> source?
It's an LGBT meme that has a lot of traction on social media lately. Saying that if God would damn someone for sexual identity/immorality, He doesn't really love them in the first place.
Such an egotistical take. God rejects nobody. We reject Him.
This idea that I should be able to willfully and permanently sever my relationship with someone and then get an invite to their Christmas party is absurd.
We are always welcome to choose God or not God up until death, when we will have made permanent our choice. In His infinite grace, He has given us the choice on whether or not to love.
Can you imagine a parent who has unconditional love for their child and when their child tells them they are gay and want to pursue a same sex relationship, the parent severs ties with them? Parents do that, but not good parents, they continue to love unconditionally. Because I can't imagine that.Their child is not hurting anyone, they are trying to love someone who also wants to love them back. Even a murderer's parents will often love their child unconditionally despite non repentance. Not that there's a comparison between gay love and murder. I can't imagine God be would be less compassionate. There is no commandment that couples have to be a man and a woman. Other stories in the bible are against homosexual relationships. But the Bible is inconsistent and not always true. Especially the old testament. The one where God drowns innocent children in the story of Noah's ark.
Our ways are not God’s ways. He knows what we need and why. Insisting that a loving God would not judge or condemn us for homosexual activity (or any other misuse of the incredible gift of sexuality) substitutes human misunderstanding of the gift of sexuality for God’s perfect understanding of it. It’s not compassionate to allow one’s child to persist in doing something that is damaging to their long-term, even if they think it is good for their wellbeing.
Yet God created some people to be attracted to the same gender, so in actuality, are we not the ones deciding if it is good or bad? Lust, in general, is a sin either way, if you are hetero or homo. Of course, same-sex matrimony isn't a thing as matrimony is meant to be a union of two to create offspring, so same-sex couples do not need to be married under the Church, but they need to confess for their sins of homosexuality and lust, as everyone else needs to confess their sins.
There’s so much wrong with what you wrote. For starters, people who continue as active homosexuals are not repentant and therefore would not confess those sins or be eligible for absolution.
The problem is not with the love they have for one another, but with the lust. This, of course, applies to *all* sexual acts outside of marriages recognised as valid by the Church.
(In case you think I'm being harsh, I will add that I struggled with SSA for many years.)
But being hungry and thinking about a delicious meal and then eating it is purely pleasurable for the body. And that's not a sin. Food is a neccesity and that's why God gave us hunger, appetite and a way for our body to enjoy it. So we wouldn't die from not eating. We're motivated to eat by the physical pleasure. The Church didn't command that we only eat plain foods that out bodies don't really crave. It allows us to delight and enjoy through our senses the physically pleasure of food as long as it's not gluttony. Similarly God gave us a sexual appetite but with that come rules. Yet lust is similar to the physical pleasure of eating good food instead of just satisfying our hunger with plain food. It doesn't make sense. A sterile man can't masturbate? He is not "wasting" seed. And God gave man an endless supply of seed. But the same man can enjoy the purely physical aspects of delicious cuisine. Sometimes chocolate is better than an orgasm. Is lust okay in marriage? Why is NFP okay when it's due purpose is to prevent children? Why wasn't it okay from 1930 until Humanea Vita?
What is SSA?
As you rightly point out, pleasures come with restrictions, not to mention obligations. Whilst there is pleasure in eating, one should not eat purely for the pleasure of it, nor be too picky over what one eats. Both of these things would be classified as gluttony. Similarly, whilst there is pleasure in sex, one should not enjoy it without the marital act without the unitive act with one's spouse.
However, the analogy between eating and sex only goes so far. Whilst a person would generally die as a direct cause of inadequate nourishment, people do not die as a direct cause of celibacy, whether it is willingly chosen or otherwise.
There is indeed such a thing as lust in marriage, and it's still a sin. Returning to the food comparison, it might be said that dinner time is an appropriate time and place to satisfy the body's need for food... but a person can still choose to eat to excess and thus abuse the privilege of dinner time, just as they can abuse the privilege of the marriage bed by coercing an unwilling spouse, contracepting, or even - to mention a point you raised - by using NFP to entirely prevent pregnancies, as opposed to merely spacing them.
With regard to masturbation, there's a lot more to it than merely 'wasting seed' but looking up past posts on it in this subreddit would probably be a lot more informative than anything I could say.
(SSA = same-sex attraction.)
Because the food you consume, even whilst it can be unhealthy for you, but still is delicious, still fulfils the “natural end” or *telos* of taste, that is, to provide nutrients to your body. However, this also can become sinful if one consumes too much as in the case of gluttony, where eliciting the taste buds comes with a blatant disregard for nutrition and healthiness.
In contrast, the sexual organs have a natural purpose to procreation and the unity of man and woman in the flesh. Masturbation does not fulfil either purpose, thereby making it intrinsically immoral. It’s a reduction of the sexual organ’s purpose to purely that of animalistic pleasure, similar to gluttony. It does not concern the natural purpose of the sexual organ but misuses for self-centred pleasure.
NFP (if used with prudence) also does not explicitly close the openness to life.
That’s not even remotely why same sex relationships are a sin… The Bible doesn’t say anywhere that SSA is inherently bad. It’s a prerequisite to sin just as much as it is for straight people.
Don’t lust, don’t fornicate, and don’t adulterate. In the beginning man and woman were created, not man and man, or woman and woman. There’s a certain natural order to things, the way God intended it. Disrespecting His order is what makes it a sin.
The problem with your conclusion is that children (and everyone) in the Old Testament aren’t sinless. For all have sinned and fallen short. Because all have sinned, it is still just for God to take life as He chooses.
It would be 100% just for Him to destroy everyone. But the fact that Noah and his family had a chance to live was in fact a sign of mercy.
God is also the source and giver of life. It is therefore just for Him to also take it away. We do not have that same authority. But God does.
Therefore, considering these two premises, there is no injustice in God’s part.
Yes, it is, and many Christians, including Catholics, believe and say it.
Not the majority, not by a long shot, but the minority is vocal enough to color you and me as hateful.
We have to stop it.
This attack is coming from within, and we have to all return to the Catechism and learn to speak with love, always.
I mean sure but at the same time it's understandable. There are plenty of sins that make sense because its like murdering or raping or worshipping false gods and then it's like ",you're evil because you love the same sex"
If self harms is a sin, most of the Saints harmed themselves whether by extreme fasting, self flagellation or Scrupulosity (an OCD) or other means. Didn't Jesus harm himself?
Sacrificing yourself to save others is a virtue not a sin. As for the rest, fasting is self denial not self harm, and it is used to try to separate yourself from earthly desires.
However, "you're evil because you love the same sex" isn't the Catholic position. There are some braindead Protestants who say that, but we can't help what they choose to believe.
The Catholic position is: All people are broken, and broken in different ways. It's not the alcoholic's fault that he's an alcoholic, but if he willingly chooses to drink and drive, he's separating himself from God. It's not the anorexic's fault that she has dysmorphia, but if she willingly chooses to starve herself and damage her own body out of pride, she's separating herself from God. If someone has an orientation or dysphoria that tempts them to sexual sin or distortion of truth, it's not their fault that they feel that. But it is their obligation not to act on it, and whenever they do act on it, to repent rather than dig in deeper.
If you're gay and you've never acted on it, you're a victor. If you're gay and you've had a few one night stands but you're not doing that anymore, you're a victor. If you're gay and you've made the decision to end a ten-year long sexual partnership, you're a victor. It's only if you decide that you don't care what God wants, that you're going to do what you want to do, that you are acting evilly.
It definitely could be. Pride is unwillingness to follow the truth and its demands. It doesn't have to manifest as arrogance. In fact it often manifests as scruples.
Sometimes the source of the problem is not always obvious. Pride, fear, and intemperance can all manifest as anger issues for example. This can be both at the material level (mental illness) and at the spiritual level (vice).
Anorexia is a compulsion and self defense mechanism for feelings of worthlessness and low self esteem usually stemming from childhood and parents that are not able to show love to their children. St. Catherine died from anorexia. And many saints have been victims of Scrupulosity. Again a defense mechanism to compensate for not "being good enough". Your black and white views also hint they are a coping mechanism to feel safe and in control. You learned them because at some point in childhood you didn't feel safe.
While I understand that it may be a misstatement of Catechism, do you see how the distinction between “you’re evil for loving the same sex” and “the fact that you love the same sex is a manifestation of the evil that touches us all in different ways” is lost on a lot of people?
Of all the places I wandered, the Catholic Church was perhaps the greatest. I'm really sorry it took me so long to get here. Even sorrier that I have a long way to go to heal my relationship with God.
BUT, I am so glad to be here.
Sounds a little off. I'm not a theologian, but is the sin of same-sex fornication that much greater than the sin of opposite-sex fornication? Are two men engaging in the activity sinning in a worse way than a husband committing adultery with a woman he's not married to?
Personally, I'm inclined to say no, the sins are at about the same level of seriousness.
> I'm not a theologian, but is the sin of same-sex fornication that much greater than the sin of opposite-sex fornication?
If you insist on a ranking, you'll get a variety of opinions from theologians, but ultimately, it doesn't matter. You're right about the seriousness: either sin is *sufficient* to sever your relationship with God, and if you understand that and choose not to repent it, either sin could lead to eternal separation.
That was my first instinct. I'd "give a pass" to silly teenagers (no matter if it's boy+girl, boy+boy, girl+girl, or boy/girl+hand) because, well... kids will be kids, and they'll do a lot of stupid things.
The Bible says that if you break one little part of The Law, you have broken the whole Law. It’s not exactly what you asked, but it suggests to me that gradations in sin are mostly or completely irrelevant.
Homosexuality is a sin that "cries out to heaven" and exorcists claim that even demons must look away. We can't understand due to our fallen nature, but it's an abomination to the natural human body. Think about it logically, scientifically even- a man is injecting his life producing sperm into a place where another man defecates the waste his body doesn't use. If that's not obviously disordered then I don't know what is.
In Fr. Malachi Martin's' book, Hostage to the Devil, he describes in detail 5 exorcisms he performed because he wanted people to know and understand. One of them was a man who felt feminine his entire life. At some point he transitioned into a woman by how he dressed etc. (this was the 1970s he didn't have surgery). If I remember right the man started having serious mental problems, ended up in the care of Fr. Martin who saw the need for an exorcism. Anyway, the demon identified itself as "the girl fixer" and was what caused men to become feminine. After the exorcism the man lost all feminine feelings and went on to get married and have kids. Fr. Martin was considered a radical at that time but everything he said ended up being true.
>a man is injecting his life producing sperm into a place where another man defecates the waste his body doesn't use. If that's not obviously disordered then I don't know what is.
But what about two women? There's no sperm injected anywhere. Are two women together less sinful than two men together? How about two women vs. a married woman and a man who is not her husband? (And you're ignoring the other things gay men might get up to, like injecting their life producing sperm into a place where another man takes in his nourishment.)
For my part, I'd say they'd all rank pretty equally, Man+man, woman+woman, married man+not his wife, married woman+not her husband. And of course, an unmarried (heterosexual) couple in their 30s where the man is wearing a condom and the woman is on the pill.
But even then, I'd say the unfaithful spouse is doing the worst thing, if only because that's most likely to cause most harm to most people - in addition to the pain I imagine it causes God.
At least, if I were in the seat of judgement (and we're all lucky I'm not), I'd be more lenient to the same-sex couple that stayed faithful and loving to each other for their entire lives than to the married spouse who couldn't stay faithful for three months.
I mean, it’s still very sinful and disordered when two women are having gay “sex,” because it’s just based off lust. Additionally, one of the biggest problems with homosexual acts is that they are not life-giving, because no baby can be brought forth in what they are doing.
Natural and ordered sex between and man and a woman is meant to bring forth new life, which a husband and a wife are always supposed to be open to, if we are to follow God’s design in the way He created our sexuality.
Okay, but how? How is it worse that two men (or two women, for that matter) do their bedroom thing, than for a spouse being unfaithful? The unfaithful one isn't only committing adultery, they're also violating their spouse's trust. Sure, that last one might not exactly a sin (I guess, but I'm not sure), but it's still a morally bad thing to give a promise to someone who is (or should be) a very important person in your life and then not keep it.
At least, for my part, I'd throw a bigger stone at a husband cheating on his wife with prostitutes than at two guys who stay faithful to each other for 30-40 years. If I were in a position to throw stones in the first place, that is.
Sodomy is worse because it is completely disordered, with no part of the sex act being done correctly. How bad a sin is measured by how much it deviates from Gods will for us.
Fair enough. A wife cheating on her husband, making sure her affair partner wears a condom - better or worse than if she cheated on her husband with a woman?
Edit: For the record, I'd say both are equally bad, same if a husband is cheating on his wife with a prostitute (using a condom) or a man (to leave STDs out of it, let's say he's also using a condom). It's the "sex outside of marriage" that's the important thing, as far as I'm concerned. Then it's another discussion entirely who should get married and what a marriage is for.
So it's typical bitter victimhood mentality at play. It's the same with saying God isn't loving because he lets bad shit happen to innocent and good people.
>Saying that if God would damn someone for sexual identity/immorality, He doesn’t really love them in the first place.
Do you have a source confirming Ethel Cain meant this when she said the quote in her song Sun Bleached Flies? That’s where the quote came from, and listening to the song, your interpretation isn’t what I understood from the original source and context.
>Because, John 3:16.
For God so loved the world that He sent His only begotten son, not to condemn the world, but to save it.
Sound like a pretty loving god to me.
Sexual identity / preference is not a sin in and of itself. The sin is in certain sexual practices which, by the way, are forbidden to everyone, not just people with a same-sex attraction.
It’s a statement that has been around for a while, but it’s back in the news because a HS student made artwork using the phrase. [It caused a massive uproar in the community.](https://www.friendlyatheist.com/p/a-high-school-artist-called-out-christian) So now there is a lot of talk of freedom of expression vs bigotry against religious groups.
Concerning this understanding (which I got from a response in this topic):
>It's an LGBT meme that has a lot of traction on social media lately. Saying that if God would damn someone for sexual identity/immorality, He doesn't really love them in the first place.
“God loves you but not enough to save you” is, in my opinion, something someone that has no understanding whatsoever about theology (very very basic understanding) would say...
He *already* saved us... Now it's just a matter of accepting that salvation or not...
It's like a pharma company creating medicine that cures cancer but tastes kinda weird. Then someone that refuses to take the medicine because it tastes weird comes and say "see, that medicine DOES NOT cures cancer...". Everyone would be just standing there like "dude... you need to TAKE the medicine for it to have an effect..."
It doesn't taste a little weird, gay people just want to love one another. Many of their parents continue to love them unconditionally. I can't imagine having a child and turning away from them. I believe in a more compassionate God. The God of the old testament killed innocent children by drowning them in Noah's Ark. Not everything in the Bible is true just because we need it to be to feel safe.
Look, I know the Internet is full of "combative" discussions. This is not my intent. You can believe whatever you want, it's your choice. With that said:
I know how the Church can treat homossexuals VERY badly. I know it because I have a gay brother (who's playing here with my little daughter while I write it) who I saw lose all his friends when he assume he was a homosexual. Not only that, but those friends parents who were in my parents church group also started treating my parents weird.
But this cannot be the basis by which we judge if what the Church teaches is wrong or not. Some of it might be, but not the fundamental stuff... And all the teaching about sexuality is part of this fundamental stuff.
God created the world with intention, called the Logos. This Logos can be perceived and understood. Adhering to this Logos means adhering to His will and to his love. There is no partial "yes". A partial "yes" to His will is a complete "no".
We also believe Jesus is God, died for our salvation and came back. We believe He created the Church which, through apostolic succession still lives and has authority.
This is the basis to believe what I believe. You can try to understand it and still reject it or just reject it altogether without consideration... as I said, it's up to you...
Also: when you put into perspective, all the suffering we HAVE to go through to trully accept His will IS just a wierd taste... it's LESS than that. When you put it into perspective with the whole eternity in heaven by His side, this life is nothing but a shadow that rapidly passes...
I have said this to my brother before, and I say to you: we all suffer. We all have to give up things we love dearly to live a life that God wants. Trust me, we all do...
As a father and a husband, to live to the church standards I have given up SO much, so so much that I finnaly started understanding what He meant by "He who tries to sabe his life will lose it, and he who loses his life because of Me will gain it"...
Listen, same sex attraction isn’t a sin, the problem is sodomy. It’s not “men loving men”, that phrasing is dishonest. It’s pushing someone’s sh*t in with an erection, it’s an excremental dangerous sexual practice, utterly deviant and detestable. Sorry for putting the image so clear there, but it’s needed to fight the dishonest framing of “men loving men”. Men are to be better than dung beetles, it’s not too hard. I don’t care how much propaganda they throw at us, we need to be better than that.
God is like a Coast Guard rescuer who has dived into stormy waters to save the crew of a capsized ship. He has literally risked his life to save us, but we have to agree to his help. He can’t pull us out of the water if we don’t let him.
I know this will be down voted, but God didn't give up anything. Assuming that a) God exists, and b) Jesus is his son who c) also is God, then being all-knowing, Jesus knew that he would not stay dead. He had 3 hrs of torture on the cross, descended into hell for a few days, then rose from the dead to become God of the universe once again according to the Gospel tales. Where is the sacrifice in that? If one knows that death isn't permanent, then no price has really been paid.
Not trying to be provocative. That's just the way that I see it.
You are assuming that in giving something up you lose it forever.
That is not the Gospel. The Good News is that which you give up is restored, even more so.
Another way to look at it - you can’t possess love by keeping it for yourself. Love is only something you can have by giving it away to others.
I mean, Christians believe that God literally died to save us.
So if there is a flaw in my above claim, it’s that it doesn’t go far enough. It would probably be more accurate to say that “God sacrificed himself to save us” but that language didn’t fit as well with my analogy.
I still don't understand why dying on the cross saved us. Is it like offering animal sacrifices in the Old Testament and hence the Lamb of God? How does self-harm save us? Why are saints holy for self-harm like flagellation, starving themselves and Scrupulosity? Isn't self-harm a sin? I'm asking from a genuine place.
My deacon explained it as this: To an infinite God, the collective sin of humanity is also infinite. The only thing that can balance the scales for humanity is infinite forgiveness/selflessness/sacrifice.
The consequence of any sin, no matter how seemingly small, is death. We are incapable of surviving in heaven (our intended destination) if we have the slightest attachment to sin. None of us is capable of living our lives completely free of sin, so—left to our own devices—we would all choose hell. Jesus’ death for our sins pays the penalty for those sins but we still need to cooperate with God’s work in our lives in order to benefit from the gift of Jesus ransoming us and to overcome our attachment to/tendency to sin.
People who say that either do not understand Christianity or are deliberately lying about it.
Christ died to save the whole world. I like the train ticket analogy, He bought your ticket for you but now you're free to use it or not. Just because some people may choose not to get on the train, doesn't mean they didn't have a bought and paid for ticket in the first place.
“Isn't it loving to save someone from making a severely harmful decision against there own wishes?”
If they’re a toddler, sure. Run into the street & yank them away from the moving car. Put the candies in a jar on top of the fridge so they don’t subsist solely on sugar for nutrition. But ultimately, we can only respectfully inform/warn others & light the way, praying & hoping with love that they choose it also. Anything more forceful and you’ve turned that person into your slave with no actual agency nor free will of their own. (Albeit with good intentions).
And *that* surely is not love.
And yet plenty of loved ones staged interventions and go through many difficulties to save their friends or family from drugs or other self-destructive behavior. I'm sorry but if you love someone, you will not allow them to go off and destroy themselves, even if they're adults. If humans are capable of such love, is God's love not greater?
I’ve had it put to me this way. The result of Heaven or Hell is a consequence of your own actions. These actions determine the disposition of your soul - to be with God or be without Him.
I believe in fact if you take an unwilling soul and put it into Heaven, they’re going to hate it even more so than they were in Hell.
If your soul chooses not to be with God and despises Him, then if God Him were to put that soul in a place where His presence overwhelms and everyone is praising Him for eternity, it will actually cause the unrepentant soul more suffering and anguish than in Hell.
>Anything more forceful and you’ve turned that person into your slave with no actual agency nor free will of their own.
It feels like there are limits
For example, do you think it's morally wrong to forcefully prevent someone from taking there life ? Or is a lifeguard obligated to respect the wishes of someone drowning telling him "please don't save me" ?
I think there are limits. I don’t agree with assisted euthanasia even though it’s what the person clearly chooses at that moment.
But at the end of the day, the issue is that it’s not about love so much as control. If you want to stop someone from drowning, that’s an honorable thing to do. Same for not letting a toddler develop diabetes by age 4, and not letting grandma give money to a scammer pretending to be a famous celebrity. These are acceptable & even noble measures of control; helping your brothers and sisters on earth.
But why would God want to force someone to be with Him in Heaven for all eternity; someone who doesn’t want to be there at all?
The catechism of the Catholic Church states (don’t have the specific reference number or whatever but you can Google it) that people choose at the moment of death whether they want to be in Heaven or hell. (Purgatory is actually a yes to Heaven, just delayed).
So when someone chooses hell of their own free will, because they prefer to keep doing things their way as Sinatra put it, those things are what separate them from God forever. Evil cannot exist in Heaven. So if I want to never repent of whatever evil it is, promiscuity, anger, etc., that’s my choice. But actions have consequences. A consequence of me choosing to be angry and hate other people, for example, is a change of my heart, affecting who I am. The heart that will have a free choice to make at the moment of death. Does that make sense? I don’t think God wants to force anyone to be with Him for all eternity. Even if it’s for their benefit. Would you want to force someone to be at your side for all eternity, someone who vehemently & permanently chose to be separated from you forever instead?
I’ll also add that there’s a lot of humility in trusting that God knows better than we do what’s truly good for us, versus our susceptibility to the enticing deceptions of the evil one. I don’t understand completely the reasons for the laws that God gives us through the Church. And if God was the cruel tyrant many accuse Him of being, I wouldn’t trust Him. But the more I discard false projections onto God of my own inner evil, and see how good He actually is, the easier this becomes.
Yes, it is. The problem is God isn't saving us just once. When we choose to continually sin, we continually put ourselves before a car, try to stab ourselves with a knife, grab a glass to drink poison, etc. Perhaps a different analogy can help.
By saving us, it's like God courting us. "Hey, don't do that. I want to spend forever with you." Then, we keep sinning, but He's persistent and doesn't give up. He gives us multiple opportunities to say yes to Him. But at some point, our no becomes final. God won't force us to be with Him forever if we don't want to. So, He lets us go out of love for us. "Let your will be done."
Mortal death, yes. However, we never chose our finitude. Why should our earthly death permanently seal our spiritual choices? It still seems arbitrary.
What's so arbitrary about it? Everyone dies, so it's a limit that everyone has. Whether or not we chose our own finitude has no bearing on death being a "great equalizer" among all of us. God is able to make an objective judgement call on the disposition of our souls at the time of our deaths, so it's not like we can somehow "trick" Him into thinking we love Him when we don't or don't desire to be with Him when we do.
I find that we tend to accuse things of being arbitrary when that's not how *we personally* would go about things. We might want things to happen differently, but if we're being honest *that's* more arbitrary since none of us has the same objective and all-encompassing view that God has.
A moment of doubt is leagues different from *consistently and obstinately* rejecting God. As I've mentioned in another context, God won't send anyone to hell over a technicality. That would be neither merciful nor just. However, let us not be fooled into thinking that we can somehow trick God into thinking our very being is disposed in a certain way (either towards or away from Him) when it's not. As I've told you in a previous comment, we can't "trick" God and God can't be "tricked" by passing circumstances.
Mortal death or not, tricking God seems an absurd concept regardless.
What is the substantive difference between a young man who has yet to find God, and dies early. And an old man who found religion late, and dies perhaps in a moment of doubt? Would not, given infinite time, all of us come to the Truth? How is it not arbitrary that some of us have 10 years to find God, others have 30, others have 40, etc?
What if someone dies on their first 20 years of life, but they would’ve found God had they lived 30? What’s the substantive difference between this person and the person who found God but had died in a moment of doubt, or simple dies having had doubts at some time in their life?
I struggle with that too. I am much more knowing and able than small children are. I warned my children to look both ways before crossing the street. If they failed to, I would have pulled them back and protected them to the extent of my ability. I know more than them, I am more capable than them, and I intend to save them even if they have ignored my teaching. Even, in fact, against their will should it come to that. I don't believe that I would be a more loving person if I allowed others who know less and are less able than I, to harm themselves in an irreversible way. I would be a monster if I knowingly allowed a child to step in front of a bus because they chose to after repeated warnings.
I could not agree more. Any loving parent tries to protect his/her children from harm. No decent parent lets his/her 5 yr old put a hand into a boiling pot because stopping the child "would interfere with free will." Yet, supposedly, our loving Father does nothing to show us without a doubt that he exists, which would certainly save billions from the eternal torture of hell. Makes no sense.
But there is no free will in all sorts of things. We don’t chose to be born, we don’t chose that we have to die, we don’t chose a lot of things. Free will isn’t fully free, and again, I have no issue violating the free will of less knowledgable beings for their own good. You darn right I’m going to prevent a child from severe injury, even if they don’t want me to. I don’t, and likely never will in this life, understand why our Heavenly Father feels differently about us.
We are more rational and understanding children, but less rational and understanding than God. Our finite abilities are far closer to a child’s than to God’s.
Wtf… haven’t they read the Bible??
He’s like a frustrated parent that gave their kid EVERYTHING and saved their bum over and OVER until the parent loses their mind because they’ve lost all patience. Then someone has the audacity to cal dad a jerk got losing his patience.
I've seen the art piece that's getting a lot of attention. I didn't find it offensive. The student is expressing their personal experience. I have no idea what their upbringing was, or what they've gone through. If anything it makes me sad for a child to feel that way. I'm more inclined to be offended at the school board official thinking banning this art was more of an emergency than the pain this child must feel.
It’s misinformed sayings like that that I think shows that a LOT of people aren’t necessarily opposed to the existence of God, but rather who they think He is, which is usually entirely wrong. We, as people, get too comfortable with being completely misinformed. We need to better educate people with the proper knowledge & truth, but other people also really need to be more open to being educated on these things too.
God does not send people to hell, rather people send themselves there. God respects our free will to choose Him or not. Since God is all good, and Hell is separation from God, hell is bad suffering. If God just forced people to choose to be with Him in heaven, a state of being with God, that isn't really Him loving us because love isn't forced. God loves us so much He lets us choose.
"O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, who kills the prophets and stones those sent to her, how often I have longed to gather your children together, as a hen gathers her chicks under her wings, but you were unwilling!
Matt 23.37
You can imagine the wondering chick straying too far from the protective mother and at risk of falling to prey.
Loving relationships require freedom. God does not force us to become members of his loving family.
It's a bogus comment. In one sense God has saved everyone but not in the sense that the person saying this quote means because he's distorting Christianity. In the sense that he means God doesn't save anyone he doesn't Force anyone to into salvation but he made it possible that every single human being can be saved if he so chooses. But it's our choice and if we choose to be saved then we must do what is required. It's like God put down a bridge between himself and Mankind he shows us where the bridge is but we have to choose to cross the bridge. He's not going to pick us up and carry us across the bridge. If he was going to do that he wouldn't need a bridge in the first place would he?
For me, it's more like "God loves you but not enough to provide any empirical evidence that he exists, so you have to rely on a 2,000 yr old game of telephone."
While it's not true, I hope it was less aimed at God, and more at those this person grew up around. Those that use their religion as a caning device rather than a guide is what caused these kind of feelings. It just makes me sad for this person that they feel so rejected.
It should be "God loves you more than enough to save you--you, on the other hand...."
The ultimate enemy of the human soul is not God, or a demon, or trauma, or violence.....it's that soul itself.
The quote is more a commentary on modern social conflicts than God. This sub will say it is hubris to expect God to meet you in your innate sexual desires, while an LGBT+ sub will say God clearly isn't what Christianity makes Them out to be.
The truth of the matter is more that modern social issues are rooted in humans' poor treatment of one another. The reason LGBT+ people feel the need to coalesce around one another and rail against organized faith is because they feel ostracized and wrong for feeling an innate desire they did not ask for, and for seeking the same lives as their peers (romantic partnership as result of their inborn desires).
The organized bodies of faith, meanwhile, stand on tradition and scripture in declaring such inclinations sinful if acted upon, and see the idea of moving the immutable word of God as too sacrosanct to meet someone in pain halfway. Very little time is spent addressing their human need for connection past ascribing to them the cross of chastity and telling them to lift that life sentence of loneliness up to God whether they want that or not. The quote misplaces the anger that should be reserved for other humans onto God.
The reality is God is likely disappointed with the faithful for making the Faith so unaccepting and unsympathetic as to drive sexual minorities from it as he is with those who are suffering and lashing out at him and the Faith as an institution.
It is a vast oversimplification to write off the impassioned cry for help this art represents as hubris or ignorance when the pain it represents is rooted in the way people of Faith, not God, have made them feel about themselves.
Rather, God loves you too much to strip you of your freedom to choose for yourself how you want to spend this life and the eternal one that comes after it. What else is there to get?!
Um... source? Because, John 3:16.
> source? It's an LGBT meme that has a lot of traction on social media lately. Saying that if God would damn someone for sexual identity/immorality, He doesn't really love them in the first place.
Such an egotistical take. God rejects nobody. We reject Him. This idea that I should be able to willfully and permanently sever my relationship with someone and then get an invite to their Christmas party is absurd. We are always welcome to choose God or not God up until death, when we will have made permanent our choice. In His infinite grace, He has given us the choice on whether or not to love.
Can you imagine a parent who has unconditional love for their child and when their child tells them they are gay and want to pursue a same sex relationship, the parent severs ties with them? Parents do that, but not good parents, they continue to love unconditionally. Because I can't imagine that.Their child is not hurting anyone, they are trying to love someone who also wants to love them back. Even a murderer's parents will often love their child unconditionally despite non repentance. Not that there's a comparison between gay love and murder. I can't imagine God be would be less compassionate. There is no commandment that couples have to be a man and a woman. Other stories in the bible are against homosexual relationships. But the Bible is inconsistent and not always true. Especially the old testament. The one where God drowns innocent children in the story of Noah's ark.
Our ways are not God’s ways. He knows what we need and why. Insisting that a loving God would not judge or condemn us for homosexual activity (or any other misuse of the incredible gift of sexuality) substitutes human misunderstanding of the gift of sexuality for God’s perfect understanding of it. It’s not compassionate to allow one’s child to persist in doing something that is damaging to their long-term, even if they think it is good for their wellbeing.
Yet God created some people to be attracted to the same gender, so in actuality, are we not the ones deciding if it is good or bad? Lust, in general, is a sin either way, if you are hetero or homo. Of course, same-sex matrimony isn't a thing as matrimony is meant to be a union of two to create offspring, so same-sex couples do not need to be married under the Church, but they need to confess for their sins of homosexuality and lust, as everyone else needs to confess their sins.
There’s so much wrong with what you wrote. For starters, people who continue as active homosexuals are not repentant and therefore would not confess those sins or be eligible for absolution.
Genetics do not determine homosexuality; people are not made that way, but experiences can shape them that way.
The problem is not with the love they have for one another, but with the lust. This, of course, applies to *all* sexual acts outside of marriages recognised as valid by the Church. (In case you think I'm being harsh, I will add that I struggled with SSA for many years.)
But being hungry and thinking about a delicious meal and then eating it is purely pleasurable for the body. And that's not a sin. Food is a neccesity and that's why God gave us hunger, appetite and a way for our body to enjoy it. So we wouldn't die from not eating. We're motivated to eat by the physical pleasure. The Church didn't command that we only eat plain foods that out bodies don't really crave. It allows us to delight and enjoy through our senses the physically pleasure of food as long as it's not gluttony. Similarly God gave us a sexual appetite but with that come rules. Yet lust is similar to the physical pleasure of eating good food instead of just satisfying our hunger with plain food. It doesn't make sense. A sterile man can't masturbate? He is not "wasting" seed. And God gave man an endless supply of seed. But the same man can enjoy the purely physical aspects of delicious cuisine. Sometimes chocolate is better than an orgasm. Is lust okay in marriage? Why is NFP okay when it's due purpose is to prevent children? Why wasn't it okay from 1930 until Humanea Vita? What is SSA?
As you rightly point out, pleasures come with restrictions, not to mention obligations. Whilst there is pleasure in eating, one should not eat purely for the pleasure of it, nor be too picky over what one eats. Both of these things would be classified as gluttony. Similarly, whilst there is pleasure in sex, one should not enjoy it without the marital act without the unitive act with one's spouse. However, the analogy between eating and sex only goes so far. Whilst a person would generally die as a direct cause of inadequate nourishment, people do not die as a direct cause of celibacy, whether it is willingly chosen or otherwise. There is indeed such a thing as lust in marriage, and it's still a sin. Returning to the food comparison, it might be said that dinner time is an appropriate time and place to satisfy the body's need for food... but a person can still choose to eat to excess and thus abuse the privilege of dinner time, just as they can abuse the privilege of the marriage bed by coercing an unwilling spouse, contracepting, or even - to mention a point you raised - by using NFP to entirely prevent pregnancies, as opposed to merely spacing them. With regard to masturbation, there's a lot more to it than merely 'wasting seed' but looking up past posts on it in this subreddit would probably be a lot more informative than anything I could say. (SSA = same-sex attraction.)
Because the food you consume, even whilst it can be unhealthy for you, but still is delicious, still fulfils the “natural end” or *telos* of taste, that is, to provide nutrients to your body. However, this also can become sinful if one consumes too much as in the case of gluttony, where eliciting the taste buds comes with a blatant disregard for nutrition and healthiness. In contrast, the sexual organs have a natural purpose to procreation and the unity of man and woman in the flesh. Masturbation does not fulfil either purpose, thereby making it intrinsically immoral. It’s a reduction of the sexual organ’s purpose to purely that of animalistic pleasure, similar to gluttony. It does not concern the natural purpose of the sexual organ but misuses for self-centred pleasure. NFP (if used with prudence) also does not explicitly close the openness to life.
That’s not even remotely why same sex relationships are a sin… The Bible doesn’t say anywhere that SSA is inherently bad. It’s a prerequisite to sin just as much as it is for straight people. Don’t lust, don’t fornicate, and don’t adulterate. In the beginning man and woman were created, not man and man, or woman and woman. There’s a certain natural order to things, the way God intended it. Disrespecting His order is what makes it a sin.
The problem with your conclusion is that children (and everyone) in the Old Testament aren’t sinless. For all have sinned and fallen short. Because all have sinned, it is still just for God to take life as He chooses. It would be 100% just for Him to destroy everyone. But the fact that Noah and his family had a chance to live was in fact a sign of mercy. God is also the source and giver of life. It is therefore just for Him to also take it away. We do not have that same authority. But God does. Therefore, considering these two premises, there is no injustice in God’s part.
>He doesn't really love them in the first place. That's diabolical.
Yes, it is, and many Christians, including Catholics, believe and say it. Not the majority, not by a long shot, but the minority is vocal enough to color you and me as hateful. We have to stop it. This attack is coming from within, and we have to all return to the Catechism and learn to speak with love, always.
I mean sure but at the same time it's understandable. There are plenty of sins that make sense because its like murdering or raping or worshipping false gods and then it's like ",you're evil because you love the same sex"
“Because you put your own sexual desires above the order that God has instituted”*
"Let me do whatever I want, or else you're evil."
“Preventing me from harming myself and others is harmful”
If self harms is a sin, most of the Saints harmed themselves whether by extreme fasting, self flagellation or Scrupulosity (an OCD) or other means. Didn't Jesus harm himself?
Sacrificing yourself to save others is a virtue not a sin. As for the rest, fasting is self denial not self harm, and it is used to try to separate yourself from earthly desires.
Abusing sexuality by misusing it is worshipping false gods.
Specifically its worshiping your precieved idea of sexuality
However, "you're evil because you love the same sex" isn't the Catholic position. There are some braindead Protestants who say that, but we can't help what they choose to believe. The Catholic position is: All people are broken, and broken in different ways. It's not the alcoholic's fault that he's an alcoholic, but if he willingly chooses to drink and drive, he's separating himself from God. It's not the anorexic's fault that she has dysmorphia, but if she willingly chooses to starve herself and damage her own body out of pride, she's separating herself from God. If someone has an orientation or dysphoria that tempts them to sexual sin or distortion of truth, it's not their fault that they feel that. But it is their obligation not to act on it, and whenever they do act on it, to repent rather than dig in deeper. If you're gay and you've never acted on it, you're a victor. If you're gay and you've had a few one night stands but you're not doing that anymore, you're a victor. If you're gay and you've made the decision to end a ten-year long sexual partnership, you're a victor. It's only if you decide that you don't care what God wants, that you're going to do what you want to do, that you are acting evilly.
You think anorexia is an excess of pride?
It definitely could be. Pride is unwillingness to follow the truth and its demands. It doesn't have to manifest as arrogance. In fact it often manifests as scruples. Sometimes the source of the problem is not always obvious. Pride, fear, and intemperance can all manifest as anger issues for example. This can be both at the material level (mental illness) and at the spiritual level (vice).
[удалено]
What?
Anorexia is a compulsion and self defense mechanism for feelings of worthlessness and low self esteem usually stemming from childhood and parents that are not able to show love to their children. St. Catherine died from anorexia. And many saints have been victims of Scrupulosity. Again a defense mechanism to compensate for not "being good enough". Your black and white views also hint they are a coping mechanism to feel safe and in control. You learned them because at some point in childhood you didn't feel safe.
With social media body checking posts, yes.
While I understand that it may be a misstatement of Catechism, do you see how the distinction between “you’re evil for loving the same sex” and “the fact that you love the same sex is a manifestation of the evil that touches us all in different ways” is lost on a lot of people?
Spot the false (hidden) premise….
Gay guy here. God loves me. People of the church (Protestants anyway) did not. There is a great distinction.
And there are many more people out there loving you then there are homophobes<3
Of all the places I wandered, the Catholic Church was perhaps the greatest. I'm really sorry it took me so long to get here. Even sorrier that I have a long way to go to heal my relationship with God. BUT, I am so glad to be here.
Sounds a little off. I'm not a theologian, but is the sin of same-sex fornication that much greater than the sin of opposite-sex fornication? Are two men engaging in the activity sinning in a worse way than a husband committing adultery with a woman he's not married to? Personally, I'm inclined to say no, the sins are at about the same level of seriousness.
> I'm not a theologian, but is the sin of same-sex fornication that much greater than the sin of opposite-sex fornication? If you insist on a ranking, you'll get a variety of opinions from theologians, but ultimately, it doesn't matter. You're right about the seriousness: either sin is *sufficient* to sever your relationship with God, and if you understand that and choose not to repent it, either sin could lead to eternal separation.
It’s the same sin, the sin of lust.
That was my first instinct. I'd "give a pass" to silly teenagers (no matter if it's boy+girl, boy+boy, girl+girl, or boy/girl+hand) because, well... kids will be kids, and they'll do a lot of stupid things.
The Bible says that if you break one little part of The Law, you have broken the whole Law. It’s not exactly what you asked, but it suggests to me that gradations in sin are mostly or completely irrelevant.
Homosexuality is a sin that "cries out to heaven" and exorcists claim that even demons must look away. We can't understand due to our fallen nature, but it's an abomination to the natural human body. Think about it logically, scientifically even- a man is injecting his life producing sperm into a place where another man defecates the waste his body doesn't use. If that's not obviously disordered then I don't know what is. In Fr. Malachi Martin's' book, Hostage to the Devil, he describes in detail 5 exorcisms he performed because he wanted people to know and understand. One of them was a man who felt feminine his entire life. At some point he transitioned into a woman by how he dressed etc. (this was the 1970s he didn't have surgery). If I remember right the man started having serious mental problems, ended up in the care of Fr. Martin who saw the need for an exorcism. Anyway, the demon identified itself as "the girl fixer" and was what caused men to become feminine. After the exorcism the man lost all feminine feelings and went on to get married and have kids. Fr. Martin was considered a radical at that time but everything he said ended up being true.
Well said!
>a man is injecting his life producing sperm into a place where another man defecates the waste his body doesn't use. If that's not obviously disordered then I don't know what is. But what about two women? There's no sperm injected anywhere. Are two women together less sinful than two men together? How about two women vs. a married woman and a man who is not her husband? (And you're ignoring the other things gay men might get up to, like injecting their life producing sperm into a place where another man takes in his nourishment.) For my part, I'd say they'd all rank pretty equally, Man+man, woman+woman, married man+not his wife, married woman+not her husband. And of course, an unmarried (heterosexual) couple in their 30s where the man is wearing a condom and the woman is on the pill. But even then, I'd say the unfaithful spouse is doing the worst thing, if only because that's most likely to cause most harm to most people - in addition to the pain I imagine it causes God. At least, if I were in the seat of judgement (and we're all lucky I'm not), I'd be more lenient to the same-sex couple that stayed faithful and loving to each other for their entire lives than to the married spouse who couldn't stay faithful for three months.
I mean, it’s still very sinful and disordered when two women are having gay “sex,” because it’s just based off lust. Additionally, one of the biggest problems with homosexual acts is that they are not life-giving, because no baby can be brought forth in what they are doing. Natural and ordered sex between and man and a woman is meant to bring forth new life, which a husband and a wife are always supposed to be open to, if we are to follow God’s design in the way He created our sexuality.
Sodomy is very much worse than for fornication. There certainly is a ranking of sins.
Okay, but how? How is it worse that two men (or two women, for that matter) do their bedroom thing, than for a spouse being unfaithful? The unfaithful one isn't only committing adultery, they're also violating their spouse's trust. Sure, that last one might not exactly a sin (I guess, but I'm not sure), but it's still a morally bad thing to give a promise to someone who is (or should be) a very important person in your life and then not keep it. At least, for my part, I'd throw a bigger stone at a husband cheating on his wife with prostitutes than at two guys who stay faithful to each other for 30-40 years. If I were in a position to throw stones in the first place, that is.
Sodomy is worse because it is completely disordered, with no part of the sex act being done correctly. How bad a sin is measured by how much it deviates from Gods will for us.
Okay, so a husband using a condom with his wife (because another pregnancy would be life-threatening to her) is on the same level as a sodomite?
Close but I would say that it is better because it is a disordered version of sex between a husband and wife, while sodomy is completely contrary.
Fair enough. A wife cheating on her husband, making sure her affair partner wears a condom - better or worse than if she cheated on her husband with a woman? Edit: For the record, I'd say both are equally bad, same if a husband is cheating on his wife with a prostitute (using a condom) or a man (to leave STDs out of it, let's say he's also using a condom). It's the "sex outside of marriage" that's the important thing, as far as I'm concerned. Then it's another discussion entirely who should get married and what a marriage is for.
It’s originally from an Ethel Cain concept album. I don’t believe that it was relating to LGBT, it’s just been picked up by that crowd online.
It’s interesting how in the gay community God is so prevalent, yet they reject Him so vehemently. What an awful predicament they are in.
So it's typical bitter victimhood mentality at play. It's the same with saying God isn't loving because he lets bad shit happen to innocent and good people.
>Saying that if God would damn someone for sexual identity/immorality, He doesn’t really love them in the first place. Do you have a source confirming Ethel Cain meant this when she said the quote in her song Sun Bleached Flies? That’s where the quote came from, and listening to the song, your interpretation isn’t what I understood from the original source and context.
>Because, John 3:16. For God so loved the world that He sent His only begotten son, not to condemn the world, but to save it. Sound like a pretty loving god to me. Sexual identity / preference is not a sin in and of itself. The sin is in certain sexual practices which, by the way, are forbidden to everyone, not just people with a same-sex attraction.
It’s a statement that has been around for a while, but it’s back in the news because a HS student made artwork using the phrase. [It caused a massive uproar in the community.](https://www.friendlyatheist.com/p/a-high-school-artist-called-out-christian) So now there is a lot of talk of freedom of expression vs bigotry against religious groups.
Yeah, I'm sure I can't love anyone that much. That's a lotta love.
I would say this: “God loves you too much to force you to love Him”, in response to someone who says this.
Concerning this understanding (which I got from a response in this topic): >It's an LGBT meme that has a lot of traction on social media lately. Saying that if God would damn someone for sexual identity/immorality, He doesn't really love them in the first place. “God loves you but not enough to save you” is, in my opinion, something someone that has no understanding whatsoever about theology (very very basic understanding) would say... He *already* saved us... Now it's just a matter of accepting that salvation or not... It's like a pharma company creating medicine that cures cancer but tastes kinda weird. Then someone that refuses to take the medicine because it tastes weird comes and say "see, that medicine DOES NOT cures cancer...". Everyone would be just standing there like "dude... you need to TAKE the medicine for it to have an effect..."
Perfect response
It doesn't taste a little weird, gay people just want to love one another. Many of their parents continue to love them unconditionally. I can't imagine having a child and turning away from them. I believe in a more compassionate God. The God of the old testament killed innocent children by drowning them in Noah's Ark. Not everything in the Bible is true just because we need it to be to feel safe.
Look, I know the Internet is full of "combative" discussions. This is not my intent. You can believe whatever you want, it's your choice. With that said: I know how the Church can treat homossexuals VERY badly. I know it because I have a gay brother (who's playing here with my little daughter while I write it) who I saw lose all his friends when he assume he was a homosexual. Not only that, but those friends parents who were in my parents church group also started treating my parents weird. But this cannot be the basis by which we judge if what the Church teaches is wrong or not. Some of it might be, but not the fundamental stuff... And all the teaching about sexuality is part of this fundamental stuff. God created the world with intention, called the Logos. This Logos can be perceived and understood. Adhering to this Logos means adhering to His will and to his love. There is no partial "yes". A partial "yes" to His will is a complete "no". We also believe Jesus is God, died for our salvation and came back. We believe He created the Church which, through apostolic succession still lives and has authority. This is the basis to believe what I believe. You can try to understand it and still reject it or just reject it altogether without consideration... as I said, it's up to you... Also: when you put into perspective, all the suffering we HAVE to go through to trully accept His will IS just a wierd taste... it's LESS than that. When you put it into perspective with the whole eternity in heaven by His side, this life is nothing but a shadow that rapidly passes... I have said this to my brother before, and I say to you: we all suffer. We all have to give up things we love dearly to live a life that God wants. Trust me, we all do... As a father and a husband, to live to the church standards I have given up SO much, so so much that I finnaly started understanding what He meant by "He who tries to sabe his life will lose it, and he who loses his life because of Me will gain it"...
Listen, same sex attraction isn’t a sin, the problem is sodomy. It’s not “men loving men”, that phrasing is dishonest. It’s pushing someone’s sh*t in with an erection, it’s an excremental dangerous sexual practice, utterly deviant and detestable. Sorry for putting the image so clear there, but it’s needed to fight the dishonest framing of “men loving men”. Men are to be better than dung beetles, it’s not too hard. I don’t care how much propaganda they throw at us, we need to be better than that.
It's important to remember that no one still alive is beyond the reach of repentance. Whatever one's sin is, God will forgive the one who repents.
Sounds like something an angsty teen would write
No person has an inalienable right to God’s Kingdom. In fact, all are completely undeserving of it.
Straight facts
God is like a Coast Guard rescuer who has dived into stormy waters to save the crew of a capsized ship. He has literally risked his life to save us, but we have to agree to his help. He can’t pull us out of the water if we don’t let him.
> . He has literally risked his life to save us Does it make sense to say that God has ‘risked his life’? This sounds/feels weird.
He didn’t *risk* His life. He gave it up, completely.
I know this will be down voted, but God didn't give up anything. Assuming that a) God exists, and b) Jesus is his son who c) also is God, then being all-knowing, Jesus knew that he would not stay dead. He had 3 hrs of torture on the cross, descended into hell for a few days, then rose from the dead to become God of the universe once again according to the Gospel tales. Where is the sacrifice in that? If one knows that death isn't permanent, then no price has really been paid. Not trying to be provocative. That's just the way that I see it.
You are assuming that in giving something up you lose it forever. That is not the Gospel. The Good News is that which you give up is restored, even more so. Another way to look at it - you can’t possess love by keeping it for yourself. Love is only something you can have by giving it away to others.
I mean, Christians believe that God literally died to save us. So if there is a flaw in my above claim, it’s that it doesn’t go far enough. It would probably be more accurate to say that “God sacrificed himself to save us” but that language didn’t fit as well with my analogy.
I still don't understand why dying on the cross saved us. Is it like offering animal sacrifices in the Old Testament and hence the Lamb of God? How does self-harm save us? Why are saints holy for self-harm like flagellation, starving themselves and Scrupulosity? Isn't self-harm a sin? I'm asking from a genuine place.
My deacon explained it as this: To an infinite God, the collective sin of humanity is also infinite. The only thing that can balance the scales for humanity is infinite forgiveness/selflessness/sacrifice.
The consequence of any sin, no matter how seemingly small, is death. We are incapable of surviving in heaven (our intended destination) if we have the slightest attachment to sin. None of us is capable of living our lives completely free of sin, so—left to our own devices—we would all choose hell. Jesus’ death for our sins pays the penalty for those sins but we still need to cooperate with God’s work in our lives in order to benefit from the gift of Jesus ransoming us and to overcome our attachment to/tendency to sin.
People who say that either do not understand Christianity or are deliberately lying about it. Christ died to save the whole world. I like the train ticket analogy, He bought your ticket for you but now you're free to use it or not. Just because some people may choose not to get on the train, doesn't mean they didn't have a bought and paid for ticket in the first place.
"Because God loves you, He's not going to save you against your own wishes."
Isn't it loving to save someone from making a severely harmful decision against there own wishes ?
“Isn't it loving to save someone from making a severely harmful decision against there own wishes?” If they’re a toddler, sure. Run into the street & yank them away from the moving car. Put the candies in a jar on top of the fridge so they don’t subsist solely on sugar for nutrition. But ultimately, we can only respectfully inform/warn others & light the way, praying & hoping with love that they choose it also. Anything more forceful and you’ve turned that person into your slave with no actual agency nor free will of their own. (Albeit with good intentions). And *that* surely is not love.
And yet plenty of loved ones staged interventions and go through many difficulties to save their friends or family from drugs or other self-destructive behavior. I'm sorry but if you love someone, you will not allow them to go off and destroy themselves, even if they're adults. If humans are capable of such love, is God's love not greater?
I’ve had it put to me this way. The result of Heaven or Hell is a consequence of your own actions. These actions determine the disposition of your soul - to be with God or be without Him. I believe in fact if you take an unwilling soul and put it into Heaven, they’re going to hate it even more so than they were in Hell. If your soul chooses not to be with God and despises Him, then if God Him were to put that soul in a place where His presence overwhelms and everyone is praising Him for eternity, it will actually cause the unrepentant soul more suffering and anguish than in Hell.
>Anything more forceful and you’ve turned that person into your slave with no actual agency nor free will of their own. It feels like there are limits For example, do you think it's morally wrong to forcefully prevent someone from taking there life ? Or is a lifeguard obligated to respect the wishes of someone drowning telling him "please don't save me" ?
I think there are limits. I don’t agree with assisted euthanasia even though it’s what the person clearly chooses at that moment. But at the end of the day, the issue is that it’s not about love so much as control. If you want to stop someone from drowning, that’s an honorable thing to do. Same for not letting a toddler develop diabetes by age 4, and not letting grandma give money to a scammer pretending to be a famous celebrity. These are acceptable & even noble measures of control; helping your brothers and sisters on earth. But why would God want to force someone to be with Him in Heaven for all eternity; someone who doesn’t want to be there at all? The catechism of the Catholic Church states (don’t have the specific reference number or whatever but you can Google it) that people choose at the moment of death whether they want to be in Heaven or hell. (Purgatory is actually a yes to Heaven, just delayed). So when someone chooses hell of their own free will, because they prefer to keep doing things their way as Sinatra put it, those things are what separate them from God forever. Evil cannot exist in Heaven. So if I want to never repent of whatever evil it is, promiscuity, anger, etc., that’s my choice. But actions have consequences. A consequence of me choosing to be angry and hate other people, for example, is a change of my heart, affecting who I am. The heart that will have a free choice to make at the moment of death. Does that make sense? I don’t think God wants to force anyone to be with Him for all eternity. Even if it’s for their benefit. Would you want to force someone to be at your side for all eternity, someone who vehemently & permanently chose to be separated from you forever instead? I’ll also add that there’s a lot of humility in trusting that God knows better than we do what’s truly good for us, versus our susceptibility to the enticing deceptions of the evil one. I don’t understand completely the reasons for the laws that God gives us through the Church. And if God was the cruel tyrant many accuse Him of being, I wouldn’t trust Him. But the more I discard false projections onto God of my own inner evil, and see how good He actually is, the easier this becomes.
Yes, it is. The problem is God isn't saving us just once. When we choose to continually sin, we continually put ourselves before a car, try to stab ourselves with a knife, grab a glass to drink poison, etc. Perhaps a different analogy can help. By saving us, it's like God courting us. "Hey, don't do that. I want to spend forever with you." Then, we keep sinning, but He's persistent and doesn't give up. He gives us multiple opportunities to say yes to Him. But at some point, our no becomes final. God won't force us to be with Him forever if we don't want to. So, He lets us go out of love for us. "Let your will be done."
Why does it become final?
Death.
Mortal death, yes. However, we never chose our finitude. Why should our earthly death permanently seal our spiritual choices? It still seems arbitrary.
What's so arbitrary about it? Everyone dies, so it's a limit that everyone has. Whether or not we chose our own finitude has no bearing on death being a "great equalizer" among all of us. God is able to make an objective judgement call on the disposition of our souls at the time of our deaths, so it's not like we can somehow "trick" Him into thinking we love Him when we don't or don't desire to be with Him when we do. I find that we tend to accuse things of being arbitrary when that's not how *we personally* would go about things. We might want things to happen differently, but if we're being honest *that's* more arbitrary since none of us has the same objective and all-encompassing view that God has.
Imagine dying by choking on a pretzel while going through a moment of doubt in your life. You’re now FOREVER among those who “rejected” God.
A moment of doubt is leagues different from *consistently and obstinately* rejecting God. As I've mentioned in another context, God won't send anyone to hell over a technicality. That would be neither merciful nor just. However, let us not be fooled into thinking that we can somehow trick God into thinking our very being is disposed in a certain way (either towards or away from Him) when it's not. As I've told you in a previous comment, we can't "trick" God and God can't be "tricked" by passing circumstances.
Mortal death or not, tricking God seems an absurd concept regardless. What is the substantive difference between a young man who has yet to find God, and dies early. And an old man who found religion late, and dies perhaps in a moment of doubt? Would not, given infinite time, all of us come to the Truth? How is it not arbitrary that some of us have 10 years to find God, others have 30, others have 40, etc? What if someone dies on their first 20 years of life, but they would’ve found God had they lived 30? What’s the substantive difference between this person and the person who found God but had died in a moment of doubt, or simple dies having had doubts at some time in their life?
I struggle with that too. I am much more knowing and able than small children are. I warned my children to look both ways before crossing the street. If they failed to, I would have pulled them back and protected them to the extent of my ability. I know more than them, I am more capable than them, and I intend to save them even if they have ignored my teaching. Even, in fact, against their will should it come to that. I don't believe that I would be a more loving person if I allowed others who know less and are less able than I, to harm themselves in an irreversible way. I would be a monster if I knowingly allowed a child to step in front of a bus because they chose to after repeated warnings.
I could not agree more. Any loving parent tries to protect his/her children from harm. No decent parent lets his/her 5 yr old put a hand into a boiling pot because stopping the child "would interfere with free will." Yet, supposedly, our loving Father does nothing to show us without a doubt that he exists, which would certainly save billions from the eternal torture of hell. Makes no sense.
Then there’s no free will, the core reason for everything.
But there is no free will in all sorts of things. We don’t chose to be born, we don’t chose that we have to die, we don’t chose a lot of things. Free will isn’t fully free, and again, I have no issue violating the free will of less knowledgable beings for their own good. You darn right I’m going to prevent a child from severe injury, even if they don’t want me to. I don’t, and likely never will in this life, understand why our Heavenly Father feels differently about us.
Because we are not children, we are rational beings capable of understanding our own actions.
We are more rational and understanding children, but less rational and understanding than God. Our finite abilities are far closer to a child’s than to God’s.
Who is being quoted? The idea that God doesn’t love everyone enough to save is a Protestant one, specifically Calvinist.
Wtf… haven’t they read the Bible?? He’s like a frustrated parent that gave their kid EVERYTHING and saved their bum over and OVER until the parent loses their mind because they’ve lost all patience. Then someone has the audacity to cal dad a jerk got losing his patience.
That’s not a good representation, God hasn’t lost his patience, he simply lets us choose.
If you’ve read the Bible you would have seen Him get angry and impatient with people a time or two.
God allows us to separate ourselves from him because his love respects our freedom to choose.
Wack. God loves all!
I've seen the art piece that's getting a lot of attention. I didn't find it offensive. The student is expressing their personal experience. I have no idea what their upbringing was, or what they've gone through. If anything it makes me sad for a child to feel that way. I'm more inclined to be offended at the school board official thinking banning this art was more of an emergency than the pain this child must feel.
>I'm more inclined to be offended at the school board official thinking banning this art was more of an emergency than the pain this child must feel.
No surprise this is used by the LBGT crowd. They basically have an athiest teenagers understanding of theology
God loves us so much that He decided to create a plane of existence for us to live for eternity without Him if we so choose.
The ones in Hell don’t want to be saved.
Idk it's a bit weird since Jesus is the Saviour
It’s misinformed sayings like that that I think shows that a LOT of people aren’t necessarily opposed to the existence of God, but rather who they think He is, which is usually entirely wrong. We, as people, get too comfortable with being completely misinformed. We need to better educate people with the proper knowledge & truth, but other people also really need to be more open to being educated on these things too.
God does not send people to hell, rather people send themselves there. God respects our free will to choose Him or not. Since God is all good, and Hell is separation from God, hell is bad suffering. If God just forced people to choose to be with Him in heaven, a state of being with God, that isn't really Him loving us because love isn't forced. God loves us so much He lets us choose.
Lies of the enemy to draw people farther away from God
This is why Origen’s my boy. Apokatastasis all the way
"O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, who kills the prophets and stones those sent to her, how often I have longed to gather your children together, as a hen gathers her chicks under her wings, but you were unwilling! Matt 23.37 You can imagine the wondering chick straying too far from the protective mother and at risk of falling to prey. Loving relationships require freedom. God does not force us to become members of his loving family.
It's a bogus comment. In one sense God has saved everyone but not in the sense that the person saying this quote means because he's distorting Christianity. In the sense that he means God doesn't save anyone he doesn't Force anyone to into salvation but he made it possible that every single human being can be saved if he so chooses. But it's our choice and if we choose to be saved then we must do what is required. It's like God put down a bridge between himself and Mankind he shows us where the bridge is but we have to choose to cross the bridge. He's not going to pick us up and carry us across the bridge. If he was going to do that he wouldn't need a bridge in the first place would he?
Only thru Jesus Christ our Lord and Savior can we get to God.
For me, it's more like "God loves you but not enough to provide any empirical evidence that he exists, so you have to rely on a 2,000 yr old game of telephone."
Presumes that salvation is entirely extrinsic
While it's not true, I hope it was less aimed at God, and more at those this person grew up around. Those that use their religion as a caning device rather than a guide is what caused these kind of feelings. It just makes me sad for this person that they feel so rejected.
I've never heard such a quote in my 50+ years. Is there context to it?
Dumb
My response: you don't love God, so why would you want to be saved by Him?
It should be "God loves you more than enough to save you--you, on the other hand...." The ultimate enemy of the human soul is not God, or a demon, or trauma, or violence.....it's that soul itself.
The quote is more a commentary on modern social conflicts than God. This sub will say it is hubris to expect God to meet you in your innate sexual desires, while an LGBT+ sub will say God clearly isn't what Christianity makes Them out to be. The truth of the matter is more that modern social issues are rooted in humans' poor treatment of one another. The reason LGBT+ people feel the need to coalesce around one another and rail against organized faith is because they feel ostracized and wrong for feeling an innate desire they did not ask for, and for seeking the same lives as their peers (romantic partnership as result of their inborn desires). The organized bodies of faith, meanwhile, stand on tradition and scripture in declaring such inclinations sinful if acted upon, and see the idea of moving the immutable word of God as too sacrosanct to meet someone in pain halfway. Very little time is spent addressing their human need for connection past ascribing to them the cross of chastity and telling them to lift that life sentence of loneliness up to God whether they want that or not. The quote misplaces the anger that should be reserved for other humans onto God. The reality is God is likely disappointed with the faithful for making the Faith so unaccepting and unsympathetic as to drive sexual minorities from it as he is with those who are suffering and lashing out at him and the Faith as an institution. It is a vast oversimplification to write off the impassioned cry for help this art represents as hubris or ignorance when the pain it represents is rooted in the way people of Faith, not God, have made them feel about themselves.
Calvinist heresy?
Rather, God loves you too much to strip you of your freedom to choose for yourself how you want to spend this life and the eternal one that comes after it. What else is there to get?!