Wanted to know what you all would say

[mosher]

I would have one question for the Originator of this Thread:

How is one to know for certain that the morals they choose are in fact moral?

 

[Ruthie]

“I do understand what love is, and that is one of the reasons I can never again be a Christian. Love is not self denial. Love is not blood and suffering. Love is not murdering your son to appease your own vanity. Love is not hatred or wrath, consigning billions of people to eternal torture because they have offended your ego or disobeyed your rules. Love is not obedience, conformity, or submission. It is a counterfeit love that is contingent upon authority, punishment, or reward. True love is respect and admiration, compassion and kindness, freely given by a healthy, unafraid human being.”

This quote horrifies me. Ian, throw that book away! That author has a starved spirit. I’ll pray for him.

“Love is not self denial.” So then, it’s OK for me to hop in bed with anyone who attracts me, as long as I still love my husband? WRONG. Self-denial is part of love. In fact, it is the every-day part of love. We are always making little sacrifices for our loved ones. And sometimes big sacrifices.

“Love is not blood and suffering.” So those who are killed or wounded in defense of their loved ones are just masochists, I guess. WRONG. Blood and suffering, at least the willingness to suffer them if necessary, is part of love. (If it weren’t, the species would have died out long ago - delivering a baby involves blood and suffering - and love.)

“Love not murdering your son to appease your own vanity.” How banal. What a misjudgement of God! The love of someone whose son or spouse volunteers for service in Iraq, for instance, doesn’t come from vanity. It comes from love which includes self-denial, which includes the possibility of suffering the loved one’s death. God sacrificed His son, with the Son’s consent, out of love for us. We really can’t comprehend God’s love for us, it is beyond our ability to understand.

“Love is not hatred or wrath, consigning billions of people to eternal torture because they have offended your ego or disobeyed your rules.” Poor author. He must have had one of those “hellfire and brimstone” upbringings, or had the kind of parents who use the threat of a vindictive God, who writes down every little thing you do wqrong and holds it all against you, as a handy way to elicit obedience.
God wants all of us to be saved. It is not His fault if we choose Hell, which is what we do when we commit a mortal sin. After all, Jesus laid down His life for us. That’s not the sacrifice of a vindictive god.

“Love is not obedience, conformity, or submission. It is a counterfeit love that is contingent upon authority, punishment, or reward.” True, but since God wants to save all souls, he allows salvation by fear as well as salvation by love. He will use any tool on us humans except one that removes our free will.

"True love is respect and admiration, compassion and kindness, freely given by a healthy, unafraid human being.” Yeah, respect and admiration, compassion and kindness are part of love. And, yes, it should be freely given. But restricting it to those who are healthy and unafraid is WRONG. That would imply that I can not love, since I have fibromyalgia, chronic fatigue, and bipolar disease. Unafraid - humph. Think a man whose wife is in labor is unafraid? Think a woman whose husband has cancer is unafraid?

That author seems to think that love can only happen out in the sunlight, under the best conditions. He is WRONG.

I’m with felra - if you want the closest to Godly love that a mere human can aspire to, read 1 Cor 13.

I don’t apply it perfectly; not at all! I try to practice it in my imperfect way. And guess what? My life is full of love, in spite of my self-denial, suffering, and bad health.

 

[lcalise]

IanBoyd57:

That’s true. I think all the stuff about God’s love for us and Jesus are true. My main point is that some of the rules and stuff, like with hell and everything else, seem somewhat off. If you are a good person, the set of morality rules you believe are correct and the God you worship shouldn’t matter. That’s all I’m saying.

“There is no freedom without the law.” (The Ten Commandments). The “rules and stuff” are the way God directs us to freedom from our sins.

Your whole statement comes from a very relativist standpoint. If you’re a “good person”-- what does that mean? You need a standard to compare anything as good or evil. If you use societal norms, you can be relatively good while being a real bastard by the standards of yesteryear.

And that’s actually one of the things I greatly respect about the Church. It doesn’t really change “the rules” to suit the prevailing social pressure. God is a constant, he’s infinite. If you’re going to call yourself “good”, why not use the standards from “the rules” set by the Bride of Christ.

But living a good life is a mitigating factor in terms of salvation. However, if you go by the catechism, there isn’t great hope of salvation outside the Church simply because it has the truth.

Sometimes the truth hurts.

Now, what I actually think is that you’re like most people I know and really don’t want to work to find the truth. You’d rather be content with your own arguments, live your life, and not really think about the arguments for the Church. If that’s not the case, my best suggestion would be to read the Catechism of the Catholic Church. I’d actually start in Part Three: Life in Christ. It’s probably the most pertinent and most entertaining part, I found. It gives you a lot of the “why” for the rules.

 

[fix]

On my way:

felra:

“One mans rubbish is another mans treasure.” What I might consider good, He might consider bad and what I consider bad He might consider good. It is not me to judge what is good and what is bad. Only God determines that.

I can only agree with a small part of this thought. God does determine what is good or bad, but we have an obligation to learn these things and form our consciences accordingly. Your above words sound confusing to me.

 

[Jubilatae]

Hi
I am sure you are right, you do know what love is, you are not a bad person, and all the other doctrines you have created for yourself, must be according to your moral ideoligy.

I do believe that you believe that there is ONE GOD.

You have experienced with your head, your heart, ( which can be oh so deceptive), but as yet my dear, you have not sunk into the nothingness, and touched your very Soul life.

Go for it, it is the greatest and most important adventure you will ever take.

You will travel in absolute darkness, but little by little your Soul will be illuminated by the TRUTH.

Leave all the pre conceived ideas behind. Forget all the things you imagine, LET GO, &&&&& the TRUTH shall set you FREE

Meet you on the other side.

Jubilatae

 

[Ramalama]

My plan is to join the Special Forces for training, then leave them and travel to places like Somalia and other warlord run countries and work alone using stealth skills and tactics to remove the warlords from power. I have a tactical military mind and I am always seeing the angles, although none of you will have any idea what I mean by that, which is good for me because the warlords won’t see it coming either. What I’m talking about is sort of related to Splinter Cell, if that helps at all. Oh, and don’t reply talking about my career and whether it would work or not- there is no precursor or precedence to it making it very difficult to explain. The point is I am still dedicating my life to helping people who need it the most, that is poor starving enslaved people who live in fear of warlords with AK’s and such.

Forgive me, Ian, but are you saying you’re going to go to Africa and kill warlords, like in a video game? I know you said not to criticize this idea, but I really think you need to spend some time reviewing your plan with a counselor of sorts.

Have you yet applied to the special forces organization you expect to get into? Do you believe you will be able to make it through their training? Do you think the warlords are going to allow you to walk up and shoot them? Have you thought through the after effects of the murder - will the people then be free, or will the war lord be replaced by someone else?

I think you “plan” needs a little more work.

 

[homewardbound]

Sounds to me like you are just upset that you can’t do whatever you want in life and just go to heaven just because you are a “good person” But, thats not for you to decide, its up to God. Hell still exists, whether you believe in it or not. God made the rules to protect us, not to keep us down. They help us lead more holy lives and keep our priorities straight. Good for you for wanting to help others, but I don’t get how it has anything to do with spirituality. Sounds like you are merely doing it for yourself, to help you feel like a good person, not to glorify God.

If you believe in God, why not try to consult Him in decisions you make instead of trying to do it all on your own? Even if you are a “good person” you’ll never be happy in life or feel satisified unless you have God’s help. Because you are right, He does not need us. But we definitely need Him. Thinking we can do it all on our own in life doing good things and not bothering with God, and then thinking we will get to Heaven. Thats silly. God wants us to know and love Him, to let Him help us. Not to just be a “good person” There is much more needed to merit Heaven then to just be a good person. Doesn’t matter if you like it or not. You remind me of a teenager complaining about the rules their parents have for them to keep them out of trouble. I pray someday you will realize its done out of love, and rebelling will only lead you to despair.

 

[st_lucy]

Hi everyone,

I just thought I would throw it out here, but if you look at OP it is dated Aug, '05. I also checked the OP’s profile and I have seen that he was on last March 6.

I really hope that either he has gotten help since he lasted posted on this thread or that he was just jerking everyone around and never believed all that he has posted.