Are some people born "damned?"

[4Horsemen]

4horsemen:

I think humans are a part of the Creation Event, which means that we are each created. If we are, then there was no pre-existing stuff from which to make us. Science will have a problem if we say that God is using what is already here. Of course, science will have a problem if we say that God creates new matter, given the Laws of thermodynamics. The soul is not merely the form, it is the unification of fundamental matter and form.

It seems reasonable to me to conclude there was no “pre-existing stuff from which to make us.” I read that Plato believed our souls existed prior to union with the body. But the inner experience of life is basically through our senses. We are living beings because of the substantial form of the unity of soul (substance) with body (accident). St. Thomas Aquinas notes that in Aristotle’s Metaphysics, the Philosopheer teaches the difference between the definition of substance and accident, that a substance is the essence while an accident is outside the essence. (As usual, I have a hard time expressing what I think I’m trying to say )

Science will have a problem defining how God created the soul which is the principle of animation even for a plant. Science tries to explain the idea of abiogenesis in purely materialistic terms. Also, if God were creating new matter, what effect would entropy have since it always increases as you mentioned concerning the 2nd Law of Thermodynamics. The prevailing narrative of how the universe began, according to scientific thought, is that it proceeded from chaos. However, order precedes chaos. The intrinsic order of one atom precedes a combination of atoms. Science asks the question, “What are the chances that life could have evolved from chaos,” which is the wrong question. Order existed from the beginning. God created the laws of science, and we are drawn by our reason to seek our destiny.

We are all made of the same stuff, so we are all fundamentally, but not completely, different. If this stuff did not pre-exist each creation-event, where was it? Certainly, Forms were instantly created. I cannot conceive of a stable of Forms. And, Fundamental Matter, ‘quarks?’ I don’t know. What do you think?

Maybe from the beginning, God set things up fundamentally that living creatures should be incorporated with form according to the essence of His created beings. In other words, I mean that the laws were in place from the outset, so “form” automatically, so to speak, comes into being at the same moment the creature came into existence. So I don’t know if God keeps creating a new form for each person, animal and plant, or if He had the principle in place so that a particular form is associated with a particular creature due to the way the ‘quarks’ fall! I don’t mean to say that God is not participating in His creation, but that He had the laws of physics in place before each creature came into existence.

Perhaps matter existed. But, certainly, Form could not. We are the creations of God, just as the macro-universe. The universe was created without the pre-presence of anything existent. Now, if God is still rolling out the universe, then he could be creating matter as part of the roll-out. Any thoughts?

Of course we know that God can do anything. But when He operates outside of His own laws of reason and logic, He is performing a miracle. So, as stated, it is difficult to understand that He would be creating new material, at least, in our own universe. However, science keep fine-tuning its theories and making new hypotheses. I don’t have the expertise to answer. I just try to read on the subject as much as time permits (vvery llittle )

That’s right. The soul is the fusion. It is Form and Primary Matter combined. Yet, it is still hard for me to conceive that God knows in advance of Creation, sequentially. It has to be at the beginning moment of creation. And, we don’t know “when” that is. But, I may be wrong.

Maybe I’m not expressing correctly what I mean. It’s just like we have a conception of the house we intend to build or any other artifact we intend to create. We “build” it mentally first. We think through a plan. Naturally, we can’t say that God has to think things through when He knows all at every moment, or in His Eternal Now. If I’m understanding your point. . . ?

I see I’ve taken the thread off-track, so to answer the question whether or not some people are “born damned,” in light of the above, I can only conclude that because free will is essential to our substance, we can only damn ourselves.

Many blessings,
4

 

[mgreen77]

You want to live as good a life as possible. You choose to do so without the threat of punishment or the joy of rewards… But the question is why would you feel that it is somehow the best thing for you to do to choose goodness over evil?

I don’t really know, though I’ve never knowingly followed “laws” to tell me what’s right or wrong.

If I hurt someone’s feelings, I feel terrible. If I act selfishly, I feel terrible. If I take advantage of a situation or someone, I feel terrible. Sick to my stomach and soul. Not because I broke a law, but because it makes me feel ugly. Like I hurt God’s feelings or dissappointed Him.

And, it seems whenever I follow my conscious, even if it seems at odds at first with common sense or what people would “approve” of, my life unfolds in this weirdly charmed way. Blessed. Not so much for me, but for those around me too. And I don’t mean material rewards, but more like finding, giving and seeing love and compassion between people everywhere. Life is beautiful, clear, laughing.

And the flipside, whenever I know I’m ignoring my conscious out of fear or doubt, everything around me begins to fall apart. People get nasty. Things break and go wrong. Life becomes ugly, dirty, annoyed.

It’s the darndest thing, I can’t prove it to anyone, but for me it’s as predictable as clockwork.

All of which is why I feel “damned,” and why I mention not really caring about getting into Heaven. My focus is on that path, on following my conscious, which to me is the voice of God’s Will in or for my life. Whether it leads to Heaven or not is besides the point, all that matters to me in the end is that I don’t dissappoint Him, following it through to the end, wherever it leads.

 

[4Horsemen]

I don’t really know, though I’ve never knowingly followed “laws” to tell me what’s right or wrong.

If I hurt someone’s feelings, I feel terrible. If I act selfishly, I feel terrible. If I take advantage of a situation or someone, I feel terrible. Sick to my stomach and soul. Not because I broke a law, but because it makes me feel ugly. Like I hurt God’s feelings or dissappointed Him.

And, it seems whenever I follow my conscious, even if it seems at odds at first with common sense or what people would “approve” of, my life unfolds in this weirdly charmed way. Blessed. Not so much for me, but for those around me too. And I don’t mean material rewards, but more like finding, giving and seeing love and compassion between people everywhere. Life is beautiful, clear, laughing.

And the flipside, whenever I know I’m ignoring my conscious out of fear or doubt, everything around me begins to fall apart. People get nasty. Things break and go wrong. Life becomes ugly, dirty, annoyed.

It’s the darndest thing, I can’t prove it to anyone, but for me it’s as predictable as clockwork.

All of which is why I feel “damned,” and why I mention not really caring about getting into Heaven. My focus is on that path, on following my conscious, which to me is the voice of God’s Will in or for my life. Whether it leads to Heaven or not is besides the point, all that matters to me in the end is that I don’t dissappoint Him, following it through to the end, wherever it leads.

What you are doing is following your conscience, and we’ve all heard about the “law written into our hearts” by God. So when we follow our conscience as long as it is well-formed, we are following the Two Great Commandmends: to love God with all our heart, soul, mind, and strength and, secondly, to love our neighbor as ourselves. All of he 10 Commandments are summarized into these two as Scripture tells us.

The reason I answered that “anything goes”, so to speak, if there is no law, it is evident that there will be people who live only according to their own wants. They do not have a well-formed conscience, nor do they pay attention to the little nudges from God to get onto the right path.

When I talked about the necessity of the Law, I was just concurring with St. Paul who claimed that it was the Law that made sin apparent. But through Jesus Christ, all is made right if we follow him. Jesus tells us, “You are my friends if you keep my Commandments.” When the Commandments are internalized in our conscience, we are doing as Christ tells us without necessarily recalling each Commandment for any particular situation. I hope I made some sense here!

 

[mgreen77]

Then add in all of the painful family, school, life and marriage experiences combined with my inability to handle or make sense of them, it feels as if God is trying to take away my hope; to keep me out of heaven.

Ask yourself if there’s something you should be doing, some calling, some path you know deep down you should be on, but for some reason keep avoiding. Something you’re not facing, something you won’t admit, something you’re running from?

I’ve mentioned elsewhere that my life tends to fall apart whenever I get off track, whenever I get too deep in fooling myself, trying to avoid doing something or knowing something that scares me. I figure the further off-track we get, the less subtle God becomes in trying to nudge us back on course

I’ve often thought that we already know everything we need to know, we just spend a lifetime of trying to come to grips with it, trying to find the courage to admit and face what we know.

 

[graceandglory]

Is it possible that some people are born damned, and inherently incapable of being “saved?”

QUOTE]

Only Presbyterians.