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I'm going to regret asking this but: What left field did that come flying in from?

Awmte

Hey, Christians get baptized, Jews get the dick thingy. All for the glory of God...

John A. Broussard

I'm not sure I understand. If individuals base their moral philosophy on the bible, shouldnt they be prepared to show the specific passages which justify those principles?

Albert Cipriani

Point is, it is metaphysically and rationally impossible to base morality upon a book. Words upon a page are symbols and symbols beg to be interpreted authoritatively.

If our deistic constitution and even our worthless business contracts necessitate courts of law for interpretation, how much more does the bible written over many centuries in various languages. Ergo, to the degree the bible is a moral guide, it must have an authentic authoritative interpreter, i.e., the Catholic Church. To pretend, as Protestants do, that it is all quite self-evident is an exercise in insanity.

Just the same, every single doctrine of the Catholic Church (there's gotta be over 1,000 of the little buggers!) is based upon scripture. But I won't go there, will not explicate the scriptural basis of any one of them to someone who's epistemology is based upon sola scriptura, for that would be feeding a monsterous error. -- Sincerely, Albert Cipriani the Traditional Catholic

John A. Broussard

We are in complete agreement. The bible can't possibly be a sound basis for morality.

Albert Cipriani

Cool. What is the basis for your morality?

In 25-words or less, the basis of my morality is rationality which culminates in theism, redacts to Catholicism, that informs my first principals (values) and authoritatively fills in the blanks of my rationality. – Cheers, Albert Cipriani the Traditional Catholic
http://www.geocities.com/albert_cipriani/index.html
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/religiousphilosophy/

John A. Broussard

Thank you. There is still the minor problem that others, also basing their morality upon rationality, arrive at conclusions very different from yours. But that's what makes human beings interesting.

Albert Cipriani

That’s not a moral problem. That’s a processing problem that leads to being mistaken, not morally deficient. Just like how, being distracted, one might miss one’s mouth with a drink and have it dribble down one’s shirt. That doesn’t constitute having a drinking problem. If there is a moral God, He will not punish such. Likewise, if we are moral, we ought not to punish those who are morally depraved, only protect ourselves and themselves from their immorality.

Are you hinting at the relativistic non-argument that different moral conclusions means that there are different equally valid moralities? If so, do you believe that when lost in the dark forest, all roads lead home?

Nah. The differing moral values of humans are what reveal us as fallen creatures, not interesting creatures. I can think of a lot more interesting ways to reveal myself as a human being than to have my heart ripped out by an Aztec priest because of some bogus demonically-informed morality. – Sincerely, Albert Cipriani the Traditional Catholic

John A. Broussard

Right on. I feel pretty much the way you do about those Aztec priests. I'm even more upset by the morality expressed in the Catholic Inquisition. I'm not sure I'd call either the Aztec or the Catholic priests fallen, but they were certainly interesting.

Albert Cipriani

Why? Do you not know that the Inquisition, as it’s name denotes, was all about questioning, not about torturing? To the degree that it was about torturing and executing, do you not know that the Protestants did more of it than the Catholics and extra-judicially, i.e., without questioning its victim’s dogmas? Why do you think Protestants abandoned England to found this country and then found the time, once here, to conduct the Salem witch hunt? Yet you single out the Catholic Inquisition to be morally upset over. Could you be a victim of Protestant propaganda or worse yet, Saturday Night Live tv skits?

Then you have a skewed view of interesting. I don’t consider ugly or immoral incidents interesting. Only innocuous incidents that shed some light on reality seem interesting to me. – Sincerely, Albert Cipriani the Traditional Catholic

P.S. Still no answer to what's the basis of your morality?