Redjake

A couple of things come to mind here - this explains the whole situation for me better than anything I've seen:

Suppose we have the following four premises, which the Bible and most other bibles assume and/or preach:
1. God is omnipotent.
2. God is omnibenevolent.
3. God is omniscient.
4. Evil exists.

Why does evil exist????????

See? It just doesn't add up. Why does God allow for evil to exist? He is either a sick bastard and likes to watch us suffer, or he is not all-powerful. Simple as that. If He isn't all-powerful, He isn't a god.

Why does shit like this happen?

Was it really necessary to kill 225,000 people? Does God have a taste for the theatrics? A bit of the old ultraviolence? Jesus. (pun not intended)

God is a scapegoat. God has a reason for everything, people! Those two hundred thousand died for a reason, we may not understand it, but they all drowned because of a divine reason. By the way, the reason you won the lottery is because God was looking after you (and apparently not everyone else?). The reason your dog was ran over is because it was his time to go - no questions asked. The reason your church was burned to the ground was because God wanted you to rebuild it and become stronger. How come the preacher didn't win the lottery to make 20 churches to further the word of God? Because it's aaaaall part of the plan.

The plan is some fucked up shit - it's all chance. The dog got run over because he jumped in front of the car at the wrong time, the two hundred thousand folks drowned because of a natural phenomenon that caught them in the wrong place at the wrong time, the church burnt down because someone lit it on fire, and you won the lottery because someone has to.

All of this is the reason it's quite easy to ignore the infinite possibilities of God existing.

If there truly is a God, and he likes to watch us suffer, then I'd rather pretend He isn't real.

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Off the record, on the q.t., and very hush-hush.