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Source: (consider it)
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Thread: Purgatory: Dangers of Omitting the Filioque?
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PaulTH*
Shipmate
# 320
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Mousethief:
We saw the Pope of Rome as primus inter pares
In understand this, which is why I wrote:
No, if you believe that these things can only be decided by Ecumenical Council.
We're talking on this thread about dangers. I think there are dangers of omitting the filoque and dangers of including it. But they don't relate to salvation, as if an understanding or lack of it, with regards to the filioque, could affect that. They relate to the chance that Christians could obey Christ's command that we be ONE. If the ommission of the filioque from the creed could further that aim, I could go along with it. I suspect that Pope Benedict XVI could too, but I speak on no authority.
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Yours in Christ
Paul
Posts: 6387 | From: White Cliffs Country | Registered: May 2001
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orfeo
Ship's Musical Counterpoint
# 13878
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by PaulTH*:
To state the obvious: if this wasn't a debatable issue, it wouldn't have caused a schism lasting a thousand years.
I was under the impression that the schism was about the process of inserting the filioque, just as much as not more than it was about the actual content of the filioque.
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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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PaulTH*
Shipmate
# 320
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by orfeo:
I was under the impression that the schism was about the process of inserting the filioque, just as much as not more than it was about the actual content of the filioque.
This is certainly so. I don't buy into theological arguements about whether or not the filioque is acceptable. I have seen Scriptural arguements from both sides, and I don't profess to be astute enough, theologically, to form a definative opinion. The schism is entirely about the process of inserting the filioque, and nothing to do with its content.
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Yours in Christ
Paul
Posts: 6387 | From: White Cliffs Country | Registered: May 2001
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mousethief
Ship's Thieving Rodent
# 953
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by PaulTH*:
The schism is entirely about the process of inserting the filioque, and nothing to do with its content.
As long as by that you mean the Pope of Rome getting too big for his britches, then yes.
The arguments for and against the filioque do sometimes seem to look like post-hoc justifications of predetermined positions.
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Posts: 63536 | From: Washington | Registered: Jul 2001
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IngoB
Sentire cum Ecclesia
# 8700
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by mdijon:
I think God couldn't but create.
In that case, whatever forced your god to create, I will call my God.
quote:
Originally posted by mdijon:
The arguments for God not having a history seem odd to me. Is the incarnation not part of God's history? OK, it isn't history in that God is outside of time, but it is something else that fills the place of history.
I would say that the generation of the Son and the spiration of the Holy Spirit are both logically prior to the incarnation of the Son. Otherwise the created order would modify God by feedback, and we are then really saying that the Trinity is caused by the incarnation (and perhaps Pentecost for the Holy Spirit). Of course, many moderns assume a "responsive" God (one that changes according to what happens in the world) anyhow, and consider that to be only natural. However, it is basically impossible to declare such a being as the uncaused cause, pure act, non-composite, etc. Then the atheist arguments actually bite.
quote:
Originally posted by mdijon:
The author would still be a person and perhaps still be an author even if he hadn't written that particular book, but to then argue that what is written in the book doesn't apply to the author because he has no history and would still be the author even without the book seems to be going too far.
Nobody is claiming that God would be Creator without creating, merely that God would still be God. It is not necessary in an absolute sense for God to will creation, it is an act of His "free will". Though due to His immutability and eternity, it is necessary in the sense that supposing that He wills it, He cannot not will it, and then will always have willed it. The freedom of will is located in the supposition, not in the fact: it is so, always was and always will be, but it could have been otherwise.
quote:
Originally posted by Pearl B4 Swine:
It looks to me that this means that The Holy Spirit comes late to the table, by split-seconds, or by eons.
My diagrams showed relations of origin, not time, nor even logical priority.
quote:
Originally posted by mousethief:
If I knew that I wouldn't need to use the analogy, would I? The whole point of analogies is that they point towards things that you can't put directly into words.
Analogies are not magic. They will only suggest a new insight, if the mapping is sensible. My point was that your mapping makes no sense, because you export a difference indicated by using different words ("begetting" vs. "proceeding") into God without knowing what to assign this difference to. What you know how to assign is merely what these words have in common (namely that something comes from something else). Alternatively, I can also say that you refuse to follow through on the very insight that your analogy is actually generating. If indeed your mapping is sensible, then your analogy tells you that there must be some difference in God that corresponds to the difference between "begetting" and "proceeding". What then is this difference? You don't know. I do. I have told you what it is. You may not believe that, fine. However, you cannot use your analogy as an argument against what I propose, because my statement is entirely in accord with your analogy: it elucidates precisely what your analogy suggests.
quote:
Originally posted by mousethief:
I am quite capable of saying that it was revealed, and yet the filioque is wrong, because the filioque was NOT revealed.
The filioque may be considered potentially wrong because it was not explicitly revealed, but this is not the same as saying that the filioque is wrong because it was not explicitly revealed. I think it is right though not explicitly revealed, like lots of other dogma.
quote:
Originally posted by mousethief:
I don't think we are right to go inventing things about the interpersonal relations among the persons of the godhead in the absence of pretty darned good evidence. And there is no pretty darned good evidence for the filioque.
Bullshit. The argument from origin is logically unassailable, and it rests on statements about God that are themselves either directly revealed or derived from revelation in a logically unassailable manner. That you are not willing to engage with an argument does not make it any less compelling. Furthermore, traditional Christians are not reduced to an "atomistic" revelation that does not dare to go beyond a first level parsing of scripture. That's perhaps a common corruption of Protestantism, which arose because they destroyed the very teaching authority that protected thinking about revelation from error. I'm not so afflicted, and neither are you, so stop your silly "sola scriptura" rhetoric.
quote:
Originally posted by mousethief:
Further, I agree with Anyuta that the Latin Church had no business at all fiddling with a creed that was hammered out in not one but TWO ecumenical councils. Talk about unilateral. Yeah, you guys should fix it unilaterally because you messed it up unilaterally.
If the filioque is true (at least in the sense of being a valid expression of a perhaps even deeper truth), then it is just plain pigheadedness by the Orthodox to require the Latins to take it back. The Orthodox could certainly ask for expressions of sorrow that due ecclesiastic process had not been followed, or some such. (Though that would make a mockery of a history of mutual aggravation, Rome certainly would show the Orthodox that bit of charity.) However, this will apparently not do. Instead, a truth would need to be withdrawn, which actually has been an essential part of Latin liturgy and theology for about a millennium. To ask for that is so incredibly idiotic and uncharitable, that the Orthodox must pretend that the filioque is a falsehood to justify it. And so they do, resulting in an unresolvable stalemate.
quote:
Originally posted by mousethief:
I'd rather say that it flows inexorably from who God is. He's a creatin' kinda God. Otherwise I think you have to say that creating is not in God's nature, only the potential to create. And AIUI God is all actual, and none potential.
It is a mistake to assign creation to God's essence, rather than to His will. If it is God's essence to create, then creation is not an act of love by God at all. It is merely necessary. It is crucial that God must be free to create or not, for Him to love doing so. God saw that creation was good, not necessary. However, you are right in the sense that due to God's eternity and immutability, this freedom of Divine will resides in what could have been, not in what was, is or will be. God is actually Creator, necessarily so in the sense that His loving decision to create never was not actual. Yet it is an imaginable possibility to be God without creating, hence God was free in loving us into existence.
quote:
Originally posted by mousethief:
If the throne of Peter included the authority to rule by fiat, then no ecumenical council would ever have been called because it would never have been needed. Just let il papa decide for us.
Non sequitur. That I can do X does not say anything about others doing X. Furthermore, it is false to say that ecumenical councils can decide any matters of faith or morals definitively alone. They can't. At all. They can only decide definitively together with St. Peter's successor. If any gathering of bishops tries to impose de fide doctrine or governance on the faithful against the pope, then their statements are null and void (and by virtue of that conflict strongly suspect of heresy). The power of the keys is bestowed on St. Peter alone. Ecumenical councils are certainly an excellent mechanism, but in the end they are just that: a way for the bishops to gather with the pope in order to declare definitive teaching and governance. It is however neither required that all bishops throw their lot with the pope, nor that they do so in physical proximity. It may have been a terribly bad idea by the pope to declare the filioque that was accepted only by the Latin side, but that does not make this act illegitimate.
If you analyze the structure of the Church merely by power, then indeed the pope is a "monarch" (primus). But the pope is a monarch that is supposed to be the "servant of servants" (inter pares). Every Orthodox bishop could likewise be accused of being an "aristocrat", as compared to the laity. The inversion of the power structure is spiritual, it is a common mistake to require it to be legal. Accuse the pope that declared the filioque of spiritual failings, and you may have a point.
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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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mousethief
Ship's Thieving Rodent
# 953
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Posted
quote:
If the filioque is true (at least in the sense of being a valid expression of a perhaps even deeper truth), then it is just plain pigheadedness by the Orthodox to require the Latins to take it back.
There are a lot of things that are true that we don't go sticking into the ecumenical creed unilaterally. That you think this is a good argument says exactly everything anybody needs to know about the swollen head of the papacy.
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Zach82
Shipmate
# 3208
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by mousethief:
quote:
If the filioque is true (at least in the sense of being a valid expression of a perhaps even deeper truth), then it is just plain pigheadedness by the Orthodox to require the Latins to take it back.
There are a lot of things that are true that we don't go sticking into the ecumenical creed unilaterally. That you think this is a good argument says exactly everything anybody needs to know about the swollen head of the papacy.
I don't really see it as much to the Eastern Churches' credit that the truth of the filioque is irrelevent next to the fact that they weren't consulted in the matter. Just adding my two Protestant Pence to the debate...
Zach
[ 02. April 2011, 16:33: Message edited by: Zach82 ]
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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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Alt Wally
Cardinal Ximinez
# 3245
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Posted
quote:
I don't really see it as much to the Eastern Churches' credit
I am shocked. SHOCKED.
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Zach82
Shipmate
# 3208
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Posted
Out of anything relevent to say, Willy?
Zach
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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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Dave Marshall
Shipmate
# 7533
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by IngoB:
In that case [if God couldn't but create], whatever forced your god to create, I will call my God.
God doesn't need forcing to create if God's nature is to create. And if it is not God's nature to create, what inspires God to create?
A feature can obviously be invented that allows God to create, but that would remain unexpressed or unfilled if God did not create. I don't see any reasonable grounds for saying both a creating and an uncreating Trinity could possess equal perfect completeness.
[ 02. April 2011, 17:51: Message edited by: Dave Marshall ]
Posts: 4763 | From: Derbyshire Dales | Registered: Jun 2004
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IngoB
Sentire cum Ecclesia
# 8700
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by mousethief:
quote:
If the filioque is true (at least in the sense of being a valid expression of a perhaps even deeper truth), then it is just plain pigheadedness by the Orthodox to require the Latins to take it back.
There are a lot of things that are true that we don't go sticking into the ecumenical creed unilaterally. That you think this is a good argument says exactly everything anybody needs to know about the swollen head of the papacy.
Read for freaking comprehension. I did not say that it was good to put the filioque in the creed. I said in the same post that doing so was legitimate (the pope in fact had the power to do so, irrespective of whether he should have done so). Thus I said that requiring the removal of a truth that was legitimately (though perhaps not wisely) added to the creed - after it has shaped close to a millennium of Latin church life - is pigheaded from the Orthodox. Because, you know, it simply is.
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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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Alt Wally
Cardinal Ximinez
# 3245
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Zach82:
Out of anything relevent to say, Willy?
Zach
The thread is festival of irrelevance IMO given what is stated in the Orthodox-Catholic statement on the topic of the thread. So what it gives rise to is for us all to ride our favorite hobby horses around. Forgive me, I simply noted the appearance of yours.
[ 02. April 2011, 21:17: Message edited by: Alt Wally ]
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mousethief
Ship's Thieving Rodent
# 953
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by IngoB:
Thus I said that requiring the removal of a truth that was legitimately (though perhaps not wisely) added to the creed - after it has shaped close to a millennium of Latin church life - is pigheaded from the Orthodox. Because, you know, it simply is.
See, we differ on the "legitimately" because of our view on the papacy. Because, you know, we simply do.
And saying that the eastern patriarchs are just prigs or stuffed shirts or whatever your insult-du-jour is, because they won't kowtow to the autocrat of Rome is just ... I don't know. Unbalanced?
[ 02. April 2011, 21:50: Message edited by: mousethief ]
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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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IngoB
Sentire cum Ecclesia
# 8700
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by mousethief:
See, we differ on the "legitimately" because of our view on the papacy. Because, you know, we simply do.
Of course you Orthodox have to maintain some corrupted view of the papacy, because otherwise you would have to self-identify as schismatics and shop for sackcloth and ashes on your pilgrimage to Rome.
Yet it is silly to expect the RCC to share your views on that matter. Hence it is equally silly to bang on about how the filioque absolutely has to be removed, merely so that your corrupted understanding of the papacy is seen as "winning" in this way. You are turning a doctrinal issue into a proxy for an ecclesiastic turf war. As if a thousand years of that crap was not enough. But if the filioque is true (and correctly interpreted it surely is), then there is no harm whatsoever in saying "Credo ... filioque ..." (I believe ... and the Son ...). There is no harm in believing what is true.
The only reasonable action here is to allow for the Latins to say the filioque, for the Orthodox to leave it out, and issue a common statement why this does not imply a contradiction in doctrine (because rightly understood it surely does not). And then talk with each other about what a pope may or may not do. Let's remove this stupid proxy already, it brings nothing but harm.
quote:
Originally posted by mousethief:
And saying that the eastern patriarchs are just prigs or stuffed shirts or whatever your insult-du-jour is, because they won't kowtow to the autocrat of Rome is just ... I don't know. Unbalanced?
I haven't insulted Orthodox bishops as either prigs or stuffed shirts. And it is strictly your problem if you see obedience to the vicar of Christ as "kowtowing". One can label any obedience negatively, including that which you presumably show to your bishop and patriarch.
But sticking to your terms, my point is not that your stuffed shirts should kowtow to the autocrat of Rome, though they should. My point is that they should stop using the filioque as a historical proxy for the question of kowtowing.
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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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Zach82
Shipmate
# 3208
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Alt Wally:
The thread is festival of irrelevance IMO given what is stated in the Orthodox-Catholic statement on the topic of the thread. So what it gives rise to is for us all to ride our favorite hobby horses around. Forgive me, I simply noted the appearance of yours.
You know, maybe you should act less surprised when people that disagree with each other disagree with each other? Just saying.
Zach
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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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Alt Wally
Cardinal Ximinez
# 3245
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Zach82:
quote:
Originally posted by Alt Wally:
The thread is festival of irrelevance IMO given what is stated in the Orthodox-Catholic statement on the topic of the thread. So what it gives rise to is for us all to ride our favorite hobby horses around. Forgive me, I simply noted the appearance of yours.
You know, maybe you should act less surprised when people that disagree with each other disagree with each other? Just saying.
Zach
I guess I don't understand your persistent beef with the Eastern Church. But it is what it is.
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Zach82
Shipmate
# 3208
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Posted
I can't see that I object to the Eastern Churches any more strenuously than the Roman Catholic Church, half of Anglicanism, or Evangelical Protestants. I am not sure disagreeing with people that disagree with me counts as a "hobby horse."
Zach
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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
quote:
Originally posted by IngoB:
And it is strictly your problem if you see obedience to the vicar of Christ as "kowtowing".
On the contrary, I don't see obedience to the vicar of Christ as anything because there is no such thing as "the vicar of Christ" in the sense that the RCC means it. And the way the RCC throws its weight around and makes grandiose claims for itself is far more than "my" problem.
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Zach82
Shipmate
# 3208
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Posted
Insofar as both Churches claim to be the One True Church, to the exclusion of all others, it sure seems that arguing about authority is ultimately a waste of time. Until either Church admits the possibility of the Church being wider than themselves, their respective claims of authority will necessarily contradict each other.
Which is a good reason to stick to the truth value of the filioque itself.
Zach
[ 03. April 2011, 03:45: Message edited by: Zach82 ]
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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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IngoB
Sentire cum Ecclesia
# 8700
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Zach82:
Until either Church admits the possibility of the Church being wider than themselves
The RCC's perspective is of course more refined than just "we are the Church", and corresponding statements have been made both at the highest level (Vatican II) and the most popular one (Catechism). Nothing of that sort is known to me from the Orthodox, which however may be partly due to their reluctance to make easily accessible any clear statement of doctrine.
quote:
Originally posted by Zach82:
Which is a good reason to stick to the truth value of the filioque itself.
However, the filioque is not important for its intrinsic truth value, but for what that is taken to signify with respect to the schism. Politics has to move before science on this one.
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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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Dafyd
Shipmate
# 5549
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by IngoB:
I said in the same post that doing so was legitimate (the pope in fact had the power to do so, irrespective of whether he should have done so).
I think Leo III specifically disclaimed having the power to add the filioque to the creed.
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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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Zach82
Shipmate
# 3208
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Posted
quote:
The RCC's perspective is of course more refined than just "we are the Church", and corresponding statements have been made both at the highest level (Vatican II) and the most popular one (Catechism). Nothing of that sort is known to me from the Orthodox, which however may be partly due to their reluctance to make easily accessible any clear statement of doctrine.
Oh, I know full well the Roman Catholic Church's view is more nuanced than that. I do attend a Catholic theological school after all. But missing out on some nuance isn't quite the same thing as being wrong. Especially when we focus exclusively on the Roman Catholic Church's claims of authority, the situation is just about as I said. Unless either Church is willing to give a little on their claims of authority, then reconciling their claims is logically impossible.
quote:
However, the filioque is not important for its intrinsic truth value, but for what that is taken to signify with respect to the schism. Politics has to move before science on this one.
I think we can safely agree that if the Church says that the Holy Ghost proceeds from the Father and the Son, then it does so for more reasons than "The Pope says so," if only because we have salvation because Jesus Christ is "the way, the truth, and the life," and not because men in pointy/bulbous hats and dresses say we are saved. We do better to look at why the pope says the Holy Ghost proceeds from the Son than whether or not he has the authority to make pronouncements like that.
Zach
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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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IngoB
Sentire cum Ecclesia
# 8700
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Dave Marshall:
God doesn't need forcing to create if God's nature is to create. And if it is not God's nature to create, what inspires God to create?
The second point is easy. Nothing inspires God, but God Himself, in a manner of speaking - for while there is no creation, there is nothing but God, so nothing other can inspire Him. A simpler way of saying this is simply that God freely decides to create (or for your god: god just creates).
The first point is difficult. A simple answer is that the god you suggest is not one I believe in. Can I show though that your god is metaphysically "wrong"? That's not so simple. Roughly, I would suggest that your god isn't actually a separate entity, but rather just a way of talking about a certain feature of the universe. Because if it is in the nature of god to create, then that is basically the same as saying that the universe just is and has to be, for there is no way god could not create it. So I think this is a kind of pantheistic position, which for some reason singles out the "just is and has to be" aspect of the universe and names that specifically "god".
What is wrong with pantheism then? Basically I would say that I observe contingency in all things. The chair I sit on is, but does not have to be. (Perhaps it is largely necessary by a series of causes in the past, but none of these causes seem necessary as such either.) Any object, or even any natural law, does not seem to have necessary existence. Putting several non-necessary entities together does not improve matters: at best one gets a causal chain that leaves the result more or less necessary by imposing their contingency onto the beginning. Hence to claim that putting all entities together somehow would make their sum, the universe, necessary seems unwarranted to me. To the contrary, from what I see in the world it rather makes sense to say that summing up all entities will deliver a radical contingency, puts an all or nothing question mark of unimaginable enormity behind it all. To give an answer to this question, I think one needs an entity that is totally other than the universe. One needs an entity that is radically non-contingent, absolutely necessary, and "bigger" than the question: an infinite exclamation mark. That I call my God.
Is this argument compelling? Probably not. It requires realizing something subtle about things, their contingency, and it requires seeing this as permeating the entire universe. (Buddhism gets this one perfectly right, by the way, calling it "emptiness".) One cannot really argue these kinds of "foundational" insights. Though one can experience this particular one, and yes, I think I have. Hence to make this argument compelling I would suggest doing what we are now calling meditation (following the Eastern use), but what used to be called contemplation.
That is admittedly weak intellectually, but surprisingly strong practically. I don't think that I can do more than that on this specific issue. Rest and see.
[ 04. April 2011, 07:30: 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
Posts: 12010 | From: Gone fishing | Registered: Oct 2004
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Dave Marshall
Shipmate
# 7533
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by IngoB:
Roughly, I would suggest that your god isn't actually a separate entity, but rather just a way of talking about a certain feature of the universe.
The only way to avoid that charge is to do what you do: define God as totally other than the universe. Which is implicitly what I do by assuming we are in fact talking about the same entity, the God of the Judeo-Christian tradition.
You are I think assuming the universe is a creation of God. To account for that God must have no necessary relationship with creation. That seems to me a special case, given the eternal context, of creation that begins and ends. The general case for an eternal creator will be eternal creating, where created reality is a process, never a final end.
Reality within that process will then be experienced within some 'horizon of perception', for us the limits of spacetime.
Posts: 4763 | From: Derbyshire Dales | Registered: Jun 2004
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IngoB
Sentire cum Ecclesia
# 8700
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Dave Marshall:
The only way to avoid that charge is to do what you do: define God as totally other than the universe.
I did a lot more than that. Try engaging with what I actually said.
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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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Dave Marshall
Shipmate
# 7533
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by IngoB:
I did a lot more than that. Try engaging with what I actually said.
Most was an explanation of what is wrong with pantheism, based on a claim that we're not talking about the same God. I've explained why I'm not in fact a pantheist.
On the question of what if creation is an eternal process then separates creator from creation, I'm not sure how to elaborate. God as creator is by definition eternal, ie. beyond spacetime and therefore beyond what we call change; creation is an eternal expression of the nature of the creator, what we experience as a process that we measure as time. Your experience of sitting on a chair is only ever a change in the 'your brain' region of space from one instant to the next, like every other element that makes up our consciousness. I don't see there is any contingency that cannot be accounted for simply by the nature of the ongoing creative process.
I guess I'm suspicious of delegating this kind of question to experience, as you suggest with contemplation. What kind of answer can that provide? Only I think one that is selectively disengaged from any means of verification, and therefore inherently unreliable.
Posts: 4763 | From: Derbyshire Dales | Registered: Jun 2004
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IngoB
Sentire cum Ecclesia
# 8700
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Dave Marshall:
I don't see there is any contingency that cannot be accounted for simply by the nature of the ongoing creative process.
For you which (kind of) created entity exists is contingent, but not that some created entity exists. Again, I see no evidence in observable entities for the necessary existence of some-thing.
quote:
Originally posted by Dave Marshall:
I guess I'm suspicious of delegating this kind of question to experience, as you suggest with contemplation. What kind of answer can that provide? Only I think one that is selectively disengaged from any means of verification, and therefore inherently unreliable.
I would have said that experience is the only reliable basis for any sort of verification, in particular also within the empirical / scientific enterprise. I assume what you actually are aiming at is that this particular experience is not provided by the dials of some measurement apparatus, but by introspection - and hence unreliable due to its means. However, meditation / contemplation is in fact rather reliable, and that was my practical point. The question what precisely you are mistrusting in contemplation is a rather interesting one - but for the sake of this discussion here, suffice to say that I don't think that there is a simple answer.
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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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Dave Marshall
Shipmate
# 7533
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by IngoB:
For you which (kind of) created entity exists is contingent, but not that some created entity exists. Again, I see no evidence in observable entities for the necessary existence of some-thing.
I don't think the model I'm describing supports the distinction you're making. Existence as an attribute only has meaning for other existing entities within the creation process.
The process itself is by definition a succession of created nows, each contingent only on the creativity of the creator. That each successive now appears to be contingent on its predecessor is only that, an appearance of contingency. In fact that appearance by definition is entirely a consequence of the nature of the creativity of the creator.
That we observe (ie. record successive states of) entities that for us exist is evidence for a creator. That we only ever observe now is evidence for creation being a process.
quote:
I assume what you actually are aiming at is that this particular experience is not provided by the dials of some measurement apparatus, but by introspection
Yes, as in your example.
quote:
However, meditation / contemplation is in fact rather reliable, and that was my practical point.
Reliable for what, though?
Posts: 4763 | From: Derbyshire Dales | Registered: Jun 2004
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IngoB
Sentire cum Ecclesia
# 8700
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Dave Marshall:
I don't think the model I'm describing supports the distinction you're making.
I think your creator could be imagined as not creating (as not having creative nature). One can show logically from the existence of some-thing that a necessary Being must exist. Since there is evidence for the former, there is evidence for the latter. But one cannot simply reverse these logical conclusions and derive that from a necessary Being it follows that some-thing exists (where the necessary Being is not classed as some-thing, or at least doesn't have to be). In other words, the existence of some-thing shows that the necessary Being has in fact created, not that He necessarily has to create.
So your model may not have a place for a non-creating God, but that just means that I can reject it wholesale without violating any known evidence or logical constraints.
quote:
Originally posted by Dave Marshall:
That each successive now appears to be contingent on its predecessor is only that, an appearance of contingency.
Parts of the universe are created as deterministically flowing from, parts as contingent with reference to, the previous state of the universe. The resulting temporal continuity of the universe is an essential part of what God creates, not a mere appearance. Furthermore, it is not the case that God is merely the "edge of now", creating stuff from moment to moment. If that were so, then some other entity would be required to eternally and continuously keep this "edge of now" god in existence, and that would be my God.
quote:
Originally posted by Dave Marshall:
That we only ever observe now is evidence for creation being a process.
Indeed, in the sense that what is created is a process, or in other (less confusing) words, has temporal features. However, this is no evidence that the Divine act of creating itself is a process: if creating was a process, then we would have to ask what clocks its steps. A process requires a reference frame, for otherwise we cannot say "first this, then that". Yet the First Uncaused Cause cannot be located within any reference frame, for no prior cause can exist to establish it.
quote:
Originally posted by Dave Marshall:
quote:
Originally posted by IngoB:
However, meditation / contemplation is in fact rather reliable, and that was my practical point.
Reliable for what, though?
It is reliably providing cognitively relevant experiences. I will open another thread to deal with this question.
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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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Dave Marshall
Shipmate
# 7533
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by IngoB:
I think your creator could be imagined as not creating (as not having creative nature).
Of course we can imagine a different model. But the point of a model is not how it is arrived at but whether it accurately describes what is known. If the fit is good, we can reasonably have confidence in its predictive value. A model based on now and a creator and sustainer of now is a very good fit, both for reality as we experience it and the essence of the God idea in the Judeo-Christian tradition.
quote:
So your model may not have a place for a non-creating God, but that just means that I can reject it wholesale without violating any known evidence or logical constraints.
Only if you have a better-fitting model to account for why there is something rather than nothing.
quote:
Parts of the universe are created as deterministically flowing from, parts as contingent with reference to, the previous state of the universe.
Determinism and contingency within spacetime assumes a necessary relationship between the states of space across successive nows. My model by definition excludes this. It specifies, uncontroversially I would have thought, that God alone is responsible for the entire state of space now, including any relationship with the state of space at a preceding now.
quote:
this is no evidence that the Divine act of creating itself is a process
Alternatively, there is no evidence it is anything but a process. We only ever observe now as a universal space that records the residual effect of creation at all preceding nows. There's no difference in quantity or quality of evidence against which to evaluate the model, just in the perspective from from which it is viewed and the framework within which it is interpreted.
Posts: 4763 | From: Derbyshire Dales | Registered: Jun 2004
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mdijon
Shipmate
# 8520
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by mdijon:
I think God couldn't but create.
quote:
Originally posted by IngoB:
In that case, whatever forced your god to create, I will call my God.
In my view that makes as much sense as talking about whatever forced God to be good.
It's my view that it is in God's nature to create and he couldn't but do it. Likewise that he is good. That isn't to say someone or something else is forcing him to do either of those things.
I agree that the Son has his origin prior to the incarnation. But nevertheless I think it is part of his history and identity.
quote:
Originally posted by mdijon:
The author would still be a person and perhaps still be an author even if he hadn't written that particular book, but to then argue that what is written in the book doesn't apply to the author because he has no history and would still be the author even without the book seems to be going too far.
quote:
Originally posted by IngoB:
Nobody is claiming that God would be Creator without creating, merely that God would still be God.
I agree with that. I think one can argue that someone does something as an act of free will, but nevertheless finds doing it intrinsically part of their nature and unavoidable.
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mdijon nojidm uoɿıqɯ ɯqıɿou
ɯqıɿou uoɿıqɯ nojidm mdijon
Posts: 12277 | From: UK | Registered: Sep 2004
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Martin60
Shipmate
# 368
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Posted
After a contented eternity in perichoretic perichorea; internally, triunely boogying He created an angelic realm and later a material one.
It would be simpler if He'd always created, but that would mean He'd always incarnated and always partook of death.
But that would be heterodox. Hey IngoB, "That's perhaps a common corruption of Protestantism, which arose because they destroyed the very teaching authority that protected thinking about revelation from error. I'm not so afflicted, and neither are you, so stop your silly "sola scriptura" rhetoric."
What authority, mate ? It didn't work for the RCC from Augustine at least. At least old Thom realised he'd have been better of saying nothing after eight and a half million words.
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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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IngoB
Sentire cum Ecclesia
# 8700
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Dave Marshall:
A model based on now and a creator and sustainer of now is a very good fit, both for reality as we experience it and the essence of the God idea in the Judeo-Christian tradition.
It is neither. I have just argued that a "god of now" itself requires some framework within which to operate, and hence is not God. Furthermore, of course a god limited to now is utterly alien to the Judeo-Christian tradition. You may be able to argue that scripture does not rule this out, since eisegesis is always hard to refute. However, there is no way that you can claim that an appreciable number of Jews or Christians in the past thought like this. They didn't, and that's historical fact.
quote:
Originally posted by Dave Marshall:
Determinism and contingency within spacetime assumes a necessary relationship between the states of space across successive nows. My model by definition excludes this. It specifies, uncontroversially I would have thought, that God alone is responsible for the entire state of space now, including any relationship with the state of space at a preceding now.
It is true that a relationship between states of the universe is absolutely necessary only through God. It is also true, however, that we find in fact a high degree of "continuing causality" between the actual states of the universe, or in other words, we find time. (Unless you wish to claim that all our memories of the past are implanted in every now to falsely give us this impression - that's a conspiracy theory making Young Earth Creationism's hiding of dinosaur bones look like child's play...) The only explanation thereof, if one assumes a radical dependence of the universe on God as we both apparently do, is that God creates this time. However, at the very least this requires "memory" in "now-god". For example, if "now-god" chose to connect the previous now to this now by applying a law of gravity in which masses attract, then it may connect this now to the future now by applying a law of gravity in which masses repel, unless it "remembers" to not do that. Would you agree?
quote:
Originally posted by Dave Marshall:
Alternatively, there is no evidence it is anything but a process.
As I've already argued, processes need a reference framework, something that makes meaningful "first this, then that". If this reference framework is a process itself, then it also needs a reference framework itself, and so forth. Observing the procedural nature of the universe hence tells us that the universe is not God, rather than that God is a process.
quote:
Originally posted by mdijon:
It's my view that it is in God's nature to create and he couldn't but do it. Likewise that he is good. That isn't to say someone or something else is forcing him to do either of those things.
It is non-trivial to tease this out with precision, but I think there is clear difference between saying that goodness is essential to God, and saying that creation is essential to God. Basically, creation involves at least one specific external act because it goes from God to something else. Whereas goodness is, or at least can be seen as, a sort of "qualifier" of being. The core essence of God is Being, God Is. I can - at least analogously - say then that God Is Good, God Is Beautiful, God is True, etc. All these "qualify" what I mean by God is Being, but do not necessarily require anything besides God Himself. Hence they can be seen as "God-internal". However, God Is Creative is "God-external" because it requires that something be created to make sense.
In short: When I say "God Is Good", I explain what I mean when I say "God Is". But when I say "God Is Creative", I say what I expect "God Has Done / Does / Will Do". The former is of Essence, the latter of Will.
quote:
Originally posted by mdijon:
I agree that the Son has his origin prior to the incarnation. But nevertheless I think it is part of his history and identity.
The Son as God has no history, but Eternity. The Son as man has a history as Jesus Christ. At any rate, if the Son has his origin prior to the incarnation, then He must be distinct from the Holy Spirit prior to the incarnation. That is what my filioque argument was about.
quote:
Originally posted by mdijon:
I think one can argue that someone does something as an act of free will, but nevertheless finds doing it intrinsically part of their nature and unavoidable.
Hmm, no. Turns this into an argument about culpability for sin, and you will see its dire consequences. What is true is that one can have free will in spite of being entirely predictable in one's choices, because then one can still be free in the sense of always choosing what is best. But this still requires that a different choice is imaginable, that one is in principle capable of doing other. Therefore, it cannot be a part of one's essence. For example, the BVM is free of sin. A dog is also free of sin. Nevertheless, the BVM is the greatest of saints, whereas the dog is no saint at all. That's because the BVM can be imagined to sin, it is not impossible by her nature, but the dog is essentially incapable of sinning. There is an essential difference between these two cases.
quote:
Originally posted by Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard:
What authority, mate? It didn't work for the RCC from Augustine at least. At least old Thom realised he'd have been better of saying nothing after eight and a half million words.
Your personal vendetta against poor St. Augustine bores me to tears. And you have understood nothing about Christian religion if you believe that St. Thomas Aquinas' writings are false or useless because of what he said then. At any rate, the authority of the RCC is rather larger than Augustine or Aquinas. It is Divine, and the RCC has indeed rejected teachings of both these saints.
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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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Martin60
Shipmate
# 368
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Posted
Your boredome bores me IngoB.
Your failure to engage from your self-appointed Olympian heights.
How ironic that Augustine's God is impersonal.
And old Thom thought his eight and a half million words were useless.
How parsimonious he became!
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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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Martin60
Shipmate
# 368
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Posted
And again, under what authority am I not that you are? That excludes me from your love?
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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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IngoB
Sentire cum Ecclesia
# 8700
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard:
And again, under what authority am I not that you are? That excludes me from your love?
You are under the same authority. You just happen to be disobedient in ways that I am not, though likely culpable for that only within limits. I'm not aware of particularly excluding you from my love, i.e., willing good for you. Your good of course includes entering full communion with the RCC, as is the case for every human being.
And can you please lay off St. Augustine? Even if you could show that something he said about God would imply that God is impersonal (and you have not done so as far as I know), it remains perfectly clear from his writings that he himself thought of God as personal. At worst then, St. Augustine was mistaken in some theological statement or the other, but his God was very personal indeed.
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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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Dave Marshall
Shipmate
# 7533
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by IngoB:
I have just argued that a "god of now" itself requires some framework within which to operate, and hence is not God.
And I have just explained that I am talking about God, not a god. So a framework within which God operates is by definition excluded from my model.
quote:
there is no way that you can claim that an appreciable number of Jews or Christians in the past thought like this.
That's not what I said. I said my model is a good fit for the essence of the God idea in the Judeo-Christian tradition. By that I mean one God who is creator and sustainer of all that is. We're talking about how best to imagine that.
quote:
It is true that a relationship between states of the universe is absolutely necessary only through God. It is also true, however, that we find in fact a high degree of "continuing causality" between the actual states of the universe, or in other words, we find time.
You switched from outside to inside the model between those two sentences. We only find what looks to us like "continuing causality" inside the creation process, from within the physical. To metaphysically model creation is to step outside the physical, to where there is only God and, in my model now, in yours presumably spacetime and other 'places' (heaven, hell, etc).
quote:
(Unless you wish to claim that all our memories of the past are implanted in every now to falsely give us this impression...)
Memories of the past are no different to any other effect of creation at prior nows. They are a residual imprint of prior neurological states on our brain state now.
quote:
The only explanation thereof, if one assumes a radical dependence of the universe on God as we both apparently do, is that God creates this time. However, at the very least this requires "memory" in "now-god". For example, if "now-god" chose to connect the previous now to this now by applying a law of gravity in which masses attract, then it may connect this now to the future now by applying a law of gravity in which masses repel, unless it "remembers" to not do that. Would you agree?
No. If God alone is responsible for the entire state of space at successive nows, then gravity and every other natural phenomenon are results of the difference between the nows (or a long enough sequence of nows to measure as time). Gravity is part of our experience of how God creates, not a feature on a blueprint to which God is referring.
If creation is now and nothing more (my model), that we exist and experience time is only evidence for how God is God in creation. God doesn't need to remember to be God; God just is.
quote:
processes need a reference framework, something that makes meaningful "first this, then that".
God's creation is only a process from our point of view. From 'outside', from the perspective of the metaphysical modeller, there is only creation. We experience that as our now, with our past imprinted on it. For God it is the eternal now, the eternal expression of God's eternal nature.
Posts: 4763 | From: Derbyshire Dales | Registered: Jun 2004
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Martin60
Shipmate
# 368
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Posted
How am I disobedient to Christ?
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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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Martin60
Shipmate
# 368
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Posted
Augustine's God is a machine. A stainless steel, faceless Bender with all future eternity spooled inside Him. A clock all ticked.
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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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mdijon
Shipmate
# 8520
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by IngoB:
It is non-trivial to tease this out with precision, but I think there is clear difference between saying that goodness is essential to God, and saying that creation is essential to God.
There are now too many strands with multiple posters for you to possibly keep track of (although you do seem to be doing extremely well) so I'll confine myself to this line for now.
I'm not sure how much of the distinction is a trick of language and how much is real. For instance, I don't know what it means to say that one can be good without any action to evidence it. I suppose one could say that one is intrinsically good and that will be expected to translate into a good action as soon as one is possible.
On the other hand, I don't think that's different from saying that one is intrinsically a creator and that that will be manifest some time or other.
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mdijon nojidm uoɿıqɯ ɯqıɿou
ɯqıɿou uoɿıqɯ nojidm mdijon
Posts: 12277 | From: UK | Registered: Sep 2004
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IngoB
Sentire cum Ecclesia
# 8700
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Dave Marshall:
And I have just explained that I am talking about God, not a god. So a framework within which God operates is by definition excluded from my model.
If you define as absent from your model what is required for it operating, it will simply fail from self-contradiction. My point is that an "edge-of-now" process needs a framework. Think of the frames of a movie as they exist on a film. If you take scissors to the film reel, then where is "now, previous and later" in the resulting heap of pieces of film? One might as well say that there are just many different pictures (curiously related to each other). And it is not enough to point to one film frame and say "it causes the next". Because the problem is then merely moved to the word "causes": how does it do that? If there is a film reel, with one film frame attached to the next, and a projector with a motor spooling the film, then we know how one frame can come after the next. This is what I mean by a "framework" for the process. God can provide this framework if He is eternal, but not if He is Himself just within the "now". A single piece of film, even if a complete picture of the scene, does not explain how one gets to the next piece of film.
quote:
Originally posted by Dave Marshall:
I said my model is a good fit for the essence of the God idea in the Judeo-Christian tradition.
Well, if you think that it is a good fit, and pretty much everyone of that tradition will tell you that it isn't, then you have a problem. Whether it is one of principle or of interpretation is what we are discussing.
quote:
Originally posted by Dave Marshall:
We only find what looks to us like "continuing causality" inside the creation process, from within the physical.
Even an illusion of continuity would have to be maintained by something continuous. A sequence of random events will not appear continuous.
quote:
Originally posted by Dave Marshall:
Memories of the past are no different to any other effect of creation at prior nows. They are a residual imprint of prior neurological states on our brain state now.
Ok, so how did they get from previous to now then? You need a "causal glue" of some kind, and that glue itself must be continuous. If I write A->B, then I may say that A and B are discrete, but only if the arrow isn't. Otherwise I get ACB, with -> becoming a discrete state C, a sequence which itself needs an explanation of the type A->C->B.
quote:
Originally posted by Dave Marshall:
Gravity is part of our experience of how God creates, not a feature on a blueprint to which God is referring.
That does not address my argument. You need to locate the continuity we observe somewhere. If it is God creating consistently, then God must be such that consistency is in Him beyond the now.
quote:
Originally posted by Dave Marshall:
God's creation is only a process from our point of view. From 'outside', from the perspective of the metaphysical modeller, there is only creation. We experience that as our now, with our past imprinted on it. For God it is the eternal now, the eternal expression of God's eternal nature.
Ahh, we are back to the straight classical model. I have no idea what all that stuff above was about then...
[ 07. April 2011, 06:32: 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
Posts: 12010 | From: Gone fishing | Registered: Oct 2004
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Dave Marshall
Shipmate
# 7533
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by IngoB:
Ahh, we are back to the straight classical model.
Well, it's also a description that's entirely consistent with the model I've been describing.
quote:
I have no idea what all that stuff above was about then...
If you look back at your objections I think you'll find they all attempt to apply a spacetime-internal frame of reference to a model that assumes an eternal perspective. They're never going to connect. It seems to be one of those things that becomes obvious once we see it. Perhaps a way in would be to consider that for creation as process, start and end are undefined. Make friends with that idea and maybe the model will begin to make sense.
Posts: 4763 | From: Derbyshire Dales | Registered: Jun 2004
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IngoB
Sentire cum Ecclesia
# 8700
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard:
How am I disobedient to Christ?
Christ knows.
However, St. Cyprian explains why I think that you are disobedient at least concerning one issue: what Church you belong to.
quote:
Originally posted by Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard:
Augustine's God is a machine. A stainless steel, faceless Bender with all future eternity spooled inside Him. A clock all ticked.
If I could live in two moments at once, instead of just one moment, would I be greater or lesser in my powers? Greater. Would I live more or less through experience and interaction? More. If I could live in a thousand moments? Thousandfold greater power and more life. If I could live in all moments at once, and even beyond? Infinitely greater power and more life. That's God.
Knowing the future has nothing to do with being a dead robot. It has everything to do with being totally alive to anything and everything in the world at once.
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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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Martin60
Shipmate
# 368
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Posted
What does Christ say mate? There's only one Church, one body - His - I'm in it. Not with you? Not included?
SHOW ME FROM CHRIST THAT I'M NOT.
YOU tell me where I'm not. Unless you're saying that Cyprian says it for you. Those might as well be your exact words.
And yes I'm angry. Yes I'm offended. Hurt. And yes I must lay that at the foot of the cross. Where we cannot meet. Where we cannot kneel together in communion.
As for your imaparsimonious rhetoric, nice.
Dispositional. What you HAVE to believe for your own narrative, untransferable 'reasons'.
Not orthodox let alone mandatory in any way that can be communicated.
I, of course, bow to the eternal meta-pre-creativity of God.
But if you need God to know tomorrow's observed electrons' spins today, like the real presence and other non-apostolic distinctives, we must tolerate that.
We must tolerate your intolerance. Your patronization. Your esotericism.
And you must tolerate our 'disobedience' in your untransferable, unexemplary, meaningless and of course imparsimoniou obedience.
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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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Johnny S
Shipmate
# 12581
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard:
What does Christ say mate? There's only one Church, one body - His - I'm in it. Not with you? Not included?
SHOW ME FROM CHRIST THAT I'M NOT.
YOU tell me where I'm not.
Bit of a tangent here Martin - if Ingo is telling you where you are not then you are insisting that you know where you are.
Isn't your major problem with Augustine that you don't even know where an electron is? (By my maths you are likely to be a bit bigger than an electron.)
Posts: 6834 | From: London | Registered: Apr 2007
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IngoB
Sentire cum Ecclesia
# 8700
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard:
There's only one Church, one body - His - I'm in it. Not with you? Not included?
If you have been validly baptized, then you are indeed "part of His body". However, the body analogy isn't really flexible enough to accommodate what (I think) your actual position is... perhaps something like a cell in this.
quote:
Originally posted by Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard:
SHOW ME FROM CHRIST THAT I'M NOT.
Shrug. Show me from Christ anything... One point SoF really drives home is how utterly futile it is to attempt any kind of religious proof against hostile opinion.
quote:
Originally posted by Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard:
YOU tell me where I'm not. Unless you're saying that Cyprian says it for you. Those might as well be your exact words.
I'd be more optimistic about the salvation of those outside of / at odds with the Church, but sure, Cyprian drives home my basic point.
quote:
Originally posted by Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard:
And yes I'm angry. Yes I'm offended. Hurt. And yes I must lay that at the foot of the cross. Where we cannot meet. Where we cannot kneel together in communion.
You are a big boy, I guess you'll manage.
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Originally posted by Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard:
But if you need God to know tomorrow's observed electrons' spins today, like the real presence and other non-apostolic distinctives, we must tolerate that. We must tolerate your intolerance. Your patronization. Your esotericism.
How droll.
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Originally posted by Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard:
And you must tolerate our 'disobedience' in your untransferable, unexemplary, meaningless and of course imparsimoniou obedience.
Well, at least I must suffer it.
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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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Martin60
Shipmate
# 368
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Posted
Thanks for nothing mate.
So my infant baptism and confirmation 6 years ago are invalid because the other priest was married and our bread is leavened?
Futile indeed.
You're welcome to kneel with me at Holy Trinity, Leicester this Sunday of course.
Remember me when you come in to your kingdom won't you. You and a billion first class Christians.
I'd happily continue to serve way beneath the broken Roman Catholic alcoholics and drug addicts I have the privilege of serving (they have nowhere else to go) a few of hours a week, in the fullness of the Kingdom, but I just get to be an object of pity on the burning shore while they are in Abraham's bosom ?
OK mate.
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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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Martin60
Shipmate
# 368
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Posted
Cyprian: If any one consider and examine these things, there is no need for lengthened discussion and arguments. There is easy proof for faith in a short summary of the truth. The Lord speaks to Peter, saying, "I say unto thee, that thou art Peter; and upon this rock I will build my Church, and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it. And I will give unto thee the keys of the kingdom of heaven; and whatsoever thou shalt bind on earth shall be bound also in heaven, and whatsoever thou shalt loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven." And again to the same He says, after His resurrection, "Feed my sheep." And although to all the apostles, after His resurrection, He gives an equal power, and says, "As the Father hath sent me, even so send I you: Receive ye the Holy Ghost: Whose soever sins ye remit, they shall be remitted unto him; and whose soever sins ye retain, they shall be retained;" yet, that He might set forth unity, He arranged by His authority the origin of that unity, as beginning from one. Assuredly the rest of the apostles were also the same as was Peter, endowed with a like partnership both of honour and power; but the beginning proceeds from unity. Which one Church, also, the Holy Spirit in the Song of Songs designated in the person of our Lord, and says, "My dove, my spotless one, is but one. She is the only one of her mother, elect of her that bare her." Does he who does not hold this unity of the Church think that he holds the faith? Does he who strives against and resists the Church trust that he is in the Church, when moreover the blessed Apostle Paul teaches the same thing, and sets forth the sacrament of unity, saying, "There is one body and one spirit, one hope of your calling, one Lord, one faith, one baptism, one God?"
Amen
And this unity we ought firmly to hold and assert, especially those of us that are bishops who preside in the Church, that we may also prove the episcopate itself to be one and undivided. Let no one deceive the brotherhood by a falsehood: let no one corrupt the truth of the faith by perfidious prevarication. The episcopate is one, each part of which is held by each one for the whole. The Church also is one, which is spread abroad far and wide into a multitude by an increase of fruitfulness. As there are many rays of the sun, but one light; and many branches of a tree, but one strength based in its tenacious root; and since from one spring flow many streams, although the multiplicity seems diffused in the liberality of an overflowing abundance, yet the unity is still preserved in the source. Separate a ray of the sun from its body of light, its unity does not allow a division of light; break a branch from a tree,-when broken, it will not be able to bud; cut off the stream from its fountain, and that which is cut off dries up. Thus also the Church, shone over with the light of the Lord, sheds forth her rays over the whole world, yet it is one light which is everywhere diffused, nor is the unity of the body separated. Her fruitful abundance spreads her branches over the whole world. She broadly expands her rivers, liberally flowing, yet her head is one, her source one; and she is one mother, plentiful in the results of fruitfulness: from her womb we are born, by her milk we are nourished, by her spirit we are animated.
Amen
The spouse of Christ cannot be adulterous; she is uncorrupted and pure. She knows one home; she guards with chaste modesty the sanctity of one couch. She keeps us for God. She appoints the sons whom she has born for the kingdom. Whoever is separated from the Church and is joined to an adulteress, is separated from the promises of the Church; nor can he who forsakes the Church of Christ attain to the rewards of Christ. He is a stranger; he is profane; he is an enemy. He can no longer have God for his Father, who has not the Church for his mother. If any one could escape who was outside the ark of Noah, then he also may escape who shall be outside of the Church.
Amen
Well that's all right IngoB - I'm at least as included in Christ as you.
No problem.
No disobedience there. No 'adultery'. No separation.
Yet YOU judge me disobedient.
To whom ?
To what ?
How ?
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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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IngoB
Sentire cum Ecclesia
# 8700
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard:
So my infant baptism and confirmation 6 years ago are invalid because the other priest was married and our bread is leavened?
Assuming that you were baptized/confirmed non-RC: Your baptism is (almost certainly) valid. Your confirmation isn't. That has little to do with whether your priest is married and what bread you use in your services. But it has to do with your episcopate not being in the apostolic succession and/or in communion with the Holy See.
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Originally posted by Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard:
You're welcome to kneel with me at Holy Trinity, Leicester this Sunday of course.
If I am in Leicester, why not? As long as I don't give scandal to my RC brethren and false witness to the non-RC ones, I can certainly worship God with other Christians and under the right circumstances even with non-Christians. Thus kneeling in prayer is on, partaking in the Eucharist not.
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Originally posted by Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard:
Remember me when you come in to your kingdom won't you. You and a billion first class Christians.
Will do, if I make it. And you remember that we don't become citizen of that kingdom by virtue of our works, but as a gift. Quit blaming me for not accepting all the gifts waiting for you.
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Originally posted by Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard:
I just get to be an object of pity on the burning shore while they are in Abraham's bosom?
Did I say somewhere that you'll go to hell? Not that I remember.
quote:
Originally posted by Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard:
Well that's all right IngoB - I'm at least as included in Christ as you. No problem. No disobedience there. No 'adultery'. No separation. Yet YOU judge me disobedient. To whom? To what? How?
The successor of St. Peter would not consider you to be in full communion with him, but he would me. End of story.
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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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Martin60
Shipmate
# 368
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Posted
Peter would. Jesus does.
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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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