Gogojili withdrawal,Enjoy Free 888+200 Daily Legal Bonus https://www.lelandquarterly.com/2011/04/how-to-instigate-a-god-debate/ Wed, 12 Oct 2011 16:38:25 +0000 hourly 1 https://wordpress.org/?v=6.6.2 By: Nathan https://www.lelandquarterly.com/2011/04/how-to-instigate-a-god-debate/comment-page-1/#comment-23217 Thu, 14 Apr 2011 18:18:49 +0000 https://www.therowboat.com/?p=1513#comment-23217 Sharp distinction! Yes, definitely. And those two different phrasings—”Is Good from God?” and “is religion necessary for objective morality” (rather, replace “religion” with “the existence of God”—reflects the somewhat different approaches the two debaters each took that night. And your observation about how Thomas would interpret the second brings to mind this bit of my report:

Eventually I made my way to a reception at Morris Inn, the on-campus hotel. The organizers were there, as was Craig, his wife Jan, and a handful of philosophy professors. Harris made an appearance later, and one of the elder philosophers greeted him, saying, “Thanks for representing the Catholic view!” (This turned out to be a controversial claim.)

That “sin is an offense against reason” is an old and sensible view, in the abstract, I agree. And I think you may be right that some people who want to do away with God have bad motives for doing so. Just as people say they believe in God for all kinds of terrible reasons, to get sex and power and the rest of it. If the good is in harmony with reason, we should all be able to call each other its tasks, whether we’re New Atheists or evangelists or otherwise.

]]> By: Fr. B https://www.lelandquarterly.com/2011/04/how-to-instigate-a-god-debate/comment-page-1/#comment-23210 Thu, 14 Apr 2011 14:03:30 +0000 https://www.therowboat.com/?p=1513#comment-23210 “Is Good from God?” and “is religion necessary for objective morality?” are two different questions. St. Thomas Aquinas would certainly have answered yes to the first question but would probably have said no to the second. He had a very optimistic view of the power of human reason to arrive at truth, doctrinal or moral, even apart from revelation and faith. “Sin is an offense against reason,” was his conviction.
On the other hand is the view of Ivan Karamazov–although the words are not found in Dostoevsky’s great novel–that if there is no God, everything is permitted.
Aquinas has reason on his side; considering the attempts of several 20th-century regimes to remove God from their societies, Ivan has history on his.
Am I imagining that the desire for a public atheism in the West is motivated by a hope that Karamazov was right and that atheism will anesthetize the sting of conscience? I do not say that this is the agenda of the public figures who are advocating atheism. I’m only wondering if this might be the hidden wish of those who cheer them on.

]]>