OpenChristian
(Formerly Lemm.ee)
This is a community for progressive Christians and friends to discuss our faith, support each other, and share inspiration for our spiritual journeys.
We seek God's message of Peace, Love, and Grace through following the Spirit of Christ.
OpenChristian Subreddit: https://www.reddit.com/r/OpenChristian/s/K3NwAgNj2a
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LGBT Discord Server: https://discord.com/invite/e8HXnzV
Wiki: https://reddit.com/r/OpenChristian/w/index
FAQ: [https://reddit.com/r/OpenChristian/w/faq]
[Lemmy mirror of FAQ] https://lemmy.world/post/32102984
Online Resources: https://reddit.com/r/OpenChristian/w/onlineresources
Community Rules
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All misogyny, racism, antisemitism, LGBTQ+phobia, etc. will result in removal and a permanent ban. This includes commenting that LGBTQ¢+ love or relationships are sinful. Be aware that using “Pharisee” as a negative slur is considered anti-Semitic.
1b. Side B folks are welcome, but follow Rule 1. If you are a Side B Christian, please respect Rule 1 above, but know that you belong here and we want you to participate.
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Notice:
OpenChristian is inclusive, open and welcoming of all. We are LGBTQ+ affirming, but we welcome any who have chosen celibacy, as long as you respect Rule 1.
Do not post or comment about how you believe homosexuality is a sin.
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Please note that as a progressive Christian community, we are explicitly followers of Christ, as well as LGBTQ+ affirming and egalitarian.
Friends are very welcome to participate, no matter what you believe.
But this is not the place for questioning or debating these positions.
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There's no devil causing evil. There's only us, flawed as we are.
And what God can do and what God will do are not the same.
What about all those non-human evils like earthquakes, tornadoes, droughts, tsunamis, wildfires, parasites and disease? They cause immense suffering and death, even of innocents such as the newly-born.
If god can stop these, why won't he?
(Edit: misspelling)
If he can and doesn't he's evil; if he can't he's not all powerful. Lucky for you he doesn't exist.
Ah, now we're shifting into the ancient Greek idea of "evil": what is harmful, rather than what is immoral.
But to actually answer your question, I don't remember anything in the Bible about God being omnibenevolent. That seems to have been added to Christian doctrine by later religious philosophers.
That said, I just don't know. And I'm alright with not knowing, because it's that or be tortured by something outside my control.
These properties were indeed added but it was by the church fathers very early in church history when christianity was very different in belief and form compared with today.
At this time the early church interacted with greek and roman ideas to create a new religion to differentiate it from Judaism from which it was born - you can see some of this debate in the new testament between the traditional jewish pov (such as in Matthew in the sermon on the mount) and different laws for non-jews such as circumcision not being needed in Paul's letters.
In exactly the same way, it's impossible to find the doctrine of the trinity in the bible. And yet the trinity is declared in the nicene creed and is the keystone to christian identity
Funnily enough, I'm also a unitarian. Unitarianism (the denomination) was pretty popular until the middle of the last century when it was mostly absorbed into Unitarian Universalism, and other denominations (eg. Jehovah's Witness) are still unitarian, so I wouldn't call it a "keystone".
Following the example of Christ is a keystone. True repentance is a keystone. Professing the Gospel is a keystone.
Sad things, tragedy, and death are not the same as evil.
Without answering the question here, just wanted to point out that it's a different question, so don't try to apply the answers to one question to the other question.
You're talking about 'the problem of suffering' not 'the problem of evil'
yeah it's not even a Christianity point to make. Who are we to condemn the happenings of Earth and it's inhabitants just because it can harm humans? We are not above our planet.
Agreed.
Evil is a moral judgement describing a motive or agent (in the sense of something with agency, something that causes something to happen). Sad things, tragedy and death are not in and of themselves evil, they are the result of evil.
When a person does things that directly cause immense suffering on purpose, we can say the evil came from a human.
Now on to god. God is normally ascribed the properties of omniscience, omnipotence and all omnibenevolence. In addition God caused the universe to come into being.
As he is omniscient he knew the world he created would cause untold suffering and so either he is not omnipotent (i e. Could not create a world without suffering) or omnibenevolent (i.e. is fine with a world where the innocent suffers. (The comments have several versions of this argument done better than I could).
If we argue that it's impossible to create a world without suffering, then what is heaven?
No, I'm highlighting the real problem of evil - that it seems inherent to the world that an omniscient, omnipotent and omnibenevolent created.