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A Morality of Being

9/27/2021

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Photo by  Mariyah Khan  on  Scopio
Click here for an audio/podcast version of this article. 
CONVERSION AND TRUTH
​​​Everyone's an evangelist whether they know it or not. You may not be an evangelist for some large, organized religion or cult, but I guarantee you’re an evangelist for some belief. You are likely affronted by my calling you an evangelist because the term has taken on some very negative connotations in our age. The fervor, pushiness, judgmental nature, and self-righteousness of many evangelists likely fuels our aversion to the term - and rightfully so. Nobody wants to be evangelized because nobody wants to be objectified, and objectification is exactly what many evangelists do to potential converts. The evangelist's subject (or victim) is often merely seen as malleable gray matter - a fertile host into which the evangelist (or parasite) can inseminate their ideas. 

As an evangelist for Christianity, I take exception to these negative connotations of evangelism, though I certainly understand and agree with their application most of the time. Such an acknowledgement of evangelism’s misuse is a sober warning to me that even in my noblest of desires, my self-centeredness may be the overwhelming motivation with which I lead. But potential egoism isn’t the only way in which I might err. When evangelism fails to be a good thing, its failure must be seen as in one of two areas: the objectification of another (which simultaneously entails the self-centeredness of the evangelist) and/or the untruth of the message - the "good news" being preached.​

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How Can Evil Exist if God is Perfect?

10/14/2020

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Photo by  Matteo Fantuzzi  on  Scopio​
​If God is good, and if God created a world which he identified as good, then how did evil come to be? In our minds the moral universe is a closed system. If the input is perfect and there is no other force outside of the input, then the result should not be of a different character.

I recently wrestled with the question of how perfect moral agents (i.e. Adam and Eve) could sin. I have also taken a look at various theodicies as to why God may allow evil. But after a recent conversation with a friend, I realized that there is still a glaring aspect of the problem of evil which I haven't addressed. I may have thought through the moral motivations of Adam and Eve to sin or the motivations for God allowing evil, but how is evil philosophically possible in the first place? In this article I want to go beyond the exploration of the human and divine nature, and instead look at a proposed explanation for the metaphysical possibility of evil in a world whose source is morally perfect.

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How Did Sin Originate in a Perfect World?

11/20/2019

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By Gustave Doré - Paradise Lost or James Donahue, Public Domain
It doesn't matter which worldview you accept in life, any position is going to produce its nagging questions. Most people don't seem to have too much of a problem with the dissonance, either because they're unaware of the bigger questions or because it ultimately doesn't matter to them. They can go on with life and never give the problems inherent in their worldviews a second thought. That does not at all describe me. The big questions nag me, and nag me, and nag me - and will likely do so until the day I die. While I'm trying to find that middle ground and come to terms with the fact that mystery exists and isn't always bad, I don't think I can ever stop working through the big questions.

One of these big questions which arise and is particularly strong in Reformed Theology, is the question of how evil originated. If God created good humans in a good world, and if human action is the result of acting upon one's desires, then how could sin have ever come about? If a good, all-powerful God created a good world, then any deficiency which arises seems to be attributable to God. But Christians know that can't be the case, for then God would be evil. ​

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gods in the Flesh

12/17/2018

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​"*Jean Claude! *Fran!" I yelled through the cold, morning air. I was yelling because my voice needed to travel through the haze from the still smoldering campfires and all the way through the slats in the small, wooden shanty to the seven occupants who resided inside. Without a door on the shack and with only blankets for windows, I didn't need to yell all that loudly for them to hear me. But my voice was the "doorbell" to make my presence known, and I wanted to ensure that I was heard. I didn't want any of my future visits to end up like my first, unannounced visit, when *Sam, Jean Claude's older brother, took me into the shack while the rest of the family were all still huddled in the same bed trying to keep warm. 

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God and Evil

4/19/2016

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One of the hardest ideas for me to work through in the Christian faith is the notion of evil. Don't get me wrong, I think Christianity handles evil far better than any other worldview. Atheism has to dismiss evil as non-existent or as a socially agreed upon, linguistic fiction. 
There isn't really any such thing as evil, just events, actions, and feelings that a majority of individuals and culturesdislike enough to cause them to band together and suppress others who perform such acts. Morality on atheism is just majoritized preferences or observed patterns for bettering survival chances and/or pleasure of the species. 
 
The Eastern religions and pantheism, on the other hand, tend to dismiss evil as a figment of our imaginations, or misguided ignorance - opposing our very strong intuitive notions of evil as malicious injustice that needs righted. Rather than making up a subjective fiction, like atheists, they acknowledge evil for what it logically is - nonexistent. In a world where everything is god, and everything is nature, what can possibly be "wrong?" Evil, then, is simply just a word used to describe a lack of understanding. Polytheists (if they exist anymore), like the ancient Greeks, end up clinging to a pantheon of gods that are just as tainted with evil as mortal man - leaving out any hope of resolution. Evil is just a natural truth that is a byproduct of an agent's choices and desires. And really, it's just a massive power struggle for the pantheon to fulfill their own desires, so evil ends up simply being fated inconvenience for those who are in the way of the more powerful. Evil is just the collateral damage of another's pursuit of fulfillment. We exist at the whims of gods, and maintain our existence by being of use to them or staying out of their way.

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    *The views and ideas on this site are in no way affiliated with any organization, business, or individuals we are a part of or work with. They're also not theological certainties. They're simply thinking out loud, on issues and difficulties as I process things.

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