What does this statement mean to you?

[Monique1]

"for the grace of God there go I" when referring to someone who is hurting more tnan you. I read this comment frequently. Do you see yourself in a better place because God looks more favvorably on you? Do you think you are better than the other person? Just what does this mean to you?

Personally, I have made this comment and caught myself. Why did I say this? The other person may be a better person inside and who am I to judge?

I would be interested in your comments.

[notesdev]

1. It's talking about luck and circumstances

it's not a moral judgment of character

[Richardo]

2. ^this^

[uppityperson]

3. I see it as I could easily be in that same place but for some reason I'm not.

Nothing to do with god or God or anything, just luck. Nothing to do with passing judgment on another person, but that I could easily be in that same place.

[damntexdem]

7. Yeah, it suggests that the speaker is NOT better than the one spoken of.

That it was the luck of the draw, with a religious interpretation.

[lob1]

4. In the same situation, the hurt person could say,

"There, except for the cruelty of God, go I."

[pintobean]

10. Luckily, most people don't think that way.

[lob1]

15. I don't actually think that way myself.

[napi21]

5. I simly eel sorrow for those who are less fortunate than I am.

I know for sure that many times I've seen mothers tenderly caring for their handicapped child, or someone bagging on the street, and thank God forsparing me those burdens. People who are less fortunate than I are not worse people than me, but most likely better people because they are able to deal with problems that I couldn't with.

[skypilot]

"There but for the grace of God go I"....

....is the entire phrase. I've always taken it to mean that God's grace is what's keeping you from sinking to the depths of the person you're commenting on. I've heard lots of people who aren't particularly religious say it. It's almost more like saying "Man, I'm lucky not to be in that guys shoes".

[slackmaster]

6. It means that bad things sometimes happen to people who have good intentions and do the right things

You can't control everything.

[HysteryDiagnosis]

8. Transfectional superstitious perceptional projections. Or you actually believe

that the grace of God puts everyone where they are.

I really get annoyed when 20,000+ humans are snuffed out by a "natural disaster" as if there is such a thing, and 3 survive due to the supernatual intervention by fill in the blank deity.

But for the grace of God I could be on that "other" board belching out their corporate inspired talking points. If I didn't make any sense I apologize for my temporary incoherence.

[Monique1]

14. Most of the time I just find myself lucky.

[a la izquierda]

26. Honey, is that you??

My husband says the same thing every time some Oklahoma family prays that they were spared in a tornado. He says, "Well I guess God hated the other family."

[HysteryDiagnosis]

28. Yup, they prayed to the wrong ceramic figurines. I just had a brain fart, the conflict

in Columbia is multifarctorial. That is all.

[leftstreet]

9. Because "for the grace of The Ruling Class go I" just sounds weird

[Motown_Johnny]

11. .

ummm......


"There But for the grace of God go I" is the phrasing I am familiar with.

To me it means that anyone who thinks in those terms is capable of compassion. To me it means not only that you could easily be hit with bad luck and end up in the same circumstance as the person you are referring to, but that the person to whom you are referring has the same worth as a human being as yourself.

I don't understand why you have a problem with yourself thinking in that manner. I also don't understand why you think you are somehow judging the other person as "not better". I respect the fact that you can see that person as an equal and not as some kind of burden on society.

[JoePhilly]

12. "God loves me more than he loves that poor schmuck".

Ok, not really.

I think most people mean, "We should help that person because some time in the future, we could need the help of others as well".

Well, I hope that's usually what they mean.

[sinkingfeeling]

13. It means that whatever has befallen some person could also happen to you or any other person. It is

meant to remind yourself that we are all human and share common problems throughout our lives.

How in the world did you get to a question of superiority?

[Monique1]

16. sinkingfeeling

I like your comment but don't understand your question. I take the quote as being superior.

[sinkingfeeling]

24. I can't understand how you can 'take the quote as being superior'.

[Rex]

17. Okay is you really want to know here is what I think.

And I apologize in advance. This whole idea of God favoring someone over someone else...makes no sense. Why would a God that is all loving yadda yadda give someone cancer or let a predator rape their 5 year old child and yet let a convicted murderer escape from prison? To me, this is proof that God does not exist and never did. When people ask me to 'pray for X', I wonder why since God obviously meant for X to have Y happen. Why else did that family die in a car accident? God wanted them to die, so they could be in Heaven? With Him? Why am I here and yet my brother didn't make it? Didn't even get a chance. What is chance to God?

Sorry, the whole thing sound a lot like something an insane person would come up with. God loves me, that is why I was just shot and killed at a grocery store. So I could be Home earlier with Him. :crazy:

[demwing]

18. From the perspective of the religious, understand "grace"...

God's grace is not earned. You don't benefit from God's grace by being good, or special, or favored, or better. Grace is a demonstration of God's unconditional love. If it were based on a reciprocal relationship, it wouldn't be "grace" at all, it would be mere payment for services rendered.

So, with that in mind, the saying refers to one's position of fortune in life as being unrelated to any good deed or status. It is the exact opposite of thinking yourself better than another.

[rocktivity]

19. I've always felt that "the Grace of God" had more to do with fate than divinity

On the other hand, I've also always felt that we give God more credit than he deserves when things go right, and more blame than he deserves when things go wrong.

Once my sister said, "Thank God everything worked out," and I said, "Everything worked out because I worked everything out, not God!"

:headbang:
rocktivity

[PATRICK]

20. Early in life

I grew to dislike and dissect old saws, cliches, popularized dogma because of the final stamp it stupidly put on problem situations. That included the creation of new saws and fads that performed the same self-satisfying or stress relieving communal wisdom that under examination got a bit ugly.

God's grace or will has been invoked for a lot of evil in a perverse palliative. God's grace in not being put to the test or suffering the slings and arrows of happenstance is indeed something unsubstantial to be thankful for, and unlike the stark concept of God's will or even judgment really calls for the grace to be shared. The moving sentiment falls a bit short in the statement and seems a reversion to a shrug of "God wills it", or "better him than me". It also could imply that the non-sufferer is especially graced and we are right back to the implied judgment of God again.

No one of course engages in these types of verbal and historical analysis when the house is burning down in front of your eyes. It is OUR house, MY house. Put out the fire. It is my brother or sister, mother or father, daughter or child. It is me. Help.

Yet we are in the process of being a passing stranger, helplessly moving on, sympathetic and briefly reflective for closure, falling short of responsibility and active compassion, much less guilt. Few if any of us are the Good Samaritan with all its risks and expenses and lonely drops in the ocean of human pain.

So I don't think or say that aphorism. I just empathize and move on helplessly without the cliche. Eventually, at some point of low ebb "grace", at some desolate chosen point of encounter in the road, that really will be me, and us all. When it was me people moved on with no apparent look to even betray a commonly held limited empathy. It seemed from that perspective that the "grace" of God had nothing to do with any of us. Adding the pain of critical thought- without action- is a torture most forgo. Seal it with a kissoff cliche. The excuses of the of the passersby in the parable were similarly legitimate- and useless.

Sounds a bit bitter but the miracle of someone being an unexpected Good Samaritan is available, tough and uncommonly rare.

[Curmudgeoness]

21. I always use the phrase "there but for fortune go I", which I see

as the same thing, without the intervention of god. Good luck/bad luck. I have had better luck than the other person.

[ThomWV]

22. I've never seen it said like that, What I've seen is "There, but for the grace of God, go I"

Meaning that it was just a matter of God's good grace that I am living well when that poor fellow is not - that my good fortune is not a matter of my own good works, but either the work of a deity or happenstance..

[roakes10190]

23. grace of God

Because Christianity has a special meaning for "grace," it means that neither you nor the less fortunate had anything to do with your state. I just say this by way of explanation; I have no use for that notion of grace.

[Monique1]

25. I was just asking because

I've read this here at DU and many other places. I myself question this statement. I am not making myself superior because I know I am not - just curious what others think and interested in your thoughts. That is all.

[lunatica]

27. I've always found that comment quite stupid so I don't use it