Just A Note On The Conversation

 The conversation is here.

I will freely admit I didn't realize Augustine and Aquinas held with predestination, as well; but I'm not surprised.  It reinforces my analysis, that this doctrine is a natural consequence of atonement soteriology; which is not the soteriology, I think, of Jesus of Nazareth; nor even of Paul of Tarsus.  More the soteriology of the church, which needed (it quickly realized) a reason for believers to believe, and what better hook than the threat of damnation?

I don't have the space or the inclination to detail a full historical and theological critique of atonement soteriology; and I fully realize it attacks millenia of Christian thought.  So I'm playing fast and loose with things; but this is a blog post, not even an essay, much less a book.  And my sole support is not really support so much as counter-argument.  From the 14th century, in England; the most famous anchorite in history, in fact.

Julian of Norwich had a near-death experience which convinced her to devote her life to God (and others) by being an anchorite.  The anchorite was a peculiar tradition that wore out soon (in terms of millenia), but involved a death to the world marked by an actual funeral service (putting an asterisk to Wittgenstein's observation that death is the only experience of life that is not lived through), and then the entry of the anchorite into her cell, which she never left again until her physical death.

The cell was not a jail cell, however, and it wasn't solitary confinement.  Julian's cell was within a church in Norwich, with a window so she could participate in the Mass, and a window into the apse where she could communicate with people who came seeking her prayers and spiritual guidance.  She also took meals (obviously), and had someone remove the chamberpot (again, obviously).  And she wrote, again and again, about the vision she had during her near-death experience.  So far as we know, it was the only mystical experience she had in her life; but it was obviously a very powerful one.  She wrote a short, and later a longer, version of her revelations, which she called in her late middle English "shewings."  I have just a portion of those, edited for my purposes, to add to this conversation; because it indicates there have always been different directions in Christianity, directions I would argue are more radical than simply subtle shadings on the basic picture.  Julian would disagree with me, but reading her words 8 centuries later, the meaning I find is suited to the present, as hers were to her time:

"But I did not see sin; for I believe it has no sort of substance nor portion of being, nor could it be recognized were it not for the suffering which it causes. And this suffering seems to me to be something transient, for it purges us and makes us know ourselves and pray for mercy; for the Passion of our Lord supports us against all this, and this is his blessed will. And because of the tender love which our good Lord feels for all who shall be saved, he supports us willingly and sweetly, meaning this: 'It is true that sin is the cause of all this suffering, but all shall be well, and all shall be well, and all manner of thing shall be well.' These words were said very tenderly, with no suggestion that I or anyone who will be saved was being blamed. It would therefore be very strange to blame or wonder at God because of my sin, since he does not blame me for sinning."

"And I wondered greatly as this revelation, and considered our faith, wondering as follows: our faith is grounded in God's word, and it is part of our faith that we should believe that God's word will be kept in all things; and one point of our faith is that many shall be damned--like the angels who fell out of heaven from pride, who are now fiends, and men on earth who die outside the faith of Holy Church, that is, those who are heathens, and also any man who has received Christianity and lives an unChristian life and so dies excluded from the love of God. Holy Church teaches me to belive that all these shall be condemned everlastingly to hell. And given all this, I thought it impossible that all manner of things should be well, as our Lord revealed at this time. And I recived no other answer in showing from our Lord God but this: 'What is impossible to you is not impossible to me. I shall keep my word in all thing and I shall make all things well.'"

"...the more anxious we are to discover [God's] secret knowledge about this or anything else, the further we shall be from knowing it...."

From chapters 27, 29, and 33, of the Shewings.

I know fundamentalists today who would consider this entire passage, but especially the highlighted portion, to be apostasy.  Hell, I know "mainline" Christians who would probably feel the same say.  It's always been interesting to me that the Roman Catholic church was truly catholic about this.  And no, it doesn't mean that you have to unravel the whole of "damnation" soteriology because of these words; but it's not a bad place to start.  Because I think the message of Jesus of Nazareth in the four gospels is consistent in this:  that all things shall be well, and shall be made well.  And that won't be done by condemnation and damnation and separating "good" from "bad;" anymore than the message of Jesus (or Paul) was that "all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God."  For one, try as I might, I can't reconcile that "apocalypse carnage" with Isaiah's vision of the Holy Mountain of God; or all the prophets who declare God's love in the midst of the Exile and its aftermath.

The message is consistently love; not "Jesus Loves Me But He Can't Stand You."