"Why did the Almighty take my daughter away?"

[BurtWorm]

A day after her 9-year-old daughter Nirmala was washed out to sea by a tsunami wave, Thenmozhi, 26, wandered dazed through the southern India coastal town of Cuddalore wailing over and over, “Oh, what sin did I commit? Why did the Almighty take my daughter away?”

[demnan]

1. Terrible pain

that poor woman. I hope she can receive some solace in her faith to comfort her.

[mcscajun]

2. It's horrifying, to be sure.

And the pain and anguish in that woman's face is awful to see.

But if her faith allows her to blame herself "What sin did I commit?" then I'm not certain where the comfort of that faith lies.

[arcane1]

3. it's hard to be comforted when the 'allmighty' is a sadistic asshole

:grr:

:cry:

[kc.ink]

55. you are referring to the neocon corporations RIGHT? n/t

[arcane1]

57. no

I am referring to their pro-war, pro-killing god, that's who

from His own evil, demonic mouth:

Isaiah 45: 7
I form the light, and create darkness: I make peace, and create evil: I the LORD do all these.

I the Lord do all these

pretty fucking clear, no?

if Jehova ever existed, all the blame is upon Him :grr:

[kc.ink]

65. poor soul

[arcane1]

66. my soul is just fine

despite its non-existence

[Solly Mack]

4. I feel horrible about her loss. I feel great anger that she was taught to

blame herself.

“Oh, what sin did I commit?"

[BurtWorm]

6. She's far from the only mother who ever wondered what SHE did

to deserve to lose a child. And the most excrutiating thing is, I think she's really trying to find a reasonable answer to that question, one that will explain her loss and allow her to maintain her faith in an "Almighty" that would do such a thing.

[Solly Mack]

8. That she isn't the the only mother or even the last does not change

my anger and it never ever will.

The last thing she needs is added guilt. She's human..she feels guilty enough without thinking she is being punished for some "sin"

[BurtWorm]

11. I hope you don't think I was suggesting anger is not appropriate

or that guilt is. I'm sorrowful for the fact that this is a nearly universal response around the world, the rush to wonder what sin "caused" this disaster.

[Pacifist Patriot]

16. I think it looks like you're both saying essentially the same thing.

Just an outsiders opinion. Disregard if I'm poking my nose where it doesn't belong.

[Solly Mack]

18. No, you're right...and thanks! You have a nice nose. :o)

[Solly Mack]

17. I've been watching coverage almost non-stop

and I can't get a handle on my emotions as I view the scenes of carnage. I apologise for my assumption.

I can't help that woman and that breaks my heart.

Sure, I can give money and have....but I can't help THAT woman...if you know what I mean..and there are so many of her...

[Pacifist Patriot]

19. I know exactly what you mean and that's why I have to confess

I can't watch the coverage. I saw a bit of it this morning and the inability to wrap my arms around the victims was just too much for me. Sending a check just doesn't seem like enough.

[BurtWorm]

26. I do know what you mean.

Her obvious pain is like a stab in the heart. I know exactly what you mean, which is why I posted this in the first place.

[Pacifist Patriot]

14. I wish I could introduce her to this guy.

http://www.ctr4process.org/about/CoDirectors/CPSCobb.htm

It's possible to maintain faith in a loving God without accepting that the "Almighty" would do such a thing. The doctrine of omnipotence and the concept of retribution for sin are a recipe for oppression. My heart goes out to her and everyone else whose first instinct is to assume personal guilt for a senseless tragedy.

[frogfromthenorth2]

5. Yeah.. After that they are trying to make us believe that God exist..

If he does he's a real cosmic joker...

[arcane1]

27. "If I die laughing, it'll be an act of God"

"Life's a big disaster
I hear the sound of laughter
coming from the Hereafter
(I find it kind of odd)

We're stooges for Jehova
He loves to knock us over
so if I die laughing
it'll be an act of God"

count on Skyclad to always have words for me, when mine fail

[Pacifist Patriot]

7. That is tragic in countless ways.

How awful to hold beliefs that compound such a burden rather than help bear the load.

[roguevalley]

9. God had nothing to do with this. The plates shifted and she

suffers. I feel so much for her. She did nothing to earn this but all she can see right now is her own broken heart. God bless her. I truly
hope so.

[BeTheChange]

10. Jesus never says people recieve pain in accordance with their sins

If anything, the Bible teaches there is no metric measuring pole. Job was a good man and look what happened to him. The bible also teaches that in life there is suffering.. not unlike the Buddhists.

I think it is hard for people who do not live by faith to understand this woman's question. Time will pass and her blame will be less but her life will better for it.

The sister of a man my fiance works with had her house burn down two nights before christmas. They lost their 3 year old daughter and everything they had. They even lost their cars. Im sure that mother did nothing to intentionally hurt her child and there was nothing that without foreknowledge she could have done to prevent the tragedy. But I bet she blames herself. It's all the same.

Sometimes people on DU piss me off because they are so quick to attack faith. Shame on the bible or the talmud or whatever for teaching her to question if she could have done anything.. if God was punishing her. Even if it was a brief scream let out in the pain of the death of her child.

See, to me that is normal. To me that conveys the anguish that she must feel. Its not some bane of religion. Its the beauty of living sacrifice.

[mhr]

15. To Feel Pain Is Human - To Blame It On Yourself Represents

The Ignorance Of Faith in action.

I get so tired of people on DU trying to proselytize the rest of us!

[BeTheChange]

20. Im not trying to proselytize anyone.

I'm simply saying that tolerance, compassion, yadda yadda are just a whole lot of talking points.

I dont care if you think Christianity is the biggest hoax perpetrated on the race of man and is simply a control mechanism to keep us subverted.

Great.

Every 300th post you can stand to hear from the other part of the spectrum. Im no less a Democrat then someone who thinks what is written above.

Until the outspoken of the left learn to drop their biases.. the South, christians, yadda yadda I dont see how this human experiment is going to see any change.

The woman is in the depths of despair for goodness sakes. Is it absolutely nessecary to psychoanalyze her religion? All Im saying is, a great amount of stuff is going down in the world right now. 20K plus dead in 9 different contries, 100K + dead in Iraq.. let it rest. Everyone has to make peace with themselves. Why are we constantly picking apart others views and saying we are this big tent?

I loved Al Sharpton. MLK did more for civil rights then 99% of people this century and he was a Baptist Minister. A southern baptist minister at that!

[mhr]

34. And All I Am Saying Is Keep You Religion And Your Religious Analysis

To yourself.

We would all be much happier.

[BeTheChange]

35. No Can do Jack...

When something needs saying, it needs saying.

[mhr]

48. Not If What You Are Saying Is Openly Offensive To Others

Your attitude is why we are having such problems in the US today.

Religion is a private affair. It belongs between the ears of each individual person not bandied about in the public domain.

This is why we have separation of church and state.

Public affairs are public, private affairs are private.

Religion is a private affair.

Stop trying to proselytize everyone at DU.

We don't all appreciate it.

[BeTheChange]

51. When tolerance is present

It is alot easier to not speak out on your beliefs. Well my democratic beliefs are intrisically tied to my spiritual beliefs. I have watched DU for a long time and not said anything and I wont be popping up in every thread with a Bible verse. However, nothing I said pushed my beliefs on you. In fact, the only belief I expressed was that there was no reason to bash a religion for a sentence said in anguish. All too often christianity is bashed and judged in a viscious way here on DU. It turns me off, and I think it turns alot of people who would be really sympathetic to the goals of most of the people on this board off too.

I have no proof on that, it's just a feeling. A perspective.

Learn how to deal with it. I wont continue debating you back and forth because it is counter productive. Dont ask me to be silent tho. Im just plain sick of doing that. I wont ask you to be silent on the views that conflict with mine either, because you have every right to have those views.

[phylny]

52. Why is it that posts that attack religion are okay

(maybe I don't appreciate that) but posts that rebut that notion are not?

[JVS]

59. State=Society?

that's news to me

[bobbieinok]

41. you don't have to read a religious post.....you may HATE it but it MIGHT

help someone else

you don't want others to preach to you.....then don't preach to others

[JVS]

58. Follow your own advice

[LanternWaste]

36. shoulder to shoulder with you on this one

I'm standing shoulder to shoulder with you on this one.

Welcome to DU! :hi:

[orpupilofnature57]

63. because someone has faith, doesn't mean their COTTON MATTHER

[luaneryder]

21. Excuse me

Have you lost a child? "Time will pass and her blame will be less but her life will be better for it." That's total BS from my point of view. I've been there, in that pain, and damned if I'm any better off for having suffered it.

[BeTheChange]

23. Im sorry for your loss..

And Im not saying that her pain will go away. But I do feel like her blame will be less. That she wont walk around all day uttering.. Lord, why have you forsaken me? What have I done?

As a result of letting go of that blame, her life will be better for it. Because she has faith at some point she has to lessen that burden. Im not in any way saying that her life would be better because she lost a child. Only that she will not always wear that face you see in the picture.

I'm apologize that my words were not as eloquent as they should have been.

[MatrixEscape]

24. OT: They are as quick as thou ...

It is normal for both sides of faith to find friction. Considering the circumstances surrounding the profession of faith today, it is easier to have compassion for those who question it. Faith has become politics in a secular Nation.

Those who profess their faith far too loudly are most likely in fear and so those that respond are mirroring that fear, and with due cause. Is not faith a deep and personal matter, at heart?

To advocate: should one cast pearls before swine and expect a silk purse?

[BeTheChange]

28. True..

I only find question in one part:

Those who profess their faith far too loudly are most likely in fear and so those that respond are mirroring that fear, and with due cause. Is not faith a deep and personal matter, at heart?


What is processing your faith too loudly? Is it wailing, "Why did the Allmighty take my daughter away?" Is it having a nativity scene in your front yard? Is it that man I saw on Extreme Makeover, Home Edition who when his house was unveiled raised his hand to the sky and said Thank you, Lord? What is acceptable now a days? What is PC enough?

I had lunch with a girl I grew up with that I hadnt seen in 10 years right before Christmas. She is a true blue republican. Interned on GWB's campaign. But I still have this card she wrote me right after my parents got divorced that says, I thank God for you and carries the pressed wildflower she had picked in it's honor. She is a kind soul. I was wiccan at the time.. so I of course rolled my eyes and chuckled at her uninformed attempt to convert me.

She told me she has gotten involved in an urban church in Downtown Dallas and she met a bunch of democrats and they were really good people. She said she had never met Democrats that shared her views.

I was so shocked at her world view. That she saw this sharply divided line. But on the other hand, I was so thankful that she had met some good people.

Every christian is not Falwell or Robertson.

[oneighty]

25. "They even lost their cars"

God Damn, that is awful.

THIS IS SARCASM.

God save the children.

180

[BeTheChange]

29. I guess the point there was..

The fire was so hot that it even melted metal. They literally lost everything they had.

[Prodemsouth]

12. How could something or someone be refered to "Almighty" (all mighty)

take a daughter from a mother? Sounds like a very small God to me.

[baby_bear]

13. But we must recall what the Bible says Jesus said on the Cross

"Lord, Why have You forsaken me?"

I always found that to be an extremely human outcry. And quite different from what I heard Jerry Falwell say on one of those Sunday politics shows yesterday (with Jesse Jackson Sr. debating him). They were talking about Mel Gibson's movie The Passion(which I did not see). Falwell claimed that Jesus was not killed at all, (he really said that) but was a willing participant in his own martyrdom (I don't think he used that exact word), but essentially that Jesus allowed himself to be used in order to make a point. That sounded like BS to me.

I am not sure what to make of all this, but when tragedies happen, people of all faiths, regardless of strength, seem to wonder why they are being punished, even Jesus (assuming the passage in the Bible is reasonably accurate, of course). Because it is humanizing, I prefer to believe it is.

b_b

[quaoar]

31. And before the crucificion

In the Garden of Gethsemane, Jesus asked God to spare him from the cross:

Luke 22:39-44:
Jesus went out as usual to the Mount of Olives, and his disciples followed him. On reaching the place, he said to them, “Pray that you will not fall into temptation.” He withdrew about a stone’s throw beyond them, knelt down and prayed, “Father, if you are willing, take this cup from me; yet not my will, but yours be done.” An angel from heaven appeared to him and strengthened him. And being in anguish, he prayed more earnestly, and his sweat was like drops of blood falling to the ground.

[BeTheChange]

32. I wonder how different the world view of the Bible would be..

If everything that was not Manna and honey was edited out and a Happily canonized version was instead put in it's place.

[Tsiyu]

38. Jesus was actually quoting a Psalm

Eloi, Eloi...

I worked in a Pediatric hospital for five years and four years in two General hospitals.

There were oh, so many times I questioned the wisdom of the universe.

Faith was pitted against reality: The wonderful parents whose baby died of an unknown cause, grieving, versus the parents gifted with a perfectly healthy babe they proceeded to abuse into a coma.


How do you answer these things? Why does one twin die? Why do people have to speed their cars through subdivisions and split little kids on their bikes wide open? Why does the air have to be so polluted that some nights it seems every inner-city toddler is in ER with an acute asthma attack?


The questions outnumber the answers.

My final analysis is that it's too true: every reaction has an equal and opposite reaction.

Did nature do this? Our relentless bombing in the Mideast? Global warming due to man's wastefulness? How can God be blamed when man is too stupid to heed warnings? If we jump off a cliff, is it God's fault when we die?

It's natural for a parent to go through this guilt/bargaining thing when grieving the loss of a child. But many times, the child dies because of a stranger's sins.

[baby_bear]

54. Did you ever get hardened?

I don't know how people could work among such sadness and tragedy and disaster and not become inured to it, yet I know it must not be true. There are many good people out there, better people than myself I am sure.

Our individual pains are so great...yet when I was 15 I remember someone asking me why I was sad, and I said, "Man's inhumanity to man."

Hey, I didn't take credit for the quote!! I just repeated it.

That was 1969. 'Nuff said.

I think I have been sad ever since.

b_b

[Tsiyu]

60. No, but I saw others who did

I was 'forced" out of the field by circumstances I won't relate here, but I did switch to equipment care for a while to get away from the sadness.

Still, when you spend a few hours ( and earn a few blisters) bagging an intubated kid while he gets an MRI, afraid he will die the whole time, and then the next week that same kid runs down the hospital hall and gives you a hug, all the heartache relents for a bit.

And you sure learn to love your kids for who they are.

[DownNotOut]

22. I give this thread another 10 min..... at the most......

[DownNotOut]

42. Well, I have to reply to myself....

Its a fucking shame that DU let me down on this thread. I expected this thread to get downright ugly and locked down.... Oh well, glad I didnt bet the pink slip.



DownNotOut

[RetroLounge]

64. "Its a fucking shame that DU let me down "

I guess It's not all about you.

RL

[RC]

30. And why is she not rejoicing because her daughter is in Heaven?

Is not religion suppose to give comfort?

[MrMonk]

40. Does Thenmozhi's religious faith include a heaven?

[KlatooBNikto]

33. What can we do to help?

[SheilaT]

37. When someone asks that question

there really is no good answer, because of all the underlying assumptions.

She's assuming God did this on purpose, killed HER daughter specifically, and never mind the 23,000 plus other people who died. She assumes that it's HER who's being punished, rather than the daughter or the daughter's father. She assumes there's a reason why God took her daughter away.

There's a slight temptation on my part to say something horribly unfeeling in response to the question, but I won't, because the anguish at losing a child is unimaginable, no matter what the circumstances of that loss.

But it's precisely those kinds of questions that make me the unbeliever that I am today. That is, I don't believe in conventional religion that has a God who wantonly kills innocents.

[MrMonk]

39. "What sin did I commit ... "

People here have been quick to assume that the woman asked this question out of guilt.

Doesn't it make as much sense to assume that it was a rhetorical question, issued as a challenge to god?

[SheilaT]

53. Even if it's rhetorical

there are underlying assumptions about the nature of a deity and the personal way in which the deity operates which make her question impossible to answer.

Think of the situations in some other disaster where people will say, because their loved one survived, God just didn't want this person. Or, when a young person dies, that God wanted another child in heaven. I find those kinds of statements to be truly horrifying, because of the way they imply that God arbitrarily and willfully kills individual persons for some sick need of his own.

Maybe the correct response, anytime someone wonders why God would do some terrible thing, is to respond that God is a sadistic bastard and you've obviously pissed him off.

[karlrschneider]

43. Life sucks and then you die.

That about covers the whole thing...

[Lydia Leftcoast]

44. That mother's question

is often asked by religiously naive people in great pain, but both Judaism and Christianity teach that there is no one-to-one correspondence between one's personal behavior and one's lot in life.

Except for cases in which we deliberately do something that gets us into trouble, our sufferings are not punishment. They just happen, and we all feel pain, whether we're religious or not.

An atheist mother whose daughter had been swept away by a tsunami would look just as anguished.

[sundog]

45. a very sad photo

:(

[donheld]

46. sadly this woman is only 1 among thousands

Too bad the US is too broke, and our military is too busy making more women like her to help out.

[manic expression]

47. Destruction...

inevitably breeds creation. This is the way of existence.
Death is not an just an end, but a new beginning as well.
There are many explanations for this, for instance, this person may have been needed elsewhere in the universe.
(God/Goddess/Gods/Gods and Goddesses) are not in control of death itself, for it is an essential element of life.
Although there is an end to all lives, everything is eternal...

[surfermaw]

49. I know the feeling

I lost my daughter and have ask every question there is, and thought of every thing I think I ever did with her or spoke to her of thought about her..God Bless the man.

[Malva Zebrina]

50. It is so sad that this young woman bears this anguish

It is also sad that she thinks she is being PUNISHED for something SHE did when all it was was nature adjusting itself, as always.

The act of retribution by a jealous god, or one who PUNISHES,heaps more anguish upon people, especially those who believe.

It is really sad. I cannot watch this along with the war in Iraq.

[kc.ink]

56. I guess if God has to be blamed for all EVIL that happens

then so be it, His shoulders are the only ones big enough.

[Princess Turandot]

61. Given the magnitude & horror of this event..

I don't really get why people are using a thread on this to have yet another endless argument about religion. Focusing on one word in her statement over the anguish in her face seems pretty trivial at this point, IMO.

Concerning the never failing entrance of a debate on Christianity into this thread, consider that Sri Lanka is 69% Buddhist, 15% Hindu, 8 % Christian and 8 % Islamic. For all you know, she was invoking any of the numerous gods in both Buddhism or Hinduism, and that got lost in translation of her statement, especially if the photographer had no idea of who the god was whom she was invoking.Had she said, 'Why did Krishna let this happen?' would this thread even be here?

(This was a response to the original post, not to you.Sorry!)

[orpupilofnature57]

62. National weather services, piss poor planning, not almighty