Re: Another Censorship . . . .

Hi Dan,
   I'm getting tired, so if I say anything completely stupid, please
forgive me. Hopefully my overall intent will be clear, however.

> It seems to me that Jesus couldn't care less(1) about actual measurable 
> damage to society, *or* the intent of the individual *or* their level of 
> responsibility for any outcome taking the circumstances into 
> consideration, only whether or not they did something forbidden by the 
> Bible. Boolean value. To me, following a set of values like that seems 
> very damaging. Murder is bad not because someone told you so but because 

  I guess it is if you don't believe in the value of them. If you feel
they make sense, then they are not.

> it is directly damaging to society; if murder were legal we would live 
> in constant fear for our lives, would be forced to defend ourselves with 
> force and could not expect any social progress. Manslaughter isn't quite 
> so bad because at least there was no actual intent to kill; we are 
> willing to be a bit more forgiving to those for whom the act was 
> accidental. If someone commits manslaughter, there's a much better 
> chance they can return to society and not kill again.

  True.

> Christianity, OTOH, tells us that you can go out and kill a man, and as 
> long as you are truly sorry about it, that's fine. The man you have 
> killed might have been a homosexual, who didn't harm or intend to harm 
> anyone, but he burns in hell for his 'sins'. Worse, he might later have 
> 'found God', and 'repented', were it not for his premature death. And 
> you rely on this to provide a framework of morality for your life. (I 
> realise that this example is a bit ridiculous and ignores the fact that 
> you can't really go out and kill someone with intent to be generally 
> sorry about it afterwards, but I hope you see my point).

   I do sympathize with what you are saying. Let me give one way you
could look at this (while this is drawing off the Bible, it is not
necessarily a view held by all Christians). 

   Just for the argument, pretend for the moment that you believe in an
almighty, omniscient, omnipotent God (i.e. the God of the Bible).
Further assume the role of someone who, noting God's omniscience as well
as His creation of everything (including time and space) is outside of
time and space and is aware of everything that has and will happen.

    Further assume that you accept that God can intervene, although He
chooses not to most of the time (simply because He could pretty much
intervene constantly and then everyone would be mindless robots). 

     Now, with that in mind, let's consider your scenario. The Bible
says God desires that no one be lost. So, if God knew the homosexual
would find Him if he were not murdered, it would stand to reason that
he'd probably stop the murder from happening. On the other hand, while
God does not condone murder, he might not intervene if he already knows
that the homosexual would not reverse course, but on the other hand, the
murder incident might eventually lead to an inspirational transformation
of the murderer who is *truly* sorry for what he did. This
transformation may go on to reach out to the family of the murdered man
and actually revives their faith (not so far fetched... it has
happened). 
  
  The key here is that God does not condone the murder, however I think
it stands to reason if we accept God intervenes, but at the same time
has shown a preference to giving mankind freewill (such as in the Garden
of Eden), that God won't interrupt sinful behavior unless it will
prevent His ultimate goal of bringing as many people as possible to Him.

  Now I realize this is also a far fetched scenario, but I think it fits
in well with your far fetched scenario. :-)

> I apologise for going off-topic, but your comparison of sin in 
> Christianity and modern justice systems really bothered me, even if it 

  I'm full of really bad examples at the moment. <g>

> was only to illustrate a minor point. I also apologise for repeatedly 
> bringing up your religion in completely irrelevant arguments, I just 
> find it interesting to hear your view on various things :).

  Thanks, I enjoy hearing your views as well. No need to apologize --
it's nice to see a different discussion on KDE-Cafe for a change!

> I mean, what you are basically saying here is that in Christianity 
> actions are more important than thoughts (or intent?). Which seems to be 
> the opposite of what you were saying earlier, with your justice system 
> examples.

  No, not exactly. Okay, back to this lust == adultery statement. We can
assume that most people have "attraction" one way or another, either
other sex or same sex. That in itself doesn't equate to sin. Lust, or
actually acting on lust, is what is sin. So, I'm not saying that
thoughts are less important than actions (if I was, I'd be conflicting
with the Sermon on the Mount substantially), what I am saying is that
temptation is not sinful, it is accepting that temptation either
mentally or physically that is sinful.

  Let's use an example that might be a little more clear than the one
above. I think both of us would agree that being an alcoholic is bad. In
the right context of responsibility, alcohol is not bad or sinful, but
when taken out of that context it is (okay, you might not like the moral
language, but bear with me). Now, an alcoholic might realize the error
of his ways and "repent"... but it is generally said that an alcoholic
never ever really becomes "non-alcoholic," they simply learn to control
their urges (temptations). Those urges aren't sinful, but if they fall
back to their old ways, that is sinful.

   Now, with alcohol, there isn't a mental equivalent (i.e. something
similar to lust), but maybe you can see where I'm going. The temptation
isn't evil or sinful, it's how you act on it (that acting can be
physical or it can be mental).

   Consider two of Jesus' examples:


Equivalent                            Mental Sin                  Mental
Temptation (not sin) 
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Murder (phys. sin) <-- anger (ment. sin) <-- disagreement (temptation)
Adultery (phys. sin) <-- Lusting (ment. sin) <-- attraction (temptation)

  Do I make more sense now? :-)

  -Tim

-- 
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Timothy R. Butler       Universal Networks      www.uninet.info
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