Different Tan
Jan. 29th, 2005 11:21 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
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ladysisyphus writes about why she is a Christian even though she cannot say unequivocally that Jesus Christ is her Lord and Saviour, which, as we all know, is the litmus of such things. People who thought that the Jerry Springer entry was intended to imply that I believed all American Christians were nutters, take note: there is at least one who is not. andrewducker says what I'd have said about truth and facts, in a conversation which reminds me of those I've had with cathedral_life.People who read Hebrew might want to have a look at the huge thread on Creationism that developed under my post here, since some of it relies on what I suspect are standard Creationist assertions about the Hebrew used in Genesis. Or you might not: after I while, I learned to avoid the Creationism threads on uk.r.c, only popping out occasionally to ambush people with physics.
There are more photos of the musicals party, to add to bluap's. My camera's rubbish in low light, alas.
Random Flash linkage: To Kill A Mockingbird, Numa Numa. Been doing the rounds, but I mention it in case you've not seen it.
Update: I got a comment from someone recommending the CICCU mission talks this year (which have now been and gone). This has started a debate on whether God is just. Read all about it in the comments inside.
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Re: This year's CICCU Main Event - DIRECTION
Date: 2005-02-08 09:33 pm (UTC)I don't think by love I mean what you mean by pure form. I understand your pure form to mean: in the abscence of other emotions/motivations. Would you say that is accurate? If that is the case, your reasoning stands.
My issue (which was the point of how emotions result in actions) is that all we know about God's character is not just his love, but also that he is just, he desires his own glory, etc..
First I would say that emotions (I want a better word to suggest the more deep-felt emotions which make up our character, rather the fickle emotions which vary from day to day) can easily appear contradictory without being so. The obvious example being how it is possible to both love and hate someone. (Has often been said how the opposite of love is indifference, not hate).
I would then think about how these result in action. I would say God's intellect works from these complex motivations to form actions. He uses his wisdom to harmonize these motivations and form effective choices, his actions.
This is my model of how a mind works. So I would agree you contradiction stands if we have love by itself, in its "pure form". But I would say this is not the case with God. He does have a genuine, universal, love. And also has a desire for justice, amongst other things, which is why what we don't get the actions we would expect if he had just that love.
God does not have that right, or at least not an unqualified right.
!!! On what basis would you qualify God's right about anything?
If he stands in relation to us as a parent to a child,
I should probably say that I don't think he does stand in relation to you as a parent to a child. That's the relationship between God, the Father, and the Christian.
As I said, it's about proportionality. We recognise that some people escape punishment for their crimes in this life, and so some kind of court in an afterlife is not necessarily immoral. However, evangelical Christianity posits that we are all guilty, another point I'd disagree with.
Hummmm. Depends what the crime being punished is. I'm guessing you're not too bothered about sins against God?
So if God appears to you (or sends an angel, perhaps) and tells you to go on a killing spree or similar, in an old fashioned OT style, would you do it?
I'm reluctant to say what I would do in situations I've never been even vagualy close to. But what I can do is affirm that when God commanded Abraham to sacrifice his son, Abraham was right to obey. I would like to say my faith was strong enough for me to have done the same, but as I said I am reluctant to do so, never having had it be tested in such a way.
Re: This year's CICCU Main Event - DIRECTION
Date: 2005-02-09 12:23 am (UTC)That's not quite what I was getting at. I was thinking of the different kinds of love (as explored in C.S. Lewis's book, say), and thinking about the kind of love which was the selfless, charitable kind, rather than the kind which included in it a desire to possess, say.
[God] also has a desire for justice, amongst other things, which is why what we don't get the actions we would expect if he had just that love.
I think I'm starting to see the point made by Wednesday in her article, where she writes that Christians use the word justice in a way which is quite alien to how most people understand it. The "justice" of God seems more like bullying: demanding worship and perfection from people who cannot match up to his ideals, and taking his wrath out against the wrong person (ignoring for a moment that that person is also supposed to be God).
!!! On what basis would you qualify God's right about anything?
On the basis of my own moral sense. What else do you do? Even if you truly have abdicated this in favour of the belief that whatever God says (or rather whatever the evangelical interpretation of the Bible says) goes, you must at some stage have considered whether God was someone you wanted to know, which in part must mean someone good.
I also believe that God should be at least as good as he expects his followers to be, so in a sense I'm against hypocrisy on his part.
I should probably say that I don't think he does stand in relation to you as a parent to a child. That's the relationship between God, the Father, and the Christian.
In John's "children of God" sense, yes, but in the wider sense of someone who, we are told, created and sustains us, this includes everyone. As some of your own poets have said, "We are his offspring." Paul is not addressing Christians here. Parents as creators have a responsibility to, as well as an authority over, their creations. We do not consider a parent moral if the child disobeys them and then they shove the child in the oven.
Depends what the crime being punished is. I'm guessing you're not too bothered about sins against God?
I am puzzled by the concept of sins against God's person, since God as portrayed by Christianity cannot be hurt by our actions. I can understand sins against goodness, but crucially I do not believe a failure to become a Christian is such a sin.
I would like to say my faith was strong enough for me to have done the same, but as I said I am reluctant to do so, never having had it be tested in such a way.
In a way, I hope your faith would not be strong enough. One of the most worrying things about religion is its capacity for making people think that hurting others is OK because God has said so.
Re: This year's CICCU Main Event - DIRECTION
Date: 2005-02-09 05:13 pm (UTC)Have read her article, she does have a point that the common understanding today is different to the Christian use, but the other guy is right that this is quite a recent development. Also I think the definition has been changing recently as people move away from the "1960s liberal consensus" (http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/3905547.stm)
Let me explain. I think an important feature of the Christian view of justice is that wrongdoing demands punishment. At the end of the last century the view of justice has changed to focus on rehabilitation and prevention and the cause of crime. Now people have realised that there are problems with this and are moving back towards an understanding of justice which seeks to punish wrongdoing again as well. Or maybe I am reading too much into the current political rhetoric.
Another issue is the basis on which we are judge (re: sins again God), hopefully will write more on that when I get a chance.
Re: This year's CICCU Main Event - DIRECTION
Date: 2005-02-19 02:00 am (UTC)I don't think that either Wednesday or I are saying that people who commit crimes should go unpunished, though. Rather, we're talking about the requirements of what I'd call justice, namely that the punishment be proportionate to the crime and that the person punished should actually be guilty of something. Neither of these requirements seem to be to be ridiculous liberal myths.
Re: This year's CICCU Main Event - DIRECTION
Date: 2005-02-19 10:32 am (UTC)Anyway, it's good to hear that you do think wrongdoing should be punished. I would say that there are people who would disagree, who I was evidently incorrectly grouping you with. (Was recently discussing justice with a doctor who was of the opinion that in was unjust to imprison Harrold Shipman, this was just pandering to our irrational human emotional desire to punish. Rather that removing his medical licence was all justice required as this would prevent further crimes as he showed no risks of harming people other than his patients.)
1) What are we guilty of? Rejecting God. The person who created us and sustains us. What limit would you put on the punishment for such a crime? If God is of "infinite" worth, an "infinite" punishment would be proportionate. What other punishment would you put on this? (I'm slightly cautious about the use of the word "infinite" as to me it implicitly implies some sort of scale we are measuring these things on, which I'm not entirely convinced is helpful)
2) How are we found guilty? (I think this has the more interesting answer). We are judged on the basis of how we respond to the revealed will of God. Clearly not everyone has the same degree of knowledge of God's will, this will be taken into account. Someone like yourself who has had the privelege of hearing God's word taught will be judged more harshly than someone who hasn't. But even he who has never heard God's word still has God revealing his law to them through their consciences (I'm thinking Romans 2) which gives them ideas of right and wrong. So when the person who has never heard anything else from God does what their conscience tells them is wrong they are still rejecting God's will. So on the basis can be found guilty.
Do you think this is a fair basis to judge people without any other revelation? What their own consciences tell them is right and wrong (which they use to judge other people in this world)?
Re: This year's CICCU Main Event - DIRECTION
Date: 2005-02-20 11:57 pm (UTC)What are we guilty of? Rejecting God.
Nope. We're guilty of rejecting what someone else tells us is God. The being himself has not put in an appearance to ask whether we reject him or not. I don't think it's reasonable to expect us to dedicate our lives to an invisible entity because some door-to-door salesmen tell us we ought to. There are lots of gods, and even lots of variants on the Christian God (q.v. recent discussions on
Even if we admit he might exist, EvangelicalChristianGod has a few questions to answer. Just because he's the creator doesn't mean he's allowed to get away with anything. But again, it's worse because he's not actually around to defend himself. I'm sure, what with him being wise and benevolent, that the problems I have could be cleared up after a bit of a chat, and then we could all be friends. This insistence that everyone gambles their eternity on which god really does have the power to send them to Hell is nothing short of silly. It's comically messed up.
Someone like yourself who has had the privelege of hearing God's word taught will be judged more harshly than someone who hasn't.
So what you're saying is that Hank will beat the shit out of me when I leave town unless I kiss his ass? Is he available for chess matches or fiddling competions in an attempt to avert this (you may tell me that's the wrong supernatural being, however, the difference isn't so obvious from where I'm sitting)? How about poker? Erm, ballroom dancing?
To be serious for a moment, my position is that there were some things of value in Christianity, certainly, but that I could not honestly continue in it any longer. Either God values honesty and people who try to do what they think is right, in which case I'm OK anyway, or he doesn't exist, in which case it doesn't matter, or he really is a cosmic jobsworth, in which case he's certainly not deserving of worship.
Do you think this is a fair basis to judge people without any other revelation? What their own consciences tell them is right and wrong (which they use to judge other people in this world)?
I don't think that is fair, because some people are fairly amoral and don't appear to be overly troubled by their consciences, whereas other good people constantly feel they're not good enough. However, I suppose most people think they're basically doing alright, and therefore if your description of how judgement works is true, it is vitally important to shoot missionaries and evangelists on sight. The needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few, as someone once said.
There are also people whose consciences conflict with what you think of as revelation, of course. What are they to do?
Justice
Date: 2005-03-01 12:55 am (UTC)We have different ideas of what justice is, which means clearly we are going to disagree if something is just. So in someways unless we can agree which definitions we should be using there is really not much point in arguing anything from those definitions!
My thinking is that if you are trying to show that what someone believes is inconsistent then you are obliged to work from their definitions. If you are trying to convince someone that your beliefs fit into their view of the world then you have to work with their definitions, or demonstrate that their definitions are wrong.
Looking back at the thread, I think that your arguement is not that I am being inconsistent, but that my beliefs about God's justice don't fit with your view of justice. So I think the way forward is for me to find out what your definition of justice is and try to establish why I think it is wrong.
So, thinking about justice (and using concepts from our justice system as the basis for what is considered just) I think we need to work out which of the following are part of justice:
1) Wrong-doing being punished
2) Ignorance of the law not being an excuse
3) Claiming the devil made me do it (or I guess modern day: I'm genetically predisposed to criminal behaviour) not being an excuse
(Actually I'm particularly interested in what you think about 2, and whether it should be part of our justice system, and why. I will add, that my argument is not, and will not become, that you being ignorant is not an excuse, as I do not think you are ignorant. Just thought when typing that that is part of our justice system, for quite good reasons.)
I think if you do away with 1 you run into big problems deciding what to do about people who commit "crimes of passion" in the heat of the moment, as deterrence and preventing reoffending, rehabilitation become weaker arguements.
I mention 3 as it might be useful to have a view on if issues about God's sovereignty and our responsibility come up later.
On the whole Hank thing, I'm guessing "kiss Hank's ass" is meant to be a witty metaphor for "repent and believe" and "Hank will beat the shit out of me" is describing God's punishment of sin. In which case I would point out that the Christian claim is not that sin is not punished, but that Christians are in union with Christ who faces that punishment for us. (It is important that I mention that we are united with Christ. Otherwise there is the obvious question of how is it just that someone else is punished for what I've done wrong.)
I'm not convinced God turning up for a chat would really make any difference at all. The last time he did we nailed him to a tree! Out of interest, if you were about at the time, witnessing the miracles Jesus did, do you think you would have followed him, or would you have told him his teaching on hell, for example, were wrong and unjust? I think the main thing greater revelation from God does is help people solidfy the positions they are in already.
Not too sure what you mean by cosmic jobsworth...
Oh, and one final comment. God doesn't need anything, he chooses to achieve his purposes through his means of choice.
Oh dear, that was rather more rambly than my usual comment. I guess mainly as I haven't decided what is the best point to argue. My apologies for that.
Meanwhile at some stage I should probably post something about WAP, and how I think using theories which rely on an multiverse of other universes we can never possibly observe is really rather curious from people who say the evidence for God is not enough! But that's for another time.
Re: Justice
Date: 2005-03-01 01:52 pm (UTC)It's a reference to this story, which I found quite amusing.
Will reply to the rest at a later date.
Re: This year's CICCU Main Event - DIRECTION
Date: 2005-02-09 05:20 pm (UTC)Re: This year's CICCU Main Event - DIRECTION
Date: 2005-02-09 05:12 pm (UTC)I think you've missed the point on proportionality.
Whatever sins may have been committed against God they are finite, yet God's punishment of those crimes are infinite. God is not just by any common meaning of the word - no one would consider being burnt alive for an infinite period of time to be a proportional fair punishment for any crime. In this way we can say that the Evangelical god is not just.