A Final thought on Philosophy for my Final Exam

Dee’s Philosophical Statement

You ask me if I believe in the God than an adult would believe in. I un-doubtably say yes. Without hesitation I will assign myself to a group referred to as “believers.” I am proud of this. I am comfortable and assured that my answer to the question of the existence of God is correct.
Philosophy is not a topic that comes to me with great ease. It is a challenge for me to wrap my mind around what many of the topics the philosophers in the anthology test have discussed. However, I do believe that I have enough of an understanding to make an educated statement as to whether or not God exists.
What is the God I believe in? I believe in a God who is and always has been Being. From Thomas’s third way we find that God, a non-contingent Being, is the source of which all contingent beings rely on. This means that the God I believe in was always there. God has been around, and been Being from the beginning of time. Time is a concept based on the expansion of the human mind. Time is a concept that humans created to give a framework to the things that were happening in the course of their lives. However, I digress.
Many anthropologists define culture as a system of beliefs and practices that a certain group of people in one place clings to. It, culture, is a survival mechanism. Just as time was created to answer the unknown, God is there to be an answer to the things than happen in life that are due to no reason or cause-other than that it happened because of God.
What is religion? To me religion is something that humans use to create a structure for the beliefs a group of people hold-to have the answers and theology in one place. I am a religious person- a Presbyterian; however, it has always been my opinion that one does NOT have to be religious to believe in God. I am a Christian. Many Christians I know have told me that it is part of my job as a Christian to prove to others that my religion is the best religion for someone to believe in. In my personal opinion, NO ONE should believe inn a religion. They should believe in God, the basis for which the religion was created. What makes one religion better than another? Honestly, I have no idea. Is it really in my place to say that the religion that I associate myself with is the best? I think not.
In my personal beliefs, I stand by the fact that God, religion and morality all go hand in hand with each other. Because I am a Comparative Religion major, I have come to the realization that the three main monotheistic religions of Judaism, Christianity, and Islam all believe in the same basic concepts. With this same the thought process, I arrive at stating that because of all cultures having some set of beliefs, morals are universal. The God that is a trunk for all religions is tied into human morals.
It is in the US that church and state be completely separated. If this is so, our governmental framework needs to be thrown in the trash. Most of the laws that the American government holds are very close to the Ten Commandments that the Judeo-Christian tradition share and try to live by. These laws, to me, are morals.
Morality is stated as the degree of humanness that someone person contains. Is morality just a characteristic of humanity, or is it more? I am not certain of the fact if it is more, but I am fairly certain that God created morality to be part of the being-ness of humans. Human beings are a part of nature correct? In Thomas’s fifth way and in the teleological argument on the existence of God we see that it seems that there is some order behind nature that guides it. In this alone, we see a philosophical experts proof that God, who created the laws, which govern the word, may possibly exist.
In the framework of my mind I believe that someone who does not believe in God is missing out. One who doesn’t even believe in the possibility of God existing is truly a fool. In my defense I will say that St. Anselm in his ontological argument on the existence of God states that the fool believes that the thought of God being real is nothing more than an idea. Something that only exists in thought. Something that has no concrete foundation in the reality of the world. Anselm argues that God is that than which nothing greater can be thought. It is not that God is out greatest idea, but that our greatest idea is God. The fool says that God does not exist outside of out thoughts. However, if the fool was thinking about God, isn’t that the greatest idea and therefore hasn’t God influenced the fools thinking by the fool just thinking about God? I think so. The anthology also mentions something about a lost island. The downside of the ontological argument is that it does not realize that God is Being itself. The idea of an island being larger and more plentiful than any other does not hold for it presuppose God as a supreme being, rather than God as Being itself.
In the world in which I love in, I see that many, many people do not believe in God. I would say that this is because of all the evil that goes on in the world. With all the war, poverty, child slavery, and wrong doing that occurs on a daily basis, how can this be a world that was created by the God of goodness-how can this exist? A classmate of mine, in dialogue once said that when discussing the element of evil, he argues that there is no such thing as real evil. Simply, evil does not exist. However, I do not take this same train of thinking. Call me a realist, but bad things do happen in the world. Friends of mine have died in car crashes, friends have been diagnosed with cancer, relatives of mine have died in wars, and my own father had an affair with my friends (ex friends) mother. However, on this dour note, I stand by the idea that God would not have created an element of evil that He could not have power over. Although this claim has not been supported by any mastermind philosopher or theologian, I believe it should be considered. If God could not recon with the evil in the world how could friends of mine wake up completely healthy after nine months in a coma, or friends of mine survive cancer, or myself be given a chance at life when my birth mother could just as easily had an abortion? An existent God is my answer. Maybe God is creating evil in the world, until everyone in the world, no matter what race, ethnicity or religion believes that He, God, is real and is there.
On one of the first days of this class we were told that just because something isn’t pictureable does not mean it is not real. Gravity cannot be pictured or drawn but it is, for a fact, real. The Christians have a picture of Jesus, the son of God-the Jews have no picture of God. The power of God is not pictureable, but I believed that God is there, and in fact, real. The love and belief I have for the God I believe in cannot be pictured, but let me assure you-it is there. It is real.