I'm considering converting to Protestantism

[Boris Godunov]

Originally posted by HisMajestyBOB
Saint Marcus - That post seems to indicate that you are a Protestant child molester.

I was going to say something about that myself...

[Apocalypse]

Too many negative sterotypes of Catholic priests. A former Basilian high school principle at my school got in trouble with an undercover female cop.

[Alexander's Horse]

I don't really think denomination matters that much. If you find a church without scandals let me know.

I think what has come out about paedophiles is healthy and will probably lead to reform of the catholic church once the current Pope is gone.

I don't really expect my clergy to be perfect and catholicism is about spiritual practices and beliefs not personalities.

I also think that its mistake to confuse Jesus with the clergy - though some of them love to be seen like that.

The real leadership of the catholic church is Jesus and the saints, not the bishops.

But the whole scandal has seriously undermined the authority of the clergy and may lead to the church being stripped of worldly assets - not such a bad thing if you ask me.

[Felch]

Charles V supposedly made a big speech one time about how he wouldn't convert to Protestantism because his ancestors were Catholic, and he trusted that they knew best. That's roughly how I view things. I don't trust my ancestors on everything, but on issues where I couldn't care less, I just go along as the default.

[Dr Strangelove]

Originally posted by HisMajestyBOB
Protestant pastors can marry. Heck, my pastor got married, got divorced and then remarried!

Saint Marcus - That post seems to indicate that you are a Protestant child molester.

No, it seems to indicate that he was molested by a protestant.

[Shi Huangdi]

"The Church is doing something about the situation isn't it? I'd heard they were. If they didn't... that would be bad."

They've known about the situation for a long time and have done nothing about it and have even protected the ones doing it. An institution that is God's living instrument on Earth shouldn't need PR and lay pressure to do what is clearly the right thing.

"What's the point of organized religion?"

For religious services. One of the commandments is "Thou shalt keep holy the Sabbath Day". The traditional way to do this is through attending Church. This is a continuation of the Jewish tradition of honoring God on a set out day by meeting together at a place of worship and worshiping God.

"What's wrong with believing what you will on your own?"

Well, Protestantism does have the priesthood of all believers.

"I believe if enough lay people make it known their outrage and demand change, it will happen."

Maybe, but the Church has an extremely scornful view of lay movements to reform the Church. The Church sees its power as coming directly from God and his servant the Pope, so therefore it acts in accordance to what it's hierarchy believes is the will of God- rather than pressure from the secular laity. Of course in spite of this it has changed itself on the rarest of occasions when lay protest has been so fierce that it changes itself to save itself.

"I hear you man."

Thanks. I'd really like to hear the opinion of more Catholics on this. It really seems many on this thread fail to grasp the extreme gravity and tragedy of the Hierarchies' failure to protect it's most vulnerable members.

"(I wouldn't agree with your "hasn't done anything" comment, though.)"

The pope could have stepped in with a strong hand and dictated a zero tolerance policy. He called together his cardinals, but all the Rome summit produced was a promise to not tolerate people who do this repeatedly molested children- saying nothing of whether people who molest a kid once should be reported to the police. The Pope was apparently fine with that settlement, and in fact I heard that Pope John Paul II may have even asked Cardinal Law to not resign.

"One way is to believe that the holy spirit just wasn't guiding the bishops. The other is to believe that the better portion of the higher ups weren't listening closely enough to this guidance."

Well, our church believes God's gudiance is available to all of us- that it the church's explanation of our conscience. But the highers ups are supposed to be especially attuned to this gudiance and act out the Holy Spirit's will. That didn't happen.

"Fortunately, this means that it is a curable disease. Just get new bishops."

When this scandal first broke out I was hoping JPII would come in with a strong and kick out Cardinal Law and all who tolerated and protected the wolves who dressed themselves in sheep's clothing and infilitrated the Church. Yet that hasn't happened- only the bishops who actively molested people were removed. And I haven't really seen any institutional changes to prevent this. The closest I have seen is a few higher-ups on this church blaming this whole problem on homosexuality and saying the Church needs to prevent homosexuals from entering the priesthood. This inspite of the fact that there is no evidence connecting pedophilia and homosexuality and in spite of that the Cathecism itself bans discrimination against homosexuals.

"Furthermore, maybe a group of Syrian Christians have had the true Pope in their group for the past 2 millennia!"

It is a fundamental part of my faith that God loves us. I don't think God would send the holy spirirt only to a small sect in Syria while leaving alone the much larger Church. In any case this argument doesn't reflect a good knowledge modern Church teachings- the Church now teaches the Orthodox Church is nearly in communion with God as they are, and it is seen that the doctines of the Catholic and Eastern Orthodox Churches, including the Syrians, are practically the same. And in any case, any Omnipotent God could bestow the powers of the papacy and the temperment to be able to serve his will, even if he is an Italian. Were God to will it he could even inspire you to become Catholic and ascend to the papacy.

"Eastern Orthodox & Protestants still aren't really considered Christians"

The Cathecism, which is the supereme church literature, does indeed consider Eastern Orthodox and Protestants to be Christians.

"We democratically elect our elders & deacons, and the elders democratically vote on the central things concerning the church."

Of course, this has led to stuff such as the Presbyterians in the South supporting slavery.


BTW, SF, as an aside, are you one of the Presbyterians that still believe in predestination?

"those who go to Presbyterian another"

Again, not neccesarily. You did have your North/South schism.

"The Church isn't about the clergy Shi, it's about the people. "

But it is about the clergy! The Church teaches the Pope is the sucsessor of St.Peter upon whom Jesus founded the Church and granted the keys to.

"We make of it what we will and take from it as little or as much of it as we need"

Well I am mainly considering two things. One is to leave the Church altogehter. The other is to remain with the Church and the Mass, but to become much more liberal a Catholic and seek my own answers to moral questions through the bible and through prayer to God and stop focusing on obeying the commands of the Church.

"I wouldn't jump into anything, protestant or otherwise, at the moment."

I have no intent on doing that, I plan on reflecting on this a great deal.....

"You've obviously got some deeper questions than this mucking around in your brain (since the Church has done worse in the past) than just simple outrage at the pedophiles that you need to take a good look at...."

Indeed- but as I pointed this is more then being mad at the Church, that the Church would do this poses a real challenge to my belief in it as God's instrument. The Church has done worse, but this is the probably the worst thing it has done since Vatican II.

"Protestants molest children too"

Maybe, but a Protestant doing it just shows that person was a bad protestant. The Clergy are far less important in protestantism what with the priesthood of all believers, and ministers are seen as mere men.

If by your post you were saying you were molested yourself- than all my sympathies are with you in recovering.

"and may lead to the church being stripped of worldly assets"

Well, the Church does seem to be fighting tooth and nail against that happening with it's agressive legal strategies- going as far as to accuse some parents of the victims of negligence........ Let's hope though, AH, that proper compensation can be given to the victims.

"I don't trust my ancestors on everything, but on issues where I couldn't care less, I just go along as the default."

Well your ansectors weren't always Catholic, before that they were pagan. I myself have some Protestant and Jewish ansectors.

[TCO]

"On this rock, I will build my Church. " -Jesus

[TCO]

He actually used that smiley when he said it...

[JohnT]

[philosophical ravings]Hell, deep down we're all Protestants anyway, so why bother changing? I have yet to find two Catholics who have the exact same opinion on religious matters, which is what Protestantism is all about... you making a personal, individual peace with God. Do you really need any organization for that? [/philosophical ravings]

Despite the above, I'm Catholic, I just baptized my daughter as a Catholic, and I have no intention on leaving the church because of the scandals. After all, just because molesters exist in the Catholic church does not prevent them from being in the Protestant denominations. Honestly, what are you going to do when you go through all the effort to become an Episcopalian and then you discover that there are molesters (or other criminal-types) in their organization as well? Change churches again? And again?

Shi, the church's biggest problem right now is not moral, but organizational - imagine a situation in a company where it is s.o.p. for the CEO to literally hang on to power regardless of his ability to handle the job, to be replaced only upon his death. Modern organizational rules of succession aren't based upon medieval lifespans, where it was almost expected for someone to die before their usefulness was through, they are based upon the CEO being answerable to another body, with that body having the right to dispose of the CEO if they aren't measuring up to standards. In short, the Catholic Church needs a board of directors.

The Pope should've been replaced 10 years ago at the latest, but there is no regular mechanism in the church to remove a Pope, other than on religious grounds (apostasy, heresy, etc), which would probably require some huge, cumbersome gathering of bishops and cardinals that would take months, years to do it's work. The fact is, it is too beneficial to the College of Cardinals to have a Pope that is addled, and this is why venal and immoral men run rampant in the Church at times.

So we have a situation where we have a Pope who, because of his failing health, has no ability to perform his functions. Couple that with the inability to replace him (other than calling him a heretic)until the day he dies... which could be tomorrow, which could be ten years from now. Add to the mix the College of Cardinals, the Pope's "subordinates," who are relieved as hell that their boss is out of the way and looks to be for some time, and you're looking at an invitation to disaster. Which is just what we got.

[JohnT]

That's odd, GP. He's using this smilie in my translation:

Some people have it where he uses , but they're non-believers and are not to be trusted.

[SnowFire]

what's with the need to label yourself "Catholic" or "Protestant"?

Words are squishy things, but there seem to be two definitions of Protestant in use: "A group of Christian churches who tend more strongly to the Bible for guidance over dogma" and "Not Catholic or Eastern Orthodox." If you use the second definition, then becoming not Catholic pretty much automatically qualifies you as a Protestant (and the 2nd definition more clearly includes groups like Mormons that don't really trace their lineage from Luther, but aren't Catholic).

Protestant pastors can marry.

So can Catholic priests. How? Easy. Be an Anglican priest and get married there, then convert. What are they going to do, tell you to get a divorce? So there actually are some married Catholic priests out there.

It is a fundamental part of my faith that God loves us. I don't think God would send the holy spirirt only to a small sect in Syria while leaving alone the much larger Church.

You know, good point. I agree completely. Let me rephrase things a bit though:

It is a fundamental part of my faith that God loves us. I don't think God would send the holy spirirt only to the church in Rome while leaving alone the rest of the Church.

Anyway, this was just a silly point brought up. Obviously if in fact the true Pope is a random minister in Syria, then his responsibilities are much more divine in nature and don't need to be "seen" by the rest of the world as much as the Catholic Pope things the job requires.

As for the Holy Spirit, there is no question in my mind that it is available to everyone, man, woman, and child- to all religions and all peoples. And if "guidance by the Holy Spirit" is what you consider to be a pope- well, the priesthood of all believers was already brought up.

And in any case, any Omnipotent God could bestow the powers of the papacy and the temperment to be able to serve his will, even if he is an Italian. Were God to will it he could even inspire you to become Catholic and ascend to the papacy.

True. However, be careful the road you walk if you believe in an interventionist God. If God were to will it, then nobody would starve and the Middle East problem would be concluded in a happy peace and I'd be upgraded to a broadband connection. God doesn't do everything for us, for whatever reasons. If He doesn't do things like that, I'm somewhat skeptical of Him "transforming" whatever Pope gets elected to be a person worthy of the position. And as history has shown, apparently he hasn't always done that in the past, so it seems he's going to let us make some mistakes in that regard.

The Cathecism, which is the supereme church literature, does indeed consider Eastern Orthodox and Protestants to be Christians.

Good to hear it. The Catechism is what's read by most people on the ground anyway, so if they say it, I'm mostly happy. As for the doctrines still on the books in Rome, who knows and who cares.

Of course, this has led to stuff such as the Presbyterians in the South supporting slavery.

Yup. If the roots of the tree are rotten, so is the whole tree, and this will be reflected in doctrine- as it should. I'm fine with this myself. You'll note that the Presbyterian church broke in two over this issue, being that they were polar opposites on the issue- Northern Presbyterians were among the most vocal abolitionists, and Southern Presbyterians were among the most vocal slavery defenders. Better than staying unified and possibly having anything less than total abolition be the church doctrine- no compromises here, I suppose.

BTW, SF, as an aside, are you one of the Presbyterians that still believe in predestination?

That would be all of them, at least the ones who hold completely to official church doctrine. Which is in actuality not all of them, especially in the more liberal branches of the church.

Predestination is probably one of the most misunderstood doctrines around. Generally, if you posit an omniscient God, then I trust you will find it very hard to get around it- if he knows everything, he knows the future, therefore at the time you were born- heck, at the time of Creation- he knows how you'll turn out.

If you do not posit an omniscient God, then predestination is not only a hard doctrine to defend, it's also an abhorrent one, and this is what it gets attacked based on. Yes, judging a book by its cover is a terrible thing to do and I certainly hope God doesn't do this. But few people will advocate this position, myself not one of them.

What are the advantages of predestination? I've always felt that the "bank account" theory of salvation was kind of crass, where you add up your good deeds and bad deeds and see which one weighs more heavily. Always smacked of pagan myth, like that Egyptian God who did the same thing (Anubis was it?). Predestination gets around that, and says that because you have been saved, you will try and pay back this wondrous gift by following God's commands. Which of course you never can, but you might as well try.

The church's official stance: http://www.pcusa.org/101/101-predest.htm

Again, not neccesarily. You did have your North/South schism.

I don't see how that contradicts that. Because there was a disagreement, the church split. That's exactly what is supposed to happen- you don't want to go to a church where you disagree with their policies, right? There were still some northern-branch churches around in the South, and some Southern branch churches in the North, if that's what you mean.

[Shi Huangdi]

"[philosophical ravings]Hell, deep down we're all Protestants anyway, so why bother changing? I have yet to find two Catholics who have the exact same opinion on religious matters, which is what Protestantism is all about... you making a personal, individual peace with God. Do you really need any organization for that? [/philosophical ravings]"

That's a good point. One could believe in as many protestant doctrines as they wanted to and still attend Catholic services.

" After all, just because molesters exist in the Catholic church does not prevent them from being in the Protestant denominations. Honestly, what are you going to do when you go through all the effort to become an Episcopalian and then you discover that there are molesters (or other criminal-types) in their organization as well?"

Well, for one while I am sure any denomination could have molestors, Catholicism is the only one where we have seen a large scale effort to protect them.

"In short, the Catholic Church needs a board of directors."

But see, the Church has the idea that Pope should be supreme as a doctrine. And the Church puts doctrines above practical concerns- see teachings on Birth control. In fact, the supreme Pope is where the Church claims it get it's power from, going back to the passage from Matthew.

"Despite the above, I'm Catholic,"

Really? Aren't you the one who always talks about how good Luther and his reformation were?


"How? Easy. Be an Anglican priest and get married there, then convert. What are they going to do, tell you to get a divorce? So there actually are some married Catholic priests out there."

Ya that's true one of my priests is married. I think it'd definitely be better if they dropped the celoibacy requirement.

"It is a fundamental part of my faith that God loves us. I don't think God would send the holy spirirt only to the church in Rome while leaving alone the rest of the Church. "

You really don't understand Catholic teachings regarding the Eastern Churches at all do you- you even said before that the RCC didn't consider them Christians. The Church doesn't believe that the other parts of the main Churches are left alone at all.

"As for the Holy Spirit, there is no question in my mind that it is available to everyone, man, woman, and child- to all religions and all peoples."

Right, but is the RCC's claim that they are especially attuned to it and that they are the main vehicle God uses to spread his word today.

"However, be careful the road you walk if you believe in an interventionist God. If God were to will it, then nobody would starve and the Middle East problem would be concluded in a happy peace and I'd be upgraded to a broadband connection."

Well remember Jesus said that his Kingdom is not of this Earth. But while the RCC claims that God doesn't do everything for everyone on this Earth, he does maintain his Church to preach and spread his teachings so people will be able to get to Heaven- hence the "keys to the kingdom"

"Yup. If the roots of the tree are rotten, so is the whole tree, and this will be reflected in doctrine- as it should."

So why are you so confident the people around you are so good? Why listen to a minister whose powers comes from poeple most of whom are no more enlightened then you! It makes more sense to have a Church in which people are promoted for biblical knowledge, holiness, etc. rather than just elections. That seems to me that it would just beg to invite preaching to the people what they want to here and staying away from hard truths if there be any.

"he knows how you'll turn out."

How do you neccesarily know that God knows everything that will happen in the future?

"Which of course you never can, but you might as well try."

Why bother trying? If you can't.

Now, you do a posit an omnipotent God? Why would God create people who had no other destiny other then the eternal fire? By positing your completely omniscient God, you posit a system in which there really isn't free will-- there is a set of decisions that you will make and that only God knows. Hence you have a system in which people don't really have the freedom to choose God, and a God that once again creates people who born to be tortured eternally. Hardly seems like the God as the presbyterians believe is that good.

"I've always felt that the "bank account" theory of salvation was kind of crass, where you add up your good deeds and bad deeds and see which one weighs more heavily. Always smacked of pagan myth, like that Egyptian God who did the same thing (Anubis was it?)."

And it's good that the RCC does not have this version of salvation, and this one of their doctrines that I think I tend to agree with them on. The RCC does teach that one who accepts God goes to heaven- but then it goes on to say that being Christian and accepting God is much more than saying "I accept Jesus Christ as my personal savior". If I rob, steal, cheat, and kill innocent peole, I am not really being a Christian and am not living by Jesus's principles. I don't think it's a good argument to say anyone who believes in God goes to heaven- the Satanist believe in God, don't they? In order to show a true acceptance of God, you must try to live according to his will. The Church goes on and gets mortal sins from this- it describes certain sins and so grevious in nature that in doing them are you are in fact rejecting God by living so apart from his teachings. This is scriptually supported- we have from the Bible the mention of the time Jesus would seperate the saved from the damned- the saved on the right, the damned on the left. In seperating them, Jesus proclaimed the ones on the right as those who had fed him, gave him drink, clothing etc-- and he proclaims the ones on the left as those who did not do this. (He goes on to say by himself he meant the poor). Key point is, in seperating them he mentions tangible deeds.

And BTW, SF, do you believe in the old Calvinist doctrine that it is a sign that you are saved if you are rich?

[ZaphodBeeblebrx]

How about Converting to Judaism, instead?

Darn, I'm not Supposed to be Proselytizing!

Oh well, you wouldn't like what we would have to do, to your Penis, anyway.

[Dr. Nick]

Word of advice: don't go with any. Believe in God, follow what you may believe to be His precepts. But don't bother with religion. It's all wrong and political and phoney.

[Ecthy]

Shi Huangdi turned his state religion to Protestant. We welcome him to our community!

[JohnT]

Shi: "Really? Aren't you the one who always talks about how good Luther and his reformation were?"

Yup. Still am planning on being in Germany late October, 2017. My secret is that I really don't care about the religious, the doctrinal stuff. All I want are the ethics, and as far as I can tell the ethical systems of all the Christian churches are pretty damned similar... so why change? Why even think about changing?

[ZaphodBeeblebrx]

Ach, don't get me started on Martin Luther!

Damn, Anti-Semite!

Adolf Hitler, quoted from him, way Too often!

[Alexander's Horse]

Originally posted by JohnT
[philosophical ravings]Hell, deep down we're all Protestants anyway, so why bother changing? I have yet to find two Catholics who have the exact same opinion on religious matters

That's the beauty of catholicism - protestants tend to think its monolithic and "top down" - in other words the Pope or the parish priest speaks and everyone follows. Nothing could be further from the truth.

Take birth control. Every adult knows if priests could get pregnant the church's stance on that would be very different. So parishioners all over the world ignore the Vatican's views on that en masse. What the hell do celibates know about sex and reproduction in the real world? Nothing.

The difference between catholics and many protestent groups is we keep our dissidents in the tent pissing out. We love our clergy because most of them are great people who spend their whole lives serving others for nothing but a possible heavenly reward. But as for moral teaching, well, most catholics use their God given conscience the way God intended.

[DanS]

Ecthelion: In the States, you don't change your "state religion" as religion is not funded through taxes.

"Every adult knows if priests could get pregnant the church's stance on that would be very different."

I don't know, AH. Sounds like you're casting about for rationalizations...

[TCO]

I like the tradition of the Church. Just a vibe...

[JohnT]

Naw, AH is pretty spot-on correct.

[DanS]

"The pope could have stepped in with a strong hand and dictated a zero tolerance policy. He called together his cardinals, but all the Rome summit produced was a promise to not tolerate people who do this repeatedly molested children- saying nothing of whether people who molest a kid once should be reported to the police. The Pope was apparently fine with that settlement, and in fact I heard that Pope John Paul II may have even asked Cardinal Law to not resign."

By and large I agree with you. Some things to keep in mind...

1) The Pope has less power than you might think. The bishops have a lot of power and everything has to be done by concensus. No quick fixes.

2) "Zero tolerance" is not in the bishops' lexicon. While the laity is in no mood for nuances and is pretty much only concerned with protecting the children, the bishops make their life's work wrapped up in forgiveness. Just think what they have to listen to AH confess!

3) If proper treatment is given and accepted, the "fall off the wagon" rate for pedophelia is pretty low. That's why you hear distinctions from the bishops about "moral monsters" versus someone who is a treated offender. Personally, I wouldn't want them making those distinctions, but that's what they're paid to do.

4) If defrocked, there is nothing stopping the former priest from abusing others.

[ZaphodBeeblebrx]

Yeah, there is.

The Legal System!

Either that, or Angry Parents, with Guns, hey, it worked for the Oneida Tribe.

[Alexander's Horse]

Any church should refer allegations of criminal sexual misconduct to the police as a first step. Until they do that, they are all going to get into trouble over and over again.

[Ecthy]

DanS, I was quoting EU2.

[SnowFire]

You really don't understand Catholic teachings regarding the Eastern Churches at all do you-

The statement you were referring to was in direct response to your counter about the real popes being in a group of random Syrian Christians. You said that God wouldn't restrict the Holy Spirit to just that small group. I agreed, and then said that he wouldn't restrict it to just a small group of Roman cardinals, basically. I wasn't making any claims about Catholic doctrine.

Now, that said... you don't believe in Syrian popes because it's too restrictive. So why believe in Roman popes? God's Holy Spirit is available to all.

Right, but is the RCC's claim that they are especially attuned to it and that they are the main vehicle God uses to spread his word today.

Yupyup, which is exactly why you should listen to them and not do what you think is best. Sometimes this can be a good thing, at least arguably (no death penalty, birth control maybe, etc.). However, sometimes this can be a bad thing (hanging John Wycliffe, then digging him up 50 years later to burn his bones, just because he translated the Bible into English). This leads into...

Why listen to a minister whose powers comes from poeple most of whom are no more enlightened then you!

'cause we need somebody to lead the service and the church, and a minister has gone to seminary and generally knows a good bit more. As for enlightenment, in the religious sense, he should be enlightened, but we aren't going to make any blanket claims- it's quite possible that some people in his congregation are "as enlightened," whatever that means.

Look, what it comes down to is this. Do some people traverse their faith differently than others? Of course, it would be silly to deny that, although any kind of meter o "progress" would be virtually impossible to create, as people have different strengths and weaknesses.

However, everybody has equal access to this, no matter what gifts they have been given. And as said about the difficulty of making a scale, making distinctions in some random "godliness quotient" is ridiculously hard and can rapidly lead to good old Holier than Thou attitudes, literally! I mean, sure, everybody hopes that their church leaders are "more in tune with God" so to speak. But you need only look at the vast number of religions around the world to see what kind of disagreement that can spark.

So yes, with the example of searching for a new pastor, you better bet that "biblical knowledge, holiness, etc." comes into play, along with a lot of other things. Just don't forget that going to seminary is generally a prerequisite, so it's not too common you have a guy walk in off the street- although they aren't ruled out, knowing the early history of the church! And "elections" rarely come down to that, really, especially in churches that aren't too huge- it's more the comitees that vote on everything, and the general meetings (where everybody attends- usually held right after church) are usually only held twice a year. And they tend to be more of an "update" where everybody explains how things are going, and then vote by acclamation.

Anyway, this is a bit more of a uniquely Presbyterian thing the extent this goes to, so consult your local minister of other denominations for specifics elsewhere.

That seems to me that it would just beg to invite preaching to the people what they want to here and staying away from hard truths if there be any

Yeah, that can be a problem. There are certainly churches that do that. On the other hand, I'm not sure how to stop that- Protestants just go to anther church if they REALLY diagree with the "hard truth," and (at least according to AH) quite a few Catholics just ignore it, with regards to birth control or the death penalty.

But for what it's worth, our last full-time minister wasn't exactly a success in that regard. Our old minister was really great, but the replacement... well, she was _very_ liberal, which would be fine if it wasn't for the fact that she couldn't do it that eloquently and tended to piss people off who disagreed with her even a little (because this was a pretty liberal church anyway already). Nice person, and I don't have much against her, but she's somebody who would be an okay minister at a church where everybody was in lockstep with her, and one who can cut membership down somewhat decently at our church in the years she was here ('91-00 roughly).

But whatever. We're doing fine now and had a FANTASTIC intermic pastor the last year and 4 months.

How do you neccesarily know that God knows everything that will happen in the future?

(in heaven) *Bring Bring*
"Hello. This is God."
"Hi, this is Peter Ingraham. I was wondering... are you omniscient? I kind of need to know for this debate online."
"Nice try. You'll have to find out for yourself. I would recommend reading some Bible passages on the subject though, especially some of the OT stuff. I know that the pro-life crowd especially like the one where I tell Jeremiah that I knew him before he was born, although that might be specific and not general. So you've gotta work it out yourself."

Darn, I still need to unpack my books so I can get at my Bible. Anyway, the answer is no, I don't know for certain that God is omniscient. But there are some Bible passages that seem to indicate this pretty strongly, even if you throw away the Psalms which tend to be jubilantly joyous about the greatness, grandeur, wonder, etc. of God (and there would surely be lots of stuff in there).

Why bother trying? If you can't.

You're feeling warm-hearted today. Okay, example. You're out there freezing on the street as an orpahn when a nice person comes by, feeds you, gives you clothes, adopts you, gives you an education, and loves you like one of their "real" children. This kind of thing does still happen. Wouldn't you like to somehow "repay" this loving parent somehow? But considering you would have frozen to death had he or she not come along, and not to mention everything else, you owe them even more than your life. It's going to be really hard to "repay" these gifts.

So you would say "Eh, I'll never be able to repay 'em, so I might as well be rude and crass to this person who saved me and not give a darn for their welfare? No need to treat them like anybody special." Somehow I doubt this.

Now, you do a posit an omnipotent God? Why would God create people who had no other destiny other then the eternal fire?

Well, we're jumping off the deep end into theodicy style stuff. I'll only say that I haven't answered these questions conclusively for myself yet, never even mind the "eternal fire" stuff. I will say that your claim about free will being subverted by determinism is false and it comes from a facile definition of free will. Free will means "the choice came from me." Take as an example these statements:

1. I went to the police station after the policemen arrested me and took me there to be held.
2. I went to the police station on a tour to see if I would want to work there.

3. I didn't eat lunch today because I wasn't hungry.
4. I didn't eat lunch today because I forgot my wallet and somebody stole my lunch bag.

2 and 3 I'd say are examples of free will; the others aren't. But according to your claim, in a deterministic universe, none of these events had free will involved. That's silly; even if you were "determined" to want to go on that tour, then fine, the fact that you would have wanted to do that was known from the beginning of time, but the choice still came from you. Unlike the policemen arresting you, which might also be "determined," but the motive force came from outside the person.

And it's good that the RCC does not have this version of salvation

A modified version, from what I understand. At least back in the bad old days, whenever you went to confessional you could be cleansed of sins. You built your sins back up during the week. The point of Last Rites would be so that you would head right on into heaven sinless. If you didn't die on Sunday or died before a Last Rites could be adminstered, then you got to sit in purgatory waiting for your sins to burn off. Although if your relatives got themselves some indulgences, maybe your waiting would be reduced.

The reason why I brought up the bank account thing was that I always got confused when the Church started talking about mortal sins, and how they can make you not a Christian even with other things, but wait you can still repent, and... eh, it got a bit complex for me. Still, I'll agree with the general thrust of what you were saying, that some actions by their very nature suggest that you aren't taking Christianity seirously.

And BTW, SF, do you believe in the old Calvinist doctrine that it is a sign that you are saved if you are rich?

And where's this from? It ain't on any books that I know of anywhere these days, and anybody who reads the Gospels even remotely cursorily isn't coming up with that.

The only things I can think of might be the late 1800's, where I'm sure some of the Andrew Carnigie types probably celebrated doctrines like that happily, and maybe some of the late decay stages of Puritanism in America.

EU References

I remember one AAR at the forums talking about a Papal States AAR where a random event.. um... had the province of Rome convert to Luthernaism. I have to say that that would be about the most HUMILIATING thing ever to happen to the Pope- to be holed up in the Vatican while the actual citizens around him in Rome are Lutheran heretics!
So I actually did my own Papal States playthrough with that as some inspiration, and some save-file map state hacking. I conjectured a charismatic Italian missionary converting the peasants of central Italy to Swiss-style Calvinism, and the Papal States secular leader converting and taking direct control over them. It was really quite fun, turning central Italy Reformed. Rome I left, although eventually a random even turned it over to Reformed later, along with some of the Moslem heathens I had conquered in Africa. My alliance members were actually pretty cool with the change. They had been at around +200 opinions before anyway, so they just temporarily dropped to 130, still plenty to rejoin the alliance and have feelings start rising again. Really quite fun.

AH: I've seen you post that little rant about 4 times. Trust me, most people can read the newspaper. I think that most Protestants know that the Catholic Church does not command lockstep control over its followers.

[Bugs ****ing Bunny]

Shi- most of the Protestant churches are riddled with scandal too. I'm in no hurry to to become a Christian, but if I was I'd head straight to the Quakers.

[Blisterz]

Originally posted by Ecthelion
Shi Huangdi turned his state religion to Protestant. We welcome him to our community!

LOL

I just finished playing a 4 hour game of EU2