Questions to Christians

[Immanuel Can]

God IS before all things, by definition. It's called being the "First Cause." So is God legitimately "before all things," and do all things "consist in Him"? Indeed so:

So in God's unconditional Love...

Where did you get the phrase "unconditional love"? All love happens within certain "conditions."

For example, if nothing else, there has to be consent of both parties. That's a condition of any relationship we would call a "love" relationship.

[Fairy]

Because whatever is the most valuable thing in the universe IS the thing most deserving of our affection. By definition, there's nothing higher.

So ok, we love and value God the supreme being most high with all our heart, and there is no other love worthy or deserving of our hearts devotion to that higher love. That love is the only real love worth loving.

Then what? or, so what? what changes? wouldn't life just carry on, the same as it ever was regardless of whether God is loved or not loved?

[Immanuel Can]

Because whatever is the most valuable thing in the universe IS the thing most deserving of our affection. By definition, there's nothing higher.

So ok, we love and value God the supreme being most high with all our heart, and there is no other love worthy or deserving of our hearts devotion to that higher love. That love is the only real love worth loving.

Then what? or, so what? what changes? wouldn't life just carry on, the same as it ever was regardless of whether God is loved or not loved?

That depends. What do you mean by "life just carry on"? Do you mean, "Carry on as it is?" Or do you hold it possible that entering into a relationship with somebody might well produce some fairly significant changes to life?

[Fairy]

Where did you get the phrase "unconditional love"? All love happens within certain "conditions."

For example, if nothing else, there has to be consent of both parties. That's a condition of any relationship we would call a "love" relationship.

I understand that. But are not all conditions unconditional? in that there is always the choice for both parties to consent to love or not consent to love.

And what ever choice is made, whether to love or not to love, would that choice make any difference to what is already this life that is unconditionally free to love or not love. What has loving or not loving God got anything to do with what is already this unconditional love that is life living free in constant flux of borderless beingness anyway? where's the relationship of borderless being? where is the relationship between the creator and the creation, surely there is no creator without the creation, just as there is no seer without the seen.

You probs won't understand this either...never mind, so I'm sorry in advance IC ... I wish never to waste your time, here on my thread, I hope you are brave enough to stay with me.

[accelafine]

Christian's 'what'?

Whatever is imagined, that's what.

What about, 'Questions to Christian's second cousin who lives just around the corner' ?

[Fairy]

That depends. What do you mean by "life just carry on"? Do you mean, "Carry on as it is?" Or do you hold it possible that entering into a relationship with somebody might well produce some fairly significant changes to life?

I don't really know what I meant by carry on, only that whether I love somebody else or not, that would not take away or add any more to the love I already am.

But then again, by entering into a relationship with somebody else, might just significantly change the love that I already am. How so...probably because the love that I already am would be doubled, when I'm loving someone else as well, my love would be greater love than the lesser love that it was before I chose to love another.

Is that what you meant?

[Fairy]

Christian's 'what'?

Whatever is imagined, that's what.

What about, 'Questions to Christian's second cousin who lives just around the corner' ?

Hardly that even, I am talking about Questions to the God believers.

[Harbal]

God IS before all things, by definition. It's called being the "First Cause." So is God legitimately "before all things," and do all things "consist in Him"? Indeed so: and it's a claim that Scripture is glad to make (see Col. 1:17).

But none of that prevents God from having priorities. So why is it not legitimate to ask what God puts before all other things?

Because whatever is the most valuable thing in the universe IS the thing most deserving of our affection. By definition, there's nothing higher.

But I'm not asking what is most deserving of our affection, I'm asking what God considers to be the most deserving of his affection.

But God is said to be eternal, therefore he can't die. But I suppose you are talking about the earthly death of Christ. Whether presented as truth, or allegory, I have never understood the "logic" of Christ's death being a benefit to anybody. It makes absolutely no sense to me, and believe me, I have genuinely tried to understand the underlying concept.

It's called "substitutionary atonement." And it's actually not a hard concept to understand. There are at least rough parallels in ordinary human practice. Think of when somebody else pays your fine for you, and you don't end up going to jail.

But for that to be analogous, the law would have to pay the fine that the law itself has imposed on me. Where's the sense in that?

It's when somebody else gives you a kidney, so you don't end up on dialysis.

But, going with the analogy again, I wouldn't need a kidney if God hadn't buggered mine up to start with.

Well we are all inevitably the centre of our own universe,...

Actually, the obvious fact is the opposite. You and I come into a world that was already formed and running when we were born. During our lives, much of what happens to us, from cradle to grave, is beyond our ability even to influence, let alone control; and what actually we can control or change often turns out to be very small, local, and only related to our own immediate situation. And we're totally out of control of when and how we die...short of suicide. And then, when we're gone, the universe will go on as if we never existed. So of what were we the center?

The entirety of our life experience takes place around us, therefore we are at its centre.

Maybe the real marvel is that so many people think they're some kind of "center of the universe" when nothing could be farther from the obvious truth.

And yet we can only experience the conduct of the universe as something that goes on around us.

But if we have any duty at all, as human beings, I think it is towards other human beings, and not to "supreme" beings, whether they be real or fictional.

To fictional ones, you're right; we can have no duty. But if God is God, then not only is it obvious we have duty to Him, but it's been an instant recognition by all cultures and by practically every person who has ever lived that we do.

I think your view is already well known, I am just expressing mine.

If it's not obvious to you, that might be a function of being raised in an atypically unspiritual culture.

I put it down to not being conditioned or brainwashed to the same extent as some people, or maybe not being as susceptible to the effects of it as some.

It's certainly not the world or historical average. And given that all attempts to construct a metaethical basis for morality on secular lines have been dismal failures so far, then if we believe in morality at all, it's only because of that legacy of recognition that mankind has that God should be the focus of our duty.

Although I am interested in why people believe the bizarre things many of them do, it's not really a matter of importance unless it threatens me in some way. I am just thankful that I don't live in a time or place where I have to pretend to believe something I don't.

[Immanuel Can]

Where did you get the phrase "unconditional love"? All love happens within certain "conditions."

For example, if nothing else, there has to be consent of both parties. That's a condition of any relationship we would call a "love" relationship.

I understand that. But are not all conditions unconditional? in that there is always the choice for both parties to consent to love or not consent to love.

Um...no, conditions are conditions. They're all "conditional."

..would that choice make any difference...

See my last answer, in the previous message.

[Immanuel Can]

...the love I already am.

I don't get this phrase.

[Fairy]

...the love I already am.

I don't get this phrase.

I mean the feeling of Love. Does the feeling of Love have any border, or is the feeling of Love borderless?

[Fairy]

Um...no, conditions are conditions. They're all "conditional."

Yes they are conditional only by definition of the word conditional, but to even know what conditional means the conditional would have to be unconditional so as to be able to make a comparison.

[Immanuel Can]

But none of that prevents God from having priorities. So why is it not legitimate to ask what God puts before all other things?

Because whatever is the most valuable thing in the universe IS the thing most deserving of our affection. By definition, there's nothing higher.

But I'm not asking what is most deserving of our affection, I'm asking what God considers to be the most deserving of his affection.

Well, "supreme" means that there isn't anything greater -- in any dimension of value.

But God is said to be eternal, therefore he can't die. But I suppose you are talking about the earthly death of Christ. Whether presented as truth, or allegory, I have never understood the "logic" of Christ's death being a benefit to anybody. It makes absolutely no sense to me, and believe me, I have genuinely tried to understand the underlying concept.

It's called "substitutionary atonement." And it's actually not a hard concept to understand. There are at least rough parallels in ordinary human practice. Think of when somebody else pays your fine for you, and you don't end up going to jail.

But for that to be analogous, the law would have to pay the fine that the law itself has imposed on me. Where's the sense in that?

If you've committed the crime, and the judge just ignores that, then he's not much of a judge, is he? He'd be ignoring the law, not upholding it. The judge, the one who was supposed to stand for the law and uphold it, just waived it and made it no longer matter. Essentially, he colluded with you in getting away with your crime.

What's to be done with the next criminal, then? If the judge then prosecutes him, he's unfair; if he doesn't, though, then is he now bound by the principle of fairness to forgo all his duty to uphold the law?

Is he even deserving of being called a judge...or of being called an agent of justice? Or is he now just another type of criminal?

Well we are all inevitably the centre of our own universe,...

Actually, the obvious fact is the opposite. You and I come into a world that was already formed and running when we were born. During our lives, much of what happens to us, from cradle to grave, is beyond our ability even to influence, let alone control; and what actually we can control or change often turns out to be very small, local, and only related to our own immediate situation. And we're totally out of control of when and how we die...short of suicide. And then, when we're gone, the universe will go on as if we never existed. So of what were we the center?

The entirety of our life experience takes place around us, therefore we are at its centre.

That's the illusion: because we are born as the center of our own perspective on the world and our own experience, we tend to think we're very important. There's nothing unusual, therefore, about human hubris, even though it's quite out of proportion to reality.

If it's not obvious to you, that might be a function of being raised in an atypically unspiritual culture.

I put it down to not being conditioned or brainwashed to the same extent as some people, or maybe not being as susceptible to the effects of it as some.

Can you be brainwashed or conditioned into Atheism, or is it only people from other places and cultures that can be brainwashed and conditioned by their ethos?

[Immanuel Can]

Um...no, conditions are conditions. They're all "conditional."

Yes they are conditional only by definition of the word conditional, but to even know what conditional means the conditional would have to be unconditional so as to be able to make a comparison.

Now it seems you're only playing word-games, and with nothing at stake. I'll forgo further comment on that, therefore.

[Fairy]

Um...no, conditions are conditions. They're all "conditional."

Yes they are conditional only by definition of the word conditional, but to even know what conditional means the conditional would have to be unconditional so as to be able to make a comparison.

Now it seems you're only playing word-games, and with nothing at stake. I'll forgo further comment on that, therefore.

Seriously I just give up. This is pure torture.

I'm so done with this BS

IC, just leave me. I don't want you to stay with with me anymore. It's nothing personal you understand, it's just that we seem to have a huge language barrier you and I and that doesn't look like it will ever change any time soon. I'm not even interested any more in trying to reconcile with you about anything to do with the subject of God that we can both agree on. It seems we are living on two different planets. And the gaping big gap between both our unique understandings of what we are each trying in vain to show each other seems to be getting wider and wider, looking almost like it will never close ever, even if it had an infinitely eternal amount of time in which to close. It's obvious it's never going to happen. So be it. I'm done, my work is done. It is finished.