Catholic view on modern heretics

[Josh]

[Josh]

[Tony]

[Adam]

[Josh]

[Adam]

::In "changing" the person, he is destroying the sinner.

Now who is allegorizing. Either human beings are being thrown into the pit, or they aren't. I say they aren't.

::Still, though, implicit in using words like "obey" and "disobey" is a standard that is being obeyed or disobeyed. Not quite an existential idea.

This is not true; existentialism acknowledges constructed mediums of subjective personal relations.

::Unworthy of what? Praise? Is his worthiness hanging on such a flimsy string as that?

Praise, obedience, faith, all of these things hang on such a flimsy string as whether or not God is mercifuly and graceful or vindictive and vengeful.

If God allowed anyone to be corrupted so that they must be destroyed, then I would never follow such a god, regardless of what people think Scripture may or may not say.

[John Anthony]

[Josh]

[AllanS]

A good author can create evil characters with the sole purpose of destroying them, and so demonstrate his glory as a writer.

A good programmer can infect his virtual world with evil AIs to make the glory of his creation all the brighter. When the simulation is complete, he can upload his good and faithful AIs to a nicer place and delete the bad AIs.

God, who is the ultimate computing device, can do the same.

So we have the 'elect' and the 'unregenerate', predestined either to glory or to destruction, their fate decided before God put pen to paper, or typed the first line of code.

Any hope of universal salvation then becomes a vain hope, indeed a wicked hope. The prayer, which I say every day "Lord have mercy on us all" becomes a nonsense, even a rebellion, since God has absolutely NO intention of having mercy on the unregenerate, no more than Tolkien intended to show mercy to Sauron. To do so would spoil his book.

But this is not to say that God is not good, no more than Sauron's existence implied that Tolkien was not good. A good God can make temporary, evil pseudo-people if it achieves a greater good, just like a good doctor can hurt someone as he sets their leg.

What God can't do, however, is pretend that he ever cared for these pseudo-people, let alone loved them. He cannot call himself ever-merciful, one whose compassions fail not, one who desires that none should perish. In this theology, God's mercy, love and compassion extends to his own chosen AIs and to none others. These others are, and always have been, the object of his wrath, doomed to destruction.

So, perhaps not all people are true people. Perhaps some are 'sons of God', some are 'sons of the devil', from the very outset.

Countering this rather grim notion is God's command to love our neighbour. This would be both absurd and impossible if most of our neighbours were intrinsically evil, being sons of the devil. (Besides, I could never be sure if God was even talking to me in this command. I might well be one of the doomed, self-deluded unregenerate.)

Tragedies are one thing, but I think the best stories have happy endings. If God is an author, he can make all things come out well for everyone and still have a book that doesn't cloy with syrup.

Similarly, rather than delete his bad AIs, a programmer can place them into any number of worlds where they continue to learn by experience. He can do so until even the most reprobate AI comes to his senses and turns from evil. In the end, reformed and perfected AIs can be uploaded into the programmer's own reality and share at his table. This is my hope.

[Adam]

[Noontidal]

[WolfVanZandt]

[John Anthony]

[WolfVanZandt]

[Adam]