Christianity and Sin

What part of "I don't accept that premise" didn't you understand? I don't think God did give us free will.

There is more than one way to conceptualize God, you know.

And that question is not relevant to anything I was saying. You are trying to steer the conversation well away from the topic I was addressing and drag me along with it.

edited 15th Sep '11 7:26:44 PM by Karalora

edited 10th Jan '13 8:39:53 AM by JosefBugman

Because you were about as clear as mud, Kara. We can run through several more pages of why or why not God gave us free will, if God even did, but what your reason for believing you don't have free will?

Okay, Josef, similar to the whole thing with why God made the universe as is, I don't believe we'll get anywhere if God just does stuff. If we can at least try to fit a reason, we'll have a relative point to jump off of.

edited 15th Sep '11 7:29:52 PM by Ramus

The emotions of others can seem like such well guarded mysteries, people 8egin to 8elieve that's how their own emotions should 8e treated.

I never said I don't think we have free will. Why do you keep demanding I justify things I haven't said?

So, gee, God didn't give us free will, but we have free will? Anything else you'd like to tell us or do I have to keep being asked why I'm demanding answers from you with legit questions?

The emotions of others can seem like such well guarded mysteries, people 8egin to 8elieve that's how their own emotions should 8e treated.

edited 10th Jan '13 8:44:03 AM by JosefBugman

You do realize then that you're approaching a theological topic without the necessary mindset or tools then, right?

The emotions of others can seem like such well guarded mysteries, people 8egin to 8elieve that's how their own emotions should 8e treated.

edited 10th Jan '13 8:47:22 AM by JosefBugman

You do realize that the one shared definition of God between all Christian sects is that God "Is", right?

The emotions of others can seem like such well guarded mysteries, people 8egin to 8elieve that's how their own emotions should 8e treated.

Or you could create the Garden of Eden(without the snake, or the Upgrade Artifact apples).

If I had that kind of power and wanted to completely avoid being an asshole, I'd come up with something to do that didn't involve creating anything with the capacity to suffer. Though I'm currently on the fence about whether there's a meaningful difference between a philosophical zombie and actual sentience, I figure omnipotence would allow me to resolve that. That's not to say that I'd necessarily create any organisms in the first place. I might just spend forever lucid dreaming, or opt to wink out of existence.

But if I didn't care that much about the asshole bit and just wanted to entertain myself, then I suppose I might create a universe somewhat like the one we live in now, except to make it more interesting, I might speed up the development of interstellar travel and tweak the laws of physics to allow for superpowers. I'd be a selfish prick, but there are still some things I find too repugnant to do. There wouldn't be any salvation, damnation, commandments, demands of worship or sacrifice, and I might even go so far as to make adjustments to the brain-analogues of the creatures I'd create so as to lower or eliminate their susceptibility to superstition, and thus the chance of becoming hosts to the religion meme. If they're going to suffer for my amusement, I'd rather the stakes of their conflicts be based in the empirical world. The only laws I would institute would be physical laws. And I'm leaning towards Cessation of Existence. Oh, and I wouldn't claim to be moral or benevolent.\\
That's all assuming that in this scenario, my mind works like it does now— i.e. for some bizarre reason, I have human psychology, and no more imagination than I do now. Without that assumption, I couldn't answer the question, since my hypothetical self would be more akin to a post-singularity AI or a Starfish Alien than to me.

Then IMO, that would mean we've chosen God Is Evil.

edited 10th Jan '13 8:47:30 AM by JosefBugman

That is correct. You're getting better at this!

I can't parse the second half of that, so I'll address the first half.

Is there anything else you want to know about me, religiously speaking?

Yes, Kara, lay out all of your beliefs so I don't have to keep asking.

And Tongpu, I'm pretty sure we can throw both of your answers out the window since one, we feel more than just contentment in this life and two, accepting the Christian premises of this stuff means that you've already forgot about Heaven and Hell among other things in there.

The emotions of others can seem like such well guarded mysteries, people 8egin to 8elieve that's how their own emotions should 8e treated.

All of my beliefs are none of your goddamn business. I'm an agnostic Neopagan with a relentlessly scientific mind. I was raised Christian. I left the church in my late teens, when it became clear that the deity being worshipped there didn't want anything to do with me. After leaving, I finally found God. That's the extent of my religion that is germane to this discussion.

edited 15th Sep '11 8:01:51 PM by Karalora

@Kara

The way you said it, you seem to have rejected God first.

"Dr. Strangeloid, or How I Learned To Stop Worrying And Love The Cleanlink" - thespacephantom

Then either leave this topic or accept the basic premises that we're discussing this stuff within some Christian canon, as of right now, the Catholic canon. You're allowed to discuss your feelings on matter of sin and how it's handled in Catholicism (or other sects) but right now, you're playing painfully passive aggressive, making lots of noise, and not really adding anything to the discussion by withholding information and then chiding me and probably other users for asking.

The emotions of others can seem like such well guarded mysteries, people 8egin to 8elieve that's how their own emotions should 8e treated.

Oh, please, how would you know? You weren't there and I didn't give any details.

And I have been. I just don't like having the subject changed on me and being saddled with a demand that I accept everyone else's terms. I'm not going to justify the Christian Doctrine of Free Will—I'm not Christian and I think said doctrine is false.

You've done much less asking than assuming. Not my fault if your assumptions turn out to be frustratingly incorrect.

Okay, well I tried my luck with an honest answer. I don't have any other idea as to how to answer your question, so I'll leave it to someone else to figure that out.

The topic of this thread is the concept of Sin within Christianity.

Not what you think of Christianity on general, Not what you think of the overall concept of sin. Not how wrong you think Christianity is.

Locking for a minimum of 24 hours for a cool down and to give me time to thump the off-topic stuff.

...if you don’t love you’re dead, and if you do, they’ll kill you for it.