The Holy Trinity

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April 21st, 2017 at 3:40:24 PM permalink
Evenbob
Member since: Oct 24, 2012
Threads: 146
Posts: 25010
Quote: FrGamble
I can see God's Providence in the role of Constantine in Church History, but I also see it as the beginning of some of the problems we still suffer from


With growth comes problems. Which would
you rather be part of, some backwater
seldom heard of religion in the Mid East,
or a worldwide organization that has been
a world player for a thousand years. That
what Constantine did for you, what Ray Croc
did for the McDonald brothers.

Quote:
If I am stronger than my neighbor why shouldn't I steal his car and if he gives me a hard time about it why shouldn't I kill him?


Caveman logic. Things changed when we became
tribes and wanderers. We had to learn to get along,
to learn moralistic behavior. It was still very clannish,
the morals only applied to members of your tribe.
Everybody else was fair game. All of this seems so
logical and natural, I don't get where any of it would
supernatural. Humans are social creatures, why
wouldn't we strive to get along. As natural as eating
and sleeping.

Quote:
If you were really interested in real answers you would not put God at the very bottom of the list, nor would you put God at the very top of the list.


That's what science does, it never rules god
out, or anything out. So far the answer to
every question has never been god. But it
still keeps looking.
If you take a risk, you may lose. If you never take a risk, you will always lose.
April 21st, 2017 at 9:43:35 PM permalink
FrGamble
Member since: Oct 24, 2012
Threads: 67
Posts: 7596
Quote: Evenbob
With growth comes problems. Which would
you rather be part of, some backwater
seldom heard of religion in the Mid East,
or a worldwide organization


I believe that while it might have taken a little longer and cost more lives in martyrdom the Catholic Church would be stronger and even wider reaching today if Constantine would not have made it the official religion on the Empire.



Quote:
Caveman logic.


The fact that we think so is refreshing and good to hear. However, if we rejected this strange supernatural morality we all possess we could still live in tribes, communities, and cities it would just be dictatorships and the strong survive and use the weak. We could be social and get along like, at least the strong could. Again the fact that this seems barbaric is a wonderful thing but if you just look at it scientifically and with cold logic you keep coming up with the idea that we should cheat, rob, steal, and dominate if we can. This gift of morality rises from somewhere within us or from outside of us and rejects this "natural" proposition.





Quote:
That's what science does, it never rules god
out, or anything out. So far the answer to
every question has never been god. But it
still keeps looking.


Yes and so should any field of knowledge. Except the other fields of knowledge like philosophy that ask different questions than science ever can or should finds the answer is God in almost every case.
“It is with the smallest brushes that the artist paints the most exquisitely beautiful pictures.” (
April 21st, 2017 at 10:41:03 PM permalink
Evenbob
Member since: Oct 24, 2012
Threads: 146
Posts: 25010
Quote: FrGamble
I believe that while it might have taken a little longer


You have nothing to base that belief
on. It's wishful thinking'

Quote:
if we rejected this strange supernatural morality we all possess


It's NOT supernatural! It's just good old plain
logic. I don't want my neighbor to steal my
pig, so we get together and agree not to
steal each others pigs. We agree that to
live in peace we must follow some rules.
What is supernatural about that. It's just
finding a solution to a problem. I can't
figure out why you would think it's supernatural.
We jump out of airplanes that logically
shouldn't be flying, and float to earth on
wisps of cloth. That should be supernatural.
Telling my kid not to steal another kids lunch
money because it's not fair is just common
sense.

Quote:
like philosophy that ask different questions than science ever can or should finds the answer is God in almost every case.


The answer to every philosophical question is
never god, what the heck are you talking about.
If you take a risk, you may lose. If you never take a risk, you will always lose.
April 21st, 2017 at 11:32:01 PM permalink
Pacomartin
Member since: Oct 24, 2012
Threads: 1068
Posts: 12569
Quote: Evenbob
Horse pucky. The religion owes it success to one man, Constantine. Not to some supernatural spirit.


Constantine's father was responsible for the Great Persecution of Christians at the end of his life. His father tried to wipe out the Christians, but the son still became one.

April 21st, 2017 at 11:49:10 PM permalink
FrGamble
Member since: Oct 24, 2012
Threads: 67
Posts: 7596
Quote: Evenbob
You have nothing to base that belief
on. It's wishful thinking'


Look at every place that the faith spread to and how it took root first in the poor and those without worldly power. It is in these places that the faith is strongest. While the faith in Europe struggles the faith in Africa grows stronger. Look at the places where the faith was persecuted, here too the faith grew quickly and strongly unlike the places where worldly powers accepted and in many cases used the faith for their own designs. History still today shows the true strength of the faith in Christ is found in places like Egypt after the recent attacks on Christians. Worldly power and wealth weakens faith in Jesus Christ it does not strengthen it.



Quote:
Telling my kid not to steal another kids lunch
money because it's not fair is just common
sense.


Again I feel a little like Neitzche telling you this but it is the opposite of common sense. We see all around us in the world of nature the strong taking what they want because they are stronger. If your kid is bigger and stronger and there is no real objective morality than what would be wrong with a culture that supported him taking a weaker child's lunch money? We as humans are unique as we implicitly reject this type of morality as false and wrong. We chose to build our society based on equality and on the care of the less fortunate or those who struggle. This comes not from nature and it goes against what we see in nature. You could say it is above nature aka supernatural.



Quote:
The answer to every philosophical question is
never god, what the heck are you talking about.


I'm talking about the questions that science cannot ask or answer. It is these questions that God always plays a important part of the discussion. Many of them cannot even begin to be answered without first acknowledging the philosophical truth of God's existence.
“It is with the smallest brushes that the artist paints the most exquisitely beautiful pictures.” (
April 22nd, 2017 at 12:24:16 AM permalink
Evenbob
Member since: Oct 24, 2012
Threads: 146
Posts: 25010
Quote: Pacomartin
Constantine's father was responsible for the Great Persecution of Christians at the end of his life. His father tried to wipe out the Christians, but the son still became one.


It's called irony.
If you take a risk, you may lose. If you never take a risk, you will always lose.
April 22nd, 2017 at 12:43:15 AM permalink
Evenbob
Member since: Oct 24, 2012
Threads: 146
Posts: 25010
Quote: FrGamble
Look at every place that the faith spread to


It spread because, after Constantine, it wiped
out every pagan sect and church it came
into contact with and grabbed the property
and converted the members. That's why it
spread, that's an indisputable historical fact.
Or will you argue that also.

Quote:
We see all around us in the world of nature the strong taking what they want because they are stronger.


So you think we can build ships and
cars and planes and invent math and
physics and build atom bombs and
computers and microwaves and
cell phones, but without the help of
the some supernatural force, we
aren't capable of not stealing from
our neighbor or snatching his kids
and selling them? We're so brilliantly
smart we can cure diseases and do
organ transplants and fly to the fricking
moon and back, but we're just too
stupid to figure out on our own that
to get along we must respect the
rights of others? Really? Is this a joke,
are you having me on, as the Brits say?
Why do you sell us so short as a species.

Quote:
I'm talking about the questions that science cannot ask


What questions that science can't ask, I
don't know of any. I know questions they
can't answer yet, I have yet to read them
saying the answer to any of them is god
in the interim.
If you take a risk, you may lose. If you never take a risk, you will always lose.
April 22nd, 2017 at 6:23:09 PM permalink
FrGamble
Member since: Oct 24, 2012
Threads: 67
Posts: 7596
Quote: Evenbob
It spread because, after Constantine, it wiped
out every pagan sect and church it came
into contact with and grabbed the property
and converted the members. That's why it
spread, that's an indisputable historical fact.


I'm glad you see the problem that arises when religion partners up with military or worldly power. This is also the history of Islam. The faith always does best as it did in its beginning three centuries when it was poor and persecuted. During these times it not only spreads but is really accepted by people based not on what is popular or who has the power but rather because of its beauty and its truth. You are of course wrong in your view of history because you extrapolate what happened in the Roman Empire with every missionary adventure. You might have seen the movie Silence and seen that the faith spread to Japan and Asia not through wiping anyone out or grabbing property. That was a story of martyrs, same thing in India, and in Africa where the Church continues to grow. The European exploration that brought along missionaries was not on the Church's part a plan to wipe out peoples and take their land. These things did happen, but could not have happened without the power of the world corrupting missionary activity (and disease, which I don't think was anyone intention).




Quote:
So you think we can build ships and
cars and planes and invent math and
physics and build atom bombs and
computers and microwaves and
cell phones, but without the help of
the some supernatural force, we
aren't capable of not stealing from
our neighbor or snatching his kids
and selling them?


Yes, these are two very different things. Why do you keep bringing up inventing the wheel or skydiving? These don't have anything to say about morality. They are also not supernatural. They are taking natural laws and such and using them to our advantage. When we are talking about morality we are talking about something that is not found in nature, something we create out of nothing, something above nature or supernatural. I hope you see this distinction.


Quote:
but we're just too
stupid to figure out on our own that
to get along we must respect the
rights of others? Really? Is this a joke,
are you having me on, as the Brits say?
Why do you sell us so short as a species.


Our brilliance is not found in going to the moon, as awesome as that is. The true human brilliance is to reject the natural law of survival of the fittest and might means right. You can claim that this is just because of the size of our brains, but that is just silly. You can claim that it is only because we want to live peacefully in society, but you can have a society ruled by the strong and that oppresses the weak. Why is that we as human beings chose rather to respect the dignity of every human person and especially look out for the poor and needy. This is our brilliance and this is why it is you who sell us so short as a species. Our awesomeness is found in our morality that is written on our hearts. This is what separates us from every other species. We are the most amazing of all of God's creatures not because we have opposable thumbs and learned how to use natural laws to fly. We are the greatest because we rise above our animalistic instincts through discipline, sacrifice, and true love for others.



Quote:
What questions that science can't ask, I
don't know of any. I know questions they
can't answer yet, I have yet to read them
saying the answer to any of them is god
in the interim.


Is there a God? Does my life have meaning? Will I live forever? What is love? What is friendship? Should we create an atomic bomb? Should we clone a human being? What is beauty? etc, etc... These are all questions that science can't ask or answer.
“It is with the smallest brushes that the artist paints the most exquisitely beautiful pictures.” (
April 22nd, 2017 at 8:34:38 PM permalink
Evenbob
Member since: Oct 24, 2012
Threads: 146
Posts: 25010
Quote: FrGamble
When we are talking about morality we are talking about something that is not found in nature,


It is found in nature, in crude forms, among
societal animals. Morality comes from us, we
make it. It slowly evolves as needed, and is
sharpened and reformed. In the OT it says
if your bride turns out not to be a virgin,
it's OK to take her back to her father and
stone her to death. Did that come from
god? Of course not, it's a primitive idea
from another time that has outrun it's
usefulness. But in those days, it was morality
at it's finest. There are thousands of examples
of moral ideas that show morals have no
supernatural source at all, just good old human
hit or miss till you get it right.

Quote:
Why is that we as human beings chose rather to respect the dignity of every human person


What are you talking about. In your ultra
moral book, the Bible, slavery is endorsed
and even encouraged. Jesus certainly never
spoke against it, none of them did. There
was no respect for the dignity of slaves, or
even much for women. It all had to evolve,
like ideas do about everything. Nothing
supernatural about it at all.

Quote:
Is there a God? Does my life have meaning? Will I live forever? What is love? What is friendship? Should we create an atomic bomb? Should we clone a human being? What is beauty? etc, etc... These are all questions that science can't ask or answer.


I'm talking about real questions, not answers
to opinions. Every 'question' you list can have
20 answers, just pick one. Nothing can
answer these, they are all just idle speculations.
If you take a risk, you may lose. If you never take a risk, you will always lose.
April 22nd, 2017 at 9:28:09 PM permalink
FrGamble
Member since: Oct 24, 2012
Threads: 67
Posts: 7596
Quote: Evenbob
Morality comes from us, we
make it. It slowly evolves as needed, and is
sharpened and reformed.


Why does evolution of morality make it not the amazing difference maker in humanity and not supernatural in its origin?



Quote:
What are you talking about. In your ultra
moral book, the Bible, slavery is endorsed
and even encouraged.


Not true on two fronts. It is not true because you are conflating the modern idea of slavery based on racial inequality with the ancient idea of slavery or servitude. Secondly the whole Bible is basically one anti slavery book. From the Exodus to Paul`s letter to Philemon.

Quote:
Jesus certainly never
spoke against it, none of them did. There
was no respect for the dignity of slaves, or
even much for women.


Please read what Jesus taught without prooftexting or taking out of context and you will see how much he blows up the concept of anyone being master of anyone else. He Himself called Himself a slave as did St. Paul and that He came to serve and not be served. His closest followers were women who were the first witnesses of the Resurrection.

Quote:
It all had to evolve,
like ideas do about everything. Nothing
supernatural about it at all.


Again the logic of your argument here doesn't follow.



Quote:
I'm talking about real questions, not answers
to opinions. Every 'question' you list can have
20 answers, just pick one. Nothing can
answer these, they are all just idle speculations.


There is no more real or important questions than the ones I gave. You can't have more than 2 answers to any of them. Does God exist? This is a yes or no question. One is right and one is wrong, surely you see that they both can't be right. Why do you think they can't be answered?
“It is with the smallest brushes that the artist paints the most exquisitely beautiful pictures.” (
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