Posted on 05/07/2014 2:27:46 AM PDT by markomalley
Most of us take it for granted that Satan hates us. But why does he hate us? That question recently came up in my Our Sunday Visitor column. It is a very different kind of writing than I do here, in that it requires me to provide very brief answers. But I’m sure you sometimes appreciate brevity on the blog! Thus consider a brief post today on a mysterious question:
Q: In the sermon the other day, the priest said Satan hates us. It occurred to me to ask, why does Satan hate me, what did I ever do to him? – John Smoot, Bayonne NJ.
A: To be sure, there are very deep mysteries involved in the motives for Satan’s hatred. We struggle to understand our own human psyches, let alone trying to understand the psyche of a fallen angelic person.
However, an important clue to Satan’s hatred is contained in the third temptation he makes to Jesus in the desert. Showing Jesus all the kingdoms of the world he says, “All these I will give you, if you will but fall down and worship me” (Matthew 4:10).
Here we see the curtain pulled back, and we glimpse for a moment the kind of inner torment that dominates Satan. He seems desperate to be adored. He cannot bear that he is a creature and that there is another, other than himself (God), who is ever to be adored.
Thus in his colossal pride Satan hates, first of all, God. And by extension, he hates everyone and everything that manifests the glory of God. Even more, he hates those who seek to adore God rather than him. In his venomous pride, Satan seeks to destroy the Church, which declares the glory of God and reminds us that God alone is to be adored. Surely he hates and seeks to destroy those who even try to adore God, and who do not accord him, Satan, the worship and pride of place for which he ravenously hungers.
Hence, as the text from the temptation in the desert suggests, Satan is tormented by pride, and his torment is filled with deep hatred for all who worship God and all who draw others to the worship of the one, true God.
For blog readers I might also suggest several sources on demonology that I have found helpful:
An Interview with an Exorcist by Fr. Jose Antonio Fortea
The Devil you Don’t Know By Fr. Louis Cameli
The Deceiver – Our Daily Struggle with Satan by Fr. Livio Fanzaga
Uh.....OK
God Himself is the ONLY Savior and Redeemer.
Yes. He kinda MADE things that way.
Not sure why this is such a controversial statement...
I don’t think I’ve been there. Which future saint is a native?
Again. Show ANY scripture that supports your position that God is the author of evilness.
You haven’t because you can’t.
I prefer to develop my beliefs and faith Biblically. And, Biblically speaking, no God is not a cuddly being you are trying to bend my words into. Tell Sodom about it. Tell Noahs neighbors about it.
My words to describe Him are Good, Holy, Righteous, Just. I ascribe to Him no evil nor evilness. THAT is Biblical. THAT is in accordance with His word.
So, God didn’t create everything. There are some things beyond his control.
Got it...
Seriously, you seem to be having problems with the concept of free will.
God is omniscient and omnipotent, but he chooses not to have men - created in his image - function as mere robots or zombis. That does not detract from his omnipotence - which itself does not demand exercising power to the greatest possible degree all the time (because then it wouldn't be omnipotent, would it?)
God knows that men will sometimes abuse the free will that he has loaned to them - but the alternative, that no-one have any power to freely choose to love God and serve him - is worse.
Lewis again: "There are only two kinds of people in the end: those who say to God, 'Thy will be done,' and those to whom God says, in the end, 'Thy will be done.'"
God created that capacity. Period. God KNEW we'd abuse it. He CREATED us that way...
I'm not having problems with any of these concepts. I know full well what they mean.
I'm just not in denial that GOD did this on purpose.
So for you all choice is illusory?
No. Quite the contrary...
We have the capacity to choose. Either way we choose serves Gods ends. The consequences for those choices are equally real.
What those ends are, I do not pretend to understand. Nor should anyone else...
And the god you follow is evil at heart, got it.
You reject that JHVH created evil. Fine.
But that is not what you have said. You used the word ‘sadistic’ to describe your god.
You said “Created the capacity’. There, I believe, you have some truth. That capacity is what I called Free Will.Yep, God created that. But it was our choice to use that Free Will for evil (sin). God did not cause it, make it, create it. He did create that capacity.
That is a far sight different than actively and directly creating evil and turning it loose.
You still have no scripture to say that God so loved the world that He created sin.
I think it’s useful to view evil not as something created but rather the absence of good. Just like a candle doesn’t create darkness when it’s taken out of a room, God didn’t create evil, evil was (and continues to be) chosen over good. Chosen by Satan when he rebelled against God and chosen by us when we choose evil over good.
Yes God created Satan, but he created him originally good. It was his choice to prefer the darkness over the light.
Now one might say, “what about storms and plagues and such, are you saying we choose to have hurricanes and plagues?”
These so-called “acts of God” are not evil in of themselves. A hurricane isn’t evil, it’s simply a force of nature. A bacterium (or virus) isn’t evil, it’s natural. The consequences of these things we may call “evil” but they aren’t. They are God’s Will, therefore they can’t be evil. They are, although we can’t see it probably until we get to heaven, good things. All that comes from God is good. Sometimes this goodness causes us pain, but this is our fallen nature that perceives it as pain. And of course, loosing our loved ones to natural disasters are painful no question. But we can’t conclude because we are in pain that what caused the pain is evil.
Again evil is simply an absence of good. Otherwise God is an author of evil, a cruel watchmaker that on occasion makes his children suffer for no reason at all, other than to keep evil “alive”. That’s not God, that’s the Devil who does that.
There is no reason to not believe evil is simply the absence of good, other than a self-centered view of the world. A view that says, “Anytime I’m hurt, that’s evil”. This is not useful. This brings no real freedom. The only freedom comes from serving God and following his will. In other words, not doing evil. And indeed, even his son, Jesus said, not my will, but yours, before he was nailed to a cross.
So if even the Son so submits to God (in his humanity) then surely we should do the same, even in the midst of our own crucifixion, or else suffering really has no meaning. Even the suffering of Jesus on the Cross.
Why does it exist?
Because God created it.
Who created the Devil? Who created him as he is? Who thought that the idea of creating a being like that was a good idea? Knowing full well what the Devil would then do?
Satan hates us because he’s not worshiped and adored? God destroyed the entire world save Noah, and a few people and animals for the very same reason.
Real Love (which is what God is, at least in part) creates. Not out of selfishness, not because it “has to” but because that’s what love does. It creates.
A consequence also of love is allowing the other to do as he wishes, even if that wish is to be cut off from that love. Otherwise it’s slavery. It’s slavery to create something that has no will of its own. Thus, God doesn’t regret creating Satan any more than he regrets creating you or me.
It isn’t truly loving HIM if we don’t have the capacity to reject him. Just like it wouldn’t be truly loving of him to create something (or someone) that was just an automatic slave. How can it be said we are above all creation if we are exactly like all creation, if we don’t have the ability to reject him? If we don’t, then we are no different than a stone or a bacterium. And this isn’t what God wants, he wants us to live forever (unlike his will for a bacterium).
He wants to give us more than he gave a bacterium, a stone, an ape, a cheetah, the sun, a black hole, a proton or even a Democrat (haha ok that last one is a bit of a joke but you get my meaning now). He wants to give us eternity, existence for all eternity with him.
And to get that, we must have as much love in our heart as he does, because “nothing unclean shall enter heaven”.
So to be like that, we have to have real love in our hearts (because again, that’s what God is, he IS, real love, so to spend eternity with him we must have only that too).
And to have real love in our hearts we must have the ability to have real love.
And we don’t have that, if we are robots.
Good day FRiend. Follow your god. You know that one that manifests evil.
You understand what I’m saying but reject the idea.
Very well.
FReegards...
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