Crucifiction

The entire concept of "God is good and just" is completely illogical. The ancient Jews never actually CONSIDERED their God to be some omnibenevolent sky daddy sitting up in the clouds; in the original Hebrew pantheon following the Israelite break with Sumeria, he was a god of war. It was the New Testament and the Christians that repackaged him into some kind of hippy god of peace and free love so that it'd sell to the actually civilized Greeks and Romans. The ancient Jews NEVER considered Yahweh to be anything more than a war god; and even after they adopted monotheism, he was never, EVER portrayed as always being "just" and "kind". The Jews themselves realized their God was violent and cruel and sadistic.

GoodLittleAtheist

Basically what it boils down to is "It" (anything in the Catholic creed) is just because God said so and/or God made it that way and he is just. If God says it is just to rip off my fingernails and dip my hands in lemon juice, then it is. It is hard to argue with that. Those arguments will always be enough for a believer, and hold no weight at all for a non-believer.

I think you just worded that wrong. Because Christianity isn't at all like a scientific theory. That would be an interesting thread topic. In a different forum of course.

Evoken

Sorry but the computer analogy doesn't works. A human does not needs to be dumb or ignorant in order to voluntarily say that 2+2=5 instead of 4. He can do out of his own desire. A computer however is fixed and you know for sure that you will always get 2+2=4 when everything is fine, in other words the computer lacks free will to make errors on it's own.

Like I have said, Adam and Eve choose to disobey while at the same time being conscious of their decision. They just choose to be led by pride and listen to the serpent and not to God.

Exactly, they would have just been robots with no thought of their own.

The Church is the only ordinary means to achieve the extraordinary, that is, salvation. Those without access to The Church or without the ability to receive baptism and the other sacraments will be judged by God in an extraordinary manner known only to him.

Well put yourself in this pace: If you just open you eyes and find a world all around you (like this one) and you are told that it is all yours for you to subdue and virtually do whatever you want in it, with the sole exemption that you are expected to follow a set of rules, including in this case not eating from the tree. Then given everything that has just been given to you, what is wrong with the giver demanding obedience from you?

Yes, the lifespan of humans slowly begins to decrease after each generation as you can see on the subsequent chapters of Genesis. Until they reach the age of 120 years established by God.

I was just making a general comment relating to that part of the discussion. My desire was not to include all atheists into that group, I know there are many (perhaps most) atheists who are not like that.

And this is what God did, he set Adam in the garden for him to work on it teaching him agriculture. Brought the animals to him so that he could know them and name them and also after that brought the woman to him. He also gave instructions and explained what would happen if they disobeyed his commandment. As well as that he told them that they could eat from every other three.

Evoken

Actually the manner of speech used here is a reproach to Adam and not an acknowledgment that he had obtained anything. Just like the manner of speech we find in the book of Job when God is questioning him. Here is what the commentary on this verse on the Douay-Rheims says:

This was spoken by way of reproaching him with his pride, in affecting a knowledge that might make him like to God.

Quote:

and now lest he put forth his hand and take also, of the tree of life and eat, and live forever-

Like I pointed in a previous post here, their pre-fall immortality is not to be taken as they lacking the possibility of dying, which they could die, but perhaps not by natural means. The Tree of Life leads to eternal life, or Heaven, it gives sanctifying grace which is exactly what we are deprived from with Original Sin. Some say that Adam and Eve ate everyday from the Three of Life until they decided to eat from the three of knowledge and disobey God, but I don't think that this, while being a possibility, is supported by the text.

The event in Babel, was another act of pride by man in oder to exalt themselves to the same place of God. As we read in verse 4: Come let us make a city and a tower, the tope whereof may reach to heave; and let us make our name famous, before we be scattered abroad the lands.

Here they also disobeyed God's commandment in Gen. 1:28: Increase and multiply and fill the earth, and subdue it.. and set their priorities on top of God's commandment, the same thing that happened at The Fall.

It it is all related, you cannot look in one part while ignoring the other, the Old Testament revelation finds it's meaning and culmination in Jesus Christ and the New Testament.

Evoken

No, Limbo is a special place for unbaptized infants, those who die before having the ability to be exposed to the Gospel and either accepting it or rejecting it. Like I pointed in this post, for people who have reached the age of reason and had the ability to listen to the Gospel and reject or accept it, The Church is the only ordinary means of achieving the extraordinary, that is, salvation.

But, those who thru no fault of their own never heard of The Church or the Gospel and die in a state of ignorance, but nevertheless they sought God with a sincere hearth and did his will to the best of their ability, then God will judge those via some extraordinary manner known only to him. So it is possible that these people can obtain salvation.

There is no clear definition as to what one must do in order to be saved other than joining The Church and remaining within her bosom. Just like during the deluge, you could be saved by not entering the Ark, but it would take a miracle to do so.

Avatar

Like eternal hellfire is "for our own good," right? I'm pretty sure I've got this straight--mankind is damned from birth because of Original Sin. According to the Christian faith, damnation is the default setting for all of us who dare to be born human.

1) God has done nothing (according to his list of atricities in his own Bible) to make me want to praise him.
2) The singing of God's praises doesn't sound like the act of someone who spontaniously decides to sing out of love. In the Bible, God demands praise...even when he is exterminating entire populations (or ordering it to be done). God seems to have deep insecurity issues.

I think that you are wrong about that. As the Christian faith is constantly portrayed by its missionaries..."Convert, or God is gonna get ya with this big old bat of his labeled "Hell!"

Now let's see...and just what evidence is there that such is the case? A highly dubious family tree supposedly stretching back to Peter.

Where was that spirit during the Dark Ages? The Crusades? The Inquisition? Pope "Innocent III"'s reign? WWII? Where was it when its heirarchy was deliberately hiding and protecting child molesters? For a church "guided by the spirit of God," it sure has a shoddy track record!

Why not? I don't see that as a problem at all. As I've demonstrated, no man who claims to speak for God can be trusted. There are as many opinions about "God's Word" as there are people alive in the world--all with exactly the same degree of "proof" behind them. All the faiths in the world have collections of utterly unverifiable "miracles" that proclaim their faith as "True." Why should I beleive your version over a Muslim's? Or a Buddists? Or a Hindu's? Or a Pagan's? Or a Baptist? Or a Mormon's?

Give me a reason why I should. First off, how do I know that God created your church? Second: The Church can't agree on the interpetation of "God's Word" even within its own ranks! How to determine who it right? If I guess wrong at all, I'm hosed.

Or it may be your hidden skeptic inside is just dying to come out.

Tell that to the Rawandans. The Native Americans. The defenders of Constantinople. The non-Christian Pagans of Europe who were hunted down like animals. The Jews. The South Africans. The Aztecs. God's "love" was shown to all these people by the blade of a sword. No matter that the Church tries real hard to pretend otherwise, "God's Word" did not sweep across Europe by virtue of its "peaceful" message. Europe was conquered with a fist of steel.

And I take issue with a lot of those judgements. Most of them, in fact. Just because he's God doesn't mean I can't demand answers when I see something I think is wrong.

God does not ask for obiedience, he demands it. God does not ask for worship, he demands it. God does not ask for love, he demands it. God does not ask for the spreading of his "Word", he demands it. These are not the actions or attitudes of a benevolent being, but a control freak.

Evoken

I am aware that there is, what I call, an "unbridgeable gap" between the believer and the unbeliever. Which can only be bridged by the unbeliever with the help of God, by giving a free response of faith to Him. The least I can do here is to expound and try to explain God's Truth to the best of my ability.

Well I was not implying that Christianity is a scientific (naturalistic) theory, but just that like all good scientific theories, it makes predictions that are successful and which make it's claims true. But these are based on both faith and reason, so I would say that is it unlike a scientific (naturalistic) theory in the sense that it cannot be tested (in it's entirely) just by natural means without taking into consideration it's supernatural/faith claims. I know it sounds odd and perhaps I am not able to properly express what I mean, but in any case I have the idea clearly on my head.

rosy tetra

“A human does not need to be dumb or ignorant…�

I don’t mean dumb or ignorant. I mean prone to reasoning incorrectly.

“He can do out of his own desire.�

But desire is a part of the whole reasoning person, right? I don’t think it makes sense to split up a human into parts, “Well, his mind says one thing, but his body says another.� He’s one whole person.

“A computer however is fixed and you know for sure that you will always get 2+2=4 when everything is fine, in other words the computer lacks free will to make errors on it's own.�

When a computer is fixed, then 2+2=4 every time. That is good design. “Free will� to make errors is a design flaw. What do you mean by “on its own�? The programmer could slip in a devious program that causes the computer to get ornery and spit out a wrong answer every once in a while.

This was in the context of talking about if Adam and Eve had not thought about their choice at all, but heard the snake and went straight for the fruit. As it is, the story mentions only a brief dialog between Eve and the snake before she eats, and Adam doesn’t have any dialog at all. He just eats.

Hm. I like that “extraordinary manner� part. Are you certain that we won’t all be judged in an extraordinary manner?

Ha! Sounds like the stereotypical foolish parents who sacrifice for their kids and shower stuff on them, all with a whiny, you gotta do something for me now attitude. Then they wind up with kids who say, “I didn’t ask to be born, you know!� By the way, I do have a teenage daughter. I give to her without expecting her to obey me. She’s nice anyway.

And then one disobedience and he got angry. Then more disobedience, more anger, more rules, more disobedience, more anger, more rules, etc. Perhaps he could benefit from an enlightened parenting class and an anger management class?

rosy tetra

Gen. 3:22 “And the Lord God said, ‘The man has now become like one of us, knowing good and evil.’�

Huh? How can anyone get that impression from this story? You mean God was being sarcastic?

Awmte

You really did take that personally, didn't you. What I meant was, ascribing motives to a decidedly inscrutable God is pretty much as Ad Hoc as you can get.

Well yes. I am trying to "stablish the conclusion" that the act was morally unjustified, and I'm trying to do so logically. That was the whole point of the thread.