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Bookcat
Guest
Catechism:
324 The fact that God permits physical and even moral evil is a mystery that God illuminates by his Son Jesus Christ who died and rose to vanquish evil.
There is not a single aspect of the Christian message that is not in part an answer to the question of evil. (CCC 309)
324 The fact that God permits physical and even moral evil is a mystery that God illuminates by his Son Jesus Christ who died and rose to vanquish evil.
There is not a single aspect of the Christian message that is not in part an answer to the question of evil. (CCC 309)
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Voice_of_Reason_1
Guest
Why did he make the earth capable of bringing so much suffering if he didn’t want it? You keep diverging the discussion onto “what the Christian response should be.” We’re not talking about that; we’re talking about Haiti and natural evil.
Sent might be the wrong term only insofar as it sounds like he intercepted with earth’s nature - his creation - to bring about something terrible. But he did know in foresight (before even creating the universe) that such disasters would be common to the world; so why did he create the world thus unless he wanted it?
Actually there’s not one single part that is. And that’s not really an answer at all; that’s more like “keep reading; the answer will make sense in some obscure, holistic way.” Real questions should have real answers. I know i’ve asked this, but I am not getting a straight response from you any time. You said that you could answer the question of evil with training (which you have). Why don’t you?
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Bookcat
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I am sorry…was that a voice from the school ground again? I gave my response to you…I do not wish to respond to such a voice.
nor should you put words in my mouth…
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Voice_of_Reason_1
Guest
You don’t wish to defend the faith, or you can’t? Honestly, now…
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Bookcat
Guest
Man hate to do this to you…but you brought it upon yourself…I know you do not like me repeating…but here goes I will repeat the post I am referring to.
I sought to have a reasoned discussion. But rather was repaid
with the dismissals of a boy in a school yard…
where I come from – one reasons and discusses things with friendliness and intellectual civility if not charity.
not childish misuse of words.
So I decided to repeat my profession. For he is the answer.
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Bookcat
Guest
I will add though a few lines from the Catechism.
309 If God the Father almighty, the Creator of the ordered and good world, cares for all his creatures, why does evil exist? To this question, as pressing as it is unavoidable and as painful as it is mysterious, no quick answer will suffice. Only Christian faith as a whole constitutes the answer to this question: the goodness of creation, the drama of sin and the patient love of God who comes to meet man by his covenants, the redemptive Incarnation of his Son, his gift of the Spirit, his gathering of the Church, the power of the sacraments and his call to a blessed life to which free creatures are invited to consent in advance, but from which, by a terrible mystery, they can also turn away in advance. There is not a single aspect of the Christian message that is not in part an answer to the question of evil.
309 If God the Father almighty, the Creator of the ordered and good world, cares for all his creatures, why does evil exist? To this question, as pressing as it is unavoidable and as painful as it is mysterious, no quick answer will suffice. Only Christian faith as a whole constitutes the answer to this question: the goodness of creation, the drama of sin and the patient love of God who comes to meet man by his covenants, the redemptive Incarnation of his Son, his gift of the Spirit, his gathering of the Church, the power of the sacraments and his call to a blessed life to which free creatures are invited to consent in advance, but from which, by a terrible mystery, they can also turn away in advance. There is not a single aspect of the Christian message that is not in part an answer to the question of evil.
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Voice_of_Reason_1
Guest
I’m not a school yard bully just because you’re intimidated. This is a reasonable discussion, I don’t know why you can’t provide what I’m asking. And if you can’t, I don’t know why you’re still participating in this thread.
But just so we’re on the same page - you don’t want to offer an explanation because you think that I’m a boy in a school yard? You don’t like me, so you’re not going to give an answer, as per your expertise? I’m asking for clarification here, not riddles.
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Voice_of_Reason_1
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This has already been posted, thanks. I’ve read the catechism a few times already. It’s not a treatment of the problem of evil; it’s really just an overview of the faith.
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Bookcat
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Bookcat
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Bookcat
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As the Catechism states:
regarding the mystery of evil
“no quick answer will suffice”
which defines the very nature of this format. a forum such as this is not fitted for such a discussion. It would take whole courses to treat of the subject …or whole books…
nor would such an endeavor with the right circumstances prove to remove the parts mystery that would remain.
a full understanding on this side of history …
it out strips us.
what we can give…we give. Our reason to trust God comes from many sources…reason, the encounter with beauty and goodness, the meaning laden creation, the joys of life and love, the very existence of reason, the revelation of God, etc…above all in the very person of Jesus of Nazareth. In his voice, in his face, in his love, in his entering the suffering caused by sin— in his resurrection we encounter God.
we respond with faith and reason…a theological answer to a theological question…
to simply dismiss it is like a someone asking a question of history and when he receives a historical answer …being unhappy to not get a mathematical answer!
regarding the mystery of evil
“no quick answer will suffice”
which defines the very nature of this format. a forum such as this is not fitted for such a discussion. It would take whole courses to treat of the subject …or whole books…
nor would such an endeavor with the right circumstances prove to remove the parts mystery that would remain.
a full understanding on this side of history …
it out strips us.
what we can give…we give. Our reason to trust God comes from many sources…reason, the encounter with beauty and goodness, the meaning laden creation, the joys of life and love, the very existence of reason, the revelation of God, etc…above all in the very person of Jesus of Nazareth. In his voice, in his face, in his love, in his entering the suffering caused by sin— in his resurrection we encounter God.
we respond with faith and reason…a theological answer to a theological question…
to simply dismiss it is like a someone asking a question of history and when he receives a historical answer …being unhappy to not get a mathematical answer!
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Voice_of_Reason_1
Guest
You know why this kind of response isn’t satisfying for me though, don’t you? I mean, it would be totally dissatisfying to hear as an answer to someone elses religion, wouldn’t you agree? Beauty, goodness, creation, life, love, existence, reason, revelation, [your God]. I mean, If I put Allah in Yahweh’s place, you’d say “how in world did he come to that conclusion!? Why is he saying these things? I don’t associate any of those things with a god that’s not Yahweh or Jesus or whathaveyou.”
I’m inclined to argree with you about that. But what is a theological answer? One which, wherein hearing it, a person is satisfied with “no quick answer,” or “'tis a great mystery?”
One of the things I wanted to promote was what you were saying about difficult ideas outstripping us. The idea of God (the unsearchable, the unknowable, unfathomable) is something which totally outstrips anything in my natural reason (and so it should - God is totally elusive to, at least, our natural senses). We have the idea of evil that is hard, intellectually, to reconcile with a loving God and we call it a mystery because it confounds some of the ideas we hold about God. But there are ideas about God within Christianity that are, at least, internally consistent, and don’t contradict other ideas (indeed, they fit in the total package; fit with what we expect), but that they don’t puzzle us or make us uneasy as to why a thing is the way it is - this is my grand point - doesn’t mean our speculations are any better. Our speculations about evil are bad ones (I know it; you’re aware of it; the Catholic church acknowledges it); Our speculations about goodness and miracles and subjectively good things are not any better by virtue of our complacency. And that, I think, is the larger problem in Christianity: that we accept as ready and unassailable truth, the things which make us feel at home, so to speak.
I don’t expect agreement about this potential problem of complacency, but it is something that should be pondered by Christians and non-believers alike.
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Bookcat
Guest
I do not agree that the Catholic understanding of evil or even the speculations are bad ones…nor do I think that one can just remove the Christian answer and replace it with Z and it would be found as reasonable and satisfying. And God is knowable …we can know him …we can know him from reason and from what he has told us about himself…and above all we can know him in the face of Jesus of Nazareth.
what we can know …we can know as truth…but at the same time he far outstrips our knowledge. it is both the affirmative and negative way…
we both know and do not know…
and speaking as a person who was not always Catholic…who encountered things fresh…as on who stood beneath the stars in wonder …who began by asking questions and seeking for answers…on the outside. I did not accept things just cause they were given or familiar.
From the inside now…that is within lived Faith and reason…I find more and more …via experience too …Jesus Christ is the Logos…is the meaning …and the even when reality outstips our understanding…I believe in him and in his resurrection …I experience life and joy and the certitude of hope in him in his sacraments and in his Church.
I live by faith in the Son of God who loved me…
There are a few chapters in Pope John Paul II’s Crossing the Threshold of Hope that also touch on questions of evil and suffering…very worth reading.
Why is there such evil in the world? Why does God tolerate suffering? What does to Save mean? these will touch on the question in a way I can not do justice to in this short space…even though they themselves are but short chapters…they come from a man who suffered greatly…
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Bookcat
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yes you will not find me agreeing with complacency.
but I will tell you that as I noted earlier…you are not the only one for whom such questions come knocking in the middle of the the night.
I face these realities…these harsh effects of nature …
not with unthinking complacency…but with the heart of a man.
one that bleeds.
and I know too another Heart …that of the one from Nazareth …
from within my reason (plates need to move for life on this earth)…
and my faith
I trust and live.
and hopefully I do what i can to help whoever is suffering…
but I will tell you that as I noted earlier…you are not the only one for whom such questions come knocking in the middle of the the night.
I face these realities…these harsh effects of nature …
not with unthinking complacency…but with the heart of a man.
one that bleeds.
and I know too another Heart …that of the one from Nazareth …
from within my reason (plates need to move for life on this earth)…
and my faith
I trust and live.
and hopefully I do what i can to help whoever is suffering…
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Voice_of_Reason_1
Guest
You’re a man! I was thinking the entire time that you were a woman because of your prosaic style of writing and screen name (don’t ask me why).
In any event, I suppose that’s as far as we can go with this discussion then. Thanks for sharing
In any event, I suppose that’s as far as we can go with this discussion then. Thanks for sharing
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Qoeleth
Guest
It seems that Bookchat and Voice of Reason are both presenting the same answer- which is, that existence of evil is cannot be explained away.
Voice of Reason makes the valid point that theology, while endeavouring to seem logically consistent, is not really so at all. I am sure the Bookchat whould agree with this, hence the existence of 'mysteries’in our faith.
Voice of Reasons identifies as a problem “that we accept as ready and unassailable truth, the things which make us feel at home.”
I agree. But I do not think it is a problem. We use theology, literature, art, music to provide us with as comfortable and useful a world-view as possible. Why should Catholics not just cling to whatever they believe, if it helps to get them through this short and turbulent journey of life, and makes them behave in a decent way?
What is the value in identifying logical inconsistencies? Ultimately, nothing in this world makes sense (including reason itself) if reason is applied rigourously enough.
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CatholicGuy22
Guest
Everything comes from God including earthquakes, sunny days, and Sometimes bad things happen to good people and it doesn’t mean that God is punishing people.
God bless!!!
God bless!!!
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aussie_jaz
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i would be more inclined to say everything is permitted to occur by god rather than it coming from god. he created nature and allows nature to take its course without controlling that course.
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Qoeleth
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As St. Augustine said “This world is a small scale hell.” And indeed, we know from the Gospel of John that Satan, not God, is the Lord of this World. What kind of God but a devil could have institutes the evil conditions which prevail, which St. Thomas More sums up as a “vale of tears, misery, labour and want”? In its very essence this world is sin and suffering. We cannot attribute anything in it to God, but everything to the sin of Adam, which is a metaphoric way of saying, the sin which is inherent in existence itself.
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