Better reasons to quit Christianity

[spockrates]

What the hell does that even mean?

It means he has no clue what omniscience means judging by the contradiction he's proposed.

It's possible it means he is thinking this is the correct definition of omnipotence:

The ability of a deity to do anything that corresponds with its omniscience and therefore with its world plan.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Omnipotence

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Jesus fucking christ. Precognitive ability alone has nothing to do with whether or not one caused an event or directed a choice, but nevertheless it removes the concept of "choice" from the equation, and I've explained why at least twice now (and each time mentioning that the precognitive ability alone, without any other powers or actions is the troubling part). You seem to want to argue another point desperately but that's too bad, go argue that point with someone else.

Having knowledge of a future event does not mean that you caused the event, but it does mean that the event is predestined -which is not an example of choice. It's the polar opposite of choice, in fact.

Yes, I agree I don't follow you, which one reason why I've asked you for an example to show the point you are trying to get across. Let me try one:

An omnipotent God predestines that a person will have freewill, and he predetermines that this freedom of choice will determine the person's eternal destiny.

I think the problem inherent with discussing predestination is that it is difficult to grasp what the person using the word believes it means. The reason is that there are a great number of conflicting ideas as to what the word actually means. Case in point:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Predestination

If you would like, we can see how the Catholic understanding of predestination proves that people (if God exists) are not free to choose to believe, or not believe in him:



The Catholic Encyclopedia entry on Predestination says,[15]:

"[...] God, owing to His infallible prescience of the future, has appointed and ordained from eternity all events occurring in time, especially those that directly proceed from, or at least are influenced by, man's free will."

Pope John Paul II wrote[16]:

"Salvation in Christ Is Offered to All
The universality of salvation means that it is granted not only to those who explicitly believe in Christ and have entered the Church. Since salvation is offered to all, it must be made concretely available to all."
"[...] [G]race comes from Christ; it is the result of his Sacrifice and is communicated by the Holy Spirit. It enables each person to attain salvation through his or her free cooperation."

The Catholic Catechism says:

"God predestines no one to go to hell"[17]




If you want me to understand from where you are coming, please explain in what way this definition of predestination demonstrates that you, or I are not free to believe, or disbelieve in the Jesus Christ you mentioned. If you are not interested in giving sight to my blind eyes, that's OK, too. I understand that it is not in the laughing hyena's nature to help, rather than mock!




Help or not, I do enjoy trying to figure out just what the heck you are trying to say. Can't say I ever have, but I like the challenge, just the same!