[Peace-discuss] Bellicose rhetoric???

[Bob Illyes]

I give up. I see that the bellicose rhetoric thread has become the God 
thread. Incidentally, all of the birds are in my yard, so don't get 
paranoid about the void in other parts of town. We even had a finch 
yesterday, which was rather late in the season for them.

When I was age 11 or so, having been told that God created the universe, I 
asked my mother who had created God. "God created himself", she answered, 
rather annoyed at my question.

Arbitrarily claiming that the universe as a whole requires a creator leads 
to infinite regress, as implied by my question to my mother (I didn't know 
the term "infinite regress" at the time, or I would have REALLY annoyed 
her). Arbitrarily claiming that God does not require a creator is no more 
satisfying than claiming that the universe doesn't require a creator.

But more importantly, it is not a question of any practical application. 
The practical question is not "who created the universe?" but rather "is 
there a personal god?". This can be answered only by the sort of personal 
experience that John just mentioned.

I just see that Laurie has replied to my Obama thread, so I was overly 
hasty in putting up the white flag.....

Bob