Tree of Knowledge

[fhansen]

He wanted us not robots because robots are so boring yes? So we’re all here to satisfy God’s wants.

The universe, is a huge set. Life, a beautiful TV show to entertain Almighty God. And we are the actors, ad-libbing our performances.

Of course, a TV show without free will and all the evils like murder, rape, genocide, kidnapping,people dying of hunger and thirst,envy, stealing is boring as well.

But then God would say, he didn’t create evil, evil is disordered love. And it is Man’s fault that there is disordered love because Man has chosen to love things before others, others before self and self before God.

So evil is all Man’s fault and God is still perfectly good.
Even more, God created saints and heroes to help re-order the disordered love, to pray for those people who have chosen the wrong path.

God created us and expects us to change a fallen world with his help of course. ( even though with a flick of his finger He can do it in an instant)

Yes, I would like to think that also, but there is no certainty.

So God is so powerful, he can give everyone that grace, the grace to find & follow the narrow gate, if he wanted to.

If he really really wanted to, he’d do it himself without our prayers. But he doesn’t want to, so we have to pray, right?

One might say, he really really WANTS to but there’s this annoying free will that he gave us which he WANTS to respect.
So he doesn’t just give us the grace, we have to ask for it.
But I don’t think Saul the great persecutor begged God (while ravaging the church) to be Paul, the great missionary.

P.S.
I’m sorry for the hints of sarcasm but I couldn’t clearly express my thoughts in any other way.

God simply wants creation-us-to will the way He, Himself, does-to be in harmony with the order of the universe IOW. Are we really such imbeciles that we can’t possibly avoid sin? Are humans not morally responsible beings after all? Is it really Gods fault if I mistreat another person? Is it wrong for God to “respect” my freedom to choose-to choose right or wrong, life or death? And is it wrong for God to nonetheless endeavor to draw, rather than force me, to choose correctly, perhaps gracing another individual here and there to help facilitate such a plan? Is freedom not good-having the freedom to choose good -or not to choose it? Or did God commit evil by giving man free will? IOW, is moral evil really made necessary by virtue of nothing more than sentient beings having possession of free will? Are the evils committed in this world men’s fault-or God’s?

 

[Nita]

He wanted us not robots because robots are so boring yes? So we’re all here to satisfy God’s wants.

The universe, is a huge set. Life, a beautiful TV show to entertain Almighty God. And we are the actors, ad-libbing our performances.

Of course, a TV show without free will and all the evils like murder, rape, genocide, kidnapping,people dying of hunger and thirst,envy, stealing is boring as well.

But then God would say, he didn’t create evil, evil is disordered love. And it is Man’s fault that there is disordered love because Man has chosen to love things before others, others before self and self before God.

So evil is all Man’s fault and God is still perfectly good.
Even more, God created saints and heroes to help re-order the disordered love, to pray for those people who have chosen the wrong path.

God created us and expects us to change a fallen world with his help of course. ( even though with a flick of his finger He can do it in an instant)

Yes, I would like to think that also, but there is no certainty.

So God is so powerful, he can give everyone that grace, the grace to find & follow the narrow gate, if he wanted to.

If he really really wanted to, he’d do it himself without our prayers. But he doesn’t want to, so we have to pray, right?

One might say, he really really WANTS to but there’s this annoying free will that he gave us which he WANTS to respect.
So he doesn’t just give us the grace, we have to ask for it.
But I don’t think Saul the great persecutor begged God (while ravaging the church) to be Paul, the great missionary.

P.S.
I’m sorry for the hints of sarcasm but I couldn’t clearly express my thoughts in any other way.

As well as being omnipotent, God is omniscient.
We agree God will not bestow grace to a degree in which it takes away a person’s ability to freely choose. Having established that fact, here is how I see God’s omniscience playing a part in whether or not He bestows grace - and to how much grace.

God knows what the free will response to His grace will be. Let’s say God bestowed the maximum amount of His grace on someone - just short of compelling the person’s free will - and the person still freely chose to reject that grace, chose not to respond to it. Then the sin of that person is greater than if he had never been granted the grace at all - or if he had been granted a smaller amount of grace. He also knows whether or not the person would repent of that sin before death. We are judged according to what we have been given.

God KNOWS whether or not a person will accept His grace. He cares about how we will spend eternity - even those who will reject Him and spend eternity separated from Him. He would desire them to experience the least amount of pain/suffering that it would be possible for them to deserve.
That is how I view it.

 

[petra22]

God knows what the free will response to His grace will be. Let’s say God bestowed the maximum amount of His grace on someone - just short of compelling the person’s free will - and the person still freely chose to reject that grace, chose not to respond to it. Then the sin of that person is greater than if he had never been granted the grace at all - or if he had been granted a smaller amount of grace. He also knows whether or not the person would repent of that sin before death. We are judged according to what we have been given.

God KNOWS whether or not a person will accept His grace. He cares about how we will spend eternity - even those who will reject Him and spend eternity separated from Him. He would desire them to experience the least amount of pain/suffering that it would be possible for them to deserve.
That is how I view it.

I think of this every time I pray for my family members who don’t know God right now. I pray that God’s will be done in them on HIS time line and not mine, because HE knows everything and I know nothing, not even what might happen in the next second. What if I pray for God to change their hearts NOW on my time line and it ends in them refusing…
So, I pray and try to let God handle it…

 

[HydanCelare]

You are correct God respects our free will. You are incorrect in that God does give to all of us the grace to ask for his his grace.
As for Saul remember he never doubted God. He was good and faithful to the jewish faith and prayed for Gods Grace. So when Christ appeared to him and he had his conversaion of heart it was God showing him the answer to his prayers. He was still free at that time to reject it and conmtinue as he had been doing,

I didn’t know that about Saul.Thanks for telling me that.

God simply wants creation-us-to will the way He, Himself, does-to be in harmony with the order of the universe IOW. Are we really such imbeciles that we can’t possibly avoid sin? Are humans not morally responsible beings after all? Is it really Gods fault if I mistreat another person? Is it wrong for God to “respect” my freedom to choose-to choose right or wrong, life or death? And is it wrong for God to nonetheless endeavor to draw, rather than force me, to choose correctly, perhaps gracing another individual here and there to help facilitate such a plan? Is freedom not good-having the freedom to choose good -or not to choose it? Or did God commit evil by giving man free will? IOW, is moral evil really made necessary by virtue of nothing more than sentient beings having possession of free will? Are the evils committed in this world men’s fault-or God’s?

I never said that the evils are God’s faults. My point is that God almighty can stop all those evils anytime he wants but he doesn’t. And I wonder why.

 

[fhansen]

I never said that the evils are God’s faults. My point is that God almighty can stop all those evils anytime he wants but he doesn’t. And I wonder why.

Human beings are radically free -free to oppose even the will of God. And we’re born free from the knowledge of God, let alone the relationship with Him that Adam experienced, so now we’re already born outside of Eden, outside of that divine will. All humans as a result of the original disobedience of and resulting separation from God now know-experience-good and evil, because, by effectively having no God and fulfilling that role for themselves, humans sometimes choose evil. We’re now to determine whether or not we prefer this state of affairs, this life without God where the will of the creature, rather than the Creator, reigns.

 

[HydanCelare]

God knows what the free will response to His grace will be. Let’s say God bestowed the maximum amount of His grace on someone - just short of compelling the person’s free will - and the person still freely chose to reject that grace, chose not to respond to it. Then the sin of that person is greater than if he had never been granted the grace at all - or if he had been granted a smaller amount of grace. He also knows whether or not the person would repent of that sin before death. We are judged according to what we have been given.

God KNOWS whether or not a person will accept His grace. He cares about how we will spend eternity - even those who will reject Him and spend eternity separated from Him. He would desire them to experience the least amount of pain/suffering that it would be possible for them to deserve.
That is how I view it.

Wow, I never thought of it like that. Thanks for sharing your thoughts, I hope you’re right.

I think of this every time I pray for my family members who don’t know God right now. I pray that God’s will be done in them on HIS time line and not mine, because HE knows everything and I know nothing, not even what might happen in the next second. What if I pray for God to change their hearts NOW on my time line and it ends in them refusing…
So, I pray and try to let God handle it…

I see that you quoted Brother Lawrence in your signature.
This is also an excerpt from the book “Practice of the Presence of God”

“That as for the miseries and sins he [Brother Lawrence] heard of daily in the world, he was so far from wondering at them, that, on the contrary, he was surprised there were not more, considering the malice sinners were capable of: that for his part, he prayed for them; but knowing that GOD could remedy the mischiefs they did, when He pleased, he gave himself no further trouble.”

My understanding of this is that Brother Lawrence no longer prayed for sinners because God could easily do help them whether or not he prayed for them. So doesn’t that mean that we too should also no longer bother ourselves with such a task?

 

[HydanCelare]

Human beings are radically free -free to oppose even the will of God. And we’re born free from the knowledge of God, let alone the relationship with Him that Adam experienced, so now we’re already born outside of Eden, outside of that divine will. All humans as a result of the original disobedience of and resulting separation from God now know-experience-good and evil, because, by effectively having no God and fulfilling that role for themselves, humans sometimes choose evil. We’re now to determine whether or not we prefer this state of affairs, this life without God where the will of the creature, rather than the Creator, reigns.

So you’re saying God can’t stop the evils?

 

[fhansen]

So you’re saying God can’t stop the evils?

Of course He can, but the answer you apparently reject is that He values our freedom to choose more. And you’re not wrong in your concerns. The CC teaches that the “problem of evil” is a mystery, not easily resolved, except to say that God will bring a greater good out of it all in the end-that creation-with free will-is worth it. And especially so in light of God’s willingness to suffer Himself in this world, at the hands of His own creation, showing us the right choice, of recognizing evil for what it is and then rejecting it, not giving into it, not becoming part of it by fighting evil with more evil. He does this-drawing us to the cross-rather than to force us to choose His way, which would be no choice at all. In the end we appreciate the Blessed Fault that won for us so great a Redeemer, with the promises of eternal life and eternal happiness which this entails, presuming that God desires to lift man to even higher heights from which he fell after enduring a world where our freedom to choose good over evil matters.

 

[Robert_Sock]

Of course He can, but the answer you apparently reject is that He values our freedom to choose more. And you’re not wrong in your concerns. The CC teaches that the “problem of evil” is a mystery, not easily resolved, except to say that God will bring a greater good out of it all in the end-that creation-with free will-is worth it. And especially so in light of God’s willingness to suffer Himself in this world, at the hands of His own creation, showing us the right choice, of recognizing evil for what it is and then rejecting it, not giving into it, not becoming part of it by fighting evil with more evil. He does this-drawing us to the cross-rather than to force us to choose His way, which would be no choice at all. In the end we appreciate the Blessed Fault that won for us so great a Redeemer, with the promises of eternal life and eternal happiness which this entails, presuming that God desires to lift man to even higher heights from which he fell after enduring a world where our freedom to choose good over evil matters.

Are we really free in this life? I don’t think so, and neither does Saint Anthony Mary Claret:

*The death of the just: Death will reach everyone, the good and the bad; but the destiny of each one is quite different. The just man sees himself in this valley of tears as a prisoner, serving a very hard term. He considers himself a slave in this world, suffering an extremely distressing servitude. He regards himself a sailor caught in a horrible storm. And as death means an end of his confinement, an end of his slavery, and is the port of his salvation, he ceases not to cry with David, “Woe is me that my sojourning is prolonged!. . .” (Ps. 119:5). He ceases not to ask with the Apostle, “. . . Who shall deliver me from the body of this death?” (Rom. 7:24)
–The Golden Key to Heaven, by Saint Anthony Mary Claret
*

 

[fhansen]

Are we really free in this life? I don’t think so, and neither does Saint Anthony Mary Claret:

*The death of the just: Death will reach everyone, the good and the bad; but the destiny of each one is quite different. The just man sees himself in this valley of tears as a prisoner, serving a very hard term. He considers himself a slave in this world, suffering an extremely distressing servitude. He regards himself a sailor caught in a horrible storm. And as death means an end of his confinement, an end of his slavery, and is the port of his salvation, he ceases not to cry with David, “Woe is me that my sojourning is prolonged!. . .” (Ps. 119:5). He ceases not to ask with the Apostle, “. . . Who shall deliver me from the body of this death?” (Rom. 7:24)
–The Golden Key to Heaven, by Saint Anthony Mary Claret
*

Well, is the just man’s justice at all a matter of choice, or not?

 

[Robert_Sock]

Well, is the just man’s justice a choice, or not?

Yes, I believe in free-will in that a person can choose under certain circumstances, like in choosing God over sin, but a slave in numerous other circumstances.

 

[fhansen]

Yes, I believe in free-will in that a person can choose under certain circumstances, like in choosing God over sin, but a slave in numerous other circumstances.

Yes, I think it’s not either/or, but both/and. We can’t do it without God, and yet He doesn’t do it (justify us) without us, without our wills involved, to whatever extent we’re able.

 

[HydanCelare]

Of course He can, but the answer you apparently reject is that He values our freedom to choose more. And you’re not wrong in your concerns. The CC teaches that the “problem of evil” is a mystery, not easily resolved, except to say that God will bring a greater good out of it all in the end-that creation-with free will-is worth it. And especially so in light of God’s willingness to suffer Himself in this world, at the hands of His own creation, showing us the right choice, of recognizing evil for what it is and then rejecting it, not giving into it, not becoming part of it by fighting evil with more evil. He does this-drawing us to the cross-rather than to force us to choose His way, which would be no choice at all. In the end we appreciate the Blessed Fault that won for us so great a Redeemer, with the promises of eternal life and eternal happiness which this entails, presuming that God desires to lift man to even higher heights from which he fell after enduring a world where our freedom to choose good over evil matters.

I finally understand it. It was necessary for man to fall because God has planned something greater for him. Like the parable of the lost sheep:

•  Now all the tax collectors and sinners were coming near to listen to him. 2 And the Pharisees and the scribes were grumbling and saying, “This fellow welcomes sinners and eats with them.”  3 So he told them this parable: 4 “Which one of you, having a hundred sheep and losing one of them, does not leave the ninety-nine in the wilderness and go after the one that is lost until he finds it? 5 When he has found it, he lays it on his shoulders and rejoices. 6 And when he comes home, he calls together his friends and neighbors, saying to them, ‘Rejoice with me, for I have found my sheep that was lost.’ 7 **Just so, I tell you, there will be more joy in heaven over one sinner who repents than over ninety-nine righteous persons who need no repentance.***

Unfortunately there will be many sheep that will never be found.

• 13 And the sea gave up the dead that were in it, Death and Hades gave up the dead that were in them, and all were judged according to what they had done. 14 Then Death and Hades were thrown into the lake of fire. This is the second death, the lake of fire; 15 and anyone whose name was not found written in the book of life was thrown into the lake of fire.*

 

[fhansen]

I finally understand it. It was necessary for man to fall because God has planned something greater for him.

It wasn’t necessary that man fall. God just knows how to take lemons and make really good lemonade.

Unfortunately there will be many sheep that will never be found.

In Catholic teaching there’s nothing arbitrary or accidental about this. God is nothing if not fair, just, and merciful so at the end of the day man does the “electing”, choosing heaven or hell, good or evil, God or no God.

 

[Aloysium]

. . . Unfortunately there will be many sheep that will never be found. . . .

:twocents:

They will not be found as a result of their choice. All one has to do is repent; up until the end, some will not.

You care that you yourself and others be spared the agony of not being with God; this is not a universal sentiment.

 

[petra22]

My understanding of this is that Brother Lawrence no longer prayed for sinners because God could easily do help them whether or not he prayed for them. So doesn’t that mean that we too should also no longer bother ourselves with such a task?

I just can’t stop praying for sinners and the poor souls in purgatory. (I’ll probably be in purgatory one day and I sure hope someone prays for me!) I feel called to it. It’s like the least thing I can do for someone and I want to do something! Something to help people, encourage people, bring God to people. I think the Holy Spirit tells me to pray for souls and I know the Blessed Virgin Mary encourages it. It keeps me busy thinking of others instead of myself so much.
I have to admit that I don’t know much about Brother Lawrence, but I liked how he tried to keep his mind on God first.

 

[petra22]

“That as for the miseries and sins he [Brother Lawrence] heard of daily in the world, he was so far from wondering at them, that, on the contrary, he was surprised there were not more, considering the malice sinners were capable of: that for his part, he prayed for them; but knowing that GOD could remedy the mischiefs they did, when He pleased, he gave himself no further trouble.”

My understanding of this is that Brother Lawrence no longer prayed for sinners??? because God could easily do help them whether or not he prayed for them.

I see for Brother Lawrence’s part he DID pray for them… me, too! Maybe he didn’t trouble himself about the outcome of his prayers, but just asked God and then let God handle it…

 

[grannymh]

In the story of Adam and Eve, why was the tree of knowledge placed in the garden, if they shouldn’t eat its fruit?

In a house, if something is toxic or bad for children, naturally a parent would make sure that this something is kept “out of reach” of the children.

And where was God when the event happened? Surely an omniscient being would know what was happening and could have prevented it.

Ah, the organic fruit tree which has a far deeper meaning than something yummy for the tummy.

Check out Genesis 3: 5.

Satan is offering a package deal. Healthy eating plus the tempting opportunity to be an omniscient being just like the Creator. What else is there to know besides the knowledge of good and evil?

Seriously, Adam, who was definitely not on the level of his loving Creator, thought it would be grand to be the same or better than his God. One thing was in the way. It is a tad difficult for a human to be another god. In fact, if truth be known, the only way Adam could remain in God’s good graces was to live in submission to God. That is what human creatures do.

Living in submission means acting in obedience. Now we are getting closer to the heart of the matter cleverly referred to as the fruit of wisdom. Adam deliberately scorns his Creator by deliberately eating the fruit of disobedience and consequently deliberately shattering humanity’s relationship with Divinity. The rest is history.