Original Sin

[rkwright]

A good analogy might be an inherited disease. People who are born with a disease didn't "choose" it - they are just born with it, perhaps because of the fault of their parents. Or think of a war. Because of the choice of one man (a leader) many will die (a nation who fights under them). The soldiers did not choose war, but they certainly bear the effects of the fighting. In the same sense all of humanity bears the burden of Adam's sin. We all die, a consequence of Adam's sin. We all have a tendency to sin, a consequence of Adam's original sin. This we all agree on. The West would also say that we are all in some sense share in the guilt of Adam's original sin. cf. Apo's post.

[rkwright]

[quote name='pat22' date='08 October 2009 - 03:45 PM' timestamp='1255034702' post='1981163']
my point is that the first poeple were born into a perfect world and never HAD to know pain or suffering. we are never even given that choice. where is the mercy in having to live a life of suffering for someone else's wrong doings? thats very far from just
[/quote]
I would argue they knew much more pain and suffering. They knew what they lost. We don't really know what they lost.

Edited October 8, 2009 by rkwright

[Resurrexi]

[quote name='Nihil Obstat' date='08 October 2009 - 03:14 PM' timestamp='1255032882' post='1981110']
It's somewhat misleading to say that we inherited sin though.
[/quote]

The Fathers of the Council of Trent didn't think so.

Edited October 8, 2009 by Resurrexi

[Apotheoun]

[quote name='pat22' date='08 October 2009 - 02:45 PM' timestamp='1255034702' post='1981163']
my point is that the first poeple were born into a perfect world and never HAD to know pain or suffering. we are never even given that choice. where is the mercy in having to live a life of suffering for someone else's wrong doings? thats very far from just
[/quote]
I do not agree. Adam and Eve, according to St. Irenaeus, were not created perfect; rather, they were created like children with the potential, i.e., through virtuous activity, to become perfect. Sadly, they failed in their task, and the natural outcome was death, but with the incarnation that situation has been spiritually reversed, and each one of us born mortal in Adam has become immortal in Christ, and through the process of [i]theosis[/i] we can achieve the bliss of heaven.

Edited October 8, 2009 by Apotheoun

[rkwright]

For Nihil and His Child

From Trent
http://www.ewtn.com/library/COUNCILS/TRENT5.HTM
[quote]2. If anyone asserts that the transgression of Adam injured him alone and not his posterity,[7] and that the holiness and justice which he received from God, which he lost, he lost for himself alone and not for us also; or that he, being defiled by the sin of disobedience, [b]has transfused only death and the pains of the body into the whole human race, but not sin also, which is the death of the soul[/b], let him be anathema, since he contradicts the Apostle who says:
By one man sin entered into the world and by sin death; and so death passed upon all men, in whom all have sinned.[8]

3. [b]If anyone asserts that this sin of Adam, which in its origin is one, and by propagation, not by imitation, transfused into all,[/b] which is in each one as something that is his own, is taken away either by the forces of human nature or by a remedy other than the merit of the one mediator, our Lord Jesus Christ,[9] who has reconciled us to God in his own blood, made unto us justice, sanctification and redemption;[10] or if he denies that that merit of Jesus Christ is applied both to adults and to infants by the sacrament of baptism rightly administered in the form of the Church, let him be anathema; for there is no other name under heaven given to men, whereby we must be saved.[11]

Whence that declaration:
Behold the Lamb of God, behold him who taketh away the sins of the world;[12] and that other:
As many of you as have been baptized, have put on Christ.[13]

4. If anyone denies that infants, newly born from their mothers' wombs, are to be baptized, even though they be born of baptized parents, or says that they are indeed baptized for the remission of sins,[14] but that they derive nothing of original sin from Adam which must be expiated by the laver of regeneration for the attainment of eternal life, whence it follows that in them the form of baptism for the remission of sins is to be understood not as true but as false, let him be anathema, for what the Apostle has said, by one man sin entered into the world, and by sin death, and so death passed upon all men, in whom all have sinned,[15] is not to be understood otherwise than as the Catholic Church has everywhere and always understood it.[/quote]

I think the bolded parts put emphasis on the teaching that we share more in Adams sin in just physical death and a tendency to sin.

[rkwright]

[quote name='Resurrexi' date='08 October 2009 - 03:51 PM' timestamp='1255035062' post='1981169']
The Fathers of the Council of Trent didn't think so.
[/quote]

aw... and I thought I was going to beat Rexi to Trent on this one! I had it up for something else I was working on....

Edited October 8, 2009 by rkwright

[Selah]

[quote name='Apotheoun' date='08 October 2009 - 05:38 PM' timestamp='1255034310' post='1981153']
I do not believe that anyone is born sinful.

Adam, by his sin, made himself and all his descendants mortal, but mortality is not a punishment of God; instead, it is simply the consequence of Adam's failure, as the head of the human family, to rise to divine status through grace.
[/quote]

What is the difference between that and Semi-Pelagianism? I heard a Calvie tell me that that's what it was once.

[Apotheoun]

[quote name='Selah' date='08 October 2009 - 06:38 PM' timestamp='1255048705' post='1981336']
What is the difference between that and Semi-Pelagianism? I heard a Calvie tell me that that's what it was once.
[/quote]
The necessity of grace, which Pelagianism rejected.

[Apotheoun]

[quote name='Selah' date='08 October 2009 - 06:38 PM' timestamp='1255048705' post='1981336']
I heard a Calvie tell me that that's what it was once.
[/quote]
I would not pay too much attention to what Calvinists think, because they subscribe to the Monenergist heresy.

[Selah]

[quote]The necessity of grace, which Pelagianism rejected. [/quote]

Ahhhhhh See now I didn't think of that. But yes, grace is still needed, as we all still do sin.

[mortify]

[quote name='pat22' date='08 October 2009 - 03:07 PM' timestamp='1255028866' post='1981047']
so after jesus came why didn't we get all that back?[/quote]

Because the Just are promised something greater in Heaven.

[quote]why did the desendents(such as us) of the first poeple have to pay for their ansestors crimes? [/quote]

It's like a father who gambles himself into poverty, his children will share in the poverty even though they never gambled.

[quote]and how come they didn't ever get a chance to re-earn all that was lost?[/quote]

Because you can't *earn* a gift from God.


Peace in Christ,
Mortify

[mortify]

Nevermind.

Edited October 9, 2009 by mortify

[OraProMe]

[quote name='HisChildForever' date='08 October 2009 - 03:29 PM' timestamp='1255033792' post='1981137']
I think that's a more accurate explanation of sin, but not Original Sin. While we didn't inherit the particular sin Adam and Eve committed, that first sin has "stained" us in some way. I know there's a term for the sin we commit by choice (the term distinguishes between that and Original Sin), but I can't think of it.
[/quote]

Actual sin.

[Stormstopper]

Any discussion of this question should FIRST begin with Romans 5:12-21 and from there, you build your theology. That's why Protestants continuously shake their heads at Catholics---as we watch you putting "philosophy" up on a pedastel, and the Bible doesn't even come into the equation. So now that you know where to look, will you do it???
Somehow, I doubt it. Your opinions are what count the most.

[Resurrexi]

[quote name='Stormstopper' date='19 October 2009 - 07:35 PM' timestamp='1255998943' post='1988047']
Any discussion of this question should FIRST begin with Romans 5:12-21 and from there, you build your theology. That's why Protestants continuously shake their heads at Catholics---as we watch you putting "philosophy" up on a pedastel, and the Bible doesn't even come into the equation. So now that you know where to look, will you do it???
Somehow, I doubt it. Your opinions are what count the most.
[/quote]

The Tridentine Decree on Original Sin quotes Scripture extensively.