Replacing Religious Morality

[Neo-Scholastic]

...if you take that position that God is "the Good", then you can no longer use greater good theodicies like Plantinga's Free will Defense, nor can you really explain why God did anything at all, at least not in terms of producing a greater good. Because only God is good under that neo-Platonic view.

I'm not very familiar with Plantinga's work. Swedenborg explains God's nature as a Creator well in "Divine Love & Wisdom." Divine love expresses itself as an unconditional gift, similar to the Thomist conception of primal matter as a propensity to be.

You don't do anything that doesn't have some basis in your values...you have certain values that incline you to do so....This is just as true for God as it is for you.

I agree completely. Your love is your life. What you love is what you seek above all other things. The righteous love the Lord and their neighbors. The wicked love themselves and the world. God is love itself which gives unconditionally.

Further, the satisfaction of being in harmony with it is itself doing something for a gain: the satisfaction.

Now, you are quibbling. The point is like this. You do not give gifts to make another person feel good, not yourself. That doing so also makes you feel good is a consequence of your actions, not the motivation for your actions.

And if it is reasonable to take either side of this, why are you using it as support for your view?

Because I keep an open mind as I listen to your opinion.

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Condescension; the last resort of the intellectually bankrupt.

I call them like I see them. Closed-minded fundamentalist bigots.