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JMMJ
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Hmmmm… When I slammed that car door on my dog’s tail he yelped, cried, and generated tears. I am pretty sure it hurt and caused him pain and suffering.
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Mmarco
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There is no doubt that animals react to external stimula, but this does not prove that feel pain or any other kind of sensations similar to ours. Also my phone reacts to my vocal commands, but this does not mean it feel any auditory perception.
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meltzerboy2
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It might although that was not my intention. However, in Judaism, the practice of judging Gd Himself is not unknown, especially on the day of Yom Kippur. After all, we are bound by a legal partnership.
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lelinator
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But now you’re forced to choose between solipsism and panpsychism. Recognizing that any position in-between is totally subjective. Personally, even as a solipsist, I recognize that lacking evidence to the contrary, the reasonable position is to assume that seemingly sentient beings, actually are, and therefore treating them with the compassion that such sentience deserves, is the prudent thing to do. The Catholic position however, is to assign higher level sentience simply in a manner that portrays God in the most favorable light. It would seem to be a rather odd juxtaposition, that lacking absolute proof, the solipsist would choose to act more compassionately than the theist.
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Gorgias
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Nah. I get your expression of your beliefs.
So… you get that these two are mutually exclusive, right? If “not broken”, then “perfect.” But hey – as a Catholic, I get it that deviations from Catholic theology tend toward incoherence. (Sorry.).
(BTW… Christians believe in the need for a savior, too… so you can’t just lay this at the feet of Catholics (other than the fact that the doctrine of original sin proceeded – originally, as it were! – from the Church).)
I think you misread what I wrote. I’ll try again: it’s patently obvious, when someone expresses their faith, that the context is “what I believe”. Obvious, that is, to the point that explicitly saying “I believe that…” is superfluous. Asserting that it’s necessary feels, well… kinda pedantic.
He ‘cried’? Anthropomorphize much?
He felt pain? Sure. He responded to his environment. That’s something that all living things do. “Suffered”, though? That sounds like something that requires rationality.
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Gorgias
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Nope. According to the creation narratives, it wasn’t that God looked and said “perfect!”, but rather, “very good.”
No. The Church doesn’t teach utopianism. (Some non-Catholic Christian denominations made this part of their interpretation of the Book of Revelation – namely, that the “thousand year” period was a time during which humanity would perfect themselves in anticipation of the eschaton. As it turns out, the global events of the twentieth century kinda took the bloom of that rose, and this kind of utopianism was largely abandoned.)
There’s a quote from Jesus, though, that’s often misinterpreted: “be perfect, as your Father in heaven is perfect.” The word used there is ‘telos’, which speaks to achieving the goal for which you exist. In our case, that’s eternal life in heaven. (It’s not, OTOH, getting a perfect score on your SAT’s.)
Rather, the Church teaches that we’re to love God and love each other, to forgive and accept forgiveness, and to be in a state of grace throughout our lives and die in that state of grace.
Yes… and no.
God gives us free will, so that we can have the opportunity to choose the good. Since He gives us the ability to be moral agents and exhibit secondary causation, then yes, it’s His intent that we use that ability. So, we could say that any use of our free will is “exactly what God intended”, even if the actions themselves aren’t good.
The sinful actions of humans cause “suffering, death, and all”. They’re not perfect in themselves as such, but only in that they’re a use of the gift of free will. (‘Per se’ as opposed to ‘per accidens’, I guess, as it were.)
So, the fact that God is the means of our salvation is His intent, so that’s perfect; but, the fact that we use our free will is also His intent – but the fact that we throw a monkey wrench into the works isn’t perfect.
Thanks! I got to squeeze one more in, before CAF goes dark!
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jeannetherese
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ChocolateCake
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Animals are innocent for the most part, why should they suffer because humans failed?
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christianchannel
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homosexuality is against nature, . . .
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Gorgias
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There’s an interesting philosophical point to be made here. With luck, emotion won’t get in the way of it, although I have my doubts…
There’s a difference between “innocent” (or “guilty”, as it were) and “incapable of culpability”. So, those incapable of decisions of moral weight aren’t “innocent”, so to speak, but merely “amoral.”
So… animals aren’t “innocent”. Rather, they’re “not moral actors”. To portray them as “innocent” clouds the issue, ascribing them a moral value that they do not possess.
In other words, calling animals “innocent” inappropriately anthropomorphizes them. But hey… that seems to be the name of the game.
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Benadam
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Sacred Scripture and psychology aren’t mutually exclusive.
Unless its true. Then not teaching them about it is a horrible thing.
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Richca
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The feeling of bodily pain or pleasure in animals and humans comes from the sense of touch which God created animal nature with for a purpose. Animals are not rocks but are living beings of flesh, blood, and bone. Through the sense of touch, animals know what to avoid because it causes pain and what to pursue if it causes pleasure. Animals avoid fire because burning hurts otherwise if they didn’t have the sense of touch they could potentially walk through fire and get burned up and die or severely injured. Animals mate because mating which involves the sense of touch is pleasurable. Prey naturally flee from predators because being attacked and bit or chewed on hurts. The sense of touch in animals and humans and the pleasure or pain which arises from it is there for survival. A human can’t go naked up in the mountains in a blizzard for very long and expect to survive or not get frostbite.
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FiveLinden
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Darwin expressed his bewilderment at the idea that a benevolent god would create a wasp to parasitise and live off living caterpillars, or that a cat would play with mice.
Virtually every non-human non-domesticated creature dies in pain and many suffer during their lives: fear, starvation, wounds…
In all my years on CAF I have never seen this issue addressed in an effective way by a believer. I have seen people claim that pain and suffering is a good thing, that god must make it right ‘somehow’ and that bad things would happen if animals did not feel pain. But the point of a god that is all-powerful and all loving is that if each of those aspects of god’s nature was correct it would not be this way. And the biblically-based belief that all this results from original sin but that animals have nothing to offset that, no form of redemption, and no eternal life further undermines (to my mind) the Christian position.
Virtually every non-human non-domesticated creature dies in pain and many suffer during their lives: fear, starvation, wounds…
In all my years on CAF I have never seen this issue addressed in an effective way by a believer. I have seen people claim that pain and suffering is a good thing, that god must make it right ‘somehow’ and that bad things would happen if animals did not feel pain. But the point of a god that is all-powerful and all loving is that if each of those aspects of god’s nature was correct it would not be this way. And the biblically-based belief that all this results from original sin but that animals have nothing to offset that, no form of redemption, and no eternal life further undermines (to my mind) the Christian position.
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Mmarco
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You should consider that we are already able to build devices which can establish what to avoid without feeling anything; the “sense of touch” (if you refer to our tactile perception) is not necessary for our devices to work, and certainly it is not necessary for God’s “devices” as well. You should be aware that your idea that animals feels pain or pleasure is only an assumption, which is not necessary to explain animal behavior or their reactions to external stimula.
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goout
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Christianity doesn’t intend to offer a satisfactory explanation for the mystery of suffering. What we can do is acknowledge that suffering happens. And at the same time we can acknowledge that it is good to exist.
The Christian response to all of life is gratitude. Not naive optimism that ignores suffering, but true gratitude for the whole of life. The word eucharist is rooted in “gratitude”. Gratitude itself opens the way for love in the midst of suffering.
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ChocolateCake
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Well regardless of you’re saying here, animals are a lot more “innocent” than humans, wouldn’t you agree with that at least?
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goout
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Animals don’t intend to commit evil. Agreed. They might by instinct pursue an action that has a result that we classify as evil.
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ChocolateCake
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“In all my years on CAF I have never seen this issue addressed in an effective way by a believer.”
It’s probably because they choose to ignore this, otherwise it would be a huge challenge to their faith.
It’s probably because they choose to ignore this, otherwise it would be a huge challenge to their faith.
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FiveLinden
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Why not? …
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goout
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To be clear, Christianity does attempt to explain suffering, but not in the sense of giving a definitive materialist answer as to why and how suffering exists. If nothing else, Christianity at least admits suffering realistically.goout:
Why not? …
In the face of mystery no explanation will be satisfactory. We can make attempts at them. Christianity gives meaning to suffering to the extent it is humanly possible to comprehend meaning. But that’s not the same thing as giving a satisfactory explanation to the demands of materialism. In this light, atheism is unrealistic in it’s demands for explanations.
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