Clivedurdle

Yesterday's Independent discusses a brewing row between Amnesty International and the Catholic Church over abortion. The commentary discusses the Catholic position as based on the Psalm - conceived in sin - and goes on to comment that souls and spirits are the same thing.

Are they theologically?

Chili

No they are not because spirits emanate from the soul which itself is densified much like water that can ascend in the form of vapor until it is all gone and that is where the New Heaven and New Earth is at (Rev.21:1) .

Clivedurdle

Like a phase transition between ice, water and steam? How many theological concepts are based on "interpretations" of natural phenomena?

There is a very interesting comment in a thread on EC about the Koran - Satan argues he is better than man because Satan was created from fire and man from clay!

The Catholic theological arguments about abortion do sound as if they are based on old ideas about the four elements and how they interact.

Chili

Good point if it takes an iceberg the sink "the crawling sea-worm, grotesque, slimed, dumb [and] indifferent [once studded with] Jewels in joy designed to ravish the sensuous mind" and you may read more on this here.http://ca.search.yahoo.com/search?fr...%20the%20Twain

You have to hang it onto something.Hardy calls it the "salemandrine fire."It is their duty to speak out because life itself belongs to the mythology and what we think is ours to govern is just the illusion that created it. Our life is therefore very vulnerable to erosion by the sensuous mind and we have the rapidly increasing number of fertility clinics to prove that.

Ray Moscow

No.

However, a friend once pointed me to an apologetic site (maybe "Catholic Answers"?) that claimed that the spirit was the "intelligent" part of the soul, or some such.

The classic NT rebuttal text is Hebrew 4:12, where "soul" and "spirit" are clearly different.

Freke & Gandy delve into a possible "gnostic" distinction between the two in their Jesus and the [Lost] Goddess (or via: amazon.co.uk), but I don't recall any classical references in the endnotes to that section.

Ray

Sign Related

There is no soul, but their are spirits. Instead of a soul we have a conscious mind.

Sarpedon

Is this a Ba and Ka issue? I thought that was over and done with. Bah.

Ray Moscow

To summarise F&G's gnostic model: the "soul" is a poetic way of summarising a person's life experience. It does not necessarily (and probably doesn't) survive the person's death.

"Spirit" is a metaphor for consciousness.

Chili

Do we just ignore the subconscious mind where our very own Thousand Year Reign is at?

Toto

Link to story

Funny that the Vatican doesn't condemn that sort of hypocricy on the part of President Bush. But I digress.

I tried to find the article on line to see if someone has finally found a Biblical reason to oppose abortion, but there must be some content that is not online. Could you give the specific Psalm and the connection between conceived in sin and forced pregnancy?