The Christianity Thread

"I’m not sure what linking an article that talks about how the Catholic Church views Hell is really establishing here."

It's establishing that, if you want to be anal about the doctrine, the Church laws are applicable to everyone. Although, if I'm understanding you correctly, most believers are as loose about thinking that their dogmata are universal as they are about condom usage, which I have absolutely no problem with.

Christians seem to expect that the vast majority of humanity is going to Hell, fellow Christians or not

Indeed. Broad is the way, after all.

Hell in the Bible is used as an example for people who actively commit sin, not really for unbelievers. Not that “Hell” is actually found in any of the original texts, since it’s a amalgamation of about three of four different words.

And, well, would it be just for typical humans to go to eternal bliss without repenting?

"Above all these numerous animal species is placed man, whose destructive hand spares no living thing; he kills to eat, he kills for clothing, he kills for adornment, he kills to attack, he kills to defend himself, he kills for instruction, he kills for amusement, he kills for killing's sake: a proud and terrible king, he needs everything, and nothing can withstand him. He knows how many barrels of oil he can get from the head of a shark or a whale; in his museums, he mounts with his sharp pins elegant butterflies he has caught in flight on the top of Mount Blanc or Chimborazo; he stuffs the crocodile and embalms the hummingbird; on his command, the rattlesnake dies in preserving fluids to keep it intact for a long line of observers. The horse carrying its master to the tiger hunt struts about covered by the skin of this same animal. At one and the same time, man takes from the lamb its entrails for harp strings, from the whale its bones to stiffen the corsets of the young girl, from the wolf its most murderous tooth to polish frivolous manufactures, from the elephant its tusks to make a child's toy: his dining table is covered with corpses. The philosopher can even discern how this permanent carnage is provided for and ordained in the whole scheme of things. But without doubt this law will not stop at man. Yet what being is to destroy him who destroys all else? Man! It is man himself who is charged with butchering man.

But how is he to accomplish this law who is a moral and merciful being, who is born to love, who cries for others as for himself, who finds pleasure in weeping to the extent of creating fictions to make himself weep, to whom finally it has been said that whoever sheds blood unjustly will redeem it with the last drop of his own? It is war that accomplishes this decree. ... Have you never noticed that no one ever disobeys on the field of death? They might well slaughter a Nerva or a Henry IV, but they will never say, even to the most abominable tyrant or the most flagrant butcher of human flesh, We no longer want to follow you. A revolt on the battlefield, an agreement to unite to repudiate a tyrant is something I cannot remember. Nothing resists, nothing can resist the force that drags man into conflict; an innocent murderer, a passive instrument in a formidable hand, he plunges unseeing into the abyss he himself has dug; he dies without suspecting that it is he himself who has brought about his death."

I think the question was more “would it be just for them to go to eternal torment for not repenting”. Though, I mentioned, the Bible itself doesn’t necessarily endorse this point of view. Church doctrines could be another matter entirely.

The Bible itself doesn't endorse anything one way or another. It's a series of stories and poems written over the course of centuries by dozens of people, few of whom knew each other. It's so full of contradictions, vague statements and even absurdities that you can use it to justify pretty much anything. And people do. Every Christian that I know who sees a part of the Bible that they don't like will interpret the passage to mean whatever they want, or discard it altogether.

Christians don't regard the Bible as an authority. They may claim to, but really they use the Bible as a tool to back up whatever doctrine they have already chosen to believe.

Infinite punishment for finite crime would be Disproportionate Retribution. But it's important to also look at the flip side: how just is infinite bliss for unrepentant mass killers?

edited 25th Oct '11 11:29:56 AM by Rottweiler

Christians: their offend their own religion better than anyone else

Anyways, on the "gays r ebil u must kill dem bwah!" pseudo-debate:

http://inspiredcreativity.deviantart.com/art/New-Testament-Homosexuality-155041403?q=gallery%3Ainspiredcreativity%2F6202302&qo=25

http://inspiredcreativity.deviantart.com/art/Old-Testament-Homosexuality-155369784?q=gallery%3Ainspiredcreativity%2F6202302&qo=26

Those essays above settle this debate. Anyone trying to beat the dead horse more is doing naught but wasting their time and making their religion look even worse.

God punishing anybody at all is Disproportionate Retribution. Retribution implies that the person harmed retaliates against the one who harms him. But if you have an immortal, omnipotent God, then it literally cannot be harmed.

The crime is really just disobedience. "Do what I say or I punish you." Punishing somebody for disobeying you rather than harming you isn't retribution, it's just being a bully.

edited 25th Oct '11 11:42:09 AM by Lawyerdude

I was speaking with my dad yesterday and brought up that general point. Essentially he said that any sin has eternal consequences. I think he was brushing aside my argument because for some Christians do not judge right and wrong in terms of harm and benefit, but on what "god says"

More or less his answer to the problem of evil was "evil is what is contrary to God's nature", and that we do not have free will to sin, but to "love god".

edited 25th Oct '11 11:49:08 AM by jasonwill2

You’re oversimplifying centuries of theological discussions, discoveries, changes to church doctrine, etc… Things like “contradictions” are taken rather serious by many Christians, and have been addressed. The major churches certainly didn't arrive at their doctrine by thinking up what sounded good to them and figuring out how the Bible supports that view. Verses are also still subject to context of surrounding verses, vocabulary, and potentially historical insights regarding what something actually means.

Some Christians do pull out a random verse of some sort to make a point. This is a favored tactic of the Westboro Baptisit Church, but often other Christians will reject these interpretations once a verse is under more scrutiny.

That suggests there are only two options here, though. The idea that punishment for sinners and rewards for the devout is suggested does not mean that everyone falls into either of those categories.

So purgatory could exist and not contradict the Bible?

Purgatory is mostly a Catholic concept as far as I understand it, so it pretty much HAS to not contradict the Bible. This doesn’t mean it enjoys great scriptural support, though.

My intention wasn’t necessarily to show that purgatory is a viable option (I admit it is the logical direction to end in when Taking a Third Option between Heaven and Hell) but more just to show that some sort of third option is viable from a Christian understanding.

I suppose purgatory does help to show that much, at least.

edited 25th Oct '11 12:12:10 PM by Justice4243

But wasn't that exactly how they came up with the Biblical canon in the first place? There were a bunch of books that were left out because they didn't fit in with what they wanted the Bible to say. The early church leaders picked the books that fit their beliefs, and said "This goes in, that goes out." The Bible was constructed to fit the agenda at the time.

A lot of fundamentalists will say that it was always god's word and it was accepted by the Christians minus the gnostic people since the day it was written.

A fact that I find to be gloriously ironic, since many fundamentalist Protestants are adamantly anti-Catholic. They subscribe to a bizarre form of sola scriptura while at the same time opposing the institution that was responsible for deciding what was scripture in the first place.

The process of what books got canonized was a long process taking place over a few centuries and involving the confirmation that scriptures where actually originally composed by the authors they were attributed to. The idea that the early church “cherry picked” or even simply “where divinely guided” to the correct books does not seem to match historical records on the matter.

Whether correct or not in all cases, early Church leaders did seem to legitimately believe they had found authentic, firsthand accounts of the material covered in much of the New Testament.

edited 25th Oct '11 3:14:01 PM by Justice4243

To Rott, I think it could be just. Justice for the crimes of humanity on Earth is delivered by humans. I would think that God has different standards and such, given how insignificant our actions here would be in the face of an infinite afterlife.

Dear God this Thread Hop left me with a migraine. Theology is complex.

I think I agree with Carciofus in that sexual 'sins' shouldn't really be considered all that worse than other ones. If you take the view that using contraception in sex is bad because it is misusing the pleasure that was God's gift, then... surely I, too, am doing the same thing when I buy a chocolate bar that I didn't really need instead of putting that $2-50 towards something more worthwhile? I have sinned about once a week for the past few months, then.

That's very true. If you Google "other six deadly sins", you can read a great essay/speech Dorothy L Sayers gave about this.

Wouldn't that fall under Gluttony?

No. Gluttony isn't indulging your self in a small way once in a while. And most branches of Christianity don't consider that it's sinful to give yourself something you enjoy once in a while. Gluttony comes into play when Food takes center stage in your life. Small treats become a problem when they're no longer occasional or no longer small. Christianity is not generally a religion that endorses extreme asceticism.

I have not been a Christian for some time, and looking on it now I find the religion somewhere between quaint and terrifying.

Perhaps I'm just a rebellious teen, but I find the concept of a God that would eternally damn anyone* both utterly alien and utterly horrifying. You might as well be worshipping Cthulu at that point.

*

As for homosexuality, I again find any God that would persecute someone for loving someone else to not be a god that I'd want to worship.