I am currently in the gap between believing in God/Jesus Heaven and Hell and not.?

If God created us then why is there proof of Human Evolution? (Do not say the Devil made that or I will facepalm into oblivion, be sure to elaborate if that's the case) But then again what put that there if Evolution did happen? But what put God there for him to make us? You can say that God is all things or whatever some of you may say but elaborate PLEASE. I've been seeing testimonies on Youtube about people going to Hell and things like that but are any of them true? Sometimes the testimonies are somewhat similar but sometimes they are completely different. Any ideas on God Heaven and Hell/ the things I have addressed?

imacatholic22013-06-01T12:56:38Z

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Do not let the small groups of Atheists and Creationists make you believe that you have to choose between God and humanity's ongoing discovery of God's Creation through Science. This is not true.

Most Jews and Christians do not take the stories of creation in the Bible literally. We believe the stories included in first 11 chapters of Genesis tell religious truth but not necessarily historical fact.

One of the religious truths is that God created everything and declared all was good.

Catholics can believe in the theories of the big bang or evolution or both or neither.

On August 12, 1950 Pope Pius XII said in his encyclical Humani generis:

The Teaching Authority of the Church does not forbid that, in conformity with the present state of human sciences and sacred theology, research and discussions, on the part of men experienced in both fields, take place with regard to the doctrine of evolution, in as far as it inquires into the origin of the human body as coming from pre-existent and living matter - for the Catholic faith obliges us to hold that souls are immediately created by God.

Here is the complete encyclical: http://www.vatican.va/holy_father/pius_xii/encyclicals/documents/hf_p-xii_enc_12081950_humani-generis_en.html

And here is the Address of Pope John Paul II to the Pontifical Academy of Sciences on October 22, 1996 speaking of the Theory of Evolution: http://www.newadvent.org/library/docs_jp02tc.htm

Here is an interesting article about Pope John Paul II's opinion in the matter: http://www.americamagazine.org/content/article.cfm?article_id=4627

The Church supports science in the discovery of God's creation. At this time, the big bang and evolution are the most logical scientific explanations.

As long as we believe that God started the whole thing, both the Bible and responsible modern science can live in harmony.

Here is a nice list of Christian thinkers in science: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Christian_thinkers_in_science

The Clergy Letter Project an open letter endorsing the Theory of Evolution signed by over 12,000 clergy from many different Christian denominations: http://theclergyletterproject.org/

I suggest you read "New Proofs for the Existence of God: Contributions of Contemporary Physics and Philosophy" by Robert J. Spitzer http://www.amazon.com/New-Proofs-Existence-God-Contributions/dp/0802863833

http://www.magisreasonfaith.org/

With love in Christ.

Mr. Bodhisattva2013-06-01T07:22:13Z

I am not religious. I think that traditional views of God are extensions of extremely strict fathers from ancient times. Still it does not follow that the fact of evolution means no God. It means that our creation happened slower than we thought. God would be at least the age of the universe. What is a few billion years?

What put the universe here? I don't know. What put God here? I don't know.

You bring up pantheism in the thought that God is all things. I think that makes the most sense. Particle physics shows that subatomic particles behave this way if observed and that way if not. They are as if they are the same entities if they interact with each other or if they come close to absolute zero. It takes a mind to create and everything is everything. It is what the eastern ancients have said centuries before Jesus. How did they know? Some of them had the luxury of sitting under trees for days on end taking a look at the world. They could scrap aside worry, guilt and depression and just take a look. Maybe we should listen to those from a less hustle and bustle world.

What ever you can imagine, you can find as testimonies on You Tube. I love the site but it is hardly reliable authority on this or any subject.

capitalgentleman2013-06-01T08:11:54Z

God exists. There is lots of proof.

Evolution exists. There is lots of proof.

Taking those two facts, many believe that God has a hand in Evolution somehow, a thing called "Intelligent Design." However, no-one is quite sure how that all works. It just makes logical sense, as both God, and Evolution are both real.

Moses asked God about some of this, and the answer was that God always was/is/will be. In fact, that's what God's name (YHWH) actually means. Do, nothing created God - God always existed.

There are many ideas regarding Hell. The Bible basically says it is just death, not an actual place, as "the dead are nothing." But, some envision it as an actual place, and some claim to have been there. Psychologists have other ideas about near death experiences. E.g., if the Bible has that Hell is not a place, but, there is a popular image of Hell, why is it these people's visions of Hell matches the popular image, and not the Biblical one?

There is a LOT to this stuff! That God exists you don't need to be in doubt about. But, anything after that can be topics of a lot of discussions.

Trevor2013-06-01T07:17:05Z

There is no proof of human evolution, just small portions of skulls aligned in a way that looks suggestive. The skulls are usually aligned in size. Evolution? Or just baby ape, mummy ape, daddy ape, baby human, mummy human, daddy human (to pinch an analogy from Goldilocks).

Notice you did not see the first ape (skull) give birth to any decendants, so you have no proof that it had any children at all.

I suggest that all these skull remains died at the same time during a flood, which is why they were fossilised or preserved, they were rapidly buried.

"But what put God there for him to make us?" God is spirit, and is eternal, so he was not born/created and will never die.

It does not surprise me that your doubts about God stem from your beliefs about Evolution. It does not surprise God either, which is why he put a prophecy about these times in the Bible (2 Peter 3:3-8)

Jay2013-06-01T07:07:17Z

You seem to be on the right path.

The thing about personal testimony is that you have to understand that people from different religions claim to have experienced different things that reaffirm their religions.

Personal testimony alone is not sufficient evidence to believe in something as grand as god/devil/heaven/hell. Especially when the testimony varies from individual to individual.

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