Posted on 01/01/2006 4:48:03 PM PST by HarleyD
"faith is...things hoped for..."
As our Protestant brothers would say "Amen!"
This is not what the Orthodox believe and I don't believe I would have said it that way. We simply do not speculate, knowing that God is not limited in any way to save by His grace whomever He wishes. We take the "Thy will be done" very seriously and literally. We can say that because we believe that God is merciful and just and that whatever happens to the unbaptized babies is merciful and just even if we can't see it that way.
I has to dow ith the ancestral (original) sin. Orthodox teaching on this Augstinian construct differs.
Exactly what the Latins teach! Earlier, there was the teaching of Limbo, but we now consider the above to be more appropriate.
Regards
Let's see whose presumptions are more reasonable sounding. Assume there is a verse in the Bible that says "... and the hungry alligator did not eat the chicken unto he had rushed upon it". Now we have the question "Does the Bible say that an alligator ever ate a chicken?" Full Court says "YES!" But you, OTOH, would say "No, no, no. I have extra-Biblical Tradition which clearly says that when the alligator got there, he and the chicken had a tea party and then had a pillow fight. Therefore, the Bible must be interpreted in this light. The Bible never says anything like what you PRESUME".
Clearly, if we even grant you your point on the "until" "unto" issue (which I do not think we are obligated to do), both sides makes presumptions about the future. I am confident that logic, and human experience strongly favor our presumptions and strongly discredit your Tradition.
That's interesting, thanks. I also agree with you about the results of a hypothetical poll among Christians as to salvation. I'll bet the answers would be nearly identical across different Christian faiths, at least in this country. It is a sad commentary on our culture, or lack thereof. :)
It is my understanding that Limbo was never the teaching of the Latin Church, but that the faithful could beleive it if they chose to. I also remember something about pe John Paul II bringing the topic of Limbo for a discussion.
Herein lies your error. Tradition is a documented life of the Church from the earliest days, within a certain culture and mindset. You cannot apply logic to cultures. Arranged marriages for other than procreation were known and not unusual within the culture of Israel of Jesus' times.
Like the tradition of burning people at the stake that the RCC so viciously carried out?
"I think on this, Latins and Greeks agree that something different is in store for unbaptized babies - but it is not hell. I think some would call it paradise but without God's abiding presence."
From what I have always understood, while we tend not to make definitive proclamations based on things not clearly defined in revelation, Orthodoxy simply believes that unbaptized children prior to the age of reason go to heaven. The only thing that an infant has inherited is the result of the ancestral sin, which is death and corruption. The infant has been incapable of making choices that would separate him from God and God's mercy. Therefore, the "default setting" for the human race is salvation and God's mercy -- we have to choose something different for ourselves if we wish not to receive God's mercy.
There is a sense in which it is "something different," I suppose, in that no real progress down the path of theosis has happened because there has been no opportunity for ascetic struggle.
If you want to see what a church believes, watch what they do. Orthodox Christians take a very relaxed approach towards baptizing their infants. While nothing prevents an infant from being baptized at the earliest possible time, and while it would seem, based on some Orthodox customs, that baptism often happened on the 8th day after birth (continuing the pattern of circumcision on the 8th day), this is rarely practiced today.
Most children are not baptized before the 40th day. This is mainly so that the mother can have her churching prayers read on or after the 40th day, be present for the baptism, and enter the church for the child's churching and for the child's first communion (baptisms commonly take place on Sunday mornings before the Liturgy in many parishes.)
Sometimes the child gets older, even. There is an Orthodox joke that the age of the child being baptized depends on the size of the parish's baptismal font (they need to be immersed.)
If we Orthodox were worried that our unbaptized children wouldn't go to heaven if something unexpected happened, we would baptize them much more quickly.
An unbaptized child of an Orthodox parent would be given an Orthodox funeral/burial, memorial services would be served, and the child would be commemorated at the Liturgy (just as an Orthodox catechumen who dies unexpectedly before being received into the Church is considered to have died an Orthodox layman.)
"Clearly, if we even grant you your point on the "until" "unto" issue (which I do not think we are obligated to do)..."
Unless you want to make up a new meaning for "eos", you have to grant the point.
As to which presumption about the future is correct, neither of us will be able to prove our point to the other. Which one is "strongly discredited" depends on whether or not one believes that the Church would consistently and unanimously pass down a history that was false.
If Jewish or secular histories say something extra-biblical, Protestants have a tendency to believe them to be true. If an extra-biblical history is passed down within the Christian Church, Protestants have the default setting of believing it to be false. It is that simple.
John 3:5 : Jesus answered, "I tell you the truth, no one can enter the kingdom of God unless he is born of water and the Spirit.
I AM a Baptist, so there is no way I am against Baptism, I am very much in favor of it. :) However, it is not at all crystal clear that this verse requires Baptism for salvation. Here is what Ryrie says about it:
"Various interpretations have been suggested for the meaning here of "water": (1) it refers to baptism as a requirement for salvation. However, this would contradict many other NT passages (Eph. 2:8-9); (2) it stands for the act of repentance that John the Baptizer's baptism signified; (3) it refers to natural birth (specifically, the fluid released when the amniotic sac breaks prior to labor); thus it means "unless one is born the first time by water and the second time by the Spirit"; (4) it means the Word of God, as in 15:3; (5) it is a synonym for the Holy Spirit and may be translated, "by water, even the Spirit." One truth is clear: the new birth is from God through the Spirit."
I can "buy" more than one of these, but the first one does contradict other NT scripture.
FK: "This directly contradicts scripture, so I would like to ask how you would square this requirement against Eph. 2:8-9?"
Where is the contradiction? In infant baptism, the faith of the sponsor (the parents, typically) supplies the faith, ad the sacrament of the water and the prayers supplies the grace.
I don't believe that faith by proxy is scriptural. The story of the paralytic is ambiguous. Who is the "their" of "their faith"? That could go either way. Plus, the whole idea makes man not responsible for his sin. Under faith by proxy, justification can be achieved by who you know, not what you believe. That concerns me.
A body count is not advantageous to either side. And we've seen on this site, that when a religious discussion devolves into one, quite often it dies.
We've avoided this thus far on this thread. Perhaps we could allow it to continue a while longer.
My understanding is also that betrothals were lengthy, but I had never heard of the sharing of a household before. Admittedly, that would help with that pesky verse 19 :) as I don't think they were married by verse 19.
In any event, I just don't see how Mary could have possibly received the news that she was going to give birth to the Savior, and it would be a result of a union outside of marriage. Since it was frowned upon, how could this be a fitting entry into the world for our Lord? Mary must have understood that.
But one thing we do know is that Mary WAS pregnant soon after the angel's visit. At the absolute maximum, it was three months later. We know by correlating the pregnancy of Elizabeth. The angel tells Mary that her cousin is six months along, and then John jumps for Jesus in the womb. That's a small window.
If that's true, then I'll take it. :) My preference would be for all true Christians to be as unified as possible.
The sticky point is "plain [meaning of scripture] at what time?" No one wants an extravagant interpretation, but we want the reading that conforms with the intent of the writer, and he lived 2,000 years ago.
You're right, the writer did live 2,000 years ago. He also lives today. He also lived before the creation of the earth. Since God invented time, He knew how to get the maximum benefit out of language in order to communicate ideas that would become timeless. The writer used different voices to convey one perfect message. The intent of one part of the message can be discerned by looking at other parts of the message to see if there is unity of purpose within the message as a whole.
That is the firs time I hear this. If baptism is only for the consequeces of ancestral sin, then why do we profess it in the Sybol of Faith as for the "remission of sins?"
Baptism has been likened by the Eatsern fathers as adoption. Without adoption, you don't belong to the Curch, you are not in Chirst, you are not a Christian, you are not a believer, you don't "rate" a Christian funaral.
Roman tombstones of their infants who were baptized read something like this: "Tiberius, six months old, a beliver." Now, an Orthodox priest can say prayers for someone who is not a Chriatian, but how can he give a non-Christian departed a Christian funeral?
In an infant, the only "sin" involved is the effect of the ancestral sin.
In someone of the age of reason, the baptism is for the removing of the effects of the ancestral sin *and* for the remission of sins committed by the person. Hence Ananias and his exhortation to St. Paul to "be baptized and wash away thy sins."
I'm repeating what I have been told. I'm not sure what the written guidelines of the Church say about all of this. It could be that I was being told something that is not traditional Orthodox practice.
I again find it unlikely that the Orthodox practice of a relatively late baptism would have developed had the parents known that their child would go without an Orthodox burial in the event of untimely death (which, up until very recent times, was a far from uncommon occurence.)
But maybe not. Regardless of what happens in funeral practices, I don't think that this would change Orthodox beliefs that all infants go to heaven -- which seems to be virtually universal in my own experience. Maybe I've just been around softies all these years.
[From: "The betrothal and marriage of Mary to Joseph" :] I take it as axiomatic that the Holy Spirit so arranged the Incarnation that the virginal conception of the Christ would raise no doubts about Joseph’s paternity and Mary’s absolute fidelity to him in the minds of their families and neighbors. This is corroborated by the fact that even three decades later these same people were still unable to accept Jesus as being anyone but the son “of the carpenter” (cf. Matt. 13:55).
This DIRECTLY contradicts the Protoevangelium of James:
[Chapter 11:] "1. Then came Annas the scribe, and said to Joseph, Why have we not seen you since your return? 2. And Joseph replied, Because I was weary after my journey and rested the first day. 3. But Annas turning about perceived the Virgin big with child. 4. And went away to the priest and told him, Joseph in whom you placed so much confidence, is guilty of a notorious crime, in that he has defiled the Virgin whom he received out of the temple of the Lord, and has privately married her, not revealing it to the children of Israel. 5. Then said the priest, Has Joseph done this? 6. Annas replied, If you send any of your servants, you will find that she is with child. 7. And the servants went, and found it as he said. 8. Upon this both she and Joseph were brought to their trial, and the priest said to her, Mary, what have you done? 9. Why have you debased your soul and forgotten your God, seeing you were brought up in the Holy of Holies, and received your food from the hands of angels, and heard their songs? 10. Why have you done this?"
So much for this guy's axioms. :) I'm not sure there is any way to know how long after the Annunciation that they were actually married.
However, the Protoevangelium clearly says that Mary was great with child BEFORE they were married. This is critical. Therefore, the Protoevangelium actually SUPPORTS my view that Mary was not expecting to actually BE married for some time, (it takes time to become great with child). So, Mary's question was logical. She was not expecting to be married any time soon, she would not dishonor her family by fooling around beforehand, and she was a virgin. How could it be that she would conceive a son? This is the basic and reasonable thought that prompted her question. (I thought it was interesting that under "Annunciation" at New Advent, they claim the two were already married at the time. Strange.)
[From Pope John Paul II:] We can wonder why she would accept betrothal, since she had the intention of remaining a virgin forever. Luke is aware of this difficulty, but merely notes the situation without offering any explanation. The fact that the Evangelist, while stressing Mary's intention of virginity, also presents her as Joseph's spouse, is a sign of the historical reliability of the two pieces of information.
What? How in the world does Luke "STRESS" Mary's intention of remaining a virgin. She asks how she can become pregnant since "I am a virgin". Does that, by itself, really translate into a lifelong pledge of virginity, especially from a betrothed woman? I can't see that at all, just on its face, never mind that Luke is stressing it.
LOL! It's funny how these "traditions" get in the way of one another.
Full Court, whenever I read statements from Alex like this, which is very often recently, I always tell myself the same thing: "This is the witness of Catholicism." That really helps me put everything into perspective. :)
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