Posted on 03/19/2016 3:12:27 PM PDT by NYer
Catholic ping!
“When there are no absolutes to govern society, society becomes the absolute.”——Francis Shaeffer
A perfect case in point.
Right is that which is in conformity with our human nature. Our human nature informs every atom and every cell. It is not subject to change by governments.
Very good. I’m a big fan of presenting an argument that is both succinct and rational. Bravo.
Humans operate from cost versus benefit.
Morality/gods are constructs to make us versus them, so it must benefit,but everything has a downside to it.
Example: would Hitler getting aborted been moral,would assassinating him been moral and just at any point in his time line? How about if his parents were killed?
Without moral law, the rule is, if it feels good, do it.
I believe there is a reason God tells us of the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil in the Garden of Eden. Also His admonition not to eat thereof, lest we would surely die.
Every human being now has that knowledge in them.
It is a fundamental problem, because that ability to discern good and evil, is too easily confused as a counterfeit substitute for our direct relationship with God through faith in Christ. As soon as we slip into that reliance, instead of through faith in Christ first, we fall out of fellowship with Him.
It manifests the nature of sin.
One step removed, morality can either be used as a counterfeit substitute for being in fellowship with Him, or it can scar us into legalism and good works without faith, which are simply good for nothingness in His Plan.
These quotes may be relevant.
“The law of nature and the law of revelation are both Divine: they flow, though in different channels, from the same adorable source. It is indeed preposterous to separate them from each other.”
— James Wilson (of the Law of Nature, 1804)
“To grant that there is a supreme intelligence who rules the
world and has established laws to regulate the actions of his creatures; and still to assert that man, in a state of nature, may be considered as perfectly free from all restraints of law and government, appears to a common understanding altogether irreconcilable. Good and wise men, in all ages, have embraced a very dissimilar theory. They have supposed that the deity, from the relations we stand in to himself and to each other, has constituted an eternal and immutable law, which is indispensably obligatory upon all mankind, prior to any human institution
whatever. This is what is called the law of nature....Upon this law depend the natural rights of mankind.”
— Alexander Hamilton
In those days there was no king in Israel, but every man did that which was right in his own eyes.
Which morality?
All of it is cost vs. benefit.
The benefit must equal or be greater than the cost, or morality flew out the window.
You mean like homosexuality, a practice that is almost universally condemned in every society around the globe and has been for all of recorded history, but that is now being labeled as "normal"?
"God does not exist" is an absolute statement.
Deeming something abnormal that has been around for all of recorded history belabors the definition of ‘normal.’
“consensus” is just another way of saying “mob rule”.
Another reason to appreciate our founders framework of a the US being a republic - not a democracy.
“I believe there is a reason God tells us of the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil in the Garden of Eden. Also His admonition not to eat thereof, lest we would surely die.”
So what you are saying is god left a loaded .45 on the table in reach of people that knew no sin, therefore innocent.
“Every human being now has that knowledge in them.’
Do you mean after he told those innocents what would happen,or before?
“It is a fundamental problem, because that ability to discern good and evil, is too easily confused as a counterfeit substitute for our direct relationship with God through faith in Christ. As soon as we slip into that reliance, instead of through faith in Christ first, we fall out of fellowship with Him.”
Are you saying that you have no proof of god? Proof always denies the need for faith like “checks in the mail.”
“It manifests the nature of sin.”
What is the biblical definition of sin?
“One step removed, morality can either be used as a counterfeit substitute for being in fellowship with Him, or it can scar us into legalism and good works without faith, which are simply good for nothingness in His Plan.”
How do you prove what you claim to be true, true?
Just curious.
Another time indeed, as atheists can argue that correct human behavior is that which is good for man to achieve self-preservation, knowledge of the truth, propagation and education of the species, and social existence...
It is what ultimately defines these things that is the issue. Stalin and the like would argue achieving these goals required their policies, as would popes who required the extermination of those Rome decreed were heretics, as did early Prots.
However, at least the latter could appeal to a document that came to be established as the supreme s wholly God-inspired standard on faith and morality, bue to its Divine qualities and attestation, even though, as with a Constitution, it can be subject to varying degrees of interpretation.
In contrast, in atheism the individual is the supreme standard, not simply in deciding he will assent to one and interpret it, but atheism collectively rejects any one sure and supreme standard, and each can autocratically assert his own morality is superior to all moral documents, even that of God.
If an atheist can do all that, then god becomes just some powerless pitiful ineffectual being. How sad.
Which morality?
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