"God has a plan"

[Anonymous]

I am (marginally) Catholic. I find it hard to believe that the whole world just appeared from nothing, and that no intelligence was necessary to create it. I converted as an adult but have of late become a spiritual recidivist, backsliding into the agnosticism of my youth and early 20's as I cope with secondary infertility and a child with fairly severe ADHD. I HATE when people say "God has a plan for you." To my ears, it sounds like predeterminism and I firmly do not believe in that. That has never been my conception of God. When people to say this to me, I think they are nuts. That kind of talk sounds like God decided to make me infertile and give me a child with special needs, while the drug addicts and child abusers in my area seem capable of procreating like rabbits based on all of the ads entreating people to foster this growing population of kids. If God is really that involved in our lives, determining what will happen to each of us and when, why the hell would he do this? It defies the intelligence and logic that I believe are a necessary component of creating a world like ours.

So I guess my question is, WHY do people believe in this "God has a plan" stuff? What are they trying to convey when they say it? IME, Catholics will say things like "look to God for strength and guidance," but not "God has a plan." However these days neither camp is working for me. Lately I'm more of the opinion that God exists but is a pure intelligence - a force of biological creation - that is indifferent to the fate of mankind.

[Anonymous]

Have you thought about counseling for the emotional toll your infertility is having on you? This post doesn't really sound like it is about God or religion in my opinion.

[Anonymous]

This is what people have to tell themselves to weather bad things, to believe there is some point to their suffering. Personally, I don't buy it either. When people say this to you, you are supposed to accept your infertility as part of some larger, greater scheme and be ok with it. It is supposed to make you feel better, that this isn't random bad luck. Personally, I'd rather believe in random bad luck than that the one being who is supposed to love me and everyone else more than anything allowed/caused some of my bad stuff to happen, but that's just me. I'm sorry things are difficult for you right now.

[Anonymous]

Maybe God does have a plan, it is just a very fucked up, shitty one?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Have you thought about counseling for the emotional toll your infertility is having on you? This post doesn't really sound like it is about God or religion in my opinion.

Yes. DCUM is so predictable. Therapy as the first suggestion and of course you don't mean what you say.

Regardless of your opinion, yes, I am asking a question about the nature of God, which I think is a normal reaction to having a large amount of poo dropped in your lap.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:This is what people have to tell themselves to weather bad things, to believe there is some point to their suffering. Personally, I don't buy it either. When people say this to you, you are supposed to accept your infertility as part of some larger, greater scheme and be ok with it. It is supposed to make you feel better, that this isn't random bad luck. Personally, I'd rather believe in random bad luck than that the one being who is supposed to love me and everyone else more than anything allowed/caused some of my bad stuff to happen, but that's just me. I'm sorry things are difficult for you right now.

Thanks, PP. And the bolded is EXACTLY how I feel. If God is love, I'm sure as shit not feeling loved right now. My other favorite is "God doesn't give us more than we can handle." I'm begging to differ at the moment.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Have you thought about counseling for the emotional toll your infertility is having on you? This post doesn't really sound like it is about God or religion in my opinion.

Yes. DCUM is so predictable. Therapy as the first suggestion and of course you don't mean what you say.

Regardless of your opinion, yes, I am asking a question about the nature of God, which I think is a normal reaction to having a large amount of poo dropped in your lap.

Well, to me the question sounds like you have a lot of anger towards other people that are able to easily reproduce or who have typical children and you aren't finding the answers you need in "God's plan". And since "God's plan" is not giving you comfort or answers right now, try counseling. Your post spoke more to that anger than to questions about religion.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Have you thought about counseling for the emotional toll your infertility is having on you? This post doesn't really sound like it is about God or religion in my opinion.

Yes. DCUM is so predictable. Therapy as the first suggestion and of course you don't mean what you say.

Regardless of your opinion, yes, I am asking a question about the nature of God, which I think is a normal reaction to having a large amount of poo dropped in your lap.

Well, to me the question sounds like you have a lot of anger towards other people that are able to easily reproduce or who have typical children and you aren't finding the answers you need in "God's plan". And since "God's plan" is not giving you comfort or answers right now, try counseling. Your post spoke more to that anger than to questions about religion.

Your opinion, that's fine. Moving on now to the actual discussion I initiated, please.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I am (marginally) Catholic. I find it hard to believe that the whole world just appeared from nothing, and that no intelligence was necessary to create it. I converted as an adult but have of late become a spiritual recidivist, backsliding into the agnosticism of my youth and early 20's as I cope with secondary infertility and a child with fairly severe ADHD. I HATE when people say "God has a plan for you." To my ears, it sounds like predeterminism and I firmly do not believe in that. That has never been my conception of God. When people to say this to me, I think they are nuts. That kind of talk sounds like God decided to make me infertile and give me a child with special needs, while the drug addicts and child abusers in my area seem capable of procreating like rabbits based on all of the ads entreating people to foster this growing population of kids. If God is really that involved in our lives, determining what will happen to each of us and when, why the hell would he do this? It defies the intelligence and logic that I believe are a necessary component of creating a world like ours.

So I guess my question is, WHY do people believe in this "God has a plan" stuff? What are they trying to convey when they say it? IME, Catholics will say things like "look to God for strength and guidance," but not "God has a plan." However these days neither camp is working for me. Lately I'm more of the opinion that God exists but is a pure intelligence - a force of biological creation - that is indifferent to the fate of mankind.

Platitudes like "God has a plan," "God won't throw more at you than He knows you can handle," "God works in mysterious ways," etc. are all intended to help people deal with the bad things that happen to them and in the world. If God is omnipotent and omniscient, then He must have some reason for causing/allowing such terrible things to happen. If that reason is not part of some benevolent, but ineffable, Plan, then God is a jerk, at best, because He knows something bad is going to happen, has the power to prevent or at least mitigate it, and chooses not to, or He's a sadist.

As the scale of our Universe (and numerous new theories proposing a "multiverse") becomes clearer, it becomes more and more difficult to consider that an entity responsible for creating all of it would even notice, let alone care about, some primitive, ape-descended life forms on an utterly insignificant little blue-green planet orbiting a small, unregarded yellow sun, far out in the uncharted backwaters of the unfashionable end of the Western Spiral arm of the Milky Way Galaxy.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I am (marginally) Catholic. I find it hard to believe that the whole world just appeared from nothing, and that no intelligence was necessary to create it. I converted as an adult but have of late become a spiritual recidivist, backsliding into the agnosticism of my youth and early 20's as I cope with secondary infertility and a child with fairly severe ADHD. I HATE when people say "God has a plan for you." To my ears, it sounds like predeterminism and I firmly do not believe in that. That has never been my conception of God. When people to say this to me, I think they are nuts. That kind of talk sounds like God decided to make me infertile and give me a child with special needs, while the drug addicts and child abusers in my area seem capable of procreating like rabbits based on all of the ads entreating people to foster this growing population of kids. If God is really that involved in our lives, determining what will happen to each of us and when, why the hell would he do this? It defies the intelligence and logic that I believe are a necessary component of creating a world like ours.

So I guess my question is, WHY do people believe in this "God has a plan" stuff? What are they trying to convey when they say it? IME, Catholics will say things like "look to God for strength and guidance," but not "God has a plan." However these days neither camp is working for me. Lately I'm more of the opinion that God exists but is a pure intelligence - a force of biological creation - that is indifferent to the fate of mankind.

OP, you are asking some very intelligent questions here. I am Christian but not Catholic and will provide my POV from that perspective.

First, please understand that when people make statements like this, they are not trying to dismiss your pain. This is just one of those clumsy things that people say when they want to say something to help, but know that no words really can. I know it's grating and hits a horrible hot spot with you, but please try to have a little compassion.

As I'm sure you know, God never promised us a perfect or an easy life. We all have our share of misery, pain and misfortune. What God did promise is that He is with us through those times and that "all things work together" for those that love the Lord and are called according to His purpose. To me, this means that it is actually irrelevant to God if we have no children or fifty - He still calls us to follow Him through Jesus. All of us, and all of our children, are broken in some way -- ADHD or something else. No one gets a pass on the problems of life.

BUT the good news is that these problems, illnesses, hardships, periods of unemployment, depression, addictions, etc etc etc can be used by God to redeem us and to witness His word and His way here on earth. I don't believe that God singled you out for secondary infertility, or your child with ADHD. These things are just factors of life in the less-than-perfect world we live in. But He can use them, and you, for good -- if you will let Him.

[Anonymous]

I think people are trying to be comforting in the absence of anything else to say.

If you had become pregnant and delivered a healthy child, how do you suppose you would feel about attributing it to God's plan for you or as an answer to your prayers?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I think people are trying to be comforting in the absence of anything else to say.

If you had become pregnant and delivered a healthy child, how do you suppose you would feel about attributing it to God's plan for you or as an answer to your prayers?

I wouldn't. To be honest, I don't believe in "God's plan for me" nor do I believe that he answers our prayers by giving us what we want like a parent buys a child a toy. I think God can provide us with guidance but does not intervene in direct ways like that.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I am (marginally) Catholic. I find it hard to believe that the whole world just appeared from nothing, and that no intelligence was necessary to create it. I converted as an adult but have of late become a spiritual recidivist, backsliding into the agnosticism of my youth and early 20's as I cope with secondary infertility and a child with fairly severe ADHD. I HATE when people say "God has a plan for you." To my ears, it sounds like predeterminism and I firmly do not believe in that. That has never been my conception of God. When people to say this to me, I think they are nuts. That kind of talk sounds like God decided to make me infertile and give me a child with special needs, while the drug addicts and child abusers in my area seem capable of procreating like rabbits based on all of the ads entreating people to foster this growing population of kids. If God is really that involved in our lives, determining what will happen to each of us and when, why the hell would he do this? It defies the intelligence and logic that I believe are a necessary component of creating a world like ours.

So I guess my question is, WHY do people believe in this "God has a plan" stuff? What are they trying to convey when they say it? IME, Catholics will say things like "look to God for strength and guidance," but not "God has a plan." However these days neither camp is working for me. Lately I'm more of the opinion that God exists but is a pure intelligence - a force of biological creation - that is indifferent to the fate of mankind.

OP, you are asking some very intelligent questions here. I am Christian but not Catholic and will provide my POV from that perspective.

First, please understand that when people make statements like this, they are not trying to dismiss your pain. This is just one of those clumsy things that people say when they want to say something to help, but know that no words really can. I know it's grating and hits a horrible hot spot with you, but please try to have a little compassion.

As I'm sure you know, God never promised us a perfect or an easy life. We all have our share of misery, pain and misfortune. What God did promise is that He is with us through those times and that "all things work together" for those that love the Lord and are called according to His purpose. To me, this means that it is actually irrelevant to God if we have no children or fifty - He still calls us to follow Him through Jesus. All of us, and all of our children, are broken in some way -- ADHD or something else. No one gets a pass on the problems of life.

BUT the good news is that these problems, illnesses, hardships, periods of unemployment, depression, addictions, etc etc etc can be used by God to redeem us and to witness His word and His way here on earth. I don't believe that God singled you out for secondary infertility, or your child with ADHD. These things are just factors of life in the less-than-perfect world we live in. But He can use them, and you, for good -- if you will let Him.

This is basically what my friend said. And again, it doesn't sit with me, because I am Type A, and I believe in my own power to get shit done, and I don't want to be "used" by God to make some sort of point about the meaning of the world or life or whatever. I hear what you are saying, and I appreciate it, but as I think more and more about it I just think that the religious notion of God no longer makes any sense to me.

[Anonymous]

I'm a lapsed Catholic and not really a "God has a plan person." That being said, when I hear it, I take it to mean that the situations presented to us help shape who we are and even so-called tragedies can present either opportunities for growth or opportunities to make a contribution. I think about people who have lost children and are able to start charities to find cures for diseases or stop pedophiles or comfort those who experienced similar tragedy.

I see it more as everyone has something to offer regardless of what life hands you. You will have a certain strength and perspective that others don't.

There's also other ways of looking at your situation. Though you may not be able to physically have another child, you could adopt.

How we cope with life's difficulties is an important part of it. I found helping those less fortunate and traveling abroad - particularly to Africa - have helped me escape my past bouts of despair. People there have unimaginable hardship and yet get through the day with a smile.

Coping with ADHD is not easy. You should take care of yourself first so that you can take care of others. Get any help you can within your means. And are you certain about your infertility? I had my first child slightly before 43. Before that I truly thought it wasn't in the cards.

Another good coping strategy is to see what's good and what works in your life.


Does God have a plan? I don't know. But I do think life is a gift.

[Anonymous]

P.S. My friend really believes that somewhere out there is a child, yet to be born, who is destined for me for whatever reason. We are in the midst of adoption and it the longest slog of my life, and I'm kind of over it. I'm tired of living in limbo without any control over what comes and when. I'm ready to pull the plug some days because at least that is a decision I can control.