It was good that Adam and Eve at the apple!

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In a sense. Last night as I was tucking my 7 year old son into bed, he said, “Dad, I have a question.” It wasn’t really a question but more of a thought. “It was good that the devil tempted Adam & Eve with the apple and that they ate it.”, he said. I asked him why. He said, “Because before Adam & Eve ate the apple they could not die and go to heaven to be with God.”

Hopefully, I gave him a sound answer.
 
An interesting and impressive thought from a 7 year old. To be slightly more accurate, I think we would say that good ultimately came from it (as good comes from everything), but that the action itself was bad for its own sake independently of its consequences and that we don’t know what would have happened if our first parents had been obedient. It is possible that the garden state would have lasted forever, or that God would have brought them to Himself in Heaven some other way.
 
Actually Mormons believe that, since through Adam and Eve’s eating from the tree of knowledge, man gained the freedom of choice in determining his fate. This is pivotal for them since they believe the falling out between Lucifer and Christ during the pre-existence of Earth revolved around Lucifer’s desire to force mankind into salvation and Jesus’s opposing plan to let people decide for themselves.

From a more orthodox point of view, Adam and Eve were already “in Heaven” in the sense of living in the presence of God, while in Eden. Eating from the tree of knowledge destroyed that, and they first hid themselves from God, then were cast out of Eden into a world of sin, suffering, and death. So salvation from sin doesn’t take us to something better than what Adam and Eve had, only restores us to what was lost due to their disobedience.
 
Adam and Eve did not have to listen to the devil, God already had a plan for them before they ate the apple, they were already in heaven or paradise, therefore they didn’t have to die, death was the consequence of desobeying God. It’s true that God can make good come out of evil but that doesn’t mean that we have to sin in order for God to do His work. Keep listening to your son’s questions, this could be the sign of a good start, be ready to give him good catholic answers.
 
Iron_Donkey said:
An interesting and impressive thought from a 7 year old. To be slightly more accurate, I think we would say that good ultimately came from it (as good comes from everything), but that the action itself was bad for its own sake independently of its consequences and that we don’t know what would have happened if our first parents had been obedient. It is possible that the garden state would have lasted forever, or that God would have brought them to Himself in Heaven some other way.
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That was my response to him.
 
Has he been reading the Exsultet?

O happy fault,
O necessary sin of Adam,
which gained for us so great a Redeemer!
 
SonCatcher said:
Has he been reading the Exsultet?
O happy fault,
O necessary sin of Adam,
which gained for us so great a Redeemer!
Click to expand...
I am familiar with the idea of “O happy Fault” and I am familiar with the obvious fact that it was necessary that the only person who could repair the shattered relationship between humanity and divinity had to be necessarily True God and True Man.

But please explain to me how Adam’s free choice turned into a “necessary sin.”
I do think we have to be careful of confusing the effects of Original Sin with implying that Adam had to commit it because he had no choice in the matter.
 
grannymh said:
I am familiar with the idea of “O happy Fault” and I am familiar with the obvious fact that it was necessary that the only person who could repair the shattered relationship between humanity and divinity had to be necessarily True God and True Man.

But please explain to me how Adam’s free choice turned into a “necessary sin.”
I do think we have to be careful of confusing the effects of Original Sin with implying that Adam had to commit it because he had no choice in the matter.
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I’m afraid I don’t understand the Exsultet much, myself. As much as I do understand, it is a meditation on the Fall of mankind and Redemption won for us by Jesus Christ.

It could not be necessary per se for anyone to sin, as you are well aware. However, when we reflect on the glory of the Cross and our own eventual resurrection, we cannot help but notice that our final home is much more glorious than the paradise where our first parents began.
 
God turned it into something good.

He is complete within Himself, but He revealed to us the depth of His love, His infinite goodness: He came down as one of us and took upon Himself our sin; Jesus died and was resurrected that we may live eternally with Him.
 
God always knew that men would sin against Him, yet He still made us in His own image… there is no bigger proof of love!!!
 
It is great that God can make a great good out of sin which is evil.

But how does anyone alive today know how much better it might have been if no one had ever sinned?

Maybe God would have done something even greater that we do not know.

And while God can make good out of evil–God does not require evil to perform the greatest good.

God CAN and does do great things in people’s lives when they do not sin.
 
Eye has not seen, no ear heard, no mind conceived what God has prepared for those who love [obey?] Him… (1 Cor 2:9)
 
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