Why doesn't God just not create the bad people to keep them from going to hell

[tonyrey]

No one has refuted this statement in the Catechism:

385 God is infinitely good and all his works are good. Yet no one can escape the experience of suffering or the evils in nature which seem to be linked to the limitations proper to creatures: and above all to the question of moral evil.

Our decision to have children implies that the immense value of life outweighs the evil caused by our descendants. We cannot pretend there is no risk involved in creating or procreating persons with free will. We are not isolated individuals but members of the human family who depend on others for our existence. If some of our ancestors hadn’t been created because God knew they would be criminals we wouldn’t be alive. It is unreasonable to expect to have all the advantages of life without any disadvantages. There is always a price to pay for everything we enjoy and treasure…

 

[oldcelt]

No one has refuted this statement in the Catechism:

Our decision to have children implies that the immense value of life outweighs the evil caused by our descendants. We cannot pretend there is no risk involved in creating or procreating persons with free will. We are not isolated individuals but members of the human family who depend on others for our existence. If some of our ancestors hadn’t been created because God knew they would be criminals we wouldn’t be alive. It is unreasonable to expect to have all the advantages of life without any disadvantages. There is always a price to pay for everything we enjoy and treasure…

To quote an old Moody Blues song, “You wonder why the world is turning around…In the end it won’t matter at all.”
I give thanks that I did not subject another human being to all this nonsense…born to die.

 

[tonyrey]

Our decision to have children implies that the immense value of life outweighs the evil caused by our descendants. We cannot pretend there is no risk involved in creating or procreating persons with free will. We are not isolated individuals but members of the human family who depend on others for our existence. If some of our ancestors hadn’t been created because God knew they would be criminals we wouldn’t be alive. It is unreasonable to expect to have all the advantages of life without any disadvantages. There is always a price to pay for everything we enjoy and treasure…

In previous posts you have appreciated the advantages of life. Now you imply death destroys its value and meaning. Your deism seems to have produced cynicism rather than a solution to suffering. Your “all this nonsense” view has brought you into the ranks of absurdists of Camus and Sartre - who were of course atheists… In your scheme of things the “clueless Creator” has become redundant to all intents and purposes.

 

[simpleas]

Not to butt in, but I just wanted to say…

Wouldn’t you say that you actually prefer to lose the “ability” to choose evil rather than lose the ability to choose altogether? So you do not want to lose free-will, you just want to be in heaven and a saint; you want to choose God.

…whoa… I had no idea this thread has gone on so long. Kind of long-winded for a rehash of the problem of evil, don’t you think?

Butt away

Sort of, I wrote that quite abit ago and I’d even forgot I’d written it! Yes I was thinking that if my will only ever wanted to choose Gods will, then I’d be “perfect” and I’d never want to choose anything that is not of Gods will.

Thanks for asking, I think it’s the proper way to ask a poster what they actually mean rather than assume

And yes some threads go on even after they have reached 1000 posts!

 

[simpleas]

In other words, you’d prefer He had just created robots.
And that you would be one, and not have to do anything.

As for your second question, you have it backwards.
God doesn’t choose some and not others.
He hopes everyone will chose Him…

I think robots work pretty hard actually

Referring to “count us among you have chosen” is what I have heard at the mass and I wondered what that actually meant. Has God chosen a set of people, and these people are the only ones that can live up to his expectation, or does it mean like you said he chooses everyone, only if they choose him, because they have freewill.?

 

[MacQ]

I think robots work pretty hard actually

Referring to “count us among you have chosen” is what I have heard at the mass and I wondered what that actually meant. Has God chosen a set of people, and these people are the only ones that can live up to his expectation, or does it mean like you said he chooses everyone, only if they choose him, because they have freewill.?

I believe the latter to be the case (He chooses us all) for the following reasons:

1. CCC 1037 which actually cites the prayer you note, but in its’ entirety, the entry says plainly that God desires NO ONE to perish, and desires us ALL to come to repentance; makes it clear that our choice is required.
2. Nowhere in all that Jesus taught does he exclude people in the sense that they have been ‘chosen’. Quite the opposite, in fact. He came for sinners…for the lost sheep…taught us ALL what to do for our salvation.

There are some Christian fundamentalist protestant sects who apparently believe that there is some sort of “chosen” among us. The idea is noxious to me.

As for Robots…they may work hard physically, but they do not have to struggle with a path to a higher, better self. Which is hard work. Nor can they become anything other than what they are already. Which apparently isn’t what God has in mind for us.

 

[oldcelt]

In previous posts you have appreciated the advantages of life. Now you imply death destroys its value and meaning. Your deism seems to have produced cynicism rather than a solution to suffering. Your “all this nonsense” view has brought you into the ranks of absurdists of Camus and Sartre - who were of course atheists… In your scheme of things the “clueless Creator” has become redundant to all intents and purposes.

It has been an interesting challenge for me, but that does not mean I would wish it on anyone else. That I view much of what occurs on this earth as nonsense should be no surprise to a truly thoughtful individual. Look around…we are accidents of creation brought to this point by our mortal predecessors. Our hope lies with ourselves…but damn, this world sure is physically beautiful.

 

[tonyrey]

In previous posts you have appreciated the advantages of life. Now you imply death destroys its value and meaning. Your deism seems to have produced cynicism rather than a solution to suffering. Your “all this nonsense” view has brought you into the ranks of absurdists of Camus and Sartre - who were of course atheists… In your scheme of things the “clueless Creator” has become redundant to all intents and purposes.

There is an element of chance but it is within the framework of order, purpose and Design.

Look around…we are accidents of creation brought to this point by our mortal predecessors. Our hope lies with ourselves…but damn, this world sure is physically beautiful.

There is spiritual beauty as well as physical beauty, John, and it is far more significant. When a person like Jesus chooses to suffer and die for others we have overwhelming evidence for the reality of free will and our power to control ourselves and influence the course of events. How could “accidents of creation” acquire such supernatural power?

Man is but a reed, the most feeble thing in nature, but he is a thinking reed. The entire universe need not arm itself to crush him. A vapor, a drop of water suffices to kill him. But, if the universe were to crush him, man would still be more noble than that which killed him, because he knows that he dies and the advantage which the universe has over him, the universe knows nothing of this.
All our dignity then, consists in thought. By it we must elevate ourselves, and not by space and time which we cannot fill. Let us endeavour then, to think well; this is the principle of morality."

–Pascal Pensees 347