STFU CC

so when you gonna go post this on your social media. Because a pirate comic book site is pretty cowardice.

The Holocaust never occured at all. Perhaps you're speaking of Dresden.

Technically the universe is changing, right? I know I said at some point that the universe is a part of God since it exists, yet He still goes beyond it. It goes back to His identity as Truth, and even the truth that hasn’t “happened yet” belongs to
Him.

I think the biggest piece that is missing right now is that my faith is a relationship with a Person. It is not mere belief that something is true. Not even half of this would make sense to me if I hadn’t spent 15 years in prayer (reaching out and
listening to Him) and silence. Just like any other relationship, it involves taking a risk. I’m willing to bet you grow in trust and friendship with others long before you understand them or even know their life story. Sometimes it’s tough to even understand one’s own self.

I am afraid I cannot distill a point from all of this. You seem to just accept a certain interpretation of what you consider scripture.

Let me ask you this, does death and suffering involve change? Certainly one would have to of from a state of life to a state of death to die. If god does not change, by what logic can you say he died on the cross?

Hi Brian Green Adams,

I am trained in Biology, where the “what” and the “why” are closely related. Structure-function relationships are a big deal in Biology. For example, one could either say that a carnivore has sharp teeth because it eats meat, or one could say that a carnivore eats meat because it
has sharp teeth. Both statements would.be ok, but the most complete way to say it is, “As the animal evolved, it became better built for how it lived because it lived that way, thus enabling it to live that way.” I suppose I
consider God through the same lens – where what He Is, what He does, and why He does it are inseparable. (Only He didn’t evolve, nor does He change).

You’ve got it - the Triune God (including Jesus) is working within His own system. In fact, Jesus often spoke of His own actions as doing the Father’s will. It’s tough to imagine through our own lens of limitations, but the Divine Will is the will of a Perfect Being – complete,
good, loving, and flawless. His own system, then, isn’t going to be anything short of complete, perfect, and
good.

You are right that God is a God of justice. If we were only able to choose the good, would our choices matter? Would we have any more dignity than a rock? It is truly a wonder of God’s love that He allows himself to be hurt just so we can be co-creators. He sure didn’t need to invite us to participate, so it is not out of necessity. It is, however, out of His identity. Love goes beyond itself. It creates and gives life. Love did not make the universe to be a mantelpiece, but to receive and reciprocate love. It is impossible to love without choice.

I can answer one alternative to Calvary from my own
experience. I “just forgave” someone who was hurting me. It amounted to pretending that it didn’t matter, and in turn that I didn’t matter, and I was rewarded with an abusive relationship. We would lose sight of God’s dignity and Personhood if He effectively lied about the gravity of our choices. Truth Himself isn’t going to lie.

I’m not sure what is meant by “without needing to effect
this exception to his system of justice”?

In Acts 10:43, it is written that “To Him all the prophets
bear witness, that everyone who believes in Him will receive forgiveness of sins through His Name.” Jesus also said “Everyone who acknowledges Me before others I will acknowledge before my heavenly Father. But whoever denies me before others, I will deny before my heavenly Father.” So the idea that He “forgives us when we believe in him” has some traction in the scriptures. Sooo… why does the Catholic Church insist
upon receiving the Sacraments? Wouldn’t it be easier to declare belief in Jesus to be enough?

Jesus also said, “Whoever has my commands and keeps them is the one who loves me. The one who loves me will be loved by my Father, and I too will love them and show myself to them.” Another direct quote from Jesus to Peter (first Pope): “I will give you
the keys to the kingdom of Heaven, and whatever you bind on earth will be bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven.” The Church would be unfaithful to Jesus if she declared belief to be enough. Jesus gave commands. For example, when He instituted the Sacrament of the Eucharist at the Last Supper, He commanded His
disciples, “Do this in remembrance of Me," and "Love one another as I have loved you."

Categorically, wounding and killing do not repair. Evil sacrifices others for the self. It devours. Love is self-sacrificing and gives life. Birth is a painful, bloody, and terrifying ordeal, but our mothers went through those wounds for us just the same. Jesus set the example for mankind in pouring out His life. His whole life was lived as a gift, culminating in His total gift of self on the Cross.

Regarding the question of sin before and after Calvary, God is beyond time. All time and space exist to Him as one single picture.

There is a lot of "what" here, but not really any why. You write the above as if Jesus and God are just working within a natural system that they just have to manage within. But they/he made it this way.

You say "by right" it would be our blood shed for the wounds of sin... But this is by design. God's design. It could not have been by way of necessity, since this universe and the moral framework was chosen by God. We can of course think of alternatives. Such as god just forgives these sins, without needing to effect this exception to his system of justice. Or forgives us when we believe in him.

But I just do not understand this idea of healing through wounds, repair through torture and suffering. You just say this as if it makes sense. But it doesn't make sense. Why does wounding and killing repair? These are not acts of healing or repair, they are destructive.

Not only this, but ever since we continue to have sin and rip the apart the fabric of the Father's Being. So either these sins we do now are not damaging this fabric anymore, which suggests they are not really "sins" in the sense they were before the crucifixion. Or, that the crucifixion etc, was not the event that actually fixes and heals things, rather, the cure is Jesus' decision to allow it to be healed etc., which means the Easter story was symbolic, which seriously undermines Christian belief.

*I goofed - evil can only warp or obscure the truth, not pollute it (nothing to pollute with).

Hi Brian Green Adams,

I'm brand new on this site and not well trained in Theology, but I'll try. What I know is from digesting little bits of information in a whole lot of silence.

In order to understand Calvary, one must understand the Nature of God, the Nature of man, the concept of evil as an absence of good, and that Jesus is true God and true Man. Please bear with me – it’s not a short answer.

God is simple. God is perfect. God alone is good. God is Three Persons in One. He is the eternal total gift of self (love) between three unique perfect Persons. Love always goes beyond the lover. It creates, gives, and self-sacrifices. These three Perfect Persons (who are Love) went beyond themselves. Creation was a gift to Love by Love, and man
is its crown jewel with the capacity and awareness to return the love of God on behalf of Creation.

Though he is limited, man is even invited to participate in creation as co-creators. By participating within the boundaries of God's design, mankind produces new human souls through procreation. By "boundaries," I reference those conditions that must be present. Mix baking soda and vinegar, you do not get a new human soul. Mix a human egg with a human sperm, and you get a new human soul. Beyond procreation, every decision made by man leaves an inerasable mark on creation.

More on the Trinity before I go to Calvary: Why Three Persons in One God? How can God have One Nature yet be three Persons?

First: if something is perfect, flawless, and whole, then nothing can
prevent it from being reality. Existence itself is good.

The Identity of the Father is perfect Truth. Truth is good and beautiful, and when complete, flawless, and whole it is perfect. In the Old Testament, God referred to Himself as “I AM WHO AM,” not the qualified version of limited creatures who say “I am who I am.” All of Creation is a part of God. He remains beyond the whole of Creation because He is infinite while Creation is not.

If the Identity of the Father is Perfect Truth, then the Word Made Flesh (nickname for Jesus) is the perfect Word describing Perfect Truth. Anything Perfect, flawless, and whole enough to be reality ought to be describable and expressible. Human tongues are limited in expression because both humans and the human experience are limited. The Word of God is
complete, accurate, and Perfect because it proceeds from a Perfect and infinite Being.

If the Identity of the Father is Truth and the Identity of the Son is the Word, then the Identity of the Spirit is the Breath by which the Word is spoken. The Holy Spirit is found in action. It is the active and perpetual expression of
the Truth.

It should not surprise us then, that there are three Persons in One God, Who act with one will. When we express the truth, we need both words and breath. God is the unceasing expression of Truth. There is no need to describe what does not exist, and so there would not be language (and arguably breath) if there were no Truth.

Evil is the absence of good.

St. Augustine tells us that evil does not exist of its own accord. It comes from the warping, polluting, and obscuring of Truth. It is a shadow, a deprivation of light. It is impossible to love without a will; it is impossible to succeed if one cannot fail. For all the trouble it can cause, nature is not malicious. Man has the capacity for malice because man has been given a will and a share in ongoing creation, both in the procreation of souls and in the history of creation. He can choose to participate or to undermine. Our failures to participate according to the True, the Good, and the Beautiful cast a shadow over the good God-given nature we have as well as over creation. Before Jesus instituted the sacrament of Confession, we could not remove the obstacles blocking the light from our souls.

Since these obstacles to light and truth exist, they become a part of the created order, which is a part of God. Thus, the fabric of God’s being was torn by the decisions of man long before the flogging of Christ. Every rebellion against the good, the true, and the beautiful simultaneously existed and rebelliously went against existence.

Jesus is True God and True Man.

Jesus needed to assume our humanity if He was to make reparations to the fabric of His Father’s being. By right, it would be our blood shed in
justice for the wounds we inflicted on the One Who gave us His life and love, but finite creatures could not hope to heal the wounds of an infinite
Being. Jesus, Himself an infinite Being, redeemed fallen man by becoming Man. He took upon Himself the expression of His Father’s wounds. He suffered with and for His Father in solidarity that the wounds of sin be healed by a member of the offending party, though sinless Himself. By His wounds, He restored mankind to friendship with His Father. In solidarity with Jesus and the Triune God, man can fast, pray, study, and trustingly submit to the Divine Will, thus minimizing His pain and offering condolences and love. Sin still exists because He still honors our free will, though we now have the opportunity to wash our robes white in the Blood of the Lamb. There are many Catholics (and other people of faith, I imagine) who do penance and make sacrifices in reparation for their sin and the sin of the world. Nothing we limited creatures can do could ever cover the full debt, hence Jesus' sacrifice was necessary.

Did you mean to say "justified"?

No. I meant "unjustified." Thanks for catching that. I'll be fixing it.