Theology and Sociology

[The Grand Nudger]

Ah, very good point. Thank you for correcting me.

Part of me wants to qualify the “current understanding of reality,” since our current understanding is pretty messed up. However, we’ll go the other way. Each side of the “equation,” Christian ideas and post-christian understanding, has to stand up to the same metric.

That's the whole problem, though, isn't it?  That our current understanding of reality is post-christian (even to christians...) is an effect of christian ideas having already failed by that metric.

Cool. I pick atheism.

You may not know what atheism is.  It literally can't be inaccurate or false or lacking in any non novel sense as it's a single line item describing whether a person does or does not believe in gods.   But sure..what truths do you think theists possess that atheists do not, such that christians possess more of whatever that is?

Is it condescending to say that you are poetic? Probably. Never mind.

Yes, Nature is amazing. What created Nature?

Nature yet again, in the only way that it even makes sense to ask or answer that question.  I assume for generosities sake that you're not a creationist?  

lol, no, it isn’t! I’m not sure how the world should be is Theology. Not trying to be pedantic here. You’re talking about Natural Theology in which we use our reason to know things about God. I don’t think (could be wrong) it would take us to the level of what the world should be. I think it stops at reasoning that there is a spirit being and some things about it. If you want, I can do some research to see how, or if, Natural Theology goes farther.

Our ideas about gods don't -have- to be moral or normative ideas, no, they might just be superstitions about the number and proper classification of various pixies out there in nature - but religions must be and so, any theology of any religion has those implications and those goals.  You're a catholic, no?  What do you think the church has been trying to do all these centuries?  If natural theology doesn't support any of these things - the way of allegedly knowing god by reason which you've said is the way to do that...then it seems like natural theology can't back up whatever the oughts in your christian religion are.

Ironically, a god of nature or an actual natural theology (I use this to differentiate between braindead and deeply motivated mischaracterizations of christian apologetics as legitimate natural theology) could provide those items.  Or at least there's no obvious reason that it couldn't. What you're telling us here is that your god facts and moral facts are not natural facts.  That they are of another kind not found in mere reality, in nature. That there really is no such thing as a natural teleology, for example.

Stuff getting eaten alive asshole first on a good day.

That’s a good day?! Yikes!

Indeed, and since we're doing natural theology and not christian apologetics -called- natural theology, can we conclude on the basis of this that this is the kind of shit the spirit being -likes- and thinks should be...or will we immediately reject natural theology at any moment where it's rigorous and consistent application was devastating to our christian superstitions or wishes? To use another fun example. It was (or must have been) god that made the frogs gay. Does god like homosexual sex or does he hate frogs?