The Roman Catholic Church believes that man was created immortal and that there was no death in the beginning of creation, but this paragraph from the article makes an interesting point:
But think about this logically. If Adam and Eve had to eat the fruit of the Tree of Life to become immortal, then God made them mortal to begin with. Adam and Eve were created in such a way that Death was a natural part of their existence, from the moment of their Creation.
The Church does not say that they were inherently immortal, only that, if they had not sinned, they would have been preserved from corruption and death by a special gift of God. Here’s how St. Thomas Aquinas puts it: “God made man immortal as long as he did not sin; so that he might achieve for himself life or death. For man’s body was indissoluble Not by reason of any intrinsic vigor of immortality, but by reason of a supernatural force given by God to the soul, whereby it was enabled to preserve the body from all corruption so long as it remained itself subject to God.”
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Since Adam and Eve had to follow God’s will in order to be immortal, perhaps part of that included eating from the Tree of Life and abstaining from the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil. Does that make sense? Does it help answer that objection?
The Orthodox Church has a fascinating view of Roman Catholic’s doctrine on original sin here:
First, I think that is a very helpful article toward understanding the Orthodox view of original sin. I especially want to point out this section, where they seem to agree with the part about original sin resulting in death: “In the Orthodox Faith, the term ‘original sin’ refers to the ‘first’ sin of Adam and Eve. As a result of this sin, humanity bears the ‘consequences’ of sin, the chief of which is death.”
source – Catholics would agree with that: we believe that too, we just add two additional consequences of Adam’s sin. We Catholics would say that these three things were consequences of Adam’s sin: death, which that article seems to agree with, and also concupiscence, which means a strong desire to sin, and finally a lack of divine sanctity, until we are baptized. That last part is why we need to be baptized in order to get into heaven: we need saving grace to make it to heaven, and a result of original sin is that we don’t have it – not until we are baptized.
Second, while that article is very helpful, it is not the only Orthodox perspective. As other have pointed out, Kallistos Ware is a popular and important Eastern Orthodox thinker who thinks the Church’s doctrine of original sin is more compatible with Eastern Orthodox thinking.
Third, the article seems to say that St. Augustine was not well-known in the East until at least the 14th century. That’s probably accurate from the 700s onwards, but before that I think St. Augustine was well-known because Latin was still understood by many in the East and because he is cited there by very authoritative sources, including the Fifth and Sixth Ecumenical Councils, both of which were held in Constantinople.
The Fifth Ecumenical Council - Session 1 - “We further declare that we hold fast to the decrees of the four Councils, and in every way follow the holy Fathers, Athanasius, Hilary, Basil, Gregory the Theologian, Gregory of Nyssa, Ambrose, Theophilus, John (Chrysostom) of Constantinople, Cyril, Augustine, Proclus, Leo and their writings on the true faith.”
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And: Session 7 - “Moreover several letters of Augustine, of most religious memory, who shone forth resplendent among the African bishops, were read, showing that it was quite right that heretics should be anathematized after death.”
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The Sixth Ecumenical Council - Session 1 - “On the meaning of [these] divine words blessed Augustine, a most illustrious doctor, thus writes in his book against Maximinus the Arian.” [Followed by a paragraph from St. Augustine.]
Fourth, while the article you linked to says that Catholics believe we are “guilty” of Adam’s sin, the Catechism says we are not at fault for what he did, we only bear the consequences: “Although it is proper to each individual, original sin does not have the character of a personal fault in any of Adam’s descendants. It is a deprivation of original holiness and justice.”
source St. Augustine mentions this too. I wonder if there is a difference in language over the meanings “fault” and “guilt” which may be obscuring things.
Fifth, you may be interested in a book written by St. Augustine where he defends himself from the charge that he invented original sin. The book is called Against Julian and here is a link to it:
St. Augustine Against Julian
archive.org/stream/fathersofthechur013910mbp#page/n6/mode/1up
Some of the most interesting parts of that book, at least to me, are the parts where he defends the statement “In Adam all die,” also the parts where he cites other passages that refer to original sin (such as Romans 7:23 – “I see in my members another law at war with the law of my mind and making me captive to the law of sin which dwells in my members.”), and also the parts where he refers to writers prior to himself, including in the East, who discussed our fallen condition. (In case you are interested, I’ve extracted the parts about writers prior to Augustine who discussed original sin and added to them
here.)
Anyway, I hope that helps. Please let me know if it does. God bless!
