From: kevin@taronga.taronga.com (Kevin Brown)
Subject: Re: Homosexuality and Christianity
Reply-To: kevin@taronga.taronga.com (Kevin Brown)
Organization: Minimal.
Distribution: na
Date: Fri, 17 Apr 1992 08:09:35 GMT

In article <adams.703432170@spssig> adams@spss.com (Steve Adams) writes:
[Amazingly, Steve seems to agree with me on just about every point I
make.  At the very least, he doesn't seem to disagree.  :-)  Anyway,
I figured my points were made long ago, and apparently Ireneus was the
one to make them.  And I had such hopes.  Ah, I can feel the fame
slipping through my fingers.  :-)   Anyway, I asked Steve to describe
his belief system.  Thus:]
>Sure...It's a variation on Free Will, in that it defends God by declaring a
>certain logical impossibility to be one.  Here goes, and forgive me if I
>confuse...just ask for clarification. :-)

Count on it.  :-)

>Anyway, there is one thing that appears to be a logical impossibility.
>Even though God is all-powerful, there is one thing that He cannot
>logically do.  And that is to create another God.  Were He to do that, He
>would cease to be unique and thus, no longer be Supreme.  Actually, a
>better way of saying this it not that God "can't", but that God "wouldn't".
>In either case, it cannot or will not be done.

Interesting, though I must ask: what is this obsession God has with
being Supreme?  :-)

>Given this particular assumption, there is a way to harmonize the 4
>premises above.  When we then look at creation, whether we refer to the
>creation of the Angels or Adam and Eve, the same situation holds.  I'll use
>the Angels first, since that allows for the allegorical story of Satan in
>the form of the serpent misleading Eve.
>
>When God created the Angels, they were slightly less than Gods.  They were
>created to be very, very much like God, but they were not God.  Since this
>is the case, we now have two grades in existance for the first time.  Since
>by definition (one of our assumptions was God being omnibonum) God is the
>most perfectly good thing in the universe, the Angels are slightly less
>good than Him.  Thus, God is the most good, the Angels the least good.  Or,
>said differently, God is the most good, and the Angels are the most evil.
>Remember, we only have two groups, and given our assumptions of God being
>perfectly good, the Angels cannot be perfect replicas of God.

Okay.  No problems so far.

>Thus, evil came into being through no 'fault' of God, but simply as a part
>of creation.  Since I restricted God in the small way above, I don't think
>it was possible for God to create without something less good (even
>minutely so) than He.

Well, more likely that he couldn't create something as good and remain
Supreme.  :-)

Actually, I'm not sure that would follow.  See, the only time you really
have a problem with multiple Gods is when they have conflicting desires.
But that doesn't happen if you make a copy of yourself [well, it's not
quite *that* simple.  If you happen to be the Jealous Type, e.g. you
would want to kill anything that is your equal, and you make a copy
of yourself, then you get everyone trying to kill everyone else.  Such
is the stuff of legendary wars in heaven.  Imagine the fireworks!  :-) ]

The point being that unless God is the Jealous Type like I described
above, he could make exact duplicates of himself without ever running
into problems.  But it would be real boring...:-)

>The same thing holds for man.  Man was corporeal, and thus slightly less
>good than the Angels.  Etc.

Okay...

>As for man's original sin, since God's desire (IMHO) was to be worshiped
>freely, man had to have a real option of not worshiping God.  And of not
>following his rules.  This is again a function of God.
>
>So although I do assign the responsibility to God, I do not 'blame' him.
>It's a fine line.

Errrmm...I can see the difference that you're talking about here.

>As for salvation, my basic problem with Ireneus is that since there is no
>Hell, what would God do with someone who in the end refused Him.

Well, what would *you* do with such a someone?  I know what I would do:
I'd set them up in whatever environment they wanted, give them whatever
attributes they wanted [and limit the extent of those attributes to the
environment I was placing them in.  Thus you can get "limited omnipotence".
Can you say "Q"?  :-) ] and then go away.  Being omniscient, I'd be able
to tell when they wanted me back, and if that happened, I'd go back.

In fact, I would do that for *everyone*.  Those that wanted my presence
would have it, that those that wanted my absence would get that.  And
either type could change their mind at any time.

In fact, they could change their mind at any time about anything.  No
problem.  Give them anything they wanted, so long as they didn't want
to be me (I could give them the *illusion* of being me, though, so it
might not matter too much).  If they wanted to be me, well, tough
shit.  They grew up on earth, after all.  They should be used to not
getting everything they wanted.  :-)

Hey, yeah...*that's* what life on earth is for...:-)

>Basically, my theology professor answered that with the belief that God
>would be forced to simply destroy that soul, based on interpolations from
>Ireneus teachings.  I find this a horrible prospect, though, for if one soul
>can be destroyed, it perhaps isn't a problem.  But if two can be, then all
>can be, and THAT's a problem!

Hmm...so what do you think of my idea above?  I mean, God *can* create
autonomous beings that do not require his presence to exist (such an
ability does not depend on being God's equal)...

>I do believe, though, that salvation is open to a much wider range of
>people than Augustine, or a typical Christian, does.  This tends to put me
>at odds with other Christians.  My point is that I don't believe a truly
>loving, good God would condemn someone who lived a good life, even though
>not being a believer, yet would save a "stinking, sinning Christian" (to
>borrow a phrase from Luther).

I agree.  See above.  I'm real interested in knowing whether or not you
agree with me on the "set him up and leave him alone" idea...

A God that set things up like that would be the ultimate Cool Dude...

>This isn't perhaps the best way I can explain it, but I haven't really had
>to write it out since I came to it.  I was led in this direction after
>writing a term paper on Free Will (which I had supported 100% at the time) and
>thinking about it for the last year or so.

A bit of time to be thinking about this stuff, to be sure.

I would say that, all in all, you've found a good compromise.  If I may
extrapolate a bit, I get the impression that you don't have much of a
problem with the beliefs of others (provided that they're at least
reasonable and harmless).  This is a welcome contrast to some of the
raving lunatics out there preaching "God's Word".  Such raving lunatics
are downright dangerous if they get real power...

There are some things about your beliefs, thouth, that I have problems with,
e.g. why did God create such a hostile place (the universe) for humans to
live in if he's so Good???  Did I answer it somewhere above?  :-)

> -Steve


		Kevin Brown (kevin@taronga.taronga.com)

Newsgroups: talk.religion.misc