Christianity

[Immanuel Can]

Here’s another way to look at it, fool.

Not interested.

I do not write because I desire to excite your interest.

Mission accomplished, then.

[iambiguous]

C.S. Lewis and the Search for Rational Religion by John Beversluis
John Loftus heartily agrees with a debunking of C.S. Lewis.

Beversluis subjects this argument [Argument from Desire] to criticism on several fronts. How universal is the desire for this ‘joy’? Is Lewis’ description of ‘joy’ a natural desire at all, since such desires are biological and instinctive?

As with other emotional and psychological states, mere mortals come into the world hard-wired biologically/genetically to feel joy...exultation, rapture, satisfaction, fulfillment, triumph, etc....in different contexts in different ways. In fact, however, experiences that some embody joyfully others will instead detest entirely. Think of all the moral and political conflagrations that still beset the human species. Joy among those in the red states and those in the blue states. Joy for many in Ukraine and joy for many in Russia. Joy for many who reside in Gaza and joy for many who reside in Israel. Joy in and out of a Planned parenthood clinic. Joy for those who celebrate the execution of prisoners who murdered a loved one and joy for those when a governor instead grants clemency for them.

Must our desires have possible fulfillment? What about people who have been satisfied by things other than God – with their careers, spouses and children?

And what of those who are able to seamlessly intertwine their fulfillment to both? In their heads, in other words. After all, it's not like we live in a world where this isn't done all the time. You simply believe what you do about God and Mammon. Indeed, those who embrace one or another rendition of "Prosperity Gospel" all but insist that Mathew 6:24 just doesn't include them. Somehow.

In what I consider the most devastating question, he asks if there is any propositional content to Lewis’ argument. Surely if there is an object corresponding to the desire for ‘joy’, then someone who finds this object should be able to describe it from her desire. Beversluis argues she cannot do this, and since that’s the case, how can she know there’s an object which corresponds to the desire for ‘joy’?

"Propositional content, philosophy: The propositional content of a statement is what can be called true or false when the meaning is clear. The problem is how the situation and context can be made clear in the evaluation." Philosophy Dictionary of Arguments

When the meaning is clear? And in that case here, how does the meaning not revolve around what C.S. Lewis himself proposes about the Christian God in his head? Or does he make his propositions regarding Christianity clearer than that? His own rendition of the Reasonable Faith videos, perhaps?

As for describing the joy a Christian feels for his or her God, when has that ever really been necessary at all? Instead, that becomes manifested in a leap of faith or in a wager or in falling back on the Bible as revealing the truth about God because it conveys nothing less than the word of God itself.

[Martin Peter Clarke]

The thing is Alexis, IC's right. I hate his evil God.

But spot on that he wants to be despised, 'persecuted for righteousness' sake'. There's a sublimated sexual thrill in that. Religious ecstasy.

And, Iam, Lewis was 2nd rate at the time. At the end of the day, no matter that he wasn't the helplessly evil damnationist that IC and his projection are, he still believed in an incompetent God, 'My will be done' keeps you in Hell's open prison. How 3rd rate.

Barth, Brunner, the Torrances, C. Baxter Kruger, the neo-orthodox do better. Barth was an actual universalist obviously. Signalling it in plain sight. Just tilt your head. And beyond them you have those emerging from God the Damner. Rob Bell. Brian McLaren. Richard Rohr. Tony Campolo (RIP). Shane Claiborne. Steve Chalke. They all contribute to a superb faith.

Which can no longer be enough for me. In the utter absence of any evidence whatsoever in nature.

Even so, they're the best there is by a country mile. They've all rediscovered the social gospel. And none are theological liberals. They all extend good will to the Trinity, and Incarnation. As do I. Jesus believed in himself. They have generous orthodoxy without any weak hostility. Which is why they're doomed to be marginal at best.

IC is Mr. Christian.

[Alexis Jacobi]

You know what is ironic here? Let us say that I agree with (what I understand of your) position: his god is really a demiurge. A sadist really. And we see the psychological pathology in that definition of God. Then, we see that IC (and so many evangelicals but also most Christians) creates, in his way, the “hell” in which he resides.

The disturbing element is that he teaches this Bible literalism. So if he is wrong there is the entire question of responsibility for indoctrination. The “meme” moves constantly.

So we seem to agree “here is a man who maintains a hell”. He did not create it (it is a universal notion) but he constructs upon this foundation.

I propose, obviously, that IC-like religionists, like their imago of a terrifying Yahweh, requires therapy. So it is IC who, like one of his forlorn sinners, whose sin has captured him ‘for all eternity’, must therapy his way out.

[The Course, Immanuel! The Course!]

Who can liberate him? He wants to be there.

Its odd because he tries to argue that sinners choose their “separation”. It is not God who sends them there. God does not intervene.

Don’t misconstrue. I think people effectively live in their hell-realms. What irks and troubles us are those who “do bad” or “do evil” but appear to suffer no consequences.

What happens psychically and psychologically to someone who has really done harm? I remember a friend who lived with curanderos in the Sierra Mazateca. He assisted when former members of Sendero Luminoso (a Peruvian guerrilla group known for atrocities) when they were high on mushrooms they confronted God. They were howling and crying in extreme remorseful pain (having murdered peasants, cut babies out of wombs, really atrocious stuff).

But there, inwardly, under the effect of the mushroom and in the care of those healers, they confronted their acts, their choices. These were men who really suffered under weight of their atrocities. And sone of them, who knows how or why, sought a cure in a remote Indian village with curanderos who use mushrooms and salvia divinorum.

I tend to think that death may be like the mushroom experience: no longer any way to hide. Completely naked before God, or a guiding spirit, or a group of souls who administer our lives in this plane.

I do not dismiss IC if he proposes that at one time or another, in life or after death, it will all be “judged”. We will participate in our judgment. We will become transparent to ourselves.

[Alexis Jacobi]

Mission accomplished, then.

You know, Immanuel, they say “it ain’t over till the Fat Lady sings”.

Or I’m finally taken out…

[Martin Peter Clarke]

I edited above you Alexis. Yeah, there is hope. I too have survived to regret, to want to atone. It's very human. Very natural.

[Dubious]

I do not dismiss IC if he proposes that at one time or another, in life or after death, it will all be “judged”. We will participate in our judgment. We will become transparent to ourselves.

For some yes; for others naught and never. It all depends how one's individual conscience will judge one in the end or close to. One can remain blind to one's deeds and faults until the last moment is finalized. There is no other revelation to be had or to encounter. That there are things we regret and painfully so can happen any time!

[promethean75]

"You know what is ironic here?"

Here is a short list of ironies compiled by A. Morissette (from The Lost Continent of Alanis)

1. A traffic jam when you're already late.
2. A no smoking sign on your cigarette break.
3. It's like ten thousand spoons when all you need is a knife.
4. It's meeting the man of your dreams and then meeting his beautiful wife.

[Immanuel Can]

Mission accomplished, then.

You know, Immanuel, they say “it ain’t over till the Fat Lady sings”.

It’s over. You bored me already.

[Belinda]

You know what is ironic here? Let us say that I agree with (what I understand of your) position: his god is really a demiurge. A sadist really. And we see the psychological pathology in that definition of God. Then, we see that IC (and so many evangelicals but also most Christians) creates, in his way, the “hell” in which he resides.

The disturbing element is that he teaches this Bible literalism. So if he is wrong there is the entire question of responsibility for indoctrination. The “meme” moves constantly.

So we seem to agree “here is a man who maintains a hell”. He did not create it (it is a universal notion) but he constructs upon this foundation.

I propose, obviously, that IC-like religionists, like their imago of a terrifying Yahweh, requires therapy. So it is IC who, like one of his forlorn sinners, whose sin has captured him ‘for all eternity’, must therapy his way out.

[The Course, Immanuel! The Course!]

Who can liberate him? He wants to be there.

Its odd because he tries to argue that sinners choose their “separation”. It is not God who sends them there. God does not intervene.

Don’t misconstrue. I think people effectively live in their hell-realms. What irks and troubles us are those who “do bad” or “do evil” but appear to suffer no consequences.

What happens psychically and psychologically to someone who has really done harm? I remember a friend who lived with curanderos in the Sierra Mazateca. He assisted when former members of Sendero Luminoso (a Peruvian guerrilla group known for atrocities) when they were high on mushrooms they confronted God. They were howling and crying in extreme remorseful pain (having murdered peasants, cut babies out of wombs, really atrocious stuff).

But there, inwardly, under the effect of the mushroom and in the care of those healers, they confronted their acts, their choices. These were men who really suffered under weight of their atrocities. And sone of them, who knows how or why, sought a cure in a remote Indian village with curanderos who use mushrooms and salvia divinorum.

I tend to think that death may be like the mushroom experience: no longer any way to hide. Completely naked before God, or a guiding spirit, or a group of souls who administer our lives in this plane.

I do not dismiss IC if he proposes that at one time or another, in life or after death, it will all be “judged”. We will participate in our judgment. We will become transparent to ourselves.

That is wishful thinking , Alexis. Psychopathy may be intractable.

I suppose these mushrooms and that salvia is not ethical for doctors to use? If it's ethical, why is that medication not used?

If Hell is purely psychological — the torment of guilt and self-condemnation — then it presupposes the capacity for remorse. But some people simply don’t have that wiring. Psychopathy shows us that lack of remorse can be structural, not just attitudinal. You can trigger fleeting empathy with psychedelics or ritual, but when the drug wears off, the architecture is unchanged. You can’t “rectify” a Hell that was never there in the first place.

[Martin Peter Clarke]

30% of us are on the psychopathic spectrum. 3% of lawyers, criminals, managers, leaders, surgeons (I suspect), psychiatrists are high end. 1% for the rest of us. I'm sure evolution knows what it's doing... Apparently many even severe psychopaths feel remorse, they just can't initiate it.

[Belinda]

30% of us are on the psychopathic spectrum. 3% of lawyers, criminals, managers, leaders, surgeons (I suspect), psychiatrists are high end. 1% for the rest of us. I'm sure evolution knows what it's doing... Apparently many even severe psychopaths feel remorse, they just can't initiate it.

There is no spectrum for intractable psychopathy. The anatomy is either there or it's not.
I suspect you confuse psychopathy and neuropathy.

[Martin Peter Clarke]

30% of us are on the psychopathic spectrum. 3% of lawyers, criminals, managers, leaders, surgeons (I suspect), psychiatrists are high end. 1% for the rest of us. I'm sure evolution knows what it's doing... Apparently many even severe psychopaths feel remorse, they just can't initiate it.

There is no spectrum for intractable psychopathy. The anatomy is either there or it's not.
I suspect you confuse psychopathy and neuropathy.

No.

[Alexis Jacobi]

And here I am, years later. I'm feeling as if the PN forum is a fruit from which all the skeptical "juice" has long ago been drained. And on the "Christian" thread we are left with a parade of non-Christians, people who have no actual grasp of Christianity at all, for the most part, endlessly recycling obvious fallacies and silly allegations, rather than any serious objections. And I find myself increasingly bored and unchallenged here. So my thought is to participate less, in future, and perhaps not at all anymore. It's beginning to look like a waste of time. People here don't want to face any of the real nature or actual claims of Christianity. They just want enough skepticism to be preserved that they can continue not to think about it.

In my case, because I am committed to “gain”, I do not recognize loss, wasted time, lack of depth in the responses, silliness etc etc. I am going back through this particular post of your because for the first time you laid out something personal plainly and directly. Your response (to any of this) is not required, Immanuel. Since one cannot actually talk with you, be silent! Your ship may yet come in.

When the Cheshire Cat is in its visibility sitting there on its branch, we have The Picture. But when the Cheshire Cat activates the invisibility-function, he is still “there” right? but seeing becomes a different endeavor. Because one has to look with different eyes.

Gloucester (King Lear) you will remember, spoke through realization, not through surface seeing:

I have no way and therefore want no eyes; I stumbled when I saw.

Where was The Spirit shown, or how was it shown, in this certainly most marvelous play?

People here don't want to face any of the real nature or actual claims of Christianity. They just want enough skepticism to be preserved that they can continue not to think about it.

I have a few comments but since one does not actually talk to IC, I know it will be rejected out of hand. “Not interested” etc. etc.

If I talk about my own trajectory it may illustrate perhaps a part of how my thinking has moved along (and we are talking about a period of 10 years+).

I became interested in a current, say, that involved not just a gentle “turn to the right” but taking such a turn in a rational/mathematical sense: i.e. defining the most acute example of a radical metaphysical posture. We all know a great deal about the radical left current and this existing current that takes people to the farthest reaches of radical transformation. If it can be said to be “a spirit” it really is there. Radical feminism, radical economic views, radical opposition to sexual normalcy; radical stances against ‘gender normativity’.

Once ‘the ground’ has been lost or erased, or once it seems to have been made to disappear, people exist in territories of metaphysical groundlessness. In my view this “defines our present”. Obviously I have written a good deal about this.

But what is the opposite of that particular radical spirit? Who goes in the other direction? And what is or what might be the “metaphysical bases” on which that metaphysical radicalism, with terrestrial implications, is defined.

That is why Jonathan Bowden’s talk on Savitri Devi is at the very least interesting. She took a radical idea and, powered by “mathematical logic”, went to the very edges of radical definition. In her extreme radicalism the Hindu god Vishnu becomes manifest in European history as the Spirit behind National Socialism. It really seems like crazy stuff, granted, but the actual issue is “metaphysical logic” and the radicalism of ideas.

In our present — I will refer to one example that has impressed me with its radical essence — is Denis Fahey and his depth position on Christ is King.

Simply put, a radical metaphysical figure (King Christ) is extended in an absolute sense to preside over manifest life. Creation, being, on-going life, social and economic relations, and all the rest. This Christ King embodies something ever-present and dynamic in Judaism: that there is only one “God” and all others (and all other paths, interpretations, means of realizing God) are demonic deviations.

This is “metaphysical radicalism” in operation. And here is the interesting thing: this “idea” has now been launched (think Candace Owens) is our present (well, in America I mean).

So my position is not so much to either support or oppose M. Immanuel Can, but rather (and properly for a philosophical forum) attempt to ‘see’ beyond the surface images and into the metaphorical cores.

[Martin Peter Clarke]

Metaphorical cores? Fear and loathing of humanity. Disgust. Gustation. Taste. Feeling sick. Wanting to vomit.

You seem closest to trying a Rogerian approach, but that doesn't work when you're being poisoned and strafed. As Rapoport noted https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rogerian_ ... imitations