mitchellmckain

Open Theism holds that God only knows the course of events in the future to a limited degree and that to the degree that man has freewill and is responsible for his actions, God does not know what we will do. This is explained by the idea that some of the future is undetermined and that God can only know these undetermined portions of the future by annihilating our free will. Accordingly, that God is all powerful and all knowing, only means that all power and knowledge are at the service of His will but not that He is constrained by our definitions so that He cannot choose to limit His own power and knowledge. The key point for the case of Open Theism is the claim that you cannot influence and foreknow without being in control to the degree that you foreknow, because if you know what will happen as a result of your influence then you are responsible for what happens. You can only foreknow and not control if you do not influence. So if you do not believe in an observer God that does not influence, and if you do not believe in a God that controls us absolutely, then you must conclude that God does not foreknow what we will do absolutely.I ask you to imagine someone who knows the future in every detail. Does he see only one future or many futures depending on what he chooses to do?If he sees only one future then either what he knows has no impact on what he chooses or what he chooses has no impact on the future. If he sees many futures depending on what he chooses to do then by his choice of what to do, he choose which future shall be.So lets list the three possibilities:1. He sees many futures depending on what he chooses to do and by his choice he chooses which future shall be.2. He sees only 1 future and what he chooses to do has no impact on the future.3. He sees only 1 future and what he sees has no impact on what he chooses to do.1. This person decides the course of the future. Only his decisions matter and the responsibility for everything that happens is his alone. If this person is God, then being all powerful, the impact of his decisions have no limit and so He is in absolute control of every detail of the future. Whether He chooses to act or not to act in any particular situation, His choice is still the only one that matters in that situation and He is responsible. In this case, human beings have no freewill. 2. This person is effectively uninvolved in the world and has no great impact on the events of the world. If this person is God then He can only have no impact on the events of the world because He chooses not to. This is the observer God of the Deists. If God is only partly observer and takes some part in the events of the world then He would have an impact on the future and that would have to be included in option 1 or 3.3. This person is the strangest of all. It is as if he has no control over his own actions or he does not care about what he sees. If this person is God, however, then as the creator of the universe, He is most like the author of a book who has written Himself into His story. So as He reads the book afterwards He knows everything that is going to happen but that knowledge has no impact on His actions in the story because they have already been written. This option is essentially no different than the first option for God remains reponsible for every detail of what happens and mankind has no freewill.Is it possible for God to have only limited impact on the world being only partially observer and partially involved? Since God is all powerful then the degree of God's impact on the world can be only be a matter of His choice, right? But if God has absolute foreknowledge, His choice of how He involves Himself and to what degree still absolutely determines the future (whether written before hand or not). Like the author of a book He can say who is responsible and have them punished for their deeds. But the reality is that the character has simply been written that way and has no free will at all.

I voted no because that is asking if I wanted to be invaded by another spirit and I do not. I am not so pathetic and effectless that I need some old spirit greedy for life taking mine to live it for me.

In the light of my main objection the answer to this questions should be obvious. It requires certain abilities to do the reading which you are suggesting. Some people are more suited to study than others. Some people cannot concentrate on the content found in many books of the Bible for more than a few minutes without falling a sleep. Some people might even come to the conclusion that reading the Bible is something only extremely idle people are even capable of doing. Many people have to work so hard they are always exhausted. For others their limited mastery of language renders much of the Bible meaningless. Should they their time spend much of their limited time reading Leviticus, Ezekiel and Revelations when they would require someone to tell them what it means anyway and even the explanations would be barely comprehensible. Let the fanatics like me and thee revel in the word to our hearts delight but make no judgements of others who have better uses for their time. That is only one aspect of Christianity for Christianity embraces a great variety of people and a great variety of experiences. I really get tired of people who try to squash it flat into a linear measure so they can compare themselves with other people favorably.

Have you read the english dictionary? If not, then shall I say that you should not make any more posts because you cannot claim to understand the meaning of english words. I have not only read the entire Bible but made an in depth study of every part of it while I was at seminary, but I still find your words here to be ridiculous, pompous and offensive. Do you believe that reading the entire a Bible is a requirement for being a Christian? Is someone who cannot read because of some disability automatically disqualified? If someone reads the whole Bible quickly without really understanding anything, has he fulfilled your requirements? Or is someone with photographic memory a better Christian because He has memorized it all? Just how much of it do you have to remember or understand in order to be a Christian? All of this is nonsense. This is not what Christianity is about. If you read the Bible 10 times and have memorized every word, it is nothing but filthy rags. Your reading the whole Bible, confers not the slightest bit of authority to your words about what the Bible means. One could read a single passage from the Bible and truly understanding it, receive Christ into his life so that with a personal relationship with the living God, he has gained more understanding of what Christianity is all about than a lifetime of studying the book.

But pluralism admits that there are absolutes, it just recognizes that some things are relative or arbitrary. It is moral relativism that makes the extreme claim that there are no absolutes at all. Despite your response, I would judge that you agree that there are no circumstances in which the rape, torture and murder of a child can be considered an acceptable recreational activity. The next question therefore is why?

Thanks for that. I get really tired of atheists who like to characterize religion and Christianity in particular as a fantasy invented to handle the fear of death. This really does not jibe with the motivations of a great deal of the religious people I have known. Unless of course the difference between good and evil is not just some meaningless set of rules but has to do with a fundamental effect on our own being. If good is basically self constructive and evil is self destructive, then "whether you believe in yourself" may not not avail the evil person at all. It was my suggestion that the real difference between heaven and hell lies in the help you get from others, and in this it should be clear why the "good person" has a clear advantage. Unfortunately I greatly doubt that such a revelation at the point of death is forthcomming. I fear that the reality is that you will be surround by friends and family who share your point of view and do little more than confirm what you already believe. It is in life that we have the rare opportunity of discovering that we were wrong and to change our minds. Unless of course,..... .....we happen to have a personal relationship with God.

I am rather surprise that no one has had anything to say on this topic since it seems to be one involving a great deal of controversy. People talk about right and wrong, good and evil. They uphold absolute values and condemn moral relativism. What do all of these things mean? How do you know what is right and wrong if you believe in any such thing?

Yes from the most objective point of view that is exactly what being Christian means. However we should not ignore a second more restrictive meaning that has also become rather important to a worldwide consensus of Christians. After all anyone can say they follow the Bible and follow Jesus. So the more restrictive meaning requires an acceptance of the decisions of the eccumenical councils of the fourth century and the teachings of the apostle Paul in his letters. According to this more restrictive definition, quite a few groups, like the Mormons and the Jehova Witness, who are Christian according to the more objective definition, are excluded. Since according to the teachings of apostle Paul, being Christian is not a matter of merit, I think of Christians as dogs begging at the masters table. A Christian church is a sinner's anonymous meeting, where the weak in spirit, who realizing that they are their own worst enemy, and who have given up trying to save themselves, now throw themselves upon the mercy of God. As such, it is not the place of any Christian to make such judgements as to who is a "true Christian" and who is not. I would say that a "true Christian" is someone who does not judge others. And yet, have I not just done this myself? The plain fact is, that we are all hypocrites and rather pathetic and worthless in some manner or other. This seems to me to be a rather odd thing for you to say, for it suggests that you consider yourself a Christian. Otherwise why would you wish to defend the integrity of the name? I never got any impression, however, from the majority of your posts that you ever considered yourself to be a Christian. This is the basic reality of life. Every parent, God included, strongly objects to their children's self destructive behavior. But the parent cannot live their child's life for them and ultimately they are free to destroy themselves if they choose.

No. I know this is a pain in the butt. But the way you say it makes it sound like one person split apart and became three different persons. But the Trinity doctrine is that there always were these three different persons in the one God. The idea is that God transcends the usual ideas of personhood, so that these three different persons are this one being called God. It appears that they are individually by nature indistinguishable in the sense that they are all perfect, infinite, all powerful, all knowing and uncreated. The only thing which distinguishes them are the relationships between them and between each and mankind. The only way I can really make any sense of it at all, is to put it down to the peculiarities of an infinite being.

Actually I wasn't calling you a heretic. I am just relating the judgements of the eccumenical council on these issues. But personally I don't think these judgements were meant to be used to cut people off from the body of Christ calling them heretics unless these personal views are used to repudiate the faith and experience of other Christians. I think that is essentially what makes the Jehova Witnesses heretical, for example. It is not their Arian view of Jesus so much as it is their doctrine that all other denominations of Christianity are inspired by the Devil. The eccumenical councils made these compromises for rather practical reasons in response to the strong tendency of people to use issues like Christology to create division within the church. These decisions form a big part of the worldwide consensus about what it means to be Christian. Far be it from me to dictate to you how the Bible should be interpreted, but I do think it is valuable to be aware of these things.

You can believe that this is the "true Christian" belief if you like, there are a lot of people who believe things like that. BUT the vast majority of Christianity are of a consensus that this idea of yours in incorrect and heretical because it contradicts passages in the Bible, which in at least two places state that Jesus was the creator of the world. That is correct. The Trinity is not in the Bible. It is a doctrine made by human beings. But it would be a big mistake to say that it is not Biblical. Despite the fact that it is not in the Bible it is the view of God that is most consistent with the entire Bible. Any attempt to make a simpler more logical view of God will come into direct conflict with passages in the Bible. A non-Christian would have some justification in concluding that by embracing a Bible full of contradictions, Christians have been forced to construct a view of God that is just as full of contradictions. That is ideed, essentially the Christian answer to the criticism of SiverFox. If you believe in an infinite all-powerful God then to be more than one person is no contradiction at all. Perhaps He is an infinite number of persons and we are only acquainted with three of them. But "whack a piece of himself" is not properly Christian for many reasons. One of those reasons is that God is not only three persons but He was always three persons. Well "three forms", is actually modalism which was declared a heresy. The key point is that it is three persons but one nature, one essence, one substance, one God. One is strongly tempted to think of split personality disorder, except that for God this is not any kind of disorder. Three different persons does suggest three different personalities, and that gives cause to wonder what is the different personality traits. I certainly don't hear anything like this suggested by Christians however. I could suggest that their personality differences are purely relational (having to do with how they relate to each other and to mankind), and I think Christians would be a lot happier with that.

I am no expert but I did take a class called Islamic studies at seminary. The more important question in my mind is that, considering the tendency of the followers of islam to create theocratic states which supress the freedom of religion, is this claim that Islam is fast growing, something to fear or welcome? How do we compare this with what "Christians" did to the natives throughout the entire continents of North and South America (or Africa for that matter)? The question we must ask is whether this really has anything to do with these religions at all or whether this is a feature of human nature. For we can find plenty of examples in history of equal or greater horrors perpetrated by human beings (Ghengis Khan, Hitler, Stalin, Mao Tse Tung, Pol Pot) which were not motivated by religion, and were sometimes motivated by anti-relgious sentiments. This is not quite accurate. Compared to Christianity, Islam has shown a great deal of inclusivity in the way they have considered Christianity and Judaism, "religions of the book" and thus practically variations of Islam. Of course these opinions have undoubtedly changed among certain Muslims in response to conflicts with Jews and Christians in certain areas. There is a question of whether this is really a matter of religion or culture. And let us remember that attitudes towards women have improved in the west only fairly recently. Go back a couple of hundred years ago in the west and the lot of women is no better than this. That does not mean that I am not concerned by this issue however. When I watch something like the concert "Celtic Woman", and consider the fact that Islamic societies forbid women to develop and share such talents like this, I give great thanks that I do not live in such a society.

I would like everyone to consider discussing the topic of ethics, which is the study of values or morality and especially the concepts of right, wrong, good, evil, and responsibility. I am particularly interested in understanding this question I often hear concerning whether one believes in "absolute values". In taking a look at what is written about ethics, one finds in the broadest strokes these two major questions: one is the basic nature of values, and the second concerns the basis for determining these values. The first is the question of "meta-ethics" and there are two major positions: There are those who say that values are not independently real but are the creations of human beings. Then there are those who say that values are independently real and must be discovered rather than invented. The second question is the question of "normative ethics" and there are three major positions: There are the virtue ethicists who see values as being derived from ideals of human nature, often called virtues. Then there are the deontological ethicists who see values as being derived from duties and rules. Finally there are the consequential ethicists who believe that values are derived from the consequences of action. In other words, to put it simply we can ask if a moral or good action is that which 1) makes you a good person, 2) obeys the correct duties and rules, or 3) produce good consequences. If we start with a clean slate, the beginning of ethics must certainly come from the realization that actions have consequences. The question of normative ethics, however, underlines what is to be considered the most important consequences. In virtue ethics it is the effect on the character of the person that does the action which matters most. In deontological ethics, what matters most is the effect on the integrity of the duties and rules that society recognizes. And, finally, in consequential ethics it is the immediate tangible impact on the well being of people that counts most. However, there are some fundamental rational flaws in the second two positions, when one considers the possible conflict between what is intended and what actually happens. In consequential ethics we have a problem when the best of intentions has disastrous consequences. This not only places us in a quandry in regards to blame but also leads to considerable uncertainty in the ethics of all action. Shall we justify a crime by the possibility that people will actually benefit by it? In deontological ethics there are serious questions about the universality of duties and rules, for circumstances often arise when obedience to duties or rules causes harm. We often try to handle this rather common problem by talking about the spirit rather than the letter of the law. But this only underlines the flaws in deontological ethics rather than actually resolving the problem. I find myself supporting virtue ethics, although I would be interested if anyone sees flaws in this position that I have not considered. What then is it that people are talking about when they use the words "absolute values"? Logically the word "absolute" suggests a comparison with the term "relative", which suggest that we consider something called moral relativism. In the ethical position called "moral relativism", moral or ethical propositions are not considered to reflect absolute or moral truths, but are relative to social, cultural, historical or personal circumstances. Is it possible that slavery was justified in a time of history where this was the only alternative to slaughter? Is it possible that polygamy is justified in a society where females greatly outnumber the males who can protect and/or provide for them? Is cannabalism justified when it is the only means of personal survival? In contrast to this then, "absolute values" would seem to suggest that what is ethical is not relative to social, cultural, historical or personal circumstances. When looked at in this light this seems to go back to the first question of "meta-ethics" about whether values are independently real or invented by society. However, it seems to me that there is some confusion involved in this, because when some people talk about absolute values, they seem to mean that the difference between what is good and what is evil is decided by the will of someone whom they call God. Effectively then, the difference is determined by the arbitrary decision of this person God (if you believe He exists) or by their religion (if you do not). People, therefore, often reject this term "absolute values" because it seems to them that the difference between good and evil ought to be based on some absolute principle like avoiding harm to other people - or other living things. And yet in regards to the question of "meta-ethics" these positions are practically reversed, for what is arbitrarily decided by religion/God seems to have a less independent reality than that which is decided by some fundamental principle. When the two fundamental questions of ethics are applied, the "absolute values" position refering to the will of God might be considered a created deontological ethics, while moral relativism also represents a created deontological ethics, and so the difference between these suggest that there is third important question of ethics regarding whether ethical determinations are neccessarily universal or not. Although in the case of discovered ethics (values are independently real) this seems to be exclusively of the universal variety. However, there is a moderate postion between those of absolute values and moral relativism that is called pluralism. Pluralism suggests that there are some values which may be equally correct even though they are in conflict with each other and even though it is not possible to objectively say which is more important. The example which comes to my mind are the differences between east and west in regards to how honesty/truth and harmony/beauty are valued in these societies. It seems that in the west a greater importance is placed upon honesty and truth, while in the east a greater importance is attached to harmony and beauty. These values clash when the truth is ugly or destructive to the harmony of the family, society or nation. Pluralism differs from moral relativism because there are limits to what can be considered equally correct. Consider this: Are there circumstances in which the rape, torture and murder of a child can be considered an acceptable recreational activity? If not then that is a universal - an absolute. Since the parameters of this can be varied continuously we can explore the limits of this absolute and even explore the key reasons why this is an absolute. But that means that this one absolute becomes the basis for an absolute system of morality - although NOT one that precludes pluralism. In other words, pluralism suggests that ethics may be a complex combination of both universal moral truths which are discovered and values which are decided arbitrarily by ones society, culture or religion. I like to use the following imagery to look at the situation. When we consider the difference between what is good and evil in all the possibilities of life, what do we envision when good is represented by light and evil is represented by darkness. Do we see a single point of light surrounded by darkness in all directions? That often seems to be the image held by those who believe in "absolute values". Pluralism suggest a different image: one of light in all directions, but where there are points of darkness which one must avoid. Christians may naturally gravitate towards the first image thinking that Christ is that one point of light towards which everyone must go. However, since I believe in an infinite God and the infinite possibilites of life, it is second image of light in all directions which makes more sense to me.

After my own difficulties with installing Windows vista (explained in another thread) that video was lovely - I laughed until I cried. It may be that the makers of my computer may get and make available the digitally signed drivers I need to make Vista work on my computer, and they may not. But I cannot say that Vista has, at this point, impressed me in any way but with the realization that Microsoft continues in the tradition of the evil empire that we have all come to know and "love".

When I bought a new computer at the end of last year I paid for the certificate that would allow me to get the vista upgrade in the mail. My plan was to install vista on an insertable drive so that I could see it first hands without putting myself in its hands.However when I got my 64 bit Business Vista CD from Microsoft and proceded to install it, I hit a major stumbling block as far as actually using this version of windows on this computer. The driver CD that came with this P5WD2/P5LD2 Series computer, which among other things, installs the drivers for the on board sound, is refused by Windows Vista because it is not digitally signed. Well since I am not willing to do without sound, that pretty much makes Windows Vista completely useless to me.This is a bit flabbergasting! Shouldn't the decision about whether things must be digitally signed like other questions of security be a decision that is left up to us? Of course the makers of the motherboard needs to make a version of their installation disk that works with Windows vista. But I must wonder about this digital signing business. Is this another example of the monopolistic tyranny of the evil Microsoft empire. Is this digital signing something that companies have pay or even wait upon Microsoft for?

It is strange. You do not see yourself as searching for the truth and yet you see yourself as a judge of truth. In most things like science, judgement is a skill that is learned as you study the thing and how it works. I do not ridicule, in principle, the faith that one would recognize the truth if they heard it, for certainly anyone searching for the truth must have this basic faith. Nevertheless, one of the important parts of studying a subject is learning the language. Without learning the language of science, for example, it is impossible to understand what it is saying. But in this case, how should the search for truth ultimately be any different, for how can you really be a judge of truth if you haven't even learned the language that is aquired in the process of searching for it?

Oh yes that is a great philosophy. Put the selfish gene in command and make selfishness the highest ideal. Instead of, "Greater love has no one than this, than to lay down one's life for his friends", we have "no greater goal has any man but to squirt his seed in as many women as possible." Oh and for the other gender, the ideal is to be a baby factory. Wonderful philosophy. I wonder what this implies about the gay community? You could join forces with the Catholic church in their ecologically insane policy of prohibiting birth control. Death of a family member is sad but I guess the death of strangers is just more resources for you and yours. Richard Dawkins invented a new moral low point with that book of his. P.S. Sigmund Freud was never a social darwinist of any sort. He was a scientist who observed the critical role of sexuality in human psychopathology.

It is true that my OP was kinda couched in the assumptions of the Christian perspective and thus in a more open environment like this forum it would probably fit better with a title like "Why Christians think Jesus is God." That at least would not quite open itself up so readily to the kind of non-Christian criticism that yuhuu is finding so irritating. Truth be told the question "Is Jesus God?" posed outside the assumptions of a Christian perspective, presuming to depend on objective evidence would frankly be laughable. God is not objectively observable and is therefore difficult to see as a meaningful concept in such objective terms.Even if we accept the basic premises of the existence of the type of God which is capable of taking human form, in the manner that Jesus was supposedly an example of, an historical claim that a particular person was such a manifestation would be impossible to establish.As a result the question I asked is practically meaningless outside the assumptions of my OP.Yet the absurdity of this question from the non-Christian perspective is not irrelevant, because it suggest the rather important question of how it is that Christians come to believe such a thing. Let us put aside such inane suggestions about being indocrinated by ones family, because there are plenty of converts who come to accept this belief without such indoctrination. No, we must consider the process of thought that puts aside the natural predjudice on this question, for in the process of becoming Christian, people must struggle with this sense of the absurdity of this idea of Jesus being God.

The point was that if you comment on the Bible without properly reading it then you are just as much an ignoramous as if you comment on science without properly understanding that subject. Sure there are plenty of religious ignoramouses who think they can comment on scientific theories like evolution without any understanding of science. They confuse science with philosophy and and its methods with rhetoric. But this is not a type of behavior that ought to be imitated even though the methods of religion are a lot closer to rhetoric than those of science.

I read your page, but there is not much that I can say. I see incredible ignorance about many things in science (evolution), mathematics, religion, philosophy, and the nature of man and society, but all of us are learning about these things and you do not pretend to know everything. One of the philosophies that I fell in love with in seminary was the pragmatism of Charles Sanders Pierce (the only systematic philosophy by the way that was born on American soil). The main idea, as I understand it, is that the effect of believing something is part of its truth value, or to put it a bit crassly, something is true if it works for you, improving your life. I also was rather enamoured of the writings of Scott Peck M.D. (beginning with "A Road Less Traveled") a clinical psychiatrist who explores the link between spirituality and psychological health based on his observations as a clinical psychiatrist. He observed that in the process of helping them, some people left their religion and some people joined a religious group. He concluded that there was a path of spiritual development that included a stage(s) of skepticism that were more advanced than a stage(s) that we would call religious. But He, as I do, believe that there are religious commitments that go beyond skepticism, that can embrace religious, skeptical, and scientific point of view. In the skeptical stage we learn to be brutally honest, squashing the prevarications which prop up our most tempting delusions, but once we have utterly given up the addiction to certainty, it is possible to see the hints of deeper truth in religion behind all the flaws and uncertainties that lie in the way. In fact, this point is often reached when skepticism advances to the extreme of becoming skeptical about skepticism itself. Thus you will find people who seem to baffle both skeptic and religious alike in their ability to be both brutally skeptical and deeply religious at the same time. I am a scientist and a vigorous defender of the value of science and its methods, strongly opposing the pseudoscience rhetoric of "Creation science". But a real understanding of how science works will also reveal its limitations. People today often think that having science, all traditions of the past are worthless superstitions and habits that ought to abandoned. But this thinking is seriously flawed. The methods of science are devastatingly accurate and efficient when it comes to the mathematical relationships between measurable quantities, but in other areas involving complex systems especially living systems, it stumbles around in almost complete ignorance. In such areas, the biggest weakness of science is revealed: the time required to examine and understand long term effects. I have felt utter amusement at the trendy behavior of the so called sciences in the areas of health and medicine. Drugs and food products firmly believed to be beneficial in one decade are declared to be dangerous and poisonous (or cancer causing) in the next decade. Thus we may realize that tradition has a strength where science is weak, for if nothing else tradition is quite aware of its long term effects. So the "wisdom of the ancients" is not as barren of value as many people of today might think and the explorations of tradition and the ideas in Christian theology and ancient Greek philosphy often bears wonderous fruit (Aristotle is one of my favorites). This thread exploring the question of the divinity of Christ is no empty excercise of reporting the prejudices of a religion that clings to past certainties. Rather it is part of my own exploration of the traditions of Christiany from an untutored beginning, in which I continue to find great wisdom where I had previously not expected to find any at all.

Well that is certainly what the Catholics would have you believe. But the truth is that birth of Catholicicsm begins with the making of Christianity a state religion, absorbing a lot of the practices of the pagan religions and particularly the practice of forcing everyone to accept a human authority in the place of God so that Christianity could be shaped into a tool of power. With the veneration of Mary the Roman empire could absorb the pagan female deities with a simple change of name and the Catholic church became the universal church for everyone. It was the habit of the roman emperors to use religion as a means of control and power, just as they used entertainment for the same purpose. So it is in the formation of the Catholic church that Karl Marx's accusation finds a seed of truth. Real Christianity, however, was preserved in the scriptures, but as long as the majority did not read them, the Catholic church could retain the reigns of power by assuming the role of telling everyone its contents and meaning. The Protestant Reformation came about when more and more people began to read the scriptures for themselves and realized that the authority and practices of the Catholic church was to be found nowhere within them, and that Jesus was only mediator needed between man and God. It is funny how denominational non-believers are. Thus I firmly believe that the Bible is the only authority given to man from God in regards to the truth, and that no human being or organization of such are given any authority to dictate its meaning (interpretation) to others. Anyone can say they understand the historical background in order to make their understanding of the scriptures seem more authoritative. But Jesus promised Himself in the scriptures that He would send aid to each of us personally to help in our understanding of the scriptures and that aid clearly trumps any imaginations of history by human beings. But you may complain, "then why do people interpret the Bible differently?" Well I say that this serves the purpose of God. We human beings like to get our understanding all in one language to create a human ediface of power and authority, but the result is always a tyrannical dominion of evil. God always seems to find a hope of human righteousness in the in the one individual who does not follow the crowd. So I think diversity has become the confirmed strategy of God among human kind just as it has always been His way in the natural world. So it is that after finding that one human being, Noah, who did not follow the rest, and destroying the evil dominion that human beings had over the world, God prevented mankind from creating another such system of power and control in the tower of Babel and through the diversity of language and culture prevents such a thing from ever happening again. So it is in the freedom of the individual that man has the hope and possiblility of a relationship directly with God, without the corruption that comes from the teachings of men. When God through Abraham, founded one nation with whom He could make a special relationship, those people came to God's prophet to demand of God that they have a king. It is interesting to see how God responded to this. (continue reading 1 Samuel 8:11-18, for the description of kings here is delightful). So even in the time of Samuel it is clear that God saw no need for the people of Israel to have any human authority over them, and by appointing such an authority God saw this as forsaking Him and choosing not to have God Himself rule over them. What then can we say of the Catholic church who insists that they have been appointed over mankind as a human religious authority to tell all Christians what the Bible means? They are liars who would have us forsake God choosing not to have God himself rule in our lives! Look there is much to admire in the Catholic church and it is the decision of the worldwide Christian consensus that they doctrinally conform to the definition of what it means to be Christian, for these doctrines are what is considered the most essential, that as long as these are taught then they can share a common experience with other Christians as one community. But in so far as the Catholic church points to itself as the authority instead of God, it ceases to be Christian altogether and they have made themselves into a religion of the doctrines of men to deceive and mislead.

I was not there and I am not God. So I cannot explain them. The question is do you believe in such a God? If you do, then you must be very proud of yourself. But if you do not, then why are you talking about things you do not believe in? Why do you make such an effort to mock the beliefs of others? Do you really need to prop up a feeling of your own superiority so desperately, and why is that? How should a parent love a child? Should he cease to love the child when the child makes a mess? The parent will quite often say BAD or some other sort of negative reaction or punishment. The child cries forlorn thinking himself unloved, but is this true? Is the love of the parent conditional simply because the parent tries teach the child things? I do not think so. The parents expression of love must be on the parents terms for it is the parent who knows what is best for the child. Likewise we cannot demand that God love us in the manner that we would choose to be loved because we are just as ignorant of the requirements of our own well being as an infant.

I agree with your summation but not with the details of your explanation. That may make sense to you but not to me. Such a God is too small and petty for me to belieive in. I believe in an infinite God whose very nature is to love and give of Himself unconditionally. I don't think the change was in how God felt about human beings but in what Adam and Eve felt about God and themselves so that the presence of God was no longer conducive to their well being. This was utterly tragic because only in a relationship with God was their any possibility for them to realize their greater potentialities. But as long as Adam and Eve refused responsibility for what they had done and instead insisted on blaming everything on each other and upon "the serpent", the presence of a God who they could depend on for everything was not what was best for them. But without the personal guidance of God, Adam and Eve and all of their decendents were doomed to fall into the self-destructive habits of sin. We were simply not meant to go it alone. This is a traditional way parents have for teaching their children responsibility. If they cannot handle the full consequences of what they have done, the parent give the child something to do as a substitiute (often called punishment) while the parent takes care of the real consequences Himself. Yes in the first chapter of Isaiha, God gets pretty sick of the sacrifices which are nothing but a cover (or "indulgence") for evil deeds. The situation is much like that of the manipulative nature of children who take their substitutionary punishments for granted and pursue wrongdoing regardless of it. At such a time it becomes necessary for the parent to change the punishments to something more like the real consequences of their deeds. So it was through the Babylonian captivity that the Jews began to realize that God's punishments for sins were more severe than any other people because God's expectation for them was greater than for other peoples of the world. Yes by what He did He not only showed us what our sins do to the innocent that try to help mankind but by doing this Himself He showed us that He was such an innocent only trying to help, but willing to suffer the consequences of our sins. Through this event God could bring reconcilliation between God and man for it demands our recognition that our sins put Him on the cross to be ridiculed and tortured to death. The point is thus that through this event, God can restore the natural relationship He had with Adam and Eve without the detrimental result of having us think that our actions have no consequences.

This is often the difference between academic honesty and religion. Religion and pseudo-scientific efforts like "Creation science" grab at any excuse, reason or evidence that they can twist into a support for the truth of their beliefs, but scientists and academics in general have trained themselves to judge things honestly according what the evidence tells them. Peer review keeps them them both honest and objective in their finding. It doen't mean that they are always right, but it does mean that unlike religion, when new evidence arises that contradicts their previous claims they are ready to change their theories accordingly, instead of stubbornly and stupidly insisting that they are right regardless.

I attended a Catholic school only one year of my life but it was a turning point. So I also can confirm the high quality of Catholic education. I don't know about any war against Catholicism but I will say that they do bring about a great deal of opposition upon themselves by their attitude of smug superiority and their claim of authority which the Catholic does not have. The Catholic church has and should have a great deal of power that properly reflects their rather large membership. But I believe the rest of the Chirstian community would be more accepting of the Catholic church (for all the great things which they are and have done, including the volume and sincerity of their prayers) if they did not insist that their human organization was the judge of all Christianity. God not Rome is head of the body of Christ.