I have used this quote by Hosea Ballou before, but it is brilliantly articulated with regards to the absurdity that God would cast a soul into "hell" for eternity.
As to the justice of endless punishment...Such justice is evidently predicated on the false principle and ungodly practice of rendering evil for evil.
God gives according to each of our needs. Not equally, but fairly. We cannot be equal because we are all created with a spectrum of different aptitudes, perspectives, weaknesses, talents and spiritual needs.
Believing God consistent, we are also given to according to our need for atonement and enlightenment. A finite yet fair and temporary state of purification, administered medicinally, not vengefully. Vengeance is human and is administered for selfish purposes. A purification, as is a jail sentence, is administered for the rehabilitative benefit of those being purified or sentenced.
Human applications of eternal vengeance do not apply to the Divine. It is a narrow and laughable view to think that God operates with such temperamental human emotions.
Vatican, listening?
And speaking of the Vatican - they just released a "New List of SINS" (see article below).
Pay particular attention to the third sentence: Modern times bring with them modern sins. If then, Vatican, you choose to pay attention to the modernity and invention of 'new sins' how can you refuse with indignance (whilst clutching ineffective dogmatic tradtion) to update your means of "saving the world"? No women priests have yet been given clearance to emerge from the Church to address the MODERN needs of dwindling priest populations. Vaginas must still too modern for the church. But by God, you had better get praying that God will send more men to become priests by vocation. How ridiculous.
Vatican lists "new sins," including pollution
By Philip Pullella – Yahoo News – Edited by Keith Weir – 3/10/08
Thou shall not pollute the Earth. Thou shall beware genetic manipulation. Modern times bring with them modern sins. So the Vatican has told the faithful that they should be aware of "new" sins such as causing environmental blight. The guidance came at the weekend when Archbishop Gianfranco Girotti, the Vatican's number two man in the sometimes murky area of sins and penance, spoke of modern evils. Asked what he believed were today's "new sins," he told the Vatican newspaper L'Osservatore Romano that the greatest danger zone for the modern soul was the largely uncharted world of bioethics. "(Within bioethics) there are areas where we absolutely must denounce some violations of the fundamental rights of human nature through experiments and genetic manipulation whose outcome is difficult to predict and control," he said. The Vatican opposes stem cell research that involves destruction of embryos and has warned against the prospect of human cloning. Girotti, in an interview headlined "New Forms of Social Sin," also listed "ecological" offences as modern evils. In recent months, Pope Benedict has made several strong appeals for the protection of the environment, saying issues such as climate change had become gravely important for the entire human race. Under Benedict and his predecessor John Paul, the Vatican has become progressively "green." It has installed photovoltaic cells on buildings to produce electricity and hosted a scientific conference to discuss the ramifications of global warming and climate change, widely blamed on human use of fossil fuels. Girotti, who is number two in the Vatican "Apostolic Penitentiary," which deals with matter of conscience, also listed drug trafficking and social and economic injustices as modern sins. But Girotti also bemoaned that fewer and fewer Catholics go to confession at all. He pointed to a study by Milan's Catholic University that showed that up to 60 percent of Catholic faithful in Italy stopped going to confession. In the sacrament of Penance, Catholics confess their sins to a priest who absolves them in God's name. But the same study by the Catholic University showed that 30 percent of Italian Catholics believed that there was no need for a priest to be God's intermediary and 20 percent felt uncomfortable talking about their sins to another person.
1 comment:
New sins? Really? If ever proof positive were needed that religion, dogmatic, staid, conventional reliigions, were just made up out of thin air by those with some agenda, this is that proof.
Also, it has always struck me that the kind of tit for tat punishment model of religous nutters is predicated on this notion that something we, the insignicant, have done to offend god. My son cannot offend me, as he is only a child. I may teach him a lesson he doesn't want to learn, but the loving emphasis is always on achieving for him a state of happiness in accordance with the rules of the house. When he throws a temper tantrum, I don't punch him back. We are not equals. Presupposing the almighty, why would I assume punishment that is not ultimately redempptive? Doesn't that also suppose an equality with god that cannot by definition, be true?
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