Are You Religious?

[ManipulatorGeneral]

My contribution to this discussion: there is literally no such thing as good or evil.

Then I certainly want to trot out this response and see what you think: if there is no such thing as good or evil, then all God's policies and actions the New Atheist posse are so fond of demonizing cannot truly be wrong. I find that either objective morals must exist or objective condemnations of God are entirely baseless. I can also argue along the following lines: the conclusion "there is no God" following from "evil exists" suggests that evil does not exist, which is an irreconcilable self-contradiction unless there is a means by which objective evil can exist without God.

Markus: My view on Epicurus' questions is that God is able and willing to prevent evil, but allows it to occur for the time being to permit free choice between the two; eventually, evil will be eliminated. If God were to eliminate all possibility of evil in the world right now or whenever it happened, we would all be dead, and nobody really wants that; God mercifully waits and allows us to repent instead. In contrast to the opposing opinions about the nature of omnibenevolence, I do not find it reasonable that an omnibenevolent God would force humans to choose Him and live in His presence for eternity. James, Markus, tensorpudding, et al, is that something you would want God to do? The only logical alternative is to permit evil to exist.

I've had some decent debate over the last couple days, so I'm riding on that high...I quite liked writing this here.