Is Christian faith necessary for Selfless Love?

[PRmerger]

LIke what the Church now refers to as ‘‘ahistorical’’ Saints you mean?

Declared Saints there’s not a single shred of actual evidence they ever existed.

Sarah x

If you want to compare Joe Bloggs to “ahistorical saints” who don’t have a “single shred of evidence they ever existed”, be my guest.

But it’s a curious position for you to argue for.

So I guess I will dismiss this man (meaning no disrespect to his family) because the atheist who brought him up as a possible example of the PAK is now claiming he’s like the saints that never existed.

 

[PRmerger]

Like the Catholic Saints, venerated for centuries, you mean:

catholic.org/saints/faq.php

Just sayin’ …

Sarah x

I get it. :doh2:

 

[ThinkingSapien]

Would “selfless love” risk one’s life for friends?

And how would we know if it were just lip service? What if somebody actually did it?

Good question. I conjecture that despite intentions some one that declares selfless love doesn’t really know how well he/she can demonstrate it until faced with the situation.

How about this dog, who does not share our Christian faith? Is this an example of selfless love? If not, then what is this we’re seeing?

Instinct? If so, then how is Selfless Love via Christian faith, any better than “instinct?”

There are no right or wrong answers for me at this point. I just wanted to ask the questions.

Also a good question. I think intentionality is a factor here. Members of insect colonies may sacrifice themselves and it may be to the advantage of the colony. I question if the understand their sacrifice. Provisionally I think they don’t, so it strikes me as instinct without love.

If I’m making the assumption the dog knew the other dog was hurt and in danger. I also assume the dog knew he could get hurt, so it appears selfless to me.

My opinion, it doesn’t matter if the person is of some Christian, some other religion, or no religion at all.

 

[PRmerger]

A quick search of online Catholic encyclopaedias produces this elaboration:

excommunication - the act of banishing a member of a church from the communion of believers and the privileges of the church; cutting a person off from a religious society

Indeed. It is a very serious penalty, to be sure.

Now, I don’t know about you, but this seems to me like a fairly condemnatory act.

No. Not condemnatory. Medicinal.

Whether it’s literally the same or not, it is undoubtedly an act of censure,

To be sure.

condemning the supposedly guilty party to banishment

Nothing condemnatory about that.

You do know that the excommunicated are not banished from the Church, right?

Echoing my beloved CS Lewis character, Professor Kirk, [SIGN1]What are they teaching in schools these days? [/SIGN1]

According to canon law, excommunication is not a “punishment”, nor is it condemnatory. Rather it is a consequence of someone’s actions that resulted in their being separated from the Church.

Thus, those who are excommunicated are not allowed to receive the Eucharist. But they are also required to fulfill their other Catholic obligations such as attending Mass every Sunday. They are also called to reconcile with the Church, which is possible by receiving absolution from the local ordinary (or, if permission is received, from his own priest.)

And there remains the question of why abortion - which hurts no sentient being

This is an absurd criterion for deciding whether one can live or die.

I presume that you or one of your loved ones have been insentient at some point in your life? Perhaps when you had your appendix taken out and thankfully were given drugs to render you insentient?* According to your criterion the doctor could have simply killed you at his wont. You were, after all, insentient.

*Please don’t go there with “No. I’ve never had my appendix out.” It’s merely a hypothetical, okay?

 

[PRmerger]

From the article you read:

Why would the archbishop be talking about throwing some one out of the Church that didn’t belong to it? From the statement of the archbishop, it’s resonable to think the abusive, rapist stepfather, is Catholic.

Sarah x

Fair enough.

 

[PRmerger]

This is the testimony of someone who saw him in his final moments, to a priest, and he makes no mention of him singing psalms:

Fair enough.

And regardless of his motivation, he did just about the bravest thing a person can do.

Sarah x

Indeed.

And I am still waiting for the name of an atheist who has done the equivalent.

And please cite your source. Eye witness accounts as well as any first-person narration of the atheist’s avowed atheism is mandatory, of course (utilizing the criteria oft proffered here by atheists.)

 

[PRmerger]

As seems to be the case with a lot of things pertaining to the religious, for practical purposes, any claimed similarity in definition will be nuanced to death.

Sarah x

I don’t know if you have any experience with higher education and academia at all, Sarah, but this is indeed the *modus operandi *of higher levels of thinking. Good or bad, it is that way.

Of course, the great thing about Christianity is that it’s simple enough for an uneducated peasant to grasp yet sublime and profound enough for theological giants like Ratzinger and Aquinas to write volumes and volumes on theological nuances.

 

[PRmerger]

Just so we’re clear though, the type of faith and the things we have faith in is fundamentally different from your religious beliefs.

I don’t think so at all.

The “faith” that atheists object to is belief in an entity for which there is no evidence.

it does appear, though, that there’s a host of atheists who are engaged in this type of belief, based on no evidence whatsoever.

 

[PRmerger]

ISide note, now that I think about it, there are no writings associated with my (real) identity to profess my thoughts on religion. I wonder if I should make one.

I think you should.

 

[atheistgirl]

Side note, now that I think about it, there are no writings associated with my (real) identity to profess my thoughts on religion. I wonder if I should make one.

This is an excellent idea.

If I ever take a bullet for some one, or donate an organ to a family member in the full and certain knowledge it will result in my death, or throw myself on a granade some nutjob lobbed into a shoping mall, or volunteer to take the place of some one in a death chamber, the very very last thing I would ever want is for religious people to claim me as their own

Sarah x

 

[atheistgirl]

I don’t know if you have any experience with higher education and academia at all, Sarah, but this is indeed the *modus operandi *of higher levels of thinking. Good or bad, it is that way.

Well, yeah.

My degrees are in real world subjects.

I wasn’t particularly drawn to the brain melting discussions on whether something was a lie, or just mental reservation

Sarah x

 

[atheistgirl]

it does appear, though, that there’s a host of atheists who are engaged in this type of belief, based on no evidence whatsoever.

Nope, my evidence is hanging on the walls of the room I’m in right now. However, as I said, I’m not about to reveal personal information to you, someone completely unknown on the internet, just to prove a point.

So feel free to completely disbelieve me and my ancestors. Not a problem.

But I have to ask, so what?

Let’s agree for arguments sake, not a single atheist, ever, in the history of mankind, ever even came close to laying down his or her life willingly for another.

Since atheists don’t operate a commission and a central database publicizing such things on a global scale over the past 2000 years, you’d have a hard job knowing that; even today, despite the efforts of many, just look at the pressure put on atheists in the military, no wonder many conceal their atheism, but, let’s just say it’s so.

Now.

So what?

That just makes us the same as the vast majority of Catholics, Christians, and other believers that ever lived.

Expecially when you remember Max Kolbe wasn’t the only priest there. He was part of a special unit set up specifically for priests.

Why didn’t any other Catholic Priests step forward?

Why didn’t 9 other priests step forward and take the place of the 9 other people sent to the death room so 9 other families could live?

Were they somehow lacking in this agape?

There were other believers there, Catholics, other Christians, Jehovah’s Witnesses, and Jews - why didn’t any of them step forward?

Were they lacking in agape and that somehow affected their love for their fellow man?

Max Kolbe’s words to the camp commander has raized a suspicion in my mind, when you remember the torture he had already endured, and his underlying medical condition. Perhaps he felt he was about to die, so thought he might as well make some good for some one else come of it.
I wonder if he was younger, stronger, and healthier, if he might have felt the best thing for him to do would be to stay alive at all costs and minister to the living, but if he felt he was about to die soon anyhow…

Anyhow, based on what another poster wrote, it’s a bit of a null discussion point really.

Because, apparently, my ancestors could only have done what they did by the grace of a God they don’t believed existed.

And taken on face value, according to you, they’re just brave couragous people, but lack that agape stuff, even though we know the real meaning of it, before the Church decided to make it something else.

Lol - you gotta laugh sometimes.

Sarah x

 

[atheistgirl]

That just makes us the same as the vast majority of Catholics, Christians, and other believers that ever lived.

That should read: Catholics, other Christians …

Before some one looking to throw an atheist on the Bar-B-Q jumps all over me for implying Catholics are not Christians

Sarah x

 

[inocente]

Now, it’s quite possible that Kolbe had developed friendships with those who shared his cell in Auschwitz, so the man for whom he gave up his life might well have been a friend, not a total stranger. I don’t think that this possibility in any way diminishes the heroism of Kolbe’s sacrifice, since our instinct for self-preservation is still prohibitively strong, regardless of the motivation to quash it, and regardless of how far it may have been brutalised by experience.

From what I’ve read Kolbe didn’t know Gajowniczek and they remained strangers. Unless there’s proof that they were friends, it wasn’t the greatest love of all according to Jesus (John 15:13) and so thankfully Kolbe can rest in peace and no longer be used as “evidence” that Christians are the bestest in the wacky world of this thread where love is a baseball bat.

Having said that, I find the idea of impersonal love to be rather sterile, and somewhat contradictory. As I intimated in a previous post, it might well be possible that a person without familial attachments could be motivated by purely rational considerations to sacrifice him/herself for another person, if that person has greater responsibilities, such as young children to care for; but is this love? And if it is, is it more noble or more worthy of respect than love for friends or family? Perhaps an expansion into considering the very definition and nature of love is a good direction for this thread to take!

I think our nature is to care more about our own children than the neighbor’s children, and more about them than kids we don’t know on the other side of town. But in the flash of an eye our hearts can go out to children we’ll never meet on the other side of the world when we see them in distress on a news item.

Whether its possible or sensible to define that I’m not so sure, I don’t think love can be disassembled, or at least it loses all meaning if it is.

 

[inocente]

I keep asking for love to be defined but no one has dared to make themselves vulnerable.

1. 
   *]Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It does not dishonor others, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres. - 1 Cor 13
   
   *]Greater love has no one than this: to lay down one’s life for one’s friends. - John 15
   
   *]Love is felt, not theory: definitions won’t help anyone who hasn’t experienced love.
   
   According to definition 1 it would not be loving to claim that Christians are capable of greater love than others (it dishonors, doesn’t trust, loses hope, etc.).

 

[Sair]

Yes, a wonderful insight.

How odd it would be for someone to say, I love you but I don’t like you.

Agape seems to require eros.*

Eros in this context does not imply a lack but springs from an overflowing generosity.

Pope Benedict XVI elaborates on this in his encyclical, God is Love.

*contrary to Kant and Anders Nygren

I think it’s fair to say that love is something that must be a personal emotion. The notion that love can extend to all people, even those one has never met, is unrealistic.

Certainly, one may have ideals and beliefs about what is right. Many people believe it is right to donate money, for example, to help people with whom they are never likely to interact personally, or volunteer at soup kitchens where personal interaction is quite transitory. Some people take the ethic of reciprocity - do unto others as you would like them to do to you - to its logical extreme and apply it to strangers as well as friends and neighbours. This is integrity, to be sure, but love? I don’t know that it can be called so.

 

[PRmerger]

Nope, my evidence is hanging on the walls of the room I’m in right now. However, as I said, I’m not about to reveal personal information to you, someone completely unknown on the internet, just to prove a point.

My response would be the same as yours if someone, when you ask for evidence for God says, “Well, Sarah, my evidence is that he appeared in my room this very night! I know I can’t share this experience with you, but you’ll just have to take my word for it,'kay?”

Both of us would, rightly, remain very, very unconvinced, no?

 

[AlanFromWichita]

My response would be the same as yours if someone, when you ask for evidence for God says, “Well, Sarah, my evidence is that he appeared in my room this very night! I know I can’t share this experience with you, but you’ll just have to take my word for it,'kay?”

Both of us would, rightly, remain very, very unconvinced, no?

He must have been multitasking. He was in my room, too.

'course “multitasking” may be an insult to God as if I could count His tasks, but we make do with the terms that are popular. I could say “omnipotent” but that’s too scary.

 

[Sair]

Perhaps.

Christianity, then, took the word and baptized it, giving it sanctity. I don’t have a problem with that. That has been the modus of Christianity in all sorts of areas.

Take, for example, festivals. They are pagan in origin and Christianity “hijacked” them and made them holy days. Or holidays.

So now we know what agape means since Christianity has taken it and elevated it.

Hmm…you say ‘to-may-toh’, I say ‘to-mah-toh’. You consider that Christianity “elevated” pre-existing ideas, while others say Christianity “hijacked” them for its own purposes of world conquest.

What seems to matter, as regards the point of this thread, is that ideas like agape and sacred celebrations predated Christian conquest of the Western world, and thus cannot be credited to the tally of supposed benefits Christianity confers. Who is to say that the notion of selfless love does not predate Christianity also? History is written by the victors, and thanks to some quirks of politics in the ancient world, Christianity became the religion of the victors…

 

[atheistgirl]

but you’ll just have to take my word for it,'kay?"

Both of us would, rightly, remain very, very unconvinced, no?

No.

You have to take my word for it, in this situation, because the situation here is I’m not giving you any of my personal information, to a complete stranger over the internet.

The framed portraits, the citations, the medals, and the recorded history, are real, physical, evidenced, witnessed and verified.

They can be seen and touched, and the recorded history verified, 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, 52 weeks per year.

Not something that can be claimed for your apparition.

Sarah x