doesn't have a job because we all know he doesn't exist. He's used as a weapon.

I wouldn't mind the power of making rainbows.
That would be really neat.

Everyone would know exactly the message I was sending.

I'm Irish, lived a large part of my life in Boston (the one place my sense of humor didn't get me into trouble) and I've got an even better one.

My Irish Catholic mother believed in the Irish flavor of reincarnation, always said she wanted to come back as a river otter because it looked like they were getting a bang out of life and didn't have that many predators.

Six months after she died, there was a snippet on the news about a family of river otters being spotted in the state for the first time in over 50 years. Cue Twilight Zone music. I got a laugh out of it and part of me will always hope she made it.

Ok you have a point.

Yes I know, my Irish family are the only ones who understand sharp wit and cynical humor.
I have to keep it toned down for everyone else.

Of course your mom made it. We know that.

You do create rainbows. Without the consciousness of the 'knower' the rainbow doesn't exist; only water vapor, atmosphere and sunlight exist without the viewer.

She was a nun, the Sisters of Notre Dame.

She was adored by all her nieces and nephews.

My aunt was very smart, highly educated, successful, humble and modest.

Very modern, with it, savvy. She is the one who first explained the internet and email to me!

She never spoke about herself, instead always talked with the nieces and nephews on their level.

We had a family reunion and she had died right before the event.
We were heartbroken for her not to be with us.

The day of the reunion, she sent us a huge beautiful rainbow.

My Boston Irish cousins are all sharp cookies, cynical as hell.
Cops, engineers, doctors, nurses, teachers, etc.

Every single one of us knew with 100% certainty that our aunt was with us and had sent the rainbow.
Only she could have pulled it off.

Or something similar to water. And it’s more fun to do so

There is insufficient evidence the red sea was ever magically parted. Just because it's in some book doesn't make it real. I read where Superman was in a book. Is he real too?

And take a glass of good wine, pour it into a glass of water and then compare it to some cheap red wine. I bet you can't tell the difference from just it's looks. They had some really awful wine back then.

Again as the poster pointed out what can god do that we can't do for ourselves?

Catholic schools, Sunday Mass, Jesuits in high school, the whole bit. I was even involved in my church for several years.

But one thing that's been bothering me for a long time is why in the world, if He does exist, He would allow nice people to get horrible diseases and not give them to assholes. I had a nephew who died of cancer in his early forties and a long-time friend who died of pneumonia in her mid-fifties, and I've known a bunch of others. Nice nice people. Meanwhile those fucking repuke assholes who are destroying our country are healthy. What's up with this?

Nature is pretty horrendous on living creatures too. Remember COVID came from nature. The lion has to kill and eat the zebra to live. Wild sheep die at astounding rates (95%) and barely survive past 52 weeks.

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3917862/

This world, natural or man made, is harsh and deadly. I can think of a much less violent and deadly natural process. Why can't god?

We always thank God for touchdowns but we never blame her for fumbles.

There must be at least one religious cult member praying before every game.
Why does God hate my team?

God either set this whole show in motion and is watching it all play out or God very subtle and nudges here and there.

Of course if you believe that God is all powerful and all knowing. Then what God does is kind of beside the point.

God could have created the universe an hour ago and provided the past pre-packaged.

God could be recreating the universe every few minutes at God's whim.

But what evidence do you have for them?

He set the whole thing in motion? Then who set god in motion? Science is still studying how the universe began but so far there is no evidence of any of the hundreds of gods human kind has imagined.

God subtly nudging the universe? What evidence is there of any of god's involvement in anything?

You can't prove anything is 100% real. We can all be living in the Matrix or on someone's computer screen. But we have to start somewhere. We have to assume we share the same reality as it appears just so we can communicate with each other.

Too bad some don’t show their appreciation and use it.

Greatest fundraising ever with no product to have to source or manufacture and nothing to stock to sell. It's all gravy.

Do what the man says, or go to hell.

As far as we know, nobody has ever seen God, unless you count Adam on the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel. Or maybe Adam and Eve, although that seems unclear.

Anyway, people have been praying to gods for a long time. The Egyptians, Romans, Greeks, and others had lots of them. The god of this and the god of that. But nobody claims to have seen any of them. Some of the Roman gods even had Greek equivalents. So how do we know that all these people over the centuries haven't been worshipping the same god, only with different names?

Of course, back in Catholic school I couldn't have asked that.