you could check out http://www.whydoesgodhateamputees.com/
the guy makes a very good argument for why prayer doesn't do anything. Sure, everyone who gets sick gets prayed for, and some people get better. Sometimes someone who is REALLY sick gets better, and people think that's a miracle, a proof that prayer works. God has reached down from the cosmos and changed the fundamental nature of the universe in response to a human's sincere pleading on behalf of another: He has made the cancer go into remission, He has made the fever go down, He has made the operation a success, He has seen the baby delivered successfully despite complications... God 'intervenes' all the time, apparently. He reaches down and Touches the person's DNA so that the blip on the xray goes away and the person no longer has cancer. He does the impossible on a daily basis.
Right?
...but there has NEVER been a case of a person's limb suddenly appearing. When someone loses a limb in a car accident, and people pray for them, the limb never appears.
God makes cancer go away, he makes premmie babies survive, he makes fevers abate... he does 'impossible' things all the time. Why doesn't he ever spontaneously regenerate limbs?
Wouldn't THAT be a great 'proof' of his existence? If an amputee woke up one morning and, in response to the prayers of his friends and family, his arm were back again?? Wouldn't that be cool? Don't tell me that God doesn't do things to 'prove' he answers prayers all the time, because He has made the cancer go into remission, He has made the fever go down, He has made the operation a success, He has seen the baby delivered successfully despite complications... God 'intervenes' all the time.
So why does hate amputees so much?
The answer is in the question.
To me - a person can see the evidence that while some prayers, apparently, are answered, the prayers of amputees are NEVER answered. It is evidence like this which a Christian must ignore, rationalise, or belittle in order to keep believing in the power of prayer and the existence of their god. If you believe in God and prayer, you have to believe this DESPITE the evidence that God clearly hates amputees.
[/COLOR]Have you ever heard of the Celestial Teapot?
Yeah, I know how 'rational' works. I don't get why you're quoting wikipedia on this.
How did I use the term?
Nothing in this world can be "proven"....PROOF doesn't exsist. So no theory, no religion or lack there of can not be proven ever. So you stand on the same side of the tracks as a Christian. You can not prove your side "rationally" either.
If I were to suggest that between the Earth and Mars there is a china teapot revolving about the sun in an elliptical orbit, nobody would be able to disprove my assertion provided I were careful to add that the teapot is too small to be revealed even by our most powerful telescopes.
But if I were to go on to say that, since my assertion <I>cannot be disproved</I>, it is an intolerable presumption on the part of human reason to doubt it, I should rightly be thought to be talking nonsense.
If, however, the existence of such a teapot were affirmed in ancient books, taught as the sacred truth every Sunday, and instilled into the minds of children at school, hesitation to believe in its existence would become a mark of eccentricity and entitle the doubter to the attentions of the psychiatrist in an enlightened age or of the Inquisitor in an earlier time.
