Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!cs.utexas.edu!bcm!dimacs.rutgers.edu!aramis.rutgers.edu!athos.rutgers.edu!christian From: djdaneh@pacbell.com (Dan'l DanehyOakes) Newsgroups: soc.religion.christian Subject: Re: Sin & G.O. (Was: Gay Ordination) Message-ID: Date: 6 Apr 91 07:50:55 GMT Sender: hedrick@athos.rutgers.edu Organization: Pacific * Bell, San Ramon, CA Lines: 111 Approved: christian@aramis.rutgers.edu In article James.Quilty@comp.vuw.ac.nz (James William Quilty) writes: > 2) Your definition is paralogical, it leads to a contradiction: > PROPOSITIONS p : God is perfect in character. > q : anything that is not perfect is against God's > character. > r : Nothing in this world is perfect. > This is in contradiction to "For God so loved the world...", > et hoc genus omne, and it assumes that imperfection (the world) > was created by perfection (God). NOTE: 'world' means planets, > stars, humans, etc. It occurs to me to wonder. . . "There is none that is perfect but God, not one." The only possible perfection, perhaps, *is* God. In that case, the only possible perfect thing that God can create is God. And God does self-create, eternally, as we know, but it would appear that God's nature is such that God would create more than Themselves. So They created an imperfect world. By necessity! But -- and here is the wonder of it -- from that imperfect world can arise beings that are not perfect, but perfected through God's work. If we are made perfect, we are still not God, for we were imperfect but will have been made perfect, while God has never been imperfect. >I would make my opinion quite clear: "There can be no 'universal list' >of sins that will apply to everybody. Yes, there can: but it is very short. It consists of three things: Failing to love God; Failing to love yourself; Failing to love your neighbor as yourself. (The second is a necessary concommitant of the third. If we do not love ourselves, then to love our neighbors as ourselves is not any great service to them or to God: but we are specifically told to love our neighbors *as* *ourselves, so QED we must love ourselves.) >We are all individuals, we are >all different, we all come before God individually, in our own way, >and God relates to us in the same manner, individually ! How can 'what >is good' for someone else be 'good' for me ? This is true in a limited sense. God has given us each work to do. To do another's work is to ignore our own, and that is not "good," it is sinful. But in a broader sense, what is "good" for you is to do God's will, and that is "good" for me also. James, I realize that you didn't say this next thing, but I don't know who did (you deleted his name from the article when you quoted). I wish to reply to that individual, and hope that s/he will see this: >> It is not logical to ordain practicing sinners in a church which >> believes that the Bible is the Word of God. Then it is not logical to ordain anyone. "There is no one who is perfect save only the Father, not one." Do you really believe that your ministers or priests or whatever are without sin? Then you are amazingly optimistic. Again, not to James: >> I don't think you really expect me to logically prove that there >> is a Satan. If you did, I'd ask *you* to prove that there was a sub- >> conscious (pick your definition!). That's very easy. You don't consciously control every breath you take, but your breath *is* controlled by your mind. Similarly, many other functions, physical and mental, which are definitely controlled by the mind nonetheless proceed some or all of the time without our conscious control or awareness. Since they are not conscious but they are mental, there must be some part of the mind below (Latin, "sub," below) the level of consciousness which performs these functions. No other explanation is sufficient to fit the data. QED. Now, can you show some data for the explanation of which the existence of Satan is necessary? >These things (murder, rape) are PHILOSOPHICALLY wrong, no question, >but does that necessarily make them 'sin' ? If you can conceive of a situation in which murder (NOT just killing) or rape (NOT just mock-violent intercourse) as being consistent with love of God and one's neighbor, why then I suppose under those that circumstances they would not be sinful. Can you suggest such a set of circumstances? >I think that since God is logical, as God is perfect, (an illogical, >perfect being is an oxymoron That's a perfectly illogical conclusion to draw. Where is the evidence for this? Logic may be "perfect" in its own sphere, but it is decidedly limited. What on earth is logical about a perfect and self-sufficient being loving such awful things as humans, to the extent that it would condescend to become one, be abused by them, suffer for them? That is not logic: that is Love, which is higher than logic. The Roach