Military chaplain: Soldier's rape 'must have been God's will'

Stick to the subject folks and it isn't the other members.

It is...

Military chaplain: Soldier's rape 'must have been God's will'

reply to post by The Djin


God gave mankind free will to commit sin or not. If man chooses to commit sin it is not God's fault or will.

I stand by my first sentence in that post though. Your post is evident that I am correct in what I said.


Added comment:

However, I will say that I am done with this thread as it has turned to nothing more than the bashing of beliefs instead of the discussion of how foolish this Chaplin is. If he were really speaking the truth of the matter and God's word he would not have said such falsehoods.


Raist

Originally posted by Jinglelord
Okay, so I believe this was mentioned before but I will say it one more time. All Christians and Jews believe in the old testament God and of course only Christians believe in the New Testament God. So lets look at the old Testament for a moment. There are a few but I will focus on one. The Book of Job.

Familiar with it? No? Essentially God allows Satan to kill all of Jobs kids and give him terrible boils and whatever else to test his faith.

Your telling me if God can will a man's children to be killed and given physical calamities to test his piousness this same God can't will for a woman to be raped in the eyes of a Chaplain?

Are you people for real?

The argument isn't about Christianity or Judaism which I will assume this Chaplain was one of the two, the argument is whether this is in line with how a holy man is expected to believe. Which it clearly is.

There are many Christians who do not in their hearts and have never truly believed in the old testament God. And there are Christians, who also know these old books are corrupted, subject to political control, and distortions, and so are very selective and can choose only those things which are of the finest purest Love... They can see the light squares in any book and see the distortions and dark squares. They can even take some of the squares that are dubious and turn them into light, and give them a different meaning. This is called growing up, for their are choices to be made, on the tests, in opposites: Love/Hate; Kindness/Harshness; Forgiveness/Retaliation, Punishment,; Patience/Impatience; Mildness/Argumentativeness; Peacefulness/Warring; Power To the Many, Equality, the inverted pyramid, superman's logo, or power to the few.



@IAMIAM: I love your posts. I can see that you are not endorsing what the Chaplain said by sharing the true heart of compassion and unconditional Love. We probably have different concepts of God, or Family, but who know, because its not those definitions that count, its the fruit of the tree, and I keep thinking, we have a higher up here, or someone very much reaching into his connection within. Thank you Big Brother for your words, and all the posts I've been noticing lately. Peace, Love & Light!

reply to post by getreadyalready

those words really struck a chord with me, as i, though childless, went through the same experience while rooming with my best friend, of 16 years, when he was struck by cancer. my dude was the epitome of health, spending hours a day working out(basketball, gym etc) only to watch him wither away from the symptoms of the treatment. the last 3 mths were heartbreaking as strokes and sickness from chemo took the fight from him.

after he passed on in '06, 2 weeks after his 27th birthday, 4 weeks after my bday and 13 days from my 1yr anniversary of a car wreck in '05 that nearly killed me(i was still undergoing phys therapy for it) i angrily asked god "why all this, and why did he have to die", the response i got, like yours, shook me to the core. why did he have to die...he earned the right. why did all the things that happened to me during that 2yr spell happen...i had to see that life is to be appreciated more than i took it for prior. i'm admittedly the last person to look to a higher power, much less stick to any religion, and am a fairly intelligent person as well...so when i got to that breaking point, and got those replys...i paused. he's been gone and i've been healthy for nearly 5yrs now, and i look at everyday as a promising one, regardless of the insanity we see now.

back to topic.

that's kind of a cold response the chaplain gave to the rape victim. not exactly a cool thing to say.
maybe he should've pointed her in another direction, in addition to the churches to resolve her issue? just saying.

reply to post by DimensionalDetective


wow you do digg up some goodins. fark !

Such an incredible cop-out.

Nobody should be in jail if everything is god's will, because not only was it god's plan for her to raped, it was god's will for HIM to rape her. The dude has the defense "GOD WANTED ME TO RAPE HER, I SWEAR" Then he can continue on raping with impunity because god wants him to do it, it's not like he's doing anything wrong.

I am not the Military bashing type at all, I honor the soldiers, but this gives SO much ammo to those bashing types. This happens quite often, and the brass doesn't care at all. They just want order, what does it matter if a bunch of women get raped, guys get plungers up their ass, whatever. It's all good. I don't see why being in a uniform should give you any sort of reason to rape and get away with it. This guy should be in gulag.

reply to post by James1982


I really want to know if our TV culture, self entitled loss of any accountability for thoughts and actions has lead people completely vacate the human capacity to understand deeper more complex concepts.

A Chaplain is a holy man who has spent many years in study and contemplation as to how the divine works. The man has a good idea of what he believes and understands what he is saying.

It is absolutely God's will that she was raped. This does not infer that God thought it was good, it does not infer the rapist should not be punished, it does not infer the woman did anything wrong, it does not infer she deserved it, it is no reflection on anything humanity can likely even fully comprehend.

How arrogant can one be to believe in an omnipotent omnipresent God and deign for a second to second guess this God?

Oh but maybe God is a peaceful and loving God and nothing like the old testament God?

NO WAY. You can't take the basic premise of a biblical God who is the creator of all things with complete power then look around our world and and say for a second he didn't create misery and pain. And before the whole free will deal comes up keep in mind we were created in his image...

Originally posted by Jinglelord
reply to post by Sinnthia

 

I like to agree with people who are obviously thinking so it feels good to agree.

I think what the Chaplain said could indeed be interpreted in a million different ways and we have no idea nor will we likely ever know what his true motives were for saying them. I saw everyone trying to say he was evil out of hand with no thought towards what he could have really been trying to say or how well what he said was actually interpreted.

I get that but what bugs me even more than that is the idea that anyone would be in such a hurry to defend this man for what he may have meant that they are willing push the rape victim down and belittle her in their effort to do it. People were so eager to defend the Chaplain that they had to resort to demonizing the rape victim in their effort. Neither seems fair to me but I am sure you can guess by now which one bothers me more.

It just bugs me when people get attacked as evil for saying something with no regard for where they were coming from, what they believe, how they said it and without any real proof as to what they said.

Perhaps the biggest confusion is that this woman did have a horrible event happen to her. Justice will need to be served for this one way or the other. The rapist will need to pay a debt to society and hopefully a larger moral debt as he gets older in the form of regret and grief for his actions. Somehow this man's actions are I believe being mixed up with a Chaplain's words. I doubt severely the Chaplain is condoning the actions of the rapist, (possible but I doubt it) he is more likely engaging in failed attempt at consolation.

If you look back at some of the posts I responded to again, you will notice that in an effort to extend all benefit of the doubt to the Chaplain, the rape victim has been called a liar by a self proclaimed "Christian" poster. Other posters did their best to try and demonize her in other ways, just to make sure we were being fair to the Chaplain. I just do not understand why this Chaplain we do not know deserves to be handled with such kid gloves while a real woman who was really raped should be not only shoved aside, but called a liar.

That kind of thinking really seems at odds with itself to me.

Now if that agrees with your take we really do see eye to eye and I will laugh at myself even harder for engaging.

Yeah, I think we do at this point.

Is this the bronze age?

I hope it is god's will that the chaplain is assailed by a swarm of concrete dildos

from: heavens

to: his cranium,


#$@$@#!

Originally posted by Janky Red
Is this the bronze age?

I hope it is god's will that the chaplain is assailed by a swarm of concrete dildos

from: the heavens

to: his cranium,


#$@$@#!

Originally posted by IAMIAM
It is because of my beliefs that we must love one another to make the changes necessary to move to our next stage of the divine plan that I am an advocate for forgiveness. I whole heartedly believe that we need to forgive the murderers, the rapists, everyone, and work on healing each and returning them to their freedom as a loving member of society. I know it isn't going to be a cake walk, but it is an absolutely necessary step to correcting the errors of our past.

Thanks a great deal for your response and kind words. Truly appreciated. I believe I see where you are coming from and I think I can sum up my response thusly.

I agree that "an eye for an eye makes the whole world blind." I have my own issues on whether I believe our penal systems helps do away with crime vs. foster it and it is a complicated issue. Rape, like abortion, is a touchy issue and one that gets even harder to discuss across gender lines. BUT I do not think anyone will ever be able to convince me that their all powerful, all loving god has a master plan and individual human suffering is a part of it. If he is all powerful, he can do things beyond my comprehension and if he is all loving, he would not want to have me raped in order to teach people things. No one is ever going to get me into their church with that line of thinking but if it helps you, then great.

I have read that prayer helps healing. I feel if that works for those people, then great. But in the context of our discussion, if you were that Chaplain and I were that rape victim, you would have lost one of your flock with that logic. But I find it hard to put myself into that flock to begin with so I admit I am biased there. Thanks for sharing your view.

Hopefully we can end on agreeing that hugs probably do far more good than whips do in the grand scheme of things and forgiveness probably leads to healing faster than holding grudges ever could. I still would have punched the Chaplain in the face based on just what I have to go on though.

He would forgive me.

Originally posted by Janky Red
Is this the bronze age?

I hope it is god's will that the chaplain is assailed by a swarm of concrete dildos

from:the heavens

to: his cranium,


#$@$@#!

reply to post by Janky Red


Apparently heaven enjoys my foul post so much, heaven has decided that I cannot edit said post, rather, I can only duplicate it with the edit button

??????

Originally posted by Sinnthia


He would forgive me.

After all... it was god's will

Originally posted by Tayesin
Sinnthia,

No offence intended....

Are you here for the Argument? You are excellently talented in this regard.

I'm not. And I don't follow the expectations of those who are. I have assumed nothing.. despite you saying I have based on some rules of argument you follow but that I care nothing for.

When a person will not see how they twisted someone else's words to suit their argument, and then argued with the person about it.. that is Dishonesty and I want no part of it.

I wish you well.

(and when I say that I mean only and exactly that in total honesty.. not anything else you may think I am saying.

Back to the advertised topic...

Nope. I was just responding to everything you had written in that post and not just the key phrases you hoped would distract me from the entire content. I apologize if that derailed the discussion. Whenever someone says "No offense" and then continues with something obviously intentionally offensive, I find it hard to ignore the second part and only respond to the "No offense" part. I know some people on ATS do not like when people question the things that they post (the entire post in context) but that is why I do not read their blogs. Thanks.

reply to post by Sinnthia


A little late I would like to give you a big applaud. Apart from staying well on topic, you have also succeeded in presenting a perspective, which more or less have been lost amongst the many more or less 'lofty' answers coming from absolute/semi-absolute 'explanations' about 'god', the universe and everything.

The perspective of pragmatism, in this context more precisely something as humble as co-sensus pragmatism. In other contexts co-sensus pragmatism would (justly) be scorned at as insufficient on grounds of lacking objectivity or methodology, but here it's valuable.

There's no need for intellectual considerations, a deep emotional empathy or even 'having felt it on yourself'. Any sane person will at an instictive and simplistic level feel an act of rape as abominable. It's a very strong violation; I can imagine much worse than just being beaten up.

There may follow some sophisticated objections to this post concerning pragmatism as a valid reference-point. I hope I can meet them ON topic.

So just: Bravo Sinnthia.

reply to post by IAMIAM


Eventually you WILL have some problems with your 'divine plan' and 'free will' dichotomy.

The ground was set long before the emergence of mankind. Gravity e.g. is so close to a cosmic absolute, that anomalies practically never happen (IF ever).

Growing complexity is another observable cosmic phenomenon; already from atomic/molecular level.

When this complexity grows into 'life' predation is observable, and predation predates mankind.

So the dog-eat-dog cosmos was here before us (unless you're a creationist), the board was set and the rules basically decided.

The real question is, HOW much free will do we have in a somewhat pre-deterministic cosmos.

The standard objection remains: An alleged 'god' gave us 'free will', but restricted our options of using it as against his will. Any plan you postulate will meet this argument.

reply to post by DimensionalDetective


I assume he is a Presbyterian with a belief in the doctrine of Predestination.

"God, from all eternity, did, by the most wise & holy counsel of his own will, freely & unchangeably ordain whatsoever comes to pass.”

Basically that all to its logical conclusion, Calvinistic predestination would indict God as being responsible for every murder, rape, theft. God has planned all of the horrors of the world for all time in advance and in minute detail.

If all has been already decided then there is no point praying or trying to be good. Just let it all happen according to God;'s will. My first act would be to have said Pastor put into a cell with a bunch of deranged sodomites for him to experience God Will over and over again.

Taken to the next level their is no point in religion, church or life as the Game has been decided in advance.

It seems a God who could decide such matters and make them happen is an evil God.

However if you take God and religion out of the equation and simply look at the facts. "Some men are bad and do not care how much damage they do to others"" it all makes a lot more sense.

The girl assaulted should be comforted and the man prosecuted. The pastor should be sacked for providing no comfort.

Originally posted by Gorman91
reply to post by DimensionalDetective

 

Not going to defend him. Going to say that the article doe snot add context. Technically everything's God's will, good and bad.

So when people get into each other hair on ATS, it's 'god's will quarrelling with itself, when a woman gets raped 'god's will masturbates and when a priest 'explains' it it's 'god' forgiving himself.

It's all clear to me now. We are zombis, but why do we post on ATS then, unless 'god' also talks to himself?