Genealogical is not Genetic

Faith & Science Conversation
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It sounds from that as if, to you, “knowledge of reality” means “science”. This is the knowledge that appears to require (potentially) changes to a lesser form of knowledge, our "theological structure, "hitherto based on uncertain principles. I’m not sure how that differs from what some have termed “soft scientism” (the belief that science is the source of knowledge by which all others must be judged), but leaving that terminology aside I’ll make just one point.

If theology is defined as “the study of the nature of God and religious belief”, then the claim appears to be that scientific knowledge (derived from the patterns discernible in material processes) is (a) unambiguous and (b) has the ability and authority to modify our understanding of “God and religious belief.”

Now, The Intelligent Design crowd are condemned widely for suggesting that science can lead to an understanding of whether there are signs of mere design in nature, without commenting on any theological implications of that. That claim would appear to be orders of magnitude more modest than what you’re suggesting.

I propose a different, more modet model: (a) physical reality contains physical truth (because God is truthful). (b) Divine revelation contains truth about God and religion (because God is truthful). Science and theology are fallible human pursuits that seek to elicit those truths and, perhaps, integrate them as do other valid and necessary human endeavours like philosophy, contemplation and worship.

It is the fact that all these, and the usual human weaknesses, interact with each other that makes knowledge messy and incomplete. To privilege one source above the others is usually due to a failure to recognise the humanness of gaining knowledge.

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I wasn’t trying to give that impression. For me, science is one way of gaining knowledge about reality. The alternative seems to be that science tells us nothing about reality and can therefore be ignored by our theology. [quote=“Jon_Garvey, post:41, topic:35659”]
This is the knowledge that appears to require (potentially) changes to a lesser form of knowledge, our "theological structure, "hitherto based on uncertain principles.
[/quote]
I draw no such distinction between scientific and other knowledge. I view us as humans as trying to make sense of our world, using all of the information we can find by whatever means possible.

Why (a)? All knowledge is ambiguous. If we relied solely on unambiguous information to form our understanding of God and religious belief, we would have no beliefs at all – something I doubt is possible for humans. [quote=“Jon_Garvey, post:41, topic:35659”]
Now, The Intelligent Design crowd are condemned widely for suggesting that science can lead to an understanding of whether there are signs of mere design in nature,
[/quote]
I’m not sure I’ve ever seen that argument against ID. In any case, I’ve never made it. I criticize the ID crowd for making bad arguments in favor of design, not for trying to detect design.

I agree with much of that model, with some important caveats. One is that I worry about drawing a sharp distinction between religious truth and physical truth; since we, the ones who practice religion, are physical beings, I’m not sure that boundary is clear. Second, the implications of (b) depend a lot on what you mean by divine revelation. The Bible as the sole and inerrant locus of revelation provides a different basis for theology than the Bible as a fallible human report, both messy and incomplete, about revelation, or as a means by which God reveals himself to us now. Third, I may have a broader view of theology than you do. I tend to view theology and philosophy as trying to integrate across all sources of knowledge, while science is concerned solely with elucidating physical regularities. (It’s possible that my view breaks down when science turns to examine the human mind, but it’s my working model.) This makes science easier and its conclusion (yes, I think this) more certain than those of theology, but also much more limited in its scope.

One of the lessons I draw from the gospels is that we can work out our theological systems, grounding them carefully in scripture and long-established tradition, and base our religious life on them, while completely missing what God is actually doing. I think that’s a possibility to be concerned about whenever we start defending systems of thought, but especially theological systems.

Thank you for the tone of your reply, by the way.

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“This means that St. Augustine and the African Fathers believed that unbaptized infants share in the common positive misery of the damned, and the very most that St. Augustine concedes is that their punishment is the mildest of all, so mild indeed that one may not say that for them non-existence would be preferable to existence in such a state (Of Sin and Merit I.21; Contra Jul. V, 44; etc.).” (Source)

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I agree that it’s important that the science be presented accurately, and that it does not rule out a historical Adam. I don’t agree that we should keep evolution out of it. I think we should have that knowledge in mind when we formulate our theologies. I also think it likely that Paul would have formulated his argument in Romans differently if he’d known about human evolution.

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This is quote mining at its worst - even though this source is hardly primary, just reading before and after your quote shows your are distorting what the Church has taught.

From your source_…that St. Augustine and the African Fathers believed that unbaptized infants share in the common positive misery of the damned, and the very most that St. Augustine concedes is that their punishment is the mildest of all, so mild indeed that one may not say that for them non-existence would be preferable to existence in such a state (Of Sin and Merit I.21; Contra Jul. V, 44; etc.). But this Augustinian teaching was an innovation in its day, and the history of subsequent Catholic speculation on this subject is taken up chiefly with the reaction which has ended in a return to the pre-Augustinian tradition_.

And that tradition (that continues in Orthodox teaching), is what I have outlined in my previous post.

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Get a grip. My original statement, including my statement about Augustine, was correct. Your attempted correction corrected nothing. My quotation from the Catholic Encyclopedia accurately portrays Augustine’s view on the subject, to the best of my knowledge; you haven’t challenged it, at any rate. The part you bolded makes the point I originally made, which is that Augustine’s view was too repellent for most theologians, leading to a variety of alternative proposals, both in the Western church and later in the Reformation. The church as a whole has not found this an easy issue to resolve.

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GJDS’ analysis is certainly “right on” when we examine the Eastern Orthodox tradition on baptism… and especially infant baptism.

I haven’t had the time to see what the Roman Catholic position might be … they may have updated it since I was a child. [EDIT: Additional Thought] I just read the posting above which points out that Augustine’s views might not reflect everyone’s thoughts on the matter. This is consistent with my research on the differences we find in the Eastern Orthodox tradition.

^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^

This book’s title (link below) says; Three Views

Book on Three Views of Baptism

I certainly prefer the view that GJDS describes !!!

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I don’t believe in disrespecting people (at least until they disrespect me!).

Glancing back at the words of mine to which you first responded, I see that in broad terms we actually share many agreements.

The original question was on discrete categories set against an evolutionary scheme, and i still maintain that science can’t help us much on that - but philosophy (including philosophy of science) and some of those other disciplines might help us. It seems that, in principle, at least, you agree, so the devil is in the detail (which is not an issue for here).

To pick up on one of your earlier points, I can imagine that exploring the idea of a vegetative soul might well help in thinking about some of those categories… the fact that it’s not been much use in two decades of science career surely says more about the (admitted) limited scope of science than the irrelevance of Thomism to theology. I did over three decades in medicine and never thought about Thomist metaphysics - but then I didn’t have any need to consider evolution in my work, either. Horses for courses.

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In some version of my post I made clear that I was talking only about Western Christianity but that bit dropped out in editing. It should at least have still been clear that I was talking about the Augustinian tradition.

1 Like
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Indeed - I explained to you in the simplest way possible, what the Church taught and practiced from its beginning, and how infant baptism arose, and how it is practiced to this day. You pick up a time of speculation and controversy during a period that involved Augustine, and now you claim you are correct - even though current thinking is along Orthodox practices.

Man you have an imagination. :weary:

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Gentlemen…

GJDS does a nice job of explaining things from the Eastern Orthodox tradition …

Here is a Catholic writing in response to Fundamentalists…

"Since the New Testament era, the Catholic Church has always understood baptism differently, teaching that it is a sacrament which accomplishes several things, the first of which is the remission of sin, both original sin and actual sin—only original sin in the case of infants and young children, since they are incapable of actual sin; and both original and actual sin in the case of older persons. "

"Peter explained what happens at baptism when he said, “Repent, and be baptized every one of you in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins; and you shall receive the gift of the Holy Spirit” (Acts 2:38). But he did not restrict this teaching to adults. He added, “For the promise is to you and to your children and to all that are far off, every one whom the Lord our God calls to him” (2:39). We also read: “Rise and be baptized, and wash away your sins, calling on his name” (Acts 22:16). These commands are universal, not restricted to adults. Further, these commands make clear the necessary connection between baptism and salvation, a connection explicitly stated in 1 Peter 3:21: “Baptism . . . now saves you, not as a removal of dirt from the body but as an appeal to God for a clear conscience, through the resurrection of Jesus Christ.”

o o o

"Fundamentalists are reluctant to admit that the Bible nowhere says baptism is to be restricted to adults, but when pressed, they will. They just conclude that is what it should be taken as meaning, even if the text does not explicitly support such a view. Naturally enough, the people whose baptisms we read about in Scripture (and few are individually identified) are adults, because they were converted as adults. This makes sense, because Christianity was just beginning—there were no “cradle Christians,” people brought up from childhood in Christian homes. "

“Even in the books of the New Testament that were written later in the first century, during the time when children were raised in the first Christian homes, we never—not even once—find an example of a child raised in a Christian home who is baptized only upon making a “decision for Christ.” Rather, it is always assumed that the children of Christian homes are already Christians, that they have already been “baptized into Christ” (Rom. 6:3). If infant baptism were not the rule, then we should have references to the children of Christian parents joining the Church only after they had come to the age of reason, and there are no such records in the Bible.”

[and more at the link below]

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Once again the exchange goes way of-topic. The original thrust was to use the repugnant insinuation that innocents are send to eternal damnation unless they are baptised, and from this show the great errors of theology, whereas science can keep us free from such, and show us what is true. This line of reasoning is plainly preposterous.

On baptism, the issue (briefly) has more to do with the sacraments and the Catholic tradition of the middle ages, in that salvation can only come through the Catholic church, who can also absolve some from their sins. The sale of indulgences was the final straw and history can show us the result.

But we need to understand that baptism is part of the acts towards accepting salvation in Christ. I cannot find anything in scripture that talks of damnation and baptism or lack of it. That part of judgement is at the last day, where Christ divides the “sheep from the goats” - and scripture makes the basis for that judgement clear - even some who are baptised are judged by God as “goats.”

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To the First George (from the Second of Georges) - - my only task in this part of the thread was to show that your interpretation is not some random arrangement of ideas - - that it is a discussion of an authentic tradition (specifically, Eastern Orthodox) …

… and that there is at least one other tradition, that (not surprisingly) significantly differs quite a bit from the Eastern Orthodox view.

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The understanding of repentance and baptism is generally unchanged throughout the bulk of Christianity (I cannot speak to fringe groups). I agree with you that various traditions may have adopted differing practices from the Orthodox tradition…

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