"god Became Man To End His Father's Wrath"

[Thy Geekdom Come]

Well, STM, looks like you had no luck on any of your attempts to post this.

I deleted the other 7 disembodied threads.

Anyway, I would say that "God became man to end His Father's Wrath" is orthodox, as it seems to be in line with St. John of the Cross's view of soteriology. However, I wouldn't limit it to the only reason for the Incarnation. There are many reasons, all of which are a part of John 3:16, which I think is the fundamental reason over all other reasons.

[Guest JeffCR07]

when we recall that the wrath of God is nothing more than the demands of Perfect Justice expressing itself through the punishment of sinners, then yes, this is certainly orthodox.

However, to think that such a quote means that a merciful Son became man in order to stave off the bloodthirsty anger of a vindictive Father is to radically misunderstand orthodox soteriology. Moreover, it should be pointed out that such a statement, while orthodox, is most certainly not a [i]sufficient[/i] explanation for why God became Man. The depth of the mystery of the Incarnation reaches far beyond the limit of any human mind, and so while many great Doctors of the Church have written much more detailed and satisfactory answers to this question, I do not believe that anyone will ever be able to lay out, in its entirety "the correct answer." Rather, we should understand the Incarnation to be a mystery so full of God's love that there will always be greater depths into which we can penetrate through contemplation.

Your Brother In Christ,

Jeff

[Thy Geekdom Come]

[quote name='JeffCR07' post='1147006' date='Dec 21 2006, 02:25 PM']
when we recall that the wrath of God is nothing more than the demands of Perfect Justice expressing itself through the punishment of sinners, then yes, this is certainly orthodox.

However, to think that such a quote means that a merciful Son became man in order to stave off the bloodthirsty anger of a vindictive Father is to radically misunderstand orthodox soteriology. Moreover, it should be pointed out that such a statement, while orthodox, is most certainly not a [i]sufficient[/i] explanation for why God became Man. The depth of the mystery of the Incarnation reaches far beyond the limit of any human mind, and so while many great Doctors of the Church have written much more detailed and satisfactory answers to this question, I do not believe that anyone will ever be able to lay out, in its entirety "the correct answer." Rather, we should understand the Incarnation to be a mystery so full of God's love that there will always be greater depths into which we can penetrate through contemplation.

Your Brother In Christ,

Jeff
[/quote]
Agreed. Thus, my John 3:16 comment.

[LouisvilleFan]

Has God's wrath more been redirected than ended, really? It is now directed towards the perfect sacrifice of Christ rather than us (at least those who make up the mystical Body of Christ).

[Guest JeffCR07]

[quote name='LouisvilleFan' post='1147075' date='Dec 21 2006, 06:09 PM']
Has God's wrath more been redirected than ended, really? It is now directed towards the perfect sacrifice of Christ rather than us (at least those who make up the mystical Body of Christ).
[/quote]

I think this is a dangerous way of approaching soteriology. God is not a vengeful lord seeking blood as payment for a debt. Rather, perfect justice comes about in one of two ways. First, the harm done is made right be the one who did the harm or, second, barring such reparations, the one who did the harm is punished in proportion to his or her crime.

Now because man was not, on his own, able to repay the harm caused by sin, he was condemned to be punished in proportion to his sin against the Infinite God (i.e. Hell). Through the Incarnation, however, Christ - a man - [i][/i]did[i] give to God what was owed, he [/i]did[i] repair the harm that was done, by living a perfect life in communion and obedience to the Father. It is on account of this perfect communion, and obedience even unto death on a cross, that the Perfect Justice of the Father was satisfied by Christ and so made eternal punishment in Hell no longer necessary.

Your Brother In Christ,

Jeff

[dairygirl4u2c]

Is this the necessary teaching of the CC? I have been told you don't have to necessarily believe in this type of atonement if you don't want as a catholic. It's the atonement that was described in the middle ages or something, based on early ages perhaps but.

I can see if there is an infinite wrong, we can't fix it. But as an alternative, anything we do wrong punishes us arguably proportionally when we don't live right. Sin is wrong for a reason, not just because. emptyness etc. So the justice is satisfied. And if you stop doing it, then you're good.

Killing the Son doesn't seem to fulfill the wrath, at least I don't see how it does. In some arbitrary sense, which God could pick as the standard given, you could say killling would suffice. But, practically killing the Son does nothing. If I owe you a gadrillion dollars, killing your son could satisfy me, if I were sadistic. it doesn't actually solve anything

Though I do realize that sin means death, and someone you might argue has to die. But we all die. But yea the money thing might not extend to this because of that. Thought the fact we all die needs considered. though him dying still doesn't make the sin not have occurred. It still seems sadistic. though death may still meet the demands that sin requirements, I concede I can sort of see it.

I'm not sure there's a way for us to understand what is necessary, we just have ot believe what we believe. Most believe in propiation, not for a necessary reason, as for a tradition that seems reasonable in a sense, and not reasonable in another. Tradition settles the issue as assumed as correct.

thoughts?

Edited December 22, 2006 by dairygirl4u2c

[beatty07]

[quote name='dairygirl4u2c' post='1147248' date='Dec 21 2006, 11:09 PM']
Killing the Son doesn't seem to fulfill the wrath, at least I don't see how it does. In some arbitrary sense, which God could pick as the standard given, you could say killling would suffice. But, practically killing the Son does nothing. If I owe you a gadrillion dollars, killing your son could satisfy me, if I were sadistic. it doesn't actually solve anything
[/quote]

I think this is just what some of the posters are getting at... that kind of image is what we must be careful to avoid. There's a common strain of soteriology in some Protestant traditions, an exaggerated legal model of penal substitution, that does just what you're critiquing. It's like God transfers all our guilt onto the Son and takes a look at him and just hates him, so he slaps him around real bad, eventually kills him, maybe sends him to hell, and then he's finally satisfied. Well, I'm sure no one here is down with that!

The precise 'mechanism' by which Christ's atonement works is not something the Church has defined. There's legitimate debate about some pretty fundamental questions. Like, did God have to save us just this way, or could He have done it some other way? Was the Crucifixion the only way to save us, or was it chosen for its demonstrative and attractive power to show us God's Love? Maybe someone can correct me, but I don't think these basic questions have ever been defined.

[Thy Geekdom Come]

[quote name='beatty07' post='1147270' date='Dec 22 2006, 12:51 AM']
The precise 'mechanism' by which Christ's atonement works is not something the Church has defined. There's legitimate debate about some pretty fundamental questions. Like, did God have to save us just this way, or could He have done it some other way? Was the Crucifixion the only way to save us, or was it chosen for its demonstrative and attractive power to show us God's Love? Maybe someone can correct me, but I don't think these basic questions have ever been defined.
[/quote]
Typically, this is the difference between Thomistic and Bonaventurian theology, I believe. I happen to be more Bonaventurian, myself.

As for Dairygirl's point...the Son's death does appease the Father. This seems sadistic to us because we do not understand God's ways very well and because we aren't grasping the full picture. The Son, as a Person of the Trinity, offers Himself eternally to the Father. When He takes on flesh, He continues to do this. By doing this, He does the Father's work on earth, making His earthly life a sacrifice to the Father. Some grow jealous of Him and He is offered the chance to save Himself, but He chooses to die. I would say that while He could have saved Himself and continued to live for God and thus redeemed humanity in God's sight, there will never be any termination in this...Christ would continue living on earth to this day. At some point, there has to be a totality to His gift...His human life must be given totally until there is nothing more to give. Thus, because of His great love for the Father, He allows Himself to die upon the Cross. That finality also allows Him to move on to the next "stages," if you will, the Resurrection, by which God the Father pours all His life back again to the Son, and the Ascension, by which God the Son returns His whole self again to the Father. Meanwhile, God the Son sends out His Holy Spirit to unite the faithful into His Mystical Body so that, as His members, they may also be offered to the Father in Him and come to eternal salvation. Likewise, being in the Son, the Holy Spirit comes from the Father, praying through the Son in His Church back to the Father. This eternal cycle of self-gift in the Trinity is vital to a proper understanding of salvation. We can't call God a sadist...He wasn't pleased by the Crucifixion in as much as it was the Crucifixion of a just and innocent Man, but He was pleased with Christ's willingness to allow Himself to be Crucified and that love appeases Him.

[dairygirl4u2c]

I could accept that. The actual dying as a sacrafice to appease I don't think is sadistic. Dying as an appeasement to cover sin legally is what I think is. You could even say semantically that Jesus died in appeasement to cover sin, and as long as it wasn't a legal thing, I would have no problems with it. (legal can be misconstrued but you get my point) People do die sacraficially all the time; it's a part of life. To say it's bad is to say life is bad. But, I reason from saying life is good, regardless of the evils, because it serves a purpose. To lay down one's life for his friends I think is one of the greatest things one can do, as Jesus said. soldiers, police, that guy who tried to save his family but died in the wilderness, etc etc, parents often do.

So you don't have to believe Thomistic atonement?

Edited December 22, 2006 by dairygirl4u2c

[beatty07]

[quote name='dairygirl4u2c' post='1147349' date='Dec 22 2006, 09:37 AM']
So you don't have to believe Thomistic atonement?
[/quote]

nope. Well, except insofar as Thomas' theology includes and speculates beyond what we do have to believe, like that Christ's atonement was for every human being, that it was sufficient for all sin, etc. But the stuff we're discussing here, no. That's why Raphael can read Bonaventure and sort of riff on him... because this is not a matter of revealed doctrine. Just a bunch of us Christians doing our best to understand and appreciate what Christ has done.

[Guest JeffCR07]

Just a few points:

First, no specific theory concerning Christ's passion, death, and resurrection is the "official" theory of the Catholic Church. Sts. Anselm, Athanasius, Thomas, and Bonaventure were all just as "Catholic" as one another - indeed, they are all Saints - however, their theories with regards to this subject differ from one another.

Moreover, as I mentioned in my first post, I do not think any one theory will exhaust the question, as Divine Mystery is deeper than, and far outstretches, the capacity of man for knowledge.

What is true is that certain theories are [i]not[/i] allowed. For example, it would be impermissable to believe that, say, the Devil "owns us" on account of our sin and that God had to "purchase" us from the Devil by sacrificing His only Son, since it is impermissible to assert that the Devil has any claim on God at all.

Your Brother In Christ,

Jeff

[LouisvilleFan]

[quote name='JeffCR07' post='1147219' date='Dec 21 2006, 11:32 PM']I think this is a dangerous way of approaching soteriology. God is not a vengeful lord seeking blood as payment for a debt. [/quote]

How is this not true? I agree there's a lot more to God than His vengence, but there's sure been a lot of blood spilled throughout time for the salvation of sins.

[quote name='JeffCR07' post='1147219' date='Dec 21 2006, 11:32 PM']Now because man was not, on his own, able to repay the harm caused by sin, he was condemned to be punished in proportion to his sin against the Infinite God (i.e. Hell). Through the Incarnation, however, Christ - a man - [i][/i]did[i] give to God what was owed, he [/i]did[i] repair the harm that was done, by living a perfect life in communion and obedience to the Father. It is on account of this perfect communion, and obedience even unto death on a cross, that the Perfect Justice of the Father was satisfied by Christ and so made eternal punishment in Hell no longer necessary.
[/quote]

I don't see how this is fundamentally any different than what I said. God's justice is remitted through Christ instead of through our banishment to Hell. Maybe I implied something that I didn't mean to imply, but it sounds like we're talking about the same thing.

[Resurrexi]

Sorry about all the repeat threads, my internet wasn't working that great or something and when I posted the threads, I went and looked at the TMD Lane page and it said they werent there.

[Guest JeffCR07]

[quote name='LouisvilleFan' post='1147404' date='Dec 22 2006, 01:37 PM']
How is this not true? I agree there's a lot more to God than His vengence, but there's sure been a lot of blood spilled throughout time for the salvation of sins.
I don't see how this is fundamentally any different than what I said. God's justice is remitted through Christ instead of through our banishment to Hell. Maybe I implied something that I didn't mean to imply, but it sounds like we're talking about the same thing.
[/quote]


please don't think that I was intending to attack you in my previous post - I wasn't at all. Rather, I was trying to make the point that, while yes, such an explanation may be true, it is a dangerous one because it has the potential to, if not mislead, then at least give your listener the wrong impression of God, and impressions are important.

Perhaps it is (actually, it very much is) semantical, but I would think of it like this - Imagine the difference between a listener's impression of Catholics after he or she hears these two statements:

1.) "Catholics pray to God [i]and[/i] to Mary"
2.) "Catholics pray to God. We also pray to Mary, but not in the same way as when we pray to God. We pray to God in worship and adoration, while when we pray to Mary, we are asking her to intercede with Christ for us."

Now technically, both of the above statements are "correct." However, I would say the first statement is "dangerous" since it could easily give someone the wrong impression of Catholicism and Mary.

In the same way, I was not saying that your statement was wrong, only that it could do with further clarification so as to guard against people misinterpreting it or getting the wrong impression.

Your Brother In Christ,

Jeff

[LouisvilleFan]

[quote name='JeffCR07' post='1147527' date='Dec 22 2006, 06:47 PM']
please don't think that I was intending to attack you in my previous post - I wasn't at all. Rather, I was trying to make the point that, while yes, such an explanation may be true, it is a dangerous one because it has the potential to, if not mislead, then at least give your listener the wrong impression of God, and impressions are important.
[/quote]

I understand... I was asking in a more questioning tone to begin with, to see if what I was saying was proper or not. I suppose what I meant is basically what you explained, but I'm curious how my simple statement could be construed differently? It'll probably be obvious when pointed out to me, but right now I'm not seeing it