'Do you agree that God is right, and that witches should be executed? If so, why are you not carrying out God's direct instruction?'

I do agree that God is right and in a time when Israel was required to obey the law that witches deserved death. The new testament makes it clear that the wages of sin is death. Sorry Lego that includes you and me. Thankfully God showed great mercy through His Son to take our punishment for what we deserve. Again you can place yourself as god and decide the murder of unborn is fine or withcraft or incest is fine. I trust God's character of love, mercy, justice far above yours. Thankfully with God mercy triump over judgement. Pity not the same as the godless that butcher babies. Oh well that's the result of putried secular judgement.

What puzzles me about God is that he endowed us with the ability to do so much yet he expects us not to do much of what he made us capable of.

individual,

<<What puzzles me about God is that he endowed us with the ability to do so much yet he expects us not to do much of what he made us capable of.>>

Is that God's fault or ours?

He's the one who gave us gifts but they won't be used effectively unless we take action to use those gifts.

<<he expects us not to do much of what he made us capable of>>

How do you know that's his expectation and not that of human responsibility?

To runner

Firstly, if you believe that God is right, and that witches should be executed, then you are tacitly admitting that people possessing supernatural powers, like witches and warlocks, really do exist.

People stopped believing that crap 400 years ago. And not only does God think that witches and warlocks exist, He did not put any time limit on His instruction that His followers should execute those people. Therefore, His punishment for this non existent crime must still stand. The Saudis think so, because they executed a so called "witch" only a few months ago. So I will ask you again. Why are you not obeying God's direct instruction and either killing "witches" ( or self declared "wiccans") yourself, or at least petitioning your elected representatives to have officials do the job on God's behalf?

Since you dodged the question last time, do you want me to answer it for you? It is because even though you never question God's judgement (because part of your brain's critical analyses circuit is in suspended animation) you know that expressing such an opinion would discredit your religion even more than advocating for the existence of a flat Earth, an Earth centred universe, or claiming that the universe was created in six days. So, you just let that one slide and hope that people don't remember it. Because it hardly puts a good light on the intelligence, the character, or the foresight, of your non existent God.

Secondly, you have also not addressed the rather embarrassing fact that because of His nonsensical instruction, God is directly culpable for the fact that for 1600 years, tens of thousands of mainly aged and innocent European women were executed on His instruction by his devotees for a crime which does not even exist.

Lastly, you have the audacity to claim that a God who instructed His followers to execute innocent people for non existent crimes such as "witchcraft" is a God of mercy and love. Only a person with an Absolutist personality with the capacity for serial cognitive dissonance could regard that as rational.

LEGO,

<<if you believe that God is right, and that witches should be executed, then you are tacitly admitting that people possessing supernatural powers, like witches and warlocks, really do exist. People stopped believing that crap 400 years ago....>>

Sadly, you are out of date and out of touch in your knowledge of demonic manifestations through witchcraft. They are alive and well today in many countries around the world.

In some countries, 'witch trials, witch camps, sorcery and other weird and wonderful occult rituals are still central to many cultures. From Africa's witch doctors to voodoo in the West Indies and Romania's witch tax on the sorcerers who are cashing in'. See: http://www.thetalko.com/15-places-in-the-world-where-witchcraft-is-still-practiced/

See also: 'Why Belief in Witchcraft Can Do Harm' (Live Science, http://www.livescience.com/54726-belief-in-witchcraft-erodes-trust.html).

I suggest you become better informed of what the demonic can do through Wicca in Australia, Cameroon, Italy, Romania, Caribbean, Chile, etc.

Tom Ozpen

So, you do believe in witches, who are women with supernatural powers? How about warlocks, elves, goblins, leprechauns, fairies, and unicorns?

I would opine that the Churches hated "witches" because they were both in the same business of appealing to superstitious people, and the church wanted to kill them to get rid of the competition.

But as you well know, executing "witches" was just a convenient way of getting rid of elderly women and old widows, who were considered to be worthless mouths to feed. And of course, some of these women were wealthy widows, so accusing them of witch craft and killing them, then confiscating their property (which was divided up between the church and government officials) was just an official form of armed robbery with murder.

How many innocents died horribly because of your stupid God's idiotic instruction, nobody knows. But one thing is certain, if there really was a God of love and compassion, he would have done the burning bush thing to the Pope and told the SOB to stop it.