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To: Aikonaa
I've always found a belief system wherein unbelievers are condemned to eternal torture a deeply disturbing one.

It is an understandable reaction. In fact, if you really listen to what the Bible has to say and it does NOT disturb you, you aren't hearing what it says. That has no bearing at all, though, on its truth claims. It does, however, bear on men's reaction to it. It is precisely the reason that men will go through amazing mental gymnastics to deny the plain truths of the gospel, and pervert their intellectual capacities to condemn the biblical God (they would say that they condemn the "teaching about" a biblical God).

Again, Romans 1 says that the plain truth of the moral nature of God, and the sustanence of the creator is evident to all men and clearly plain to them, but they don't like it and suppress it at every opportunity

Men had rather willingly deceive themselves and will deliberately believe lies rather than face the idea that they must stand before a thrice-holy God who is determined to extirpate every shred of cosmic rebellion from the universe.

The older theologians called this the "noetic" (noos="mind") effects of sin. The concept is that sin has affected our reasoning abilities as well as our capacity to choose. It is not that the unregenerate man believes that 1+1=3 (unfortunaately, I sometimes believe that kind of stuff is limited to the ranks of fundamentalist believers, who believe any number of wacky ideas), but it is that men use their (sometimes prodigious) cognitive and intellectual abilities with an undercurrent of desire to escape God. Men deliberately seek to employ logic and intellect in an attempt to throw off what they do not like. We see it here in religious threads all the time. My personal experience (and I believe the teaching of scripture) is that only a personal experience with the slaughtered and risen Son of God, and an understanding of his love and forgiveness, have sufficient power to reverse this mental state in men.

241 posted on 03/28/2007 9:49:52 AM PDT by DreamsofPolycarp (Ron Paul in '08)
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To: DreamsofPolycarp
The older theologians called this the "noetic" (noos="mind") effects of sin. The concept is that sin has affected our reasoning abilities as well as our capacity to choose. It is not that the unregenerate man believes that 1+1=3 (unfortunaately, I sometimes believe that kind of stuff is limited to the ranks of fundamentalist believers, who believe any number of wacky ideas), but it is that men use their (sometimes prodigious) cognitive and intellectual abilities with an undercurrent of desire to escape God. Men deliberately seek to employ logic and intellect in an attempt to throw off what they do not like.

Your thinking is more Catholic than you want to admit--but then, truth is truth...

From The Catholic Encyclopedia again (a very useful online tool...):

The first effect of mortal sin in man is to avert him from his true last end, and deprive his soul of sanctifying grace. The sinful act passes, and the sinner is left in a state of habitual aversion from God. The sinful state is voluntary and imputable to the sinner, because it necessarily follows from the act of sin he freely placed, and it remains until satisfaction is made.

Thankfully, God gave us a means for his grace in satisfaction of our transgressions: the Sacrament of Reconciliation.

246 posted on 03/28/2007 10:55:08 AM PDT by pgyanke (RUDY GIULIANI 2008 - BECAUSE IF YOU'RE GOING TO COMPROMISE YOUR PRINCIPLES ANYWAY... WHY WAIT?)
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