Mom of found boy cites power of prayer as real, but aruba girl still gone

[mopaul]

i'm happy for the boy being found of course, but i grow weary of his mother's claims that heaven is not closed and prayer works and little boys come home.

they showed the happy mother, and then immediately went to the mother still looking for her girl in aruba three weeks after she went missing.

prayer isn't working so well for the mother in aruba.

[liberal N proud]

1. Maybe the mother in Aruba isn't strong enough in her faith

That is the malarkey the fundies would tell you if you ask them

[Snotcicles]

31. Dang I thought it was excellent training as a scout that saved him. n/t

[okieinpain]

2. or the guy that got decapitated in iraq. oh yeah his mother's prayers

were too negative.

[donco6]

3. God hates blonde girls.

Didn'tcha know?

[Modem Butterfly]

4. Maybe it's part of God's plan for the girl in Aruba to never be found

:sarcasm:

Shit like this seriously pisses me off. After 9/11, I actually frothed at the mouth at someone who said that a particular person survived because "God has a plan for him,". I fucking lost it and said, "So God's plan for this guy involved putting 3,000 human beings through a concrete blender? And you WORSHIP this being? Are you INSANE?"

[SteppingRazor]

5. The answer is obvious -- Michael Jackson is God.

How else to explain that only little boys are returned?

[ucmike]

8. ouch.

[mopaul]

9. micheal did claim that he cured that little boy of cancer

unless i'm simply imagining things again.

[mopaul]

6. it's always the lucky who cite the wonders of prayer

a person is the sole survivor of a jetliner crash and says, 'i must have had a guardian angel looking over me', or, 'god was sitting next to me' or some shit, disregarding the 123 folks who burned up.

[Connie_Corleone]

7. That's what really irks me...

People talk about it's a miracle or God answered their prayers, but what about the children who get kidnapped and end up dead??

What about the people who didn't survive some plane crash? One person survives and people call it a miracle.

The kid survived for 4 days and someone found him. Parents are happy. End of story. No miracle.

It drives me nuts!

[stopbush]

10. Yes, but it was the prayers of gay people that were answered

and led to the boy being found.

How will the BSA deal with that? :)

[UdoKier]

11. Oh, come on Mo, magical mumbo-jumbo always works.

All those poverty-stricken people that work hard, follow the rules, pray for riches and get screwed are just not God's little favorites.

Dintcha know that?

[stopbush]

12. I doubt it. God has his hands full helping those NBA players

make it through the finals. You know, the guys who point to the heavens and thank god for making all those baskets for them?

[VALibby]

13. I bet that made...

the father who's son has been missing for a year, that helped in this hunt, feel so good. It's as if the mother was saying to him "God felt my son was worth it but not yours". What a slap in the face.

I don't think God had anything to do with it...it was the efforts of all those people searching.

:eyes:

[catmandu57]

14. Doncha know little white boys

are worth more than little white girls.

[Logansquare]

15. I promise that if I ever go missing and get found

I will tell Katie Curic "I credit the powers of rational humanism." This is what tees me off about evangelicals: never mind the efforts of the rescuers, or the good fortune of having this happen in warm weather near a plentiful water supply...it's all because of magical incantations.

[scarpa43]

16. I hate when people ask for prayers

To me it makes God sound like a selfish jerk.

Is he sitting in heaven saying "I would save that kid in the woods, but ONLY if enough people pray to me, otherwise forget it."

If God wants to save someone, he should just do it, not wait for the right number of prayers to come rolling in before doing anything.

Is it just me?

[mopaul]

17. petition the lord with prayer? petition the lord with prayer?

you CANNOT petition the lord with prayer...

......jim morrison

[annabanana]

39. oh yeah!

(good old chills down the spine)

[donco6]

20. Reminds me of those old urban legends of . . .

collecting pop tabs for dialysis. "Yes, folks, if you collect enough pop tabs, we can save little Johnnie here . . . otherwise, he's a goner!"

Divine extortion?

[FreedomAngel82]

41. I agree

If the powers that be and God were to save you they would lead you and you listen to them. The thing people have to remember about prayers is not all prayers are supposed to be answered or it's not ready to be answered. But we have freewill and we can change things and that's where it comes in with searching for people etc. We make our own realities here in this world. The powers that be sometimes intervine but most of the time it's us and sometimes even a "gut" feeling.

[plcdude]

18. exactly

I too am totally exasperated at this narrow fundamentalistic view of how "God" operates. Since the Utah people were Mormons their prayers were not really directed Jesus and the Alabama group perhaps should be utilizing Mormon prayers rather than Christian prayer modes. Absolutely incredible! And the runaway bride did anyone catch that? Such self-serving, manipulative, and down-right deceptive drivel I have not heard in a long time. Where are we going as a culture that allows this individual access to a national podium to seek sympathy for her irresponsible behavior? Okay now I feel better.

[The Revolution]

19. That's something that bothers me as well

I really don't like it when people claim that God has directly intervened to help them. What's ironic is that people use these types of situations to reinforce their faith, but for me it causes everything to unravel.

Why does God help one person but not another? What if the child had died, would that have been because of God too? Or would that be the work of the devil? If the devil is doing these things God doesn't like, then why doesn't God destroy the devil? (he is all powerful, right?) If God has everything planned out, then what is the purpose of existence? Can I drive down a street at 120 mph, comforted by the fact that if I kill anyone, it was part of Gods plan for them to die? Does anything we do matter at all? Etc, Etc, Etc.

So then it just becomes easier to say that God doesn't intervene and that praying to him is useless, or that God doesn't exist at all.

[PurityOfEssence]

21. Booga booga booga

All good comes from the allfrighty, and none of the bad is his fault.

Oh, tidings of comfort and joy.

[progressivebydesign]

22. I read that the same way.. I guess God is selective.

My problem with people that think God answers prayers: You have a pediatric ward in a hospital. 2 children are on the brink of death. Both families are praying. 1 child dies, the other lives. Okay.. did the family not pray hard enough? Did God favor the other kid? Or shall we use the trite excuse.. "God needed more angels"??

In my belief, there is a spiritual energy in all people which can be used for good. Life is random, our lives are no more pre-ordained or watched over than the ant we accidentally squash on the sidewalk.

[jmaier]

23. A mean-spirited thread

Regardless of how you feel about the prayer issue, why demean someone's pain or hope.

[catmandu57]

25. We're just practising living in a republican world

If you jesus freaks don't like it then don't open the thread.

[jmaier]

28. I'm an long-acknowledge atheist

I wasn't commenting on someone disbelieving the power of prayer (I don't believe in it myself).

But more criticizing something along the lines of "nyeh, nyeh, see prayer doesn't work" to someone in pain. Human compassion doesn't require religion and human intolerance doesn't seem to require Rethuglican conservativism.

[A-Schwarzenegger]

33. Why do you hate your country?

Just kidding. (Can't find the smilies.)
Yer my kinda atheist, jmaier.

[mopaul]

26. yeah, i'm the meanie up in here

i SAID i was happy for her. and i don't see how i'm demeaning anyone's pain or hope, both of which i've actually experienced.

[Theres-a]

24. It's unfortuanate when people confuse God with Santa.

Not denying the power of prayer,just agreeing with the misguided nature of many who use it.

[mopaul]

27. RIGHT NOW: the power of prayer and belief in miracles & angels

on msnbc

[Disturbed]

30. God's will.

that's another little phrase I cringe at.

If this God were in fact interactive, what sort of God do these folk believe in? Consider all of the recorded events of this planet that have devasted humans and then think about what sort of God allowed those to occur. It is human beings ascribing wishful thinking to a human like God that they conjur up to make sense out of random events.

[SoCalDem]

32. Lou Dobbs to Dana Rohrbacher.."God Bless You".

because Dana wants to cut the US dues to the UN, until they "shape up".:(

[shrike]

29. Well, I'll tell ya ...

My little niece became deathly ill recently. Literally at death's door. I posted a thread (in Religion and Theology) asking for prayers. I also asked for good vibes and wishes from the nonbelievers, many of whom were kind enough to send them along.

My niece is fully recovered, playing, and doing all the things four year olds should do. I asked my brother, who's a doctor, if he thought prayer helped. He said he had no idea. Neither do I. (We're both Catholic.)

One positive thing that did come out of prayer: he and his wife knew they were not alone. Messages of support came from all over the world: Europe, Australia, the Mideast. People who had never met or heard of my brother were sending their prayers and their support. All thanks to the magic of the Internet. They were humbled by all the caring people who took the time to think of them. Which is the closest thing we have to a God on earth, I guess.

[A-Schwarzenegger]

34. Amen to this:

"They were humbled by all the caring people who took the time to think of them. Which is the closest thing we have to a God on earth, I guess."

Thanks, shrike.

[put out]

37. Well, we just didn't pray hard enough

or have enough faith to save my loved ones. Maybe there were not enough people praying. Maybe they didn't come from from far and wide enough.

Please understand that the people who love those who fall ill and die or are killed, find it difficult to reconcile. I am glad your niece has recovered from her health difficulties. I wish her continued good health and a long and rewarding life.

If I could have prayed someone else's way out of pain or suffering, I would have. I couldn't. We all did the best we could on this world. It wasn't on the internet.

On reading what I have written, is sounds real snotty. I don't mean it like that, but these things are painful. It isn't as though we didn't try enough or do the best we could.

[shrike]

38. I am so sorry for your loss

As I said in my post, I have no idea if prayer made any difference at all. Neither does my brother. No one is sure why my niece lived --she shouldn't have. Even the doctors who cared for her are a bit puzzled. They wanted to know what, if anything, they did right. No one has been able to tell them.

My point was, the only thing we know for sure is that the sheer number of well-wishers was a source of strength to my brother and sister-in-law. We would never claim that they CURED her. My brother is a doctor and he is too familiar with the sight of people losing the ones they loved. He would never claim that HIS child was saved by God and others were not.

Then again, would that huge number of well-wishers made much of a difference to them had the outcome been successful? Probably not.

My lord, don't ever think that not PRAYING hard enough would cause you to lose your loved ones. Don't ever, ever think that. And I hope you find peace; in the memories of your loved ones, if nothing else.

[put out]

42. I appreciate your response very much.

We loved those people. They were dear (for the most part, ha!) and worth so much to so many. All the good things we wanted for them go with them, where ever they may be.

I do not mean to disparage your faith. I hope your loved ones always fare well. I think we can find peace in knowing we did what we could, while we could.

[stanwyck]

35. There's a wonderful movie

"Touching the Void" about two young mountain climbers who have a truly horrendous experience. (I don't want to give too much away). It's a quasi-documentary. (scenes are re-enacted). The two men, now middle-aged, talk about the horrible ordeal. The one man, who faced a hopeless situation, by himself, in darkness, said he contemplated during that time whether or not he had faith in God. He decided he didn't. None at all. He didn't pray to God for help (and if ever there was a time for that -- this would be it).
Instead, he summoned his own strength and decided he needed to act in order to survive. He made a very risky decision.
And it worked.

[Disturbed]

36. I saw that film.

It was riveting and inspiring. The human spirit can surely be strong.

[FreedomAngel82]

40. That's sad

I'm happy for the boy too and I'm sure he and his family are releaved but it's sad for the daughter. :(