E
ellzeena
Guest
I’m presently reading Fulton J. Sheen’s “Life of Christ” and am finding much trust that resonates with me. I am also finding error: error based upon the scientific knowledge at the time of the writing; error based upon his interpretation of certain things. Archbishop Sheen goes so far as to attribute “psychoses, neuroses” to a state of sin. We are presently in the year 2013. No sin inflicts such anguish; St. Augustine came up with the concept of original sin.
Site: quotes
Augustine of Hippo (354–430) taught that Adam’s sin[16] is transmitted by concupiscence, resulting in mankind becoming a massa damnata (mass of perdition, condemned crowd), with much enfeebled, though not destroyed, freedom of will.[2] When Adam sinned, human nature was thenceforth transformed…Augustine held that the effects of Adam’s sin are transmitted to his descendants not by example but by the very fact of generation from that ancestor. A wounded nature comes to the soul and body of the new person from his/her parents, who experience libido (or concupiscence)…Christian parents transmit their wounded nature to children, because they give them birth, not the “re-birth”.[22]
Augustine believed that the only definitive destinations of souls are heaven and hell. He concluded that unbaptized infants go to hell as a consequence of original sin.[25][26]"
end site
Now, what’s ridiculous about this? Absolutely everything. Where do we learn about the “sin” or failure of “Adam and Eve”? Yes, mitochondrial DNA does point to a specific female in a specific location in Africa as the “foundational mother” of humanity: so? Is Genesis to be taken literally? if so, who believes (given the vast amount of information coming at us from sophisticated equipment that is now traveling outside our planetary system) that the universe is 6,000 years old? Carbon dating alone destroys this concept. Ok, so is carbon dating a ploy of Satan? Is what we see from the 2 Voyagers, fantastic pictures of a small portion of our galaxy, and now information that presents an actual radio signal from so far into the past that scientists cannot believe it and cannot comprehend it? Is this all a lie? Why would God allow such a lie? to what purpose? to confuse, to make it impossible to know Him, or to understand right, wrong, and in between? what sort of God does that? What sort of God passes on the “sin” of the parents to the innocent baby and forces upon that innocent life suffering and horror for something s/he has NOT voluntarily committed?
WHAT DO WE REALLY KNOW?
WHAT IF these rules and regulations, arrived at by supposed infallibility, by councils and college of cardinals, ARE WRONG. What if the very thing Jesus came to tell us, that OUR RULES AND REGULATIONS ARE FROM MAN AND NOT FROM GOD, has been perverted, yet again? WHAT IF what He wants of us is as simple as what He told us: Love God with your whole heart and soul and love one another as you love yourselves? There’s nothing there about original sin. There’s nothing there about Holy Days of Obligation. There’s nothing there about purgatory or limbo. St. Augustine said the souls of unbaptized infants went to hell! Is that a God you can believe in? Well, I can’t.
So here you have it: my God I have known my entire life, since infancy (and yes I do remember being an infant). He is beyond everything else, totally loving; He is absolutely merciful; He follows every soul past physical death in pursuit of joining that soul to Himself. He condemns no one since we condemn ourselves upon meeting Him. He allows free will or the creation would have no meaning other than some narcissistic entity. I believe He is bringing all of creation - and all has consciousness (even rocks, because down to the subatomic level consciousness has been proven) - to Himself: the ultimate “mirror image” wherein all that He loves so much can enter His embrace. And then “the eyes of the blind shall open, and the ears of the deaf unstopped; then shall the lame man leap as an hart, and the tongues of the dumb shall sing.”
This is Jesus. I’ve met Him. He laughs, He has great joy, He has great sorrow for each creature who suffers (not just Humans); His arms are always open, He offers healing to everyone who approaches Him in faith, He turns no one away. He approaches the serious sinner, most likely many times a day; He uses us, if we let Him, to teach, to testify, to heal (yes, heal) because, through his grace, we are His arms, His feet, His lips, His voice. And He allows His most blessed Mother to stand between us and our dire enemy because she will ultimately defeat that enemy.
I go to Mass because I meet the Lord there in His flesh and blood, not because I fear the condemnation to hell imposed upon me by some human, somewhere, some time. Our love for Him does not make us “safe”, there is no “safety”. Our love for Him does not make us rich, happy, secure, healthy…we live in this world, we are subject to its vicissitudes. Our love for Him makes us His disciples, and perhaps we will be martyred in many ways, and even die physically because of it.
I question not the Divinity of the Lord Jesus Christ; I question the right of humanity to put limitations on God and to judge one another when there is no true understanding of the other. We don’t all follow the yellow brick road. In some of our paths, there is true horror. Horror beyond belief. Let us remember that.
Site: quotes
Augustine of Hippo (354–430) taught that Adam’s sin[16] is transmitted by concupiscence, resulting in mankind becoming a massa damnata (mass of perdition, condemned crowd), with much enfeebled, though not destroyed, freedom of will.[2] When Adam sinned, human nature was thenceforth transformed…Augustine held that the effects of Adam’s sin are transmitted to his descendants not by example but by the very fact of generation from that ancestor. A wounded nature comes to the soul and body of the new person from his/her parents, who experience libido (or concupiscence)…Christian parents transmit their wounded nature to children, because they give them birth, not the “re-birth”.[22]
Augustine believed that the only definitive destinations of souls are heaven and hell. He concluded that unbaptized infants go to hell as a consequence of original sin.[25][26]"
end site
Now, what’s ridiculous about this? Absolutely everything. Where do we learn about the “sin” or failure of “Adam and Eve”? Yes, mitochondrial DNA does point to a specific female in a specific location in Africa as the “foundational mother” of humanity: so? Is Genesis to be taken literally? if so, who believes (given the vast amount of information coming at us from sophisticated equipment that is now traveling outside our planetary system) that the universe is 6,000 years old? Carbon dating alone destroys this concept. Ok, so is carbon dating a ploy of Satan? Is what we see from the 2 Voyagers, fantastic pictures of a small portion of our galaxy, and now information that presents an actual radio signal from so far into the past that scientists cannot believe it and cannot comprehend it? Is this all a lie? Why would God allow such a lie? to what purpose? to confuse, to make it impossible to know Him, or to understand right, wrong, and in between? what sort of God does that? What sort of God passes on the “sin” of the parents to the innocent baby and forces upon that innocent life suffering and horror for something s/he has NOT voluntarily committed?
WHAT DO WE REALLY KNOW?
WHAT IF these rules and regulations, arrived at by supposed infallibility, by councils and college of cardinals, ARE WRONG. What if the very thing Jesus came to tell us, that OUR RULES AND REGULATIONS ARE FROM MAN AND NOT FROM GOD, has been perverted, yet again? WHAT IF what He wants of us is as simple as what He told us: Love God with your whole heart and soul and love one another as you love yourselves? There’s nothing there about original sin. There’s nothing there about Holy Days of Obligation. There’s nothing there about purgatory or limbo. St. Augustine said the souls of unbaptized infants went to hell! Is that a God you can believe in? Well, I can’t.
So here you have it: my God I have known my entire life, since infancy (and yes I do remember being an infant). He is beyond everything else, totally loving; He is absolutely merciful; He follows every soul past physical death in pursuit of joining that soul to Himself. He condemns no one since we condemn ourselves upon meeting Him. He allows free will or the creation would have no meaning other than some narcissistic entity. I believe He is bringing all of creation - and all has consciousness (even rocks, because down to the subatomic level consciousness has been proven) - to Himself: the ultimate “mirror image” wherein all that He loves so much can enter His embrace. And then “the eyes of the blind shall open, and the ears of the deaf unstopped; then shall the lame man leap as an hart, and the tongues of the dumb shall sing.”
This is Jesus. I’ve met Him. He laughs, He has great joy, He has great sorrow for each creature who suffers (not just Humans); His arms are always open, He offers healing to everyone who approaches Him in faith, He turns no one away. He approaches the serious sinner, most likely many times a day; He uses us, if we let Him, to teach, to testify, to heal (yes, heal) because, through his grace, we are His arms, His feet, His lips, His voice. And He allows His most blessed Mother to stand between us and our dire enemy because she will ultimately defeat that enemy.
I go to Mass because I meet the Lord there in His flesh and blood, not because I fear the condemnation to hell imposed upon me by some human, somewhere, some time. Our love for Him does not make us “safe”, there is no “safety”. Our love for Him does not make us rich, happy, secure, healthy…we live in this world, we are subject to its vicissitudes. Our love for Him makes us His disciples, and perhaps we will be martyred in many ways, and even die physically because of it.
I question not the Divinity of the Lord Jesus Christ; I question the right of humanity to put limitations on God and to judge one another when there is no true understanding of the other. We don’t all follow the yellow brick road. In some of our paths, there is true horror. Horror beyond belief. Let us remember that.
