[net.religion] OMNIPOTENT God and Love

rtris (04/07/83)

In response to Don Chan's (utcsrgv!donald) article w.r.t. an OMNIPOTENT God.

I think the position I stated w.r.t. Yigal's article can be maintained
consistently but didn't want to spend a page at it at that time. But Don
(correctly) rips what I said apart, so I will try to explain my understanding
more fully.
Remember, I don't think I'm proving anything, merely showing that I think
something can be held consistently.

First, I'd like to deal with his last remark: if God is OMNIPOTENT it makes
no sense to say he loves us (my paraphrase).
One of the axioms of Christianity is that God is a personal God. We are
persons, and we are made in his image. Christ was one with God and Christ
was a person, and loved etc. etc. God's omnipotence exists within this
context (and I don't see off hand how it limits it).

Now then, a short treatise on the problem of moral evil (my understanding
of it anyway).

God is at the decision point. To create or not to create, that's the question.
His motivation for creation was that he was ALONE, and wanted fellowship with
beings, that would be satisfying. The only way to accomplish that was to create
beings with FREE WILL (relationships with robots, however sophisticated, is
unsatisfying). He acknowledged at that point that these beings could abuse
that free will. If they so chose however, it would be at great cost to them,
and to God, but that situation too, God would be able to work to the good of
all involved.
   So knowing the possibilities, God chose to create and WE messed things up.
Now moral evil exists in the world, and God disapproves (bleh what a square
word). But to get rid of the evil, he would have REMOVE our free will
(you'll notice that I'm defining moral evil as rebellion against God and
His ways). This however would undo what he has wrought. It would go
counter to the spirit of the thing. Furthermore, note that man was not
created to be happy, but a companion to God. (It also doesn't say man
isn't supposed to be happy, but that's not his Purpose). So God carries
on His creation, attempting to communicate with humanity (in a way
suited to His purpose (which are probably more complicated in totality than
I indicated)). And that's how we came to be where we are.

							Ralph.

P.S. Eternal life may seem like it's going to be a bore, but it also promises
that there will be no sorrow, pain or tears or such things. So I'm sure
God will provide some kind of solution. (P.P.S. Sometimes (in my more
"blasphemous" instants) I think all this was created
in a moment of Cosmic Boredom.....)

mark (04/10/83)

the article this follows up stated that god is omnipotent, and then went on
to explain how god created humans with free will so that they would make
interesting companions, but we abused our freedom of choise and messed
things up.  this strikes me as a pretty poor grade of omnipotence.  why 
couldn't god create people that would not make bad choises?  surely some
of us do choose "rightly"; what's wrong with the rest of us - manufacturing
defects?

			mARK bLOORE
			univ of toronto
			decvax!utzoo!mark