I'm going to give an example. If my parents only met because of Hitler, would I not exist if not for the actions of Hitler. Or does God give the same souls life regardless of our parents? There are different verses in which some would say we have existed before birth (Jeremiah 1:5), and others claiming that we are created from nothing (Genesis 2:7).

St. Thomas Aquinas presents a good logical proof on how a being called god exists: He is what I assumed he said [this is in my own words]: > Everything in the universe has a cause, without a cause nothing will take place [like Newton's first law]. If we try to question the existence of anything present on the earth, the causes of the causes will lead us to the very creation of earth. Reasoning more, will lead to the formation of the universe. Now the universe, needs a cause for its production, which is, God. Now how do I prove that God is good, or God "is active," or "interferes in human activity"? With this I mean that God [son of God, who is in fact God but a different manifestation] comes onto earth, does miracles, and punishes and blesses, and tells everybody that they are subject to a future judgement. How do I prove that God is not a Deist God, which means that God is merely transcendent in relation to the universe, who doesn't interfere in its working? Some people may reason that since God is the creator, he has a fundamental power to morph things in the universe, but some may ask why. In my atheist friend's language—"Why does god check on the actions of people? why doesn't he chill?" This is all part of some kind of thought experiment to prove logically that God is as He is portrayed in the Bible. Since St. Thomas Aquinas started this "logical thinking" and was a Christian, I decided to ask it in the Christianity Stack Exchange. I myself am not a Christian, but I love studying Christianity and pondering over it.

This argument from redeemed zoomer 's twitter account. What is the catholic response to it? > How can you infallibly know whether the true church is the Catholic > Church or the Orthodox Church? > > If you can use fallible historical reason to determine that, then I > can use fallible historical reason to determine the canon of Scripture

We read in John 1:1-2: > In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God. Clearly, John means The Son of God for “the Word who was with God”, as is evident from Vs 1:2. No other Evangelist uses the concept of "The Word was God "; neither do we hear Jesus referring to himself as "The Word". Of course, he speaks of the words from the mouth of God, as in Matthew 4:4: > But he answered and said, it is written, Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of God. Now, there is a difference between Word that proceeds from God' and Word that was God'. Is it possible that John sourced the concept from an ancient Jewish text, or from Greek philosophy? My question therefore is: **According to Catholic Church, what was the source of the concept "The Word was God " that John the Evangelist introduced in Jn 1: 1?**

I recently took the time to re-read the prelusive words of William Lane Craig’s Reasonable Faith. This quote stuck with me:

When a person refuses to come to Christ, it is never just because of lack of evidence or because of intellectual difficulties: at root, he refuses to come because he willingly ignores and rejects the drawing of God’s Spirit on his heart. No one in the final analysis really fails to become a Christian because of lack of arguments; he fails to become a Christian because he loves darkness rather than light and wants nothing to do with God.

A decade after first reading this, I remember I was struggling to understand who he intends the book to be for, and Craig's motivations. If we are not to assume that Craig is not serious or that he is lying about his sincerity, it could be that he is sincere but wrong: in the sense that he genuinely cannot make sense of atheism as an intellectual position. But then it seems to me that he is so caught up in his own religious convictions he cannot fathom the possibility someone could sincerely disagree with his position. An unfortunate position, in my view. The disagreement is also shifted from the intellectual realm of evidence to the moral realm of personal integrity, effectively *faulting the non-believer* for an emotional or spiritual deficiency. It appeals to notions of spiritual deficiency rather than engaging directly with intellectual critiques. The quote makes apologetics seem like its whole purpose is to convince those who already are convinced. I also think this type of argumentation renders the argument difficult to empirically verify or falsify. If non-belief is attributed to an internal disposition (such as a preference for "darkness" over "light"), it becomes impossible to test or refute through evidence. Thus I am curious if Craig has revised these position in recent times, if he has matured as he has gotten older. Questions: 1. Has Craig changed his view or added nuance to his stance? Does he still attribute unbelief primarily to the willful rejection of God rather than to intellectual or evidential challenges? 2. Is evidence still something that, for him, acts only insofar as a dual warrant of one’s Christian beliefs alongside the inner witness of the Spirit? 3. Has he acknowledged intellectual or evidential factors as genuine obstacles to faith? 4. What role does he currently assign to evidence and objective methods in relation to the work of the Holy Spirit?

If there is a god then he probably wouldn't let us have 100% proof that he is real, so that we can have faith in him instead of just having physical proof. so we cant know for sure that he is or isn't real. But if there isn't a god, then eventually we should be able to find 100% proof that he isn't real, and that people are just bending reality to fit their religion. but we don't have that proof yet. So, how can I know if he exists or not?

As I understand neoplatonism within Christianity (from this answer ) all people are envisioned as being on a 'path', with a relationship with Christ at one end and the opposite at the other end. Where one is and what direction one is heading on that 'path' is indicated or determined somewhat by what one does and more so by why one does it. The foundation seems to be (as the answer explains) that > "In the neoplatonist tradition, all goodness comes from God, and to be good or do good, in any sense, is to participate in God's goodness" therefore "to do good is to serve Christ, whether or not you know you are doing it, and to do evil is to go against Christ, even if--or especially if--you do that evil in Christ's name.". Therefore there is, for the Christian neoplatonist, just one path and everyone is on it either serving Christ or opposing Christ whether they know it or not. At Matthew 7:13-14 Jesus says the following: > "Enter ye in at the strait gate: for wide is the gate, and broad is the way, that leadeth to destruction, and many there be which go in thereat: Because strait is the gate, and narrow is the way, which leadeth unto life, and few there be that find it.", and He appears to be delineating two different 'ways' and two different entry points to those 'ways'. Way, here, is *hod-os'* (see [interlinear of Matt 7:13](https://biblehub.com/interlinear/matthew/7-13.htm)) which is the common Greek word for road or street. **How does Christian neoplatonism understand Jesus' apparent delineation of two different ways, or roads, or paths having two different entry points?**

There's a concept that I heard used many times throughout my life in regards to idolatry. The idea is that inside each of us is a "God-shaped hole"--a place inside of our hearts that only God can fill. If we try to put anything else in there, it won't fit (meaning, it won't fill the need we have inside of our heart/soul). Where does this concept originate? Is it a biblical concept or just a fanciful rhetoric?

According to Catholicism, can unaided reason know that every religion except Christianity is false? For example, if someone claimed that they are 95% sure Christianity is true and 5% sure some other religion is true (and let's say for the sake of argument this person is perfectly informed about both religions), would Catholicism tell them this is a reasonable belief to hold and the right way to think about things, or would they say no, there is enough information out there that if you actually know about that religion you would know with complete certainty that it is false?

> In contemporary philosophy, a **brute fact** is a fact that cannot be explained in terms of a deeper, more "fundamental" fact. There are two main ways to explain something: say what "brought it about", or describe it at a more "fundamental" level. For example, a cat displayed on a computer screen can be explained, more "fundamentally", in terms of certain voltages in bits of metal in the screen, which in turn can be explained, more "fundamentally", in terms of certain subatomic particles moving in a certain manner. If one were to keep explaining the world in this way and reach a point at which no more "deeper" explanations can be given, then one would have found some facts which are brute or inexplicable, in the sense that we cannot give them an ontological explanation. As it might be put, there may exist some things that just are. > > To reject the existence of brute facts is to think that everything can be explained ("Everything can be explained" is sometimes called the principle of sufficient reason). > > ... > > **Bertrand Russell took a brute fact position when he said, "I should say that the universe is just there, and that's all." Sean Carroll similarly concluded that "any attempt to account for the existence of something rather than nothing must ultimately bottom out in a set of brute facts; the universe simply is, without ultimate cause or explanation."** > > Source: [Brute fact - Wikipedia](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brute_fact) Postulating that the universe *just is*, as a *brute fact*, devoid of an ultimate cause or explanation, is a viewpoint often embraced by naturalists and non-theists, exemplified by figures like [Sean Carroll](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sean_M._Carroll) and [Bertrand Russell](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bertrand_Russell) . However, this notion runs contrary to the Christian faith's premise of a Creator God serving as the ultimate explanation for the universe's existence. How might a Christian effectively persuade a naturalist non-theist, such as Sean Carroll, that it is metaphysically impossible for the universe to be a brute fact? --- *Bonus for the interested reader with about one hour of free time*: [God is not a Good Theory (Sean Carroll)](https://youtu.be/ew_cNONhhKI)

> In short, open theism posits that since God and humans are free, > God's knowledge is dynamic and God's providence flexible. Whereas > several versions of traditional theism picture God's knowledge of the > future as a singular, fixed trajectory, open theism sees it as a > plurality of branching possibilities, with some possibilities becoming > settled as time moves forward. Thus, the future, as well as God's > knowledge of it, is open. Open Theism states that, while God knows everything that can be known, the future free-will choices made by individual persons do not fall in the knowable category. In Isaiah 46 we find the following: > Remember the former things of old: for I am God, and there is none else; I am God, and there is none like me, Declaring the end from the beginning, and from ancient times the things that are not yet done, saying, My counsel shall stand, and I will do all my pleasure: (vs. 9-10) There are no explicit or implicit limitations on God's foreknowledge contained in this passage: He declares (and therefore must know in advance) the end from the beginning. Open Theism declares that human, free-will choices are unknowable in advance by God. However it appears that, since the inception of any future circumstance is laden with, and even produced by, a myriad of human choices, declaring from ancient times the things that are not yet done would necessitate intimate knowledge of future human choices. On what basis does Open Theism limit God's possible foreknowledge? Of interest is this peer-reviewed article from the Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy (entitled Foreknowledge and Free Will) arguing against the assumption that perfect foreknowledge eradicates free will.

Some rabbinic texts make the rather blasphemous (and bizarre) claim that God lied to Abraham in Gn. 18:13/4. >"In one case we even find **God twisting the truth** in order to preserve amicable relations between Abraham and Sarah and to prevent Abraham’s feelings from being hurt. Upon overhearing the prediction that she was about to become pregnant, Sarah laughs, “Now that I am withered, am I to have enjoyment—with my husband so old?” (Gen. 18:12); God, however, quotes her in Abraham’s hearing as having said, “Shall I in truth bear a child, old as I am?” (Gen. 18:13), making no reference to Abraham’s inadequacy. This episode was used by the Sages of the Talmud as a proof-text showing that it is permitted to deviate from the strict line of truth in order to establish peace (BT Yeb. 65b; BT B.M. 87a)." - **Yael Shemesh**, Lies by Prophets and Other Lies in the Hebrew Bible, 2. Lies in the Bible (paper|Bar-Ilan University), p. 4. >"I BEING OLD — Scripture [euphemism for God] in relating her words to her husband alters them for the sake of peace, for she had said (v. 12) 'my lord is old'" (Rashi on Gn. 18:13). >"Bar Kappara said: Peace [between spouses] is a great thing, as even Scripture [euphemism for God] spoke untruths [baddāʾîṯ] in order to establish peace between Abraham and Sarah" (Bereshit Rabbah 48:18). The Bible doesn't seem to say God can't lie in a way that is completely immune to textual abuse. So, my question is, can it be proven through unaided reason (that is, natural theology) that God can't lie? I would like a detailed explanation that goes beyond "God is truth."

This question is regarding the Catholic view. Why did Satan and the other demons rebel against God? What do they get out of it? Demons are outside of time so they perceive everything in one eternal moment [sic]. They do not have physical inclinations that could lead them to sin. Unlike humans they perceive all of their knowledge at the same time, which means they couldn’t forget or not take into consideration the fact of God’s omnipotence and their own damnation for disobeying Him. Wouldn’t they also know that the only reason God allows them to rebel against Him is to bring some greater good out of it, which would defeat the purpose of their actions? Wouldn’t it have been in their personal interest to not rebel against God since hell is the worst thing and it far outweighs whatever they got out of rebelling? This makes it seem like they were irrational, but how can such beings be irrational? **some quotes from Catholic Answers:** > When the angels made their initial choice to love and serve the Lord or not, they perfectly saw—according to their angelic natures—the irrevocably eternal consequences of their actions. That is, they were given the power by God to make a clear and irrevocable choice to love and serve him or not. Some chose well, while others chose very badly. > They understood the world and their decisions immediately—according to Thomas Aquinas, they have no active and passive intellect (I, 54, 4)—and the exercise of their free will is instantaneous and final. I don't know whether they are strictly atemporal or not, but whatever they are, the nature of their decision was such that there was no going back despite God's infinite mercy. **Addendum**: Angels do not know the future (see ST I.57.3) Also, this question differs in no way from the question of why humans choose damnation. The answer to both questions is that there is no answer. This is because free will by definition is the *terminus ad quem* of explanation. The only explanation for an act of free will is God; there's no intervening created explanation. So the closest thing to an answer of this question is that they rebelled in order to manifest God's attribute of justice.

James Fodor is an atheist physicist who has written rebuttals against the Christian faith and its arguments for God. One of those articles that he wrote was [*A Case for Christianity: a Critique*](https://jamesfodor.com/2014/05/02/a-case-for-christianity-a-critique/) in which he tried to debunk the contingency argument. I was wondering how you would reply to him? Here are some quotes from the article: **On Contingency** > The speaker argues that the universe is probably contingent, because > the universe is simply the sum total of everything in the universe, > and as far as we know everything in the universe is contingent. There > are several flaws with this argument. First, we simply do not know > very much about the large-scale structure, origin, and nature of the > universe. We do not know what was possible and what wasn’t – the > science (and philosophy) of these matters is a long way from being > settled. For the speaker therefore to simply assert that ‘as far as we > know everything is contingent’ grossly overstates the extent of our > knowledge, and dismisses too readily the high levels of uncertainty > that remain. Second, the speaker actually gives no reason as to why > the universe should be contingent even if all of its constituent > components are contingent. This is simply the fallacy of composition. > He does acknowledge that it isn’t logically necessary that this be the > case, but then he simply brushes off this objection and asserts that > ‘it is a real stretch’ to argue that the universe could be necessary > even though all its constituents are contingent. Why? No argument is > given. Indeed, there seem to be many obvious counterexamples where > properties of the whole are not manifested in any of the parts. For > instance, cells are alive, but cells are made up of nothing but atoms, > which are not alive. Words have meaning, but words are made up solely > of vibrations of air or dots of ink, which do not have any meaning > associated with them individually. To give another example, we would > have to ‘go and look’ to see if any particular book was in a library – > that fact would be contingent. But it would not be a contingent fact > that a library contains books of some sort, or else it would not be a > library at all. For these reasons, the speaker fails to establish > their conclusion that the universe is contingent. **On the Principle of Sufficient Reason** > The speaker argues that all contingent facts must have some reason or > explanation as to why they are the case, a notion which is called the > ‘principle of sufficient reason’. He argues that this principle > underpins essentially all of science, and that rejecting it leads to > nonsensical conclusions. However, I think the speaker fails to > establish their argument about PSR, for the following reasons. First, > he is not clear about exactly what constitutes a ‘reason’. Is it a > physical cause? A non-physical cause? An explanation? A purpose? What > exactly? It seems difficult to take the argument very seriously when > it is not even clear what claim is actually being made. On a related > point, even the notion of causation itself is philosophically > problematic, as David Hume and others have noted. To this the speaker > makes no reference at all, and seems content merely to take the > concept of ‘causation’ as an unproblematic given. Second, the fact > that something like the PSR (arguably) ‘underpins all of science’ does > not imply that it is everywhere and always true. The author falls into > the same trap that he accuses the naturalist speaker of falling into, > namely of assuming that because a given concept sometimes works or is > successful in a particular sphere (in this case science), it therefore > follows that it is universally applicable. That simply does not > follow. It could be the case that science works well for questions > where PSR (or something like it) is applicable, and does not work well > for questions where it does not. One can also raise the deeper > question of whether science actually provides ‘reasons’ or ’causes’ at > all, rather than merely describing empirical regularities (again, as > argued by Hume). These are complex and much-debated questions in > philosophy, but the speaker ignores them, and simply adopts as > ‘obvious’ particular simplistic answers which, conveniently enough, > also support his argument. Third, to reject the PSR does not imply > ‘nonsense’. It merely is to say that we do not properly understand > abstract and difficult concepts like ‘causation’ well enough to make > confident claims about them.

>If it looks like a duck, swims like a duck, and quacks like a duck, then it probably is a duck. There is arguably little difference between the lifestyle of the Stoic and the lifestyle of the Christian. Both eschew effeminacy in pursuit of virtue. Both find it best for man to worry about things he can control and to not worry about the things he cannot (Epictetus wrote of this. Christians call this "trusting the plan"; there is also the Christian serenity prayer which expresses this). Both believe in the cardinal virtues of Prudence, Justice, Fortitude, and Temperance (Christians certainly ought to believe these, and I'd bet most Stoics do believe them as well). I would argue that their way of life is in essence, the same. The question is this: if a Christian and a Stoic both **live the same exact life**, and the **only** difference in their essence is that the Christian believes in the gospel, then why does the Christian go to heaven while the unbelieving Stoic does not? More generally, the question is about the "mechanics" of Christian salvation: when one comes to believe in Christ (esp. when converting from stoicism) what is it that *actually* changes in the person's essence/soul/existence that makes him fit for the Kingdom of God? In other words, what is it about the intellectual position of being Christian that impacts the *state* of someone's soul?

I've recently been studying [category theory](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category_theory) (mathematics), in which the relations between objects are generalized to a very abstract level. I was wondering therefore if the relations between the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit could be expressed in terms of concepts from category theory. The explanations and analogies for the Trinity are often inadequate / oversimplified, but due to the nature of category theory I thought there may be a way to express the Trinity in terms of category theory. This question of course calls for some background knowledge in category theory, which not everyone may have, but I appreciate any answers anyone can provide!

The [2020 PhilPapers Survey](https://survey2020.philpeople.org/survey/results/4842) includes the following result: # God: Atheism or Theism? As shown, the majority of philosophers are non-theists, with only 18.93% accepting or leaning toward theism. From a purely statistical perspective, it seems that engaging in philosophy is more likely to lead one away from theism than toward it. **Does Christianity consider philosophy a threat to the faith?** --- **Question:** > Were the total number of respondents 1,770? That's literally that the website says. Screenshot below: --- **Question:** > Did the target group include all 30 plus branches of philosophy? The target population is described [here](https://survey2020.philpeople.org/survey/design/population) : > ## Target Population > > The Survey's target population includes 7685 philosophers drawn from > two groups: (1) From Australia, Canada, Ireland, New Zealand, the UK, > and the US (6112 philosophers): all regular faculty members > (tenure-track or permanent) in BA-granting philosophy departments with > four or more members (according to the [PhilPeople > database](https://philpeople.org/departments)) . (2). From all other > countries (1573 philosophers): English-publishing philosophers in > BA-granting philosophy departments with four or more > English-publishing faculty members. An English-publishing philosopher > is defined as someone with one or more publications in the [PhilPapers > database](https://philpapers.org/) in a wide range of English-language > venues, including English-language journals and book publishers. > > For meaningful longitudinal comparisons, we also designated a > [100-department target > group](https://survey2020.philpeople.org/survey/design/comparison-departments) > in the same regions as the 2009 survey, based largely on rankings (all > Ph.D.-granting departments with a 2017-2018 Philosophical Gourmet > Report score of 1.9 or above, plus two leading departments with MA > programs and a selected group of European departments based on expert > recommendations). This group of 2407 philosophers was used only for > longitudinal comparisons. > > We also allowed any PhilPeople user to take the survey, regardless of > whether they were in the target populations. These populations cannot > be considered controlled, but results for all respondents and for > graduate students are given in some tables on this site. > > > Lists of departments > * [Target departments for the survey](https://survey2020.philpeople.org/survey/design/target-departments) > * [2020 departments used for longitudinal comparison](https://survey2020.philpeople.org/survey/design/comparison-departments) > * [2009 departments used for longitudinal comparison](https://survey2020.philpeople.org/survey/design/comparison-departments?old=true)

I'm not sure how to elaborate further, but I love the Bible and don’t ignore anything in it. However, I was wondering if there are other Christians who don't believe everything that is written in it. Based on personal experience, I don't believe in apocalyptic scripture, for example. I may take scripture differently than others. However, I still identify as a Christian and take a few core verses seriously, such as Proverbs 3:5-6 and John 3:16. Am I still able to identify as being saved? I believe Jesus existed, and died on the cross, and I believe the resurrection is a core claim to his identity. I don't believe Jesus is returning.

I have seen life at either extreme, first as a Hindu, with a sort of blind faith in general religiosity, and later as an atheist, with a blind faith in knowledge obtained through the senses alone. I have now been a Christian for 2 years, and I find that it resonates with my life experiences, and I am wiser and more balanced in living my life. Christianity seems to be the most rational of all worldviews I have experienced, if we define rationality not solely at an intellectual level, but at a level which takes into account the human experience. In fact, since we are embodied beings, and not merely thinking agents (or philosophers), I would suggest that the very definition of rationality of a worldview needs to take this "experiential" reality into account. To try and put things another way, Christianity seems rational at a holistic and integrative level -- one involving faith, reason, emotion, intellect and experience -- a level that transcends pure reason alone. I would like to know if any Christian philosophers or apologists have made a case for Christianity from this sort of definition of what it means to be rational. ---------------- I would like to add the excerpt below, taken from *Wikipedia*, as a guide to the notion of rationality that I refer to. > **In philosophy, rationality is the characteristic of any action, belief, or desire, that makes their choice optimal under a set of constraints.**

Throughout history, people have faced suffering, sometimes even choosing to endure pain or death for a cause they believe is greater than themselves. Soldiers in war, for instance, may face the possibility of dying because they believe their sacrifice will protect others or bring about some greater good. If I had the certainty that my death would save others or fulfill some noble purpose, I could understand willingly sacrificing myself. Jesus, had that knowledge about His own sacrifice. He knew His suffering would bring redemption. However, as an individual, I lack that certainty. I don’t have the divine knowledge Jesus had about the greater meaning behind His suffering, and yet I am still expected to endure pain, hardship, and loss. Why is it that humans are required to endure so much suffering without the kind of clarity that Jesus had? Why do we go through physical and emotional pain that often seems endless and without purpose? How can we find the strength to keep going in the absence of clear knowledge of the purpose of our suffering? Does this kind of endurance even have meaning, or is it simply part of the human experience that we must accept? How do we endure the feelings of helplessness and despair when we don't know why we are going through it all?