A Rational Explanation of the Trinity

[White Knight]

[quote name='LittleLes' date='Sep 4 2005, 04:47 PM']RESPONSE:

No. It is certainly not a "fact" that the Holy Trinity exists.  There is no "evidence" that it does.

The existence of God is a seperate matter and need have no conncection with the Trinity. Judaism, for example, is a monotheistic religion which does not ascribe to the "fact" of the Trinity.

The Roman Catholic and the Orthodox Catholic religions believe belief in the Trinity, but each considers the other's "belief" to be heretical.
[right][snapback]710871[/snapback][/right]
[/quote]



[b]"God's Existance" is proven by His signature which is been left in all creation and most of all the human race.[/b]


The Holy Trinity is refered all through out Sacred Scripture, Especially Jesus and the Heavenly Father being linked together, ethier loved, hated, accepted, or rejected, one way or another they are linked as one., and the Holy Spirit is the active being who is God working throughout God's Holy Church, the Catholic Church.



Judaism is always claiming One God, and there is One God. The Holy Trinity which is God in Three equal forms in One Equal God, is the same God of Judaism. The God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.

[oakleyswitch]

you guys are really smart, im not really up to date on this god stuff.. but you guys make it very interesting

[LittleLes]

[quote name='White Knight' date='Sep 5 2005, 01:06 AM'][b]"God's Existance" is proven by His signature which is been left in all creation and most of all the human race.[/b]
The Holy Trinity is refered all through out Sacred Scripture, Especially Jesus and the Heavenly Father being linked together, ethier loved, hated, accepted, or rejected, one way or another they are linked as one., and the Holy Spirit is the active being who is God working throughout God's Holy Church, the Catholic Church.
Judaism is always claiming One God, and there is One God. The Holy Trinity which is God in Three equal forms in One Equal God, is the same God of Judaism. The God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.
[right][snapback]711469[/snapback][/right]
[/quote]

RESPONSE:

Please provide the Old Testament reference to the Trinity. The old "it is implicitly contained" ploy doesn't work. An actual reference!

Please note the Jesus and his heavenly Father (but our heavenly Father too; we are sons of God also although nobody claims our divinity) would only be two, not three, deities. The Holy Spirit was a late comer.

Yes, I think you are getting it. The Catholic Church had to adapt its teaching to the strict monotheism of the Old Testment, hence the three-in-one concept of God. But this concept was not developed until the late second century so the early Christians were labeled heretics (starting around 90 A.D.) and expelled from the synagogues when they began to claim Jesus was divine and deviated from Mosaic law . The gospel of John records this fact evidencing that his gospel was written after this date.

[LittleLes]

[quote name='oakleyswitch' date='Sep 5 2005, 01:21 AM']you guys are really smart, im not really up to date on this god stuff.. but you guys make it very interesting
[right][snapback]711482[/snapback][/right]
[/quote]

RESPONSE:

Hi Oakley,

If you want to get a good overview of the history of the Catholic Church, you might enjoy "A Concise History of the Catholic Church, Revised and Expanded Edition" by Fr. Thomas Bokenkotter, Image Books, NY 1990.

Its in paperback and is easy reading. Moreover, it contains an extended bibliography on all major topics it you want to read further.

Its been in print long enough to be aailable at most new and used bookstores and Catholic and regular libraries. If you have any trouble finding it, ask your librarian who will be able to obtain it on interlibrary loan (That great boon to us amateur historians!).

LittleLes

[Laudate_Dominum]

I acquired that book some years ago and I can say that its skewed and liberal.

[Guest JeffCR07]

I maintain that God's existence can be, and has been, proven.

The Trinity, however, is not a mystery to be resolved, but apparent descrepancies [i]can[/i] be accounted for by virtue of the fact that such theological language and terminologies are, in their very nature, apophatic.

It is like we are trying to look at a painting from very far away. When asked to describe the painting, we do the best we can, but the painting appears blurry and we can't make out everything. Thus, we will describe certain things which we [i]can[/i] see, but which may not make sense (or even may seem contradictory) if we do not see the whole of the picture clearly.

Thus, while the Trinity may [i]seem[/i] to be a contradiction, this is only on account of the fact that human language in discussion of the Divine is necessarily apophatic.

In Christ,

Jeff

[Apotheoun]

[quote name='Laudate_Dominum' date='Sep 5 2005, 05:36 AM']I acquired that book some years ago and I can say that its skewed and liberal.
[right][snapback]711686[/snapback][/right]
[/quote]
LittleLes has a "liberal" book? I am shocked by the news!!!!

[Laudate_Dominum]

I've noticed a mentality in which a bias exists in that the person always seems to suppose that whatever is most cynical, negative and suspicious is automatically the truth (or at least "more true").
Critical thought is in fact more balanced than that approach, which seems to have no other mode of operation than suspicion and "worst-case-scenario". I'd say its a rather pathological trait.
It is extremely evident in the "philosophers of despair" and seems fairly common among the liberal contingent.
The irony is that it promotes itself as being "objective reason" and is utterly deluded since it is intrinsically incapable of seeing its own extreme limitation and impotence.

But I acknowledge that it has a certain seductive quality since it exploits a set of weaknesses in the human psyche.

[LittleLes]

[quote name='Laudate_Dominum' date='Sep 5 2005, 07:36 AM']I acquired that book some years ago and I can say that its skewed and liberal.
[right][snapback]711686[/snapback][/right]
[/quote]


RESPONSE:

Anything in particular?

It does include Vatican II teachings, which some find objectionable.

[Laudate_Dominum]

Its a tract for the liberal agenda. The entire atheistic tone of the presentation is simply setting the stage for the agenda that is made more explicit toward the end of the book, namely the liberalization of the Church, the destruction of Papal authority, the bending of the Church's moral teachings and disciplines to the spirit of the age, etc.

[LittleLes]

[quote name='JeffCR07' date='Sep 5 2005, 08:27 AM']I maintain that God's existence can be, and has been, proven.

The Trinity, however, is not a mystery to be resolved, but apparent descrepancies [i]can[/i] be accounted for by virtue of the fact that such theological language and terminologies are, in their very nature, apophatic.

Thus, while the Trinity may [i]seem[/i] to be a contradiction, this is only on account of the fact that human language in discussion of the Divine is necessarily apophatic.

In Christ,

Jeff
[right][snapback]711717[/snapback][/right]
[/quote]

RESPONSE,

Ah yes, apopthaic (or apopthatic) theology. From the Wikipedia we have:

"Negative theology, also known as the Via Negativa (Lat. for "Negative Way") and Apophatic theology, is a theology that attempts to describe God by negation, to speak of God only in terms of what may not be said about God. In brief, the attempt is to gain and express knowledge of God by describing what God is not, rather than by describing what God is."

Actually, the discrepancy is the contradictions in the theory itself, however some might want to rationalize them.

LittleLes

[Laudate_Dominum]

[quote name='LittleLes' date='Sep 5 2005, 10:47 AM']RESPONSE:

Anything in particular?

It does include Vatican II teachings, which some find objectionable.
[right][snapback]711851[/snapback][/right]
[/quote]
I discovered I'm not the only one who had this impression. From comments on amazon.com:

Headlines:
[quote]"Historicist apologetics for the liberal agenda"
"Look somewhere else"
"Handwringing anachronism of a book"
"Needs more history and less editorializing"
"Author never heard of a liberal idea he didn't like"
"Not Concise, Not History, Not Catholic"
"Bokenkotter's odd history"
"A popular (slanted) history of the Catholic Church"
"How not to write a history book"
"Leans to the Left"[/quote]

Gleaned quotes:
[quote]I found the author's portrayal of events not outright aggressive. Rather, he subtly undermines certain aspects of honest history and integral faith applying a modernist type of historical-critical method.

Bokenkotter writes like he doesn't want to offend anyone [except faithful Catholics] and defends those who would damage or change the true faith.

If you think the Church's history is full of embarrassments and missteps, that American Catholicism reached its peak during the decade of dissent that was the 1970s, that the Gospel is primarily about social justice and not salvation, that wedding the Redemption to Marxism via liberation theology is a good idea, and that the the truths of the Faith concerning celibacy, the all-male priesthood, and human sexuality are mere negotiable propositions, then this is the book for you.

a liberal catholic perspective on the past and a re-interpretation of history from the unique liberal catholic perspective.

Throughout the book the author attempts to force his personal opinion onto the reader. The means applied are elegant but for the experienced quite transparent. First level documents are rarely cited, a deficiency that makes the recommended list of titles for further reading useless. Relying on secondary and higher order sources alone is unacceptable for composing a history book. - There are several thousand volumes in my personal library. Bokenkotter's history was one of the few books I filed in the waste basket after having read it ones. The author may want to consult, e.g., Aland's "A History of Christianity" (translated by J. L. Schaaf) as an example of an objectively presented history of a religion.

The author's hope that this book "would help Catholics cope with all the changes going on in the Church by showing them how much change had occurred in the past" is more clearly revealed toward the end of his novel work: "An important reason for this weakening of the Church's absolute authority in the realm of morality is a deepened sense of history. Catholics are now more aware of the relative nature of past decisions by ecclesiastical authority in the realm of morality." The "deepened" sense of history promoted by Bokenkotter is deprived of theological acumen and factual integrity.

Bokenkotter's history of the Church includes a curious, odd fascination with both the murderous Sandinistas of the 1980s and practitioners of the discredited liberation theology.

To get a sense of the ideological bent of Fr. Bokenkotter, one need only read his eulogy of the late Pope John Paul II printed in the pages of the Cincinnati Enquirer:

"No one has all the answers. Hence the criticisms - some fair and some not - one hears in the midst of all the adulation. While praising the triumphs of democracy in the world, John Paul seemed unable to see the implications for the internal life of the church. In fact, he did little and even hampered the development of collegiality of bishops, which was one of the outstanding merits of the Second Vatican Council."

"Many indeed think his determined effort to root out dissent in the church put a chill on the theological creativity that added such luster to the Catholic Church at the time of the council. There is also the inadequate response to the scandal of pedophilia so tormenting to faithful Catholics. And there was the extraordinary favor he showed to Opus Dei, the originally Spanish organization, that many see as nostalgia for the pre-Vatican Church that offered cheap grace through total conformity to authority. Finally, the pope's unbending stance in regard to sexual and marital morality made many, even devout Catholics, wince."

This book is an interesting although deeply flawed look at Church history over the past 2,000 years. It is less a history than a collection of moments in time without a true feel for the flow of events.

The last part of the book covering the period since Vatican II was the most disappointing to me. The author abandons any attempt to write a history and instead turns the book into an editorial about the Church's failure to become "modern" in the last 40 years. Strangely, this is the longest part of the book. I'm not sure how a book claiming to be a history can discuss 1,960 years of Church history in 400 pages and then the remaining 40 years are given more than 100 pages. Overall, the book is fair as an introduction to Church history until about 1900 but a failure as an editorial on the current Church.

An example of the kind of intellectual dishonesty contained in this book is the author's contention that the vocations "crisis" which we now face is primarily the result of a poisonous "legalistic" mentality left over from pre-Vatican II days. This claim has been rendered utterly absurd in light of revelations reported by Michael Rose in his book Goodbye, Good Men (also available on Amazon.com) and similar books on the horrendous state of moral laxity in US seminaries.

I didn't mind the first half of the book, in fact I enjoyed it. But I really got tired of the liberal voice always having the last say. Being a modernist, there are no absolutes, no dogmas, all is subject to change and change is good.

The difficulty with this volume is not an inept or incompetent author. The difficulty, rather, is that this is tendentious Modernist ideology masquerading as history. The book is not an anti-Catholic diatribe so much as it is a celebration of anything and everything in Church history which would denigate, dismiss, deny, or destroy the Magisterial Authority (cf. Luke 10:16; John 14:26) of the Church. The teaching of the Church notwithtanding, Bokenkotter happily embraces proportionalism (372, 404), liberation theology (410), the fundamental option (403), historicism (401), Kung and Curran (396), and the radical feminist agenda (428). The Church knows little, apparently, but that is all right, for our guide Bokenkotter "explains it all to us."[/quote]

Happy reading oakleyswitch.

[LittleLes]

[quote name='Laudate_Dominum' date='Sep 5 2005, 11:17 AM']I discovered I'm not the only one who had this impression. From comments on amazon.com:

Headlines:
Gleaned quotes:
Happy reading oakleyswitch. 
[right][snapback]711894[/snapback][/right]
[/quote]

RESPONSE:

You failed to tell us who these quotes are from.

It wasn't perchance some of those Catholic Answers folks or Mother Angelica from EWTN, was it? :

[Laudate_Dominum]

[quote name='LittleLes' date='Sep 5 2005, 11:29 AM']RESPONSE:

You failed to tell us who these quotes are from.

It wasn't perchance  some of those Catholic Answers folks or Mother Angelica from EWTN, was it? :
[right][snapback]711903[/snapback][/right]
[/quote]
Here are a few of the names (not everyone said who they were):
[quote]Rev. Christopher J. Pollard, Ph.L. S.T.L.
Emil W. Deeg (a highly educated person from the looks of it)
A. P. Schiavo Jr.
Dr. Toner
Rich Leonardi
Thomas Paul (teaches at Hofstra University in NY)
Xavier Thelakkatt (A Catholic diocesan Priest)
Gladiator Christianus (just a cool guy obviously)[/quote]
I wish it was Mother Angelica.

[LittleLes]

[quote name='Laudate_Dominum' date='Sep 5 2005, 10:53 AM']Its a tract for the liberal agenda. The entire atheistic tone of the presentation is simply setting the stage for the agenda that is made more explicit toward the end of the book, namely the liberalization of the Church, the destruction of Papal authority, the bending of the Church's moral teachings and disciplines to the spirit of the age, etc.
[right][snapback]711862[/snapback][/right]
[/quote]

RESPONSE:

Everything kind of going to hell in a basket, eh.