauns and...

...the motives of unicorns.

[JenniferJuniper]

6. yes and

God hates queers, don't you see
God hates immigrants, just like me
God wants the poor to suck it up, and I agree
God is good with kids in cages, fine with me
God thinks Father Knows Best was a reality show,
And back to the 50's we should go

Aren't I just the Godliest person ever?

[zipplewrath]

7. Pretty much

Of all the conflicts I might have with organized religion, one of the less controversial and yet more threatening to them is that they don't all "know" the same God, yet all profess to know him anyway. And infinite being is incomprehensible to a people that still can't figure out the Unified Field Theorem, or even know if there is one. But somehow we are able to know and understand an infinite being. At best, one should acknowledge that "knowing God" would be akin to the blind man touching the elephant. One will "know" very little about the elephant, and it will very likely be completely different from what other blind men are touching.

[edhopper]

10. Yet our entire life

should be based on the feel of a tusk.

[zipplewrath]

11. Something like that

Although if you're feeling the tusk, ya might wanna take a couple of steps back.

[edhopper]

20. That would be more urgent

if you are feeling the tail.

[3Hotdogs]

9. WRONG ! I know.

For a couple'a hundred dollars a year, I'll tell you what he says.

BARGAIN RATE ! For a cash deposit of $10,000, + $25,000 on installments, I know how to get you a seat in the Sky Room, right next to Jesus. But you gotta act fast. Seats are limited on a first come, first serve basis. When they're gone, they're gone.

PM me if interested. If not, you take your chances.

[trotsky]

12. "We can never truly know or understand God...

...except for all the things I'm going to tell you about MY god." -- Pretty much every believer, everywhere.

[uriel1972]

22. I'm thinking of a song...

"We sit and argue all night long,
About a God we've never seen,
Who never fails,
To agree with me..."

Sitting outside a broken phone booth with money in my hand, is the title the band, The Primitive Radio Gods? not sure on that one