Ensign Steve

Thanks for putting up with me, Amos. I logged off and was lifting weights when it hit me, "DUH, that's what he meant by 'Nothing to worry about because you did not do this to make a statement of fact.'" It's all coming clear to me now... ever... so... slowly. I need coffee!

abe smith

If the (alleged) Incarnation (altho the powers- that -allege- to-be agree that it was not *necessary* = "gawd" could have done it another way.) ...... If the alleged Incarnation was NOT PHYSICAL and REAL, >>> to produce a true bodily humanbeing
born of a true bodily human woman, THEN the alleged Redemption of humankind by the alleged Sacrifice of the Cross DID NOT HAPPEN. Gotta obey the Rules if you want ta play the Catholic Game.
Of course The Only True Catholic need not obey any rules but those'ns he makes-up.

Amos

Not true at all Abe. It just did not happen in the physical sense that people are looking for. It happened in the metaphysical sense and that is why people are looking for it and will keep looking for it because it can happen to each one of us.

However, the redemption of "humankind" is protestant theology. For one, the CC would never refer to our humanity as humankind. Second, just as Jesus died for his world, so must we and it is because our world is not part of man but only pertains to our humanity it follows that when we crucify our humanity we will die to our world.

abe smith

Just like to point-out that Amos & I had agreed some while back that we would/will not communicate further w/ each other; this agreement in order to avoid fights. Some one please remind him about that.

Meantime I'd like to say to any innocents new to the site that it would be inadvisable to accept as gospel, and especially as ROMAN CATHOLIC DOGMA/teaching, any pronuntiamenti you are apt to find asserted here; including mine. IF you want to KNOW what "the Church" teaches, get yourself to your local Bishop and ask for straight dope according to the most recent Catechism. My impression is strong that member Amos of this site does not speak for the Vatican. Verbum sap.

Amos

So what is an "innocent" Catholic doing on a board like this Abe. OK. I get it, since you can't slam the church here you are now suggesting that the newcomers go directly to the sheep and ask them if they know where they are going.

Ensign Steve

resists pointing out the paradox in the above sentence ...

I'll address this one, since I'm the one who posted the original question.

I posted the original question out of simple curiosity. I am not Catholic. I don't plan ever to be Catholic. So the information I get from Amos and anybody else on this site is good enough for my purposes.

This board does not have many "innocents" on it. Most of us are educated adults and critical thinkers who know better than to accept as fact anything posted on any message board (unless reliable sources are cited).

Thanks for the tip, though.

Jen

Amos

. . . and nobody here wants you to become one. This is just fun with philosophy and you are welcome to be part of it.

Ensign Steve

This is an atheism board, Amos. I don't think it is I who need your welcome.

Besides, you can say that you don't want me to become one. But I really don't think you are in a position to tell me, without a doubt, that nobody here wants that.

Lastly, what was the point of that post? I never even remotely implied that I thought anybody was trying to convert me.

Amos

Evangelization is not Catholic, never was and never will be except by those that are called to be evangelists and in the Catholic tradition they are Jesuits who bear the stigmata ("as I am so I am sending you" while showing the wounds). Hence, the name Jesuit=is follower of Jesus instead of the church.

Stephen T-B

How about this?
In the early years AD, Jewish revolutionary religious teachers vied with each other to “modernise” ancient Judaism, borrowing ideas from one another and adding new ones of their own. One of these teachers was especially prominent and was killed by the Romans as a trouble-maker.
His death turned him into a cult figure and as the decades past, followers of the cult promoted him to the position of Messiah - mainstream Judaism rejecting this utterly - and the deification of Jesus Christ then ensued. This involved attributing to him magical powers, a miraculous birth and - as a Sin Offering which the Jews in those days were very familiar with - a Sacrifice. This last was the innovative bit, and it led to the irresistibly-appealing (but not entirely original) notion of a Resurrection And in order to avoid annoying the all-powerful Romans, the early Church laid the blame for his execution on their enemies, the Orthodox Jews (thereby laying up all sorts of problems for them.)
In order to reconcile elements of Jewish dogma - the Old Testament remaining an essential religious text - with this Messiah, the most powerful brains of the day were concentrated on formulating appropriate and necessarily convoluted doctrines which to this day we see preserved in the Orthodox Church and the somewhat revisionist Roman Catholic Church - “Catholic” here being a boast of universalism, which the existence of the Orthodox Church (and the Celtic church) demonstrated to be an exaggeration.
One of the problems of the “God-Made-Man” doctrine was Original Sin, overcome by absolving god’s mother (Mary) of it by ascribing to her an Immaculate Conception. It’s only a wonder that the Heavy Thinkers of the early church didn’t go on and ascribe an IC to Mary’s mother - and back and back. Of course, in the end that would have brought them to Eve, where the whole Original Sin thing began, so best not to go further back than Mary’s saintly (but normally-conceived) mum.
My bet is that scholarship will, over the next decades, confirm the essentials of this account.
And will it undermine the RC Church?
I doubt it. Faith is unthinking; Faith is blind - as Gemma T. demonstrates time and time again.