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Source: (consider it)
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Thread: Where do they go?
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mousethief
Ship's Thieving Rodent
# 953
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Posted
Where do the souls of aborted babies go? On the assumption that an egg being penetrated by a sperm creates a new little human soul, what happens to it when the little blastocyst is swept away?
Does it go to heaven? Is heaven filled with billions upon billions of souls of embryos that never implanted or were spontaneously aborted soon after fertilization?
Do they cease to exist?
Do they go to Limbo?
Where do they go?
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W Hyatt
Shipmate
# 14250
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by mousethief:
Do they cease to exist?
My belief is that God would never allow anything good to cease existing, most especially the soul of a person. My speculation is that they probably end up "above" heaven (i.e. between God and heaven) where they can help God communicate with and bestow joy on his creation, although still in a state of immaturity and therefore without conscious awareness.
But of course any and all answers are going to be highly dependent on one's theology.
What are your beliefs, hopes, and/or speculations?
[ 06. August 2015, 05:06: Message edited by: W Hyatt ]
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A new church and a new earth, with Spiritual Insights for Everyday Life.
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Ad Orientem
Shipmate
# 17574
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Posted
I would say that ultimately we do not know but because we believe in a merciful God we have a good hope that such will be with the Lord.
Posts: 2606 | From: Finland | Registered: Feb 2013
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Albertus
Shipmate
# 13356
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Posted
...and I think there's nothing more that we can say about it.
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Lamb Chopped
Ship's kebab
# 5528
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Posted
This is obviously going to be all speculation, since Scripture tells us zip zilch nada. But if you don't mind that,...
My guess is that they form part of that millions-upon-millions of people from every tribe and nation around the Throne worshipping and rejoicing in Jesus. After all, we are told that "the way is strait, and the gate narrow, and few there are that reach it"--which suggests that a lot fewer people than we may think will wind up in heaven--but at the same time we are given this picture in Rev. 7:
quote:
9 After this I looked, and behold, a great multitude that no one could number, from every nation, from all tribes and peoples and languages, standing before the throne and before the Lamb, clothed in white robes, with palm branches in their hands, 10 and crying out with a loud voice, “Salvation belongs to our God who sits on the throne, and to the Lamb!”
They have to have come from somewhere!
Just my two cents' worth.
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Er, this is what I've been up to (book).
Oh, that you would rend the heavens and come down!
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Brenda Clough
Shipmate
# 18061
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Posted
In Dante, Paradise is depicted as a gigantic rose. (Or, an analogy the poet could not have used, a football stadium.) In the middle is Christ and the petals are seats or places, for all the saved who are adoring him. Of the stadium seating, fully half is taken up by babies who died baptized, but before they could commit any sins.
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Science fiction and fantasy writer with a Patreon page
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Crœsos
Shipmate
# 238
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Lamb Chopped:
This is obviously going to be all speculation, since Scripture tells us zip zilch nada.
Is that actually the case? If we accept MT's stipulation that the unborn have souls, why not simply assume they suffer the same postmortem fate as any other non-Christian soul?
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Humani nil a me alienum puto
Posts: 10706 | From: Sardis, Lydia | Registered: May 2001
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ExclamationMark
Shipmate
# 14715
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Posted
I believe they have souls, as they have life. They will be with the Lamb of God who has wiped away every tear.
I await one reunion with real joy: our miscarried child is there waiting for us to join him/her - perfect in every way and worshipping the creator.
Posts: 3845 | From: A new Jerusalem | Registered: Apr 2009
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Ad Orientem
Shipmate
# 17574
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by leo:
I don't believe in 'going to heaven.'
As I see it, at the end of time God will redeem the whole created order - 'finish then thy nee creation'
So all aborted babies will grow and flourish - something denied to them in/by the old creation
But what a out the time in between, or do you believe in soul sleep?
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Jammy Dodger
Half jam, half biscuit
# 17872
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Posted
Tom Wright in 'Surprised by Hope' talks about life after death being with God in heaven but then life after life after death is the resurrection/renewal of creation.
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Look at my eye twitching - Donkey from Shrek
Posts: 438 | From: UK | Registered: Oct 2013
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mousethief
Ship's Thieving Rodent
# 953
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by W Hyatt:
What are your beliefs, hopes, and/or speculations?
Well my hope, as a closet Orfie universalist, is that everyone will achieve theosis, if not in this life (which is very rare) then in the next. What prevents this in any individual case (and it's only prevented in individual cases, not aggregately) is for someone to hold out indefinitely against turning to God.
The problem I have is that who we are as persons is only partly determined by our genetics, but also in very large part by our experiences and choices in this life. And the unborn by definition have not had any experiences or choices in this life. They have no personality to speak of. Will they be infused with a personality in the afterlife? Will they develop one in the context of eternity, which is not time going on forever but something else which we can hardly put into words? Who are they and how do they become who they are?
It also bothers me that people say very few of us who are born and life out some kind of "normal" life span will end up saved, but all of these unborn infants (which, if we are humans from the moment of fertilization, is more than half of all humans ever created) will. Not that I don't want them to, but that this sets up a very strange ethical conundrum: if an aborted foetus is guaranteed salvation, but a person living out a normal life has a slim chance, then by insisting the foetus be brought to term and allowed to live, we are insisting on, in the majority of cases, denying it salvation.
This is one of the things driving my universalism. If you really thought that the born have a (say) 10% chance of salvation and the unborn have a 100% chance of salvation, and you want people to be saved, you would be positively insisting that women have abortions, lest their children come to eternal perdition. But nobody takes this stance. Leading one to think that they believe the first death (cessation of biological life) is WORSE than the second death (eternal damnation). And not, as they claim, of secondary importance.
So I am conflicted all over the place for myself, and uncertain that pro-life people really believe what they say they believe. Or rather I think they believe two contradictory things, contradictory in a BIG way, and wonder if any have thought of this, and if so how they reconcile it.
I can't square the circle without either universalism or a bizarre sort of hypercalvinism that says it doesn't matter if they're born or not as far as their salvation goes, so you should let them be born because given that they're lost anyway, the greatest good they can accomplish is biological life, and it's immoral to deprive them of at least that much.
(I should add by way of disclosure, and not to gain sympathy points, that this is a personal question for me, inasmuch as I had/have two sons who died at birth.)
[ 06. August 2015, 16:23: Message edited by: mousethief ]
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Lamb Chopped
Ship's kebab
# 5528
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by mousethief:
quote:
Originally posted by W Hyatt:
What are your beliefs, hopes, and/or speculations?
Well my hope, as a closet Orfie universalist, is that everyone will achieve theosis, if not in this life (which is very rare) then in the next. What prevents this in any individual case (and it's only prevented in individual cases, not aggregately) is for someone to hold out indefinitely against turning to God.
The problem I have is that who we are as persons is only partly determined by our genetics, but also in very large part by our experiences and choices in this life. And the unborn by definition have not had any experiences or choices in this life. They have no personality to speak of. Will they be infused with a personality in the afterlife? Will they develop one in the context of eternity, which is not time going on forever but something else which we can hardly put into words? Who are they and how do they become who they are?
It also bothers me that people say very few of us who are born and life out some kind of "normal" life span will end up saved, but all of these unborn infants (which, if we are humans from the moment of fertilization, is more than half of all humans ever created) will. Not that I don't want them to, but that this sets up a very strange ethical conundrum: if an aborted foetus is guaranteed salvation, but a person living out a normal life has a slim chance, then by insisting the foetus be brought to term and allowed to live, we are insisting on, in the majority of cases, denying it salvation.
This is one of the things driving my universalism. If you really thought that the born have a (say) 10% chance of salvation and the unborn have a 100% chance of salvation, and you want people to be saved, you would be positively insisting that women have abortions, lest their children come to eternal perdition. But nobody takes this stance. Leading one to think that they believe the first death (cessation of biological life) is WORSE than the second death (eternal damnation). And not, as they claim, of secondary importance.
So I am conflicted all over the place for myself, and uncertain that pro-life people really believe what they say they believe. Or rather I think they believe two contradictory things, contradictory in a BIG way, and wonder if any have thought of this, and if so how they reconcile it.
I can't square the circle without either universalism or a bizarre sort of hypercalvinism that says it doesn't matter if they're born or not as far as their salvation goes, so you should let them be born because given that they're lost anyway, the greatest good they can accomplish is biological life, and it's immoral to deprive them of at least that much.
(I should add by way of disclosure, and not to gain sympathy points, that this is a personal question for me, inasmuch as I had/have two sons who died at birth.)
I also have three children who died before birth, so much sympathy.
It seems to me that the key to what you're saying is right here:
quote:
If an aborted foetus is guaranteed salvation, but a person living out a normal life has a slim chance, then by insisting the foetus be brought to term and allowed to live, we are insisting on, in the majority of cases, denying it salvation.
First--we are nowhere told that a child who dies untimely is guaranteed salvation. It seems a pretty safe guess, considering the kind of God we have--but then, considering the kind of hearts we have, he is doubtless wise not to give us total certainty on the subject. I can totally imagine the murderous "salvation campaigns" some lunatics might get up.
Second, it is emphatically NOT denying someone salvation to give them the opportunity to grow and exercise their own free will. Yes, some will use that free will badly; but abusus non tollit usum,* and I know no one who believes that free will is a bad thing in itself.
That's probably as far as we can go digging into this mystery, except to observe that God himself apparently thinks free will and a lifetime of experience a sufficiently good thing that he allows a large percentage of the human race to experience it--and not just in countries and ages where Christianity is known.
(My private speculation is that God wants a certain number of late converts in his kingdom on account of liking variety. The Christianity of a cradle Christian is a bit different-flavored than that of an adult convert, and both probably differ from that of a person who died at birth.)
* The abuse of a gift does not take away the proper use of that gift.
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Er, this is what I've been up to (book).
Oh, that you would rend the heavens and come down!
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mousethief
Ship's Thieving Rodent
# 953
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Lamb Chopped:
I also have three children who died before birth, so much sympathy.
Thank you.
quote:
(My private speculation is that God wants a certain number of late converts in his kingdom on account of liking variety. The Christianity of a cradle Christian is a bit different-flavored than that of an adult convert, and both probably differ from that of a person who died at birth.)
This would seem to be saying that God is content to condemn billions of souls to Hell for the sake of a little variety. Spicing up the heavenly rolls, as it were. "Yes, millions of people are in eternal screaming agony to allow you to be this interesting, but after all I like interesting."
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mousethief
Ship's Thieving Rodent
# 953
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Lamb Chopped:
First--we are nowhere told that a child who dies untimely is guaranteed salvation. It seems a pretty safe guess, considering the kind of God we have <snip>
Hence my OP and the title of this thread. Where do they go? It seems we have four alternatives (well, four that I can think of; others please feel free to add your own thoughts!):
1. salvation/theosis
2. annihilation
3. some kind of "limbo"
4. damnation
Of course we do not, and cannot without divine revelation which has thus far not been forthcoming, know which it is.
quote:
--but then, considering the kind of hearts we have, he is doubtless wise not to give us total certainty on the subject. I can totally imagine the murderous "salvation campaigns" some lunatics might get up.
A frightening prospect, yes.
quote:
Second, it is emphatically NOT denying someone salvation to give them the opportunity to grow and exercise their own free will. Yes, some will use that free will badly; but abusus non tollit usum,* and I know no one who believes that free will is a bad thing in itself.
No, I did not say denying them. But given the two presuppositions (1. all infants go to heaven, and 2. very few adults go to heaven), it is greatly reducing their odds.
quote:
That's probably as far as we can go digging into this mystery, except to observe that God himself apparently thinks free will and a lifetime of experience a sufficiently good thing that he allows a large percentage of the human race to experience it--and not just in countries and ages where Christianity is known.
Which is what drives me to universalism. That God must think the current arrangement better than not letting people live the threescore and ten with its inherent dangers. Perhaps this thinking (my universalism, I mean) is too utilitarian, in the sense that it seeks the greatest good for the greatest number. Maybe God doesn't give a piss about the greatest good for the greatest number and only cares about a select few, and Hell take the rest (literally) (where "literally" means literally). But despite arguments that "his ways are not our ways" this is incomprehensible to me, that God should be so callous.
Apologies for chopping up my response into two posts.
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mr cheesy
Shipmate
# 3330
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Posted
There could be other alternatives:
* Souls are not allocated until birth
* Unused souls from the stillborn are recycled to other live births
* They experience life in some other kind of dimension (I'm sorry, I do not have the vocabulary, dimension isn't really the right word) where they experience the life they would have had and are therefore subject to judgement based on that life rather than the life they didn't get to have.
* The life of their parents is taken into account in judgement
Some of these are more attractive than others, but just thinking aloud really.
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arse
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mr cheesy
Shipmate
# 3330
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Posted
I'm not offering this as a proof text, but I think one of my main understandings of God is described in verses like Luke 12:48 - ie that much is expected from those who are given much.
To me this suggests some kind of sliding scale of responsibility - and that those who have the most faculties many things are expected, whereas those who have fewer faculties much less is expected.
For someone who hasn't been born, in my view, nothing can be expected because nothing was given.
But, for me, I think I think that the soul is allocated at birth, so the idea that one could abort an embryo and send the soul straight to heaven is a non-starter for me. On the other hand, one could do the same for a live birth child, which for me is a completely different moral issue.
In that latter case, I think that the child may well be saved, but this monstrous act may well put the perpetrator into danger. I don't think God takes too kindly to people who take other people's lives in their hands for the rightness of their own theological position, particularly when the victim is a defenceless child.
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arse
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art dunce
Shipmate
# 9258
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Posted
What an interesting thread, it's made me ask people I know what they believe. I don't believe that fertilized eggs have souls. Scientist believe that at least two-thirds of fertilized eggs fail to implant or spontaneously abort (some scientist say up to eighty percent!) and so I don't believe that they are given unique souls since it would make no sense to me that God would doom so many souls to never make it. I also don't believe that embryos have souls. Just imagine all those IVF labs filled with countless souls in eternal frozen stasis, but then again who knows. I have dear friends, who fervently hope that fetuses have souls, since like others on this thread they wish to see them in the next life. I have another who had an abortion and hopes she will have the chance to 'apologize to the never born child' (her words). But I would say that 'at first breath' is probably the most common belief. I have never had an abortion or miscarriage and so I realized that I didn't think about my own children's souls until their baptisms as infants.
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Ego is not your amigo.
Posts: 1283 | From: in the studio | Registered: Apr 2005
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Nicolemr
Shipmate
# 28
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Posted
Maybe they return to the guf from where many believe they came in the first place.
Personally this seems like a very reasonable possibility to me.
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art dunce
Shipmate
# 9258
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Posted
Didn't poor Origen get in big trouble for suggesting pre-existence of souls?
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Ego is not your amigo.
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W Hyatt
Shipmate
# 14250
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by mousethief:
It also bothers me that people say very few of us who are born and life out some kind of "normal" life span will end up saved, ...
I'm curious - is that what the Orthodox Church teaches, that very few of us will end up saved?
quote:
This is one of the things driving my universalism. If you really thought that the born have a (say) 10% chance of salvation ...
Does the Church teach that God might allow anyone to end up not being saved by chance (e.g. by accident or by ignorance)? If not, does it make any sense to talk about the "chances" of salvation?
Personally, I'm highly confident in my belief that God gives everyone a 100% chance of salvation if they desire it, even if just a little bit. Even so, I waver between sometimes thinking that most people are saved and sometimes thinking that very few allow themselves to be saved. But it has nothing to do with chance.
And to Lamb Chopped's point about apparently thinking free will and a lifetime of experience are important, I think God values our free will and our opportunity to experience our own choices even more than we do. Without them, I don't think it's possible for us to experience any joy at all.
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A new church and a new earth, with Spiritual Insights for Everyday Life.
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Lamb Chopped
Ship's kebab
# 5528
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Posted
The problem is this verse (Jesus speaking), and others like it:
quote:
Matthew 7:13-14
“Enter by the narrow gate. For the gate is wide and the way is easy that leads to destruction, and those who enter by it are many. For the gate is narrow and the way is hard that leads to life, and those who find it are few."
As for me personally, I would love to believe that everyone is saved. The trouble is I can't find warrant for it in the Scriptures--not sufficient to overcome verses like the above, anyway.
I'm still hoping it will turn out that way, but I dare not assume it's so.
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Er, this is what I've been up to (book).
Oh, that you would rend the heavens and come down!
Posts: 20059 | From: off in left field somewhere | Registered: Feb 2004
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IngoB
Sentire cum Ecclesia
# 8700
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by mousethief:
Do they go to Limbo?
I think this is most likely. They go then to a place of perfect natural happiness, but not to supernatural bliss in grace. They will not lack God in the pains of hell, but they will also not know God in the beatific vision. I imagine some kind of eternal happy childhood. In comparison to an adult (in the presence of God) it has an incompleteness about it, but considered in itself as an experiential reality, it has a natural fullness. A child does not feel the lack of what it cannot perceive, and we need not be sad that a child is not an adult. (Though we may of course be sad about a child not reaching adulthood - but this is a sadness about the world, which is sad in so many, many ways. But the child is not deficient as child, just because we may wish to have seen it grow into an adult. Our sadness is about what might have been, not about what was, and in Limbo perhaps eternally is.)
quote:
Originally posted by mousethief:
And the unborn by definition have not had any experiences or choices in this life. They have no personality to speak of. Will they be infused with a personality in the afterlife? Will they develop one in the context of eternity, which is not time going on forever but something else which we can hardly put into words? Who are they and how do they become who they are?
I think it is important to remember that the human soul has two aspects, a corporeal one as form of the body, and an incorporeal one that has the intellectual function of abstracting universals. We could say that it is a spark of cognition fused with a biological exploration machine. Those of us who had almost no time for this biological exploration nevertheless do not lack that spark of cognition.
Perhaps then the resurrected body and mind of a human being who died very early in development is largely "generically human" with only those few traces of its individuality imposed on it that it had already developed. This may seem like a lack, but it may be a complementarity, given that the spark of cognition infused by God is the same.
If we consider the heavenly life of perceiving God in beatific vision, then we may think of a trade-off between purity and richness here. Those whose "spark of cognition" did not receive much worldly formation approach God with particular purity and lack of bias. Those whose "spark of cognition" encountered the word at length approach God with particular richness and depth of experience. Together they may form a harmony of human experience of God greater than what they each could have achieved on their own.
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They’ll have me whipp’d for speaking true; thou’lt have me whipp’d for lying; and sometimes I am whipp’d for holding my peace. - The Fool in King Lear
Posts: 12010 | From: Gone fishing | Registered: Oct 2004
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IngoB
Sentire cum Ecclesia
# 8700
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Posted
Correction to post above:
"... encountered the world ..."
[ 07. August 2015, 02:52: Message edited by: IngoB ]
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They’ll have me whipp’d for speaking true; thou’lt have me whipp’d for lying; and sometimes I am whipp’d for holding my peace. - The Fool in King Lear
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orfeo
Ship's Musical Counterpoint
# 13878
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Posted
Whatever the fate of these beings is, it's worth remembering that they probably outnumber us. It's estimated that 70 to 75% of conceptions end in miscarriage (including a very large number of cases where the mother wasn't ever aware she was pregnant).
quote:
Originally posted by IngoB:
I imagine some kind of eternal happy childhood. In comparison to an adult (in the presence of God) it has an incompleteness about it, but considered in itself as an experiential reality, it has a natural fullness. A child does not feel the lack of what it cannot perceive, and we need not be sad that a child is not an adult. (Though we may of course be sad about a child not reaching adulthood - but this is a sadness about the world, which is sad in so many, many ways. But the child is not deficient as child, just because we may wish to have seen it grow into an adult.
Talking about them not growing into adulthood rather misses the important point that they never grew into childhood, either. We might be talking about human beings, but we're not talking about children.
Which then raises the question, if your imagination allows for the possibility of these human beings, many of them incredibly tiny, growing into children and having an eternally happy childhood, why does your imagination not extent to them growing into adults and having an eternally happy adulthood?
Posts: 18173 | From: Under | Registered: Jul 2008
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Lamb Chopped
Ship's kebab
# 5528
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Posted
Personality clearly has a genetic component--it is "built in," as it were. Experiences may develop it, but anybody who cares for newborns regularly can see the differences in temperament. They are not generic. (I'm dealing with an 8-week-old puppy at the moment, and being flabbergasted at the very evident STRONG personality of this 2 pound scrap of caninity. Google tells me it's a characteristic of her breed.)
As for when and where never-born children "grow up," I don't know, and I figure I don't need to, as God has that matter in hand. If God can cope with people dying at assorted random ages after birth (and various states of decrepitude), and still make the general resurrection come out all right, then I figure he can cope also with wee babies who never saw the world's light. To him it's just another stage, right?
And I take it for granted that they are in Christ according to the verse "As in Adam all die, so in Christ shall all be made alive." They are certainly human enough to die; they are also therefore human enough to be included in Christ by his gracious compassion. And they certainly haven't reached the point of being able to consciously reject him, so...
I'm glad I don't have the job of deciding when souls/nephesh come into being. My speculation would be at conception, though, since there is no particular reason to prefer quickening (which date varies depending on the mother's sensitivity--first time mothers tend to feel it later, not being experienced); viability (which also changes based on new discoveries and technologies, and which varies depending on the part of the world you're in when delivery becomes inevitable); or birth (which again is basically a physical passage from one spot to another, not an ontological change--and anyway, at what point are you actually "born"--when the head comes out? the whole body? What if you're breech? and so on).
I'm not fussed about the fact that the majority of the human race dies before birth, and even before the end of the first trimester. This fact cannot have escaped the attention of the all-knowing God; and being the kind of God he is, I'm sure he will have taken steps to deal graciously with those people. But it's not strictly necessary for him to tell us what he has done.
It just occurred to me--in the case of the "when do souls come?" argument, shouldn't we be considering the case of Jesus? Because I would expect that the Incarnation happened at that same moment, whenever it was--otherwise there would have been a time when his humanity and his divinity both existed but not in union--which appears to be nonsense and is doubtless some kind of heresy as well. In fact, I rather think that all would have had to happen at his conception--human body, human soul, divine nature--or else we get the same dividing-Christ boggle.
And if it happened in his case, he tends to be archtypical for the human race--so I'd take it that the ensoulment time was the same for all people.
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Er, this is what I've been up to (book).
Oh, that you would rend the heavens and come down!
Posts: 20059 | From: off in left field somewhere | Registered: Feb 2004
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Gee D
Shipmate
# 13815
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by orfeo:
Whatever the fate of these beings is, it's worth remembering that they probably outnumber us. It's estimated that 70 to 75% of conceptions end in miscarriage (including a very large number of cases where the mother wasn't ever aware she was pregnant).
I think it's more accurate to say that it is that proportion of fertilisations which end in a failure to conceive, that is, a failure of the fertilised ovum to become attached to the endometrium. The number of miscarriages drops enormously after that event.
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Not every Anglican in Sydney is Sydney Anglican
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mr cheesy
Shipmate
# 3330
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Posted
I don't understand the concept of limbo (at least in this context). IngoB are you saying that these souls are never judged and never reach heaven/hell? If so, what is the point of their existence?
Also I can't see why the need to have both limbo and purgatory. If the purpose of purgatory is to perfect souls, why couldn't these souls of the unborn go there too?
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arse
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mr cheesy
Shipmate
# 3330
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Gee D:
I think it's more accurate to say that it is that proportion of fertilisations which end in a failure to conceive, that is, a failure of the fertilised ovum to become attached to the endometrium. The number of miscarriages drops enormously after that event.
Whilst this might be more accurate, I'm not sure it makes any difference in this discussion, as we are still saying (if the assertion that the soul is allocated at conception) that a very large number of fertilised zygotes do not become live births, aren't we?
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arse
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Laurelin
Shipmate
# 17211
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Posted
Fascinating thread. I've often wondered, myself.
quote:
Originally posted by Crœsos:
Is that actually the case? If we accept MT's stipulation that the unborn have souls, why not simply assume they suffer the same postmortem fate as any other non-Christian soul?
Well, there's this: And he said: "Truly I tell you, unless you change and become like little children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven." That's me choosing to interpret Matthew 18:3 in a very literal, simplistic way, but hey.
Many of us struggle with the idea that a God we Christians like to think of as loving and kind would create billions of human beings just to condemn large swathes of them eternally, including large swathes of unborn human beings who never saw the light of day anyway. So, yep, I'm definitely an evangelical with universalist tendencies/sympathies. I share Lamb Chopped's caution, but I also think that God's grace is way bigger than any of us can conceive.
I do believe in judgment, because I believe that evil is defeated in Christ and that He will kick evil to the eternal dustbin. Not up to me to judge who God will judge though. And I think He does hold us responsible for the things we do, but also offers grace. Holding unborn foetuses, babies and toddlers to account? - nope.
quote:
Originally posted by leo:
I don't believe in 'going to heaven.'
As I see it, at the end of time God will redeem the whole created order - 'finish then thy nee creation'
So all aborted babies will grow and flourish - something denied to them in/by the old creation
I like this. A lot. ![[Cool]](cool.gif)
![[Votive]](graemlins/votive.gif) for those of you who've lost children.
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"I fear that to me Siamese cats belong to the fauna of Mordor." J.R.R. Tolkien
Posts: 545 | From: The Shire | Registered: Jul 2012
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Laurelin
Shipmate
# 17211
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Nicolemr:
Maybe they return to the guf from where many believe they came in the first place.
Personally this seems like a very reasonable possibility to me.
I forgot to comment on this: I'm not familiar with Jewish mysticism, but this is a fascinating, and really rather beautiful, concept. ![[Smile]](smile.gif) The Treasury, or Tree, of souls ...
I can live with the mystery.
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"I fear that to me Siamese cats belong to the fauna of Mordor." J.R.R. Tolkien
Posts: 545 | From: The Shire | Registered: Jul 2012
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Gee D
Shipmate
# 13815
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by mr cheesy:
Whilst this might be more accurate, I'm not sure it makes any difference in this discussion, as we are still saying (if the assertion that the soul is allocated at conception) that a very large number of fertilised zygotes do not become live births, aren't we?
In one or other of his posts, IngoB said that he could not say exactly when the soul was given. ++ Peter Carnley has said that this is an area where more thought is needed, but that the relevant time may be conception rather than fertilisation.
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Not every Anglican in Sydney is Sydney Anglican
Posts: 7028 | From: Warrawee NSW Australia | Registered: Jun 2008
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North East Quine
Curious beastie
# 13049
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Posted
Our son is buried in a part of the cemetery reserved for stillbirths and neo-natal deaths. It dates back to the 1960s at least and there are hundreds of burials there. Parents have the option of a small, standardised stone with three lines engraved; name, date, six word max phrase. Most of these phrases "In the arms of Jesus" " An angel in Heaven" etc, etc, overwhelmingly express the hope of eternal life. Indeed, it has often occurred to me that, in this part of the world at least, God is disproportionately smiting the Christian babies.
We chose "Psalm 139 13-16" as our phrase, and that is the bedrock of my belief on the subject. Our David was known to God in the womb. He was known to God at the moment of his death before birth.
We knew from the twenty-week scan on that David was not developing "normally." We knew for about the last six weeks of the pregnancy that his would be a short life. (No child born with his condition in Britain had lived past their first birthday). Because of the extra scans associated with a difficult pregnancy we knew we were expecting a son. We named him David because he was small and fighting against the odds. Also, had he lived we knew people would stare (he had gross skeletal deformities) and we wanted his name to be a constant reminder that people may look at the outward appearance, but God looks at the heart.
We prayed for him; the congregation of our church prayed for him; my friend's church's prayer group prayed for him. If I'd been on the Ship then I'd have had the prayer thread prayer warriors praying for him. I believed that God knew who we were praying for; how could He not? The concept of God being baffled by prayers because he didn't know their subject is ludicrous. Of course God knew our David! If he didn't know our David, then He would not be omniscient.
Posts: 6414 | From: North East Scotland | Registered: Oct 2007
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Gee D
Shipmate
# 13815
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Posted
An excellent and very moving post NEQ - we totally agree with you.
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Not every Anglican in Sydney is Sydney Anglican
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Kaplan Corday
Shipmate
# 16119
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by mousethief:
if an aborted foetus is guaranteed salvation, but a person living out a normal life has a slim chance, then by insisting the foetus be brought to term and allowed to live, we are insisting on, in the majority of cases, denying it salvation.
Precisely.
That is the reasoning which used to niggle at the back of my mind in the days when I demonstrated outside abortion clinics.
I still believe that babies are automatically saved, and I still disapprove of abortion, but I reached the point as a never-to-be-pregnant male, and as a father whose children were both planned and wanted, and whose daughter had never been raped and impregnated, where I could no longer try to tell women what to do.
quote:
I can't square the circle without either universalism or a bizarre sort of hypercalvinism
Actually, I seem to recall that Calvinists such as Spurgeon and the Princeton School (Hodges pere et fils, Warfield) taught that the death of a baby or small child indicated that he/she was one of the elect.
[ 08. August 2015, 00:58: Message edited by: Kaplan Corday ]
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leo
Shipmate
# 1458
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Ad Orientem:
quote:
Originally posted by leo:
I don't believe in 'going to heaven.'
As I see it, at the end of time God will redeem the whole created order - 'finish then thy nee creation'
So all aborted babies will grow and flourish - something denied to them in/by the old creation
But what a out the time in between, or do you believe in soul sleep?
We live on in the mind of God - who is outside time - so the question makes no sense.
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My Jewish-positive lectionary blog is at http://recognisingjewishrootsinthelectionary.wordpress.com/
My reviews at http://layreadersbookreviews.wordpress.com
Posts: 23198 | From: Bristol | Registered: Oct 2001
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Ad Orientem
Shipmate
# 17574
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by leo:
quote:
Originally posted by Ad Orientem:
quote:
Originally posted by leo:
I don't believe in 'going to heaven.'
As I see it, at the end of time God will redeem the whole created order - 'finish then thy nee creation'
So all aborted babies will grow and flourish - something denied to them in/by the old creation
But what a out the time in between, or do you believe in soul sleep?
We live on in the mind of God - who is outside time - so the question makes no sense.
Eh?
Posts: 2606 | From: Finland | Registered: Feb 2013
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Belle Ringer
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# 13379
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Posted
A friend's firstborn was stillborn, one of those rare things that happens, strangled by the umbilical cord during birth. When casually asked how many kids he has, he answers "two living."
The stillborn is still and always his child, loved before birth, loved after death. Can a human father be more loving than God?
Of course God loves and welcomes all his children.
Having a year ago completed my slow progression to universalism, I no longer have a problem with "where do dead babies go" nor with "where did your heathen Grandmother go" or even "where did Hitler go."
God's love is bigger than our theologies; and far bigger than our desires for "fairness" by which we usually seem to mean "limited distribution of love", and "revenge on those we think not as good as we are" (whether "good" is defined by efforts or by saying the right prayer or getting dunked in water at the right time).
They are with God. As fully and completely as you and I will be.
As to personality growth (and anyone, including those philosophers, who thinks newborns are "blank slates" hasn't been around babies much), I doubt our personalities are frozen for all time at the moment of death, a 5 year old staying 5, an alzheimer's irritable remaining irritable. Personalities modify with experiences, why wouldn't they continue modifying in heaven?
Posts: 5830 | From: Texas | Registered: Jan 2008
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Dafyd
Shipmate
# 5549
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by leo:
quote:
Originally posted by Jammy Dodger:
Tom Wright in 'Surprised by Hope' talks about life after death being with God in heaven but then life after life after death is the resurrection/renewal of creation.
I don't think you'vbe read him very well.
Jammy Dodger's reading is correct. Wright does indeed believe in a two-stage life after death.
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we remain, thanks to original sin, much in love with talking about, rather than with, one another. Rowan Williams
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mousethief
Ship's Thieving Rodent
# 953
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by W Hyatt:
quote:
Originally posted by mousethief:
It also bothers me that people say very few of us who are born and life out some kind of "normal" life span will end up saved, ...
I'm curious - is that what the Orthodox Church teaches, that very few of us will end up saved?
I don't know if it's an official teaching, but it's certainly the majority of what I've heard Orthodoxen, including those with teaching authority, say.
quote:
Does the Church teach that God might allow anyone to end up not being saved by chance (e.g. by accident or by ignorance)? If not, does it make any sense to talk about the "chances" of salvation?
I think you are equivocating on "chance." "Chance" meaning "open to unplanned factors" and "chance" meaning "possibility; odds" are two different meanings of the word that do not necessarily go together. You could say what is the "chance" of something happening when that something is in fact completely determined by conditions (which of several holes a dropped ball falls into, for example). So just because we talk about "what are the chances," meaning "what are the odds," doesn't mean we think the thing happens by random chance.
quote:
And to Lamb Chopped's point about apparently thinking free will and a lifetime of experience are important, I think God values our free will and our opportunity to experience our own choices even more than we do. Without them, I don't think it's possible for us to experience any joy at all.
I don't have any quibble with this.
quote:
Originally posted by Lamb Chopped:
Personality clearly has a genetic component--it is "built in," as it were. Experiences may develop it, but anybody who cares for newborns regularly can see the differences in temperament. They are not generic.
True. But having a genetic component and being determined by genes are quite different. Our personality is formed by the intersection of our genetic dispositions, the experiences we face, and the decisions we make.
quote:
As for when and where never-born children "grow up," I don't know, and I figure I don't need to, as God has that matter in hand.
Well, sure. But if we just say "Who knows? God has it in hand" for every difficult question of this sort, then 2/3 of theological Purgatory discussions (and probably Kerygmania discussions) would evaporate.
quote:
And I take it for granted that they are in Christ according to the verse "As in Adam all die, so in Christ shall all be made alive." They are certainly human enough to die; they are also therefore human enough to be included in Christ by his gracious compassion. And they certainly haven't reached the point of being able to consciously reject him, so...
"All" shall be made alive? But you're not a universalist.
quote:
I'm glad I don't have the job of deciding when souls/nephesh come into being. My speculation would be at conception, though, since there is no particular reason to prefer <snip> birth (which again is basically a physical passage from one spot to another, not an ontological change--and anyway, at what point are you actually "born"--when the head comes out? the whole body? What if you're breech? and so on).
The other possibility is first breath. Which may not be "ontological" but certainly has biblical warrant, especially since in Hebrew "spirit" and "breath" are the same word.
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This is the last sig I'll ever write for you...
Posts: 63536 | From: Washington | Registered: Jul 2001
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leo
Shipmate
# 1458
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Dafyd:
quote:
Originally posted by leo:
quote:
Originally posted by Jammy Dodger:
Tom Wright in 'Surprised by Hope' talks about life after death being with God in heaven but then life after life after death is the resurrection/renewal of creation.
I don't think you'vbe read him very well.
Jammy Dodger's reading is correct. Wright does indeed believe in a two-stage life after death.
Is there a source for this assertion?
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My Jewish-positive lectionary blog is at http://recognisingjewishrootsinthelectionary.wordpress.com/
My reviews at http://layreadersbookreviews.wordpress.com
Posts: 23198 | From: Bristol | Registered: Oct 2001
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Banner Lady
Ship's Ensign
# 10505
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Posted
I agree with Lamb Chopped & NE Quine. And William Blake who wrote a poem called The Vales of Har for the comfort of himself and his wife...
They do not, cannot, disappear as though they were nothings. I have two children and four grandchildren that did not make it into this world. Some of them have names.
The scripture I hold on to is "changed from glory into glory" because I believe this is the divine intention for each and every life. One day I will know more truly what that means, but I often imagine my unknown family as the age might have been in this life. I am not the only parent who does this. But if we grow in likeness to God throughout eternity then we are each on a journey of transformation from the time life begins.
Changed from glory into glory.
[ 11. August 2015, 17:25: Message edited by: Banner Lady ]
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Women in the church are not a problem to be solved, but a mystery to be enjoyed.
Posts: 7080 | From: Canberra Australia | Registered: Oct 2005
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Crœsos
Shipmate
# 238
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Lamb Chopped:
And they certainly haven't reached the point of being able to consciously reject him, so...
I always thought that the usual Christian standard for salvation was 'accepting Christ', not 'not consciously rejecting Christ'.
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Humani nil a me alienum puto
Posts: 10706 | From: Sardis, Lydia | Registered: May 2001
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Lamb Chopped
Ship's kebab
# 5528
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Posted
Nope. God is unscrupulous and will press his advantage wherever he can, by any means to save people.
There are those who use the language of "accepting" Christ (which many others such as Lutherans wince at--we are the ones who need accepting), but most of those are not speaking technically and pedantically when they say this. They are thinking of adult, competent and knowledgeable people when they talk of "accepting" Christ; they are not for the moment considering the case of infants, or the mentally disabled, or those who have never heard the Gospel because it hasn't made it to their culture yet.
Most Christians if asked will say that those "can't accept/can't reject" people fall under God's mercy--and that we strongly suspect God counts them as his own. "As in Adam all die, so in Christ shall all be made alive"--the default position for humanity appears to be "in Christ" unless we choose to be otherwise.
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Er, this is what I've been up to (book).
Oh, that you would rend the heavens and come down!
Posts: 20059 | From: off in left field somewhere | Registered: Feb 2004
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Dafyd
Shipmate
# 5549
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by leo:
quote:
Originally posted by Dafyd:
Jammy Dodger's reading is correct. Wright does indeed believe in a two-stage life after death.
Is there a source for this assertion?
Personal communication. Also, I've seen him say so explicitly in two or three books that I glanced at while browsing in bookshops.
But as a general point, I can see how if Jammy Dodger is correct you could by reading less carefully than Jammy Dodger come to the conclusion that Wright believes in post-mortem resurrection. I can't see how if you were correct Jammy Dodger and I could have come to the two-stage belief by reading less carefully.
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we remain, thanks to original sin, much in love with talking about, rather than with, one another. Rowan Williams
Posts: 10567 | From: Edinburgh | Registered: Feb 2004
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teddybear
Shipmate
# 7842
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Posted
In the midst of life we are in death. We really can't say more than this, all else is speculation. And why the medieval liturgists added, do not forsake us Lord our God.
I am pretty much an agnostic heretic, in that I think all theological arguments are like a blind man in a dark room searching for a black cat that isn't really there to begin with. To think we can ever really know anything about whatever it is out there is the height of presumption. The most vain of all vanities. If there is a greater Presence out there and there is a life after death and the pre born do have that eternal spark within them and that Presence, whatever he/she/it may be called, truly is merciful and loving, then one would think this Presence would provide for these little ones in the like manner as those of us who have been born and lived whatever span of years we have been given. Not my circus, not my monkeys.
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My cooking blog: http://inthekitchenwithdon.blogspot.com/
Posts: 480 | From: Topeka, Kansas USA | Registered: Jul 2004
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