The Problem of Evil Disproves an All-Loving, All-Powerful God

To the Pro, and the readers, I apologize if it is hard to follow which of Pros points I am debating. I was running out of room & needed to down size. Pro for your rebuttal please label paragraphs so we don't have to recite/quote entire lines. Thank you. I admit that Pro holds a extremely valid point, But now I would like to ask Pro this, How well do you know god? Do you both go out on the weekend & have a few beers? My point I am trying to make is that no one knows gods true limitations. We have seen what he can do thus far, but we have not seen what he can't do. Who is to say that god could not have made a perfect earth? In fact he did when he had created the heavens, We are mortals, how are we to know what gods big picture is? Con then states: "The problem with this is that it implies a limit to God's power. An omnipotent God would be entirely capable of causing life to flourish without the necessity of tiny organisms or plate tectonics." Which in turn brings me back to the previous rebuttal. Pro repeatedly assumes that because our world is not perfect, god is not omnipotent. For Pro to be able to prove his theory he would need to prove to all of us that he knows god as well as his own son. Resorting to my last point who is to say that God can not? Maybe it is within his grand plan, but I have realized that Pro & many others like him need facts. Which is why I go on to say again that god wants man to choose between good & evil. Pro has not defined what he believes evil is so I will state my beliefs; Evil is some one that can watch something die with no emotion, to be completely numbed to the act of killing. Evil is a mother that drowns her children in the bathtub, a man that tortures captives just to listen to them scream. And finally evil can be anything that causes another to act out wrongful deeds. I realize I could have simply searched among the dictionary for the definition, but I feel like it would not have the same impact as some of the examples I have listed above. The Christian view point is that if you believe in God the almighty, and that his son Jesus Christ died for our sins. You repent & are truly sorry for what you had done, you too can achieve immortality through Jesus Christ. The key into heaven is believing, but you will be blessed for your good deeds. And lastly if you do believe in the lord, you are more than likely a follower of his ways trying to achieve as many acts as good as you can. Pro and I then dispute if man is capable of free will, And what free will is. I cede to the fact that all of our choices come from an outside influence. A man who is forced to steal to feed his family is a prime example of this. But where our viewpoints differ is that free will does exist. If a child grows up in a family that loves basketball. It is his free will to choose if he does or not. Yes his choice is going to be influenced by his family and others who may enjoy the game. But in the end it is his choice, you can spin it so many ways but in the end it is if you want to accept it. I cede with Pros view that even if the bible is accurate, it is impossible to judge how accurate it actually is. I quote Pro; "In the same way, if I published a science textbook in which the last 150 pages were from "Alice in Wonderland, the credibility of the scientific claims would not carry over to the fictional ones." This is a very valid fact that Pro contests which we all must think about (When I first read that I busted out laughing). Last night I was watching South Park. It was the one where Towlie posed as a man so that he could publish his book. He then was invited on Oprah's book show, and it was nominated book of the month. Minge, we will say is a close partner of Oprah's, revealed that Towlie was not a man but a Towel. The people had then began to protest. The book had helped so many people with their lives & now they have found out that it was written by a towel. Oprah then said "It does not matter that it had been written by a towel because it had helped so many people with their lives." The point I am making here for those that didn't follow the story is that even if some of the things within the bible had been fabricated, it still proves to make peoples lives better. What is so wrong with that? For my final point I go on to quote Kyle Broflovski (South Park, Episode Imagination land); "Some of these characters in here are just as real as you & me. Hell some are even more real than us because when we die, they will live forever." The term Christianity is to bold of a term for this debate. Because different Christians have different views in which they go by. For example; (1) "Mormon teachings about heaven include the thought that when you die, you are resurrected as a spirit creature and judged according to the deeds you performed on earth. Mormon beliefs include three separate types of kingdoms or what they refer to as degrees of glory. This includes the celestial kingdom; this is the highest degree of glory and is reserved for those who accept Jesus as their savior, live according to his gospel and their teachings. There is also the terrestrial kingdom; this is for people who refuse to accept the gospel of Jesus Christ but who live good or honorable lives apart from these beliefs. And the third part of Mormon beliefs about heaven is the telestial kingdom; those who continue in their sins and do not repent until after they have died. (2) While in roman Catholicism "If it were true that going about doing good deeds gets one into Heaven (or to be more accurate, makes one an heir to God's kingdom), then human beings would be perfectly capable of saving themselves. Some other way than weighing us solely on our merits is needed; we believe that way is in Christ." The two religions all though both Christian do hold different beliefs. My point to the comparison and to answer Pros contentions is to show that those that are more unlikely to pass the judgment day can fall into a different type of heaven. This all depends on what religion we are debating. For those that are religious & are following this debate, I do not mean to discredit anyone's religion by showing contractions. I might as well ask Pro "Why Do we exist at all then? God wants us to bond & grow and ultimately get closer to him. He wants us to prove ourselves worthy enough to sit within his kingdom. Would the USMC be the same if they just let anyone in? No it wouldn't you have to work hard to achieve what you want, to be considered the best. To call yourself a United States Marine, the USMC prides itself upon excellence and that is why they are seen all over the world as the best. The same can be said for reaching heaven. I understand what Con is saying and it does raise the question as to why some countries are flourishing and others are suffering. This is just a theory as to why that might be happening seeing how I do not have an answer to that question. My theory is this, Let us take the US, When the US was founded it was mostly about religion. Until recently we had "In God We Trust" printed among our currency & followed the teachings of god even if subtle. Look at the US today we are in a better standing than a majority of countries. Now let us look at the Middle East a majority of those countries are Muslim in nature & follow the Qu'Ran. Who is to say that they are not suffering? Its a question that can't be answered but only assumed but it does hold rationality to its logic. I agree but the same could be said for if your friend had ran in & told you he won $10,000 at the casino. Yes you are more likely to believe the cheeseburger than the money but in the end all though unlikely it is feasible. Website References: (1) http://ezinearticles.com... (2) http://everything2.com...