Morals without god/the bible

[B. W.]

B.W:

I don't think I've talked to you before arriving here. My grandfather came to Scotland from Poland at the start of WW2. He never really spoke of the war but for fear of being deported - he said he survived the first charge against the Germans which was pretty much a massacre, when he was told he should prepare for the second charge he done the off. He made his way cross country, meeting my grandmother who escaped from a pow camp along the way and eventually settled in Glasgow, hence me. I've only ever posted under the name of Proinsias online and aside from here only touched on these matters over at....

Well, you write like someone I debate from Scotland who fled Poland around the 1980's. Interesting though, nevertheless, to meet online another from Scotland w Polish background.

Give me a few days to respond to your post. In the mean time...

What made the 9/1939 German invasion of Poland wrong if there are no objective rights or wrongs to measure by?
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[B. W.]

Part one of two - 1/18/10 — response to Proinisias ---

Our assigning a human word such as love to describe love does not disprove that love comes from a source that already exists. It would rather demonstrate the wisdom of the Creator in assigning us the emotional and intellectual make-up in order to learn how to govern in his stead on this earthly realm.

For me it neither proves or disproves the objective existence of love any more that than the word melancholy proves that melancholy objectively exists. We may attach far more meaning and importance to love but that does not prove its existence for me.

Do you love your daughter? Does your Daughter exist?

Pros, you are beginning to sound too much like Kant trying to explain away the objective reality of the tree. Why are you hanging on to such logic — Kant prove or disapprove!

Through your daughter you discovered many things about the objective reality of love. At nine months old you held her as she hugged your neck — that is not reality???

Pros, you are missing the point again — we do have the ability to discover truth and that truth revels that Love exist as that is how were designed.

The value you discover about love toward your own family simply is the means to discover that indeed a thing called love indeed exists outside ourselves and should be the highest absolute moral value in which to govern the world by.

Again it's about the creation of value or the discovery of value. Do I discover feelings or do I create them - or do I just pick a word that roughly matches my feeling and use it, attaching my own personal feelings as I do. ...

So the whole world is knowable / unknowable because there are no truths, only phenomena about the world — again your Kant is showing.

Are you a feeling being then? If so, you do objectively exist. You really can know the thing in itself.

Love exists because God exist. We fell away from that love and perverted it as evidenced clearly by how we treat each other where ever we are at governing in this world. We fall short...

I have, many different, feelings I call love for things, I don't think this means that something objectively exits that is called love. Because we can attempt to conceive of some sort of perfect love which we measure ourselves against does not show me that it exists. ...

Again do you love your Daughter? Does she exist?

How do you refine precious metals to make them pure? Answer: By fire and removing of dross...

We make something pure by deciding upon a definition and removing anything which does not subscribe to that definition. ...

No — you place the metal in a container and apply heat. It melts and you skim off the dross. It takes objective effort to produce an objective result.

Same with morals: It takes objective effort to produce an objective result. The fire is truth whether subjective (relative morals) are true are not. This removes anything that is not pure (subjective morality) leaving you with discovering that there is such thing as tangible objective morality.

Premeditative murder is wrong, no matter how a culture or society defines it. When it is done unto them — the discovery is made that Premeditative murder is wrong.

God writes the prescription to us — these are objective morals. We can avoid taking the medicine, ignore it, or listen. One way makes you well - the others - remain ill.

If you had acute appendicitis — leaving it inside you will cause great harm. Removing it creates great good to your health. Subjective Morality leaves acute appendicitis alone, calling it neither a great good or great evil. Look around at the results of subjective morality and the links to the unhealthy state of the world it produces both in history and now. The secular atheistic subjectivism has murdered more people in the last 100 years than all the wars of religion combined. Add abortion in as well.

If God denied choice to his intelligent beings he created then how could that be perfectly just? Without choice, how could anyone justly respond? Freedom to reason and discover can not be denied as that would make God absolutely unjust.

God created many intelligent beings, not just humans. If God was perfectly just why create a whole range of beings with different levels of intelligence and reason? Surely every living thing created by God would have the same levels of intelligence and reason, this is clearly not the case even in humans. Another thing would be degrees of freedom. Some level of freedom may be hard to disprove but to say that humans are absolutely free to make choices and reason seems a little far fetched to me - nature and nurture would seem to limit out freedom.

Chimpanzees been around quite awhile — so far — I know none that built a rocket ship, or wrote a novel. That only proves that there are objective measures of intelligence, if objective measures exist — then morals also have an objective measure to gage right and wrong and that measure is called truth.

No, human beings are not absolutely free — we are enslaved to our own relativism and that is the problem. Since we can make decisions and choices, means there are right choices and wrong choices we can make. Problem is human relativism that Kant decide if it can or Kant.

Have you made right choice and wrong choices? If you say, “I can't be sure if any choices are right or wrong…”

Then do you love your Daughter?

You do exist and can you reason independently

Independently of what?

How do you know what wrong is if wrong doesn't really exist?

The same way I determine value, relatively

If you say in the same way 'you' determine values then isn't that not what defines independent reason?

Denying that God exists in order to be sure that there is absolutely no existing objective morality outside ourselves that can objectively judge us! And it is we, humanity, that continues to spread the pain - yet we blame God for not stopping it!

Being a former atheist, I used to misuse God's goodness and gifts of reason to accuse him and blame him so I could deny him and exalt myself and human knowledge / wisdom above God.

I'm not denying that God exists in order to be sure that no objective morality exists. I'm just not convinced of either. I don't blame God for anything.

An atheist who blames God would be more akin to a theist in denial to me, not an atheist.

Then why did Hume want to commit books about God to the flames and if that is not hate, then what is? Why the war against God, and specifically - Christianity then waged by many atheists?

Since you stated that “Sometimes I decide what I ought to do and don't do it,” then how are you judging that you are falling short if there is nothing to solid — objective — letting you know, personally, how you fall short?

If I decide I should do something and don't do it I've fallen short of my own target. I set targets, sometimes I meet them sometimes I don't. No need for an objective scale, my own subjective one will do.

What is your own subjective scale based on? For something to be true, an opposite must exist to be true, if not, then it is false. Therefore, for your own subjective moral scale to exist also means that there is an objective moral scale that exist as well. If not, then any subjective moral scale is false.

For you to say only subjective morals of right and wrong exist understand that is an absolutist statement. If there are no absolutes, how can you be so sure? For true to truly true, an opposite, false, exist as well.

Is it a NO — NO to touch an open flame or hot stove top? Is it a NO — NO — to pick up that big paper clip off the floor and put it in your mouth — little child?

Touch the flame, burn yourself a little, get a sore finger, learn. Some things you take from others some you just have to find out for yourself no matter how many times you are told otherwise, it's different things for different people.

Paper clips can choke a little child to death — so if I hear what you are saying — then is okay to let happen?

Again, how does a person refine precious metals to make them pure?

By defining what it is and removing things which do not fit that definition.

Then cannot you see what God is doing? He has his objective definitions — humanity seeks to assert its own. Humanity is choking on a paperclip, but according to relativism that is okay, hmmm God says — don't put it in your mouth. We do.

The bible shows us truth and how to gage morals objectively by truth. That is why it is so hated and Hume preferred to have it burned while others seek to only ignore.
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[B. W.]

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Contiued from above - Part two of two - 1/18/10 — response to Proinisias ---

All other religions depend on ones own self efforts and works to earn favor with God, gods, forces, better reincarnation, etc, enter heaven, bliss, etc. Such works declare that human works are superior to God's and thus humanity should be the real god that determines ones personal fate.

In other words, human works and efforts are superior to God's efforts and works — which by they way are defined by his act of grace. If by God's act of grace then why should human works overthrow God's grace and deeds proving that God is not God enough to save anyone and thus not really God at all. God overthrown and man becomes god.

This is more than an insult to a loving God. It is abusing God's love in order to manipulate God into serve them based on their deeds and efforts. God's ways are superior over ours. We deny justice. God does not. He lets people make there own choices despite already foreknowing their answers — he still lets people decide. That is just. Unjust would be in denying this from happening.

I don't see it like that. Most traditions or schools have rules to follow. Things one should or shouldn't do. Christianity has the ten commandments. To me it is simply that at the lower, for want of a better word, level traditions have easy to follow rules at the higher levels it is understood that one does not need to follow rules one can simply act with complete trust in God, act in accordance with the Tao, or simply be in the in the case of Zen or some such. In many eastern traditions there is emphasis on things like meditation, avoidance of certain practices or simply refraining from over indulgence. I don't see it as a huge insult to God that Christians are encouraged to do certain things like obey the commandments, worship or meet as part of a church. As Christianity may place huge importance in faith in Jesus Christ as the Saviour others place huge importance on enlightenment.

I don't see that teaching what deeds one thinks God may approve of or disapprove of is saying that human works are above those of God. Religions have a main thrust whether that be submission to Allah, faith in Jesus Christ or the realization of enlightenment. They also have doctrines which apply to more day to day life, usually written down by people seen to to be inspired by God or simply people who have reached further than others into that particular doctrine.

If Christianity is not based upon ones efforts or deeds then what is the point in the Christian God providing an objective moral framework. If deeds or works don't earn one a place in heaven then what is the point in the objective moral law, surely God will not take into account deeds and efforts. If God does judge by an objective moral law and this has some bearing on life after death then one can earn God's favour through deeds -

It seems that if Christianity is not based upon one's efforts or works then objective morality becomes rather pointless. It doesn't matter what your objective actions were to God, the only thing that matters is the heart and mind. You can build lots of objectively bad swings which injure people or murder, what matters is that is done with the conviction that Jesus is the one true Saviour, with complete faith in God.

To pull up the Inquisition or the crusades, from what I understand from your posts it is not that objectively bad deeds were being committed, what matters is that those who are committing these deeds truly believe they are doing Gods will - even if they may be interpreting it erroneously.

First off, your answer shows that you do not understand what Christianity is or its message. In fact, your answer substantiates my point. Human efforts to earn their way into favor 'was' what I was driving at. That effort seeks to supplant God. True Enlightenment comes when one sees this.

Next, If all is only relative — then what good are any works at all? If all leads to non-existence — what good are works?

Moral Law serves to teach us right and wrong revealed by the fire of truth. Complete faith in Christ saves and restores our lives back to what God had originally in mind on his terms. Precious metals are refined by an objective process. The Christian Faith is a living active manner of life, not a set of intellectual ideas.

To pull up the events and results of progressive ideology of the last 150 years, progressive liberalism, Marxism, socialism, communism, from what I understand from your posts it is not that objectively bad deeds were being committed by these frames of ideas, what matters is that those who are committing these deeds truly believe the greatest good is achieved by the state governed by men for the best and noblest of purposes.

Yet, history proves that such anti-God subjective morality that governs these systems have murdered, robbed, stolen more than any crusade did years ago.

We serve a living God. Since we do, he corrects us. Christianity learns from its past and was corrected and still corrected by the unseen hand of God. Islam does not serve a living God and has no unseen hand of correction ever manifested in its history. Christians are not crusaders — that was a long time and era ago. Any religion can be hi-jacked for political purposes. Only Christianity has shed the hi-jacking successfully.

More people have been killed, robbed, stolen, crushed, and oppressed by secular progressive, socialistic, atheistic forms of government than all wars of religions combined and also Islam, more than any other religion uses war for spreading its gospel as well. That is an observable objectively factual based historical fact.

Again, human effort proves itself well and that is why God's terms are better.

Should God violate his own justice so our concept of justice is supreme? Who do you think you are thinking like this?

I'm not claiming that my own justice is supreme. It's my own, patched together with inconsistencies and glaring errors, it's also changing continually. .

If morality is subjective - isn't that a supreme statement? Therefore ones own patched together with inconsistencies and glaring errors, changing continually, is supreme — isn't that what you been stating?

You faith is in inconsistencies and glaring errors, changing continually is the supreme morality then…Haven't your own words on this Forum Thread clearly incites this?

So you are absolutely sure that your justice with its inconsistencies and glaring errors, changing continually is the best and most moral way to live?

Being born into a Christian home does not make you a Christian — nor does going to Church. Being a Polish Roman Catholic or from Protestant background does make you a Christian either. Christ does.

I agree

Then why not become a Christian then?

What makes you responsible? Why???

The thoughts of myself and other people, not God. If God does exist in the fashion that you believe I may find out God's opinion once I've died, in the mean time I'll go with my feeling and those of others.

Take a chance??? Would you really board an airliner knowing it has a 100 percent failure rate and will crash somewhere along the flight?

Christ died in your place so you could miss that flight.

You say — go with feelings of others — why then the exclusion of the Christian message then?
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P. S. I'll go over your 3rd response, Pros, and answer it later as it will involve my time to respond.

[B. W.]

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Continued from above posting regarding Part 3 Comments on 1/19/2010

B.W: response to part 3:

You think it would make life unpleasant?? What standard are you basing this on if none exist other than what we create. If we create, then a violent criminal creates in his / her mind that such acts are morally right.

Again — what standard do you use to make the judgment that violent acts are wrong if we create morals relativisticly?

I'm basing it on my own feelings and the testimonies of others. When I got caught drinking at 15 by the police my mother was upset, it made her life more unpleasant, she told me, no need for objective moral standards. When I lose my temper with my wife or daughter they tell me it makes their life more unpleasant, I believe my mum, my wife and my daughter. It's a relative standard. I deem what makes life unpleasant by my own feelings and what those I relate to tell me - not always in words.

There are many little things that make life unpleasant for others, it really depends on who you have relations with, you adjust accordingly. Here I'm always very aware of capitalizing the word 'God', on the atheist toolbox I'm always aware of using a lower case.

A violent criminal may well see violent criminal acts as morally right, I don't agree in most cases. Other people may see violent criminal acts as morally acceptable - attacking pedophiles springs to mind - I don't. The war in Afghanistan or Iraq is seen by many as violent and criminal, who's to say if it is objectively morally right or wrong. In the absence of getting a straight yes or no answer from God on current affairs we are left with the subjective opinion of people. Abortion and contraception also spring to mind.

You stated quite clearly that your own feelings and the testimonies of others as the basis of morality. Therefore, as I stated before, what have you learned / discovered from these?

If you say, moral relativity, I will say — you are discovering what makes wrong-wrong and right-right. In other words, that there is a wrong and there is right.

Right and wrong do exist. That is my point. It does not matter ones culture or social status — there is right and wrong that does not vary. Have, yourself as the victim of stealing, robbing, murder, hate, prejudice, etc…then you learn what and why wrong is wrong. You cannot escape such moral absolutes. You can attempt to hide inside the garden of relativism but you can't hide from Moral Law.

Moral Law simply teaches us what makes right-right and wrong-wrong just as Romans 7:7 states, “What shall we say then? Is the law sin? Certainly not! On the contrary, I would not have known sin except through the law. For I would not have known covetousness unless the law had said, "YOU SHALL NOT COVET." NKJV

Moral Law or Objective Morality is best summed in Romans 7:7-25 note verses:

“14…For what I am doing, I do not understand. For what I will to do, that I do not practice; but what I hate, that I do. 16 If, then, I do what I will not to do, I agree with the law that it is good.

“17 But now, it is no longer I who do it, but sin that dwells in me. 18 For I know that in me (that is, in my flesh) nothing good dwells; for to will is present with me, but how to perform what is good I do not find. 19 For the good that I will to do, I do not do; but the evil I will not to do, that I practice. 20 Now if I do what I will not to do, it is no longer I who do it, but sin that dwells in me...” Rom 7:14-20 NKJV

Relativism provides no means to know right from wrong, good or evil, because it is based on the ever changing whims of humanity.

The Point of Moral Law is that it exist because God exist and He Knows what makes wrong-wrong and right-right. In other words, what is a truly wrong and what is truly right. There is truly goodness and there is truly nefariousness.

The whole point is this, we learn/discover that there is truly right and truly wrong. Yes, we learn from moral relativism that there are truly things right and truly things wrong — in other words that Moral Objective Law exist and we break it everyday. We need someone to help us overcome and that one is Christ.

Galatians 3:24, “Therefore the law was our tutor to bring us to Christ, that we might be justified by faith.” NKJV

I know from the sound and tone of your comments that you despise the usage of the bible, again, how could a moral person know what God's standard of Moral Law is unless it is revealed, recorded…written? It would be pretty dumb to remain silent on this subject but great equitious justice displayed in providing documentation. This documentation is found in two places one in the bible and the second a conscience.

Through God's foreknowledge he fashioned within us all (humanity) a conscience so we can decipherer what moral law is, either from the written source or our conscience — we can learn objective truth about what is right verse what is wrong. However, our conscience has become diluted by subjective morality so we need a written standard to help us discover truth again about what makes right-right and wrong-wrong.

We have been designed with a conscience...

Romans 2:14, 15, “…for when Gentiles, who do not have the law, by nature do the things in the law, these, although not having the law, are a law to themselves, 15 who show the work of the law written in their hearts, their conscience also bearing witness, and between themselves their thoughts accusing or else excusing them)…" NKJV

What you describe is laboring over what wrong and right is — that is called your conscience. God fashioned humanity with a conscience that helps lead one to discover what makes truly right/good and what make truly wrong/nefariousness.

All your posting demonstrate that struggle without doubt. You tie the knot wrong in the swing set — you know it. Problem — moral relativism seeks to assuage your conscience but it cannot as it points out clearly how you break moral law and in need of aid.

What is causing you to take responsibility? Objectively your swing building caused harm… If objective reality and morals cannot exist then was the injury real?

I don't know if the injury was truly real. In the absence of this knowledge I'll use my judgment and that of others. If I or people I trust say there was injury caused and it was due to me then I'll take responsibility. If it turns out I was on candid camera and it was all big joke I'll rethink it.

Scenario was — rope swing set tied wrong causing injury to the person swinging — no other variables. There is a right and a wrong way to tie the knot. Since there is — object right and wrong exist as well as responsibility for this injury. Stop trying to hide in the garden of moral relativism covering your self with verbiage trying to get off the hook.

Then there are absolutes that are measurable, tangible, and objective then! Glad to see you finally agree!

No. Someone deciding on a design and evaluating the outcome of that design is not the same as objective absolutes. People agreeing that a design did or did not meet it's expected outcome is a case of people agreeing, not absolutes.

…I said: “As I've hopefully explained I don't think I have all the answers….

Maybe I do have all the answers, I just don't know. As for relative meaning, different people require different answers - my answers, whilst answering some questions for me may not answer them for you and vice versa.

New Scenario: Someone else tied the knot in the swing set. You took a swing — knot loosens causing you great injury. It doesn't matter ones social or cultural backgrounds to determine that right and wrong exist. Through your fall, you discovered what makes truly right and truly wrong. There is a right way and a wrong way...

Great mystery of the Garden of Eden here for those inclines to wisdom…

Not knowing” is an objective statement.
Does truth exist?

I think I don't know all the answers, but maybe I do - I just don't know it yet. This to me is not much of an objective statement.

I have no idea if truth exists, again truth means a great many things to a great many people, whether there is an objective part to it that we all access to greater or lesser degrees is something I can't take for granted.

You have overabounding evidence that truth exist.

One plus one equals two — true or false?

Malicious Premeditative Murder wrong — true or false?

Adultery wrong - true or false?

Covetousness wrong - true or false?

Nefarious theft wrong - true or false?

Please spare us the Kantian square and Hume's logic and Doaist circles this time — it does not matter the context, when the context is happening to you…

You proved my statement true by your answer…or you would not have mentioned being thrown in hell as an appeal that accuses God of being wrong for tossing you there. If there are no wrongs — then how can you judge God's actions as fair or not fair as evidence in your statement?

I don't think I did. I'm trying to convey that if it turns out that I'm wrong and you are correct I'll take the consequences - I suppose I won't have much choice.

I didn't accuse God of being wrong if God throws me into hell, I said "so be it". There are plenty wrongs, almost every person, even Christians have lists of them even though deeds don't matter. The point is if God has objective wrongs and from what I gather the only wrong that really matters is the one of not accepting the Christian God - building a swingset in an objectively wrong manner and causing injury will make no difference on judgment day - only faith will. .

You can avoid this through a free gift of God's grace extended to you. You chose to board an airliner knowing it has a 100 percent chance to crash. In hopes the logic of your relativism will earn a merciful outcome…

Again with pride like that — is it any wonder God will not let such into heaven, why? answering question — why make heaven corrupt as it is on earth? Note Isaiah 26:10

Yes God made it simple — Faith — not intellectual Faith but a living active faith that saves you because Jesus took your seat on that airliner. God made it so simple, only we make it so complex. Why keep smacking the Lord's extended hand of help and aid away?

What made you abandon Christianity? What standard of judgment did you use if there is none trustworthy enough exists? Again, what makes a Christian is Christ — not a church or affiliation.

I don't think I did really abandon Christianity. As you say being born into a Christian family etc does not make one Christian, Christ does. I don't think I ever really put much emphasis on Jesus Christ, maybe God but not Jesus, if that makes any sense. I felt I was indoctrinated into a tradition with a huge emphasis on ritual and little on theology. If there was an emphasis it was more on Mary and the saints than Jesus.

I grew out of my upbringing , for a short time I was against all religion. Then I realized the worth and value in religion for me. I began to explore. I found lots of stuff that interested me. As with most things in life I tend to avoid complete adherence to one system. There are great insights to be had from great minds everywhere. If I was has been born into a Hindu or Buddhist environment I believe he would be seen as a great Buddhist or Hindu sage.

In short: If the thing that separates Christianity from all other systems is that it is not based on deeds and efforts, then where does objective moral law fit in? Surely it is all dependant on subjective attitudes to God and Jesus? Moral law seems to me based on deeds.

Moral Law Leads us to our need in Christ….

Buddhism cannot save you despite being in lower coach class on a doomed airliner...

You say you seek great minds why then don't you seek out Christ? Why not read the bible — start in John's Gospel, then the book of Romans, etc…

Hate to say it but Polish Roman Catholicism you may have found yourself in is not Christianity. Christianity is how Christ transforms your life out of darkness into true light. Your end is not in Buddhist nihilism, i.e. Platonic oneness. You can avoid the flight on a doomed airliner and discover a new life far better than the unknowns you struggle with today. It is free — and that you scoff at, just as I once did. May the Lord lead you to Himself soon! Amen.
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Response B. W. Melvin
Author of: A Land Unknown: Hell's Dominion
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Note re-edited for clarity 1/20/2010

[Proinsias]

Cheers B.W

Again quite a lot to take in' and I'm rather enjoying taking my time over an internet discussion for a change, so I might be a wee while again but I'll definitely be back.

[B. W.]

Cheers B.W

Again quite a lot to take in' and I'm rather enjoying taking my time over an internet discussion for a change, so I might be a wee while again but I'll definitely be back.

Cheers to you too Proinsias!

Take your time!

So your Avatar name Proinsias is from the Celtic name for Francis / Frank as well as a comic book figure 'Proinsias Cassidy' from the 'Preacher Comic' book series. Wondering if you knew this?
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[Proinsias]

Yeah. The first forum I ever joined was Barbelith, which was a reference to Grant Morrison's The Invisibles comic. The only modern comic I had read was Preacher so I picked the name from that, he was the best character in the comic and was completely embarrassed by his Christian name, Proinsias. Stuck with it ever since. Perhaps not an ideal reference for this particular forum but I like having the same handle across different sites.

[B. W.]

Yeah. The first forum I ever joined was Barbelith, which was a reference to Grant Morrison's The Invisibles comic. The only modern comic I had read was Preacher so I picked the name from that, he was the best character in the comic and was completely embarrassed by his Christian name, Proinsias. Stuck with it ever since. Perhaps not an ideal reference for this particular forum but I like having the same handle across different sites.

This used to be popular but I never read any of these but I found the following link interesting nevertheless...

Quote Below from -- http://www.adherents.com/lit/comics/Cassidy.html

Concerning the story line…

....Cassidy had made a deal with God. He would ensure Jesse's death and subsequent release of the entity that made him a threat to The Almighty and in return God would ensure that both Jesse and Cassidy were resurrected.

In the final issue of Preacher, Cassidy attains some degree of redemption. In letters to Tulip and Jesse he makes amends and reveals things to Tulip that he had previously kept hidden. Namely that when it was thought Jesse was dead his last words had been, "Tell Tulip I love her." He is then shown watching the sunset, looking as he did in 1916 with fully healed eyes, and disposing of the sunglasses he had worn for decades. As part of his resurrection he had been cured of his vampirism and given a chance to lead a normal life

In hindsight, as Cassidy himself pointed out in writing his last note to his friend, Jesse's greatest accomplishment throughout the Preacher storyline might have been fostering Cassidy's redemption: forcing Cassidy to look hard at himself and the choices he made over his prolonged vampire life, and forcing Cassidy to choose the right way.

Your avatar name seems appropriate after all…

God does work in mysterious ways to get our attention as well
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[Proinsias]

Mysterious indeed

[Proinsias]

Hi B.W:

Part 1 -

You say my Kant is showing, my philosophy is not great. I assume you mean something like love being a shared human experience not implying objective existence of love, or a tree for that matter?

If so then my Kant may well be showing.

You say I am missing the point. That we can discover truth, that reveals love and that is how we were designed. I don't think I'm missing the point, you're making it very clear. I just don't agree.

Are you a feeling being then? If so, you do objectively exist. You really can know the thing in itself.

It seems like another way of saying "I think therefore I am". It's nice but hardly rock solid reasoning for objective existence of an independent self.

Do I love my daughter, again yes I do. Do she exist, it would appear so - not necessarily is so.

It takes objective effort to produce an objective result.

Not really, I wouldn't say the earth or the sun are using effort to heat things to high temperatures, purify, combine and create. There a whole school's of eastern philosophy devoted to non-action, non-effort, non-doing, wu-wei. The idea being that effort implies strain, focus, division. Non-effort implies neutrality, awareness, non-duality. Stuff will still happen and we can only speculate as to whether things would or wouldn't have turned out differently. Some people spend their lives focused on getting somewhere and never get there, others get there without even meaning it.

Premeditative murder is wrong, no matter how a culture or society defines it. When it is done unto them — the discovery is made that Premeditative murder is wrong.

So once someone has been murdered they then know it is wrong? Currently my belief is that once someone has been murdered we have no idea what happened to them or how they feel about it.
Culturally it's a huge issue on one side you can have one culture declaring war and killing another culture, as it's not murder but the other culture simply sees it as murder. Culture determines what premeditative murder is, heck it even comes up with the name. As I've said before one persons sacrafice, death penalty or assassination is another premeditative murder - if the premeditative murder of a human(s) seems like a good idea to a culture they quickly give it another name - if a civilian kills a murderer it's murder, if an executioner does it by order of the government it's capital punishment - same actions, different names.

So yeah premeditative murder is wrong in any culture, but each culture is free to define it as they wish - it's usually not murder for a culture to kill someone they think should die.

If you had acute appendicitis — leaving it inside you will cause great harm. Removing it creates great good to your health. Subjective Morality leaves acute appendicitis alone, calling it neither a great good or great evil.

I wouldn't label appendicitis good or evil, I'd try to find someone who could remove the appendix - I don't care what the docs theological position is on medical conditions. If I get toothache I don't think it's evil, my tooth somehow puling away from God or somesuch, I go find a dentist. It may make me feel terrible but this doesn't mean that illness is inherently evil any more than a tree is evil for falling over and squishing a person.

Look around at the results of subjective morality and the links to the unhealthy state of the world it produces both in history and now. The secular atheistic subjectivism has murdered more people in the last 100 years than all the wars of religion combined. Add abortion in as well.

I don't think the state of the world is that bad and I'm always suspicious of 'good old days' type arguments.
I don't doubt that subjectivism can be used to murder lots of people, that shows it has power. It is a tool and can be used to murder or save, just as with religion.

Chimpanzees been around quite awhile — so far — I know none that built a rocket ship, or wrote a novel. That only proves that there are objective measures of intelligence

No it doesn't, it proves that humans build rocket ships and write novels, chimps don't. Humans then use a rather vague term 'intelligence' to rank themselves above chimps, and each other.

Since we can make decisions and choices, means there are right choices and wrong choices we can make.

Again the only 'proof' we have that we make choices is the notion that we could have done something other than what we have done or will do. We feel free therefore we are free.

Then why did Hume want to commit books about God to the flames and if that is not hate, then what is? Why the war against God, and specifically - Christianity then waged by many atheists?

I think the distinction here is between a war on the belief in God/ the Bible. It makes no sense to wage war on something you don't believe to exist. It may make sense to wage a war on the culture built up around something you believe not to exist. I would imagine if all the bibles were burnt then God could just inspire another, if there is no God then it's gone for good.

What is your own subjective scale based on? For something to be true, an opposite must exist to be true, if not, then it is false. Therefore, for your own subjective moral scale to exist also means that there is an objective moral scale that exist as well. If not, then any subjective moral scale is false.

My subjective moral scale is not true or false, it's a subjective moral scale. My taste in music is not true or false, it's my subjective taste. Because we attach more value to morals values than musical ones does not mean they then start to objectively exist. To me it seems that if we find something terribly important we feel the need for something other than our fallible selves to determine it, this does not make it so. There are a whole range of human emotions beyond love, I don't think they exist objectively either, it seems to me that as people feel love is so important they lend it some objective existence.

Paper clips can choke a little child to death — so if I hear what you are saying — then is okay to let happen?

So can sweets, my daughter has both. Putting a paperclip in your mouth is not objectively wrong, it's just maybe not the smartest idea for continued life. Touching a hot stove isn't objectively wrong, it's just best avoided if you don't want a burnt finger. Certainly if kids or animals are unreceptive to reasonable explanation one can intervene with an authoritative tone, or physically, under the assumption that the kid or animal does not want to get burnt.

[Proinsias]

Part 2:

First off, your answer shows that you do not understand what Christianity is or its message. In fact, your answer substantiates my point. Human efforts to earn their way into favor 'was' what I was driving at. That effort seeks to supplant God. True Enlightenment comes when one sees this.

I tend to agree. However although true enlightenment appears to be the aim of many religious practices what marks one religion from another is intellectual ideas, the very word enlightenment is an intellectual idea to try and describe the indescribable. I suppose the difference is that you seem to see subscription to a set of intellectual ideas or practices as trying to supplant God, I see them more as aids to experience God, Brahman etc..
Whilst religions may at their heart may be a means to enlightenment they have as their body sets of idea and practices. Ten commandments, spiritual texts, intellectual theological concepts, ritual and many others - I thoroughly enjoyed Ninian Smart's Dimensions of the Sacred a few years ago which went into this in detail.
The daoist idea of wu-wei seems to be contained within the above quote if I snip off the start:

effort seeks to supplant God. True Enlightenment comes when one sees this.

Next, If all is only relative — then what good are any works at all? If all leads to non-existence — what good are works?

Indeed. Good question.

I'm not claiming all does lead to non-existence. Non-existence is a far tougher concept to wrap one's head around than God or afterlife in my opinion. God and heaven imply ideas like good and love, at least for me, things we can on at some level can identify with. All non-existence gives us it that it won't be anything like existence or anything in existence, all we can think is what it won't be like. I think it's far easier to give oneself to the idea of an afterlife which will be better and more wonderful than we can conceive as opposed to something which we simply cannot conceive.

The Christian Faith is a living active manner of life, not a set of intellectual ideas.

I see it as both. Enlightenment or complete faith in God is one thing. Pursuing that through the Christian branch of Abraham's faith is where the set of intellectual ideas come in.

To pull up the events and results of progressive ideology of the last 150 years, progressive liberalism, Marxism, socialism, communism, from what I understand from your posts it is not that objectively bad deeds were being committed by these frames of ideas, what matters is that those who are committing these deeds truly believe the greatest good is achieved by the state governed by men for the best and noblest of purposes.

No, what matters to me is a mixture of outcome and intention. I think it's very complicated.

I certainly don't think that objectively bad deeds were being committed by frames of ideas. Frames don't do things, people do.

What is it that matters? Is it the believe in Jesus? the good intentions? the objective results? the circumstances running up to the event?

It seems you wish to have your cake and eat it. That Christianity is a living relationship with God but on the other hand is a test that all will face and the text of the Bible is the study guide for that test - maybe having your cake and eating it isn't such a bad thing though

Yet, history proves that such anti-God subjective morality that governs these systems have murdered, robbed, stolen more than any crusade did years ago.

It wouldn't surprise me if the major political uprisings of the past 150yrs cost more deaths and involved more money than any crusade did.

We serve a living God. Since we do, he corrects us. Christianity learns from its past and was corrected and still corrected by the unseen hand of God. Islam does not serve a living God and has no unseen hand of correction ever manifested in its history. Christians are not crusaders — that was a long time and era ago. Any religion can be hi-jacked for political purposes. Only Christianity has shed the hi-jacking successfully.

Christianity has seven hundred years on Islam. Maybe it just needs time.
When has the unseen hand of correction manifested in Christian history, post inception of Islam?

If morality is subjective - isn't that a supreme statement? Therefore ones own patched together with inconsistencies and glaring errors, changing continually, is supreme — isn't that what you been stating?

I'm not saying it's supreme. I think I've got a decent morality going and a decent tea collection going, neither are perfect or supreme but I hope I can improve both over time - and both have glaring errors - they may not be the best but they're all I've got.

So you are absolutely sure that your justice with its inconsistencies and glaring errors, changing continually is the best and most moral way to live?

No.

Difficult moral issues don't have easy answers. Defining moments of my life were not clean cut good/bad. We can all agree that sneaking into the neighbors house to kill their kids is pretty much indefensible, what the issue is is all the stuff that goes between that and helping an old person cross the street. God's perfect moral law may be clear when thinking about killing or robbing 'innocents' but becomes more elusive when dealing with complex issues which relate to friends, family and loved ones, real life situations with context. This is what I mean by a patchwork of inconsistencies. When it comes down to a complex social issue is there really any difference between a Christian going with hir heart as opposed to an atheist communist going with hir heart.

Then why not become a Christian then?

Mainly because I think other religions are great too.

Take a chance??? Would you really board an airliner knowing it has a 100 percent failure rate and will crash somewhere along the flight?

I think I'd be more amazed at my ability to know the future with 100% accuracy.

You say — go with feelings of others — why then the exclusion of the Christian message then?

I'm not trying to exclude it, I'm trying to incorporate it. If I was trying to exclude the Christian message I wouldn't be here, I came here to hear it.

[Proinsias]

You stated quite clearly that your own feelings and the testimonies of others as the basis of morality. Therefore, as I stated before, what have you learned / discovered from these?

If you say, moral relativity, I will say — you are discovering what makes wrong-wrong and right-right. In other words, that there is a wrong and there is right.

Why? I don't get it.

If I say we create right and wrong, you will then say we discover it, who wins?

I do learn from others but the difference I feel is not that we are all discovering right and wrong but are creating right and wrong and being influenced by the creations of others.

Right and wrong do exist. That is my point. It does not matter ones culture or social status — there is right and wrong that does not vary. Have, yourself as the victim of stealing, robbing, murder, hate, prejudice, etc…then you learn what and why wrong is wrong. You cannot escape such moral absolutes. You can attempt to hide inside the garden of relativism but you can't hide from Moral Law.

Stealing, robbing, hate, prejudice I've encountered. Not murder, but I have spent the evening with convicted murderers. It is not so much a matter of knowing what is wrong, it's the complex situations they appear in.

“14…For what I am doing, I do not understand.

Exactly

Relativism provides no means to know right from wrong, good or evil, because it is based on the ever changing whims of humanity.

Agreed.

The Point of Moral Law is that it exist because God exist and He Knows what makes wrong-wrong and right-right. In other words, what is a truly wrong and what is truly right. There is truly goodness and there is truly nefariousness.

There may be an objective thing called "good", although I don't currently believe think there is.

The whole point is this, we learn/discover that there is truly right and truly wrong. Yes, we learn from moral relativism that there are truly things right and truly things wrong — in other words that Moral Objective Law exist and we break it everyday. We need someone to help us overcome and that one is Christ.

Or, we create right and wrong.

I know from the sound and tone of your comments that you despise the usage of the bible, again, how could a moral person know what God's standard of Moral Law is unless it is revealed, recorded…written? It would be pretty dumb to remain silent on this subject but great equitious justice displayed in providing documentation. This documentation is found in two places one in the bible and the second a conscience.

I don't despise your usage of the bible at all. I'm only beginning to get to grips with the bible, and I work slowly.

Scenario was — rope swing set tied wrong causing injury to the person swinging — no other variables. There is a right and a wrong way to tie the knot. Since there is — object right and wrong exist as well as responsibility for this injury. Stop trying to hide in the garden of moral relativism covering your self with verbiage trying to get off the hook.

I've not once tried to get 'off the hook' as you say. I've said if injury has been attributed to my negligence I'll take responsibility. If it was my fault I'll admit and do what I can to remedy the situation and ensure it doesn't happen again, no need for an appeal to an objective holy law. As I've said there is not a right way and a wrong way to tie the know, there are many ways.

Saying that there are no other variables leads me to the conclusion that the scenario you are depicting is not from any sense of reality I'm familiar with.

New Scenario: Someone else tied the knot in the swing set. You took a swing — knot loosens causing you great injury. It doesn't matter ones social or cultural backgrounds to determine that right and wrong exist. Through your fall, you discovered what makes truly right and truly wrong. There is a right way and a wrong way...

I don't think I do, I fall off a swing. I'm surprised it has never happened to me as I've been on some pretty unsafe swings in my younger years. I think I would have discovered more about my own stupidity than about than any true sense of right or wrong stemming from the knot maker. I've had shaving brushes where the knot has had to be sent back to the manufacturer, I didn't discover objective right and wrong, I discovered that even from well know knot makers knots aren't always perfect. I didn't email them explaining they were objectively wrong as the knot does not do what it should, I explained the problem, they explained why they aren't perfect, took responsibility and sent me a new one.

One plus one equals two — true or false?

Human creation and concept, not true or false. Very useful though.

Malicious Premeditative Murder wrong — true or false?

Can premeditative murder not be malicious? Aside from that I think I covered this above.

Adultery wrong - true or false?

Entirely depends on circumstance, I certainly wouldn't say it is always wrong.

Covetousness wrong - true or false?

I thought that only applied to false gods, neighbours wives and that sort of thing. Is it bad to covet my wife or for a Christian to covet the Christian God?

In short it depends on what you covet, with the possible addition that any want can lead to trouble.

Nefarious theft wrong - true or false?

You may as well have written "is wrong theft wrong". Theft is not always wrong, Robin Hood and all that.

Please spare us the Kantian square and Hume's logic and Doaist circles this time — it does not matter the context, when the context is happening to you…

Context is of the greatest importance. Internet forum examples of context free situations are of little use to me as they never happen to me. My life is filled with context that makes great differences to what would otherwise be a simple affair.

You can avoid this through a free gift of God's grace extended to you. You chose to board an airliner knowing it has a 100 percent chance to crash. In hopes the logic of your relativism will earn a merciful outcome…

I'd more more amazed at my ability to know an airliner has a 100% chance of crash - it comes back to predicting future events with 100% certainty.

Buddhism cannot save you despite being in lower coach class on a doomed airliner...

I think that's the issue for me. Christianity claims we need to be saved and provides a solution to save us, Buddhism is more about realising you don't need. It's like saying art won't help you solve an equation mathematics has decided needs to be solved.

You say you seek great minds why then don't you seek out Christ? Why not read the bible — start in John's Gospel, then the book of Romans, etc…

I am doing so, albeit slowly. I started with Job, then I read Job, then I read Mark, then I read Job again. I've been reading about the bible and Christianity in general here and have learned a great deal. I've also been reading many bits here and there. I'll go for John next then the book of Romans. Much like many other sacred texts it's something I like to spend my time over as there are so many translations, opinions and resources - probably more for the bible than any other text.

Hate to say it but Polish Roman Catholicism you may have found yourself in is not Christianity. Christianity is how Christ transforms your life out of darkness into true light.

Perhaps not for me but I do feel that it was Christianity for many involved and close to me, Christ transforming life, albeit with the addiction of an army of saints and the Virgin Mary.

I watched your video on youtube, great talk!

From what I gather you went from atheist to Christian pretty much due to one life, or death, changing event. I don't consider myself atheist by any stretch, I'm convinced of the value of all religion and have been for some time, I'm convinced of the value of Christianity, I just don't see it as an all or nothing option at the moment.

[B. W.]

Hi Proinsias,

I'll review everything you wrote and I'll respond after a bit of time...

I'll see if I can condense everything too - so it is easier to communicate
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[jlay]

Human creation and concept, not true or false. Very useful though.

Are you saying that you could take one of something, add it to one more of the same thing and come up with three of something, if we just decided it to be that way?

[Proinsias]

Hi Proinsias,

I'll review everything you wrote and I'll respond after a bit of time...

I'll see if I can condense everything too - so it is easier to communicate
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That would be nice, brevity is not a skill I have yet mastered.