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Source: (consider it)
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Thread: Purgatory: Is Calvinism the Asperger's Syndrome of Protestantism?
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Zach82
Shipmate
# 3208
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by orfeo:
The inevitability of sin has no direct bearing on the availability of grace - except for making a God who limits the availability of grace into a total bastard. But there is no CAUSAL link.
Arminian God is still, in your system, a bastard, for he damns people to hell for sin they were powerless to avoid anyway, and furthermore incompetent for trying to save them with inefficacious grace.
You are also basically denying the gravity of sin, for your system relies on some pure part of the soul that can choose to accept grace and leave sin behind. Which of course the Bible will have nothing of- humanity is dead to sin. Sin is the sickness unto death, and that capacity that would embrace grace is dead too.
quote:
You appear to be stumbling inarticulately towards a proposition that those 2 particular humans had a special quality that enabled them to be sinless, a special quality that other humans lack and can't emulate, but that wasn't the question.
That's just the dogma of the catholic faith revealed in the Holy Scriptures.
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Don't give up yet, no, don't ever quit/ There's always a chance of a critical hit. Ghost Mice
Posts: 9148 | From: Boston, MA | Registered: Aug 2002
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mousethief
Ship's Thieving Rodent
# 953
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Posted
Hey Zach, how about you answer the question you keep avoiding: Does God want all to be saved?
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This is the last sig I'll ever write for you...
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Zach82
Shipmate
# 3208
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by mousethief:
Hey Zach, how about you answer the question you keep avoiding: Does God want all to be saved?
That's what the Bible says.
I'm not going to be falsely accused of introducing some concept of compulsion into the theory of predestination again, am I?
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Don't give up yet, no, don't ever quit/ There's always a chance of a critical hit. Ghost Mice
Posts: 9148 | From: Boston, MA | Registered: Aug 2002
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orfeo
Ship's Musical Counterpoint
# 13878
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Zach82:
quote:
Originally posted by mousethief:
Hey Zach, how about you answer the question you keep avoiding: Does God want all to be saved?
That's what the Bible says.
And does the Calvinist Bible go on to explain why he apparently frustrates his own desires, despite holding all the cards?
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Technology has brought us all closer together. Turns out a lot of the people you meet as a result are complete idiots.
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orfeo
Ship's Musical Counterpoint
# 13878
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Zach82:
quote:
Originally posted by orfeo:
The inevitability of sin has no direct bearing on the availability of grace - except for making a God who limits the availability of grace into a total bastard. But there is no CAUSAL link.
Arminian God is still, in your system, a bastard, for he damns people to hell for sin they were powerless to avoid anyway, and furthermore incompetent for trying to save them with inefficacious grace.
Every time you refer to the grace as being "inefficacious" I find myself wondering what on earth you mean by that. This appears to be one of the cases where you define the word "efficacy" to mean something no other person would recognise.
My vacuum cleaner is efficacious at picking up dust IF I USE IT. Of course it doesn't pick up dust if I leave it sitting in the hallway cupboard, but I can't think of anyone besides you that would declare that my vacuum cleaner was "inefficacious" when clearly the problem isn't the vacuum cleaner, the problem is me being too stupid to plug the damn thing in.
I suppose if someone was sufficiently desperate to ensure that my house was dust free then yes, they could charge into the house, plug in the vacuum cleaner (heck, bring their own) and clean the place up.
You basically propose a vacuum cleaner company that selectively charges into certain houses but not others, apparently while willing that all houses be clean. There's no apparent rhyme or reason why this company only charges into certain houses while possessing the power to charge into ALL houses.
Whereas I propose the far saner proposition of a vacuum cleaner company that offers vacuum cleaners, offers excellent instructions on how to use vacuum cleaners, wishes everyone would take a vacuum cleaner, but recognises the sad reality that not everyone acknowledges a good vacuum cleaner when they see one.
[ 20. July 2012, 03:39: Message edited by: orfeo ]
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Technology has brought us all closer together. Turns out a lot of the people you meet as a result are complete idiots.
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Zach82
Shipmate
# 3208
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by orfeo:
And does the Calvinist Bible go on to explain why he apparently frustrates his own desires, despite holding all the cards?
Calvin says that, whatever God's reasons, his actions are necessarily to his own glory.
Look, you can have free will. I believe in free will as much as anyone, but have taken enough philosophy to know that defining free will is a very sticky matter. I just think predestination is the obvious truth of the Scriptures, and whatever free will is, it has to be compatible with predestination somehow. Certainly I am not the one to try to square them.
Gamaliel was pitching a tantrum for tension and grey area up the thread, but one doesn't get tension by making one end powerless. It's the truth of predestination that puts it in tension with the seeming autonomy we have over this moment.
In the end, Calvin didn't see these doctrines as at all diminishing the tensions of Christian life. He still saw the Bible as calling sinners to repentance and new trust in God's grace. He just saw that repentance as the work of grace, as God turning lost sinners around and putting them in a right relationship with Himself.
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Don't give up yet, no, don't ever quit/ There's always a chance of a critical hit. Ghost Mice
Posts: 9148 | From: Boston, MA | Registered: Aug 2002
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Zach82
Shipmate
# 3208
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Posted
God's grace would be inefficacious if it could not bring about salvation. Unless you take Dafyd's hopelessly simplistic understanding of the human will, acceptance of grace, whatever that is, is not a matter of certainty. So there are all these people who are offered salvation, but due to mixed motives or backsliding or what have you, will not obtain the salvation offered.
So God's grace would come to nothing for those poor souls. Luther, on the other hand, insists that God's grace brings about salvation even when the will falls short of acceptance.
Which is apparently terribly wicked to believe.
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Don't give up yet, no, don't ever quit/ There's always a chance of a critical hit. Ghost Mice
Posts: 9148 | From: Boston, MA | Registered: Aug 2002
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orfeo
Ship's Musical Counterpoint
# 13878
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Zach82:
quote:
Originally posted by orfeo:
And does the Calvinist Bible go on to explain why he apparently frustrates his own desires, despite holding all the cards?
Calvin says that, whatever God's reasons, his actions are necessarily to his own glory.
That's an evasive 'No' from Calvin if ever I saw one.
quote:
Look, you can have free will. I believe in free will as much as anyone, but have taken enough philosophy to know that defining free will is a very sticky matter. I just think predestination is the obvious truth of the Scriptures, and whatever free will is, it has to be compatible with predestination somehow. Certainly I am not the one to try to square them.
Gamaliel was pitching a tantrum for tension and grey area up the thread, but one doesn't get tension by making one end powerless. It's the truth of predestination that puts it in tension with the seeming autonomy we have over this moment.
In the end, Calvin didn't see these doctrines as at all diminishing the tensions of Christian life. He still saw the Bible as calling sinners to repentance and new trust in God's grace. He just saw that repentance as the work of grace, as God turning lost sinners around and putting them in a right relationship with Himself.
It struck me a few hours ago that Christians frequently lob the accusation at atheists that an atheist life is somehow devoid of ultimate meaning. Frankly, I'm looking at Calvinism and seeing something that strips ultimate meaning from life just as effectively but in a worse fashion.
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Technology has brought us all closer together. Turns out a lot of the people you meet as a result are complete idiots.
Posts: 18173 | From: Under | Registered: Jul 2008
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orfeo
Ship's Musical Counterpoint
# 13878
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Zach82:
God's grace would be inefficacious if it could not bring about salvation.
But that's CAN. My vacuum cleaner CAN remove dust. Grace CAN bring about salvation. Calvinism turns that into grace MUST bring about salvation.
You're completely confusing capability with compulsion. In the same way that you confused "sufficient to do something" with "will do something". You constantly turn CAN into MUST.
Dare I say it, one of the most basic ideas I have to deal with in my work. CAN, MAY and MUST all mean totally different things, and then I encounter people like you who exchange them willy-nilly.
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Technology has brought us all closer together. Turns out a lot of the people you meet as a result are complete idiots.
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Sober Preacher's Kid
Presbymethegationalist
# 12699
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by mousethief:
Hey Zach, how about you answer the question you keep avoiding: Does God want all to be saved?
Not even Calvinists are sure about that one.
Aside from the fact that we can't know God's intentions, aside from what He chooses to share with us, Universalism is four-point Calvinism. There are a significant number of four and five point Calvinists, the four-pointers are liberals.
This whole thread pitting Arminianism against Calvinism as if they cannot live together is such arrant nonsense. I belong to a church that has and continues to prove that Calvinists and Arminians can and do get along just fine together. We're just starting on the fourth generation now, my niece was born last year and my grandfather was born the year after Church Union.
[ 20. July 2012, 05:09: Message edited by: Sober Preacher's Kid ]
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NDP Federal Convention Ottawa 2018: A random assortment of Prots and Trots.
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mousethief
Ship's Thieving Rodent
# 953
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Sober Preacher's Kid:
Aside from the fact that we can't know God's intentions, aside from what He chooses to share with us, Universalism is four-point Calvinism.
No, it isn't. I am a universalist but I don't believe in any of TULIP. I don't believe in total depravity, I don't believe in unconditional election, I don't believe in limited atonement, I don't believe in irresistible grace, and I don't believe in perseverance of the saints.
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This is the last sig I'll ever write for you...
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Dafyd
Shipmate
# 5549
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Zach82:
Unless you take Dafyd's hopelessly simplistic understanding of the human will,
I was quoting St Paul. Romans 7:20, a passage that as I've pointed out before contradicts your analysis of the human condition. If you find in my words any picture of the human condition more simple than Paul's you've put that picture in yourself.
Where in Holy Scripture does it mention the human will out of interest? Since you're so Biblical?
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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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Zach82
Shipmate
# 3208
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Posted
quote:
That's an evasive 'No' from Calvin if ever I saw one.
Yes, we're ever the victims of malicious misreadings.
quote:
It struck me a few hours ago that Christians frequently lob the accusation at atheists that an atheist life is somehow devoid of ultimate meaning. Frankly, I'm looking at Calvinism and seeing something that strips ultimate meaning from life just as effectively but in a worse fashion.
If the ultimate meaning you want is that you have the autonomy to avoid sin, embrace grace, and live independent of the grace of God, you can't have it. At least, not while being an orthodox Christian.
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Don't give up yet, no, don't ever quit/ There's always a chance of a critical hit. Ghost Mice
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Robert Armin
All licens'd fool
# 182
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Posted
Zach: quote:
The false modesty isn't making me forget what you said.
Zach, if I was rude about you I am very sorry. I admit that I have been rude about Calvinism, which was less than charitable of me, but I never intended to be rude about you personally.
On another level, why are the only alternatives Calvinism and Arminianism? I go for months on end without thinking about either one; they both seem to be fairly small fragments of the Christian world to me.
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Keeping fit was an obsession with Fr Moity .... He did chin ups in the vestry, calisthenics in the pulpit, and had developed a series of Tai-Chi exercises to correspond with ritual movements of the Mass. The Antipope Robert Rankin
Posts: 8927 | From: In the pack | Registered: May 2001
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Zach82
Shipmate
# 3208
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Posted
quote:
On another level, why are the only alternatives Calvinism and Arminianism? I go for months on end without thinking about either one; they both seem to be fairly small fragments of the Christian world to me.
You can go so long without thinking about the difference because it makes little difference in day to day life. I know lots of people who have very little understanding of Christology, but calling them heretics for not understanding what a "hypostasis" is would be silly. While the nature of Christ and efficacy of grace are central to Christian theology, it "really comes down to it" less often than one might think.
Like I said, Calvin still sees the Bible as calling sinners to repentance and new life in Christ. He, furthermore, still believes in the autonomy of the human will, just not the sort that can choose salvation without the grace of God.
It ought to be pointed out that Calvin and Luther didn't get themselves into trouble with the Church for preaching predestination. That was very much part of the catholic tradition- both Augustine and Thomas Aquinas believed in it. A close reading of Saint Paul reveals that he had no concept of the individual autonomy that Orfeo and Dafyd are basing their arguments on.
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Don't give up yet, no, don't ever quit/ There's always a chance of a critical hit. Ghost Mice
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Nick Tamen
Ship's Wayfaring Fool
# 15164
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by mousethief:
quote:
Originally posted by Sober Preacher's Kid:
Aside from the fact that we can't know God's intentions, aside from what He chooses to share with us, Universalism is four-point Calvinism.
No, it isn't. I am a universalist but I don't believe in any of TULIP. I don't believe in total depravity, I don't believe in unconditional election, I don't believe in limited atonement, I don't believe in irresistible grace, and I don't believe in perseverance of the saints.
Perhaps it is more accurate to say that four-point Calvinism can be consistent with universalism.
quote:
Originally posted by Robert Armin:
On another level, why are the only alternatives Calvinism and Arminianism?
They aren't the only alternatives, of course. Nor, again, is "Calvinism" a monolithic alternative. What Calvinism is one talking about? The Institutes or the French Confession? The Five-point Calvinism of Dordrecht? The various lapsarianisms? Four-point Calvinism (hypothetical universalism)? Hyper-Calvinism? Van Tillian Calvinism? Barthian Calvinism/neo-orthodoxy? Neo-Calvinism? New Calvinism?
And perhaps this is the time to mention again that it is questionable whether Calvin was a five-point Calvinist. Calvin died when Arminius was 3 or 4 years. Five-point Calvinism developed 50+ years later as a response to Arminianism.
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The first thing God says to Moses is, "Take off your shoes." We are on holy ground. Hard to believe, but the truest thing I know. — Anne Lamott
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EtymologicalEvangelical
Shipmate
# 15091
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Zach82
The song of a vineyard is a metaphor on the attentive grace of God and human failure to live up to that grace, not a theological treatise on free will.
Is that an assertion or an argument?
If the latter, then please provide the supporting evidence.
quote:
Though no doubt such a reading is convenient to your thesis, I see nothing in the text that indicates that it is particularly useful to your cause.
You see nothing in this text that indicates that God's grace can be resisted? I'm flabbergasted.
God did all he could to cause the vineyard to bring forth good grapes, but it brought forth wild grapes. Call it metaphor as much as you like, but if this passage of Scripture means anything at all, it means that what God does - and what he wants - can be resisted by man. And this is the rationale behind God's judgement, hence God's invitation to "judge between me and my vineyard".
In fact, you agree with me because you talk about "human failure to live up to that grace". Just as God expected the vineyard to bring forth good grapes, so he expected his people to live up to his grace, but they chose not to. Nothing to do with God's predestination at all.
Therefore the "I" of TULIP (Irresistible Grace) is false.
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You can argue with a man who says, 'Rice is unwholesome': but you neither can nor need argue with a man who says, 'Rice is unwholesome, but I'm not saying this is true'. CS Lewis
Posts: 3625 | From: South Coast of England | Registered: Sep 2009
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Zach82
Shipmate
# 3208
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Posted
quote:
Nothing to do with God's predestination at all.
I agree it has nothing to do with predestination- it's neither for nor against it.
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Don't give up yet, no, don't ever quit/ There's always a chance of a critical hit. Ghost Mice
Posts: 9148 | From: Boston, MA | Registered: Aug 2002
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orfeo
Ship's Musical Counterpoint
# 13878
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Zach82:
quote:
On another level, why are the only alternatives Calvinism and Arminianism? I go for months on end without thinking about either one; they both seem to be fairly small fragments of the Christian world to me.
You can go so long without thinking about the difference because it makes little difference in day to day life. I know lots of people who have very little understanding of Christology, but calling them heretics for not understanding what a "hypostasis" is would be silly. While the nature of Christ and efficacy of grace are central to Christian theology, it "really comes down to it" less often than one might think.
Like I said, Calvin still sees the Bible as calling sinners to repentance and new life in Christ. He, furthermore, still believes in the autonomy of the human will, just not the sort that can choose salvation without the grace of God.
It ought to be pointed out that Calvin and Luther didn't get themselves into trouble with the Church for preaching predestination. That was very much part of the catholic tradition- both Augustine and Thomas Aquinas believed in it. A close reading of Saint Paul reveals that he had no concept of the individual autonomy that Orfeo and Dafyd are basing their arguments on.
*Bangs a head on the desk, not necessarily my own*
The. Question. Was. Not. Why are the differences between Calvinism and Arminianism important!!
The Question. Was. Why are they the only two options.
And the answer is clearly that they aren't. I mean, I only had to go as far as here to be introduced to other schools of thought. Funny how you can construct an entire little debate for yourself to win without mentioning Catholic, Orthodox or Lutheran understandings of these things.
Frankly, I'm not at all sure that I'm an Arminian. All I've figured for certain so far is that I'm Not A Calvinist. The two statements clearly aren't equivalent.
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Technology has brought us all closer together. Turns out a lot of the people you meet as a result are complete idiots.
Posts: 18173 | From: Under | Registered: Jul 2008
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orfeo
Ship's Musical Counterpoint
# 13878
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Zach82:
quote:
That's an evasive 'No' from Calvin if ever I saw one.
Yes, we're ever the victims of malicious misreadings.
quote:
It struck me a few hours ago that Christians frequently lob the accusation at atheists that an atheist life is somehow devoid of ultimate meaning. Frankly, I'm looking at Calvinism and seeing something that strips ultimate meaning from life just as effectively but in a worse fashion.
If the ultimate meaning you want is that you have the autonomy to avoid sin, embrace grace, and live independent of the grace of God, you can't have it. At least, not while being an orthodox Christian.
And I call total bullshit on THIS for the reasons just cited. Namely, that there are an astonishingly large number of Christians, considered well and truly orthodox, who are not Calvinist and who therefore do not share your understandings of these matters.
You are far, far too ready to imply heresy the second that someone doesn't agree with you. Are Lutherans heretics because they don't believe in Irresistible Grace? Is Wesley a heretic, and all the Methodists? That's clearly the one of those 5 'points' that us "heretics" have the biggest difficulty with, and it may stun you to discover that Lutherans and Methodists are not widely listed as among the heretical churches out of communion with the 'orthodox' ones.
EDIT: At least, not in contrast to Calvinists. I'm sure there are some churches out there that look upon all Protestants as heretics and don't give a flying damn about TULIP-Protestants versus non-TULIP ones.
[ 20. July 2012, 14:48: Message edited by: orfeo ]
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Technology has brought us all closer together. Turns out a lot of the people you meet as a result are complete idiots.
Posts: 18173 | From: Under | Registered: Jul 2008
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Sober Preacher's Kid
Presbymethegationalist
# 12699
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by mousethief:
quote:
Originally posted by Sober Preacher's Kid:
Aside from the fact that we can't know God's intentions, aside from what He chooses to share with us, Universalism is four-point Calvinism.
No, it isn't. I am a universalist but I don't believe in any of TULIP. I don't believe in total depravity, I don't believe in unconditional election, I don't believe in limited atonement, I don't believe in irresistible grace, and I don't believe in perseverance of the saints.
That's nice, but not really Orthodox of you. Perseverence of the Saints? God will not let the Church fall into error, though this may mean that 99.9999% is in error? Josephine said that. Of course, this hypothehical right person is manifesting God's will, according to the will of God. Ephesians, anyone?
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Posts: 7646 | From: Peterborough, Upper Canada | Registered: Jun 2007
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EtymologicalEvangelical
Shipmate
# 15091
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Zach82
I agree it has nothing to do with predestination- it's neither for nor against it.
Do you enjoy twisting people's words?
It's obvious what I meant, and unlike you, I go to the trouble of explaining my position and seek to support it with some reasoned argument. You just seem to be coming out with smug rejoinders, which does nothing to help your cause.
The passage has nothing to do with predestination in the sense that God did not predestine (either by direct decree or by decreed neglect) the state of affairs in his vineyard. What God did and wanted was a vineyard producing good grapes. His purpose was thwarted. His "predestination" (i.e. his activity and agenda) was resisted.
So this passage most certainly speaks clearly against the TULIP view of predestination in which God's predestined grace cannot be resisted.
[ 20. July 2012, 14:49: Message edited by: EtymologicalEvangelical ]
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You can argue with a man who says, 'Rice is unwholesome': but you neither can nor need argue with a man who says, 'Rice is unwholesome, but I'm not saying this is true'. CS Lewis
Posts: 3625 | From: South Coast of England | Registered: Sep 2009
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orfeo
Ship's Musical Counterpoint
# 13878
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Posted
And to break down your straw man: your "avoid sin" jibe is based on the fact that I pointed out Jesus Christ was an example of a human being who didn't sin. If you don't agree that Jesus Christ was human or if you don't agree that Jesus Christ was without sin, I'm quite sure I can find a whole HOST of heretical labels to slap you with.
And your "living independent of grace" remark is just demonstrating that you change the definition of grace as it suits you, unless you are asserting Universalism without coming out and SAYING it. If there are people on this earth that are going to be damned, then they are somehow living despite not having grace in your sense of saving grace, yes? Thereby demonstrating that your declaration that there is only life on earth thanks to God's grace is talking about a completely different definition of 'grace' which is a total red herring when it comes to the Calvinist-Arminian controversy.
And at this point, because I'm ready to push the ![[Mad]](angryfire.gif) button about 10 times, it's time to call you to Hell.
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Technology has brought us all closer together. Turns out a lot of the people you meet as a result are complete idiots.
Posts: 18173 | From: Under | Registered: Jul 2008
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Zach82
Shipmate
# 3208
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Posted
quote:
And I call total bullshit on THIS for the reasons just cited. Namely, that there are an astonishingly large number of Christians, considered well and truly orthodox, who are not Calvinist and who therefore do not share your understandings of these matters.
When you're done pitching your tantrum maybe you'll see that I never made Christianity a dichotomy between Arminianism and Calvinism. in fact, I've cited Luther many times! ![[Roll Eyes]](rolleyes.gif)
But regardless, your arguments here fit into NO Catholic system. You are arguing against Calvinism with the Pelagian heresy. Which may be fine with you for all I know.
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Don't give up yet, no, don't ever quit/ There's always a chance of a critical hit. Ghost Mice
Posts: 9148 | From: Boston, MA | Registered: Aug 2002
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orfeo
Ship's Musical Counterpoint
# 13878
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Posted
You still haven't explained whether I was wrong to say Jesus Christ was human or whether I was wrong to say Jesus Christ was sinless.
That will help me to decide whether you're a Docetist or something else I haven't spotted the label for yet...
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Technology has brought us all closer together. Turns out a lot of the people you meet as a result are complete idiots.
Posts: 18173 | From: Under | Registered: Jul 2008
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Zach82
Shipmate
# 3208
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by orfeo:
You still haven't explained whether I was wrong to say Jesus Christ was human or whether I was wrong to say Jesus Christ was sinless.
That will help me to decide whether you're a Docetist or something else I haven't spotted the label for yet...
Jesus was human and sinless. You are wrong to say that anyone but Jesus and Mary can avoid sin.
Apart from grace, of course.
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Don't give up yet, no, don't ever quit/ There's always a chance of a critical hit. Ghost Mice
Posts: 9148 | From: Boston, MA | Registered: Aug 2002
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orfeo
Ship's Musical Counterpoint
# 13878
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Zach82:
You are wrong to say that anyone but Jesus and Mary can avoid sin.
Except I never said it. I said I could think of 1 sinless human, namely Jesus, and you just ran away with a whole bunch of implications for reasons that escape me. Except in Hell where I've suggested reasons that you might have chosen to respond to something I never said.
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Technology has brought us all closer together. Turns out a lot of the people you meet as a result are complete idiots.
Posts: 18173 | From: Under | Registered: Jul 2008
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Zach82
Shipmate
# 3208
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Posted
This goes back to your inexplicable division between accepting grace and rejecting sin.
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Don't give up yet, no, don't ever quit/ There's always a chance of a critical hit. Ghost Mice
Posts: 9148 | From: Boston, MA | Registered: Aug 2002
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Robert Armin
All licens'd fool
# 182
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Zach82:
This goes back to your inexplicable division between accepting grace and rejecting sin.
In what way? How do you get from orfeo's post to the statement?
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Keeping fit was an obsession with Fr Moity .... He did chin ups in the vestry, calisthenics in the pulpit, and had developed a series of Tai-Chi exercises to correspond with ritual movements of the Mass. The Antipope Robert Rankin
Posts: 8927 | From: In the pack | Registered: May 2001
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ken
Ship's Roundhead
# 2460
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by mousethief:
quote:
Originally posted by Sober Preacher's Kid:
Aside from the fact that we can't know God's intentions, aside from what He chooses to share with us, Universalism is four-point Calvinism.
No, it isn't. I am a universalist but I don't believe in any of TULIP. I don't believe in total depravity, I don't believe in unconditional election, I don't believe in limited atonement, I don't believe in irresistible grace, and I don't believe in perseverance of the saints.
![[Confused]](confused.gif)
On the face of it this post is self-contradictory, so unless you were having a strange brain-fart you must have meant something other than what you wrote.
If you are a universalist then you surely believe everyone is saved (or will in the end be saved, from their own point of view) which is clearly the same as unconditional election, irresistible grace, and the perseverance of the saints. In a 1+1=2 sense, that's what those words mean.
If election were conditional, then some might fail the conditions and not be saved, so universalism is the same thing as unconditional election. If grace was resistible then some might resist and not be saved, so universalism is the same thing as irresistible grace. If God's grace did not guarantee the perseverance of the saints then some might not persevere, and fall away from grace, and not be saved, so universalism is the same thing as the perseverance of the saints.
You could make an argument for universalism being the same as limited atonement as well, but the limit is everybody. Which is I suppose true but a bit uninteresting because does a limitless limit mean anything? Hmmmmmm... it does in maths, something can tend to infinity. But I bet that's not what they meant by it back when they were arguing about whether God knows the number of the saved.
I'll give you the "T" - whether or not "total depravity" is a fair description of our human condition has no bearing on whether or not all are saved. But its hard to see how any Christian could call themselves a universalist without agreeing with those other four points - though of course they might not use that particular jargon.
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Ken
L’amor che move il sole e l’altre stelle.
Posts: 39579 | From: London | Registered: Mar 2002
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Dafyd
Shipmate
# 5549
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by orfeo:
Are Lutherans heretics because they don't believe in Irresistible Grace? Is Wesley a heretic, and all the Methodists? That's clearly the one of those 5 'points' that us "heretics" have the biggest difficulty with, and it may stun you to discover that Lutherans and Methodists are not widely listed as among the heretical churches out of communion with the 'orthodox' ones.
I think the one of the 5 points that most Christians have the biggest difficulty with is Limited Atonement.
There are three apparently irreconcilable propositions in the Christian tradition.
1) For each person, God wants that person to be saved. (Explicitly stated in 1 Timothy and also follows directly from the belief that God is love and a number of Jesus' sayings.)
2) If God wants something to happen, then that thing happens. (The Biblical support is solely a dense and unclear passage of St Paul's in Romans. One might also say that it's implied by a number of theological propositions about the relationship between God and the world, although some of the further implications are problematic.)
3) Some people are not saved. (Heavily implied by Scripture but all the passages are susceptible of other interpretations.)
Calvinists reject 1), Arminians 2), universalists 3).
1) seems to me to have the most solid support from Scripture and the most support from other grounds.
2) has the least scriptural support. It is also difficult for anyone to defend without sounding like a child whining that their big brother in the sky can beat up your big brother. (The only theologian I know who fully avoids sounding like that is Julian of Norwich.)
3) is the one I hope is false. And I believe it would be sinful not to wish it were false. The only reason comprehensible to those who walk by faith and not by sight for thinking a good God might not bring it about is the existence of free will.
If someone believes that those who never hear the Christian message are damned then I suppose they have to reject 1) unless they're effectively deists.
It is true that if someone rejects 2) they are then saying that God creates people whom he foreknows will reject salvation. However, logically their rejection of salvation depends upon their being created, and God's foreknowledge logically depends upon their rejection, so it's not as if God could based on that foreknowledge decide against creating them.
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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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Dafyd
Shipmate
# 5549
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by ken:
quote:
Originally posted by mousethief:
I am a universalist but I don't believe in any of TULIP. I don't believe in total depravity, I don't believe in unconditional election, I don't believe in limited atonement, I don't believe in irresistible grace, and I don't believe in perseverance of the saints.
Like ken I don't see how universalism is compatible with rejecting unconditional election or with rejecting (post mortem) perseverance of the saints.
quote:
But its hard to see how any Christian could call themselves a universalist without agreeing with those other four points - though of course they might not use that particular jargon.
I suppose that if you reject total depravity you can say that there is some part of the soul in every person that never consents to sin. In which case, one might for some reason reject the idea that the relation of the grace to the soul is one in which it even makes sense to talk about resisting.
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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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Nick Tamen
Ship's Wayfaring Fool
# 15164
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Dafyd:
There are three apparently irreconcilable propositions in the Christian tradition.
1) For each person, God wants that person to be saved. (Explicitly stated in 1 Timothy and also follows directly from the belief that God is love and a number of Jesus' sayings.)
2) If God wants something to happen, then that thing happens. (The Biblical support is solely a dense and unclear passage of St Paul's in Romans. One might also say that it's implied by a number of theological propositions about the relationship between God and the world, although some of the further implications are problematic.)
3) Some people are not saved. (Heavily implied by Scripture but all the passages are susceptible of other interpretations.)
Calvinists reject 1) . . .
Again, not all Calvinists.
Posts: 2833 | From: On heaven-crammed earth | Registered: Sep 2009
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Dafyd
Shipmate
# 5549
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Nick Tamen:
quote:
Originally posted by Dafyd:
Calvinists reject 1) . . .
Again, not all Calvinists.
Sorry - correct Calvinists to Calvinists not included under the other two categories.
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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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MarcArthur
Apprentice
# 17145
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Posted
I greatly appreciate the opening question and the replies. As a Presbyterian pastor I've often labeled myself as a "Five Point Calvinist," but now gripped by this strange desire to be more "honest," I wonder if I've merely just tried to belong as an obedient little guy who's never very bold before others; that is, unless I hold all the cards as I often (and quite mistakenly) have thought. So my "obedience" has really just been a self-defeating ploy to avoid confrontation from self-confident equals. Anyway, I wonder if there are others out there like myself...
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Gamaliel
Shipmate
# 812
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Posted
Me - MacArthur - because I used to be almost a Five-Point Calvinist ... well, I tended to be a four-point one, truth be told ... or a TUlIP one at best - with small 'l' rather than a Big L.
Let's get a few things straight in terms of my own position, which is hardly fixed and is evolving, like most people's, I suppose ...
Firstly, I have nothing against Calvinists. Ken is one of my favourite Calvinists. Nick Tamen seems a reasonable sort too, I'm sure we'd get on. I'm sure I'd get on well with Zach82 in real life too, but although I would concede that he has brought in Lutheran arguments as well, he does seem inveterately wedded to what is - to my mind - a very binary and dualistic view - namely, that if you aren't a fully-paid up Calvinist then the only alternatives are that you must be a Pelagian heretick ...
Even the redoubtable Ken falls into binary and dualistic mode. Observe how he tries to argue that Mousethief's universalist position must logically be a Calvinistic one, although using different terminology and therefore - even though Mousethief is unaware of it himself - he must be unconsciously adopting a Calvinistic schema ...
This illustrates the point I was trying to make so clumsily (and unintentionally offensively) in the OP. Some Calvinists are apparently unable to see any alternative to their own schema - as if Calvinism and orthodoxy (small 'o') are coterminous.
They are apparently unable to hold certain aspects in tension or to allow room for 'mystery' and for a degree of agnosticism about those issues that are way past sounding out ...
One wonders, at times, how they are able to hold onto the tensions implicit in the Chalcedonian schema or in the doctrines of the Trinity - yet apparently they do. So why should the whole issue of soteriology and of predestination/free-will be given the reductionist treatment?
Indeed, the way that Zach82 writes about the sacraments they sound almost mechanical. I, too, believe that sacraments are a means of grace, that God 'affects' things through them, works in and through them but I don't see them as magic nor as some kind of electricity charge or conveying some kind of irresistible faith-force ...
I'm still working out my position on them, to be honest ... and I can live with a degree of ambiguity.
The same as I can live with ambiguity on the whole soteriology thing. As a young evangelical convert I used to worry about whether I was 'really saved' and so on ... that's normal. I don't get too exercised about it now, not because I have some kind of uber-confident 'assurance of salvation' nor because I've become indifferent and couldn't care less how I live and what I do (or don't do) ... but because I don't see any great value in getting all het up over it.
All I can do is to respond as far as I can and whatever way I can to what I understand as God's grace. I try to work out my salvation in fear and trembling and I don't make a very good job of it - but underneath are the everlasting arms ...
Sure, Calvinism can be a comfort and that's fine, but it can also lead to all manner of wierd and whacky views. So can Arminianism. So can any other soteriological schema. I get as narked by some Arminians as I do with some Calvinists. And I also don't think it's as binary and oppositional as that - there are other options.
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Let us with a gladsome mind
Praise the Lord for He is kind.
http://philthebard.blogspot.com
Posts: 15997 | From: Cheshire, UK | Registered: Jul 2001
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Nick Tamen
Ship's Wayfaring Fool
# 15164
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by MarcArthur:
Anyway, I wonder if there are others out there like myself...
Quite possibly, I would think. Might I ask to which Presbyterian body you belong? I'm PC(USA), and I think one would have to look long and hard to find many true 5-point Calvinists among our teaching elders, including among the more conservative ones.
quote:
Originally posted by Gamaliel:
Nick Tamen seems a reasonable sort too, I'm sure we'd get on.
My thanks, and I'm sure we would as well. ![[Big Grin]](biggrin.gif)
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The first thing God says to Moses is, "Take off your shoes." We are on holy ground. Hard to believe, but the truest thing I know. — Anne Lamott
Posts: 2833 | From: On heaven-crammed earth | Registered: Sep 2009
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balaam
Making an ass of myself
# 4543
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by MarcArthur:
I greatly appreciate the opening question and the replies. As a Presbyterian pastor I've often labeled myself as a "Five Point Calvinist,"
Hello and welcome MarcArthur.
Five Point Calvinism is usually (at least round these boards) used as the reason to dislike Calvin and his theories.
But it doesn't take a lot of study to realise that:
a) Calvin didn't write the five points.
b) There's a whole lot more to Calvinism than the five points.
Arminianism has five points. The five petals of the DAISY of Calvinism were written by later followers of Calvin as a response to the five points of Arminianism. As the five points of TULIP are not all there is to Calvin's teaching all they tell us is why Calvin's followers disagreed with Arminianism.
When you look behind the TULIP at other things Calvin taught, a lot of them are less severe, some more so. It is these other aspects of Calvin that I am drawn to. I particularly like the way he said scripture is to be understood.
Questioning what Calvin wrote is good. If Calvin taught we are to test scripture, how much more are we to test the non-scriptural teachings of John Calvin.
But watch out for the detractors who claim that Calvin taught that God saves people without their consent, or that Christ died only for the elect. Calvin taught neither of these things, but it is not unusual in these discussions to find people confusing this hypercalvinism with the things Calvin actually said.
I think Calvin was a brilliant theologian. Many of the things he said ring true today. For the time he lived in that is all the more remarkable.
Yes I am a fan of Calvin. He got so much right. But as I said on page one, a few of the things he said are horrendous.
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Last ever sig ...
blog
Posts: 9049 | From: Hen Ogledd | Registered: May 2003
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Martin60
Shipmate
# 368
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Posted
There is only ONE predestined from before the foundation of the world.
He will have His way with us ALL. If we WILL. As Sodom and Gomorrah have a more bearable judgement to come than the nonetheless still bearable judgement of Bethsaida and Chorazin, who WON'T?
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Love wins
Posts: 17586 | From: Never Dobunni after all. Corieltauvi after all. Just moved to the capital. | Registered: Jun 2001
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orfeo
Ship's Musical Counterpoint
# 13878
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Zach82:
This goes back to your inexplicable division between accepting grace and rejecting sin.
Oh look. Another thing I never actually said.
Involving a question I asked you to go back and clarify, because the question you actually asked and which I actually answered bore little resemblance to the question you apparently meant to ask and implied that I answered.
In fact you didn't even ask about accepting grace, or rejecting sin, you asked about rejecting grace.
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Technology has brought us all closer together. Turns out a lot of the people you meet as a result are complete idiots.
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Kaplan Corday
Shipmate
# 16119
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Posted
quote:
detractors who claim that Calvin taught that God saves people without their consent, or that Christ died only for the elect. Calvin taught neither of these things
As for your first point, true but irrelevant, and as for your second, that is a matter of ongoing controversy.
Posts: 3355 | Registered: Jan 2011
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Sir Pellinore
Quester Emeritus
# 12163
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Posted
One of the problems, as I see it, for the average person on the street today - not the theological addicts (I'm desperately trying to give it up) - is that Calvinism is so bloody difficult for them to understand.
Modern people want something simple.
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Well...
Posts: 5108 | From: The Deep North, Oz | Registered: Dec 2006
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venbede
Shipmate
# 16669
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Sir Pellinore (ret'd):
One of the problems, as I see it, for the average person on the street today - not the theological addicts (I'm desperately trying to give it up) - is that Calvinism is so bloody difficult for them to understand.
Modern people want something simple.
Sorry Sir P, that's just silly.
I haven't said anything here because I fear I will be like those who butt into Eccles saying in effect "why bother with all this silly ritual"?
What I don't get is this. If someone with no religious beliefs or commitment shows generous, brave or sensitive compassion to others at some cost to themselves, surely God in Christ is at work? I really don't understand what "justification" means apart from living a loving and/or prayerful life.
I hope someone here can explain.
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Man was made for joy and woe;
And when this we rightly know,
Thro' the world we safely go.
Posts: 3201 | From: An historic market town nestling in the folds of Surrey's rolling North Downs, | Registered: Sep 2011
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Sir Pellinore
Quester Emeritus
# 12163
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by venbede:
... What I don't get is this. If someone with no religious beliefs or commitment shows generous, brave or sensitive compassion to others at some cost to themselves, surely God in Christ is at work?...
I think many Christians could see God's Grace working outside the Church in ways it's not easy to theologise about.
"Justification" in the Calvinist sense is something I'm really not qualified to speak of.
My previous post, "silly" as it may seem to you, seemed quite reasonable to me. Sergius Bulgakov once termed Protestantism "The Religion of the Professor". Calvin's works seem to be something originating very much in the study and very little from day to day life as it concerns ordinary people. Christ's preaching seemed the direct opposite: pithy, down to earth and easy to act on.
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Well...
Posts: 5108 | From: The Deep North, Oz | Registered: Dec 2006
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Gamaliel
Shipmate
# 812
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Posted
I've heard it asserted, by Calvinists, that Calvin's views emerged from his messy, day-to-day pastoral work. He was intrigued as to why some people seemed to respond positively to the preaching of the Gospel and others didn't. So he set his legal mind to the task of working out why that might be ... and so, tan-ta-tara ... there you had it ... the doctrine of Unconditional Election!
I don't buy that, as it happens, because it leaves out the late medieval/Renaissance Scholastic context that Calvin was operating within. It also suggests that Calvin jumped from personal observation to full-blown TULIP style conclusions - which, as Jengie Jon, Balaam and others have pointed out, simply wasn't the case.
I'm not convinced that Calvinism is too difficult for the modern mind to comprehend. I suspect that it appeals to a particular mindset, largely a Western mindset and I'd be prepared to lay odds that it appeals to IT-geeks and to lawyers and to such-like 'directive thinkers' rather more than it does to more 'discursive' or lateral thinkers - but I might be wrong.
I think there is something of the academy and the professorial about it - largely because of its roots in medieval Western Scholasticism. That's not a bad thing, necessarily, as long as it is acknowledged and we don't try to make out that it covers all the bases.
Calvinism is right in the way it tries to defend the sovereignty of God and the work/initiative of God of securing our salvation. It is wrong, it seems to me, in the way it goes about trying to achieve this.
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Let us with a gladsome mind
Praise the Lord for He is kind.
http://philthebard.blogspot.com
Posts: 15997 | From: Cheshire, UK | Registered: Jul 2001
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venbede
Shipmate
# 16669
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Posted
I have far more secondhand suspicion of Calvin than informed opinions based on close study of his writings, but...
It is the lack of visual imagery and embodied symbolism (ie ritual) at I couldn't be doing with.
With regard to its perceived appeal to intellectuals, it does have a very good record in English speaking lands of appealing to the uneducated, and indeed providing them with an education that a repressive society denied them. (I'm thinking of Bunyan.)
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Man was made for joy and woe;
And when this we rightly know,
Thro' the world we safely go.
Posts: 3201 | From: An historic market town nestling in the folds of Surrey's rolling North Downs, | Registered: Sep 2011
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mousethief
Ship's Thieving Rodent
# 953
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Zach82:
Jesus was human and sinless. You are wrong to say that anyone but Jesus and Mary can avoid sin.
Apart from grace, of course.
Nobody thinks otherwise, at least not here. There are no Pelagians on this thread, contrary to what some stubbornly refuse to see.
quote:
Originally posted by Dafyd:
I suppose that if you reject total depravity you can say that there is some part of the soul in every person that never consents to sin.
I don't think you need to go that far. I think you can just say there's some part of the soul that feels shame and wants to turn. "I do not do the good I want to do." --Romans 7.
quote:
Originally posted by Dafyd:
Like ken I don't see how universalism is compatible with rejecting unconditional election or with rejecting (post mortem) perseverance of the saints.
I should probably explain that I am a contingent universalist, not a necessary universalist. I hold out hope that in the end, all will turn. I admit the possibility that some will not, but hope against hope that it is not true.
Perseverence of the saints is just another way of saying irresistable grace, it seems to me. I think that passage in Hebrews 6:4 seems to indicate that it is possible to be saved and yet fall away. Admittedly it says that if you fall away you can't fall back. But then I don't think anybody is all the way saved in this life. "I believe; help thou mine unbelief." For the Orthodox, salvation is not a light switch, it's a process.
quote:
Originally posted by Balaam:
But watch out for the detractors who claim that Calvin taught that God saves people without their consent, or that Christ died only for the elect. Calvin taught neither of these things, but it is not unusual in these discussions to find people confusing this hypercalvinism with the things Calvin actually said.
Actually I think most of the detractors of Calvinism don't give a rat's ass what Calvin himself actually said. Our fight it not with Calvin. Who cares about Calvin? Our fight is with present-day Calvinism.
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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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Jengie jon
Semper Reformanda
# 273
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Posted
Yes but you only want to argue with the neo-conservative form of that. Can you imagine what a hiding a person would get here if they insisted Lefebrve Catholicism was true of all Roman Catholicism. Well you are doing that with Calvinism and ignoring the majority of churches that carry that label.
Jengie
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"To violate a persons ability to distinguish fact from fantasy is the epistemological equivalent of rape." Noretta Koertge
Back to my blog
Posts: 20894 | From: city of steel, butterflies and rainbows | Registered: May 2001
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mousethief
Ship's Thieving Rodent
# 953
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Jengie Jon:
Yes but you only want to argue with the neo-conservative form of that. Can you imagine what a hiding a person would get here if they insisted Lefebrve Catholicism was true of all Roman Catholicism. Well you are doing that with Calvinism and ignoring the majority of churches that carry that label.
That's what we're arguing about here. Don't make the mistake of thinking that because I'm arguing about one thing in a place where we're arguing about that one thing, I never argue about something else otherwhere.
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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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