Endless Punishment, Fundie style

[Giordano]

Dear pakeha,

It's because the vastness of interstellar space and time doesn't mean anything. It's just crap floating in space. The human world means something, it is the repository of meaning in the universe, aside from any elsewhere pockets of other intelligent lifeforms.

...why wouldn't He take an interest in the most interesting beings in the universe? What else is He going to do, study dwarf stars or something? The universe doesn't care about Him, He created man who could care about God and so God could meaningfully care about man.

I don't think I'll ever recover from my mild amazement at how people think because something is bigger than they are, it should be more important.

Cpl Ferro

Actually, the splots on Deneb IV are even more interesting than humans. But as you predicted, they are very small (10 cms high). Their God has 8 tentacles, just like them.

And dwarf stars are fascinating...

 

[Donn]

Dear Cpl Ferro,
There was no Adam.

 

[Donn]

I don't think I'll ever recover from my mild amazement at how people think because something is bigger than they are, it should be more important.

So, that's god dealt with then? Glad we finally agree on something.

 

[CplFerro]

Just to be clear, I thought according to doctrine, that Christ's suffering was to offload us from original sin. I even thought that the church had an age of consent below which you were not libel for any "sins" you might commit (I know that the Jewish religion does). Are you now saying that new born babies, not because they have free will, but because they use that free will to want to "sin" (whether they can physically "sin" or not) are committing sin until they are old enough to "accept" Christ and be forgiven?

I also learned that unbaptized babies go to Limbo, but I know the church no longer professes this. Are you saying that they go to Hell instead, due to their "sinning?" Is this your belief or held to by a particular church? If you think they go to Heavan insead, why?

Thanks- I ask out of intellectual curiousity.

Dear Giordano,

To my knowledge Christ suffered to save us from sin, period, not one particular type of sin. That said, man's record of sin flows in theory from an original fall, compounding itself with time as potential-for-sin becomes actual-sinning.

If there's a cut-off period whereby a person becomes culpable for sin, I've never been taught it. The age of reason (8 yo or so) seems about right.

I can conceive that newborn babies can do as you say,

not because they have free will, but because they use that free will to want to "sin" (whether they can physically "sin" or not) are committing sin until they are old enough to "accept" Christ and be forgiven?

Limbo, it is said, was always speculation and not doctrinal reality.

The Church, to my knowledge, simply doesn't know and doesn't announce it as dogma.

My belief is that, though some sort of fall, even if it be merely a "fall upwards" through evolution into personhood, man is depraved and must recognise this fact if he is to attain to the better part of his natures, the part made in the image of God.

My own speculation about people who die while infants is that they will be dealt with mercifully, but that the rewards for serving God successfully in this life will outweigh the reward for living a brief, virtually sinless life of invincible ignorance. But, I could be wrong.

I hope this answers your questions,

Cpl Ferro

 

[CplFerro]

This isn't a prayer meeting, it is a discussion group where arguments are presented, and countered, in a logical manner. The use of logical fallacies impedes any progress for all those involved. Prayer doesn't help either. What does move the conversation forward is answering questions put to you.

I'll make it very simple. Without invoking a certain "Muggeridge quoting" homophobe , please explain how sinful babies are born again. Why would they be subjected to eternal torment? Thanks.

Dear crhkrebs,

My only guess is that such a person might receive a vision of Christ on their deathbed or just beyond, giving them a chance to receive salvation. Similar to a suicide or a heathen.

Cpl Ferro

 

[Giordano]

Dear Giordano,

I can conceive that newborn babies can do as you say,


My belief is that, though some sort of fall, even if it be merely a "fall upwards" through evolution into personhood, man is depraved and must recognise this fact if he is to attain to the better part of his natures, the part made in the image of God.

My own speculation about people who die while infants is that they will be dealt with mercifully, but that the rewards for serving God successfully in this life will outweigh the reward for living a brief, virtually sinless life of invincible ignorance. But, I could be wrong.

I hope this answers your questions,

Cpl Ferro

I think I am unclear if you believe that newly born babies who die go to Heaven or to Hell. Is the mercy of which you speak enough to send them to Heaven?

But does this mean that you do believe that a new born baby is deprived enough in the womb to have wanted to commit a sin, and thus sinned in the eyes of God. whether or not they actually were able to do the physical "sin"?

If so, I presume that you believe that that an adult "can sin in one's heart" by just thinking about doing a sin, whether or not one actually does it? If true, I am so doomed. And you must have an interesting life just getting through the day.

 

[CplFerro]

What part of "does not believe in gods" escapes you? Or do you honestly believe that anyone who is not a Christian must be an idolater? Is this the same as how you believe that bad Christians are all atheists?

Originally Posted by CplFerro View Post
If the basic premise of a transcendent One escapes you, what difference does it make all the rest?

Cpl Ferro
Thank you for baring the intellectual bankruptcy of your arguments for all to see. You don't have an answer when confronted with difficult questions, so you blame the person for asking the questions. How typical.
What part of "does not believe in gods" escapes you? Or do you honestly believe that anyone who is not a Christian must be an idolater? Is this the same as how you believe that bad Christians are all atheists?


Thank you for baring the intellectual bankruptcy of your arguments for all to see. You don't have an answer when confronted with difficult questions, so you blame the person for asking the questions. How typical.

Dear Frozenwolf,

If you'd like to go beyond logic into the realm of Intellect and help me understand Nicolaus of Cusa's work better, I'm all eyes.

If you are invulnerable to understanding the possibility of transcendent Being, [shrug], I'm not a miracle-worker.

Yes, I think that if one does not worship God, one worships something else, even if it's something as apparently innocuous as one's wife, or logic and scepticism, or being an Internet wit, or perceiving football. And I think such idolatry has long-term social consequences, especially as it mutates toward more and more un-Biblical forms like witchcraft, heathenism, and the like.

And, yes, Christians who do bad things are probably not Christians, but, as I said much earlier in this thread, there is ultimately no way to tell this side of the Judgement who is a real Christian and who is not.

Cpl Ferro

 

[CplFerro]

I think I am unclear if you believe that newly born babies who die go to Heaven or to Hell. Is the mercy of which you speak enough to send them to Heaven?

But does this mean that you do believe that a new born baby is deprived enough in the womb to have wanted to commit a sin, and thus sinned in the eyes of God. whether or not they actually were able to do the physical "sin"?

If so, I presume that you believe that that an adult "can sin in one's heart" by just thinking about doing a sin, whether or not one actually does it? If true, I am so doomed. And you must have an interesting life just getting through the day.

Dear Giordano,

There's no point in getting bent out of shape about sinning in one's heart. It happens, one prays and moves on.

Yes, I can imagine that we're sinful from the moment we're first given a mind, we have that tendency toward depravity and it quickly forms part of our identity. I imagine further that such babies enter either a very brief Purgatory, a very low-simmering Hell, or a very weakly-lit Heaven.

Cpl Ferro

 

[pakeha]

Dear pakeha,

It's because the vastness of interstellar space and time doesn't mean anything. It's just crap floating in space. The human world means something, it is the repository of meaning in the universe, aside from any elsewhere pockets of other intelligent lifeforms. If God is a god of meaning--willing to live a human life for the sake of finding out what it is that these humans go through in their lives--why wouldn't He take an interest in the most interesting beings in the universe? What else is He going to do, study dwarf stars or something? The universe doesn't care about Him, He created man who could care about God and so God could meaningfully care about man.

I don't think I'll ever recover from my mild amazement at how people think because something is bigger than they are, it should be more important.

Cpl Ferro

You're trolling, aren't you?
Or are you ignorant of the dimensions of the galaxy, let alone the universe?

What makes you think we're the most interesting beings in the universe?

 

[Donn]

Someone tell Ferro that there was no Adam, I seem to be invisible. A bit like god, really.

 

[abaddon]

Someone tell Ferro that there was no Adam, I seem to be invisible. A bit like god, really.

Cpl Ferro

There was no Adam.

 

[Donn]

Tah muchly.

 

[bruto]

According to my Catholic friend, Cain, the fate of unbaptised babies was only speculation by the Church, never dogma.

Cpl Ferro

As I understand it, the speculation was about limbo, but are you suggesting that unbaptized babies are exempt from the doctrine of endless punishment, now, after having argued so thoroughly that they are not?

Dear bruto,

Adam and Eve had free will and were peccable but not sinful until they acted to eat the fruit. I would say original sin requires a free will, but is not based on that free will, but rather a freely chosen disposition towards sin. If this is not so, then I do not understand it.

Also as I wrote to Cain, according to my Catholic friend, Cain, the fate of unbaptised babies was only speculation by the Church, never dogma. So to speak, it's pop religion that has produced this idea of boiling babies in Hell.

Cpl Ferro

So the argument that a newborn baby is a sinner owing to intellect and free will, which was made before, is now discarded? How is free will differentiated from a "freely chosen disposition towards sin?" How can a baby who does not understand or choose anything be said to have a freely chosen disposition towards sin? How is a baby born with brain damage, or in a coma, differentiated from one who is not? Is there a loophole in the doctrine?

No matter how you slice this, somehow a human being is, according to this doctrine, responsible without exercising responsibility for sin without sinning.

 

[CplFerro]

You're trolling, aren't you?
Or are you ignorant of the dimensions of the galaxy, let alone the universe?

What makes you think we're the most interesting beings in the universe?

Dear pakeha,

What do the dimensions of the universe have to do with its value compared with beings made in the image of God? As I said, there may be other people in the universe, but they're not going to be any more interesting than us, for that reason of our intrinsic constitution, aforementioned.

Cpl Ferro

 

[ehcks]

Adam and Eve had free will and were peccable but not sinful until they acted to eat the fruit. I would say original sin requires a free will, but is not based on that free will, but rather a freely chosen disposition towards sin. If this is not so, then I do not understand it.

The fruit was of the tree of knowledge of good and evil, yes?

If they had not yet eaten of it, how could they have known that eating of it was evil? How could they have known that disobeying god was evil?

How can you punish an untrained animal for eating food you leave on the floor?

 

[tsig]

Dear pakeha,

It's because the vastness of interstellar space and time doesn't mean anything. It's just crap floating in space. The human world means something, it is the repository of meaning in the universe, aside from any elsewhere pockets of other intelligent lifeforms. If God is a god of meaning--willing to live a human life for the sake of finding out what it is that these humans go through in their lives--why wouldn't He take an interest in the most interesting beings in the universe? What else is He going to do, study dwarf stars or something? The universe doesn't care about Him, He created man who could care about God and so God could meaningfully care about man.

I don't think I'll ever recover from my mild amazement at how people think because something is bigger than they are, it should be more important.

Cpl Ferro

Wouldn't god already know this, being omniscient and all.

You have a very exalted view of humanity and a very small view of god.

 

[CplFerro]

As I understand it, the speculation was about limbo, but are you suggesting that unbaptized babies are exempt from the doctrine of endless punishment, now, after having argued so thoroughly that they are not?

I'm saying, dear bruto, that the Church doesn't know, and I don't know, but, that it is conceivable that it might be that way.

So the argument that a newborn baby is a sinner owing to intellect and free will, which was made before, is now discarded? How is free will differentiated from a "freely chosen disposition towards sin?" How can a baby who does not understand or choose anything be said to have a freely chosen disposition towards sin? How is a baby born with brain damage, or in a coma, differentiated from one who is not? Is there a loophole in the doctrine?

No matter how you slice this, somehow a human being is, according to this doctrine, responsible without exercising responsibility for sin without sinning.

No, I would hold that human depravity exists intrinsically, as a function of free will, though not identical to free will itself. Think of it in terms of order versus chaos. The individual has these two tendencies from the beginning, and the moral mission is to purge chaos and retain order. We choose chaos from our earliest mental times, defining us as "sinners".

I don't think we can say with absolute thoroughness a baby understands nothing and can choose nothing. Our science is not sophisticated enough to see past the veil of forgetting that all of us have covering those times in our histories.

As to babies born in coma, brain-damaged, etc, I don't know.

Cpl Ferro

 

[tsig]

I think I am unclear if you believe that newly born babies who die go to Heaven or to Hell. Is the mercy of which you speak enough to send them to Heaven?

But does this mean that you do believe that a new born baby is deprived enough in the womb to have wanted to commit a sin, and thus sinned in the eyes of God. whether or not they actually were able to do the physical "sin"?

If so, I presume that you believe that that an adult "can sin in one's heart" by just thinking about doing a sin, whether or not one actually does it? If true, I am so doomed. And you must have an interesting life just getting through the day.

Most religious types solve that problem by not thinking at all.

 

[CplFerro]

Wouldn't god already know this, being omniscient and all.

You have a very exalted view of humanity and a very small view of god.

As Timothy Keller puts it, tsig, God qua God is alienating. It took Him incarnating as a man to allow men to relate to Him on a human level, to prove that He was willing to go the distance for man.

Cpl Ferro

 

[CplFerro]

The fruit was of the tree of knowledge of good and evil, yes?

If they had not yet eaten of it, how could they have known that eating of it was evil? How could they have known that disobeying god was evil?

How can you punish an untrained animal for eating food you leave on the floor?

My view on human origins, ehcks, is 2001: A Space Odyssey. The Monolith appeared before proto-man and they "fell" into self-consciousness. This created a dynamic in them between order and chaos, between God-like power and progress, and Satanic destruction and animalism. So, I'm not sure we can take the story literally, any more than we can take Noah's Ark literally. The essence is, man has sinful tendencies generally related to below the eyes and ears, below the belt, and man is made in the image of God, able to understand truthful principles of nature and thereby reorder nature to his own advantage.

Cpl Ferro