Evoken

This is riddled with many misconceptions:

(1) One is not sent to Hell just for being born.
(2) The Church does not says that one is to be killed for working on the Lord's Day, it does encourages however that one avoids unnecessary work that may hinder us from dedicating the day to God (The Sabbath was made for man and not the other way around as Jesus said).
(3) The Church, while not opposed to the death penalty, it does not throws it out away like you seem to imply (click here for more info about this).
(4) As far as wearing cloth from different fabrics (among other things found in the OT), these were laws for a specific time during the history of Israel and are not applicable today.
(5) The same with stoning people to death and the like be it for adultery or something else. The Church does not holds this view, they have the chance to repent and do penance to be forgiven, which is what Jesus said during his time on earth.

God specs us to be obedient to his laws, He however won't force us to do so, you are free to disobey, he wants us to freely accept them, for our own good. I am not sure why you see it as wrong to sing praises to God, this is a good thing and it is something that fills us with grace and aids man in attaining his supernatural end. Personally I do not go to Church, fast, pray, etc just because I fear that God may sentence me to Hell or anything like that, I do so out of love for God.

Also The Church is an authority established by God, he did not leave us in blindness, but as He promised, He sent us the spirit to guide us in all truth. This spirit is what guides and protects The Church.

See, that is the problem, you think that God needs to bow down and explain himself to you. You do not trust those he left in charge of guarding and proclaiming his truth. In fact just you and I interacting in this forum may be God's way of trying to help you open up to him, who knows (although I admit of being a poor messenger on my own). God is not a monster, He is a God of love. This does not means that he does not judges, he does.

knotted paragon

Hello IAsimisI, it is nice to meet you. I enjoy reading your posts since you are usually the most steadfast and plainspoken of the believers that post here.My question to you is - how does one go about identifying "those he left in charge of guarding and proclaiming his truth?" There are so many folks who claim to be just such guardians and proclaimers; somebody has to be fibbing, right?

Evoken

Thanks! I try to stay true to my religion while at the same time of expounding it faithfully and fully to others, always like peter said, with humility. I am glad that you enjoy reading my posts.

This is a good question and one that I will admit has no simple answer. I have not been a Catholic all my life and it was not till last year that I finally decided to join The Church and I am still in the process. I will try to focus on the different Christian denominations and work from there for the sake of simplicity. If you have any other questions, just ask them and I'll try to answer them the best I can.

Giving a quick look at Christianity today would leave anyone with a headache. Really, what is it with the 30,000 or more different denominations that we see today, all claiming that their version is the real one? Obviously not all of them can be true but not all of them can be false either. If Jesus existed (and I believe he did) then we can be assured that he actually said something and that he had a motive to do so, that he had a goal in mind. So, the plethora of denominations that we have today cannot all be what Jesus said or intended. There has to be at least one that is true.

Christianity, unlike most religions is based in historical events, on things that happened and like any scientific theory it is based on these facts. So if there is any place from which to look for the truth of Christianity it is in history.

Working backward in history, it is very easy so see that up until the reformation back in the 1500s, Christianity and Catholicism were one and the same thing. There was no division and here we don't find all the denominations we see today. After the Reformation is where all these denominations start to be born and then split to give birth to new denominations and so on ending up in what we see today.

Before the 1500s there were a couple of heresies here and there but nothing serious(perhaps with the Arian controversy being an exemption) and much less not anything compared to what we see today. Also a good way to see how the protestant denominations are in error is by looking at the canon they use for The BIble. The Bible in it's entirely was finally settled by The Church back in a council at around 380 AD and even before that there was already the same list, with which the early Christian lived and passed the tradition. On the other hand, the protestants, in this case Luther took books away from The Bible and went against The Church, this happening after about 1400 years of Church tradition and of the question of the canon having been settled already and confirmed in subsequent councils.

Going further back in history, some people have the misconception that Christianity (or a corrupted version of it) was born at the Council of Nicea back in 325 and that all sort of manipulation and distortion took place there. This is I'd say a popular myth and by reading the texts of the council itself we find nothing of the sort.

Before that time probably by the end of the second century we find Valentinian Gnosticism (and in other branches even earlier than that) promoted by Valentinus, of which I formed part for about a year before I little by little started to get into a more Orthodox view of Christianity and one more in accord with it's history. The Gnostics went as far as to say that Jesus, while on earth had no body, but that he was a spirit, they rejected the Old Testament (with the exemption of Sethian Gnosticism) and also rejected many of the New Testament books as well. There are many more errors that I could point out from the Gnostics which contradict Jesus and other things. But during their time both Iraneous and Tertullian spoke against them (specially Marcion, perhaps the first Gnostic). Tertullian uses as an argument against Marcion the fact that the Church preserved the succession of bishops and that the Church was undivided in it's beliefs and doctrines contrary to the Gnostics who relied on private teachings and various forms of initiation and also upon many questionable methods of interpretation.

This succession of bishops and unity of doctrine that Terullian refers to is today preserved in The Catholic Church. And not only that, but if we had to judge by The Bible and the Christian tradition, you would see how The Church instead of arbitrarily choosing what to hold to, encompasses all of Christianity and is entirely rooted in it. And also how she, in spite of all controversies, has remained true to it.

In any case, this is but a very brief sketch, I know that I have left many things out. But I hope that you found it helpful and like i said, if you have any further questions let me know.

Also I think this went completely off topic..oh well..

GoodLittleAtheist

You are talking about the law making process that we can be part of here on earth. God is a dictator in the afterlife. He only cares about his rules and whether you followed them.
That isn't the threatening I was talking about. I was talking about holding eternal damnation over my head.
And something you can only accept on faith.

GoodLittleAtheist

That's more like it and what I said earlier. The Church has no official position other than they cannot enter Heaven and it is up to God's mercy. (What is funny is that I didn't read about the concept of Limbo until I was an atheist. At least, I don't remember hearing about it, but I became an atheist in my teens.) But still the whole thing is still not fair. Surely, heaven is the best place, with God, and the baby did NOTHING to be cursed with this original sin. (To take it back to the O.P., this idea of babies not going to heaven says to me that there is no moral basis for O.S. God excludes them from Beatific Vision on basis of what their ancestors did.)

rosy tetra

It sounds like the equivalent of throwing a wrench in your computer and saying, “My computer now has the free will to come up with 2+2=4 or 2+2=5.� Because really, the choice Adam and Eve had came down to simple reasoning like that. “The creator is all good and all powerful. The creator told us to not eat that fruit or we will die. The snake told us the fruit is okay to eat. The snake is not the creator. = Let’s eat the fruit!�

There is a problem with the situation. Either Adam and Eve did not really know that the creator is all good and all powerful, or they had wrenches in their brains, or both.

That would be like not having a brain at all.

So Baptism erases Original Sin. Seems so simple, yet so dependent upon having a Church near by.

I can understand a creator wanting to teach his creatures good ways of living a happy life. I can’t understand a creator demanding pure obedience. Not unless we define creator=the universe.

[quote=IasimisI]Isn't society structured in the same way? You have to summit to authority, follow the law and "play by the rules" so to speak. The same thing with God, he has his laws for us and he wants us to follow them.]

Well, you don’t always have to submit to authority, otherwise, for example, we would have no USA. You can, of course, say that God’s government is perfect, unlike Great Britain’s government. There are the laws of nature, like gravity, for example. But instead of thinking that gravity means that people can never fly, we fiddled around with stuff and found ways to fly, defying what we thought was true.

Yes, I’m all for enjoying the universe and appreciating life. Criticizing the universe is depressing.

So “day� must in this case have some other meaning than the normal 24 hr period. Or else “die� has a different meaning. Like “begin to die� or “die from grace.�

This sounds like an expected but inaccurate Catholic assumption about athiests. Obviously, we don’t think God should be anything at all. Nor do we typically expect the universe to bend its laws to create miracles for us.

A good parent would not get angry at his son. He would figure out a better way of teaching why something is right or wrong to do. Or he would consider that the son is not yet capable of understanding the issue. A good parent does not demand obedience, but teaches how the world works, within the safety of his protection.

JEST2ASK

Just a request for clarification ... regarding humans being created as immortals

Genesis (KJV) 3 : 20 - 24 (20) And Adam called his wife's name Eve, because she was the mother of all living (21) Also for Adam and his wife, the Lord God made tunics of skin and clothed them.(22) Then the Lord God said ,"behold the man has become like one of Us, to know good and evil, and now lest he put forth his hand and take also, of the tree of life and eat, and live forever- (23) Therfore the Lord God sent him out of the Garden of Eden to till the ground from which he was taken. (24) So he drove out the man, and he placed cherubim at the east of the garden of Eden and a flaming sword which turned every way, to guard the way to the tree of life

also as context read Genesis chapter 11 : 1 - 9 *
(6) And the Lord said , indeed the people are one and they all have one language, and this is what they begin to do, now nothing they propose to do will be withheld from them

Stripping away the added meanings of X-anity .. this leads me to see the term jealous in a different light ... I have never found validation for thinking that Genesis had anything to do with X-anity (based on my reading of the stories / intent )

Evoken

Well that is the purpose of our earthly life, to follow God's commandments. Man is destined for a supernatural goal. In Heaven everyone will have received each according to his deeds. God is not a dictator to anyone in the afterlife because those who get to meet him in Heaven, love him without restrain and without the need of God imposing anything to them, it is free love going both ways.

That's the way it is, it is what God has made. It is his manner of judging his creation and I don't think that we are in any position to judge Him. Also know that this is not coming from someone who (like a Calvinist), is assured of his salvation. As you should known by being a former Catholic, I could very well head straight to Hell if I ever died in a state of mortal sin.

But contrary to how it may look, just as I pointed out in a previous post. I follow God and keep his commandments out of love and not fear, I have grown to love and dedicate myself to God, with my own short comings and imperfections of course. But God has never removed his hand from me to help me over come them.

I won't deny that many aspects of Christianity demand faith, after all it is impossible to please God without faith. But also, I would say that Christianity, not unlike any good scientific theory, makes successful predictions about the world, human nature, etc. that are both very accurate and beneficial. But I think that this is a completely different discussion and strays from the topic at hand.

Second Post..

It is not without a moral basis because man does not has a natural right to Heaven, contrary to what we may think, Sanctifying Grace is an unmerited gift.

Also, from our perspective it may look that for the baby it would be much better to receive the Beatific Vision, but God is just and he will give to each according to what he deserves. The baby in Limbo will not be lacking in anything but will be in a state of natural bliss and happiness. Also the statement about Limbo is not final, it is possible that the baby actually gets to Heaven as I have read in some sources. It really depends on God's mercy.

The baby does not inherits the guilt or sin that Adam did but the effects, which is the lack of Sanctifying Grace. This is why God gave us the Sacrament of Baptism and this is why the baptism of infants is so encouraged by The Church. So that they may go directly to Heaven if they die at an early age.

knotted paragon

Thanks for the insight, much better than the usual "because this book here says so..." Sorry for the derailment.

JEST2ASK

Originally Posted by IAsimisI
It is not without a moral basis because man does not has a natural right to Heaven, contrary to what we may think, Sanctifying Grace is an unmerited gift.
Also, from our perspective it may look that for the baby it would be much better to receive the Beatific Vision, but God is just and he will give to each according to what he deserves. The baby in Limbo will not be lacking in anything but will be in a state of natural bliss and happiness. Also the statement about Limbo is not final, it is possible that the baby actually gets to Heaven as I have read in some sources. It really depends on God's mercy.

The baby does not inherits the guilt or sin that Adam did but the effects, which is the lack of Sanctifying Grace. This is why God gave us the Sacrament of Baptism and this is why the baptism of infants is so encouraged by The Church. So that they may go directly to Heaven if they die at an early age.

what is this LIMBO does it also apply people who have not been exposed to the "Gospel message" does it apply to the mentally challenged ... to those who lived before Jesus ... to those who are mislead into a sincre belief or disblief ...