Posted on 12/30/2002 11:02:27 PM PST by JohnHuang2
Do you have pews at all? The Serbian church I visited up here had pews but all stood.
An excellent insight that somehow got lost in the noise of the thread. Perhaps that's because a nation cannot analyze itself. But the optimism you mention and the naivete that I encounter daily are what leads us to say that "people are people" (Huh? What's that supposed to mean?) and parrot that all American cliche you'll never hear outside our borders that "people are the same everywhere". Well, they ain't, or we'd be all dancing in the street celebrating the 9/11 attacks!
That optimism and naivete are what leads us (as a nation) to elect the Krintongs and to almost elect Goron, and to reject straight talkers like Keyes, Buchanan and Perot (with all their faults, which, from a bird's eye view, aren't any worse than the faults of the Bushes!)
This is the voice of "Arminianism": Free Will...co-mixture of good and bad "tendencies" inside of us yada, yada...yada...
Prager denies that we are born totally depraved, as Romanists do.
-------------------
Many are both. The various proportionalities are a matter of unimportance to calculate. What matters is that any political system will be corrupted and this results in a first priorit of needing to keep one's self free from political systems and one's life separate from that of other people.
School's going okay. I'm happy to be out for another few days on Christmas break. As to my silence, I eventually got tired of arguing in circles. ;)
Got a copy of Vol. I of Theological Institutes for Christmas--my parents got it through alibris.com. ;)
TG
Speaking as a 'voice of Arminianism' myself, I can deny that quite handily. As an Arminian (an admittedly Wesleyan, Biblical, total depravity-believing one), I affirm with any Calvinist that man is 'very far gone from righteousness.' Free grace has always been the emphasis of "high" or Wesleyan-Arminianism. (I am including Arminius himself as a 'high' Arminian, though too early for a Wesleyan-Arminian.) The problem lies in the subtle deviation from that 'high' Arminianism among many churches into liberalism and semi- or full Pelagianism.
Our beliefs are different, as we really don't like Augustine all that much.
"St. Paul tells us (sin) is an egocentric illness contracted from the parasites called corruptibility and death. Adam died because he sinned, and death spread to all men. Now, we sin because we die, for the sting of death is sin. Sin reigns in death, in our corruptibility and mortality. Death is the root; Sin is the thorn that springs from it. In the end, the last enemy that shall be destroyed is the endles cycle of corruptibility and death, the Seat of Sin. Ontologically, Jesus Christ has already accomplished this by His own death and Resurrection. At the Second Coming, then, He shall terminate these enemies once and for all, freeing men from all taint of Sin forever and raising us body and soul to incorruptibility and immortal life. Thus, without His Resurrection in the first place, there is NO SALVATION! His Resurrection destroys Satan and Sin by destroying the source of their power: Death and corruptibility.
This is why we proclaim at Pascha, "Christ is risen from the dead, trampling down death by death..."
Do you have pews at all?
In the Russian tradition, we do not.
Thanks for the ping, RnMomof7.
Regarding babies, skull stomper, watch any newborn to 2 year old. They display anger when they don't get what they want. We must train them to control themselves when they are of the age to "understand" temper tantrums are wrong. Their angry displays do not make them evil children, merely evidence that there is a badness in them already which must be brought under control and done away with, if at all possible.
Left to "become" who they are without correction, we see these children later, in pre-teen and teen years (and even younger), as tyrants and/or manipulators...only concerned about and motivated by their own selfish wants and desires without regard to others' needs. These little tyrants are children who have not been taught to deny themselves or to control their wills.
Humanist psychologists would not have parents constrain babies/toddler/teens because their "self-esteem" may be injured if they are told they've done something "wrong," they don't "measure up" to a moral STANDARD of behavior. To humanists, "wrong" is relative.
I think that's another reason why you see so many kids doing so many things morally wrong today (as opposed to mischievous behavior). They have not been taught to deny their selfishness, have not been taught to control their will, have not been equipped to understand moral right and moral wrong. They are "standard" free, left to forge out their own tyrannical versions of right and wrong in our "if it feels good, do it" society.
And I believe you're mistaken. End of conversation.
I do not believe in "original sin". I also do not believe that you have a clue. Truth is self-evident.
Kevin, is it fair to ask why, if Man is inherently evil, there would be any struggle at all?
Oh, well. We all take our chances, one guesses.
"...why, if Man is inherently evil, there would be any struggle at all?"
Since God is good, I believe God needs us to be good, His goodness so enhanced.
If there were no such struggle, we would all seem automatons.
I'm not so sure he feels entirely that way...at least about men: Why Judaism Rejected Homosexuality.
Thank you for confirming that you are indeed a pagan.
Who are you to be so judgemental? Do you walk on water? I am underwhelmed.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.