One of my favourite Morris West books is The Clowns of God. In it, Pope Gregory XVII claims to have had a private revelation of the end of the world – with the message that it is immanent and he has to prepare the people. The Roman Curia suspect him of being a madman, or a fanatic grasping for power. They seek to silence him before his prophecies can harm the Church.
Our commenter KA is right. Christians should – and mostly do – accept that such prophesies are possible. Yes, we need to be discerning. Yes, we need to investigate: see if the prophesy fits with scripture and tradition; if the prophet is a prayerful person who shows evidence of holiness; if the whole thing makes sense. But if we believe in God (whatever or whoever we may conceive God to be) we have to believe that people might – just might – be telling the truth when they say they’ve had a vision or heard a message.
If that’s deluded, then I’m deluded.
The thing is, I understand why atheists are bewildered by faith. Part of it is that many of the reasons atheists give for why people believe are clearly out of touch with reality. I’m not following the faith of my fathers. I’m not poorly educated. I’m not stupid. I’m antiauthoritarian and anarchic. And, in modern New Zealand, my Christian faith – and particularly my Catholic faith – doesn’t win me social acceptance and career advancement. Quite the contrary.
In a blog post called Freak for Christ, Heather King writes:
The long answer is that Catholicism is a radical search for the truth. We don’t hear nearly enough that grace costs. We don’t hear nearly enough that to follow Christ more or less means being poor. We’re not called to live in destitution but we’re clearly called to not own much more than we can use, which is really not all that much. We’re called to poverty, chastity, and obedience. And what I’ve found is that these are the most exciting, challenging states possible! They lead to a kind of freedom and a state of being awake is completely lacking in our narcotic culture…
I lost my marriage in part because I converted. I quit my job as a lawyer because I converted. I’m not sure I lost friends, but I may have lost a certain closeness with certain friends. That Catholicism is constantly misinterpreted, misunderstood, maligned, scorned, despised, spat upon I can accept. What bothers me more is the view of Catholicism as mindless eccentricity. Right after Obama was elected a friend was gushing about him and after awhile she said: “You love Obama, too, right?” I said, “Well, he seems like a nice enough guy but I’m not crazy about the fact that he supports embryonic stem cell research and I bet you anything nothing gets better for poor people and he starts a war or two and in about a year everyone turns around and starts to hate him.” And she said, “Oh well that’s just your Catholicism.” I almost crawled out of my seat. “My Catholicism!” I replied. “My Catholicism is my life, my Catholicism is the air I breathe.”…
So for me the sorrow is knowing I’m on to the most inexhaustibly absorbing path imaginable and living a culture that is more or less dead. Low-grade hopelessness, ennui. What brings you alive is sacrifice and suffering. What brings you alive is falling in love with reality…
Love, Truth, Reason, Reality, Life. I don’t believe that these are just abstract terms for biological and cultural habits; I believe these are names for God, and our ability to think in abstract terms is comes from our nature as tiny, broken, imperfect reflections of elements of His transcategorical being. Is it mindless eccentricity to believe so? Does that make me a freak; a clown?
I’m okay with that. The clown has been a subversive figure throughout history; challenging authority and the status quo. In some medieval kingdoms, the fool had the privileged role of reminding the king of his faults when he became too full of himself. Secular, capitalist, material society is certainly too full of itself. Is it possible that the merciless mockery of those taken in by Camping’s false prophecy of the endtimes is witness to a certain unease on the part of those who would rather not be reminded of their faults?
I can’t claim to speak for everyone but in my case it was mockery pure and simple without trace of unease. 😀
And if you are the clown then I am the small child watching the royal procession and tugging on his mother’s skirt saying just a little too loudly: “But Mama! He has NO clothes on!”
Seeker, I was struck by the fact that your mockery was not without mercy – you were one of the first that I heard expressing concern for those who would be disappointed.
Camping has now said the end of the world will still happen on the 21st of October. I really hope that those who listened before have learned not to do so again. 😦
http://www.stuff.co.nz/oddstuff/5046003/Apocalypse-preacher-now-saying-Oct-21
Seeker, I said the clown, not the emperor. The clown is the perpetual small child – and the emperors forget the clown at peril of their souls – and worse (or so they think), of their dignity.
Yes I realized that. However unlike the clown, the child is not part of the royal party but stands on the sidelines – outside and not part of it and thus has quite a different perspective.
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“But if we believe in God (whatever or whoever we may conceive God to be) we have to believe that people might – just might – be telling the truth when they say they’ve had a vision or heard a message.”
Wello, Joyful, we must consider the possibilty, indeed probability, that everyone who says they’ve had a vision or heard a message, may well be telling the truth.
Especially when the message says, “Go to the supermarket and cut off a British lady’s head,”or, “Go out and kill as many prostitutes as you can.”
You ignored that bit, Toad.
JP
I understand the sentiment behind this post, and the appeal of dignity in the face of derision. And the appeal of tradition and faith in the face of flippancy and a culture cut off from its roots.
This affair with Harold Camping has revealed several things, to my mind at least.
First: there has been a sea-change in Western attitudes to Christianity. Even in just this last decade. As recently as the ’90s the story would have played differently. For secular journalists, bloggers, and the man in the street, — the difference between Harold Camping and the Archbishop of Cantebury is simply that the Bishop is more cultured, and quite harmless. Their beliefs are seen as essentially equally mad. —- That reflects a huge change in the zeitgeist — ” EVEN christians are laughing at this” said a man I overheard. And so yes, end times, in a sense.
Second: Christianity has an inoperable tendency to fixate on the destructive end of the world. It is ecclesiastical structure that has contained this impulse, but it flairs up when ever Christians form small sects. This is due to the foundational texts themselves. I think particulary of Matthew just now. The eschatological discourse and the parables of the Kings feast, the Talents, the wise and foolish virgins etc, building up to that horrible image of the wicked cast into eternal punishment and the saved heading off to a reward.
This a.) encourages believers to subordinate this world to a future one — this can have disasterous consequences. b) It involves psychological manipulation “you never know when but JUDGEMENT is coming– never relax”. c.) It endorses a morality based on fear of punishment and hope of reward. — These are two distorting factors that wreck a mature moral system.
All these issues have been dealt with by thoughtful Christians. But this only serves to highlight the gap between Christian theology and its foundational texts.
It doesn’t make you a freak or a clown. — Our sense of God demands a response from us. — Our sense of the numinous and the ultimate good fills us with a desire to name and point to the sacred, to find a structure that tells us about God and helps us relate to him. — To verify our sense of the numinous by holding particular beliefs. This impulse is especially clear in “Surprised by Joy” which I know you’re familiar with. An organised religion is an external and tangible reference point outside ourselves that gives us “something” to know and believe about God.
But they all over-reach. They all try to (cf Roger Scruton) eff the ineffable.
And to categorise the transcategorical. Yes, indeed.
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“I’m okay with that. The clown has been a subversive figure throughout history; challenging authority and the status quo.”
But you’re not OK, are you? Not when the authority is Catholic dogma itself.
Anyway, Toad thinks we don’t know our clowns from our jesters.
But, then, he’s only a clown-
As an adult should, Toad, I choose my authorities, and think about, adapt, and worry at those that don’t fit the knowledge-shaped hole they claim to belong to. Some of my rambling explorations I share on this blog. Others are decades in the past.
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Put it like this:
When Joan of Arc gets a message from God to go and kill Englishmen (and He even provides the sword) that’s GOOD.
When Peter Sutcliffe gets a message from God to go and kill whores, that’s BAD.
There. That’s that sorted.
It was lovely of Brother Burrito to invite us to the wedding feast. — And what a wonderful feast it would be! But of course the human imagination isn’t all sunshine. Humanity invented the feast, but also dreamed up the outer darkness with the wailing and gnashing of teeth for those who are not suitable for the feast.
I think the great advantage of coming to accept reality is that angels and devils, heaven and hell, all fade away together. You’re left with a world that wasn’t made with us in mind, of which we are a natural part, and mortal.
Amen to that! 😉
She makes a fair complaint. Catholicism is an incredibly intricate and internally coherent structure. — And within its confines entire lifetimes of intellectual effort can be spent. It involves 2000 years of theology, liturgy, philosophy, literature, and spirituality etc to engage with.
Have you ever noticed that the atheists on Being frank sometimes seem to be unsophisticated with respect to Catholicism?
— But the awful rub is, that when the system is viewed as a whole, not from within where one authority may always buttress another, —– in other words when someone is so unsophisticated as to question the whole edifice— it becomes less impressive.
That is exactly what I found! From within it is rich, beautiful, complex and complete. From the outside it is self-supporting, self-validating and ultimately a rather grubby human edifice.
I came to it from outside – with an entirely negative view, and looking for evidence to support my prejudices.
Not to downplay the personal significance of changing denominations, especially to one that was viewed with suspicion and prejudice, I think that the kind of ‘standing on the outside’ that I am talking about encompasses not just the peculiar doctrines of the Catholic church but indeed all those of Christianity as a whole.
It’s always is the sorrow of the true believer, in every age, whichever the one true path discovered maybe, but human culture has carried on, despite being often written off as decadent. And perhaps sobriety always seems grey to someone on a high.
Toad, how kind of you to illustrate the point with utterly spurious comparisons, such as between Joan of Arc and Peter Sutcliffe. We’ve done Joan before, remember? I recall she was asked to drive the English out of France, which isn’t quite the same thing as “killing Englishmen”, or, for that matter, killing unarmed prostitutes. Perhaps I’m missing something.
Was she meant to use a charter bus to drive them out instead?
I’m sure she would have allowed them to hop on the bus and leave peacefully if they were prepared to do so. The point was eviction, not slaughter. Whereas the other chap …
This is all a bit glum, isn’t it? I suppose it’s meant to be the tears of a clown and all that.
In the opening pages of his “Introduction to Christianity”, the Pope cites a story of a circus which sets fire. The clown is sent to the village to ask for help and to warn of the fire. He is taken as an advert, ridiculed and ignored. The circus and village are burned down. The clown is the theologian today.
But the Christian message hallows the path of the Holy Fool, along with many others – the poor, the disposessed – to whom the world can offer only hollow lip-service. Yeah sure, everyone is valued. Yeah sure, everyone has dignity.
The trouble with the pursuit of worldly success is that even more are called and even fewer are chosen. The only thing worse than sitting outside the rat race, is racing and losing, and the vast majority do lose, don’t they?
As for visionaries being deluded, well, what evidence would prove the contrary? I mean, suppose, instead of there being only one visionary, there were something like 70,000, and the event was predicted in advance, perhaps even the cynics might admit that something funny might be going on. But there’s no pleasing some people.
Perhaps Toad will start calling me Fatimanus.
Even if you race and win, Manus, all that does is prove that you’re a slightly faster rat! Where’s the satisfaction in that?
I’m sure we’ll receive words of wisdom on this topic from our slightly grumpier Toad.
Loved the video Mr Seeker 🙂
KA
this only serves to highlight the gap between Christian theology and its foundational texts.
John W. Martens very ably deals with that :
http://www.americamagazine.org/blog/entry.cfm?blog_id=1&entry_id=4248
From what I can tell, the Catholic Church has shown a remarkable ability to avoid getting ensnared in end of the world prophecies. Perhaps there is something after all in her traditions, methods of exegesis and hermeneutics, communal discernment, and authority structures ?
God Bless
There is indeed a great deal to her traditions, methods of exegesis and hermeneutics, communal discernment, and authority structures. John W. martens article was, as expected, thoughtful and sensible within limits.
As to whether or not the catholic Church IS ensnared in an end of the world prophecy, that is a seperate question.
However thanks for posting that article.
Fr John MacKenzie SJ wrote well on the dangers inherent in the apocalyptic approach (in, I think, his The New Testament Without Illusions) as a narrow and pessimistic ulta-conservative retreat into some kind of Christian “ghetto” unable to see anything good in the secular world. A distressing tendency unfortunately still with us in some quarters.
Fr Raymond Brown SS had an interesting piece in his Introduction to the New Testament relating the idea of an immanent second coming with Paul’s seeming lack of interest in doing much to end slavery in his time. Apocalyptic approaches do seem to run against doing very much to make the world a better place. Such an approach is markedly at odds with the Christian ethos.
God Bless
Well Jesus as presented in Matthew, Mark and Luke, is emphatically focussed on apocalyptic expectation. — Think for example of the parables he delivers in Matthew which culminate in the description of the seperation of sheep and goats. The synoptic Jesus is very focussed on the end of the world, judgement, and eternal punishment.
That sounds reminiscent of “the world” as portrayed in the gospel of John.
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“Yes, we need to be discerning. Yes, we need to investigate: see if the prophesy fits with scripture and tradition; if the prophet is a prayerful person who shows evidence of holiness; if the whole thing makes sense.
You ignored that bit, Toad.”
Well, of course Toad didn’t ignore that. But ..
How can we be “discerning” and “investigatory” when apparently all we can do is see if the prophecy “fits” with scripture and tradition? What independent sources are there for verification?
Most ‘prophecies’ seem to be self-fullfilling anyway to Toad. And what the heck is a “prayerful” person? How can we tell? How do we know that? If Toad prays, is he a “prayerful person?” If, so does that give him extra credence?
And what is “evidence of holiness?” Is it “prayerfullness?” Some vicious circles here, thinks Toad..
And a lot of traditions are thoroughly nasty.
(Viz, Churchill and the Royal Navy.)
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Albert Camus
Toad was led up the garden path as far as I know.
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“Perhaps I’m missing something, ” muses Manus.
Toad thinKs that what Manus is missing is the point.
Which is that the approved technique for removing foreigners from one’s patch was battle and slaughter. In Joan’s case, we have been told, with a sword personally donated by God himself.
And He didn’t give instructions to only use it on her toenails, as far as Toad knows. They did things differently in those days. Look what happened to the poor, deluded, hysterical child herself. Not nice.
Anyway, is there any record of her politely asking the English to leave quietly?
All in all, we should be careful of voices in the head, Toad thinks. The poor clown.
Toad will be pleased to know that Joan, according to her own testimony and others, was explicitly forbidden to use the sword God gave her to kill. Her job in battle was to carry a banner. She did, however, say that it was very useful for chasing prostitutes out of the French camp.
Chris thinks that Toad makes an excellent point re Joan of Arc.
Some of our human traditions, even those in the Church, are, of course, quite rotten.
We can distinguish them from the Apostolic Tradition, that taught by Christ and handed down by the apostles.
No killing anyone or wars to drive the Romans out of Palestine in that tradition.
God Bless
g
Sorry, that post above is obviously a mistake.
I presume that Chris recognises the sanctity of Joan of Arc, despite the circumstances, since she is recognised by the Church as a saint?
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Chris agrees with Toad. A sure sign of the Apocalypse.
God Bless
No post today JP?
Computer problems.
Let’s not forget that Jesus was an apocalyptic prophet – failed – but an apocalyptic prophet all the same. Let’s also not forget that the disciples expected the second coming within their lifetimes.
KA
I tend to agree, but let’s also not forget that there is no complete consensus.
How’s the wee grand kiwi doing?
Agreed, but the lack of consensus is only the theists!
Micro-kiwi is doing just fine thank you. Will be a year old in a few months! Mini-kiwi still shacked up with loser boyfriend though – sigh 😦
KA
Mini-Kiwi has a Dad with his head screwed on, I’m sure she and micro-kiwi will be fine.
It’s hard to say with Jesus, some very smart people have thought the apocalyptic stuff was added later.
But who cares? Glad to hear micro-kiwi is well!!
No Toad,
What I am still missing is how you offer any defensible comparison between Joan of Arc and Peter Sutcliffe, whom you now seem to have quietly dropped.
We’ve discussed Joan before – of course she is on the very edge of the spectrum of sanctity. I’m sure you consider the vast bulk of saintly pacifists utterly unworthy of your attention, but that’s where the centre of gravity of the Church’s approval lies. And I like Chris’s point about the Romans in Judea – good connection.
There is nothing remarkable in suggesting that visionaries are likely to be hysterical – I’m sure your average PP has more experience of religious mania that even you, Toad. Hence the church has developed good practice in discerning what it considers, in its own terms, to be signs of a genuine visionary, as JP suggests.
So why are you lot all so sniffy about Fatima? It’s got it all: child visionaries, a firm but wild prophecy screaming out across the national papers, due cynicism, apocalyptic visions seen by tens of thousands, but everyone gets to go home for tea. The perfect family outing for believers and doubters alike.
Debacles like the one played out this week only go to show how remarkable Fatima actually is.
Yes there is something to be said about Joan of Arc, we don’t know too much about it, but she was stirred by some passion. I believe in God Manus, but I’m no longer sure about the Catholic creed. Certainly something happened at Fatima. I am just wise enough not to sneer. But God knows
Manus if it was divine, how do we square that with the times when divine action has seemed so necessary and yet been absent?
A very general problem. As the then Bishop of Durham said to the Synod of the Church of England in 1984 at York University (I was a student there and sneaked in to hear the debate) – why bother with the resurrection – conjuring with bones – and not act to prevent the Holocaust?
That’s just another spin on the problem of evil – the intervening God and the problem of evil.
Fatima can’t answer that. It is yet more basic – an instantiation of an event, previously predicted, well documented, large scale, and inexplicable on a materialist basis.
And I need reassurance from time to time that materialism hasn’t got it licked. Hard evidence, not philosophy.
I’ve been sniffy about it because I like to think I’m too clever for that sort of thing. But the world has a way of deflating feelings of cleverness I think.
The same problems arise in science and religion. Here is a beautiful quote from a recent conference on global warming in Cambridge.
“People underestimate the power of models. Observational evidence is not very useful,” adding, “Our approach is not entirely empirical.” John Mitchell, principal research scientist at the UK Met Office.
c/f Gallileo. And nobody can blame the Church for this one.
We all do it, all the time.
Joan of Arc a saint ?
Let’s see…
Burnt at the stake at the say so of an official Catholic Ecclesial court. Apparently for sticking with God against the authority of the said official Catholic Ecclesial court.
Hmmm … I’d say that definitely qualifies for sainthood.
The Church is always in need of such saints.
And we have plenty of them today such as Fr Roy Bourgeois and Bishop Morris of Toowoomba.
Fortunately the state authorities won’t let the Church burn them at the stake anymore, as another saint, Thomas Aquinas, once advocated. Thank God for the secular state, huh ?
God Bless
Chris, does it ever occur to you that God might be real and always present, but your creed might be bull ****?
Which creed do you mean ? As you know, I have more than one.
God Bless
I think that if anyone was writing a gospel circa 70AD (Mark) when the temple was destroyed and Israel devastated in a Roman slash and burn policy to put down the armed uprising, or in the decades thereafter (Matthew, Luke) then they’d quite likely include apocalyptic elements simply due to the horror and devastation they’d been thru.
For most Jews at the time, the destruction of the Jerusalem Temple was the end of the world.
The apocalyptic genre was rather common in 1st Century Judaism and it seems reasonable to suppose that would have had at least some influence on the gospel writers.
God Bless
I agree, but how do we distinguish between Jesus and the evangelist? Especially when so much harsh theology has been built on the harshest passages in the gospels???
http://cantuar.blogspot.com/2011/05/did-christ-wrongly-predict-his-second.html
I’m sorry JP, but I just don’t buy that. The guy has based his argument on a single verse. You really ought to read more widely on the subject, preferably outside of the usual Catholic apologetic writings.
KA
JP, I don’t so much mean that Jesus made a false prediction, as I mean that Jesus (as opposed to modern Christian writers such as C.S. Lewis) provides a stunningly harsh eschatology. — One in which some, or rather many, will suffer eternal torment, and no one can be completely sure of exactly how to avoid such an unthinkable fate.
Surely that vision of the world is in essence (despite the carrot of eternal reward) bleaker than the atheist vision of natural death. —- And I mean the eschatology of the gospels (Matthew especially) NOT the later theological attempts to make this appalling vision consistent with a good God — C.S Lewis is an example of such attempts.
The presentation of damnation in the New Testament seems to me to be (upon much reflection) very hard to square with either the infinite goodness of God or the absolute goodness of Jesus.
I mean this query very very seriously. The vision of the world divided between sheep and goats, and the goats being tormented for EVER, may have had some appeal to the down trodden in an unjust society.
But upon cool reflection is not such a vision monstrous? And are the theological apologia not ultimately untrue to the foundational texts?
“Hell is for those who finally and absolutely reject God”
Says the apologist.
—- Sounds great, but it gets no sanction from the parable of the wedding feast for example. Which terminates in the inappropriately dressed guest (lax, unwatchful, who knows?) being cast into the outer darkness, from which he isn’t coming back.
People have commented this evening (I’ve checked the times) but none show up in the recent comments box other than Lucia and my comments since then. Odd – wordpress issue I assume
how do we distinguish between Jesus and the evangelist ?
Which seems to be another way of asking how to distinguish between love and the human limitations (the clay jars) of those who profess love.
Leviticus offers one infallible guide : do unto others as you would have them do unto you.
Jesus offered an even better infallible guide : love one another as I have loved you.
Read the scriptures thru the lens of Love, distinguishing between what is really Love and what is the clay jars it comes in.
Then everything pretty much fits into place.
God Bless
A rather wise comment there Chris!!
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“What I am still missing is how you offer any defensible comparison between Joan of Arc and Peter Sutcliffe, whom you now seem to have quietly dropped.”
Says Manus. Well, Toad will have to spell it out. The clear and obvious comparison is that both heard voices in their heads, telling them to do unusual things, did they not?
For Toad, the problem of following such voices can very possibly lead to this sort of “reasoning”:
Q: “How do you know the voices that you hear speak the truth?”
A: “Because they come from God.”
Q: “How do you know they come from God?”
B: “Because they speak the truth.”
Difficult.
–
… and Bernadette was told to dig in a certain spot …
… and Lucia was told there would be a miracle in several months time …
Weren’t these “unusual” too? Do you compare these girls to the Yorkshire Ripper?
Discernment of the vision is based on the fruit that it yields, in the individual and in the community around them, which is why the Church is slow to get excited about any claimed vision. Yet another reason to have access to the Church’s long experience rather than trusting one’s own flawed interpretations.
What Joan was “called” to do was clearly on the very end of the spectrum of what we would expect of saintly activity. However, her chief virtue was surely utterly selfless bravery, along with faithfulness to the calling she received.
If you actually think that soldiering per se is morally equivalent to the activities of the Ripper, well good luck to you.
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Manus, it’s not the ‘activities’ it’s the voices.
Which are, Toad thinks, open to infinite interpretation.
(Seem to have hit a nerve here.)…
and Bernadette was told to dig in a certain spot …… and Lucia was told there would be a miracle in several months time …Weren’t these “unusual” too? Do you compare these girls to the Yorkshire Ripper?
Toad didn’t suggest thes things were usual. Does he compare these girls to the Yorkshire Ripper? Come on. He didn’t even MENTION the girls. You did.
I think that the Toad is right.
If one hears a voice telling one to go and kill anyone, even enemy occupying troops, then such a voice cannot be from God. Even if you happen to be Abraham considering killing your own son.
We are supposed to love our enemies and pray for them, not kill them.
Of course there are lots of other ways one can deal with brutal enemy occupying troops. See, for example, how Jesus and the Apostles dealt with brutal and corrupt Roman troops occupying Palestine. Not even after the brutal Roman suppression of the Jewish revolt and their desecration of the Jerusalem temple did the early Church turn to violent resistance or any supposed “just war”. They just kept on loving their enemies and wrote gospels about how to do it and how Jesus did it.
The Apostolic Tradition is the gold standard and there’s nothing in it about God ever telling anyone to kill anybody. Quite the reverse in fact.
God Bless
E. B. Stansfield has some interesting comments rejecting the thesis of 1st Century immanent apocalypse belief.
See his two posts:
Misconceptions Concerning the Apocalypse (part 2)
By E. B. Stansfield | Wednesday, May 25, 2011 04:41:26 PM
Misconceptions Concerning the Apocalypse (3rd and last)
By E. B. Stansfield | Wednesday, May 25, 2011 04:44:28 PM
http://www.americamagazine.org/blog/entry.cfm?blog_id=1&entry_id=4248
God Bless
Toad,
If we take each component of the comparison between Joan and Sutcliffe step by step, I think we will mostly be in agreement. Indeed, having re-read your original comment, and subtracting the heavy splodge of sarcasm, I agree even with that: Joan (on balance) GOOD, Sutcliffe very clearly BAD.
What you appear to imply, however, but fail to substantiate, is that the Church is willing to sanction any nutter who claims to have a vision from God, on the one hand, and/or that the Church secretly harbours ambition or admiration for full-scale blood letting, especially for religious purposes, on the other.
The Church’s preferential option for non-violence is clearly indicated by the dull CVs of the vast majority of its declared saints. And the Church’s initial treatment of practically all visionaries who subsequently are considered saints shows a culture of deep and proper scepticism about nearly all religious visions and/or interpretations which contrasts admirably with some of our more excitable Protestant neighbours.
There isn’t the faintest prospect of the Church endorsing either the vision or the actions of Sutcliffe, or anything remotely similar. As you well know.
You can be sniffy about Joan with all the moral hindsight you can muster. She is clearly a rare case.
Chris, the case for absolute pacifism based on Gospel values is not universally acknowledged. There were swords and soldiers in the Gospels too, and they were not given blanket condemnation by Christ.
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Manus, you misunderstand me. Probably my fault. Toad does not think for one moment that the Church, let alone anyone in their right mind would, “endorse either the vision or the actions of Sutcliffe, or anything remotely similar.”
Why should it? All I am trying to say is that it is hard to distinguish The Voice of God, (if so it is) from the voices some people hear in their heads. Hard for them that is, and apparently hard for the Church at times. Because, at times, the Church agrees it actually is God on the line.
Q: How do you know it’s God talking?
A: Because I recognise His voice.
Q: How do you recognise His voice?
A: Because that’s what He sounds like when He talks to me.
Yeah Mr Toad, that’s my point about delusion. What makes schizophrenics delusional and theists non-delusional? How come one person’s voices in their head are bad yet another’s are good? Is it only bad when the voice tells them to do something we consider bad in these modern times? The voices that many of the Old Testament actors heard told them to do the most horrendous things. Was that god talking, or were they just undiagnosed schizophrenics?
Very difficult to know really, eh?
KA
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“Very difficult to know really, eh?”says KA
Not really, KA.
“Chris, the case for absolute pacifism based on Gospel values is not universally acknowledged.” says Manus.
Doesn’t stop it being a good idea, though.
I doubt that ANY gospel values are universally acknowledged.
But humanity generally, down the ages, hasn’t considered killing such a great idea.
There is a great deal in the gospels quoting Christ against violence, for turning the other cheek, for loving one’s enemies, for not killing (and Christ never listed ANY exceptions there), and commands to St Peter to put down his sword.
The sum total of that is that Christ clearly stood for non-violence if he stood for anything at all.
If he didn’t, well I say that he COULD NOT HAVE BEEN GOD, and we might as well all give up, go home, and become atheists.
God Bless
I still maintain that threatening eternal punishment (repeatedly!) is significantly worse than not being completely anti-violence.
Genre, my dear badger, genre.
The good Jesus never threatened that. Sin, of course, does lead to its own punishment, a form of hell on earth, which Gehenna actually was.
All the NT references translated Hell are not Hell. They are Hades or Gehenna.
God Bless
Mostly, KA, those were just the OT authors way of speaking. Gods supposed command to Abraham would have been written down many centuries after the events, when Abraham was long dead.
One of the reasons we have the Church is to distinguish good voices from bad voices. By and large, the Church’s system does seem to work. Although the Crusades and the Inquisition would seem to be remarkably notorious counter-examples 🙂
But then they don’t seem to have claimed a voice from God telling them to go and torture and kill all those people. Maybe they should have waited until someone DID get such a divine command ?
God Bless
Chris, of course I am familiar with Gehenna. I didn’t learn the NT from the KJV. — It in no way solves your problem.
The eternal* torment promised by Jesus means that quite simply.
*(I’m sure you’ll point out that the term used is aion, an age. In a world that recognised the present age and the age to come, the time of God’s kingdom, it signifys eternity)
Why would you fool yourselves into thinking otherwise? It is the explicit teaching of Jesus, most prominently in Matt 25. It is fully in line with 1st century Judaism where the idea of eternal torture for the damned was rife. It was the teaching of the Church founded by Jesus, cf Justin and his rather absurd apologies which are gleeful about it.
Jesus DID teach eternal punishment, and you do yourself a dis-service by creatively reading it out of the texts, as many wishful thinkers have done before you
I can accept that it may be a challenge that simply can’t be met. But I find the response “The good Jesus never threatened that” to be frustrating in its willful obtuseness.
.
“But humanity generally, down the ages, hasn’t considered killing such a great idea.”opines Chris.
Greetings from the planet Earth, Chris!
In the 17th Century, Pascal was asking,
“Why do you want to kill me?”
and answering himself,
“Because you live on the other side of the river, that’s why!”
And things are not improving, thinks Toad.
.
The very open question as to the morality of the eschatology of Jesus SHOULD be kept in view, even in a discussion of non-violence. Since the nineteenth century christian writers have (protestants first) been trying to extricate themselves from the claim of the NT and the overwhelming majority of Patristic writers, and of course good old Aquinas. —- I was impressed for a while by C.S Lewis and Balthasaars attempts, but no longer.
As a first century radical Jesus makes sense, as the incarnate God, he raises serious questions about the goodness of God.
I see above that Chris is fighting the good fight for the OT. And good luck to him. I’ve done it myself in the past
Salman Rushdie was on point when he queried whether liberal apologists are doing good or ill in these well meaning attempts.
A theologically sophistcated understanding may salve the conscience of a liberal. — But “the baccili still lurk in the texts themselves waiting to break out again”
I suppose one could read the gospels and find that jesus was a pacifist, the idea is not out-right contradicted. However it is undermined by the fact that Jesus showed no particular interest in issues such military conflict. His radical injunctions are almost exclusively addressed to individual interactions. The only sure conclusion is that Jesus was aware of the existence of the military, had dealings with soldiers, and no criticism whatsoever of the institution has come down to us.
Jesus in the minds of most Christians is a composite figure anyway. Partly drawn from a fusion of the four gospels, partly drawn from later writers reflecting on those gospels, partly drawn from the tradition dominant within the Christian faith.
Mr Badger,
I expect you’ve noticed that the whole of Mat 25 consists of a set of parables.
And that shepherds might separate their sheep from their goats, but they don’t torture the goats.
How many of us have NEVER feed ANYONE, clothed anyone, tended anyone sick, visited anyone in prison ? None of us I expect.
How many of us could have done more and sometimes turned away Jesus when he needed our help ? All of us I expect.
Parables are parables, not literal predictions of eternal punishment.
The essential point of this one is not eternal punishment. It’s Jesus’ real presence in the poor and the suffering and our call to help them. Least that’s how Mother Teresa of Calcutta interpreted this passage, and she’s surely a saint.
Why would you fool yourselves into thinking otherwise?
Oh, simply because it isn’t Love. And the Church isn’t in the business of condemning anyone. We’re in the business of saving everyone. Every last soul. So is Jesus.
One of the books recommended to us is Margaret Nutting Ralph’s very readable “And God said what? An introduction to biblical literary forms”. She happens to be the director of masters degree programs for Catholics at Lexington Theological seminary and secretary of educational ministries for the Catholic diocese of Lexington, Kentucky.
God Bless
Sorry to Badger on about this. But the combination of high intelligence, wish-thinking, and obfuscation, reflected by this — is exactly why liberal Christianity is ultimately as intellectually dishonest as conservative christianity is palpably false.
Chris: with respect to your reply of 8:21 pm which I’ve just read (lest we get out of sync):
Origen would of course nod along. But as you know his universalism was rejected. But I digress…
Would a shepherd torture a goat? No. Or to be precise, maybe, depends on the shepherd. Does jesus plan to judge sheep and goats? No. it is not difficult to recognise symbolism and eschatological reality in this parable (although as Daniel Harrington points out it is a difficult piece to classify).
Parables Chris, mashal if you like, serve multiple functions. This one served to lay the foundation for the eschatology of the Christian Church.
Chris I understand that you realise that the eschatology (lets not just think of Matt 25) of the NT is inconsistent with the claim that God is love. But you sell yourself short by not recognising that the problem lies in the NT itself.
But as you know his universalism was rejected.
Not really, from what I can tell.
The NT is inspired, but also a human work. There are problems in all human work.
It’s interesting how the last parable in Mt25 begins with the Son of Man and then suddenly switches to a King who seems to become less and less like Jesus as the parable progresses to its conclusion where the King is the complete opposite of Jesus.
I expect that to a 1st Century Jew, especially in Matthews time, a King denoted, not Jesus but his opposite – some brutal tyrant like Herod or Agrippa of Caesar.
This does seem to set the stage for Matthew’s entry into the passion narrative which begins immediately after this parable.
God Bless
No the entry into the passion narrative begins at 26:1 directly after the judgement story we talked about earlier which is 25:31-46. You’re incorrect.
Oh you mean at 25:40, where the term king is used. Right.
Granting that “King” is the term used. You interpret this to mean that the judgement described is enacted by a indeterminate figure, but it isn’t a divine judgement?
Yeah, and then we’re right into the passion narrative where we see what Kings really do to people like Jesus. Try to place them into eternal punishment. But Jesus refused to play that game. The Kings condemned him to death but he defied them by rising from the dead.
As for the patristic fathers. We’ll you’ve probably seen enough examples of their anti-semitism and miscogny and odd attitudes to sex to know that not all of their interpretations were always all that great.
God Bless
Indeed. In one apocryphal gospel Jesus is asked the fate of the toothless who are sent to the outer darkness. “They shall be given teeth to gnash” he says. —- It’s a late fiction of course, but an amusing insight into the minf of the writer.
Literary form is both incredibly important, and secondary to this issue.
Ultimately from your vantage point you are not prepared to either accept the NT and patristic witness, nor accept the proposition that these often powerful texts are purely human. — With all the flaws that entails.
Toad,
In all walks of life it is proper for the individual to be judged by the community. This can lead to tension in the case of a genius, visionary, scoundrel or lunatic. Only in these days of accentuated individualism would we expect things otherwise. In the well-ordered society true prophets must suffer, or we will be awash with false ones. That’s why the most sensible of them respond with horror to the calling.
But I think we’ve beaten Joan to death by now, eh? Let’s hope she’s not waiting for us at the Pearly Gates to repay the complement. With that big sword God gave her.
Badger,
I’m very interested in your current position, which seems to be as follows:
1) God exists, is interested in humanity and has interacted with us, including via Jesus.
2) However, his big plan, by including Hell, is morally obnoxious.
How’s that for starters?
Manus,
I want to seperate the question of God from the question of Christianity. I am rather disillusioned with the claims of the Christian faith, yes. As to God, no. But the “big plan” as you put it, I’m not convinced of the morality of that. But that is because I am disillusioned with the claims of Christianity. Does that make me kind of a “deist”? God knows, all is in flux. And why not, who can be certain?
Certainty is the main characteristic of these discussions I suppose. Either certainty that a creed is true, and all criticism is misunderstanding. Or certainty that all creeds are false and so the argument is a fait accompli.
Mr badger,
Which claims are you disillusioned with ?
Exactly what in the “big plan” do you find morally objectionable ?
The creeds are all true (well, the 39 articles excepted but they aren’t binding on us Anglicans anymore).
The Church’s work is to save everyone. In the Legion of Mary we pray for that every day. God is quite capable of saving everyone. I think Hell is empty, as St Therese of Lisieux did.
God Bless
Chris.
Firstly I’d like you to demonstrate that the use of the term king in matt 25:40 represents a shift to an individual who can no longer be identified with divine justice.
secondly: I take the 39 articles as seriously as his promises of fidelity to Ann.
Now with respect to why I no longer think the claims of the Christian religion are true or even tenable, I’m happy to discuss it, but I can’t offer a comprehensive list in good time.
Yes the Fathers were a mixed bag. And to my mind Tertullian for example was a nasty piece of work.
I find your reading of Matt 31-46 to be too clever by half. Firstly because the actual dialogue has a certain beauty to it. It refers to christ identifying himself with the naked, the sick, and the imprisoned. —- Is that no evidence that it refers to the judgement OF christ not some “king” who represents worldliness etc?
To be honest I find the Sacra Pagina commentary more convincing.
Well Malina & Rohrbaugh in their Social Science Commentary on the Synoptic Gospels advance the thesis that the last parable in Mt 25 was originally two. The first about the Son of Man, the second about a King. These were later fused. There does seem to be some evidence that the parables were developed and the final form may be rather different than what Jesus actually said.
One does need to read this in the light of the whole of scripture as vatII’s Dei Verbum and the Holy Father insist. Put it in the context of a God of Love who was more interested in dying for us than condemning us and who said he came not to codemn the world but to save it.
I think much of Matthews more gloomy texts say more about Matthew than about Christ.
Sacred scripture is certainly inspired but it also a human composition and the humans bring all their limited world views to it.
The Church doesn’t require any Catholic to believe that anyone is in hell. We cannonise heaps of saints as being in heaven. But we haven’t defined one soul as being in Hell. There’s a huge hint there.
God Bless
Ok, I don’t want us to get stuck in a sterile dispute about a single verse. But look at it this way. It is a demonstrable fact that much appalling theology has been built upon this scene. Or to stick with the same gospel you know as well as I do the use made of “his blood be on us and our children” — whatever the original intent.
Is it plausible that divine inspiration lies behind (easily ommitted!!) texts that the divine mind could see the fearfull consequences of?
Don’t forget the horrific Jewish war 66-72AD Matthew and his community had just come out of. 1 million people killed. Israel destroyed in a brutal Roman slash and burn retaliation. Total alienation of the Christians from the Jews. The temple destroyed. I think all that must had had a heavy psychological affect, especially on Jewish Christians as Matthew seems to have been.
We’re all products of our times to some extent.
God Bless
I don’t find Harrington very convincing.
1st century Kings were all brutal tyrants to the Jewish mind. The other parables show Kings killing people and torturing them.
Anyway I must bow out. Time for bed. A homily to prepare. Classes tomorrow.
God Bless
Good luck for tomorrow. But for next time:
It might be fair to trace some of the harshness to Matthew and his community.
Certainly in John Jesus has some very venomous remarks to make to the Jewish leaders who don’t believe in him. — Most people believe this reflects the anger and alienation of the Johannine community at the end of the century.
But once we’ve given up on the idea that a “red letter bible” gives us the words of Jesus verbatim, we simply have different reconstructions to choose between.
The assumption that Jesus is the second person of the trinity is built on rather literal readings of (mainly) John’s gospel. Once that idea is deflated it is by no means clear that everything Jesus said or did has to be “good”, can’t he simply be the man of his time who emerges from a cool reading of the gospel texts?
It is a demonstrable fact that much appalling theology has been built upon this scene.
Agreed.
Or to stick with the same gospel you know as well as I do the use made of “his blood be on us and our children” — whatever the original intent.
In Judaism, blood heals us and atones for sins. Moses sprinkled blood on the congregation. I’d be very happy as a Jew to have God’s blood all over me and mine.
Is it plausible that divine inspiration lies behind (easily ommitted!!) texts that the divine mind could see the fearfull consequences of?
Oh, for sure. God accepts us as we are, warts and all. The alternative would be for God to write it all himself or getthe sacred authors to simply take dictation.
But in some mysterious way God relies on us to play our role in salvation.
The work of getting to an empty hell, salvation of all, is part of OUR mission.
Good night & God Bless
Yes. When the Jews were expelled from England by Edward I, one of the ships with a load of Jewish passengers was left high and dry on a sand bar by the low tide. The captain invited them all to stretch their legs. Which they did.But they weren’t allowed back on. As the tide came in the Bishop of Durham who was an honoured guest on the ship challenged them to call on their God to part the waters like he did for Moses. —- And everyone of them drowned. —- The basis for this action was (to his credit Edward hanged the captain for the offence) to be found in Matthew. — I can believe Matthew as a purely human production… but divinely inspired???
It does seem that this parable has a great deal of input from Matthew.
My best ever scripture teacher, Sr Barbara Reid OP, in “Parables for Preachers vol A” pg 213 says that some scholars see this parable as entirely a Matthean creation and that most scholars see it as coming from Matthews special source and redacted according to his own interests.
She goes on to point out that a number of the terms in the parable are very typical of Matthew.
We are seeing something which has been considerably influenced by Matthew’s worldview, one influenced by the Palestinian disaster of his time.
God Bless
The parable is about mercy and commends those who show mercy. Especially the kind of mercy which saves people from … death (which we can read as both physical and spiritual death). IE Mercy leads to salvation.
Just as we are enjoined to show mercy to others, God shows mercy to us. In fact his mercy is infinitely greater than ours. Muslims knows God as Allah the MOST merciful, Allah the MOST compassionate ie the one who is WAY more merciful than we are.
And way more merciful then those wont to “condemn all those others to hell”.
Fr Brendan Bryne SJ, a member of the Pontifical Biblical Commission (therefore one whose general views would appear to have papal approval) in “Lifting the burden : Reading Matthews Gospel in the Church today” sums it up:
God Bless
Mr Badger,
The assumption that Jesus is the second person of the trinity is built on rather literal readings of (mainly) John’s gospel.
Not really.
It’s build on our shared EXPERIENCE of Jesus as God in our own lives right here and right now today and down the centuries.
You seem to write as someone with a faith built on intellectual understanding (or criticism) of the scriptures. Maybe it would be helpful to let go just a little on all that and seek to rest in the experience of God’s love thru prayer, the sacraments, a retreat perhaps ?
The more one experiences what God is like, fully merciful non-violent Love, the easier it becomes to see Jesus in the scriptures and discern the human from the divine in what the sacred authors composed.
God Bless
Badger,
I know you are shrouded in uncertainty, but the tragic tale you cite and your reaction to it is inconsistent with your complaint against God.
So the ship’s captain abandon’s the Jews to their fate on the sandbank, and they are taunted by the bishop. The King hangs the captain, which is to his credit, says you. Of course Toad is the bleeding heart round here, I’d have probably hung the bishop for good measure too. But in any case we know that this is temporal, imperfect justice – the best we can do, and as much about maintaining good order through setting examples.
What should God do with the captain, and let’s assume of course that he is an unrepentant, defiant captain?
I’m with the Red Queen for this one!
Manus, (actually I feel uncomfortable with having said “to his credit the king hanged the captain” – who did that help? But of course i meant at least the crime was recognised at the time).
I wouldn’t call it a complaint against God. — I would call it one small anecdote among thousands that reminds us of the poison that flowed through Europe for more than one thousand years. I DON’T blame Christianity, the gospel of Matt etc reflect intra-Jewish tension — but i do question the work of the holy spirit in the production of these texts, texts with such terrible seeds within them.
and to be clear I don’t blame matthew either. I merely affirm that history points to the raw –and exclusive– humanity of these texts. The results of which no human author could have known in advance.
but i do question the work of the holy spirit in the production of these texts, texts with such terrible seeds within them.
I dunno, Mr Badger.
I actually thought that the repeated commands not to kill, to love your neighbour as yourself, to do unto others as you would have them do unto you etc were actually pretty clear.
Although humanity’s perversity in misreading even a simple command like “don’t kill” in order to make it mean the opposite does seem to say something about our willingness to twist the meaning to suit ourselves.
God Bless
Whoops. Apostrophe apocalypse. For “abandon’s” read “abandons”
.
Manus, Toad knows full well it is not the practice to correct other people’s grammar, and he’s sorry but, as an old hack, he must protest at ‘hung.’
Pictures are hung, bulls are hung.
Bad Captains are, or should be, hanged.
Toad has hanged editors for less.
Spelling mistakes are, as always, encouraged, though.
And while he’s on, ‘a bleeding heart?’ Moi?
Toad is one of the most callous amphibians you’ll meet in a month of Fatimas.
So…
Q: “How do you know the Scriptures are true?”
A: “Because they are the Word of God.”
Q: “How do you know they are the Word of God?”
A: “Because, if they were not the Word of God, they wouldn’t be the Scriptures, would they?”
There. That’s that sorted.
Toad,
Magnifico! And bad bishops should be hanged too. Quite right. But you are confusing me. I thought you were a blushing pacifist with a bleeding heart.
Your little logical conumdrums really aren’t a big deal, you know. There are no assumption-free assertions. Thus:
Q: Why is two plus two equal to four?
A: Because four minus two equals two.
Q: But why is four minus two equal to two?
A: Because two plus two equals four.
Simples.
Language and logic require communal agreement and conventions.
The community decided that the scriptures were the word of God because, over a long period of time, study and reflecting on each proposed book, the found that what was written squared with the God they experienced in their own lives and the religious traditions handed down to them and which they found helped bring them closer to God.
God Bless
I’m reminded of another ship captain, the one in the film Amazing Grace, who used to be the captain of a slave ship.
What he needed wasn’t punishment, but grace.
He wrote this hym:
If one wants to know what God is really like, find out what Jesus was really like because Jesus is the best image we have of God.
Jesus spent a great deal of time dispensing grace and healing people and saving people. Not once do the scriptures ever describe him as punishing anyone.
I expect what the ship captain and bishop of Durham needed was not punishment but grace.
God Bless
Chris,
A great connection, thank-you. But the problem is with those who refuse grace – and how do we protect those poor who would be their next victims?
We believe God combines perfect justice with perfect mercy. People tend to approach that ideal from different angles, some emphasising the importance of mercy first, others of justice. It is always good to have the community or Church to correct our particular biases.
The obvious problem of emphasiasing mercy over justice is that the tyrants will push themselves to the front of the queue for mercy. Doesn’t the condemnation of the steward who was forgiven much and who pursued a much smaller debt sugest this?
Manus,
I was thinking of the grace which melts the hearts of tyrants.
As it did to the composer of Amazing Grace, once a slave trader who received grace and responded by becoming a campaigner against slavery.
The plan to deal with hard hearts is to convert them.
God Bless
I think I’m not making my point very clearly, so I’ll try again. I’m not deriding Matthews gospel at all.
I’m saying that I think it is a profound book if understood purely as a product of it time.
But it (understandably) reflects the bitterness of the early Christians as well.
The crowd calling down blood guilt upon themselves is of course a) fictional and b) no grounds for race-hatred anyway if you understand the traditional context.
But when that text left its original context, as it had to, and mingled with different cultures and later Christian chauvinism, it INEVITABLY became a proof text for fiendish evil. It’s an indication that these are purely human texts, with all the flaws and genius that implies. — No divine involvement at all.
it INEVITABLY became a proof text for fiendish evil
I disagree.
In the OT, Moses threw the blood on the people. Was than an invitation to Shoah and progroms ? Of course not. The blood made us Holy.
One needs to read Matthew thru Jewish eyes. What gentiles may find repugnant, Jews find Holy.
I think you may have missed my point about “do not kill”.
If people can twist something clear ,simple and plain like
“do not do X”
to twist it into
“do X”
then people are quite capable of twisting anything else into whatever else they want to justify, especially any more complicated sentence structure.
Does that mean that “do not kill” cannot be holy, good, or divinely inspired ?
No, it does not.
It just means that people can twist anything into its opposite.
God Bless
I know the Jewish context Chris… but …
Take that to 12th century London. Do you know what would happen to you?
The TEXT itself is not at fault, I agree. But that isn’t my point!! — see above.
This situation might raise some basic questions about the coherence of the very idea of “scripture” …
Mr Badger,
To seem to be heading in the direction that scripture shouldn’t say anything at all, because it will be misinterpreted.
[I sometimes think that I shouldn”t say anything because I’m often misinterpreted].
I you think that scripture is God doing dictation then you might have a point. But I think rather than this is good evidence that God works with and thru the worldview of the human author, warts and all.
Dictation is not love.
Respecting the freedom and creativity of the human author is Love.
To me, this points to divine inspiration, to Love.
God Bless
Chris,
Of course that’s the plan – that grace should melt the heart of tyrants. But the same problem recurs, both for this world and the next. Given the theory of free will, and the empirical evidence we see played out in many a wretched nation, what do we (and God) do about the tyrants who refuse to accept grace?
Isn’t that at least part of Badger’s problem?
Are we certain that the tyrants refuse to accept grace? Could it be that there is no grace? 😛
Indeed, Chris, you certainly don’t have that problem. Now remind me again, what exactly is the atheist’s good news to the poor? That they are free from the delusion that their life can be anything but abject misery at the bottom of the heap? Pray tell.
Well, I would say it’s pretty good news to know that they are free from patronizing feel-gooders patting them on the head and telling them their tears will turn to joy in the next life.
It’s bad news for the rest of us as it means we can’t rely on an omnipotent god to right injustices, but instead we have to get off our tushies and make it happen ourselves.
That would be a bit more convincing Seeker, if so many initiatives aimed at giving the poor a chance to get our of poverty were not run by theists.
I’m not getting into the ‘theists are more charitable than atheists’ argument – because I think it’s a crock. But your patronising feel-gooder stereotype is also a crock.
Yes, I was actually aware of that. I was replying to Manus with the same hyperbole as he was using in his reply to me.
I mean Seeker!!!
.
Manus is right, of course there is no good news on Earth for the poor. After that, well..
what do we (and God) do about the tyrants who refuse to accept grace?
Heal their stony hearts. We start by praying for them.
God Bless
.
“what do we (and God) do about the tyrants who refuse to accept grace?
Heal their stony hearts. We start by praying for them.”
Right, Chris. We’ve prayed for them. No good. Still stony. Now what do we do?
Shortly after his conversion Albert Camus wrote a moving piece on this very issue. You should look it up.
Seeker,
Yes, I agree, I was a bit sharp – I’m sorry. Can I blame man-flu?!
Here’s the contrast, I suppose: the theists worrying about the justice of God in dealing with the tyrants (despite the huge dollop of added goodness in the world their faith implies), while the atheists (perhaps only in the quiet of their hearts) despairing for the vast majority of humanity who will never get a glimmer of what at least the theists hope for.
Perhaps you’re right, but as you say the vast majority of humanity has lived and died under the weight of horrible suffering. But despair is no good, I agree.
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