If God both created the Universe and cares about humans, why did he make it so large?

[ronnie_bonigli]

I am not at all bothered by Hawking’s claim that we need not invoke God for the origin of this universe, because my faith in God does not depend on the cosmological argument.

And I too do not feel the “design argument” or the “cosmological argument” have anything to do with real Faith. But still, when condescending supercilious atheists try to haughtily tell people that the “science has shown” that the universe and man himself are nothing more than cosmic accidents it’s always nice to point out that that’s actually not the picture that current physics and cosmology paint. And btw, even though he’s very brilliant, or at least was, I’d put Hawking in the catagory of supercilious atheist, a little humility regarding the limits of human knowledge (like his old buddy Roger Penrose displays) would be in order for Steve.

 

[StAnastasia]

But still, when condescending supercilious atheists try to haughtily tell people that the “science has shown” that the universe and man himself are nothing more than cosmic accidents it’s always nice to point out that that’s actually not the picture that current physics and cosmology paint.

True. Many such people jettisoned their natal religious tradition in adolescence or earlier, so the God they imagine we believe is not that at all.

And btw, even though he’s very brilliant, or at least was, I’d put Hawking in the category of supercilious atheist, a little humility regarding the limits of human knowledge (like his old buddy Roger Penrose displays) would be in order for Steve.

I agree. I like Hawking’s exposition of cosmological discoveries and theories, but the theological conclusions he draws therefrom are somewhat simplistic, even puerile.

 

[ronnie_bonigli]

I agree. I like Hawking’s exposition of cosmological discoveries and theories, but the theological conclusions he draws therefrom are somewhat simplistic, even puerile.

sounds just like some of the reviews I’ve read of his latest book The Grand Design , even many atheist philosophers thought the atheist leaning conclusions he draws in the book are embarrassing. It may be “slot machines and dog track” time for Steve (i.e retirement), he seems a shadow of his former self.

 

[cassini]

In that case the Church is guilty of pride, distorted by warped thinking and fooling others into the same pit of ignorance because the Church accepts evolution!

Again Tonyrey, you take liberties, as did Cardinal Ratzinger, and now as Pope benedict XVI and numerous other cardinals, bishops, priests etc., and as Pope John Paul II did. There personal opinions are not Church teaching. Church teachings are brought to us by way of the MAGISTERIUM, be it extraordinary or ordinary.

Now the last teaching of the MAGISTERIUM, ordinary in this case, came to us from Pope Pius XII’s Humani Generis. In this encyclical he clearly teaches Catholics can ARGUE their case, providing equal time and consideration be given to both sides, and in time (1, 10, 100, 10000 years?) the CHURCH will rule on what ii accepts and what it rejects. But given the whole hiararchy of the Church is theoistic-evolutionist, and talk down the permitted literal reading of Scripture, not only are they operating against the spirit and intention of Humani Generis, but are liable to to have their one-sided thinking interpreted as genuine teaching. In other words, there being no proper Humani Generis debate taking place, how in God’s name can the CHURCH ever decide a correct position on the whole subject of creation and origins?

Now you tonyrey, and all mentioned above can write books and tell us this and that and give out false assertions that ‘the Church accepts evolution’, but it is false teaching.

Perhaps now you will see why I get angry with new ‘magisterium’ modernism. I accept you are sincere and truly believe what you say, but you have been led up the path of ‘false prophets’, all trying to look good in the eyes of the Pontifical Academy of Science, the source of all the compromise and false doctrines about the business of destroying the absolute incorruptable literal reading of Genesis held by all the Fathers and still the teaching of the Church unless changed by some future pope - which will not happen.

 

[StAnastasia]

Perhaps now you will see why I get angry with new ‘magisterium’ modernism. I accept you are sincere and truly believe what you say, but you have been led up the path of ‘false prophets’, all trying to look good in the eyes of the Pontifical Academy of Science, the source of all the compromise and false doctrines about the business of destroying the absolute incorruptable literal reading of Genesis held by all the Fathers and still the teaching of the Church unless changed by some future pope - which will not happen.

Cassini, you’ve got a long and daunting uphill struggle ahead of you, and you started 400 years after they let the horse out of the barn.

StAnastasia

 

[ronnie_bonigli]

If one takes Genesis literally, as all the Fathers, saints, popes, faithful did for 1800 years, then they were all intellectually retarded according to your thinking, hopelessly bound to an ignorance that we Catholics today would consider bringing Catholicism into disrepute. How dare any so-called Catholic even think such a thing, let alone post it up to fool others into the same pit of ignorance.

As for the latter remark, that the lessons of Job, taught within Catholicism since its beginning, is an example of human pride, well I will leave others to share in this warped thinking.

Do you really think “ALL the Saints” believed in a literal reading Genesis? I’ve read many times that Saint Augustine (who by the way live 1600 years ago, long before Darwin, Big Bang cosmology and a host of others even came on the scene to question literal Genesis scientifically) anyway, Augustine ***did not ***think it a good idea to *assume *Genesis is literal. He wrote numerous times on it, one book is De Genesi ad litteram libri duodecim (i.e. “The Literal Meaning of Genesis”). Augustine took the view that everything in the universe was created simultaneously by God, and not in seven calendar days like a plain account of Genesis would require. He argued that the six-day structure of creation presented in the book of Genesis represents a logical framework, rather than the passage of time in a physical way, it would bear a spiritual, rather than physical, meaning, which is no less literal. One reason for his interpretation is the passage in Sirach 18:1, “he created all things at once”, which Augustine took as proof that the days of Genesis 1 had to be taken non-literally.

A well known quote from his The Literal Meaning of Genesis sums up what he thought of people who demanded Genesis MUST be literal;
Usually, even a non-Christian knows something about the earth, the heavens, and the other elements of this world, about the motion and orbit of the stars and even their size and relative positions, about the predictable eclipses of the sun and moon, the cycles of the years and the seasons, about the kinds of animals, shrubs, stones, and so forth, and this knowledge he hold to as being certain from reason and experience. Now, it is a disgraceful and dangerous thing for an infidel to hear a Christian, presumably giving the meaning of Holy Scripture, talking nonsense on these topics; and we should take all means to prevent such an embarrassing situation, in which people show up vast ignorance in a Christian and laugh it to scorn. The shame is not so much that an ignorant individual is derided, but that people outside the household of faith think our sacred writers held such opinions, and, to the great loss of those for whose salvation we toil, the writers of our Scripture are criticized and rejected as unlearned men. If they find a Christian mistaken in a field which they themselves know well and hear him maintaining his foolish opinions about our books, how are they going to believe those books in matters concerning the resurrection of the dead, the hope of eternal life, and the kingdom of heaven, when they think their pages are full of falsehoods and on facts which they themselves have learnt from experience and the light of reason? Reckless and incompetent expounders of Holy Scripture bring untold trouble and sorrow on their wiser brethren when they are caught in one of their mischievous false opinions and are taken to task by those who are not bound by the authority of our sacred books. For then, to defend their utterly foolish and obviously untrue statements, they will try to call upon Holy Scripture for proof and even recite from memory many passages which they think support their position, although they understand neither what they say nor the things about which they make assertion.

 

[3DOCTORS]

IMO, I wouldn’t be surprised if God has created beings on the many other worlds out there. I don’t think that any of them landed at Area 51 near Roswell in 1947, though!

My guess is that if He did, we’ll find out about it in the next life if we’re meant to know. And if He didn’t, then that’s the way He meant to do it, and as long as we get to be with Him, it makes no difference.

I like to read and write sci-fi - and it’s fun and enlightening to use “aliens” and alternate scenarios as a storytelling device to reflect on our Earthly existence, our morality, and our place in the universe, from a sort of “outside viewpoint,” as it were.:takeoff:

 

[tonyrey]

IMO, I wouldn’t be surprised if God has created beings on the many other worlds out there. I don’t think that any of them landed at Area 51 near Roswell in 1947, though!

My guess is that if He did, we’ll find out about it in the next life if we’re meant to know. And if He didn’t, then that’s the way He meant to do it, and as long as we get to be with Him, it makes no difference.

I like to read and write sci-fi - and it’s fun and enlightening to use “aliens” and alternate scenarios as a storytelling device to reflect on our Earthly existence, our morality, and our place in the universe, from a sort of “outside viewpoint,” as it were.:takeoff:

It is a healthy antidote to the tendency to regard man as “the measure of all things”. Morality is not invented by human beings because the same basic moral principles apply to persons anywhere in - and beyond - the universe.

 

[inocente]

Augustine ***did not ***think it a good idea to *assume *Genesis is literal. … He argued that the six-day structure of creation presented in the book of Genesis represents a logical framework, rather than the passage of time in a physical way, it would bear a spiritual, rather than physical, meaning, which is no less literal.

Three cheers for Augustine then. Genesis has a poetic form used by the ancient Hebrews, I think known as parallelism, which does not involve the chronological ordering we are inclined to. Augustine seems to be reading it as the original writer intended.

 

[inocente]

It is a healthy antidote to the tendency to regard man as “the measure of all things”. Morality is not invented by human beings because the same basic moral principles apply to persons anywhere in - and beyond - the universe.

However , suppose there are aliens who don’t have the same sense of self as us, who act as a collective with little or no sense of “self”. Would the same moral principles apply, or would they see our principles as wrong?

 

[tonyrey]

However , suppose there are aliens who don’t have the same sense of self as us, who act as a collective with little or no sense of “self”. Would the same moral principles apply, or would they see our principles as wrong?

In the past - and even now - there are human beings who who don’t have the same sense as most of us but that doesn’t invalidate fundamental moral principles. They may not be culpable but they are certainly ignorant!

 

[ronnie_bonigli]

Three cheers for Augustine then. Genesis has a poetic form used by the ancient Hebrews, I think known as parallelism, which does not involve the chronological ordering we are inclined to. Augustine seems to be reading it as the original writer intended.

Augustine was one smart cookie. When the old atheists and pagans would bring out that old red herring about “What was God doing before he created the universe, and why would he wait all that time before creating it?”, Augustine was perhaps the first human being to come up with the concept that time is not absolute. He said “God created the universe*** with time not in ***time”, that time is only function of the created universe. No one could understand how that could even make sense for about 1500 years until some guy Einstein came along with the Theory of Relativity.

 

[StAnastasia]

No one could understand how that could even make sense for about 1500 years until some guy Einstein came along with the Theory of Relativity.

Actually, Cardinal Nicholas of Cusa 1401-1464 understood Augustine’s idea quite well, and articulated ideas that would later lead to the model of panentheism.

 

[3DOCTORS]

However , suppose there are aliens who don’t have the same sense of self as us, who act as a collective with little or no sense of “self”. Would the same moral principles apply, or would they see our principles as wrong?

Now that would be a cool idea for a thought-provoking sci-fi story! Can I steal it?

I would think that God would design for the collective a morality that fits their state of being . . . but that if they visited us, they would indeed find our ways a bit strange.

(voices of the collective, LOL)

 

[Alijandra]

To show you that he loves you more than,anything in the world,to show you his love for you,his love is like if you were the only one that existed individually.And it’s beautiful isn’t it?God’s beauty mysteries and wonders.That God’s beauty ALL that he created was to show you how beautiful,how mystical, how wonderful,and how God really is…it goes,on God is shown in everything he created.That’s what I think.And it shouldn’t matter what I write or say,what truly comes from your heart is what matters,in everything that you think is right for you.

 

[cassini]

Cassini, you’ve got a long and daunting uphill struggle ahead of you, and you started 400 years after they let the horse out of the barn.

StAnastasia

Yes St A, I do realise I have an uphill struggle ahead of me. But that will not deter me in my task. The first thing to do is to show everyone I can that Einstein, in 1905, shot the 400 year old heliocentric ‘truth’ out of the Bible with his re-introduction of relativity as the prevailing mystery that is the Universe. Sadly, Rome did not want anyone to see this truth that showed their 1741-1835 U-turn against the traditional position of the Fathers was based on a scientific illusion, not on clear and certain evidence as St Augustine demanded.

‘Exeunt Copernicus, Galileo and Newton as trustworthy prophets of the way the heavens really go. The only trouble is that theologians in particular and Christians in general are still blind to the tragedy behind this momentous turnabout after A.D. 1905 [Einstein’s reassertion of relativity]. For the consequences of the choice between the above-mentioned alternatives have been, and are, far-reaching. The geocentric position virtually compels a man at least to believe in a metaphysical Designer, specially interested in mankind and our dwelling place in the heavens. It engenders worldviews of the Genesis type. The ruling model today, gradually and unavoidably developed as a result of the Copernican revolution, suggests that we are no more than a freak accident out of many, evolved somewhere in the universe about which we can say nothing with any measure of certitude or probability.’ ----Walter van der Kamp

In other words, in God’s Omnipotent wisdom, He created the universe metaphysical, beyond the comprehension of man, to show us our limited minds and His existence as Creator. This will be fascinating to those Catholics who have been taught under the darkness of Modernism in their Church, and who are blessed with the grace to see the ways of God free from the constraints of modern scientific theories foisted upon them by both Church and State for the last 150 years. Then they will see insights into the teachings of God about these things.

'St Paul said the pagans who affected not to know the truth of God had no excuse, because “God has manifested it unto them. For the invisible things of Him, from the creation of the world, are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made: His eternal power also, and divinity, so that they are inexcusable.” (Rom. 1:19-20) ’

Where is God to be found in ‘modern science’? Modern science is human reasoning that totally excludes the supernatural and preternatural. It totally excludes any ongoing cause outside the laws of nature as man finds them. Modern science is Godless reasoning.
The Catholic however, should know that God sustains everything. That there is no cause that has not Him as First Cause. The first proof of God’s existence is to be seen in the sky. After the Copernican-evolution revolution, championed by Francis Bacon and Freemasonry, Satan’s army purged this thought out of man’s minds by replacing it with an IMAGE that now prevails. Gone is the earth as a special place for us in His metaphysical mystery created out of eternity. Gone is the visible proof that we are special and exist alongside Him Who resides outside that created for us. Today the world has modern science to show the universe doesn’t need God, that it exists on its own laws. The very basis of atheism depends on this image, one conceded to by churchmen from 1741 to now. The only difference is a laughable compromise, that God gave nature the ability to CREATE, a theological absurdity. But that theology was also purged with all the scientific theories, leaving Catholicism like a religion with no substance, just a make it up as science changes.

Oh I could go on St A, but thanks for the opportunity to say my piece.

 

[cassini]

Do you really think “ALL the Saints” believed in a literal reading Genesis? I’ve read many times that Saint Augustine (who by the way live 1600 years ago, long before Darwin, Big Bang cosmology and a host of others even came on the scene to question literal Genesis scientifically) anyway, Augustine ***did not ***think it a good idea to *assume *Genesis is literal. He wrote numerous times on it, one book is De Genesi ad litteram libri duodecim (i.e. “The Literal Meaning of Genesis”). Augustine took the view that everything in the universe was created simultaneously by God, and not in seven calendar days like a plain account of Genesis would require. He argued that the six-day structure of creation presented in the book of Genesis represents a logical framework, rather than the passage of time in a physical way, it would bear a spiritual, rather than physical, meaning, which is no less literal. One reason for his interpretation is the passage in Sirach 18:1, “he created all things at once”, which Augustine took as proof that the days of Genesis 1 had to be taken non-literally.

A well known quote from his The Literal Meaning of Genesis sums up what he thought of people who demanded Genesis MUST be literal;
Usually, even a non-Christian knows something about the earth, the heavens, and the other elements of this world, about the motion and orbit of the stars and even their size and relative positions, about the predictable eclipses of the sun and moon, the cycles of the years and the seasons, about the kinds of animals, shrubs, stones, and so forth, and this knowledge he hold to as being certain from reason and experience. Now, it is a disgraceful and dangerous thing for an infidel to hear a Christian, presumably giving the meaning of Holy Scripture, talking nonsense on these topics; and we should take all means to prevent such an embarrassing situation, in which people show up vast ignorance in a Christian and laugh it to scorn. The shame is not so much that an ignorant individual is derided, but that people outside the household of faith think our sacred writers held such opinions, and, to the great loss of those for whose salvation we toil, the writers of our Scripture are criticized and rejected as unlearned men. If they find a Christian mistaken in a field which they themselves know well and hear him maintaining his foolish opinions about our books, how are they going to believe those books in matters concerning the resurrection of the dead, the hope of eternal life, and the kingdom of heaven, when they think their pages are full of falsehoods and on facts which they themselves have learnt from experience and the light of reason? Reckless and incompetent expounders of Holy Scripture bring untold trouble and sorrow on their wiser brethren when they are caught in one of their mischievous false opinions and are taken to task by those who are not bound by the authority of our sacred books. For then, to defend their utterly foolish and obviously untrue statements, they will try to call upon Holy Scripture for proof and even recite from memory many passages which they think support their position, although they understand neither what they say nor the things about which they make assertion.

Yes Ronnie, I am aware of St Augustine’s position. But it does not challenge the scholastic understanding of a literal reading of Scripture. Over six days or immediately is still an ex nihilo complete creation of all things according to their nature and purpose in six days or less. Both Augustine’s proposal and that of the other Fathers, depicts the earth as created at the centre with the rest of the universe created to serve the earth and thus mankind, those crerated in God’s image and likeness. Note the geocentric description above that makes that interpretation unanimous - a sign of infallibility according to Trent and Vatican I that prevents that literal reading to be contradicted. Change that and you undermine the very credibility of Christian infallibility. Yet the Modernists did.
In other words, St Augustine here above held a position (the literal) that today’s modernists would say puts him in the category described by him: 'Now, it is a disgraceful and dangerous thing for an infidel to hear a Christian, presumably giving the meaning of Holy Scripture, talking nonsense on these topics; and we should take all means to prevent such an embarrassing situation, in which people show up vast ignorance in a Christian and laugh it to scorn.'

You see the contradictions that Modernism (subjecting Catholic belief to scientific theories beyond the reach of empirical science) leads to . Here ronnie you thought you were rebutting my earlier posts by showing St Augustine opinion. But all you did was show he too was a geocentrist, a position that is laughed out of it from Rome to the South Pole today. I keep telling you, truth cannot be caught out. The lie on the other hand, leads to confusion, error and false teaching.

 

[MindOverMatter2]

I wonder whether you yourself have read the relevant literature, or understand what the authors are saying. If you had, you wouldn’t attack me as you’ve done in your post.

As a charter member of the International Society for Science and Religion (issr.org.uk/) I am personal friends with members such as Paul Davies, John Polkinghorne, George Ellis, Nancey Murphy, Robert Russell, and the late Arthur Peacocke. I’ve been to and spoken at numerous conferences covering such topics aw the anthropic principle. I reject the notion as hopelessly anthropocentric that the universe and its purpose revolve exclusively around Homo sapiens and planet earth.

StAnastasia

Why is it that people pick up the bible and assume they must take everything in it literally? I was once infected by this kind of thinking and it almost drove me insane being torn between my intellect and supposed orthodoxy. I would have lost the faith if wasn’t for good honest Catholics who took it upon themselves to show us that the catholic faith is not a product of ignorance. I say good by to cave man religion and hello to an honest faith. Why doesn’t the church once and for all say that it is highly improbable if not impossible, given what we know of the universe, that 7 day creationism is true? Do they still believe that it might be true? Or is this just about keeping believers in the church?

 

[MindOverMatter2]

Yes Ronnie, I am aware of St Augustine’s position. But it does not challenge the scholastic understanding of a literal reading of Scripture. Over six days or immediately is still an ex nihilo complete creation of all things according to their nature and purpose in six days or less. Both Augustine’s proposal and that of the other Fathers, depicts the earth as created at the centre with the rest of the universe created to serve the earth and thus mankind, those crerated in God’s image and likeness. Note the geocentric description above that makes that interpretation unanimous - a sign of infallibility according to Trent and Vatican I that prevents that literal reading to be contradicted. Change that and you undermine the very credibility of Christian infallibility. Yet the Modernists did.
In other words, St Augustine here above held a position (the literal) that today’s modernists would say puts him in the category described by him: 'Now, it is a disgraceful and dangerous thing for an infidel to hear a Christian, presumably giving the meaning of Holy Scripture, talking nonsense on these topics; and we should take all means to prevent such an embarrassing situation, in which people show up vast ignorance in a Christian and laugh it to scorn.'

You see the contradictions that Modernism (subjecting Catholic belief to scientific theories beyond the reach of empirical science) leads to . Here ronnie you thought you were rebutting my earlier posts by showing St Augustine opinion. But all you did was show he too was a geocentrist, a position that is laughed out of it from Rome to the South Pole today. I keep telling you, truth cannot be caught out. The lie on the other hand, leads to confusion, error and false teaching.

You can’t twist it. The fact of the matter is, Augustine held a position contrary to six day creationism. End of story.

 

[cassini]

Why is it that people pick up the bible and assume they must take everything in it literally? I was once infected by this kind of thinking and it almost drove me insane being torn between my intellect and supposed orthodoxy. I would have lost the faith if wasn’t for good honest Catholics who took it upon themselves to show us that the catholic faith is not a product of ignorance. I say good by to cave man religion and hello to an honest faith. Why doesn’t the church once and for all say that it is highly improbable if not impossible, given what we know of the universe, that 7 day creationism is true? Do they still believe that it might be true? Or is this just about keeping believers in the church?

No one in the Church ever took EVERYTHING literal. The Church was not founded on ignorance. From the very beginning the Fathers knew that the Scriptures held literal truths, metaphors, symbols, parables, etc. By ‘cave-man’ religion I presume you refer to those who were not ‘informed and educated’ in scientific theories. Seems to me your faith lies in science, not the faith of the cave-men Fathers.