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My mum went into a coma, her breathing was a horrible gurgling sound, she was rushed to hospital. The doctors said there was nothing they could, do, her lungs were flooding.,she might have days to live.

We called a priest, though none of us had a faith at the time, we thought it was what we should do. As the priest prayed, the gurgling sound disappeared, about ten minutes after the priest left, my mum came round. She lived another eleven years.

My siblings were there at the time, they did not associate her healing with the priest praying. I can only say it had a profound affect for myself and my mum.

EricPH wrote: ↑August 16th, 2022, 3:26 am My mum went into a coma, her breathing was a horrible gurgling sound, she was rushed to hospital. The doctors said there was nothing they could, do, her lungs were flooding.,she might have days to live.

We called a priest, though none of us had a faith at the time, we thought it was what we should do. As the priest prayed, the gurgling sound disappeared, about ten minutes after the priest left, my mum came round. She lived another eleven years.

My siblings were there at the time, they did not associate her healing with the priest praying. I can only say it had a profound affect for myself and my mum.

Understandable. Thanks for sharing. Like your siblings, I would have seen it as coincidence. Correlation or causation?

If you had no faith, why call a priest? It would never have occurred to me in that situation. It seems to me that you were already religiously inclined, but less so than after your mother's surprising recovery.

Sy Borg wrote: ↑August 16th, 2022, 9:05 pm

EricPH wrote: ↑August 16th, 2022, 3:26 am My mum went into a coma, her breathing was a horrible gurgling sound, she was rushed to hospital. The doctors said there was nothing they could, do, her lungs were flooding.,she might have days to live.

We called a priest, though none of us had a faith at the time, we thought it was what we should do. As the priest prayed, the gurgling sound disappeared, about ten minutes after the priest left, my mum came round. She lived another eleven years.

My siblings were there at the time, they did not associate her healing with the priest praying. I can only say it had a profound affect for myself and my mum.

Understandable. Thanks for sharing. Like your siblings, I would have seen it as coincidence. Correlation or causation?

If you had no faith, why call a priest? It would never have occurred to me in that situation. It seems to me that you were already religiously inclined, but less so than after your mother's surprising recovery.

Yet another anecdote that demonstrates the statistical difference between unlikely and impossible.

Sy Borg wrote: ↑August 16th, 2022, 9:05 pm
If you had no faith, why call a priest? It would never have occurred to me in that situation.

My mum was bought up Catholic,, we thought she would have wanted a priest. I had not been to church for about 25 years. My mum had suffered from multiple sclerosis for about twenty years before the coma, and had been paralyzed from the neck down for a few years. There were times she said she wanted to die, she asked us if we could help her to die. This was something we were unable to do.

After the coma, my mum heard what had happened in hospital, she now said she was pleased she had lived. She had a sound mind and seemed to find a profound sense of peace for the last eleven years of her life. I could never understand her faith in God, her kindness and accepting her terrible condition. I will never meet a stronger or kinder person than my mum. She was an inspiration in so many ways.

After seeing what faith In God did for my mum, it lead me to search for God.

EricPH wrote: ↑August 17th, 2022, 11:56 am

Sy Borg wrote: ↑August 16th, 2022, 9:05 pm
If you had no faith, why call a priest? It would never have occurred to me in that situation.

My mum was bought up Catholic,, we thought she would have wanted a priest. I had not been to church for about 25 years. My mum had suffered from multiple sclerosis for about twenty years before the coma, and had been paralyzed from the neck down for a few years. There were times she said she wanted to die, she asked us if we could help her to die. This was something we were unable to do.

After the coma, my mum heard what had happened in hospital, she now said she was pleased she had lived. She had a sound mind and seemed to find a profound sense of peace for the last eleven years of her life. I could never understand her faith in God, her kindness and accepting her terrible condition. I will never meet a stronger or kinder person than my mum. She was an inspiration in so many ways.

After seeing what faith In God did for my mum, it lead me to search for God.

My Mum was a Catholic too; her bedroom was a riot of crosses, rosaries, pictures of White Jesus and other paraphernalia. It still would not have occurred to me to call a priest, unless she asked for one, and she died too quickly (mercifully) for that.

Pretty amazing that your mother could enjoy the last decade as a quadriplegic. I would definitely want out in that situation. It seems to me that she would have had some peak experiences/NDEs while in hospital.

God is not an enormous man in the sky. God is the creator of physics. Now, contemplate the "being" or "thing" that could create such a thing, such miraculous order and beauty and strangeness, and the Revelation of God will begin to approach.

Sy,

The placebo effect is well-documented. Online educators will know far more than I do. The placebo effect is the reason why researchers go to the trouble of conducting double blind tests.

My focus is purely on the capability and where it arises from, in that context, placebo is largely irrelevant, as it is only the catalyst, not the cause.

BrianKingofTrolls wrote: ↑August 17th, 2022, 10:47 pm God is not an enormous man in the sky. God is the creator of physics. Now, contemplate the "being" or "thing" that could create such a thing, such miraculous order and beauty and strangeness, and the Revelation of God will begin to approach.

The creation is, as you say, ordered and beautiful.The enormous display of order and beauty is created by men and our need for making order out of chaos. No doubt other animals make order out of chaos in their own ways. Some men experience no order or beauty during their entire lives and are literally unable to see what they have never experienced.

If all men ceased all at once the display of order and beauty would cease to exist in the temporal sense. Order and beauty would be eternal only i.e.unmanifested as separate consciousnesses. Eternity is defined as , not sequential time, but absolute time .

Sy Borg wrote: ↑August 17th, 2022, 8:32 pm Pretty amazing that your mother could enjoy the last decade as a quadriplegic. .

Enjoy is possibly the wrong word, she seemed to accept her condition, and she seemed at peace.

. It seems to me that she would have had some peak experiences/NDEs while in hospital

We helped her understand she'd had a near death experience. We said the doctors could do nothing and she had days to live. We told her about the priest praying for her, and how she responded. I guess that reinforced her faith in God.

EricPH wrote: ↑August 18th, 2022, 11:53 am

Sy Borg wrote: ↑August 17th, 2022, 8:32 pm Pretty amazing that your mother could enjoy the last decade as a quadriplegic. .

Enjoy is possibly the wrong word, she seemed to accept her condition, and she seemed at peace.

. It seems to me that she would have had some peak experiences/NDEs while in hospital

We helped her understand she'd had a near death experience. We said the doctors could do nothing and she had days to live. We told her about the priest praying for her, and how she responded. I guess that reinforced her faith in God.

There have been some remarkable anecdotes of dying people being healed, physically or mentally, after an NDE. That takes some explaining, but nothing has been verified.

Having had peak experiences (which can be similar in some ways to NDEs), I can understand why people would interpret it as God. When one feels enveloped in unconditional love, it's only natural to wonder who is doing all that apparent loving and understanding. If nothing else, these experiences reveal the potential of the brain, of the mind, to experience extraordinary states. If not for the many exigencies of life, transcendent states of mind might have been normal. Sadly, anyone lost in self-contained bliss in nature (or the human world, for that matter) is a potential victim.

No wonder so many faiths see life on Earth as a prison, a harsh education or even Hell (and for some, it no doubt is).

Hi Sy, you look to science for answers, I believe and trust in God for an answer. In times of worry, fear and anxiety, I find a profound sense of peace that is beyond my understanding.

I dont see faith in God as a prison, but rather as a comfort and support through the hardship of life.

EricPH wrote: ↑August 19th, 2022, 3:39 am Hi Sy, you look to science for answers, I believe and trust in God for an answer. In times of worry, fear and anxiety, I find a profound sense of peace that is beyond my understanding.

I dont see faith in God as a prison, but rather as a comfort and support through the hardship of life.

Really, I look to anything for answers, be it science, art, mysticism - whatever it takes.

I start most inquiries with science because I have massive respect for the efforts of the many geniuses who, collectively, created out bodies of knowledge. I see no reason to disregard such a resource.

However, science doesn't have answers for everything. I myself believe in God, but my conception is different. I see God as a purely subjective entity, not a creator. Hence, many report a personal connection with God, but no hint of God has ever been found by testing objective reality.

For thousands, maybe millions, of years humans have considered overpowering natural phenomena as gods, or a god. For millions of years, conceptions of God have shaped the brains of humans. These people lived in a time when gods were ostensibly real. A generation or two of rationalist positivism does not cancel out this vast evolutionary chain of belief. So, Richard Dawkins will have God in his brain as much as anyone else, just that he only ever accesses it indirectly through his love of nature.

When one is in dire straits in life, we all have this subjective God to draw upon, if we choose. And let's not forget that other great salve for the soul in dark times - philosophy! In a personal sense, Marcus Aurelius and Albert Camus have helped make my life more peaceful. On a collective level, Plato, Aristotle, Kant and Hume made great contributions.

Sy,

Hence, many report a personal connection with God, but no hint of God has ever been found by testing objective reality.

I find this a bit presumptuous because it assumes that God, who purportedly is a spirit, would want to be found that way. The entire thrust of most religions (or spiritual practices) is that God is something that is found in the heart or spirit. And belief is related to personal growth and other character developments/progressiveness - Faith is the objective, not proof. So when we try to examine God in an empirical sense, we completely lose sight of the whole purpose.

I do not believe that God is to be found so as to say, "this fact proves he/she/it exists". But rather to say that we have found God through belief and personal growth. As far as I see things, we have frameworks and precedents established in different scriptures. If those standards are met through personal experience or circumstances etc., I think that an individual has a valid reason to believe what they do. That said, establishing which God is the 'true' one, is another kettle of fish altogether.

Fanman wrote: ↑August 28th, 2022, 5:15 am That said, establishing which God is the 'true' one, is another kettle of fish altogether.

No matter what God anyone thinks they prays to, the same God hears all our prayers. The greater challenge is, how do we get on with each other despite all our differences?

Why not believe in God when it is impossible to disprove?