Dear Stephen, I Believe in Oscar Wilde’s God

[@heisenberg69]

So Great when so humble. Thank you, Justin, for all your hard work. You never walk alone, but you know this already.

[@PMartyStuff]

Good Job, Justin! “We can ignore even pleasure. But pain insists upon being attended to. God whispers to us in our pleasures, speaks in our conscience, but shouts in our pains: it is his megaphone to rouse a deaf world.” ― C.S. Lewis, The Problem of Pain

[@lovesong252]

Thanks Justin. I found your video very moving, along with Oscar Wilde's story. Both speak to me of suffering, love, forgiveness, eternity..... My experience of God's love in my life, is as you and Oscar Wilde described - it turns sin, selfishness, pain, loneliness into love, beauty, fellowship, kindness, hope and more.

[@oyoghejay9]

His outburst is the start of a prayer, a conversation with God. Let's hope he keeps the channels open so he gives God a chance to respond. He alone can get the much needed answer across to Stephen. All the best Stephen. God is better than the best you could find or present here on earth. He is the constant in chaos and transcends life and death, wealth and poverty, He is sovreign. Our 'smartness' makes Him smile, yet He is available to both the naive and the wise. Seek and you will find, knock and it will be opened. It will be your choice whatever happens next.

[@vincentmcnabb939]

Nothing became him in his life as his leaving it. RIP Oscar.

[@vadesmcgades]

Thank you for your well thought out response Justin.

[@acaswell84]

Great little video. Keep up the good work.

[@denisemaxwell51]

YESSSSSS!!!

[@petermayhew7036]

How does that help people who have never heard of him, or creatures incapable of understanding the bible, such as myself?

[@tednash7210]

Well done, God bless you.

[@Dieselfu]

Was that Santa Clause behind you.

[@BigIdeaSeeker]

Stephen Fry: God (as defined and described by Christianity) created a world where (especially before modern medicine and conveniences) natural suffering and painful death are exceedingly common amongst much of humanity. Justin: But I know a different aspect of him. He loves us and died for us (and some of us will benefit eternally). Does that say anything about Stephen's original point? how does the prospect that he loves us and that a minority of people will be blessed for eternity stand up to Fry's point? Perhaps I need to watch this again, but it seems you (and Wilde) argued as step siblings with a common father. In the first marriage/family (Fry's) he was abusive and neglectful. In the second (your and Wilde's) he's obviously gone through some counseling and had some parenting classes. That you know this father as loving does not mend the bruises Of the children of the previous family. And perhaps he is still somewhat abusive, but you choose to overlook that?

[@Loobypleb]

A really interesting video which provides another part of conversation in the never ending question about life. However, I don't like the title at all. 'Viral anti-God video by Stephen Fry'...... It wasn't 'by' Stephen Fry, and he most likely didn't expect this one tiny part of a larger interview to go 'viral'. He was simply responding to the same question asked of many celebs for that piece of Irish TV but, by your title you make it sound as if he purposely made a video himself just to debunk God. Why not instead title it with responds to Stephen Fry's response to question he was asked about God ? That's more truthful.

[@Duffloop]

Now let Me describe to you the groundwork, the outline of My plan. It is very simple. Faced with the shattered and dissolved, disintegrated particles of My Creation, I wish to rebuild it, as a man with a ruined garden would wish to bring it back to perfection. And just as that unhappy gardener will need to depend on the flowers themselves to grow back to beauty, so I choose to depend on the shattered fragments, the inchoate particles of My Creation to reform and purify themselves, to reshape themselves stage by stage into Perfection. And as the gardener lays out his ground plan of flower beds and paths, rockeries and lawns, shrubberies and lily ponds, and then waits for Nature to assist him, so I lay out My plan, and wait for the force of good inherent in the broken substance of My Creation to assist Me. But whereas the best of human gardeners knows very little of Nature, or even of the soil of his garden and its capacities, or of the individual seeds that he sows, I know everything. No grain of soil in My garden is unknown to Me. No seed that I sow. I know each cell of every seed, of every rock and shrub. I know its abilities. And I love it. I love each grain of dust because I made it. Every leaf, even the most withered. Every bud. Every insect that works in My garden. Even those insects that work to harm My flowers. I love them all as you cannot conceive of love. As the sun loves the earth. I burn with love for all of you, for everything that I have made. And I suffer as I burn. However, I have not brought you here to tell you of My sufferings, but to explain My plan to you. As I have said, among the particles of My ruined Creation I know the capacities of every one. And among them I choose the best to serve as nuclei for greater combinations of particles or cells. As if I was picking out one particle or cell to be the directing force of the group, its brain. And the duty of that directing nucleus is then to combine and guide the group of cells around it into a greater being dedicated to good. Once this has been achieved a group of these new beings will in their turn be gathered around a new directing nucleus, and the process will be repeated. Ideally, the process should be simple and straightforward, like gathering corn into stooks, and then into stacks, until eventually the whole harvest can be stored in the barn. But this would be to calculate without the Enemy. And without the frailty that is as inherent in Creation as the will towards good; a frailty that derives from Free Will, the possibility of doing not good, but evil.

[@KristaAMartin]

So, that's Oscar Wilde's grave, it figures that's the first of him I'd run into, maybe I should read some.

[@theeditor9408]

This video response is probably what Stephen Fry was hoping for all along. He always wanted to get spanked by Oscar Wilde...:D

[@nated4599]

wilde is most depressing man ever smh he disliked nature and I still don't know what his view on after life are or heaven or what God look like. and he disliked science ad well

[@neorich59]

Yes, it *is* a God worth believing in :O) So, why not abandon the tyrannical God of the Bible and his threats of eternal torture if we don't obey his weird rules and read Oscar Wilde instead... Thomas Paine saw the God of the Old Testament as a "demon"...he had a point! :O)

[@petermayhew7036]

How does that help people who have never heard of him, or creatures incapable of understanding the bible, such as myself?

[@justinbrierley]

I doubt you are incapable of understanding the Bible if you are capable of posting a comment on KZbin

[@BigIdeaSeeker]

Justin, to be fair I think Peter Mayhew may be referring to the reality that many biblical scholars devote their lives to the study of scripture in original languages, historical contexts and so on and yet they stand in a vast spectrum of thought and opinion. Peter Enns and Lee Strobel differ greatly in their positions and yet neither of them are at the extreme ends of the spectrum. Ergo, Mr. Mayhew cannot be criticized for feeling incapable of understanding the Bible. It appears that if any of us do, far more do not though they think they do. Mr. Mayhew should be lauded for his honesty, especially when juxtaposed to the blatant misguided certainty of so many pastors in my area.

[@debrarufini6906]

Mr Brierley, I'm afraid this is the sort of comment that turns genuine sceptics away. I'm 46 years of age, my beloved father is a retired church Pastor, but I STILL sincerely struggle with faith. The very reason I left the church is because I got exhausted with Christians judging me that I was in rebellion, not 'trying hard enough,' etc. And in the end, you have to walk away from this criticism. So, if this man is a complete outsider, how would he know how to search, purely on the basis that yourself along with all the other Christians who have cracked the code have? Also, he may have learning difficulties. He may have been referring to any number of reasons. But in typical Christian fashion we unapologetically judge. It's so desperately sad. :-(

[@debrarufini6906]

Just something that has come to mind, Mr B - you wouldn't dream of saying to a blind person; "Well you just need to try to see a bit harder, after all, I can. What's your problem that you can't?" There's something about your comment that has made me really tearful. I think it's the reminder of how I've been treated in the name of this supposedly loving God, spoken for by the most unkind & unloving words.