I'm leaving Catholicism

[rdj69]

The problem is that your belief in Divine Revelation is entirely baseless. There is essentially no difference between your blind belief in Catholicism and a Muslim’s blind belief in Islam. You are literally the stereotype Christian that many new atheists make fun of.

I don’t know why I keep trying to help you when it’s been clear the entire time that you’re not here to learn, you’re not here seeking help in understanding; you’re here to assert that you are right and Christianity is wrong and you could not care less what anyone here says to you about it. Your mind has been made up from the very beginning, which is why the many attempts to explain your errors to you have failed - you have already decided that you are incapable of error.

As I said earlier in the discussion: you cannot learn what you think you already know.

 

[TheDefaultMan]

I don’t know why I keep trying to help you when it’s been clear the entire time that you’re not here to learn, you’re not here seeking help in understanding; you’re here to assert that you are right and Christianity is wrong and you could not care less what anyone here says to you about it.

First of all, I’ve made countless posts explaining my arguments and the reasons for why I find the Catholic position on Simplicity and the Trinity to be contradictory.

Second of all, It shouldn’t be my job to assume that Christianity is true unless proven otherwise. That’s just not how philosophy tends to work.

Third of all, it is clearly you who’s closed minded. You have literally gone through countless mental gymnastics and baseless appeals to Divine Revelation (which we don’t both accept).

Why is it me who’s the closed minded one? I’m literally going out of my way to consider and respond to everyone who seriously engages with my arguments, while you’ve retreated to just screaming “Divine Revelation” at me. Like I said, this is no different from a Muslim blindly believing in Islam.

And please for the love of God stop whining as if I’m infringing on your rights or something. You don’t have to engage with this thread if you don’t want to. All I’m interested in is seeking truth. I’m very very very sorry if I offended you by challenging what you’ve already decided to be true.

 

[rdj69]

I’m not going to respond to your uncharitable mischaracterizations of what I’ve said here, or your childish character attacks. My own words speak for themselves, regardless of how much you misinterpret and misrepresent them.

Goodbye.

 

[TheDefaultMan]

“uncharitable mischaracterizations”
“childish character attacks”

This is the same person who constantly mischaracterized what my position is and why I believe it. This is the same person who thinks that I’m merely being arrogant and not recognizing “Divine Authority”, while not justifying those claims himself.

Goodbye. I hope you’ll learn how to engage in critical thinking in the future.

 

[Magnanimity]

The Church, and from my understanding, at least, the first few councils, explicitly teach that there are real distinctions within the Trinity. I would also like to point out that I take Edward Feser’s view

Feser is a Thomist, and the early church likely did not mean by “real distinction” what Aquinas meant by the same. And I’m well aware of the Thomistic criticism of the Scotistic formal distinction. However, Scotus’ reasoning seems to directly allay your concerns (most of which are borne out of an insistence on a “real distinction” between the divine Persons). But you didn’t address any of that…

Another aspect in this discussion which might be worth bringing up is the crucially important transcendental of “relationality.” I do wonder whether it’s a particularly Western problem to think there is some fundamental issue arising within a simple God as a Trinity of persons. The West tends toward seeing humanity as merely an assortment of separable selves. But plenty of Fathers disagreed with this view. Origen, St Gregory of Nyssa and St Maximus the Confessor extended the Pauline analogy of the church as Christ’s body to the whole of humanity. As in, the human race is itself a totality of relational persons. The Scottish philosopher John MacMurray argued powerfully in his book Persons in Relation that there are no human selves who exist in isolation. There are only persons in relation. Humanity itself, this relationality of personhood is like a small sacrament of the Real.

Between simplicity and trinitarian theology, it would be the former that would be in need of refinement. From my understanding, W. Norris Clarke attempted just that.

 

[MarkRome]

I just cannot be Catholic if it means accepting logically contradictory doctrines.

I would not be Catholic either if there were logically contradictory doctrines either. However, the Trinity isn’t logically contradictory. A difficult topic to be sure, but not contradictory. Bishop Barron has some good videos on the Trinity that you can find on YouTube.

 

[MarkRome]

The problem is that your belief in Divine Revelation is entirely baseless.

Ah, here is a problem. We wouldn’t know God is a Trinity without Divine Revelation. It isn’t something that you can argue to from reason alone, like you can for the existence of God. The philosophy used to explain God (such as Person, Essence, Being, Simplicity) are just tools to do that. I think the problem is in your understanding of these terms.

Ultimately, there were many things that I didn’t understand before converting to Catholicism. I didn’t throw the baby out with the bathwater, though. I put it on the shelf and gave it to God. One can never fully understand the Trinity, but I have a better understanding and appreciation for it after studying it.

 

[Theban]

No. H2O is literally water. Water doesn’t have to only refer to the liquid mode. It is entirely accurate to say that ice and water vapor are essentially water in different states of matter.

This is a very chemical definition of water, and you are correct that it is coherent, but I don’t think it works because in a similar vein we could reduce everything to the subatomic level and make the case that everything is really just protons and neutrons in different modes and patterns.

In such a physical definition of matter, everything becomes a purely logical distinction, and language loses its power to convey the reality we clearly see. Ice is clearly different from water vapor, just as coal is different from diamonds, even if they are composed of the same material components. Therefore to call it all H2O and water is an inappropriate use of terms.

the Church’s position is that God is not a genus

I didn’t say that God was a genus. As a matter of semantics I submitted to the idea that the Trinity could be thought of as a genus, in order to show you that there can be real differences between the Persons of the Trinity, and that x is y but y is not x. It doesn’t have to be thought of in terms of a species and a genus though, here is a quote from Saint Augustine on the matter:

“We do not therefore use these terms according to genus or species, but as if according to a matter that is common and the same. Just as if three statues were made of the same gold, we should say three statues one gold, yet should neither call the gold genus, and the statues species; nor the gold species, and the statues individuals. For no species goes beyond its own individuals, so as to comprehend anything external to them. For when I define what man is, which is a specific name, every several man that exists is contained in the same individual definition, neither does anything belong to it which is not a man. But when I define gold, not statues alone, if they be gold, but rings also, and anything else that is made of gold, will belong to gold; and even if nothing were made of it, it would still be called gold; since, even if there were no gold statues, there will not therefore be no statues at all. Likewise no species goes beyond the definition of its genus. For when I define animal, since horse is a species of this genus, every horse is an animal; but every statue is not gold. So, although in the case of three golden statues we should rightly say three statues, one gold; yet we do not so say it, as to understand gold to be the genus, and the statues to be species.”

 

[Theban]

why exactly does it not require them to be different entities?

In order for a difference in Persons to require there to be a difference in entities, a personhood would need to include its own entity. I hold that a person is not an entity on its own, it is an aspect of an independently defined being. Since a person is not a being itself, there is no contradiction in saying that a single being can be several persons.

A Personhood doesn’t depend on the Divine Essence, but rather, it is the Divine Essence, the same way all of God’s attributes essentially are his Divine Essence. This would mean that a multitude in persons would also be a multitude in Divine Essences.

But if one Person can be the Divine Essence without taking away from what the Divine Essence is, why cannot three Persons be the same Divine Essence? Why is the Essence limited to one? If a personhood isn’t its own entity but gets it’s existence from the Divine Essence it’s clear that there can be more than one Person in the Divine Essence.

 

[Dudd]

“Father and I are one” is also what Jesus said. It is therefore contradictory as well- which is why Trinity is important. Trinity shows us how God relates to himself and hence helps us understand how we ought to relate to ourselves. It has bearing on salvation. Greatness of Father in relation to Son is in Monarchy of the Father, not the essence of the Father nor polytheistic interpretation- as both those would contradict unity of God and fact each Person of Trinity is in perfect unity with others, to the point of being one God.

The only requirements for salvation is faith in Christ life, death, and resurrection. If Trinity had bearing on a persons salvation it would be clearly stated in the bible and a person would have to accept its teaching the moment of salvation. When Jesus said, “the Father and I are one,” he wasn’t implying a co-equal trinity or that he is the same, co-equal - yet different person as the Father and the Holy Spirit. He was simply stating that he and the Father are on the same page - they are one in thought, feeling, and purpose.

 

[Dudd]

Jesus never claimed he was God, and he never proclaimed a trinity. He said the Father is greater, and said he didn’t know the day or hour of his return. I believe him.

 

[OrbisNonSufficit]

The only requirements for salvation is faith in Christ life, death, and resurrection.

So then atheist who believes Jesus was ordinary man who lived, died and was somehow resurrected (without involvement of God at all), but murders, lies and doesn’t repent would be saved?..

Interesting concept.

He was simply stating that he and the Father are on the same page - they are one in thought, feeling, and purpose.

“He who has seen me has seen the Father” would mean what in this context?

 

[OneSheep]

Another aspect in this discussion which might be worth bringing up is the crucially important transcendental of “relationality.” I do wonder whether it’s a particularly Western problem to think there is some fundamental issue arising within a simple God as a Trinity of persons. The West tends toward seeing humanity as merely an assortment of separable selves. But plenty of Fathers disagreed with this view. Origen, St Gregory of Nyssa and St Maximus the Confessor extended the Pauline analogy of the church as Christ’s body to the whole of humanity. As in, the human race is itself a totality of relational persons. The Scottish philosopher John MacMurray argued powerfully in his book Persons in Relation that there are no human selves who exist in isolation. There are only persons in relation. Humanity itself, this relationality of personhood is like a small sacrament of the Real.

This is a very good point. I don’t understand why this conversation is so entangled with the head stuff, as if relationship has no place in the whole of it.

I’m literally going out of my way to consider and respond to everyone who seriously engages with my arguments

Hmm. I thought I had seriously engaged the discussion, but I didn’t get a response. You must have missed it.

Is faith all about the head stuff, or how about relationship? Is relationship unimportant? Does relationship not enter into our choice to be Catholic? Isn’t any one individual’s loving relationship with God more important than the entirety of what Aquinas wrote?

Is faith all about how we intellectually frame our world,? Is faith only about how we intellectually understand God (as if that were possible)? These are kinda “begged” questions here, right?

 

[TotusTuusForever]

I’m not an intellectual type, but I have had enough classes on philosophy, theology and world religions that I hope what I say doesn’t get dismissed.

If you believe in a creator then you believe that you are created. So, it seems like you are getting ahead of yourself by expecting to fully understand, as a mere creation, the mind and nature of God. “A servant is not greater than his master”. A child thinks they have their parents figured out until they have their own children, then they realize that they didn’t know a great part of what goes into being a parent (especially the intense love that goes into it).No matter how many fancy arguments you have, you are still just a human being. You are not God. This is why we rely on divine revelation through the Bible and the Church. Jesus came to personally direct us towards heaven. He literally bled out and died for you because he loved you so dang much. Please don’t walk away from that. Please don’t let yourself think that you, as a created being, can figure out everything about God. Because you can’t, unless you have a personal relationship with him and discover his essence through love and by attaining a great degree of holiness. Love is the only way. You have to move from your intellectual theories, to your heart.

 

[Wesrock]

I have not caught up on the posts in this topic since my last entry, and I apologize for that. I had some thoughts I wanted to put down while they were fresh in my mind. The main objection I’ve seen from the OP is that he does not see that the relations between Father, Son, and Holy Spirit are anything more than logical relations.That’s been on my mind, and I think I can more clearly state (compared to yesterday) why the relations are not just logical but real.

The Divine Nature is real, and the intelligible act of the intellect in God is real. There is a real procession, which means that there is a real principle that is being proceeded from and a real term that is being proceeded to. To reiterate, again, there is a real, unidirectional procession in God that is not just a logical connection or entailment. Necessarily, then, there is a real relation between the principle being proceeded from and the term being proceeded to.

Claiming it is a logical relation only is, to me, like stating that the relation between mother and child is only logical and not real, or the relation between an agent and the end she wills and obtains is logical and not real.

 

[Dudd]

First of all, that’s NOT what I said. If you’re trying to build your case up by misconstruing what I say - it won’t work.

It means Jesus represents the Father - NOT that he IS the Father.

 

[OrbisNonSufficit]

If you’re trying to build your case up by misconstruing what I say - it won’t work.

I’m trying to see implications of what you said, not what you said.

It means Jesus represents the Father - NOT that he IS the Father.

as a mere man? So we represent Father too?

 

[TULIPed]

Jesus never claimed he was God

I disagree.

“I and the Father are one.” John 10:30.

Or here from John 14:

“8 Philip said to him, “Lord, show us the Father, and it is enough for us.” 9 Jesus said to him, “Have I been with you so long, and you still do not know me, Philip? Whoever has seen me has seen the Father. How can you say, ‘Show us the Father’? 10 Do you not believe that I am in the Father and the Father is in me? The words that I say to you I do not speak on my own authority, but the Father who dwells in me does his works. 11 Believe me that I am in the Father and the Father is in me, or else believe on account of the works themselves.”

 

[Wesrock]

Jesus never claimed he was God

That’s not how the Pharisees interpreted what he said, and while Jesus criticized many of them severely for being hypocrites in how they lived, he did tell his followers to listen to their teachings.

 

[OrbisNonSufficit]

Do you not believe that I am in the Father and the Father is in me?

This strongly shows Trinity. “Father is in me” and “I am in the Father” results in there being mutual exclusion, which one could not say about creature and creator.