r/CatholicPhilosophy

There are different ways of reading the Bible. A valid way of reading it would be understanding what its authors intentions are, who their intended audience is, and how they came to be. Ancient Hebrews used to believe that the world was flat and the sun moves across the sky, in agreement with the ancient Babylonian cosmology. Based on this understanding of nature, the Church found the heliocentric theory to be suspect. Science also proved that a literal interpretation of the stories of creation in Genesis is wrong. In the New Testament, the author(s)of Mark and the apostle Paul believed that the return of the Messiah would be imminent, to coincide with the destruction of the Second Temple in Jerusalem. This prophecy never came to pass. There are numerous other passages in the Bible that contradict the idea of a loving and merciful God if they are read as they are, and not in a metaphorical sense. Some Mosaic laws are interpreted literally while others are only understood “in spirit of the law”. What then are the criteria of theologians when making decisions on whether a metaphorical and not a literal sense are to be used when understanding Biblical passages?

Representationalism is the view that concepts are mental pictures that may or may not correspond to reality. This doesn't seem to be the theory that Catholic Philosophy uses, so I was wondering if we have any arguments against it.

I have a bachelor’s in philosophy from a public university and am thinking of maybe going back for my masters (not right now but perhaps in the future). Of course you have to get a bunch of books from the likes of Descartes, Kant, Marx, etc. I’ve gotten more into my faith since then and on most examinations of conscience it is a sin to have books from certain authors who are either on the list or are in general contrary to the church. I understand that the index no longer has a legal force but its moral force does remain. I always somewhat assumed because of the nature of my education I would be somewhat excluded from this but I’m thinking more and more I might not be. Nobody has really granted me permission and I am not involved in any apologetics or the like. If it is wrong I have to get rid of them, but I feel that I couldn’t get my masters without having experience in anything besides Catholic stuff. I’m also a big fan of those great books programs, particularly Adler’s list which includes such like authors. How do I manage my interests and potential career moves without falling into sin. Thank you in advance!

Peace to all,

As a OMNiLogicalGod mystic, rationally, God wants a Body becoming again from the Spirit through the created flesh becoming in One Body becoming fulfilled from the spirit through the life loving only and loving with only the most love becoming again for all Creation in One Holy Spirit Family One God in being.

OMNiLogicalGod is from the Faith of Abraham, were Saint Paul sees the Light of Faith on the Road to Damascus, Stephen Andrew delivers the Logical Mind of the Family of God the Faithful Catholics to be able to see God as The Holy Spirit Family One God in being, rationally and logically, from the Faith of Abraham.

Rationally and finitely understood, logic preexists in energy manifesting through transformation becoming through light energy becoming transformed light mass flashing becoming space and time through the Big Bang for Creation.

Baptism and The Eucharist, becomes Catholic rebirth and salvation for One Family for all becoming again in One God in being.

There are logically two sacraments becoming from death through life from Baptism through The Eucharist, rebirth and salvation becomes unites in the Christ from the cross fro all through the Blood of The Family of God from the Living waters becoming again for all Creation in One Holy Spirit Family One God in being.

Starting with Baptism, transformation is from a united failed Body From Adam and Eve, becoming immortality and "Rebirth" through the living waters. Sanctification becomes from the Powers through flesh becoming transformed from the living waters for the created soul to be able to become from death through resurrection becoming brothers and sister for all forgiven from mortality becoming immortality for all through the New Eve.

The Eucharist is Salvation for Jesus through Mary becoming Virgin Born united through immaculate immortality from spirit incorruption becoming One Body united "In The Christ" becoming from Sacrifice through Penance becoming forgiven for the Spirit from the Powers of the Holy Spirit becoming from incorruption through the immortal flesh for the souls becoming Glorified becoming Sons and Daughters of God becoming again for all Creation Transfigured in One Holy Spirit Family One God in being.

Peace always,
Stephen Andrew

Is my approach to the problem of evil consistent with the catholic philosophy?

Evil – one of the fundamental questions of the human existence. Still unexplained. At least, in a way acceptable to the broad audience. In our daily life we experience evil as “bad things happening to good people” or “bad things happening to the innocent”. But there is also the pure evil – evil spirits, that every human culture speaks about. And bad people doing bad things. How the good Almighty can allow all these bad things? All the evil? Impossible. He is either not that good, or not almighty, isn’t He? This logic, simple as the flail construction, has been used for millennia. It stood behind Manichaeism, today it results in many people losing their faith.

Let’s start from the top. From the pure evil. Lucifer and other fallen angels. Why God allows this evil to exist? It’s the lack of understanding, what stands behind such questions. If you ask this question yourself, then what would you want God to do? Annihilate the fallen angels? OK, so the Almighty creates intelligent, free-will beings, gives freedom to them, but! ...but if they choose not what He prefers, He annihilates them mercilessly. Would it still be God, or rather the godfather of the Scorsese’s movies: “If you are against me, you’re dead!”. Thinking that God should annihilate, or, at least, enslave Satan, is thinking of Him in mundane – natural categories. It’s the way of thinking present in polytheism: God as a powerful king, who needs to defend His kingdom.

The way to understand is in terms: Omnipotent, Omniscient, Good (=Loving). From our perspective Satan is dangerous, willing (and able) to do harm to us. But from the perspective of the Omnipotent and Omniscient, Satan and his secret plots present no more danger, than powers and plots of a cartoon hero. If Satan presents no danger at all, then why God would want to enslave him, or deprive him of powers? Everything, what’s given to us upon creation by God, is given forever. Our powers, intelligence, free-will. No matter what we do, our Loving Father shall never punish us by depriving us of anything He gave us on creation. And the same goes to angels.

“All right. But Satan can do harm to us! Why God allows that?”. Well, He doesn’t. Apart from some very rare incidents described in Scripture and well explained by theologians. Satan and devils have no power over us, unless we give it to them ourselves. This may be hard to believe for generations raised on pop-culture, where devils can interfere in our lives, just as we can interfere in the lives of other people. But this picture is false. Why? Well, suppose it is true. Do you think, that the pure evil of immeasurable hatred would not use all and every means to do harm to us in all possible ways? To destroy us utterly, if only possible? If devils could really interfere, there would be nothing but hell on earth. But it isn’t.

So, what can devils do? They have some influence over people, who willingly open themselves to demonic powers. Consciously, or not. Devil is the master of disguise. There is some good books on this subject. And this text is no place for details or explanations. Therefore, I put it in the short form: will, our free-will is everything here. If you really want to return to the Light, you can always do it. That is why demons put so much effort into convincing people that they are worthless, that they went too far to be saved. A man is doomed, when he starts to believe that salvation is not for him. And making a man to think like that is always the aim of demons.

Think of a devil as of a neighbor, who cannot get to your home, who won’t even speak to you, unless asked first. Would you want the police to execute him just because he is a bad guy and can hurt you, if you get too familiar with him? Is a preventive execution (or jail) a good thing to do? It’s like this apple from the tree of knowledge. You have to willingly extend your hand, grab the apple and taste it yourself. So, whose fault is it? Yours or God’s? Would the free-will have any real value if you were unable to taste everything? Do whatever you want? In fact, it’s only the consequences that people keep whining about.

Now, we shall move to the mundane reality. This is where much more complains arise. People keep complaining on pretty much everything. If God is Omnipotent and Omniscient, He is responsible for everything, right? He knows how horrible things do happen, and He does nothing about it! There are millions of complains. Everyone can enumerate dozens of sufferings saying that, if they would vanish, the world would be a much better place. That’s obvious, clear as day. It is impossible, to say otherwise.

Suppose, we have the godlike powers. Suppose, you, my reader, are able to fix the world. To make it, as it should be. Without all that pain, suffering, tears of despair. What would you start with? It does not matter. You will not rest, till you eradicate the very last reason for pain, suffering, death of innocent young. What would be worth your work, if having such opportunity, you would stop half-way? Right?

So, let’s do it! I’ll be your advisor, to help you achieve this wonderful goal even more effortlessly. Should children die of cancer (like leukemia, for instance)? Of course, they shouldn’t. What a good god can allow it? Young, innocent, at the threshold of life. You say: “- Children won’t die of cancer, anymore!”. And it’s done. But there are other illnesses that, in certain circumstances, can be fatal. Should it happen? Obviously, it should not. But losing a limb, becoming blind or deaf is still a nightmare for a child and its family. Can we allow it?

As you might have noticed already, the question is not where we start, but where do we stop. Is it pneumonia? A flu with fever? A broken leg? The last one opens a new store of problems: accidents. They can be a reason for death or a life-long disability. What’s the use of removing cancers and diseases, if we allow a teenager to spend rest of his life on a wheelchair, because once he wanted to stunt on peers and he’d jumped to a shallow lake, breaking his spine? Of course, such jumping is a dumb thing to do. But the penalty for a moment of stupidity of a teenager cannot be a life long, can it?

But the real problems start when we go into details. Because, if we say that children should not die of cancer, then should we allow adults to die? A 23-years old woman, for example? A 40-years old father of two? Would the critics of the God’s goodness stop complaining just because children do not die, anymore? Is an eighteen years old girl (or boy) still a child or an adult for the sake of our reasoning? Details, details, spoiling everything.

But that’s just a beginning. If we have this boy climbing trees, who always falls down luckily without any serious injury. The boy will inevitably become a man some day. His experience of many falls without any bone broken taught him that falling is pretty safe. If you, as a god, decide to “switch off” this safety when the boy becomes older and wiser, he can become unpleasantly surprised some day. With both his legs broken. Would he say, that you are a good god, then? And his family? Friends?

And this criterion: “older and wiser”. We all know, that there are people quite irresponsible, childish at the age of 25 or 30. Should the wise and responsible be punished with results of their momentary irresponsibility, just because they are generally wise and responsible? Or should the irresponsible ones be taught responsibility and wisdom by facing the atrocious consequences of their behavior? Whatever you choose, my reader, you won’t please all.

Perhaps the total: “nothing bad ever happens to anyone” is the answer, then? As a god, you are able to make it happen. Wouldn’t it be wonderful? Imagine: no sicknesses, no pain, no broken leg or arm, no starvation of children in Africa. No death by thirst in the desert. A happy, perfect world. I’ll help your imagination and show you a tour around.

People know, that nothing bad ever happens. No need to eat, drink, brush your teeth. Staircases are needless. You just jump out through a window – nothing bad ever happens, right? Newborn babies are just thrown into a corner of their rooms and left there till they grow and start walking and talking. Cause nothing bad can happen to them, right? They won’t feel hunger, thirst, sick or cold, nothing bad at all! So, why to care about them? It’s you, as the god, who takes care of everything. So, why to bother? There are much better ways of spending one’s time. Like, for example, throwing bricks on the heads of pedestrians from a roof. Just for fun. Nothing bad ever happens, right? Those bricks cannot hurt anyone.

But would there be any roof, at all? And any brick? Who would care to build anything? If one can sleep on ice, rocks or hot lava, as comfortably as in one’s own bed. Cause discomfort is something bad, right? In the ‘perfect world’ even a slightest discomfort would be considered as “evil”. Something undeserved, an unjust punishment. You might think, that I exaggerate here. Not at all.

Little children cry over a flying bug accidentally sitting on them. And what would make people to grow up mentally in the ‘perfect world’? Where nothing you do, or not do, ever has any bad consequences? People do whatever they want: sleep where they want, walk where they want, swim in boiling water or arctic ocean. Or just live at the bottom of a sea. They can drink juices or acids – no difference except for a taste, which cannot be bad, anyway. You cannot hurt anyone, or be hurt by anyone. You can spend your life just lying in one place. The ‘perfect world’.

If you, as the god of this world, would want to provide some incentives for people, to do something rather, than nothing, you would immediately face complains: “This is bad! Why do you do it to us?! We don’t deserve it! It’s evil and you’re bad!”. Childish? Yes, but people in the ‘perfect world’ never grow up. Why to create such world? What for? Sooner or later people living in this world would become totally bored and very unhappy. And they would be right blaming you (the god) for their misery.

The thing that stays unseen by all these “world repairers” is that our experience and our opinion are always relative. Always. Of course, we can form an objective outlook. Philosophical, reason-based. Just as I do in this very text. Nevertheless, in our day-to-day living, our natural, common, first reaction and opinion is always relative to our own experiences. Things we are used to, become “normal”, others stay “extraordinary”.

The more objective outlook requires time and effort put into thinking things through. Let’s take for example the famous among the ‘good-hearted world improvers’ “people living for one dollar per day”. Atrocity. How can anyone live for just one dollar per day? It’s not living, it’s only an existence. These people must be thoroughly unhappy, mustn’t they?

But the truth is that these people live just as any other in the world. Boys playing soccer with a bag filled with rags on a pavement do have as much fun as if playing with a shiny new ball on a grassy playground. An old, dirty rag doll not worth a penny can be a better friend of a little girl, than a dozen of fashionable Barbies. A teenager does not feel bad being shoeless, as long as everyone else is also shoeless. And those few having worn-out gym-shoes are perceived as the owners of pricy convertibles in the wealthy West. Relativity (of live experiences).

This relativity of experience is best seen on more unpalatable examples. A several years old boy suffering from congenital brittle bones. He is on a wheelchair, several of his bones have been broken in the last weeks. Pain of various intensity is a common thing for the boy. And yet, when some volunteers made one of the boy’s dreams come true – the boy is happy. He smiles. His exultation is true. People get used to suffering. They have their moments of happiness and joy, just as any other human being. And this is no exception. This is common and natural.

I read a testimony of a man, who saw the life in a Soviet gulag in Siberia. People imprisoned there had to work very hard even during the Siberian winters. Those unable to work could freeze to death. Many prisoners lost their ears, fingers, arms or legs to the Siberian frost. As this testimony says, the most impressive picture was to see these people, without arms or legs, going to the weekly bath in summer. A procession of naked or nearly naked cripples walking and crawling to the place of bath. They were joking and laughing on their march. Jesting one of another. Their cheerfulness was the most striking for an observer. They were joyful and happy at this time. Prisoners. Cripples. Futureless. But having their moments of joy and happiness as any other human being.

One of the most traumatic memories of my childhood (if we call “traumatic” an event that is bad and stays vivid in memory after many years) is the memory of losing a nail. I was five or six. With three other boys we’d found a concrete plate in the outdoor playground of our kindergarten and we’d decided to lift it. Immediately after lifting it, the others decided to let it go. I didn’t. The plate crushed the tip of my finger. To this day I remember running through the grassy playground, screaming terribly, looking at my nail becoming separated from my finger at 45°.

Of course, losing one’s nail is very painful. But objectively, it’s nothing in comparison to some really bad experiences. But our experiences, our feelings and emotions know no objective comparisons. They are always personal, subjective, unique. They are relative to other personal experiences forming our memories and life experience. There can always be moments of happiness and laugh, no matter where these personal experiences could be put by an objective observer on a scale of good and bad happenings.

As we see, the amount of bad experiences and bad conditions of living does not prevent people from having their moments of happiness. On the other hand, we all know that even the young, rich and healthy can feel unhappy. As one could say: the joy of living is inside a person, not outside.

We’ve seen the relativity of good and bad experiences on some life taken examples. But we can find the same relativity in our own history. Over the last thousand of years our civilization had made a big progress. The Black Death, fatal pandemics, local epidemics. It’s all in history books. It’s a common knowledge in a way. But do we understand it?

Nearly one half of the total population of Europe died during the Black Death pandemic. Today it would mean something like 300 millions deaths. Entire towns, villages left empty. Big cities stripped by half. Every second citizen of London or Paris dies. In just several months. Thousands of orphans. Often just a few years old. Can you imagine 9 persons of every 10 you know dying? You had family, friends, colleagues, and now there are just 3 persons of them all left? Your entire family dead.

This is how it had been. Because this one half (of population) is just statistics. There were places untouched by the disease, and villages where only one person survived. And similar things repeated itself every few decades. Not many people were lucky enough to live their lives without witnessing such atrocity. Many lesser epidemics and sicknesses had been killing one or two members of a family every several years.

People were suffering from incurable sicknesses for years. Because there were hardly any cure for any disease. Healthy children were turned into cripples by polio. Others suffered for their entire lives from results of diseases that are nowadays non existent.

Let’s take the most objective index: the average lifespan. What was the average lifespan in XIII or XVI century? Young children mortality index was very high. How many died before reaching the age of 5? 15%? 25%? How many died before becoming teenagers? Another ten, fifteen percent? Sicknesses, diseases, epidemics, accidents, wars, starvation. Plenty of reasons for an untimely death. And teenagers had no better perspectives. However, they were already pre-selected. Healthier, stronger, than the ones who perished. But they had to start working, helping their parents. And this multiplied the risks.

Even in XIX century many young people died of galloping consumption. Young men could die in war, young women could die in childbirth. And they could still die because of accidents, starvation, disease. The age of 40 was a prominent age of elderly people. The age of 50 or above often made people seniors of their entire family. So, what could be the average lifespan? If one half dies below 20, the other half below 40, the average lifespan would be below 20 years. Of course, there are people who reach the age of 60, 70 or more. But they are less than 5% of born. How much can they rise the average lifespan index? To 20 years? 21? To 25 years? Unlikely. Most probably this index would be below 25 years. Your expected time of death, my reader, would be at the age of 24, or 21. If you would live 500-800 years ago. It would be not much better even 150 years ago.

Today a healthy born baby can die only by a very rare, very serious accident. Or by a very, very rare and serious cancer as a child or teenager. Or by some rarest and still fatal illnesses. Or by a cause unexplainable by modern medicine – as rare as a fall of a meteor. And pretty much the same in case of adults. If an adult dies before the age of 70, it is mostly because of the lack of self-care: overworking, stressful environment, bad diet, addictions, risky behaviors. You die early, because you didn’t care enough to live longer. In most cases.

There is a real precipice between us and our predecessors living in past centuries. I suppose, they wouldn’t believe in the advance we’ve made over the last 150 years. The average life length went up from 23 years up to 70. 3 times! We live 3 times longer on average! Unbelievable. No starvation, nearly every sickness curable, houses like palaces from fairy-tales – thanks to electricity and electronics. We fly faster than birds, we ride faster than horses, and we still complain! Many people still ask: how good God can allow this and that? Or they plainly say that the amount of evil in the world proves there is no (good) God at all. And they think, it shows their sanity, wisdom and understanding: “- Only a fool can say otherwise!”.

I think, we’ve reached a point, where it becomes apparent, that no improvement could be found satisfying. Would be the average lifespan of 200 years, or even 600 years satisfying? When one can still die at the age of 45 in a plane crash? Would be the curability of every cancer found satisfying, if people would still have to suffer several months of unpleasant treatment? Remember: this is not we, that are to answer these questions. They are to be answered by people living in times, when such things become common. Just as our contemporaries answer the question, if our times are the fulfillment of dreams about living in paradise. Not the medieval victims of the Black Death.

Relativity. We take what is given for granted, and ask for more. Always. It is either the “nothing bad ever happens”, which leads to the nightmare of absurdity, or never-ending complains on the “bad things happening to the innocent”. That’s the ‘problem of evil’ in short.

Yet, there is still one more question worth explaining. We’ve touched it already as the “lack of self-care being the reason for untimely deaths”. It is broader than addictions or risky behaviors. It is about facing the consequences of our actions. In this material world we all, sooner or later, meet with consequences of what and how we do. The laws of physics cannot be deceived.

We build a school at the foot of a hill with dense bushes and trees growing on. Yet, we need firewood and building material. So, we cut down trees and bushes on the hill. And when their roots keep the soil on the slope no longer, then one bigger downpour is enough to result in a mud avalanche. And what question is asked then? “How good God could allow the school pupils to perish in a mud avalanche?”. The wood could be acquired elsewhere. But we are lazy and plants on the hill’s slope were closer and easier to get.

We are proud of our technical achievements. We build an unsinkable titanic ship. On her virgin travel, she sinks after collision with an iceberg. “How could God allow so many innocent people to drown or freeze to death in the cold ocean?”. There were not enough life boats, improper materials were used on the ship construction, iceberg warnings were discarded, and so on.

Victims of laziness, greediness, sheer stupidity and vast irresponsibility are counted in thousands. But the first to blame is the Almighty. He is almighty and He did nothing. Where does such thinking lead to? To the same absurdity. No safety precautions are needed. God will save us. Because: where would you put a threshold? After which God would not interfere and allow the worst to happen? And remember: “the worst” is relative. The more people get used to safety guaranteed by God, the more insignificant things become “the worst”. Like a broken nail.

As I’ve shown, the vast amount of complains on “God allowing evil” is a result of our foolishness, misunderstanding and lack of comprehension. What we really want is immortality and heaven on earth. Immortality, because the fear of death is the common denominator of all the complains concerning our fragility. It’s the primal fear. Heaven on earth, because we want everlasting happiness.

And this is exactly what is Promised to us. But after this short mundane existence on Earth. The truth is that immortality and happiness without God are impossible. Every attempt to conceive it without God turns into a horror. We are unable to fill up the time-infinite existence. But our innate relativity of life experiences, and what we consider as suffering and unhappiness, prevents anything less than Heaven to satisfy us. No matter how much our life improves in comparison to our predecessors, the amount of complains and whining stays the same.

Finally, we should ask ourselves the question: what’s the World for? There can be many answers. No doubt, the Omniscient can invent things which fulfill many goals. I’ll present one of the answers. In short: God wants us to freely choose, whether we want to be His friends, or not. To avoid overwhelming us with His Immeasurable Omnipotence, He created this world to hide Himself behind it. The world runs on as if God was non-existent (at least, it seems so). We can live without the overwhelming pressure of His Presence. Therefore, we can freely choose to be His friends, or not.

However, all that does not mean that God does not help us in many ways. It only means, He is discreet. Usually, we call His interference “luck”. But sometimes the word “luck” is not enough and we say: “a miracle”. Miracles happen so seldom, that who wants, may speak about exceptionally lucky happenings, or unexplainable powers of nature (human organism), etc. Whatever happens, you can always live as if God was non-existent. That’s the base of our freedom (and need of faith).

We’ve seen already, that the “nothing bad ever happens” world is a place where nobody cares. “Care” is non-existent. The very notion of “care” makes no sense in such reality. There can be no empathy, no altruism, no sacrifice is ever needed. How can you help anyone in such world? In what? “Nobody suffers” means that nobody is in want of anything. Because if you need/want something and you cannot get it, you suffer. And there can be no suffering.

Our humanity (=goodness) is in our attitude towards the suffering ones. As I’ve mentioned before – the world without suffering is not only unreal, absurd; it is also inhuman. It’s a nightmare. Suffering lets us differentiate good and evil. Suffering – our own and that of other people – is able to make us more emphatic, less selfish, simply: better. But why is there so much of it?

Wars, genocides, totalitarian systems – it’s the free-will of evil (greedy, mad) people. God does not intervene, cause our life on this world is the time of choosing. And anybody, even after years of crimes, can change and return to the Light. If God would intervene, then where would Saint Paul be? This is the Great Promise of God: to the very last moment of your life you can change. Always. No exceptions.

Epidemics, tornados, volcano eruptions – they cause lot’s of suffering and deaths. Everybody knows how a volcano looks like. Everyone knows the risk. Yet, people decide to build their houses nearby. Why? Comfort, laziness.

We know the areas where earthquakes happen. Where tornados come. We know that big agglomeration of one species make them vulnerable to epidemics. It’s basic biology – same for trees, chickens, cows and humans. Yet, we decide to live in big cities. Why? Comfort, laziness.

It’s all our decisions. Our responsibility. Why to blame God, when we have the knowledge needed to avoid much of that evil?

Did I overlook anything? Is there any kind of evil, that people complain about, which does not fall into one of the mentioned categories? Let’s check:

• All kinds of sicknesses – there is a continual advance in curing and avoiding them. But no progress can be satisfying.
• All kinds of accidents, natural disasters – we get better and better in avoiding them and their damage. Yet, no progress could be found satisfying.
• Wars, genocides, criminal acts. They are inevitable results of our free-will. Complains about having the free-will are unreasonable. And we can become really good at diminishing the power of bad people over our lives. But what we really want is Heaven – a place without any bad people.
• The objectively bad suffering gives us an opportunity to get the best of us – empathy, care, altruism. World without any suffering would inevitably turn into an inhuman horror. A dreadful punishment without escape. Because the only escape could be in death. And death, as the primal suffering, would be forbidden.
• And finally, the spiritual evil – devils. They exist because God is Good and Omnipotent. Not the opposite.

Does the question (problem) of evil prove anything about God? Or does it rather tell us something about us?

so i am thinking of creating a web app that make chritians world wide connect and pray to god during a time of the day..

maybe i can make it a prayer for specific times of the day
for example 5 prayers a day if people want and its based on the location of the sun... is anyone appreciate something like this? i would like to keep it as a free service that run on donations.

• 🌅 First Light – Awaiting the Light of Christ
• ☀️ Sunrise – Resurrection and new life
• ☀️ Solar Noon – Christ the Light of the World
• 🌇 Sunset – The Cross and thanksgiving
• 🌌 Night – Watchfulness and hope for Christ's return

Hi everyone,

Today someone in this subreddit posted a question regarding Mackie's error theory, and I have been thinking about it all day.

The reason his theory stuck in my head is because he asks the exact same questions that atheists, nihilists, and relativists ask: Are human values purely a human creation, or do they exist objectively and we are just attuned to them?

At the heart of Mr. Mackie's claim is the idea that morality is not objective, but rather created as a social phenomenon. If I am reading him correctly, I believe he is fundamentally wrong, and I hope to prove my case here.

Full disclosure: I am a systems architect. I recently built an AI governance system based directly on the Thomistic structure of the soul.

Translating classical philosophy into deterministic code forced me to confront a reality that philosophers often discuss only abstractly.

Here is a quick summary of the architecture I built and how it maps to Aquinas:

Synderesis Thomas Aquinas defines synderesis as the innate, infallible habit of first moral principles (the permanent knowledge that good is to be done and evil avoided). In my architecture, Synderesis acts as the foundational compiler of the agent's moral and operational universe. It takes an organizational charter and compiles it into strict, machine-readable baseline rules, normalized weights for core values, and hardcoded scope boundaries.

Intellect The cognitive power that apprehends truth and proposes actions. In silicon, this role is performed by a Large Language Model (LLM). The LLM generates the initial draft response, but it is strictly limited to proposing answers.

Will The rational appetite and executive gatekeeper. It is blind and cannot think; it solely exists to freely choose or reject what the Intellect proposes. The artificial Will is an entirely deterministic component that invokes no intelligent component. It runs multiple passes to evaluate drafts against structural invariants and check the Conscience ledger for hard-gate failures.

Conscience Not a separate faculty, but a specific act. It is the precise moment the Intellect takes the immutable rules of Synderesis and applies them to judge a concrete action. In an LLM architecture, this must be structurally separated to avoid the "student grading his own homework" problem. The Conscience is built as a separate module that evaluates the draft against compiled values and returns continuous alignment scores to compose a mathematical ledger.

Spirit (Habitus) The stable disposition of the soul formed by repeated actions. The artificial Spirit faculty maintains an Exponential Moving Average (EMA) of alignment over time, tracking how the agent's actions cohere with its core values to form a permanent memory state.

Based on Thomas Aquinas, this is the architecture of the soul. But here is why building this artificial version made me realize Mackie is wrong.

Mackie looked at human moral codes and argued that because we enforce them, we must have invented them as a social contract. But when you actually build a deterministic AI, you realize what a system looks like when it truly has no objective moral reality.

A machine has no soul. It has no innate Synderesis. It is like an airplane, not a bird.

An airplane does not "want" to fly. Engineers have to mathematically enforce the laws of aerodynamics to keep it in the air. Birds, on the other hand, did not invent the laws of aerodynamics. They were simply born to take advantage of them.

When values are removed, intelligent systems do not become free. They become incoherent. They drift. They self-sabotage. They lose the ability to consistently pursue any meaningful end. What I discovered building this architecture is that values are not optional constraints imposed on intelligence. Values are the structural conditions that make coherent agency possible in the first place.

Error theorists argue that evolution and society just produced these behaviors because "they work." But why do they work? Why is reality structured in such a way that stable flourishing repeatedly emerges from cooperation, trust, and responsibility rather than their opposites?

The error theorist looks at morality and sees a useful human invention. I look at morality and see something closer to mathematics or aerodynamics. We don't invent morality any more than birds invented lift. We discovered it through participation in reality, and our human architecture is naturally designed to tune into it.

Mackie confused the map for the territory.

Animal Soul - Non eternal, can’t grasp immaterial thoughts and intellect
Rational soul - Eternal in nature can understand immaterial thoughts and intellect

Does a disabled homosapien (after Adam and related to Adam) have a rational soul -Yes 
Since thomistics think animal souls exist on earth, there must be a first rational soul. That title goes to Adam (or Eve), if it was purely based off of biology, it could only be by Adam being the first human by a time cutoff or the first ready DNA, it is a time cutoff it must be a fraction of a second that matters. But that must mean it also can change something in every part of the universe. Even if we go to one of the fastest and most defining moments of your life, conception when the sperm meets the egg. It still would take more time than an instance switch. That certain time must always mean something, but if we move a thousand years ahead or backwards that instant means nothing. But an instant still doesn't answer why a homosapien would have it over a bird or fish, it also must not be related to Adam as imagine a mother and dad before Adam who have a son after. The son is not related but still after the time cutoff. If it is pure biology then it must not be about being related to Adam as the same example provided before. The son could have the same DNA genetics, species and time of birth and still not have a rational soul.
This proves it must be a divine choice as the reasoning behind Adam being the first human.

Animals suffer extremely, first what is the punishment of hell - eternal suffering with no hope of change. Since animals can not comprehend time when they suffer they can not comprehend a different future. Because of that they are not saying this is forever, but they are in an absence of hope for change as well. Their suffering is the entire universe, and eternal. 
The only difference is the intellectual suffering, as in the suffering of not choosing god. 
But a rational/eternal soul is NOT equivalent to choosing or not choosing god. 
A disabled homosapien has a rational soul, and can never choose god. Any animal could function exactly like a disabled homo-saponer where they go to heaven, but still can't comprehend the ideas of god. So it is not a valid argument unless you are going to then say that disabled humans either do not have a rational soul or have it better.

The idea that being related to Adam can give eternal soul, even if you are not rational.
The argument is in theory if they were not disabled they would be rational, but how can you say a human who was broken since a fetus. Could never be disabled. Disabled is now part of their entire earthly life. 
Now if it is purely a divine choice, why would there be a divine choice to Adam and not every non rational animal. There were millions of years before Adam, meaning millions of years of suffering and no possible compensation. Animals experience the pain of a disabled human but not the reward. 

1. Life is only a gift if it is a positive experience, an animal that its first day alive watches its mom get brutally killed by a bird, then its second day falling out of its nest to be crushed by the tree. To starve for the next 3 days so a lion can find it. At no point was it ever wanting to live. I think if i said you would turn into a animal you would kill yourself before i had the chance to.
2. A total positive experience is still not making up for an individual negative experience - Even if we assume that when the dog gets to eat the meat , overall the universe has had a positive experience for animals (still very debatable). If God is willing to say every animal does not have an after life, he must look at the individual experience. Or else he is not just. Imagine a king watching all the peasants starve, they all have 1 bread. He takes the 1 bread and multiplies it and spreads it to every other peasant. But even if he had every way to feed the peasant he still didn't. You can make the peasants dogs, cats or any other animals.
3. Non eternal souls are not necessary for the universe, while you can argue you need non rational beings. We can absolutely find a connection between the brain and rationality. Even if the soul needs to be at the level, the brain does too. If I damage your brain you will not be rational. Therefore a being to be eternal has nothing to do about its rationality. If it's about the base of the structure. Then he could have made the structure of all souls related to rational. If we wanted to, the world starts with a rational bird, frog and homosapien. 
4. God has the right to withhold any gift. While its true god can, if god is a good fair and just god. Who is related to all that? He must always act fair, if it is him that decides what is fair or he is bended to the universe's laws of good. Imagine a king who has infinite food, he loses nothing by simply feeding his dogs and cats. He is the creator of them, and truly owns them. He still has an inherent right to give them justice, a gift can not be extended to one but not to others (if you have infinite resources). Imagine a father with every toy possible. His daughter gets a million dollar house and his son a rusty beyblade even if it is a gift. It still is not just.
5. An animal is content being an animal, but so would Adam being an animal. He decided to make his soul rational. By no means did Adam HAVE to be rational (if he did then something must make him special). An animal is only content being an animal because they were not given any way to understand. If an animal could understand even the concept of just staying alive forever, not dying like everyone they see. And you said there was no pain. They would all take it. This is exactly what heaven was like. 
6. Animals don’t have to risk hell, imagine your 2 sons identical in every way. They go to a casino. You decide to give 1, 100 dollars and the other absence of the idea of money. They will be judged based on how much money they have and the others will not be judged. Even if the son can still go into negatives it would easily be worth the pure chance at goodness.

 

Which work did you love more, and why? Let me hear it

i've read a good chunk of St. Thomas' Summa Theologica and the Shorter Summa. however when it comes to actual Greek Philosophy i haven't really dipped my toes in the massive pool, i figured i'd start with Aristotle since St. Thomas Aquinas was heavily influenced by Aristotle. i found a few cheap books of his on amazon but i need help discerning which one to grab; the ones i'm discerning are "De Anima", "The Metaphysics", "Art of Rhetoric", "Politics", "Poetics" & "On the Heavens". which one of these would you guys recommend? thanks and God bless.

Mackie's error theory states that though moral discourse aims to describe objective moral facts, such claims are false. How can we argue against this?

Did God have to be a trinity or could it have been that he was 2 persons. I understand the Bible teaches trinity, my question isn’t “if trinity is in the Bible” but is 3 persons needed and if so why?

In thomistic ideologies, animals suffering is not wrong as it is physical pain not moral pain.
He says humans should not harm animals because

1. Humans do not own animals
2. The humans character may become more likely to harm humans

But neither apply to God.
God does own the animals and his character can’t change, or atleast change to evil.

So if God came down and did some unthinking action to an animal. Other than the reason God can’t do wrong (because you must first prove this is wrong). This would be morally permissible.

While it stands philosophically it seems not many people who believe in thomistic ideas belives God could and would not do these awful things and still remain all loving, powerful and knowing.

Seriously what are the odds of God being goodness itself instead of just a amazing or even almost perfect, what makes God goodness in itself and what are the chances of a God being all Good feels almost impossible for someone to be all loving and everything just because they are the beginning, it just seems very unlikely and illogical how God was goodness in itself just because your the being Doesn't mean you have to be all loving or even all knowing and powerful but i can get passed that, it just semes very unlikely probability wise and also this Doesn't help when religions like deism believe That God isn't love itself, give me actually good answers nothing to dogmatic God bless you all🙏

Why was the promised land needed? What was the significance of Israel needing a geographical area (so much so that they had to commit genocide to get it) in the grander scheme of Gods salvation plan for humanity. I hope this doesn’t come of as aggressive or anything like that, I genuinely want to know more about what role it plays in it all.

One thing that has always puzzled me is how polarized discussions about Catholic traditionalism have become. Too often, every criticism of the SSPX or of certain traditionalist movements is dismissed as "modernism," while every defense of Vatican II is portrayed as a rupture with the Church's past. I don't think either position reflects the Church's own understanding.

First, I want to make an important distinction: not every traditional Catholic is an SSPX supporter, and not every critic of Vatican II belongs to the SSPX. Likewise, not every supporter of Vatican II embraces the so-called "Spirit of Vatican II." These distinctions matter.

Benedict XVI's Hermeneutic of Continuity

Joseph Ratzinger (later Pope Benedict XVI) was not simply a pope commenting on Vatican II decades later. He was one of the Council's theological experts (peritus) and spent much of his academic life explaining how the Council should be interpreted.

In his famous address to the Roman Curia (22 December 2005), Benedict XVI rejected both extremes:

the "hermeneutic of discontinuity and rupture", which sees Vatican II as creating a completely new Church;

and the opposite tendency of freezing the Church in one historical period as though authentic Catholicism ended at Trent or before the Council.

Instead, he proposed the "hermeneutic of reform in continuity."

That principle remains, in my opinion, the best framework for understanding the Council.

The Church Has Always Developed

Many people seem to forget that Catholic history is a history of development.

The Council of Trent itself was a response to one of the greatest crises in Christian history. Martin Luther initially sought reform within the Church before the conflict eventually became an irreversible separation.

Likewise, Vatican II did not appear out of nowhere. It emerged from decades of Catholic biblical scholarship, liturgical renewal, patristic studies, Thomistic renewal (ressourcement), Catholic social teaching after Leo XIII's Rerum Novarum (1891), and extensive theological work by Catholic bishops and theologians.

Recognizing this historical development does not mean rejecting Tradition. It means understanding that Tradition is living.

As St. John Henry Newman argued in his Essay on the Development of Christian Doctrine, authentic doctrine develops while preserving its identity.

The Problem Is Ecclesiology, Not Latin

Personally, I have no objection to Latin, Gregorian chant or the Traditional Latin Mass.

My concern is ecclesiology.

The issue becomes serious when groups begin to reject the ordinary Magisterium, question ecumenical councils, or perform episcopal consecrations without papal mandate despite explicit requests from the Holy See.

At that point the discussion is no longer about liturgical preference.

It becomes a question of communion with the Church.

Catholic Social Teaching Is Also Part of Tradition

Another point often forgotten is that Catholic Tradition includes the Church's social teaching.

Beginning with Leo XIII, continuing through Pius XI, John XXIII, Paul VI, John Paul II, Benedict XVI, and Francis, the Church has consistently criticized both revolutionary socialism and unrestricted economic liberalism.

This is often overlooked.

Some traditionalist circles strongly emphasize the Church's condemnations of Marxism while giving far less attention to its equally strong critiques of economic exploitation, excessive inequality, unjust wages, and unrestricted capitalism.

That balance is part of Catholic Tradition as well.

Charismatic Renewal and Traditionalism

Even debates about the Catholic Charismatic Renewal are often oversimplified.

Some traditional Catholics criticize charismatic spirituality because they believe it borrows excessively from Pentecostal worship styles.

Others defend it as a legitimate spirituality fully recognized by successive popes.

Again, the central question is not personal preference.

The central question is communion with the Church and fidelity to the Magisterium.

Conclusion

For me, the debate is not about choosing between Vatican II and Trent.

Nor is it about choosing between Latin and the vernacular.

The real question is whether we interpret Catholic Tradition through rupture or through continuity.

Ironically, some groups that accuse Vatican II of creating a rupture sometimes adopt the very "hermeneutic of rupture" Benedict XVI warned against.

If Benedict XVI's theology is taken seriously, then authentic Catholic Tradition cannot be separated from communion with Peter, the living Magisterium, and the Church's continuous development throughout history.

Suggested academic references

Pope Benedict XVI (2005). Address to the Roman Curia (Hermeneutic of Reform in Continuity).

St. John Henry Newman. An Essay on the Development of Christian Doctrine.

Pope Leo XIII. Rerum Novarum (1891).

Pope Benedict XVI. Caritas in Veritate (2009).

Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith. Libertatis Nuntius (1984).

Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith. Libertatis Conscientia (1986).

Vatican II: Lumen Gentium, Dei Verbum, Sacrosanctum Concilium, Gaudium et Spes.

As you know or don’t know, the Holy Father and Successor of St Peter, Pope Leo XIV has excommunicated the Society of St Pius X and its laity for their disobedience by ordaining four new bishops on July 1, 2026 in Econe, Switzerland.

Will the faithful be able to attend SSPX masses and receive confession?

This is a pretty controversial and confusing topic that is going on.

Also, who is to blame for this? The SSPX or Pope Leo XIV?

Thank you and God bless.

Hello, I’ve been thinking about Christianity a lot so ima give it my best shot.
For sake of argument assume these as true.
Animals have mortal souls
Humans have eternal souls
Humans are rational, animals are not.

Would a brain made in a lab or in supercomputer have a rational soul - no
Would a disabled human have a rational soul - yes
Would Adam’s parents have a rational soul - no

If we combine these it can not be about genetics, when you lived, or your species.
If adam is only chosen because he is the first ready human, that first says that human could not make anything living rational which is not true and somehow everyone who is not related to Adam is non ready.
So it was completely a divine choice.
Adam is the first human, but imagine that a mom and dad where born before Adam, but the son was born after Adam, the son has the same biology, species and date of birth.

But why would this divine choice now not apply to this son.

First is a rational soul even better?
Imagine God as a father and giving money to each of his sons, when they leave the casino they will be judged based on how much money they have. He gives his son Thomas 100 dollars (rational soul) and his son Travis 0 dollars (animal soul), even though Thomas can go into negates (hell) it still is by far worth the opportunity to gain money (heaven)

Do non rational creatures need to exist.
Maybe to show his true beauty he needs to show everything both rational and non rational.
But now this leaves out non rational creatures even more, when a non rational creature is in pain all they understand is pain they can not imagine a future pain free. Because pain and suffering is a large amount of animals lives.
But earth has non rational creatures, for millions of years before rational creatures. Was that just for God to admire his own beauty. Singular celled organisms can not understand the beauty that comes with the universe.

Is god entitled to give rational souls too his creations.
Well no, but if god is fair and just than maybe.

Is it fair to not give creatures rational souls?
Imagine a king with infinite food, reasorces and space, he is in a kingdom full of his creations. They are starving peasants. Is it fair and just if god only gives 1 food and the title of a prince. Obviously not.

So if rationality was a divine choice, and rationality is better than non rationality, and non rationality is not neccecaey, if the gift of life is not a excuse to cause suffering to your creations, and every living creature can be rational, and god is just.
God must give all of his creations rationality.

Even if it coild just be human logic and god is more advanced. It still is a logical argument to atleast have reasonable doubt the Christian god does not exist.

Gods judgment can’t be off pure belief of his existence because the devil belives in him.
Christian’s deny it is about being a good person.
If it is about putting your trust in Jesus, even a gnostic who belives the creator of the physical world is evil, still puts their trust in Jesus.
So if it is about being honest and open, an atheist who puts all their effort into finding the correct answer, but can’t find it because of gods hideness.

Many Christian’s like “if someone proved to me that Christ is outside the truth, and if the truth really did exclude Christ, I should prefer to remain with Christ rather than with the truth” - Dostoevsky
Let’s assume he really means this, and still and will
Till his death believes this.

This is not being honest and open to finding the truth. If god heard this, and an atheist said the exact opposite, If I was proved to god is real I would stil not belive in him. God would condemn them for not wanting a relationship. But now a Christian wanting to be comforted by a god is not condemnable.
That is a double standards.
Would a Christian who said something like Dostoevsky still make it to heaven under a fair and just god.

I’ve been reading Zizioulas lately and I’ve been trying to reconcile theology with Biological Thermodynamics and Anthropology.

Two things I want to call out for context:
>”What is created is, of its very nature, mortal… The whole world—by the very fact that it is created—perishes while existing and exists while perishing: its life and ours are not ‘true life’” (Communion as Otherness)

>”there is no question of the ecclesial hypostasis, the authentic person, emerging as a result of an evolution of the human race, whether biological or historical.*** Teilhard de Chardin's understanding of man bears no relation to patristics theology.”

So if the second law of thermodynamics is a fundamental principle of creation but at the same time death didn’t enter into creation until the Fall, then what the heck is going on in the first three chapters of Genesis.

Let’s assume chapter 3 is allegorizing the Neolithic revolution. If we define life as an engine of negentropy, then agriculture was an innovation that allowed an immense capture of free energy to keep it going.

But at the same time it introduced human toil, new diseases, and death of course (Genesis 3:17-19). So what exactly was the historical sin of the Fall?

We see Christ actions as a movement of negentropy. He undoes death. And this gift is rooted in the future— the eschaton.

Zizioulas even says that “The truth of history lies in the future, and this is to be understood in an ontological sense: history is true, despite change and decay, not just because it is a movement towards an end, but mainly because it is a movement from the end, since it is the end that gives it meaning.”

So if the end of history must be an existence without death and decay, is Jesus Christ basically Maxwells daemon? If so, then the tree of Good and Evil perhaps taught Adam and Eve judgement and made humanity mistakenly believe it could sustain and order the universe as finite creatures. What would the Neolithic revolution may have looked like if that never happened, I’m having trouble picturing it. But I think this definitely explains the farming analogies Jesus uses in his parables in Matthew 13 for example

And even though Zizioulas doesn’t believe the emergence of this new ecclesial being is generated from a biological evolution in the human species, it must certainly be coextensive with it. For the body we inhibit must be like what we see Jesus capable of doing after his resurrection, all things which are physically impossible in our current bodies.