Gyroscopic Investing

Mountaineer wrote:

Gosso wrote: Does the search for truth ever end?

My quick response:  At our death?  At Judgement Day?  Whose truth?

My very slighty pondered response:  In this life it may depend on whether one believes the truth is within (e.g. postmoderns) or external (e.g. moderns and premoderns) to themselves as well as on whether one has a curious mind.

... Mountaineer

For some it ends before it starts. These are the uninteresting people in our lives. It also makes places like this forum a little oasis where interesting people can get together and discuss ideas and everything under the sun.

Kshartle wrote: For some it ends before it starts. These are the uninteresting people in our lives.

A little off topic, but, this reminds me of the first two brothers in "The Golden Bird" from The Grimm's Fairy Tales.

"The Golden Bird" is one of my favorite fairy tales and represents a simple allegory for the Christian life and journey (at least that is how I read it).

In case anyone thinks I have completely gone off my rocker, here are a few quotes regarding fairy tales:

Albert Einstein wrote:“If you want your children to be intelligent, read them fairy tales. If you want them to be more intelligent, read them more fairy tales.”? - Albert Einstein

CS Lewis wrote:“When I was ten, I read fairy tales in secret and would have been ashamed if I had been found doing so. Now that I am fifty, I read them openly. When I became a man I put away childish things, including the fear of childishness and the desire to be very grown up.”? - CS Lewis

Charles Dickens wrote:“In an utilitarian age, of all other times, it is a matter of grave importance that fairy tales should be respected." - Charles Dickens

GK Chesterton wrote:“If you happen to read fairy tales, you will observe that one idea runs from one end of them to the other--the idea that peace and happiness can only exist on some condition. This idea, which is the core of ethics, is the core of the nursery-tales.”? - GK Chesterton

Albert Einstein wrote:“When I examine myself and my methods of thought, I come to the conclusion that the gift of fantasy has meant more to me than any talent for abstract, positive thinking.”? - Albert Einstein

Joseph Campbell wrote:"The folk tale is the primer of the picture-language of the soul." - Joseph Campbell

GK Chesterton wrote:“Can you not see, […] that fairy tales in their essence are quite solid and straightforward; but that this everlasting fiction about modern life is in its nature essentially incredible? Folk-lore means that the soul is sane, but that the universe is wild and full of marvels. Realism means that the world is dull and full of routine, but that the soul is sick and screaming. The problem of the fairy tale is-what will a healthy man do with a fantastic world? The problem of the modern novel is-what will a madman do with a dull world? In the fairy tales the cosmos goes mad; but the hero does not go mad. In the modern novels the hero is mad before the book begins, and suffers from the harsh steadiness and cruel sanity of the cosmos. ”? - GK Chesterton

Joseph Campbell wrote:"If ever there was an art on which the whole community of mankind has worked--seasoned with the philosophy of the codger on the wharf and singing with the music of the spheres--it is the ageless tale." - Joseph Campbell

Desert, nice post.  Even though I'm preaching to the choir. 

... Mountaineer

Desert wrote: Thanks Mountaineer.  And just to be clear, there's not a choir in the land that would let me sing with 'em.   

Ditto!  I can't carry a tune in a bucket.   

Desert wrote: What sets Christianity apart from all other religions is the birth, life, death and resurrection of Jesus.  There has been a very high interest in Christian apologetics research and writings in recent years.  I think the evidence available is sufficient to support the reasonableness of the Christian beliefs.  But the evidence is not coercive.  It might take a lifetime to study each and every point in sufficient detail to prove Christianity to oneself, while disproving all other religions in the process.  But I don't think many are converted to Christianity through a lifetime of study.  Nobody would put in that kind of effort unless they felt that there was something of utmost importance to be discovered.  Rather, I think the apologetics exists to show that a belief in the deity of Jesus is reasonable.  This can at least allow the ideas to be considered seriously rather than ridiculed.  Then the study of God's word, the Bible, opens our hearts and minds to the reality of God's presence.  In my case, other books along with the Bible (Pascal, Tullian Tchividjian, C.S. Lewis, Ravi Zacharias, Keller ) really helped to open my mind to the possibility of God's existence. 

In summary, I think the truth is available and verifiable.  But it's just as possible to convince ourselves that there is no truth, no God, no afterlife.  And I think it has to be so, for humans to have free will.  If God merely imposed his will on us, we would be nothing but robots or slaves.  But he doesn't, and offers us so much more than that in the process.

That's a beautiful post!

I agree that Christianity is a process or perhaps a journey towards knowing God and the life of Christ.  It won't be easy, there will be plenty of dragons to slay (metaphorical of course), but the prize at the end is worth it.  If there is no prize at the end then at least we'll have a good story to tell.  Some people get further along the journey than others in this life, while some won't even attempt it (ie. Parable of the talents).

Another thing that pulls me towards Christianity is that it provides a good blend of enabling us to participate in the "mystery and joy of the universe" aka God, while also remaining grounded in our community with the Church, family, virtue, etc.  So it beautifully combines the spiritual and material worlds.

There is also the fact that I was born in a Christian country which makes the Christian symbols more appealing to my subconscious (I have been seeded in a Christian field).  This doesn't mean I have to reject other religions, but rather accept that they won't work as well for me.  I personally believe that love for God/Christ (ie. circumcision/baptism of the heart) and the attempt at a virtuous life (ie. accepting Jesus as a teacher) are enough for salvation, but I'm willing to revise my position as I learn more.

Forgive me if this has been asked and answered, but I also am struggling with the doctrine of election, particularly as it is described by Paul in Romans 9: 11-13.

I was curious how you have found peace with this. I recently finished a bible study of Romans and feel less at ease, and less Calvinist about this than before.

6 Iron wrote: Forgive me if this has been asked and answered, but I also am struggling with the doctrine of election, particularly as it is described by Paul in Romans 9: 11-13.

I was curious how you have found peace with this. I recently finished a bible study of Romans and feel less at ease, and less Calvinist about this than before.

6 Iron

I will attempt to address your concern from the perspective of the "Lutheran Church - Missouri Synod"  of which I am a member.  First of all, your struggle is a very common one.  Here are some Q&A's from the LC-MS that discuss the issue.  Romans 9:11-13 is not specifically addressed but other references are given.  I will go look in my Romans Commentary shortly and see if there is a better analysis that would help.  If I find something, I'll put it in a second post.

Romans 9:11-13
English Standard Version (ESV)
11 though they were not yet born and had done nothing either good or bad—in order that God's purpose of election might continue, not because of works but because of him who calls— 12 she was told, “The older will serve the younger.”? 13 As it is written, “Jacob I loved, but Esau I hated.”?

... Mountaineer

Q:  How does the church feel about the theological tension between the universal offer of salvation (Matt 11:28, John 3:16, John 6:40) and divine election (John 15:16, Eph. 1:4, Acts 13:48)? If God already predetermined who was saved, what is the point of witnessing?

A:  Let me first of all refer you to a couple of resources that set forth the position of the Synod on Election and objective or "universal" justification. The doctrine of Election is summarized in the Synod's A Brief Statement of the Doctrinal Position of the Missouri Synod. You may also find helpful the Commission on Theology and Church Relation's 1983 Theses on Justification (see esp. section VI The Universal and Finished Results of Christ's Work of Obedience).

From the standpoint of human reason, the scriptural teachings that God has objectively justified (objective justification) the whole world through the redemptive work of Jesus Christ and wants all people to be saved through faith in Him (subjective justification), and that He elected by grace from eternity those who are saved, cannot be resolved. We must say with Paul when he contemplates the mystery of our election, "Oh, the depth of the riches and wisdom and knowledge of God! How unsearchable are his judgments and how inscrutable his ways!"

And yet, we can say this on the basis of God's Word. By faith we hold that it is precisely because we Christians are God's elect that we proclaim the good news of salvation. We see this in Ephesians, where Paul begins by praising God for His election (the purest of Gospel and only meant for our comfort; Eph. 1:3-10), while at the same time and in the same breath declaring "Of this gospel I was made a minister according to the gift of God's grace, which was given me by the working of his power. To me, though I am the very least of all the saints, this grace was given, to preach to the Gentiles the unsearchable riches of Christ...." (Eph. 3:7-8).  This same Apostle, who regarded himself as among God's elect, wrote to the Corinthians, "For necessity is laid upon me. Woe to me if I do not preach the Gospel!" (1 Cor. 9:16). We witness, therefore, because God commands us to make known His saving will to others and because we are in fact part of God's elective plan being carried out in history (Eph. 3)!


Q:  One of your FAQ answers states that it is possible for one to lose his salvation. However, in your Theses on Justification (1983) on this website it says plainly that believers have eternal assurance (paragraph 58). Which is it?

A:  Lutherans believe both are true and Scriptural: It is possible for a believer to fall from faith and lose salvation, and it is possible for a believer to have complete assurance of eternal salvation through faith in Jesus Christ. If this seems paradoxical to human reason, then (Lutherans say) this is only because the teaching of Scripture itself on this issue (as on many other issues) appears paradoxical to human reason.

For Lutherans, this is essentially a matter of properly distinguishing between Law and Gospel: Warnings against falling from faith are the strongest form of God's Law, intended to warn against "carnal security" based on "good works" or against the attitude that "since I'm saved, I can do anything I want to do." Assurances of God's constant and eternal love in Christ are the sweetest and purest form of Gospel, intended to comfort those who are plagued by their sins and by their failures to keep God's Law perfectly.


Q:  I understand that God chose those for salvation before the very foundation of the world. The Bible does not say that there are those who are chosen and that there are those who are not. So, does that mean then that God chose everyone to be saved before the foundation of the world and therefore it is man's choice whether he will accept God's saving grace or not? However, one cannot come into God's grace by himself, but by the Holy Spirit "leading" him unto salvation. Is that the correct interpretation? I am confused by the fact that we were chosen by God before the foundation of the world, yet the very action of choosing can mean that there were those who were not chosen. I know that God wishes everyone to be saved. Can you help me?

A:  The question you are wrestling with is really the question, "Why are some saved and not others?" Theologians throughout history have referred to this question as the "crux theologorum" ("the cross of the theologians") because of the difficulty (and from the Lutheran perspective, the impossibility) of giving an answer to this question which is satisfactory to our human reason.

Some answer this question by pointing to man's "free will"--only those are saved who "choose" to be saved. Lutherans reject this answer as unscriptural because according to the Bible even man's will is "dead" and powerless to "choose" God and his grace in Christ. We are saved not because we "choose" to be saved but because the Holy Spirit works faith in our heart through the Gospel (even faith is a gift!). Others answer this question by pointing to God's sovereign will: God himself predestines from eternity some to be saved and others to be damned. Lutherans reject this answer as unscriptural because according to the Bible God sincerely desires all to be saved and has predestined no one to damnation.

So how do Lutherans answer this question? The answer is that Lutherans do not try to answer it, because (we believe) the Bible itself does not provide an answer to this question that is comprehensible to human reason. Lutherans affirm, with Scripture, that whoever is saved is saved by God's grace alone, a grace so sure that it excludes all human "action" and "choice" but rather rests on the foundation of God's action in Christ and his "choice" (predestination) from before the beginning of time. Lutherans also affirm, with Scripture, that those who are damned are damned not by God's "choice" but on account of their own human sin and rebellion and unbelief. From a human perspective, there is no "rational" or "logical" way to put these two truths together. Lutherans believe and confess them not because they are "rational" and "logical," but because this is what we find taught in Scripture.

For a further discussion of this issue, you may want to read Of the Election of Grace in the Brief Statement of the LCMS, and/or Articles II and XI in the Formula of Concord (contained in the Book of Concord, the Lutheran Confessions).

6 Iron wrote: Forgive me if this has been asked and answered, but I also am struggling with the doctrine of election, particularly as it is described by Paul in Romans 9: 11-13.

I was curious how you have found peace with this. I recently finished a bible study of Romans and feel less at ease, and less Calvinist about this than before.

I lean towards Arminianism, and even more towards Catholicism, so I am skeptical towards the Calvinist interpretation of election.  Only with the concept of free will can I rationally believe in a good God...I would appreciate it if anyone could help provide me with arguments for the other side.

There are a series of videos on YouTube posted by Dr. Jerry Walls, an Arminian and professor at Houston Baptist University, explaining where he (and his student Paul Sloan) disagree with Calvinism.  Here are the videos focusing on Romans 9:

Part IV - This sets the background necessary to interpret Romans (27 minutes): http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D6rmrX5p44Y

Part V - This gets into the heart of Romans (36 minutes): http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_5cx2H1rS6E

I didn't understand everything in these videos, but it seems to be all about context.  Romans 9 is not about individual salvation but rather the election of Israel to be the light of the world.  It is not about a narrowing of God's mercy but rather an expansion of His mercy.

The first three videos are more philosophical than biblical, but also really good.

I hope this helps.

6 Iron wrote: Forgive me if this has been asked and answered, but I also am struggling with the doctrine of election, particularly as it is described by Paul in Romans 9: 11-13.

I was curious how you have found peace with this. I recently finished a bible study of Romans and feel less at ease, and less Calvinist about this than before.

I think this saying sums up God's relationship to us perfectly, "If you love something, set it free, if it comes back, it was meant to be."

Peter Kreeft has a good article on the problem of free will and predestination:

I do not think either truth needs to be compromised. I think we can do as much justice to the sovereignty of God as a Calvinist and as much justice to the free will of man as a Baptist. Yet it would not compromise the very essence of God to deny predestination. Arminianism, the theological viewpoint that denies predestination and emphasizes the role of man's free will in receiving grace from God, may be wrong. But it is wrong at a relatively technical, theoretical level. Denying human free will, on the other hand, would cut out something immediately essential to the Christian life: personal responsibility. If I am a robot, even a divinely programmed robot, my life no longer has the drama of real choice and turns into a formula, the unrolling of a pre-written script. God loves me too much to allow that. He would sooner compromise his power than my freedom.

Actually, he does neither.  It is precisely his power that gives me my freedom. Aquinas reconciles freedom with predestination by saying that God's love is so powerful that he not only gets what he wants but he also gets it in the way that he wants. Not only is everything done that God wills to be done, but it is also done in the way he wants it to be done. It happens without freedom in the case of natural things like falling rain and freely in the case of human choices. A power a little less than total may get what it wants without getting it in the way that it wants it. But omnipotence gets both. And the way omnipotence wants human acts done is freely.

In other words, freedom and predestination are two sides of one coin. The omnipotent author chose to write a story about free human beings, not just trees or machines. That means we are really free. We are free precisely because God is all-powerful.

If love and power were not one, we would have the classic standoff, an unending conflict between the two. Once you see the center, love, everything else falls into place like spokes in a wheel.

http://www.peterkreeft.com/topics-more/ ... nation.htm

So what about Jesus going to India?

BBC Documentary: "Jesus Lived in India"

jan van mourik wrote: So what about Jesus going to India?

BBC Documentary: "Jesus Lived in India"

For about three years I believed that Jesus was simply a spiritual guru, and that he traveled to India for his training.  It is possible.  It is easy to believe that Jesus was not God, as Desert mentioned up-thread.  All I can say is keep searching.

Even if Jesus was in India it doesn't change the life he lived in Israel and his resurrection.

I still occasionally read the Gospel of Thomas, which is borderline Buddhism.  But obviously I don't hold it in as high regard as the four gospels.

Thanks, Gosso and Mountaineer. I will continue to delve.

6 Iron wrote: Thanks, Gosso and Mountaineer. I will continue to delve.

6 Iron,

I found some material in my Romans Commentary by Martin H. Franzmann that I believe is additive re the verses you mentioned.  I will try to type it out and post in a day or so; it is a page or so in length.  I'm really tired right now and my wife just came home from the hospital today with a new knee ... have to play caregiver now almost full time for a while. 

... Mountaineer

Gosso wrote: For about three years I believed that Jesus was simply a spiritual guru, and that he traveled to India for his training.  It is possible.  It is easy to believe that Jesus was not God, as Desert mentioned up-thread.  All I can say is keep searching.

Even if Jesus was in India it doesn't change the life he lived in Israel and his resurrection.

I still occasionally read the Gospel of Thomas, which is borderline Buddhism.  But obviously I don't hold it in as high regard as the four gospels.

I was a fundamentalist/charismatic/Pentecostal Christian (I spoke and sang in tongues) and though I'm not comfortable aligning myself with the Christian religion today,  I still believe in Jesus the Messiah.

ns3 wrote:

Gosso wrote: For about three years I believed that Jesus was simply a spiritual guru, and that he traveled to India for his training.  It is possible.  It is easy to believe that Jesus was not God, as Desert mentioned up-thread.  All I can say is keep searching.

Even if Jesus was in India it doesn't change the life he lived in Israel and his resurrection.

I still occasionally read the Gospel of Thomas, which is borderline Buddhism.  But obviously I don't hold it in as high regard as the four gospels.

I was a fundamentalist/charismatic/Pentecostal Christian (I spoke and sang in tongues) and though I'm not comfortable aligning myself with the Christian religion today,  I still believe in Jesus the Messiah.

Ha!  I'm far too Catholic to have that much fun! 

I just read this wonderful blog post from Fr. Robert Barron that others might enjoy, "We cannot speak of God, but we must speak of God":

It is the rock, the storm, the lion, the flood, the desert. It is the bear, the leviathan, the whirlwind, the barely audible whisper, the voice, the silence, the city strongly compact, the mother with abundant breasts, the tearful father. There is a mysterious reality, at the borders and at the heart of our ordinary experience, suffusing and yet transcending all that surrounds us, a reality that can be evoked with a thousand names and that cannot, finally, be caught by any name. This mystery judges us and energizes us, frightens us and gives us incomparable peace, overwhelms us and captivates us. Like Melville’s white whale, it surges up from the depths and sinks our ships, and like Jonah’s whale it draws us into itself and gives us protection. It is as high as the heavens are above the earth and as low as the caverns of Hell; it is as dark as a pillar of cloud and as luminous as a pillar of fire; it is the burning bush that is not consumed, and it is the water from the rock. It is the sheer act of Being itself, and it is nothing at all; it is what is hardest to see, and it is what is most obvious.

Every great mystic, prophet, or theologian knows that this mystery cannot be spoken of adequately, that, like a wily fish, it escapes all the nets of thought and language that we set for it. Thomas Aquinas—the most talkative theologian in the tradition—simply stopped talking at the end of his life, convinced that all he had said of the mystery amounted to so much straw. And yet, as my catalogue of traditional names suggests, we talk, almost compulsively and manically, of this power, pushed by some inner drive of the spirit. We cannot speak of God, and we must speak of God. It is as simple and as strange as that.

We are compelled to theologize precisely because we are who we are: those strange beings already described in this book, sinner open to metanoia, change of mind. God must be spoken of because we are alienated from the Mystery that alone can give us life, and we know it; God must be engaged because we are wired for the Mystery and nothing short of the Mystery can give us peace. We are not so much rational animals (as Aristotle thought) or productive animals (as Marx would have it) as we are those animals who speak of God. Time and again, in the course of the centuries, various philosophers and social reformers have predicted that we would grow out of our debilitating and embarrassing tendency to engage in God-talk, but they have all faded away, and God-talk remains. The preoccupation with the Mystery is in us, and it can’t ultimately be wished or thought or threatened away.

All of this suggests, of course, that the naming of God is a vitally important exercise and not merely a game of the mind. To name the divine with something approaching adequacy is to foster a right relation with the Mystery, to undo, to some extent, the effects of the originating sin that has placed us at a remove from God.

It is my conviction that the God-talk of our tradition (though tainted by sin) is a consistent and largely successful attempt to undo the effects of the Fall by orienting us to the God who is really God and not the fantasy of the sinful soul. The theology, art, literature, architecture, drama of the Christian heritage constitute an attempt to name God, not as the pathetic rival to the ego’s phantom unconditionally, but as the power in which the fearful ego can find itself through surrender. God is that reality which, thankfully, can be neither manipulated nor avoided, neither controlled nor hidden from, and, as such, God is that which effectively invites the ego to give up its fearful and finally illusory place at the center of the universe. In naming God in the wildly diverse ways that it does, the Christian tradition attempts to doctor the soul, to frustrate the myriad moves of the grasping or self-concealing ego.

http://wordonfire.org/WoF-Blog/WoF-Blog ... iding.aspx

Gosso, thanks for your links to Robert Barron's material.  As a Lutheran I agree with him on many things and disagree with him on many things, but I literally could watch his videos all day long.  There's an LCMS pastor with a similar video series that I think Mountaineer linked to one time, but his style is all Bill Nye-ish and it's hard to watch.

Mountaineer wrote:

6 Iron wrote: Thanks, Gosso and Mountaineer. I will continue to delve.

6 Iron,

I found some material in my Romans Commentary by Martin H. Franzmann that I believe is additive re the verses you mentioned.  I will try to type it out and post in a day or so; it is a page or so in length.  I'm really tired right now and my wife just came home from the hospital today with a new knee ... have to play caregiver now almost full time for a while. 

... Mountaineer

6 Iron,

Please let me provide some context for the material from the Romans Commentary, below, as well as some of my previous posts.  Missouri Synod Lutherans are somewhat unique (my opinion based on my previous church experiences with ELCA Lutherans, Methodists, Baptists, Presbyterians, Episcopalians and classes taken dealing with Islam, Catholicism and Eastern Orthodoxy) in three aspects of understanding Scripture.  First, there is a huge emphasis on understanding the differences between Law and Gospel - in short, Law is what God tells us to do and us used to make us realize that we are so desperately in need of a Savior, Gospel is what God has done for us and provides the sweet promise that God loves us and we are forgiven if we just do not reject the gift.  Secondly, Lutherans believe that Scripture interprets Scripture with the clearer passages being used to understand the more vague passages; and in the inerrancy of Scripture but it must be understood in context - to me that means no cherry picking verses - read the whole section or Chapter and understand to whom the passage is being written and what was going on in the area at the time it was written.  Thirdly, Lutherans emphasize the two kingdoms that God is in charge of, the vertical realm that deals mainly with God stuff (e.g. Word and Sacraments, one’s relationship with Jesus, etc.), and the horizontal realm that deals with civil stuff (e.g. politics, church organization and polity, relationships with one’s neighbors, etc.).  It might also be useful to understand where I personally am “coming from”?; you can read my post describing my journey to Moda0306 many pages back in this thread and many other of my responses in this thread if you are interested.

Hope this helps.

… Mountaineer


From Martin H. Franzmann “Romans, A Commentary”?

Verse 10:  The same sovereign freedom of the Word is apparent also, and more fully, in the story of the sons of Isaac.  Rebecca was no slave concubine but the free wife of Isaac, and both or her twin sons were free.

11-12: But here, too, the Word of the promise determined everything; independent of any will or work of man, it made the choice between Esau and Jacob before the boys were born.  It overrode the hallowed right of primogeniture, ordaining that the firstborn should be servant to the younger son.  Here God’s purpose, God’s free choice, God’s call were wholly sovereign, independent of the will of man. 

13: The history of the nations descended from the sons of Isaac confirmed what God’s Word had said of the nations Israel and Edom.  Centuries later, God through Malachi could say, “Jacob I loved, but Esau I hated”? (Mal 1:2-3).  Men and nations do not live by bread alone, nor by being begotten and being born alone, but by every word that proceeds from the mouth of God.  (Matt 4:4; Deut 8:3).

Paul speaks of “God’s purpose of election”? here (v. 11), but he is speaking of that purpose as it works in the history of men.  He is not speaking here, as he spoke in 8:28-30, of the eternal predestination of God’s elect to righteousness and glory; he is not now uttering the doxology of the redeemed.  Rather, he is showing how God freely chose Isaac and Jacob for the furthering of his purpose, to bless all the families of the earth, in order to make dear that all depends on Him and on His Word alone.  His choice of Isaac does not of itself doom Ishmael to perdition; Ishmael, too, received a blessing from God (Gen 17:20; 21:13), and Ishmael, too, comes under the blessing promised to all the families of the earth in Abraham’s seed.  God’s purpose of election does not mean that all Ishmaelites and Edomities were to be damned, no more than it means that all the descendants of Isaac and Jacob should be saved.  Even the words from Malachi, “Esau I hated,”? must be understood in the light of their setting and in accordance with the Hebrew mode of speech.  Malachi is spewing of the fate of Jacob and Esay as nations, not of their eternal weal or woe.  And to “hate”? in Hebrew usage often means little more than the opposite of “prefer”? or “choose.”?  In Gen 29:31 for instance, the words, “Leah was hated,”? simply restate what was said in Gen 29:30: “He loved Rachel more than Leah.”?  This mode of speech is found in the New Testament too; to “hate”? one’s life, mother, wife, children, etc. means to surrender them, to love them less than Christ (Luke 14:26; cf Matt 10:37-39)

Still, Paul, in emphasizing the fact that the unbelief of physical Israel does not call in question the power of God’s Word to Israel, has spoken boldly, to the point of ambiguity.  The question can arise: “Is God, then, unjust?  Is not this freedom of His mere arbitrariness, a tyrannous assertion of His will because it is His will?”?  Paul anticipates that question - see Romans 9:14-29.

jan van mourik wrote: So what about Jesus going to India?

BBC Documentary: "Jesus Lived in India"

I was thinking more about the difference between eastern religions and Christianity.  One way to look at it is Christ as the personality of the Tao, or Christ as the Tao with personality.  This enables us to love the Tao and it can love us.  So using the trinity, it would be the Father as the Tao, the Son as the Personality, and the Holy Spirit as the connection we share between the love of the Tao and Son.  It's not a perfect translation but I think it helps represent how Christians see things.  At least it's something to chew on.

Xan wrote: Gosso, thanks for your links to Robert Barron's material.  As a Lutheran I agree with him on many things and disagree with him on many things, but I literally could watch his videos all day long.  There's an LCMS pastor with a similar video series that I think Mountaineer linked to one time, but his style is all Bill Nye-ish and it's hard to watch.

Yeah, Fr. Robert Barron's videos are indeed intoxicating - such a beautiful mind and human being.  He has helped me get past a lot of prejudices towards the Catholic Church.  I still don't fully agree with everything the Catholic Church teaches, but I now at least understand their point of view (mainly that there actually is a creator God, and our egos need to be tamed).  I was also (and still am) extremely tempted to remain non-denominational and forget the whole church scene, but it seems the Eucharist and community are an important part of being a Christian.

Interesting article:

... Mountaineer

Did your absentee father make you an atheist?
on January 15, 2014 in PERISCOPE, REPORTER
(RNS) — A once-popular book that links atheism with shoddy fathering is getting a second life with a new publisher, thanks, in part, to the rise of nonbelief in the United States.

Faith of the Fatherless: The Psychology of Atheism by Catholic psychologist Paul C. Vitz posits that “intense atheists”? throughout history — Nietzsche, Voltaire and Madalyn Murray O’Hair — had absent or rotten fathers. This, he argues, damaged their ability to form a relationship with a heavenly father.

Vitz also holds that many notable believers — Renaissance man Blaise Pascal, anti-slavery activist William Wilberforce and Nazi martyr Dietrich Bonhoeffer, among others — had great relationships with their dads, and were therefore more able to build relationships with God.

“We need to understand atheism has a lot to do with our emotional attitudes toward life, other people and a lot of other things,”? Vitz said from his office at the Institute for the Psychological Sciences, a Catholic graduate school in Arlington, Va. “I think that is an important thing for atheists and believers alike to take into consideration.”?

And consider it they have. When the book first appeared in 1999, it polarized critics. The religious media loved it. New Oxford Review, a Catholic publication, described it as “an engaging analysis of psychological factors in religious belief and disbelief.”?

But the atheist and humanist media did not swoon. Skeptic magazine panned it as “insulting to those of us who came to a point of nonbelief as the result of careful study and consideration.”?

Still, the book struck a chord, especially among Christian groups who saw the collapse of the traditional family as a threat to their beliefs. Focus on the Family, a Colorado-based Christian ministry, used Vitz’s findings to promote its outreach to fathers, and he was cited by a host of Christian psychologists and scholars.

So why revise the book?

A lot has changed since 1999. For one, the first decade of the 21st century saw the rise of the so-called “New Atheists”? — outspoken critics of religion such as Richard Dawkins, Christopher Hitchens and Daniel Dennett, whom many contemporary atheists credit for swelling the ranks of nonbelievers.

And their ranks have swelled. According to the Pew Research Center, the percentage of Americans who are atheists and agnostics has grown from 3.7 percent to 5.7 percent from 2007 to 2012, and the overall number of those who say they have no religion has grown from 11.6 to just under 14 percent in the same time period.

“The rise of militant, evangelical, fundamentalist atheism in our time adds to the pertinence of this book,”? said Mark Brumley, president of Ignatius Press, the Catholic publishing house that has reissued the book.

“Some atheists try to equate atheism with rationality. Vitz’s book shows that atheism, like many belief systems, has significant irrational elements.”?

Vitz said he wanted to revise the book not only to include the New Atheists, whose family relationships he scrutinizes (Dawkins was sexually molested by a clergyman, a subject he has discussed before), but also because there was new research about atheists and attachment theory (generally, they didn’t get much of it) and atheists and autism (many autistic people also are atheists, the book claims).

As he did in the first edition, Vitz makes an important point — the book does not try to prove or disprove the existence of God. Rather, its goal is to examine some of the “irrational”? underlying reasons some people become atheists.

“I am certainly not predicting that every atheist is the result of one hypothesis, much less mine,”? he said. “I am just saying there is a tendency for more things to go together than you’d expect normally,”? like atheism and a poor relationship with one’s father.

The reaction to the book, again, has been polarizing. Christians love it — Paul de Vries, president of New York Divinity School, a Protestant school, praised it as “one of the most profound books in the empirical psychology of religion.”?

But atheists are less enthusiastic. “I have a spectacular relationship with my father and consider him to be the most admirable man I’ve ever known,”? wrote JT Eberhard, an atheist blogger for Patheos. Many of the comments on his review are unprintable.

Vitz, a Catholic who identified as an atheist in his youth, acknowledges there are exceptions to his theory. He identifies a big one in his book — Sam Harris, a New Atheist who hit the best-seller list with The End of Faith, has an apparently healthy relationship with his father, too.

“The best answer I have to explain that is I don’t know,”? he said. “I haven’t studied them [the exceptions] enough.”?

— Kimberly Winston

© 2014 Religion News Service. Used with permission.

Mountaineer,

Do you find that men need God more than women?  It seems to me that women are better designed for this world, they have beauty, intelligence, good work ethic, can create life, and all this seems to give meaning to their lives.  While men have intelligence and desire to create, yet they seem to crave a deeper meaning to all of it.  Or else they turn to alcohol, TV, video games, workaholism, etc as an escape.  Obviously this isn't a rule, but generally speaking.

Gosso wrote: Mountaineer,

Do you find that men need God more than women?  It seems to me that women are better designed for this world, they have beauty, intelligence, good work ethic, can create life, and all this seems to give meaning to their lives.  While men have intelligence and desire to create, yet they seem to crave a deeper meaning to all of it.  Or else they turn to alcohol, TV, video games, workaholism, etc as an escape.  Obviously this isn't a rule, but generally speaking.

In my experience, I do not observe much difference between men and women when it comes to needing God.  There for a minute in your second sentence, I thought you had subconsciously and inadvertently included a "wo" and subsequently left it out of your third sentence. 

What prompted your question?  I assume your experience is different?

... Mountaineer

How is being fatter, weaker, and able to get pregnant a better design for this world?

Lowe wrote: How is being fatter, weaker, and able to get pregnant a better design for this world?

Let's not go in this direction.

Just saying, I think the hundreds of millions of women, who lived as slaves to physically stronger men for thousands of years, might disagree with the premise.