No I don't see. The scriptures describe God exactly like the Church knows Him.
Then how do you or the Church explain how an omnipotent God is not a failure for not getting what you say He wants?
FK: ... that presumes that a man has something within himself that allows him to be able to love God. The Bible argues against that.
The Bible doesn't. All these prooftexts refer to the fallen man apart from the grace. But the grace is given us. It is by grace alone that we can turn to God and many do. You don't seem to disagree with that, and your question is, "when do all humans receive that grace?" The answer is, at all times since conception, of course, although ordinarily the outpouring of sanctifying grace occurs with the participation in the sacraments of the Church. (emphasis added)
I don't understand. All the scripture quotes I copied were about walking talking people, well after conception. Therefore, all of these people HAD saving grace if that is given "at all times since conception", from what you said. That doesn't match these same scriptures. Do you mean that, aside from the sacraments, all other people are given saving grace at various specific times in their lives? If so, then this would clearly show favoritism since all men would not have an equal shot. Some would get it at conception, leaving a lifetime to make the right choice, and others would get it on their death beds, etc.
FK: I hope you realize that you are putting the free will of man above the power of God ... Man's will now trumps God's will.
Not at all; we only have free will because God gave it to us: "God created man to his own image" (Gen 1:27).
I agree that God's will is that we have a will, however, if you say that man decides whether he goes to Heaven, and God's will is that all go, and most decide not to go, THEN man's will has trumped God's will, perhaps you would say, BY GOD'S WILL. :) Even if you allege that man's will still is superior. This would have God relegated to sort of a subservient silent partner. God puts up the resources, but man does all the work and is in charge of the operation.
FK: Would you save your child from playing with matches against her will?
Because I can. God cannot "save" a reprobate by violating the reprobate's free will, because it is a logical impossibility: love cannot be forced.
So you can save the lives of your children, regardless of their wills, but God CAN'T save the lives of His children without their consent??? This makes God sound like a vampire, impotent unless invited in. :) Why don't your children have to love you first before you are able to save their lives? I'm trying to figure out where this rule of yours for God comes from.
CS Lewis addressed this in “The Great Divorce,” a fascinating little book about heaven and hell, and who goes where and why.
People who cling to sin, who will not turn away from their vices, who treasure their faults (this is easier to do than you might think) keep themselves out of heaven. It is not God’s will that anyone stay out of heaven, but He allows people to choose where they want to be.
The book is very perceptive about what constitutes sin...
To use the child with matches analogy, if the parent corrects the child, keeps all matches away from the child, sooner or later the child will be older and have more freedom, and if the child still has the desire to play with matches, see things burn, if the child will not accept the correction from earlier, if the child ignores willfully the father’s loving teaching, then that child will likely be burned someday in spite of all the father tried to do.
Unless he put the child in a cage and allowed no matches near her, if she wants to burn things and explore fire, she will do so. Does the loving father want his daughter in a cage all her life? No. He wants the best for her: a free, life filled with happiness and no pain....
He does not want to place us in Paradise mechanically. He wants us to be saved; that is a condition of our souls. something is required of us to get there.
all men would not have an equal shot
Alll men do not have an equal shot because not all men are evangelized equally. For example, someone raised in Sweden would naturally be a Lutheran, and someone raised in a Baptist environment would naturally be a Baptist, or a Muslim would be a Muslim. All these are handicaps (of different severity, to be sure) that God takes into consideration when judging us. In other words, we are saved by our works and not by the perfection of our Catholic faith. This is how Baptists or Muslims, or any other faith that deprives itself from the sacraments of the Catohlici Church get saved.
God puts up the resources, but man does all the work and is in charge of the operation.
That is His will though. What you marvel about is no different than the pusslement of the apostles of how Christ will have to suffer and die for no fault of His own. In both cases, you expect God to exercize power, when God's love is self-emptying.
So you can save the lives of your children, regardless of their wills, but God CAN'T save the lives of His children without their consent???
Neither can I save my children from their free will. Your original question was about a child playing with matches. That, I can save them from, and likewise every time you breathe in another breath, God saved you in the same way. But I cannot save my daughter by marrying a jerk, or failing her future husband in some way. Those will be the adult decisions I will have to respect, even if they pain me.