|
Source: (consider it)
|
Thread: Kakangelicalism
|
EtymologicalEvangelical
Shipmate
# 15091
|
Posted
Thank you, Latchkey Kid, for reminding us of this word kakangelion.
Bad news.
I've often wondered how the Gospel is actually "Good News", when it is based on the idea that everyone deserves to burn in hell for all eternity due to the effect of original sin.
This is what I wrote recently on another thread:
quote:
Suppose a brilliant doctor deliberately took his newly pregnant wife to live in the shadow of Chernobyl shortly after the disaster, and she gave birth to a seriously ill and deformed child. Then they moved away from there, and the doctor performed some amazing surgery on the child (after allowing the poor soul to suffer pain and humiliation for years) and demanded praise for so doing. Furthermore, he claimed to have 'saved' his child from the agony that he (the child) justly deserved, for committing the sin of having been born in the shadow of the nuclear reactor.
It doesn't add up, does it?
But that is what a lot of popular 'evangelical' theology sounds like, I'm afraid. And then the Church wonders why so many people are not interested.
But if that is not what the 'evangel' is, then what is the good news?
And why has such a twisted message managed to pass as 'good news' for so long?
Also, in the same vein, is the preaching of this kakangelion a form of psychological and emotional abuse, especially when directed at children*?
*a recent comment on the hell board drew attention to this:
quote:
I was unfortunate enough to be brought up in a fundamentalist Christian home. We attended a pentecostalist church where Sunday after Sunday we were 'favoured' with blood curdling hell-fire sermons, which scared the life out of me. I suffered from awful nightmares as a consequence. At eleven I did the 'born again' bit as I was frigtened of going to hell, I was even quite sickeningly devout for a while!
--------------------
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
| IP: Logged
|
|
Bostonman
Shipmate
# 17108
|
Posted
quote:
Originally posted by EtymologicalEvangelical:
I've often wondered how the Gospel is actually "Good News", when it is based on the idea that everyone deserves to burn in hell for all eternity due to the effect of original sin.
It wouldn't be (good news), if it were (based on that idea).
How about this: the Good News is that, while we are in fact burning in hell for all our time, there is a way out of all this brokenness. And that God loves us so much that he came down to live in all this crap among us.
(If I'm reading your post right, you're not actually saying that the Gospel is based on that idea, but that that's the "kakangelical" approach. Either way.)
From my second-hand experience, you can get the same outside evangelicalism; my girlfriend has been pretty much scarred by the years she spent in constant fear of going to hell if she skipped mass once or twice, as a result of her early Catholic-school education.
Posts: 424 | From: USA | Registered: May 2012
| IP: Logged
|
|
Pancho
Shipmate
# 13533
|
Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Bostonman:
my girlfriend has been pretty much scarred by the years she spent in constant fear of going to hell if she skipped mass once or twice, as a result of her early Catholic-school education.
How old is your girlfriend? That guilt-tripping-nun-stuff stereotype has been pretty atypical for the past 30+ years.
And for every ex-Catholic with a pre-Vatican II horror story of Sister Meany Skirts there's an everything-has-gone-to-pot-since-Vatican-II Catholic whose early memories are straight out of The Bells of St. Mary. Go figure.
--------------------
“But to what shall I compare this generation? It is like children sitting in the market places and calling to their playmates, ‘We piped to you, and you did not dance;
we wailed, and you did not mourn.’"
Posts: 1988 | From: Alta California | Registered: Mar 2008
| IP: Logged
|
|
Latchkey Kid
Shipmate
# 12444
|
Posted
Kakangelicals may be found outside Evangelicalism, and Evangelicals are not necessarily kakangelicals.
In Tim Costello's book Tips from a travelling soul-searcher he relates how at an Amnesty international meeting he compared AIs work in letter writing to the NT where letters were written either in prison or to people facing imprisonment, persecution or death and which can be seen much as "Letters and Papers from Prison" (with apols to Bonhoeffer).
After Tim's speech Phillip Adams (Our ABC radio's much loved atheist) got up and said "My father was a Congregationalist minister. I hated him. My father taught me anti-Semitism: he hated Jews because they crucified Jesus. He was a fundamentalist: he taught me of a God who hated me.' Addressing Tim in front of all who were gathered at the Queensland Parliament reception area, Phillip asked, 'Where were you and where were ministers like you when I needed you?'
It's for things like this I feel compelled to speak against those create a living hell for their listeners.
--------------------
'You must never give way for an answer. An answer is always the stretch of road that's behind you. Only a question can point the way forward.'
Mika; in Hello? Is Anybody There?, Jostein Gaardner
Posts: 2592 | From: The wizardest little town in Oz | Registered: Mar 2007
| IP: Logged
|
|
Mere Nick
Shipmate
# 11827
|
Posted
quote:
Originally posted by I've often wondered how the Gospel is actually "Good News", when it is based on the idea that everyone deserves to burn in hell for all eternity due to the effect of original sin.
Are you sure?
--------------------
"Well that's it, boys. I've been redeemed. The preacher's done warshed away all my sins and transgressions. It's the straight and narrow from here on out, and heaven everlasting's my reward."
Delmar O'Donnell
Posts: 2797 | From: West Carolina | Registered: Sep 2006
| IP: Logged
|
|
Mere Nick
Shipmate
# 11827
|
Posted
quote:
Originally posted by I've often wondered how the Gospel is actually "Good News", when it is based on the idea that everyone deserves to burn in hell for all eternity due to the effect of original sin.
Are you sure?
--------------------
"Well that's it, boys. I've been redeemed. The preacher's done warshed away all my sins and transgressions. It's the straight and narrow from here on out, and heaven everlasting's my reward."
Delmar O'Donnell
Posts: 2797 | From: West Carolina | Registered: Sep 2006
| IP: Logged
|
|
Latchkey Kid
Shipmate
# 12444
|
Posted
quote:
Originally posted by EtymologicalEvangelical:
I've often wondered how the Gospel is actually "Good News", when it is based on the idea that everyone deserves to burn in hell for all eternity due to the effect of original sin.
We've had threads before on "What is the Good News" and I might look to see if they still exist.
I notice that many look to Paul to see what is the Gospel, and I draw blankness when I refer them to the Gospels. I think they see the Gospels as only stories and Paul's writings as the definitive theology.
--------------------
'You must never give way for an answer. An answer is always the stretch of road that's behind you. Only a question can point the way forward.'
Mika; in Hello? Is Anybody There?, Jostein Gaardner
Posts: 2592 | From: The wizardest little town in Oz | Registered: Mar 2007
| IP: Logged
|
|
Evensong
Shipmate
# 14696
|
Posted
The Bad News reminds me of the old priest and eskimo joke:
Eskimo: "If I did not know about God and sin, would I go to hell?"
Priest: "No, not if you did not know."
Eskimo: "Then why did you tell me?"
[ 31. January 2013, 02:49: Message edited by: Evensong ]
--------------------
a theological scrapbook
Posts: 9481 | From: Australia | Registered: Apr 2009
| IP: Logged
|
|
Bostonman
Shipmate
# 17108
|
Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Pancho:
How old is your girlfriend? That guilt-tripping-nun-stuff stereotype has been pretty atypical for the past 30+ years.
Twenty-one, for what it's worth.
I'm sure it's a combination of internal factors (i.e., perfectionist personality and so on) and external (i.e., the school environment, her being Episcopalian and not Catholic, etc.) Point being, this sort of thing isn't limited to evangelicals.
Posts: 424 | From: USA | Registered: May 2012
| IP: Logged
|
|
IngoB
Sentire cum Ecclesia
# 8700
|
Posted
quote:
Originally posted by EtymologicalEvangelical:
Bad news.
I've often wondered how the Gospel is actually "Good News", when it is based on the idea that everyone deserves to burn in hell for all eternity due to the effect of original sin.
That seems rather straightforward. If everyone is going to hell, then news of a way to avoid that fate clearly is good news, and for everyone. If not everyone is going to hell, then news of a way of avoiding that is good news primarily for the hell-bound. If nobody is going to hell, then news of a way to avoid hell is pointless to all.
Mind you, I don't think that "not going to hell" is quite what the good news are about, though it is a start. But other than that you just seem to be rehashing the endless "good God cannot allow bad hell" argument.
--------------------
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
| IP: Logged
|
|
EtymologicalEvangelical
Shipmate
# 15091
|
Posted
quote:
Originally posted by IngoB
That seems rather straightforward. If everyone is going to hell, then news of a way to avoid that fate clearly is good news, and for everyone.
I suppose that the idea of "good news" could be understood in this superficial and pragmatic way, but a beautiful building built on rotten foundations will not stand. So we have to look beyond the superficial.
Salvation is not simply a matter of getting a good deal, but also involves having a relationship with the person offering the deal. What kind of person is this? Clearly a God who declares that we all deserve to scream in hideous agony for ever, simply for committing the sin of daring to be born into a fallen world, is worse than the devil. This 'devil' may offer a 'good' deal to all people, such that those who respond may avoid hell, but then they are required to spend eternity with someone whose understanding of justice bears absolutely no relation at all to any concept of justice held by any sane and reasonable person. So we are delivered from one hell, only to be installed in another, because the latter requires that we spend eternity worshipping a sadist.
That doesn't sound like "good news" to me.
--------------------
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
| IP: Logged
|
|
IngoB
Sentire cum Ecclesia
# 8700
|
Posted
quote:
Originally posted by EtymologicalEvangelical:
I suppose that the idea of "good news" could be understood in this superficial and pragmatic way, but a beautiful building built on rotten foundations will not stand. So we have to look beyond the superficial.
I'm all for pragmatism and the "superficial" here is the primary evidence of scripture, as well as the vast majority of tradition till maybe a hundred years ago.
quote:
Originally posted by EtymologicalEvangelical:
Salvation is not simply a matter of getting a good deal, but also involves having a relationship with the person offering the deal. What kind of person is this? Clearly a God who declares that we all deserve to scream in hideous agony for ever, simply for committing the sin of daring to be born into a fallen world, is worse than the devil.
And if it were so, then so what? Your options remain just the same, have this relationship with the "worse than the devil" God, or burn in hell. Unpleasant situations and people do not disappear just because we don't like them.
But indeed, this entire debate is usually framed in the totally wrong way, as if the traditional side must argue for hell concerning the question whether a good God and hell are compatible. They need not, and should not. That hell exists and that some will fry in it for eternity is one of the most certain conclusions one can draw from scripture and tradition. Rather the traditional side should be busy arguing for the goodness of God.
If the traditional side loses that argument, hell does not somehow disappear. Rather, our assumption that God is good does. So if your main concern is to stay out of hell (a good idea), and if you believe in the evidence of scripture and tradition (a good idea), then quite frankly the typical discussion with the universalists is rather pointless. At best (or worst) the universalists can demonstrate that God is not good, in which case it becomes rather more urgent - not less - to stay in God's good graces.
quote:
Originally posted by EtymologicalEvangelical:
This 'devil' may offer a 'good' deal to all people, such that those who respond may avoid hell, but then they are required to spend eternity with someone whose understanding of justice bears absolutely no relation at all to any concept of justice held by any sane and reasonable person. So we are delivered from one hell, only to be installed in another, because the latter requires that we spend eternity worshipping a sadist. That doesn't sound like "good news" to me.
Seriously, since when is the world determined by what you consider as its ideal state? Do you think "I don't like the people in Syria fighting," and then instantly they all drop their arms? Is your boss impressed if you tell him that you don't find some work inspiring and therefore it has ceased to be? Do you walk into the bank and tell them "I would like to have a million pounds and therefore I do." Is that how reality works?
This whole argument is just wishful thinking written so large that it can pretend to be an argument. But it is utterly irrelevant for truth and falsehood whether you like what is true or what is false. You have not been asked for your opinion, much less for a decision, on how things are going to be. God is as He is, and the world is as it is. The only thing that you get to decide is what you are going to do about it. And if you think that what is on offer from God is no "good news", then the sum total of relevance of this sentiment is: Zilch. Zip. Nada. Diddly-squat.
And please, spare me any cries of "I'd rather burn in hell for eternity than living with such a monster of God." This is either totally hypocritical bullshit based on the firm belief that hell does not exist (it is easy to be heroic about non-existent threats), or it is a statement of fact, which really doesn't change anything. Nothing happens just because someone takes a principled stance and burns in hell. Other than that person burning in hell, of course. This is the sort of tactics of Buddhist monks setting themselves on fire in order to shame the Chinese government into acting less evil. But compared to God, the Chinese government is utterly fickle, changing its mind at the drop of a hat. God is eternal. God is not going to change because you - in your mind bravely and in defence of moral principle - are determined to go to hell. The only thing that will change is you dying and then, possibly, going to hell. And then that won't change either. Forever. That's all. There's no Gandhi moment to be had here. This is not about the world as you know it. This is about eternal fate. Adjust to reality, or - possibly - pay the prince. (I say "possibly", because God is in fact good, in particular, merciful. If you claim He isn't, do feel free to delete that word though.)
--------------------
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
| IP: Logged
|
|
Matt Black
Shipmate
# 2210
|
Posted
![[Overused]](graemlins/notworthy.gif) (first time I've ever given IngoB one of these I think).
For me, the good news is akin to this: many many generations ago, some humans consumed poison, even though they'd been warned it was poison and would seriously fuck them up and ultimately kill them. That caused a spiritual version of a bad genetic mutation which has been passed down ever since with the same as consuming the poison in the first place. Fortunately a kindly Deity (the same guy as it happens as tried to warn them off the poison) wanted and still wants to fix it by absorbing the poison's effects for us and offering the resultant cure to us gratis. Also, He would really like to be best mates with us.
YMMV, but I call that Good News.
[ 31. January 2013, 09:46: Message edited by: Matt Black ]
--------------------
"Protestant and Reformed, according to the Tradition of the ancient Catholic Church" - + John Cosin (1594-1672)
Posts: 14304 | From: Hampshire, UK | Registered: Jan 2002
| IP: Logged
|
|
Marvin the Martian
Interplanetary
# 4360
|
Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Matt Black:
Fortunately a kindly Deity (the same guy as it happens as tried to warn them off the poison) wanted and still wants to fix it by absorbing the poison's effects for us and offering the resultant cure to us gratis.
So what's stopping him?
quote:
Also, He would really like to be best mates with us.
That's nice, so long as He doesn't make the cure contingent on that friendship. That would be hideously manipulative and wrong.
--------------------
Hail Gallaxhar
Posts: 30100 | From: Adrift on a sea of surreality | Registered: Apr 2003
| IP: Logged
|
|
Matt Black
Shipmate
# 2210
|
Posted
What's stopping him? Our acceptance of the cure. Oh wait, what? You want Him to force it down our throats? Same consideration applies re His friendship - it takes two to tango.
--------------------
"Protestant and Reformed, according to the Tradition of the ancient Catholic Church" - + John Cosin (1594-1672)
Posts: 14304 | From: Hampshire, UK | Registered: Jan 2002
| IP: Logged
|
|
Karl: Liberal Backslider
Shipmate
# 76
|
Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Matt Black:
What's stopping him? Our acceptance of the cure. Oh wait, what? You want Him to force it down our throats? Same consideration applies re His friendship - it takes two to tango.
I think what a lot of people might like is a bit more reason to believe that the cure really is the cure, that the poison actually exists, and that the being offering the cure is real.
This is the problem. Most of the people I know who aren't Christians haven't rejected the cure - they simply haven't been convinced that the whole problem is actually real.
Nor am I; I take the pill just in case. I know Pascal's Wager is bollocks, but I'm stuck with it. I'm still stuffed if the Muslims turn out to be right, or indeed quite a few Christian sects.
--------------------
Might as well ask the bloody cat.
Posts: 17938 | From: Chesterfield | Registered: May 2001
| IP: Logged
|
|
EtymologicalEvangelical
Shipmate
# 15091
|
Posted
quote:
Originally posted by IngoB
This whole argument is just wishful thinking written so large that it can pretend to be an argument. But it is utterly irrelevant for truth and falsehood whether you like what is true or what is false. You have not been asked for your opinion, much less for a decision, on how things are going to be. God is as He is, and the world is as it is. The only thing that you get to decide is what you are going to do about it. And if you think that what is on offer from God is no "good news", then the sum total of relevance of this sentiment is: Zilch. Zip. Nada. Diddly-squat.
This put-down is the antithesis of the command in Proverbs 4:7:
quote:
...in all your getting, get understanding.
Anyone can use this kind of non-argument: "You have not been asked for your opinion." As it happens, I could just as easily respond in like manner: "who gave you permission to write all this?" (BTW... we have all been asked for our opinion concerning the nature of God's justice: read Isaiah 5:3, which clearly indicates that God does actually want us to appreciate that his justice really is just - according to how any normal, sane, reasonable person defines the word.)
Interestingly, I responded to an atheist on another site, and this is what he wrote in response to my original comment (and we were discussing something philosophical - the mind-brain problem):
quote:
I'm sorry but your personal dislike of the idea is irrelevant and doesn't change where the evidence points. To claim otherwise without evidence would be total folly. ... I'm sorry but your conjecture does nothing to change the facts as they are.
So really your response is no different. You have your dogmatic view, and woe betide anyone who dares to question it.
But as I pointed out to the atheist: how do you know that your position is, in fact, true? If none of us are allowed to "have an opinion", then how could we possibly ascertain the 'facts'?
(I must admit that I am rather surprised at this response from you of all people, Ingo, because you have often come across as a thinker.)
The fact is that what we believe about God's character does actually matter. It's not just a case of being in the Mafia Godfather's good books (and who gives a toss how he treats anyone else?). You know the first commandment. How can anyone obey this from his heart unless he has a view of God which he can accept?
Of course, you can reply by saying: "Tough! That is just the way it is." Unfortunately that is a very poor argument, because we cannot even know if your view is correct unless that is a conclusion we have drawn from the logical analysis of the evidence. That is how truth is normally perceived. And that is the method that I am using.
By the way... I am not denying the reality of hell. The Bible certainly mentions hell. But a particular interpretation of this doctrine is not a foregone conclusion. So therefore, I have been asked for my opinion. And thank God that He is Someone who doesn't insult people's intelligence by demanding blind submission, as you seem to think.
[ 31. January 2013, 10:20: Message edited by: EtymologicalEvangelical ]
--------------------
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
| IP: Logged
|
|
Matt Black
Shipmate
# 2210
|
Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Karl: Liberal Backslider:
quote:
Originally posted by Matt Black:
What's stopping him? Our acceptance of the cure. Oh wait, what? You want Him to force it down our throats? Same consideration applies re His friendship - it takes two to tango.
I think what a lot of people might like is a bit more reason to believe that the cure really is the cure, that the poison actually exists, and that the being offering the cure is real.
This is the problem. Most of the people I know who aren't Christians haven't rejected the cure - they simply haven't been convinced that the whole problem is actually real.
Well, yes, but that's where the importance of belief comes in: belief that there's a problem (although as Romans 1 reminds us, a cursory glance round at the world does tend to point to that) and belief in the solution.
--------------------
"Protestant and Reformed, according to the Tradition of the ancient Catholic Church" - + John Cosin (1594-1672)
Posts: 14304 | From: Hampshire, UK | Registered: Jan 2002
| IP: Logged
|
|
South Coast Kevin
Shipmate
# 16130
|
Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Matt Black:
What's stopping him? Our acceptance of the cure. Oh wait, what? You want Him to force it down our throats? Same consideration applies re His friendship - it takes two to tango.
But if the result of not accepting the cure is an eternity of conscious agony, then I can well understand people deciding they'd really rather God did force the cure down our throats. And furthermore, deciding they can't credit a God who doesn't do this as being a God of love.
--------------------
My blog - wondering about Christianity in the 21st century, chess, music, politics and other bits and bobs.
Posts: 3309 | From: The south coast (of England) | Registered: Jan 2011
| IP: Logged
|
|
Karl: Liberal Backslider
Shipmate
# 76
|
Posted
How are people meant to know which cure is the right one? The Muslims offer one answer, the JWs another, the Hindus yet another, and various political ideologies offer yet other approaches. And apparently, if we get it wrong, despite having little to go on, we're buggered, according to most of the religious suggestions.
You understand why people might be a little "you WHAT?" about all this?
--------------------
Might as well ask the bloody cat.
Posts: 17938 | From: Chesterfield | Registered: May 2001
| IP: Logged
|
|
Marvin the Martian
Interplanetary
# 4360
|
Posted
quote:
Originally posted by South Coast Kevin:
But if the result of not accepting the cure is an eternity of conscious agony, then I can well understand people deciding they'd really rather God did force the cure down our throats.
Indeed. I mean, if we're really as spiritually sick as all that, then surely we can't be trusted to be able to correctly discern our need for the cure. Surely what is needed is a form of spiritual sectioning so that we can be protected from our own self-destructive tendencies and refusal (or inability) to accept that there's something wrong with us?
--------------------
Hail Gallaxhar
Posts: 30100 | From: Adrift on a sea of surreality | Registered: Apr 2003
| IP: Logged
|
|
Matt Black
Shipmate
# 2210
|
Posted
Oh yes (although I'm not convinced that you have to jump through so many epistemmological hoops to get the cure as you seem to imply). But do you not accept that it's a rather different message to the kakangelion set forth in the OP?
[reply to Karl. Marvin and Kevin - would people really like that though? Would we not have a claim to bring to the spiritual equivalent of the ECHR?? "Help, help, I'm being oppressed: I'm being cured against my will and I don't even accept that I'm ill!" ![[Big Grin]](biggrin.gif) ]
[ 31. January 2013, 10:39: Message edited by: Matt Black ]
--------------------
"Protestant and Reformed, according to the Tradition of the ancient Catholic Church" - + John Cosin (1594-1672)
Posts: 14304 | From: Hampshire, UK | Registered: Jan 2002
| IP: Logged
|
|
Karl: Liberal Backslider
Shipmate
# 76
|
Posted
I for one would quite like unambiguous evidence from God that he's real and his cure is necessary and real, yes.
--------------------
Might as well ask the bloody cat.
Posts: 17938 | From: Chesterfield | Registered: May 2001
| IP: Logged
|
|
Marvin the Martian
Interplanetary
# 4360
|
Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Matt Black:
Marvin and Kevin - would people really like that though? Would we not have a claim to bring to the spiritual equivalent of the ECHR?? "Help, help, I'm being oppressed: I'm being cured against my will and I don't even accept that I'm ill!"
Asylums and Psych Wards are full of people screaming similar stuff, but the rest of us know that it's only because they're ill and that the treatment really is in their own interests. And when/if they get better, they realise it as well and are thankful for the actions taken to save their lives.
After all, if Heaven and Hell are real then this life means precisely fuck all except as a way of deciding which one we go to. What kind of loving God, knowing that, would prioritise our happiness in this tiny scrap of irrelevant shit we call 'life' over eternal happiness in Heaven?
--------------------
Hail Gallaxhar
Posts: 30100 | From: Adrift on a sea of surreality | Registered: Apr 2003
| IP: Logged
|
|
Matt Black
Shipmate
# 2210
|
Posted
Of what value, then, is faith?
--------------------
"Protestant and Reformed, according to the Tradition of the ancient Catholic Church" - + John Cosin (1594-1672)
Posts: 14304 | From: Hampshire, UK | Registered: Jan 2002
| IP: Logged
|
|
Marvin the Martian
Interplanetary
# 4360
|
Posted
Relying on faith is like a doctor relying on his mentally ill patients to cure themselves.
--------------------
Hail Gallaxhar
Posts: 30100 | From: Adrift on a sea of surreality | Registered: Apr 2003
| IP: Logged
|
|
Matt Black
Shipmate
# 2210
|
Posted
That doesn't answer my question: what's the point of faith?
--------------------
"Protestant and Reformed, according to the Tradition of the ancient Catholic Church" - + John Cosin (1594-1672)
Posts: 14304 | From: Hampshire, UK | Registered: Jan 2002
| IP: Logged
|
|
Evensong
Shipmate
# 14696
|
Posted
quote:
Originally posted by IngoB:
quote:
Originally posted by EtymologicalEvangelical:
I suppose that the idea of "good news" could be understood in this superficial and pragmatic way, but a beautiful building built on rotten foundations will not stand. So we have to look beyond the superficial.
I'm all for pragmatism and the "superficial" here is the primary evidence of scripture
No it's not the primary evidence of scripture.
The primary evidence of scripture is the reverse.
The superficial reading is the damned to Hell forever meaning.
quote:
Originally posted by IngoB:
Adjust to reality, or - possibly - pay the prince. (I say "possibly", because God is in fact good, in particular, merciful. If you claim He isn't, do feel free to delete that word though.)
Your logic reminds me of Martin Luther's hidden God....
Your redeeming feature is that you don't believe the logical bullshit you're sprouting. ![[Smile]](smile.gif)
--------------------
a theological scrapbook
Posts: 9481 | From: Australia | Registered: Apr 2009
| IP: Logged
|
|
Anselmina
Ship's barmaid
# 3032
|
Posted
quote:
Originally posted by IngoB:
That hell exists and that some will fry in it for eternity is one of the most certain conclusions one can draw from scripture and tradition. Rather the traditional side should be busy arguing for the goodness of God.
The 'goodness' of God which includes his creation of a hell prepared for the Devil and his angels and all those who will 'fry in it for eternity'? Even in the flawed administration of human justice a person given the death penalty for their crime can only die the once.
That concept of hell, of course, was hardly new to ancient peoples. The gods were in heaven doing what they pleased, receiving the praise of a people grateful for their crumbs of good fortune, punishing when that praise wasn't forthcoming. And the other side of the coin, the ruler of hell below ready to take his victims down into the darkness with him for ever.
Nobody expected, as a right, justice at the hands of anyone in those days. No doubt a 'good' God who could punish eternally, or at least more fearfully than any crime could deserve was anthropomorphically comprehensible in civilizations where brutal, over the top behaviours from even wise sovereigns where par for the course.
And the appeal to scripture as a certain warrent for hell - at least in the form described - is faulty, imo. The Bible - as a book - is not consistent in after-life experience. But I have to admit I don't see scripture as one big block of immutable 'thus says the Lord'.
Posts: 10002 | From: Scotland the Brave | Registered: Jul 2002
| IP: Logged
|
|
Karl: Liberal Backslider
Shipmate
# 76
|
Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Matt Black:
That doesn't answer my question: what's the point of faith?
Indeed. Why expect us to believe something with very little corroboration, rather than making the issue clear and hard to deny?
That is indeed one of my unanswered questions.
--------------------
Might as well ask the bloody cat.
Posts: 17938 | From: Chesterfield | Registered: May 2001
| IP: Logged
|
|
Matt Black
Shipmate
# 2210
|
Posted
Tied up with trust, the bedrock of any true relationship? "Just a suggestion", as they say at Tescos.
--------------------
"Protestant and Reformed, according to the Tradition of the ancient Catholic Church" - + John Cosin (1594-1672)
Posts: 14304 | From: Hampshire, UK | Registered: Jan 2002
| IP: Logged
|
|
Karl: Liberal Backslider
Shipmate
# 76
|
Posted
I have trust in my relationship with Mrs Backslider. I don't have to lie awake at night wondering if she actually exists in order for this to be the case though.
[ 31. January 2013, 11:29: Message edited by: Karl: Liberal Backslider ]
--------------------
Might as well ask the bloody cat.
Posts: 17938 | From: Chesterfield | Registered: May 2001
| IP: Logged
|
|
quetzalcoatl
Shipmate
# 16740
|
Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Karl: Liberal Backslider:
quote:
Originally posted by Matt Black:
That doesn't answer my question: what's the point of faith?
Indeed. Why expect us to believe something with very little corroboration, rather than making the issue clear and hard to deny?
That is indeed one of my unanswered questions.
I think one answer would be that you are required to abandon self, or die to self. If you want stuff to be 'clear and hard to deny' you are implicitly setting up your own self as a tin-pot little god! Then, naturally enough, it denies God, or doubts God, because it is its own god.
Or, in terms of the various Western intellectual traditions, you are beginning with a dualist concept of reality (subject/object dualism), which is fine, but then you are guaranteed to find religion odd, since you are going to reify God as object, which is doomed.
--------------------
I can't talk to you today; I talked to two people yesterday.
Posts: 9878 | From: UK | Registered: Oct 2011
| IP: Logged
|
|
iamchristianhearmeroar
Shipmate
# 15483
|
Posted
The trouble, as I see it, with getting hung up on the issue of hell and ECT is that if I were to believe in that sort of God the result in me would be entirely death-dealing and life-quenching. It would scare me to death - not literal death necessarily (but perhaps) but certainly something approaching spiritual death. My whole focus would be turned inwards with a desperate obsession to ensure that "I was OK" and not going to suffer for ever and ever and bugger everyone else. That attitude would, in any case, probably therefore be self-defeating...
This is also not the life I see being advocated by Jesus in the scriptures. I see in Jesus someone who came that we might have life, life in all its fulness/in eternity/in perpetuity (however you render it). Also someone whose primary teachings seem to be to care for others before yourself and attend to their needs at the expense of yourself. I do not see someone who came to encourage us to be inward-looking death-obsessed people constantly anxious about our eternal destiny, and for that matter people who would write off God's created world as a simple binary soul-sorting process.
Ultimately I think this whole issue comes down to how you would answer the question "Is God violent?".
My own answer to that is "no" and that would characterise how I would approach this whole issue. A non-violent God necessarily cannot tolerate what might be described as a "traditional" view of hell. It does not deny that hell, or something like it, exists, but it would be a very different setup to the Dante's Inferno hell which seems syncretically to have invaded people's reading of the Bible.
YMMV
--------------------
My blog: http://alastairnewman.wordpress.com/
Posts: 642 | From: London, UK | Registered: Feb 2010
| IP: Logged
|
|
Evensong
Shipmate
# 14696
|
Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Karl: Liberal Backslider:
I have trust in my relationship with Mrs Backslider. I don't have to lie awake at night wondering if she actually exists in order for this to be the case though.
Just extend that metaphor when thinking of God.
Ask it of life.
The most important decision we make is whether we believe we live in a friendly or hostile universe.
-Einstein.
Same thing.
[ 31. January 2013, 11:40: Message edited by: Evensong ]
--------------------
a theological scrapbook
Posts: 9481 | From: Australia | Registered: Apr 2009
| IP: Logged
|
|
Matt Black
Shipmate
# 2210
|
Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Karl: Liberal Backslider:
I have trust in my relationship with Mrs Backslider. I don't have to lie awake at night wondering if she actually exists in order for this to be the case though.
At the risk of getting all po-mo on yo ass, how do you know she exists?
[ 31. January 2013, 11:43: Message edited by: Matt Black ]
--------------------
"Protestant and Reformed, according to the Tradition of the ancient Catholic Church" - + John Cosin (1594-1672)
Posts: 14304 | From: Hampshire, UK | Registered: Jan 2002
| IP: Logged
|
|
Karl: Liberal Backslider
Shipmate
# 76
|
Posted
Evensong - I understand all the individual words in that post, but as a whole they convey absolutely bugger all to me.
Quetz - we've been here before. But it's still a Catch-22 - how can I die to self for the sake of this God before I know he's real and therefore it's worth doing? I cannot get a handle on this sort of "never mind about whether it's real or not" thinking. If God requires that, then he's a priori rejected me, because I'm not capable of operating in that way.
--------------------
Might as well ask the bloody cat.
Posts: 17938 | From: Chesterfield | Registered: May 2001
| IP: Logged
|
|
Karl: Liberal Backslider
Shipmate
# 76
|
Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Matt Black:
quote:
Originally posted by Karl: Liberal Backslider:
I have trust in my relationship with Mrs Backslider. I don't have to lie awake at night wondering if she actually exists in order for this to be the case though.
At the risk of getting all po-mo on yo ass, how do you know she exists?
I have sufficient physical evidence of her that it would be a perverse conclusion to decide she didn't. Would that that were so of God, but it isn't.
--------------------
Might as well ask the bloody cat.
Posts: 17938 | From: Chesterfield | Registered: May 2001
| IP: Logged
|
|
Evensong
Shipmate
# 14696
|
Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Matt Black:
At the risk of getting all po-mo on yo ass, how do you know she exists?
That's a terrible use of pomo on yo assness dude. ![[Paranoid]](graemlins/paranoid.gif)
quote:
Originally posted by Karl: Liberal Backslider:
Evensong - I understand all the individual words in that post, but as a whole they convey absolutely bugger all to me.
Don't worry about it.
It was either pure genius or utter crap. I can't quite decide myself.
quote:
Originally posted by Karl: Liberal Backslider:
I cannot get a handle on this sort of "never mind about whether it's real or not" thinking. If God requires that, then he's a priori rejected me, because I'm not capable of operating in that way.
Viola!
If God would condemn such an honest one to eternal torment, she would be entirely unjust and in contradiction with the scriptures.
You'll be right mate. ![[Biased]](wink.gif)
--------------------
a theological scrapbook
Posts: 9481 | From: Australia | Registered: Apr 2009
| IP: Logged
|
|
quetzalcoatl
Shipmate
# 16740
|
Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Karl: Liberal Backslider:
Evensong - I understand all the individual words in that post, but as a whole they convey absolutely bugger all to me.
Quetz - we've been here before. But it's still a Catch-22 - how can I die to self for the sake of this God before I know he's real and therefore it's worth doing? I cannot get a handle on this sort of "never mind about whether it's real or not" thinking. If God requires that, then he's a priori rejected me, because I'm not capable of operating in that way.
I'm not saying that God requires that. I wouldn't know. It's just the way it seems to operate.
But I agree with your last point, and I often puzzle over this. Many people don't want to 'die to self', or feel unable, so what about that?
Well, it is a puzzle, and it stops me going senile, having something like to chew over in my dotage.
When I used to do meditation groups, I would usually get in the groove straight away, and get a lot out of it, but others didn't, and that puzzled me as well. But I realized one day they are different from me!
As she said, viola!
[ 31. January 2013, 11:58: Message edited by: quetzalcoatl ]
--------------------
I can't talk to you today; I talked to two people yesterday.
Posts: 9878 | From: UK | Registered: Oct 2011
| IP: Logged
|
|
Mere Nick
Shipmate
# 11827
|
Posted
I'm planning to get The Fire that Consumes on my kindle.
He seems to sum it up in this lecture but would like to read his detailed study.
I was surprised to learned that a movie called Hell and Mr. Fudge has been made and was well received at the Houston film festival where it was first released.
--------------------
"Well that's it, boys. I've been redeemed. The preacher's done warshed away all my sins and transgressions. It's the straight and narrow from here on out, and heaven everlasting's my reward."
Delmar O'Donnell
Posts: 2797 | From: West Carolina | Registered: Sep 2006
| IP: Logged
|
|
|
|
EtymologicalEvangelical
Shipmate
# 15091
|
Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Karl: Liberal Backslider
quote:
Originally posted by Matt Black:
That doesn't answer my question: what's the point of faith?
Indeed. Why expect us to believe something with very little corroboration, rather than making the issue clear and hard to deny?
That is indeed one of my unanswered questions.
I rather like what William Paley wrote:
quote:
Of a revelation which really came from God, the proof, it has been said, would in all ages be so public and manifest, that no part of the human species would remain ignorant of it, no understanding could fail of being convinced by it.
The advocates of Christianity do not pretend that the evidence of their religion possesses these qualities.
...
What would be the real effect of that overpowering evidence which our adversaries require in a revelation, it is difficult to foretell; at least, we must speak of it as of a dispensation, of which we have no experience. Some consequences however would, it is probable, attend this economy, which do not seem to befit a revelation that proceeded from God. One is, that irresistible proof would restrain the voluntary powers too much; would not answer the purpose of trial and probation; would call for no exercise of candour, seriousness, humility, enquiry; no submission of passions, interests, and prejudices, to moral evidence and to probable truth; no habits of reflection; none of that previous desire to learn, and to obey the will of God, which forms perhaps the test of the virtuous principle, and which induces men to attend, with care and reverence, to every credible intimation of that will, and to resign present advantages and present pleasures to every reasonable expectation of propitiating his favour.
(Evidences of Christianity, Part 3, Chapter 6).
In short, irresistible evidence would undermine free will.
However, I admit that there is a problem with this. If eternal torture in hell is the consequence of people exercising their free will, such that they choose one course rather than the other, then, in what sense, does God respect their freedom? It would be no different from a torturer telling a victim that he respects his freedom to keep silent, but if he does so he will waterboard him, electrocute him, beat him or worse. In any human system of justice, this practice would be termed coercion.
But I can see Paley's point. Just as science would be redundant (and therefore the joy of scientific inquiry and discovery would be impossible) if every human being instinctively at birth knew everything about the universe, so spiritual inquiry would be redundant if God provided incontrovertible evidence for his existence and the truth of His ways. The problem comes when people fail to draw the right conclusions. But how can they be blamed for so doing, if the truth was so elusive anyway?
I am fast coming to the view that the biblical doctrine of hell is actually a description of some form of purgatory. I am aware that there are verses that speak of the finality and permanence of hell, and I wouldn't mind discussing those at some point (maybe in Kerygmania). But I cannot ignore the truth that "God's mercy endures forever" and "mercy triumphs over judgment". I cannot ignore the fact that "God desires all people to be saved and come to the knowledge of the truth" and my puzzlement as to why an eternal God would limit the pursuance of this desire to a very confused, difficult, dangerous and, of course, finite period of life on planet earth. Why is it that God's desire to save operates in a limited environment, and yet his 'desire' to condemn operates in an eternal environment? That does not make sense to me. It would appear that God's desire to condemn is infinitely greater than his desire to save.
Furthermore, we have been led to believe that there are two sides to the "salvation equation": what God has done in Christ through the cross, on the one hand, and our response to it, on the other. The latter is as important as the former. If the latter side of the equation is missing, then the former becomes inefficacious.
Now, as a Christian, I certainly believe that God has attended to the first part of the equation with complete and total commitment: He sent His own Son to die, and since the Son only does what He sees His Father do (as the Bible says), then all of God suffered on the cross. The cross is a revelation of the wholehearted commitment of God to our salvation.
But if the second part of the equation is necessary, then, presumably God would be as committed to the success of it, as to the first part. But this does not appear to be the case! What we see is this: millions of people living and dying before the advent of Christ; millions living in countries completely closed to the communication of the gospel; millions rejecting the gospel because the Church has abused them or preached a distorted message to them; millions in countries where there is a huge disincentive to responding to the Christian message, because of the fear, not only of personal torture and death, but also the torture and murder of one's own relatives; millions who cannot be expected to respond to the gospel, because understandably they wish to be faithful to the viewpoint they were brought up to believe ("honour your father and mother" is, after all, a biblical injunction!), millions being incapable of responding due to mental incapacity, and so on...
Surely a commitment to salvation would necessitate giving every single human being overwhelming opportunity to respond to the gospel message!!
The only logical conclusion that I can draw is this: the second part of the equation is not as important as the first. I have to assume that God sees 'response' in a radically different way to the way so many Christians see it. There is considerable latitude when it comes to human opinions. Response to the gospel is not a simple matter of subscribing to a neat set of doctrines. God sees the heart, and can apply the first part of the equation in situations that appear to have nothing to do with formal Christianity.
I guess this probably makes me a heretic. I really don't care. Frankly, I am more interested in truth.
--------------------
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
| IP: Logged
|
|
Enoch
Shipmate
# 14322
|
Posted
Quite a good test of anyone's presentation of the Christian message is, 'is this good news?'.
Obviously Amos Starkadder's "you're all damned" fails that test. So does anything that tells you, you need to be somewhere else to receive it - whether it's, come the revolution, married to someone else, or have got a PhD. Likewise the bland, anything that produces a 'so what' reaction, like 'the world would be a better place if we were all nice to each other'.
--------------------
Brexit wrexit - Sir Graham Watson
Posts: 7610 | From: Bristol UK(was European Green Capital 2015, now Ljubljana) | Registered: Nov 2008
| IP: Logged
|
|
Adeodatus
Shipmate
# 4992
|
Posted
quote:
Originally posted by IngoB:
And please, spare me any cries of "I'd rather burn in hell for eternity than living with such a monster of God." This is either totally hypocritical bullshit based on the firm belief that hell does not exist (it is easy to be heroic about non-existent threats), or it is a statement of fact, which really doesn't change anything.
It doesn't quite work like that. For some people, the thought of spending eternity worshipping the monster-God is hell. It's 1984's Room 101 made eternal.
--------------------
"What is broken, repair with gold."
Posts: 9779 | From: Manchester | Registered: Sep 2003
| IP: Logged
|
|
Matt Black
Shipmate
# 2210
|
Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Karl: Liberal Backslider:
quote:
Originally posted by Matt Black:
quote:
Originally posted by Karl: Liberal Backslider:
I have trust in my relationship with Mrs Backslider. I don't have to lie awake at night wondering if she actually exists in order for this to be the case though.
At the risk of getting all po-mo on yo ass, how do you know she exists?
I have sufficient physical evidence of her that it would be a perverse conclusion to decide she didn't.
What physical evidence?
--------------------
"Protestant and Reformed, according to the Tradition of the ancient Catholic Church" - + John Cosin (1594-1672)
Posts: 14304 | From: Hampshire, UK | Registered: Jan 2002
| IP: Logged
|
|
Karl: Liberal Backslider
Shipmate
# 76
|
Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Matt Black:
quote:
Originally posted by Karl: Liberal Backslider:
quote:
Originally posted by Matt Black:
quote:
Originally posted by Karl: Liberal Backslider:
I have trust in my relationship with Mrs Backslider. I don't have to lie awake at night wondering if she actually exists in order for this to be the case though.
At the risk of getting all po-mo on yo ass, how do you know she exists?
I have sufficient physical evidence of her that it would be a perverse conclusion to decide she didn't.
What physical evidence?
Matt; this really isn't going anywhere. The simple fact is that I am for all intents and purposes convinced of Mrs KLB's existence, and not of God's. If you're really going to try to convince me that my higher level of confidence in one over the other is not rational then you're getting pretty desperate.
I'm not playing this silly game.
--------------------
Might as well ask the bloody cat.
Posts: 17938 | From: Chesterfield | Registered: May 2001
| IP: Logged
|
|
quetzalcoatl
Shipmate
# 16740
|
Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Karl: Liberal Backslider:
I like violas, but I prefer 'cellos.
And it would be difficult to reverse that, wouldn't it? I suppose it could be done via brain-washing.
But I see the same problem with religion - I don't see how I can choose not to believe what I do believe, or to not resonate with what I do resonate. Therefore, those who simply don't believe, or don't resonate, cannot change this. Why should they be punished for this? For not trying hard enough?
--------------------
I can't talk to you today; I talked to two people yesterday.
Posts: 9878 | From: UK | Registered: Oct 2011
| IP: Logged
|
|
Matt Black
Shipmate
# 2210
|
Posted
Karl, I don't see it as silly at all; for me (at least), it is germane to the issue. You are placing trust in your physical senses and the evidence which you perceive they communicate, without knowing for sure that this is indeed trustworthy, as opposed, say, to your existing in a Matrix-style virtual reality. The fact that the level of faith you have to exercise the trust in the physical is lower (far lower maybe) than that in the metaphysical does not negate that there is a continuum between the two.
--------------------
"Protestant and Reformed, according to the Tradition of the ancient Catholic Church" - + John Cosin (1594-1672)
Posts: 14304 | From: Hampshire, UK | Registered: Jan 2002
| IP: Logged
|
|
Karl: Liberal Backslider
Shipmate
# 76
|
Posted
There's a continuum between the likelihood of my own physical existence and the likelihood of the existence of the Flying Spaghetti Monster, but continuum does not imply equivalence.
But that's hardly the point. The fact is I do have evidence of the existence of Mrs Backslider, and I have nothing even remotely analogous for the existence of God. I have hope, wishful thinking and a few questionable experiences open to equally viable explanations other than the existence of God.
[ 31. January 2013, 14:43: Message edited by: Karl: Liberal Backslider ]
--------------------
Might as well ask the bloody cat.
Posts: 17938 | From: Chesterfield | Registered: May 2001
| IP: Logged
|
|
|
Printer-friendly view
