Maybe this isn't exactly the format or place to do this, but as a religious person (and forgive me for being presumptuous about what religion that is) what do you make of the teaching of felix culpa? That the Fall in the Garden was a felicitous event because it brought about the conditions such that the Son of God could redeem the sins of fallen humanity?
Maybe this isn't exactly the format or place to do this, but as a religious person (and forgive me for being presumptuous about what religion that is) what do you make of the teaching of felix culpa? That the Fall in the Garden was a felicitous event because it brought about the conditions such that the Son of God could redeem the sins of fallen humanity?
This probably isn’t the format or place to discuss such things, but I cannot resist such an interesting question. Felix Culpa is embraced by many protestants but is a bit more emphasized in the Catholic tradition, so it’s not something I’ve interacted with much. I think that it’s really hard to look at the fallenness of our world and conclude that everything is great because Jesus’ grace then gets a chance to really show what it can do. God’s goodness and grace are not dependent on the bad (or good) things human beings act out. So on one hand, God is working and moving through the ups and downs of history and bringing things to the point where His ultimate glory will be realized, and Jesus returns to rule His kingdom in the flesh. On the other hand, mankind has really made a mess of things, and that has caused and continues to cause untold pain and requires serious lament.
Felix Culpa makes more sense to me from the perspective of the experience of the believer. The depth of God’s goodness and grace become more apparent to the person to understands just how utterly rotten they truly are. That God meets us in our unworthiness through Christ is something that for me, is too wonderful to really understand.
A smarter person would give you a better answer than that I’m sure, but you’ve asked for my thoughts, and I suppose you now have them.
This was really insightful! The way you described the sins committed by all humans sounds like the theological equivalent of entropy, which as we know from the Second Law of Thermodynamics can in practical terms only increase.
Yeah this pretty much recapitulates the opposite of Ivan Karamazov's position in the chapter "Rebellion" - we cannot justify evil but nor can we blame God for it because God is incapable of committing evil acts. (By the way, I'm sure this also frustrates you as a Christian in a similar way it does for me as a metaphysicist, but the objection that people of Ivan's persuasion raise to God's essential goodness based on the existence of evil is an error of epistemology from those who are too steeped in mechanical thinking and presume that grace must operate as some sort of physical and measurable force or else it's superfluous.) I think the term is 'prevenient grace' and as you say that seems to be necessary to explain the behavior of man (though again forgive me but don't certain Protestant sects believe more in something like predestination with some subpopulation of elect being the receivers of grace?).
I like the framing of felix culpa as something seen as good from the point of view of the fallen and not as something necessary or part of God per se. Any attempts to know the mind of God will always have serious problems, but something that interests me is what the Devil brings up in a late chapter in Brothers K: that he is eternally sentenced to being a 'negation' (a very Hegelian word) and as being necessary for there to be any events/history (also very Hegelian). I understand that, unlike Hegel, Christians do NOT believe that God contains negation within himself (because then he would have the capacity to do evil), but how do you/others think about the unfolding of history from the Fall to the Second Coming if not in this self-contained dialectical form?
The idea of negation within God reminds me of the account of Augustine and Fortunatus going head to head. Augustinian theodicy walks the tightrope between God’s sovereignty, man’s free will, and the problem of evil pretty elegantly, but Fortunatus argued that God was complicit with bringing evil into the world by bestowing free will upon mankind. Augustine’s arguments have certainly won the theological popularity contest through the ages, and have been refined by John Calvin, and defended notably by Alvin Plantinga.
Regarding the Christian views on the unfolding of history, there are obviously many, and many opinions on what the role of a Christ follower is in the present age. In general, I think there’s consensus that God’s plan for His creation is restorative. It’s to do away with all evil, and to reflect His omnibenevolence. The end result isn’t a manichaeistic balance between good and evil, but the ultimate and final triumph of good over evil. The hope of the Christian isn’t to find harmony with the universe as it is, but of a radical restoration of the universe to its ideal state. Jesus’ proclamation of the arrival of the kingdom of God is the announcement that the gears are in motion to bring this about.
Thanks again! I hope that Christian theology can be part of the near-term restoration that appears to be necessary for our civilization to avoid some number of catastrophic outcomes.
Thank you, my friend. Always a pleasure to bump into you in these parts.
I have serious doubts that Christian theology for all its charms (and there are many) is the answer to society’s problems in the near term. At least not all by itself. The shooter in Uvalde was in a community filled with pious people, and yet did anyone reach out? Did anyone just put their arm around this kid? I don’t know for sure, but I suspect not, and that makes me angry. And it makes me ashamed that I probably would have done the same thing were that guy in my orbit. If Christianity is to make a serious dent in society’s ills, it won’t be primarily from masses of people acting on newfound theological information or spiritual enlightenment. It would be from the people who already profess Christ to be people of His character, following Him with more sincerity and earnestness.
Maybe this isn't exactly the format or place to do this, but as a religious person (and forgive me for being presumptuous about what religion that is) what do you make of the teaching of felix culpa? That the Fall in the Garden was a felicitous event because it brought about the conditions such that the Son of God could redeem the sins of fallen humanity?
This probably isn’t the format or place to discuss such things, but I cannot resist such an interesting question. Felix Culpa is embraced by many protestants but is a bit more emphasized in the Catholic tradition, so it’s not something I’ve interacted with much. I think that it’s really hard to look at the fallenness of our world and conclude that everything is great because Jesus’ grace then gets a chance to really show what it can do. God’s goodness and grace are not dependent on the bad (or good) things human beings act out. So on one hand, God is working and moving through the ups and downs of history and bringing things to the point where His ultimate glory will be realized, and Jesus returns to rule His kingdom in the flesh. On the other hand, mankind has really made a mess of things, and that has caused and continues to cause untold pain and requires serious lament.
Felix Culpa makes more sense to me from the perspective of the experience of the believer. The depth of God’s goodness and grace become more apparent to the person to understands just how utterly rotten they truly are. That God meets us in our unworthiness through Christ is something that for me, is too wonderful to really understand.
A smarter person would give you a better answer than that I’m sure, but you’ve asked for my thoughts, and I suppose you now have them.
This was really insightful! The way you described the sins committed by all humans sounds like the theological equivalent of entropy, which as we know from the Second Law of Thermodynamics can in practical terms only increase.
Yeah this pretty much recapitulates the opposite of Ivan Karamazov's position in the chapter "Rebellion" - we cannot justify evil but nor can we blame God for it because God is incapable of committing evil acts. (By the way, I'm sure this also frustrates you as a Christian in a similar way it does for me as a metaphysicist, but the objection that people of Ivan's persuasion raise to God's essential goodness based on the existence of evil is an error of epistemology from those who are too steeped in mechanical thinking and presume that grace must operate as some sort of physical and measurable force or else it's superfluous.) I think the term is 'prevenient grace' and as you say that seems to be necessary to explain the behavior of man (though again forgive me but don't certain Protestant sects believe more in something like predestination with some subpopulation of elect being the receivers of grace?).
I like the framing of felix culpa as something seen as good from the point of view of the fallen and not as something necessary or part of God per se. Any attempts to know the mind of God will always have serious problems, but something that interests me is what the Devil brings up in a late chapter in Brothers K: that he is eternally sentenced to being a 'negation' (a very Hegelian word) and as being necessary for there to be any events/history (also very Hegelian). I understand that, unlike Hegel, Christians do NOT believe that God contains negation within himself (because then he would have the capacity to do evil), but how do you/others think about the unfolding of history from the Fall to the Second Coming if not in this self-contained dialectical form?
The idea of negation within God reminds me of the account of Augustine and Fortunatus going head to head. Augustinian theodicy walks the tightrope between God’s sovereignty, man’s free will, and the problem of evil pretty elegantly, but Fortunatus argued that God was complicit with bringing evil into the world by bestowing free will upon mankind. Augustine’s arguments have certainly won the theological popularity contest through the ages, and have been refined by John Calvin, and defended notably by Alvin Plantinga.
Regarding the Christian views on the unfolding of history, there are obviously many, and many opinions on what the role of a Christ follower is in the present age. In general, I think there’s consensus that God’s plan for His creation is restorative. It’s to do away with all evil, and to reflect His omnibenevolence. The end result isn’t a manichaeistic balance between good and evil, but the ultimate and final triumph of good over evil. The hope of the Christian isn’t to find harmony with the universe as it is, but of a radical restoration of the universe to its ideal state. Jesus’ proclamation of the arrival of the kingdom of God is the announcement that the gears are in motion to bring this about.
Thanks again! I hope that Christian theology can be part of the near-term restoration that appears to be necessary for our civilization to avoid some number of catastrophic outcomes.
Thank you, my friend. Always a pleasure to bump into you in these parts.
I have serious doubts that Christian theology for all its charms (and there are many) is the answer to society’s problems in the near term. At least not all by itself. The shooter in Uvalde was in a community filled with pious people, and yet did anyone reach out? Did anyone just put their arm around this kid? I don’t know for sure, but I suspect not, and that makes me angry. And it makes me ashamed that I probably would have done the same thing were that guy in my orbit. If Christianity is to make a serious dent in society’s ills, it won’t be primarily from masses of people acting on newfound theological information or spiritual enlightenment. It would be from the people who already profess Christ to be people of His character, following Him with more sincerity and earnestness.