“Faith seeks understanding” (St. Anselm, 1033-1109). Mine is no different. I do not wish to adopt a belief system to satisfy those of the same belief system in circular self-affirmation. In an effort to find a suitable structure of thought to understand what I believe, I have come up with this z-theory. I am certain it is nothing new, but as old as the sun. However, it is a new way of thinking for me that has unlocked the shackles of fundamentalism from my mind and liberated my thinking. I now experience a new level of joy and freedom I have not known before. I wish to share it with my readers because I believe it is helpful.
I am certain that this theory is a structure for thinking about reality that is not offensive to anyone of any faith, religion, philosophy, or non-faith, etc., but in fact useful to all people of every persuasion. Being that I find myself a Christian, and a pastor of a church at that (I’ve been reminded of that many times lately!), I find this theory can be constructive to the Christian faith. I do so for these reasons:
- It is Trinitarian in form: God, God Incarnate, God the Spirit.
- It acknowledges the transcendence of the Absolute, the Almighty, the All Above All… Father, God, and Lord.
- It is Christocentric. God Incarnate, dethroned, condescended from non-Being to being. The only way we are connected to the Transcendent is in the son of man.
- It embraces the Spirit, which is the spirit of the Christ who lived truth, justice and love, which is at work concretely in all relationships.
Philosophical research abounds on the issue of the Transcendent. Debates continue to heat up surrounding the historical Jesus and the reliability of the documents. Party politics proliferate divisions over where the Spirit’s loyalty lies. My hope is that this z-theory, a tentative structure for understanding reality, will promote dialog among diverse groups.
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David Hayward is an artist trapped in a pastor's body, stripping to the essential.
I think Karl Barth would put it up on the door of his office. Nicely done.
It takes a person who is secured in Christ as the source of his identity to be able to pull of a mode of thinking that is not the norm. To meditate on what really matters, and then have the ability to convey that to others… that to me is where evangelism grabs its legs and runs further, faster.
Your Z-theory didn’t sound new to me; but maybe because I am carrying the same kinds of internal frameworks, having similar actions and conclusions.
Continue to keep rocking; your art in word and pen is still inspring.
“I do not wish to adopt a belief system to satisfy those of the same belief system in circular self-affirmation.” Wow I wish people understood that. The offense created when you seem to be “leaving them” is quite absurd when you realize we are all a part of the same Church.
NP,
I appreciate your attempts to clarify your thinking with further posts.
In my defense, as one of the critics of your previous posts, I believe I was seeking dialog — seeking clarification — and I believe others were as well (esp. fishon). You even admitted that your post was controversial. You certainly expected response and challenge.
When you publish your thoughts and ideas to the world and even invite response (eg comments are on), then you have to expect that there will be disagreement and challenges. Just as when I respond with these comments, I open my own beliefs to criticism and challenges.
Kenny: I couldn’t agree with you more. I totally expect dialog. I invite it, like you say.
I am trying to understand. I am also trying to understand for the sake
of others.
The central message of Christianity is that Christ Jesus’ death on the cross paid the price for sin, and created a pathway to relationship with God for those who believe that and accept Him as Lord. You seem to be casting doubt on the possibility of Jesus’ actual existence or perhaps his existence as divine, when referencing the reliability of historical documents. Why do you stay within the framework of Christianity when expressing your theory, if the evidence for it is suspect?
the Z theory is really a good way to picture the whole thing, i’ve been thinking a lot about it the past couple of days. it was just confusing to read for the first, it sounded really “universalist”, like the “it doesn’t matter which god you pray to” stuff of the new age.
thanks for clarifying tho.
I agree with this perspective.
hmm this makes more sense. Okay. Sorry.
What is “non-Being” to “being”? Don’t you mean “Being” to “being”?
“Faith seeks understanding” (St. Anselm, 1033-1109). Mine is no different. I do not wish to adopt a belief system to satisfy those of the same belief system in circular self-affirmation. In an effort to find a suitable structure of thought to understand what I believe, I have come up with this z-theory.
—————What part does the Bible play in the formation of your z-theory?
And I would be interested in how you pick and choose which parts.
Since you didn’t answer the Allah question, I am hoping you will answer those 2 questions. If I was sitting in a class you were teaching, I would ask those of you.
fishon
“Faith seeks understanding” (St. Anselm, 1033-1109). It would give more validity if you quote apostle Paul, ” That I may KNOW HIM and Power of HIS resurrectioin.
To design more theory, doctrine, and beliefs, to analize feelings, emotions and all the Why’s of human nature….is waisting time to pursure the higher things of this life, and will amount to a pile of Dung. just my humble opinion.
Whenever someone suggests that they’ve found something that the whole world needs (a new understanding of the concept of God etc.), my guard immediately goes up, as it should. As I’ve already said directly to your dear and beloved face, I question the need to redefine God and Christianity after these 2000+ years. Is it not just “The Gospel According to David Hayward”?
Redefining the gospel to remove it’s offensive nature is treading dangerous waters, not to mention contrary to Scripture. I do however understand that if you are struggling with what you believe, that it’s human nature to try to make it work for you so you can find some measure of peace. I’m just not convinced that it’s truly what you need, what our community needs, or the world needs to make God more acceptable. It’s the other way around, we are to become acceptable offerings to Him.
It’s a god fit for the intellectuals.
Heidi: if I was trying to write something less offensive, I wasn’t very successful.
I like dialog. Dialog is good. Is there a goal? And desired result? A purpose?
Heidi…if someone wants to dialog with the outsider and not just preach to the choir,sometimes the old songbook won’t do…the better question shld be: what fruit does it bear?
Heidi said, on June 25th, 2009 at 9:34 am
~”Whenever someone suggests that they’ve found something that the whole world needs (a new understanding of the concept of God etc.), my guard immediately goes up, as it should. ”
This reeks of the – “If it’s old it’s true, if it’s new it probably isn’t” mentality. Nothing wrong with being skeptical mind you, but to be skeptical of the “new” simply because it has not yet been shown to work, and to not be skeptical of the old, even though it has been shown that it doesn’t work, seems kind of “religious” to me.
~”Redefining the gospel to remove it’s offensive nature is treading dangerous waters, not to mention contrary to Scripture.”
Dangerous? How so? Is God going to send a lightning bolt his way? As for “contrary to scripture”, my guess is that any belief that differs from your belief, you would consider “contrary to scripture”. If not, then you are admitting that your own belief may be contrary to scripture.
~”I do however understand that if you are struggling with what you believe, that it’s human nature to try to make it work for you so you can find some measure of peace.”
Isn’t that what we all do? If so, then why chastise David for doing what all of us humans do? Why is it that, in any industry, if it isn’t working, it is innovative and praiseworthy to loom for ways to fix it. But in religion, if it isn’t working, the one who attempts to fix it is condemned?
~”I’m just not convinced that it’s truly what you need, what our community needs, or the world needs to make God more acceptable.”
…I don’t get it. You see that what David is doing is perfectly normal for a human to do, yet you don’t think he should do it? Perhaps your perscription would be to pray and study the bible? Me thinks has has done that, and continues to do that.
~”It’s the other way around, we are to become acceptable offerings to Him.”
Don’t you think that, by his act of contemplation, searching, and sharing, that that is exactly what David is trying to do? In his way, which is the only way David can do what he is doing, because he is who he is, don’t you think he is trying to do what HE believes he needs to do for his community and himself?
Please don’t think that I think that David needs or desires anyone to come to his defence. My purpose in commenting is not to defend him. I am just attempting to show you what dogma looks like to us outsiders. To us, it is very unattractive.
bob,
But don’t you have your own dogma? [I don't know you, just reacting to this particular post]. The dogma that there is no true religious knowledge or that it’s somehow inadequate or lesser knowledge? The dogma of tolerance — not of people — but that all beliefs are good beliefs (except, of course, if you hold them too dearly). It’s basically intolerant tolerance. All beliefs are good unless you believe them too much. In fact the very claim that we must not hold to our beliefs too strongly is itself a strongly held belief by you — it’s self-defeating.
Some of the commenters I’ve seen on this blog appear to believe that an acceptance and promotion of orthodoxy is somehow an extreme form of intolerance and ignorance. Well, it’s not. At least not in my case.
So maybe it’s you who needs to step down off the high horse… and not Heidi.
Ouch Kenny…OUCH!
Did anything I wrote penetrate? Did you not see anything of value in my response? Did i not make even one good point?
I guess it is a vicious circle. Most of us would say freedom is good.
David was exercising this freedom by thinking freely and sharing his thoughts with others. That’s all he is doing.
Heidi was exercising her freedom by condemning Davids exercising of his freedom.
I was exercising my freedom by disagreeing with Heidi’s condemnation of David’s exercising of his freedom.
You are doing likewise, but also accusing me of thinking a bit to highly of myself, but you would be mistaken. I am an idiot.
Yes, I admit that I am intolerant of intolerance. And I find orthodoxy, in general, to be intolerant.
No, I have no dogma. And I do not believe all beliefs are good, but when someone, WHO DOESN’T KNOW, tells someone else WHO DOESN’T KNOW, that there is really no need to look for the answer, then it is perfectly reasonable for me, the observer, to object. And I will continue to object, in the name of reason, every time someone tries to counsel, rebuke, or persuade because of their beliefs in their holy book. Sorry, but that is what I do on occasion.
I think Ingersoll summed it up best ~ “The clergy know that I know, that they know, that they do not know.”
David simply has the fortitude to admit that he just doesn’t really know, and he is doing what one normally does when he just doesn’t know…he looks for answers. And apparently orthodoxy does not like that.
“Some of the commenters I’ve seen on this blog appear to believe that an acceptance and promotion of orthodoxy is somehow an extreme form of intolerance and ignorance. Well, it’s not. At least not in my case” (Kenny)
Because Kenny – it can be. It creates an exclusive system wherby someone can claim one thing (righteous) and judge another’s life (damned)…by the formal belief/confession to a bunch of statements which sets them apart somehow…it’s a bunch of useless lips service if u ask me (what does it actually do? Re-affirm one’s set position over and over?).
But it’s ignorant also because what if the creed is flawed? Shouldn’t we question such an idea like God being 3 in 1 when Judaism never held to such a belief about the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob? If not, why not? Because someone in antiquity already did it…but if we don’t review these things and accept them on ‘faith’ – then yes – we are being ignorant on some level.
But worst of all – it reittirates the exclusion that has existed in the church for centuries – which inevitably leads to questionable/immoral behavior. If you think ‘your right’ and ‘they’re wrong’ – how long before that movement moves to do something to the ‘wrongs’ of society?
Classic example is the anti-semitism movememts that have arisen in various periods of the church (last 1900 years) – even up to the early 1900’s. Why do these movements happen every odd while – read the book of John I guess. Some of the NT language is very questionable and can paint Jewish people in extremely bad lights.
A more recent example could be the pro-lifers and the doctors…with one doctor recently being shot again. It seems like every few years another doctor gets shot or someone fire bombs an abortion clinic – resulting in harm. But those pro lifers no one small thing…it’s ‘us’ vs ‘them’ and may the best side win.
Christianity inevitably leads one into this behavior which IMO is dangerous on some levels (not on extreme levels all the time). It can lead to self-righteousness and promote division – in families and in communities. But it will lead you astray from others to disconnect somehow from the world around you. And I think being out of touch leaves you more in the clutches of someone who may proclaim high levels of control over you (some pastor or apostle figure) – leaving you at the whims of someone else’s corroded thinking. This is all possible.
Well said Bob….if yr an idiot,I want to be one
societyvs,
And what of the alternative? That none of can know truth? That any convictions about our beliefs are bad? That we can’t know anything — at least not with certainty? Aren’t we getting to the point of absurdity?
Actually, I would argue that that view is largely unattainable. I doubt anyone here who has condemned us for having convictions don’t have their own convictions. In fact, I already pointed one out — the conviction that one should not have convictions.
But I imagine you all have many other such beliefs that you are deeply convicted about, such as that it’s wrong to molest a child, and I’d imagine you’d not concede that you should accept that alternative view as truth. I doubt you’d even entertain a serious debate with someone from NAMBLA.
I am humble enough to admit that my beliefs about God and Jesus might be wrong, but I don’t believe they are. In fact, I am quite confident in my beliefs. And I don’t believe it’s wrong for me to be so confident.
I don’t have easy beliefism. I am a skeptic at heart. What I believe to true, I believe I hold real knowledge about. My faith is founded on years of seeking, thinking, searching, considering, etc. I believe I have found the truth — I didn’t just accept it as such when it was first presented to me.
And the whole “Christianity leads to dangerous behavior” is ludicrous. It’s not Christianity, but people. Let’s not forget the evil committed in the name of atheism (eg Stalin, Castro, etc)
Kenny Johnson said, on June 25th, 2009 at 12:40 pm
~”And what of the alternative? That none of can know truth? That any convictions about our beliefs are bad? That we can’t know anything…”
Kenny, this is straw man building. I do not believe this position has been proposed. I do not believe that truth can not be known, I just don’t believe that those claiming to know the truth (with regard to their religion in this discussion) actually KNOW what they claim to KNOW. I’m not saying they CAN’T know, but that they DON’T know….but some believe they KNOW and talk as if they KNOW.
~”I doubt anyone here who has condemned us for having convictions don’t have their own convictions.”
I am not condemning you for having convictions, but questioning the motivation behind condemning David’s process based on your convictions. Condemning the honest searching’s of another because of your religious convictions deserves to be pointed out as an absurd and harmful religious exercise.
~”But I imagine you all have many other such beliefs that you are deeply convicted about, such as that it’s wrong to molest a child, and I’d imagine you’d not concede that you should accept that alternative view as truth. I doubt you’d even entertain a serious debate with someone from NAMBLA.”
I don’t understand. How can you possibly compare a religious conviction about, say, whether water baptism is by immersion or sprinkling, with a moral conviction that it is wrong to make a sexual object of a child? Can’t you make a more even comparison?
~”I am humble enough to admit that my beliefs about God and Jesus might be wrong, but I don’t believe they are. In fact, I am quite confident in my beliefs.”
I hope you re-read your statement above and can recognize the glaring contradiction between the beginning and the end. “I might be wrong but I know I’m not”….?
~”And the whole “Christianity leads to dangerous behavior” is ludicrous. It’s not Christianity, but people.”
Then I have to assume that you do not believe that Stalin committed his atrocities BECAUSE OF atheism, correct? It’s not atheism, but people, correct?
~”Let’s not forget the evil committed in the name of atheism (eg Stalin, Castro, etc)”
Ooops, my mistake. It’s not just “people” when it comes to non Christians, but it is their evil beliefs (or non beliefs).
bob said, on June 25th, 2009 at 10:12 am
Heidi said, on June 25th, 2009 at 9:34 am
~”Redefining the gospel to remove it’s offensive nature is treading dangerous waters, not to mention contrary to Scripture.”
Dangerous? How so? Is God going to send a lightning bolt his way? As for “contrary to scripture”, my guess is that any belief that differs from your belief, you would consider “contrary to scripture”. If not, then you are admitting that your own belief may be contrary to scripture.
——–Bob, the gospel itself is offensive to many people. So to do away with proclaiming the gospel would be going against the words of Jesus to “go….” That is dangerous in itself because to pick and choose parts of a blueprint is to invite disastser. Just like going through a stop sign.
To take away from truth [the word of God] is dangerous because the offensive parts are put into the Word as a warning of danger up ahead. Speed limits are offensive to some people, but they save lives, if obeyed.
BOB:Is God going to send a lightning bolt his way?
————If he takes away the offensive parts—it will be much worse than a lighting bolt.
fishon
BOB:I guess it is a vicious circle. Most of us would say freedom is good.
———-NO, Bob, freedom is NOT good. There must be limits. And that is where the battle lines are drawn.
BOB:David was exercising this freedom by thinking freely and sharing his thoughts with others. That’s all he is doing.
———-That doesn’t make it safe, however. Carl Marx–Mao–Lenin–Joseph Smith–Jim Jones–etc.
There is great danger in sharing thoughts, that is why we all get challenged when we share them. Share them, we should. But expect to be criticized.
fishon
Bob:Yes, I admit that I am intolerant of intolerance.
——–Hey, Bob, just what is intolerance?
fishon
Kenny:I am humble enough to admit that my beliefs about God and Jesus might be wrong, but I don’t believe they are. In fact, I am quite confident in my beliefs. And I don’t believe it’s wrong for me to be so confident.
————That is what so many hate of us, our confidence in our belief. And we place our eternal life in the hands of the confidence, Jesus Christ, the Messiah.
What many do, many on this blog site, is try and he hedge their bet. If they don’t take an exclusive stand for Christ, then somehow if they are wrong and Christ is the only way, he will have mercy on them and they will be ok, anyway.
fishon
Bob:I am not condemning you for having convictions, but questioning the motivation behind condemning David’s process based on your convictions.
—————-Yep, that is the new mantra, question the motive because the conviction is quiet possible right on.
fishon
fishon said, on June 25th, 2009 at 1:50 pm
————That is what so many hate of us, our confidence in our belief.
Well, let me just make one point fishon: I, for one, do not hate you for your confidence. I disagree with you, and in some way, am fearful and sad that people believe what you do, as strongly as you do, but I do not hate you.
Perhaps you would rather that I did hate you for your beliefs?
“I admit that reason is a small and feeble flame, a flickering torch by stumblers carried in the star-less night, — blown and flared by passion’s storm, — and yet, it is the only light. Extinguish that, and naught remains.”
~Robert Ingersoll
“That we can’t know anything — at least not with certainty? Aren’t we getting to the point of absurdity?” (Kenny)
Bob answered this fairly well – but I’ll say something also. I am not against the search for ‘truth’ (something being what it is) – but to proclaim something as true you need to define 2 things in that process – define ‘truth’ and is truth ‘concrete or static’?
People for many years thought the world was flat – and this went without little question because it suited our known human reality (we all walk on the earth’s surface – this must be flat). However, over time this ‘truth’ changed when new evidence was introduced to prove the earth was in fact ’rounded’.
Another example could be concerning the belief in the ‘return of Christ’. It’s pretty solid that the gospel and letter writers though this event would happen in their age – and it did not. I am pretty sure they assumed this to be ‘fact’. Since then countless others have come along with the same predictions and scenarios of proof to back that up – and ‘wholla’ – no 2nd coming yet. Did they believe their ideas were ‘truth’? Probably or why write and proclaim them as such.
This is what I mean about the search for ‘truth’ – I am all for it – but lets at least define what we mean by using a term like the ‘truth’ (factual/true/real) and is this ‘truth’ in the process of interpretation?
“My faith is founded on years of seeking, thinking, searching, considering, etc. I believe I have found the truth — I didn’t just accept it as such when it was first presented to me.” (Kenny)
Same here Kenny – 15 years and going strong in the search for my best stance in faith in God. Yet we seem to arrive at differing conclusions on subjects – who’s right? You may very well be right on some things and I may very well be right on some (and a host of others may be right on other issues)…proving one simple and obvious thing – we are very limited beings and not a single one of us holds all that knowledge – but we try to find out…so the safe thing to say (and IMO the humble thing) is ‘truth may be concrete – but as humans we are limited and in a process of revelation of that truth’.
What you thought was true about something some 5 years ago may not be true anymore – ever have that happen? So it is with faith and it revealing nature – if we had it all pieced out and perfected – we’d no longer need God or anyone else – we’d be all the universe needed.
bob said, on June 25th, 2009 at 3:42 pm
fishon said, on June 25th, 2009 at 1:50 pm
————That is what so many hate of us, our confidence in our belief.
Well, let me just make one point fishon: I, for one, do not hate you for your confidence. I disagree with you, and in some way, am fearful and sad that people believe what you do, as strongly as you do, but I do not hate you.
————Bob, you may not hate people [fundies] for their confidence, but over the last couple year on this blog, there has been plenty of spewing of great dislike of me and others because of our confident stance for what we believe and our willingness to state it.
I am hate you do not hate me. I did not have you in mind when I wrote what I did. Interesting that you would take it that way.
fishon
One of my mantras is, “Presupposition, presupposition, presupposition!” Many of our presuppositions are unspoken, even unarticulated, yet they are operative in all we say and do–and often lead to misunderstandings, when we assume some eklse’s presupposition is the same as ours. I think several you you are talking past each other because of differing presuppositions.
Let me approach this “debate” from the perspective of spiritual gifts. One of those is the gift of faith; my wife has that. She has not the slightest bit of doubt about God, Christ, etc. But not all of us have that–I don’t. Consequently, there VERY few, if anything, I am 100% cionvinced of; some things I believe because I am 99.44% sure of it, and other things I believe because I am 51% convinced. But if I act on something that I have 51% confidence in–is not that the same as if I were 100% sure?
John
You’ve misquoted Anselm – or at least mistranslated. The participles interplay is crucial to what he is saying.
I also agree with you about this Z theory not being new. It smacks of gnosticism, which has at its core the unknowability of God despite the fact that in the messy historical particularities of the Hebrew people and Jesus in specific, God has clearly revealed himself.
CLL+
I think I’ve got the gist of anselm, but if not i still make my point.
And I disagree that this is gnostic. I talk about incarnation, etc.
First, let me tell you that I mean to respectfully and gracefully disagree with you.
I do think you have the gist of Anselm correct in terms of what an intellect must do when faced with the non-negotiables of faith. I don’t think that you and he agree with what the deposit of revelation (i.e. the faith) consist. (I mean in the main – not just in the context of medieval scholastic Latin rite theology.)
I believe that your Z-axis is flawed in the last two legs – that it is the Spirit which consists of the bond between the two levels, and that Jesus is the historical particularity (or the base line). Perhaps I should move my comments to that particular posting. However, I started on this one because of your bold claim that: “I am certain that this theory is a structure for thinking about reality that is not offensive to anyone of any faith, religion, philosophy, or non-faith, etc., but in fact useful to all people of every persuasion.”
I did find it offensive when applied to Christianity, because I see it as a reiteration of gnosticism – a heresy that is deadly to the Christian faith (and one the Church has countered multiple times, and is facing today…whenever it isn’t distracted by bedroom behavior).
The gnostics spoke of incarnation – it didn’t stop them from being gnostic. It just means that they redefined the word to mean something other than the ineffable God being communicated to us as the Word made Flesh. So simply using the language of incarnation, of afflatus, or what-have-you is not sufficient to safeguard against error. And I believe that you are dangerously close in this particular axis.
Perhaps the reversal of lines, where it is the Spirit that bridges the gap of communication and the Son who is the historical particularity (and the Church catholic as His body on earth), would safeguard the truth?
Humbly,
CLL+
Fishon— “Bob, you may not hate people [fundies] for their confidence, but over the last couple year on this blog, there has been plenty of spewing of great dislike of me and others because of our confident stance for what we believe and our willingness to state it.”
I simply disagree with your beliefs, both in content and fervor, that’s all. Didn’t mean to “spew”.
fishon — “I did not have you in mind when I wrote what I did. Interesting that you would take it that way.”
“That is what so many hate of us, our confidence in our belief.”
Interesting that you would make such a comment on this blog, then be confused that I might think you were talking about me. Honestly, I think you may, like many Christians, have a persecution complex, and consider any criticism or disagreement to be an attack from the underworld.
Rest assured, I have no problem with your beliefs or your confidence in your beliefs other than I just think your religious beliefs are…misguided, and your confidence in them, misplaced. No hatred. I may make sarcastic or biting responses at times, just as you do at times, but that’s as deep as it goes.
I have to wonder fishon, you said earlier – “NO, Bob, freedom is NOT good. There must be limits.” Could you elaborate? Perhaps you could explain what you thought I was saying? I find this comment to be frightening and confusing, especially the “freedom is NOT good” part.
Bob,
No persecution complex here. Just an observation. Radical Muslims hate me; that doesn’t mean I have a persection complex.
On the freedom thing:
BOB:I guess it is a vicious circle. Most of us would say freedom is good.
———-NO, Bob, freedom is NOT good. There must be limits. And that is where the battle lines are drawn.
BOB:David was exercising this freedom by thinking freely and sharing his thoughts with others. That’s all he is doing.
———-That doesn’t make it safe, however. Carl Marx–Mao–Lenin–Joseph Smith–Jim Jones–etc.
———–Bob, I would have thought my responses to you about that would have clarified what I meant. ————-Freedom needs limits. If no limits we end up with the Jim Jones of the world. Don’t you think someone should have tryed to stop him. Oops, someone tried; a congressman, and it got him killed.
Right from the start God put limits on freedom: “Don’t eat.” The gospel itself has limits: Heaven-hell.
Man is free to murder, but that freedom is only for a short time because judgment day is just around the corner for us all. At the same time that man is free to murder, he is not given the freedom to murder by God without penalty.
Sorry I can’t expain in writing what I mean better.
By the way, you never answered my question to you: What is intolerance?
fishon
in?tol?er?ance
–noun 1. lack of toleration; unwillingness or refusal to tolerate or respect contrary opinions or beliefs, persons of different races or backgrounds, etc.
As for “freedom”, I was talking about (I don’t know how it could be more obvious) Davids freedom to believe and express his beliefs. How in hell you could interject “Carl Marx–Mao–Lenin–Joseph Smith–Jim Jones–etc.” in my sentiment, I have no idea.
Of course there are limits on freedoms. You freedom to swing your fist ends at my chin. I know that, you know that. That has absolutely nothing to do with what I was talking about. Of course I know that freedom has limits. :l
As far as your god limiting what I eat, I pretty much ignore those limitations, don’t you?
And no, man is not “free to murder”, as you put it. Just visit your nearest prison.
John Fariss said:
“One of my mantras is, “Presupposition, presupposition, presupposition!” …. But if I act on something that I have 51% confidence in–is not that the same as if I were 100% sure?”
I abridged your response due to space and np’s bandwidth, but I respond to the whole thing. I completely agree with and identify with what you wrote about “faith.”
Bob,
How in hell you could interject “Carl Marx–Mao–Lenin–Joseph Smith–Jim Jones–etc.” in my sentiment, I have no idea.
————-Ok, let’s extract Max-Mao-Lenin.
But I will leave Smith and Jones as they were guys who came up “in freedom” X and Y theories.
Intolerant: So, if I say practicing homosexuality is a sin, yet I respect the opinion of the practicing homosexual, I am not intolerant. Glad to know you feel that way. But many homosexuals on this blog don’t feel that way. I can tell you that for sure, from what they have wrote to me.
fishon
I’ll stick my toe in the water of this moral freedom debate.
Why is “freedom” so dangerous? Because it is never freedom at all, when not constrained by God’s law.
We have an infinite capacity for self-rationalization. We think we know the boundaries. We think our reason can keep us safe.
The problem is, as C. S. Lewis wrote in his timeless essay, “Men Without Chests,” that our reason is no match for the passions of the flesh. Lewis put it this way: Our stomachs (that is our appetites) can’t be controlled by our minds (that is, reason). Something else has to come in to play—and that is the spirited element, or our chests, as he called it. It’s our will being trained to do what is right and just.
Nearly every grave moral failure begins with a small sin. Because there comes a time, after we toy with sin, when one pull of the flesh causes us to cross the line, to disengage from reason, and to follow our appetites wherever they may lead.
Ours is a self-indulgent age. Our wills are not trained to do what is good, but to do what pleases us. And so it is at least as true of our age, and perhaps more true, that we need the restraint of divine law because we have little law in us (either in our chaotic volition or muddled irrational epistemologies).
Truth be told, many of us have become – as Lewis said – men without chests.
Humbly, CLL+
fishon said, on June 26th, 2009 at 3:06 pm
“Intolerant: So, if I say practicing homosexuality is a sin, yet I respect the opinion of the practicing homosexual, I am not intolerant. Glad to know you feel that way. But many homosexuals on this blog don’t feel that way. I can tell you that for sure, from what they have wrote to me.”
hey, all I did was give you a difinition(sp) of the word.