I wouldn’t be a Christian

[Belacqua]

Your putting forward that Catholicism as an example of good religion/christianity?

I would never try to excuse the bad things that the Catholic Church has done.

I brought up the changes that Thomas Aquinas made to Catholic theology in order to say that there is not only one Christian way of thinking over the centuries. Theology evolves, and when we speak of "Christian thought" we have to specify more clearly what we're talking about.

---

That thing that determine a ' real christian?'

It called agape'

I agree with you that, if we want to point to a single defining characteristic of what Christians are called upon to do, agape would be a good choice. 

I'm interested in the different ways Christians have chosen to express this over the centuries. There are a lot of variations. I also think that a more loving (in the agape sense of love) world would be a very good thing. I hope to get better at it myself.

[brewer]

Your putting forward that Catholicism as an example of good religion/christianity?

I would never try to excuse the bad things that the Catholic Church has done.

I brought up the changes that Thomas Aquinas made to Catholic theology in order to say that there is not only one Christian way of thinking over the centuries. Theology evolves, and when we speak of "Christian thought" we have to specify more clearly what we're talking about.

If you want to put the idealist christian thinkers throughout time on a pedestal I'm OK with that (for you). I think that you'd have a difficult time giving examples where the totality of these thoughts were taken up and practiced by the church or the masses. Philosophical academia rarely survives outside of academia except as ideals. 

And I'd still like to see examples of "only with/by/thru god" can these ideals exist. Any god is a mental concept/construct created by man. Claiming a god exists, other than as a concept, is a psychological tool for human manipulation.

[Belacqua]

If you want to put the idealist christian thinkers throughout time on a pedestal I'm OK with that (for you).

Both the idealists (Plato/Augustine etc.) and the materialists (Aristotle/Thomas etc.) are essential if we want to understand Western thought. I don't know if they're on a pedestal, if that means accepting them uncritically. I enjoy studying those things but, as I said, if you don't that's no problem. 

I think that you'd have a difficult time giving examples where the totality of these thoughts were taken up and practiced by the church or the masses. Philosophical academia rarely survives outside of academia except as ideals. 

There are surely no examples at all of the "totality" of these things being taken up and practiced. Real world applicability is case-by-case. But I don't see why the opinions of the masses are any indication of quality, or of the value of my studying those things. 

I was in academia briefly, and didn't like it. My own experience has been that if you want to talk about art and theology (instead of publications and conferences) you're better off outside of academia. But again, that's an institutional problem and not the fault of the topics I'm interested in.

And I'd still like to see examples of "only with/by/thru god" can these ideals exist. Any god is a mental concept/construct created by man. Claiming a god exists, other than as a concept, is a psychological tool for human manipulation.

That's an interesting question. I can't say to what degree certain key ideas in Western thinking depended on theology to be worked out. That would be a counterfactual sort of thing, in which we imagine a different history than the one we have. Given the history we have, the history of many ideas that are still important is best studied through their development by Christian thinkers. Because Christian thinkers are the history we happen to have. 

As a random example, the philosophy of language was largely originated by people who wondered about the words that Adam used before the Fall. The idea that there could be a necessary and not contingent relationship between the word and what it refers to began in this way, and has been taken up by more modern non-religious thinkers. It's not even clear if the original philosophers of language took the Adam story literally or just used it as an imaginary case of non-contingent language. The well-known scholar of Thomas Aquinas, Umberto Eco, who was an atheist, wrote a fascinating book about this. 

https://www.amazon.com/Search-Perfect-La...t+language.

[brewer]

Adam had no words as he did not exist except as a concept invented by mans imagination. Just the same as the Fall does not exist.

Umberto Eco was not an atheist. You'd just like him to be. 

https://www.goodreads.com/quotes/643630-...asn-t-made

Just because ideas were developed by christians does not support the existence of a god or a continued belief in christianity. It is an institution whose time is ending. 

Are are plenty of historical ideas/actions that came about because of christianity that I wish had never existed/occurred. I hope that you do also. To not take these into account is simple one sided thinking.

[Belacqua]

Adam had no words as he did not exist except as a concept invented by mans imagination. Just the same as the Fall does not exist.

Umberto Eco was not an atheist. You'd just like him to be. 

https://www.goodreads.com/quotes/643630-...asn-t-made

Just because ideas were developed by christians does not support the existence of a god or a continued belief in christianity. It is an institution whose time is ending. 

Are are plenty of historical ideas/actions that came about because of christianity that I wish had never existed/occurred. I hope that you do also. To not take these into account is simple one sided thinking.

I'm sorry that someone has misled you by quoting Umberto Eco out of context.

The quote you link to was not spoken by Eco. It is from page 259 of the novel The Mysterious Flame of Queen Loana, a novel -- FICTION -- written by Eco. The man who says the words is a fictional character. There is no reason at all to think that the sentence expresses the opinion of the author.

https://www.amazon.com/Mysterious-Flame-...052&sr=1-1

The main character in the novel is an unreliable narrator who begins the work with near-total amnesia. In the conversation you quote from the narrator is actually arguing against the man who believes in God. 

I am very careful not to write down as fact things that I only want to be true. It isn't fair of you to accuse me of doing such a thing. 

Here is a list of atheist authors from Wikipedia. Eco is listed here.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_atheist_authors

Here is an article which says he was an atheist.

https://sacredmattersmagazine.com/thewis...mbertoeco/

I have also heard lectures by him (for one I was in the audience in person) in which he said he was an atheist.

[brewer]

My mistake about Eco, apologies. But being or not being an atheist is not really part of the discussion. My knee jerk reaction to christians referencing "ex-atheists" or stating that atheists support blah blah blah.

Are you going to address anything more than my Eco mistake?

[Belacqua]

Adam had no words as he did not exist except as a concept invented by mans imagination. Just the same as the Fall does not exist.

That's true. The issue I mentioned was the question of whether words can have more than a contingent relationship with the things they refer to. The philosophy of language is based on two foundations, for the most part: Plato's Cratylus and the Jewish/Christian belief that a perfect language would be possible in an unfallen world. As I mentioned before, language philosophers don't have to believe in a historical prelapsarian world in order to think about the contingency or essentialism of words. Atheists like Eco still refer to the "language of Adam" as a term for non-contingent language. I didn't decide that, they just do.

https://www.amazon.com/William-Blake-Lan...ge+of+Adam

Just because ideas were developed by christians does not support the existence of a god or a continued belief in christianity.

That's true, and I have never said otherwise.

It is an institution whose time is ending. 

Maybe, maybe not. Best not to write things as facts if they are really desires.

Are are plenty of historical ideas/actions that came about because of christianity that I wish had never existed/occurred. I hope that you do also. To not take these into account is simple one sided thinking.

The good things are good and the bad things are bad. Knowledge of which is which requires accuracy about what was really said, by whom, for what purpose, and with what results.

[The Grand Nudger]

Thomas Aquinas made his nut by proposing an even greater syncretism between pagan philosophical traditions and catholicism.   

Aquinas didn't come up with anything, he took the (then)newly rediscovered stores of classical philosophy and sought to make them concordant with his beliefs.  We can refer to those positions of others which aquinas assumed if we wished to understand "western thought" - aquinas is only required to understand christian thought, and..specifically, how christians sought to make their silly religion less silly by affirming pre-christian pagan traditions , lol.

Christian thinkers are emphatically -not- the only thinkers we have (nor are christian luminaries particularly relevant to our current academic traditions), and those thinkers cribbed their shit verbatim from the people they exterminated. There's some history for ya, to examine.



(just because it;s fresh on my mind from other threads)
The idea that there is good and there is bad predate christianity, christian thought, and christian thinkers. Christian thinkers and christian thought referred to their predecessors in justifying this position for themselves, and the current incarnation of this idea is the majority position of academia..but is entirely stripped of any theological underpinning..because we recognize that those underpinnings were garbage.... even on their own terms.

I don't actually have to know anything about christianity, christian thought, or christian thinkers to understand this subject. Christianity added nothing to this subject, and christinaity is absent from this subject in the present. Europe went full retard for a thousand years......that's the long and short of christian thought. Thankfully, we came to our goddamned senses (I mean that literally, god damns your senses, lol )

This is just a microcosm that follows the same pattern as the religious macrocosm, and yet another part of the reason why I wouldn't be a christian.

[Mister Agenda]

It's possible to be a theist and anti-theist simultaneously. You believe in God but don't think anyone should and wish you didn't.

[brewer]

Adam had no words as he did not exist except as a concept invented by mans imagination. Just the same as the Fall does not exist.

That's true. The issue I mentioned was the question of whether words can have more than a contingent relationship with the things they refer to. The philosophy of language is based on two foundations, for the most part: Plato's Cratylus and the Jewish/Christian belief that a perfect language would be possible in an unfallen world. As I mentioned before, language philosophers don't have to believe in a historical prelapsarian world in order to think about the contingency or essentialism of words. Atheists like Eco still refer to the "language of Adam" as a term for non-contingent language. I didn't decide that, they just do.

https://www.amazon.com/William-Blake-Lan...ge+of+Adam

Just because ideas were developed by christians does not support the existence of a god or a continued belief in christianity.

That's true, and I have never said otherwise.

It is an institution whose time is ending. 

Maybe, maybe not. Best not to write things as facts if they are really desires.

Are are plenty of historical ideas/actions that came about because of christianity that I wish had never existed/occurred. I hope that you do also. To not take these into account is simple one sided thinking.

The good things are good and the bad things are bad. Knowledge of which is which requires accuracy about what was really said, by whom, for what purpose, and with what results.

Yep it's ending. 

So............ the good ideas/words of christianity out way the bad. 

Um........... kill them all and let god sort it out. (yeah I know, not accurate) But it was said, by a christian, for the purpose of killing, people were killed (lots of people).

Would you care to google other christian atrocities and come back with "but look at the good".