Okay....but only because Mimi has challenged me (poohed poohed???) to come out and fight like a man will I say this...

(Apologies in advance to cc)

WAT - I know that you are one of the most revered (no pun) posters here...but I think you are saying things without giving due thought to your comments. Furthermore, I question if you really mean the things you're saying.


"I don't follow any Church laws (except by coincidence.....

In the end, I'll argue, personal conscience is the most reliable enforcer. What is it's source? Personal morals or divine message? Does it matter?"

First, I would jettison the notion of "church law". What is that? I know that, unfortunately, each group (Catholic, Baptist, Methodist..etc) for some reason feels compelled to come up with a supplement (addendum?) to the Bible. But...they are all man-made interpretations that find their roots in the Bible. Now that the kindly King James has broken the flood gates and allowed us to have the Bible in the language of commoners (KJV, NAS, RSV...possibilities are endless), there is no reason that any of us who are literate can't read the passages for ourselves. It is often nice to hear what others think of various subjects (obviously my favorite is C.S. Lewis), but we don't need to have them "interpreted" for us).

So anyway....that's the reason that I nix "church law".

Now...getting to the meat of the matter. Where did this very notion of marriage come from? And...what difference does it make as to whehter or not a spouse is faithful? What does "faithful" mean...and where does even such a preposterous idea come from? Why should a man have sexual relations with only one woman when there are millions of them around? That doesn't make any sense to me. And of course...the wind blows both directions on that.

But yet...for some reason we can return to a (somewhat) agreed upon recognition of right and wrong. How? What is the basis?

You say you don't follow "church law" except by coincidence. I put forth that you are awash in church law (if we must call it that) and otherwise the very notion of "marriage" would be ridiculous to you.

To follow your logic, the best solution to the pain of marital infidelity would be to retrain our personal conscience to embrace such behavior. Why not? If the bar is personal conscience...which we know can be seared and skewed...why not just re-educate all of us BS's (that term would no longer have meaning) to realize that our expectations of our mates ("our" mates? like we own them?) would be irrelevant..so we could do away with all this pain we've endured.

Wouldn't that be the simplest and most logical fix...if we take your comments to their logical conclusion?

So...I restate your rhetorical question:

Does it matter?

Georgia

(There, Mimi...how's that?)

Georgia -

OK, interesting.

I actually thought we were in agreement in a path for cc to take - it's between her God and her.

I've been challenged on my logic here before and no one usually wants to follow it to it's conclusion, but I'll try again.

I follow the Golden Rule. This is my basis of right vs wrong. I believe it's intuitive to human existance and comes as a result of our ability to reason augumented by learning.

Mom to little boy: Johnny, stop hitting your sister!! How would you like it if she was the oldest and was hitting you?????

The GR predates all organized religions, yet all organized religions essentially adopt it in so many words. Remove the biblical Commandants referring to God and what are left? - a subset of the Golden Rule. Almost complete. <img src="/ubbt/images/graemlins/grin.gif" alt="" />

Aside from our (mamilian) ancestors' hard wired notions to mate with as many females as are available to prepetuate the species, "marriage" arose, I believe, as a formality to attempt to secure monogamy - based on the result of our reasoning ability and emotional development applying the intuitive Golden Rule. It didn't feel good to be cheated on. Evolution has not yet provided us with a mandatory predisposition for monogamy - the vestiges of desiring multiple partners remains. We are still "animals."

So, I counter, I am not "awash in church law", Church Law is awash in the Golden Rule.

Infidelity is wrong in marriage because we make promises to be true to our partner. This is what makes it wrong for me. If this also means the Big Guy doesn't like it, good. BTW, why does the bible (unless I'm misinformed) restrict infidelity to fornication? Guess EAs are OK, huh?

But in the end, the source of "morals" doesn't matter if you don't follow them.

So, here's my question no one wants to answer: What is the predictive power of future behavior for having biblical based right vs wrong compared to intuitively acquired and taught right vs wrong?

I say none.

Hence my recommendation to cc. Forget all the dogma and be at peace with your God. Having rules or procedures or processes means nothing if you don't follow them and they're easily bypassed. Her ethics appear to be solidly based in the oldest moral standard - the Golden Rule - whether she knows this or not. Let her God speak to her through her conscience.

Respectively,
WAT

I would have to find exact scripture.. but God allows divorce not because of the ACT of adultery.. but because of the hardness of hearts. A hard heart is impossible to work with.

I believe that God allows one to walk away from a marriage that has been handed the difficult path of adultery.

I also believe you better be listening to what God really wants before you make that decision.

WAT, having no desire to "Threadjack" cc's thread or the attempts to help her in her search, I will keep my comments brief. If you care to "have another go at it," we could move to another thread to "carry on" such a discussion.



Perhaps that's because your "conclusion" is arrived at before examining the facts. You eliminate God from the equation and are left with nothing but humanistic reasoning.

The "conclusion" is known before the discussion ensues or the "arguments" considered.



If you choose to follow whatever extent of the "Golden Rule" you feel appropriate, I think that's great. It is way ahead of being mean and vile and disgusting, self-centered and self-absorbed.

But you again BEGIN with a conclusion to "explain" your choice. That "beginning" is evolution, both physical and societal. I, on the other hand, begin with Creation and the active will and design of God who writes His laws in our hearts. God also gives us "Free Will," so that we CAN choose our actions, hopefully to be the ones that honor and obey Him out of love for Him. But SIN entered the picture and corrupted things and we have been in a state of "moral entropy" ever since. An occasional influx of external energy to temporarily give the appearance of combating the entropy(as in America), but the "human system" has been winding down ever since Sin corrupted ALL systems, animate and inanimate.

But your statement; "I believe it's intuitive to human existance and comes as a result of our ability to reason augumented by learning" seems to lack the logic you are referring to. There is NOTHING "intuitive" about the Golden Rule or that it is tied to our "ability to reason augmented by learning." One need look no further than the current conflict with Islam or many other parts of the world to see that "learning" has little to do with it. The USA gets lambasted in the press for Gitmo and "alleged" abuses (non-Golden Rule) while the press conveniently ignores or downplays that the killings and beheadings are the PRIME and PRIMARY choice of "Golden Rule" behavior for the radical Islamists. Then there's the Pakistani's who want to kill a man who converted FROM Islam to Christianity. I wonder how many Christians want to kill someone who might convert to Islam or to anything else? While we are at it, how about the treatment of Women by a large majority of the Eastern and Middle Easter world.

The "point" is that human nature (our sin nature) trends to anti-Golden Rule despite a "few exceptions" that choose to try to employ the GR for their own lives. The Golden Rule is NOT "inherent" to our (Mankind's) nature.



This is where we differ again. You begin with the rejection of God and the embracing of unproven Evolution "a priori" and attribute the Golden Rule to Evolutionary theories of "survival traits" that get passed on to succeeding generations. If it is passed on, there should be no need to relearn it in subsequent generations, since the "superiority" of the Golden Rule in the balance of "survival of the fittest" would mean that the "less beneficial trait" (anti-Golden Rule) would be "lost" to the newer and better trait as the new trait is incorportated into succeeding generations.

God the Creator gave us marriage, and the ultimate in the "Golden Rule" in the Garden of Eden. But SIN corrupted things then, and continues to corrupt things today. But God provided the means whereby we CAN "get things back on track again." It is NOT within our own power, but it IS within the power of Jesus Christ and God. God not only tells us HOW to live, but He provides all the means necessary for us to accomplish living for His glory, in obedience to HIS commands. He does so in the promise of Philippians 4:13...."I can do all things through him (Christ) who gives me strength." But THAT promise is strictly for Christians. It is not available to unbelievers.



WAT, following this statement to it's conclusion, you set an "arbitrary" standard for judging behavior. It is NOT a standard that is "unchangeable" because it is set by the Sovereign Lord, according to your statement.

"Infidelity is wrong in marriage because we make promises to be true to our partner. This is what makes it wrong for me." The "Standard" in your scenario is YOU. But your chosen "Standard" cannot be imposed by you upon anyone else. It is YOUR chosen Standard, and each "animal" is free to choose their own acceptable Standards. There is, in your scenario, NO INDEPENDENT Standard that is SET by ONE WHO HAS AUTHORITY TO DETERMINE RIGHT AND WRONG REGARDLESS OF WHAT WE HUMANS THINK.



You are misinformed. And EA's are not "OK." But do you really want a biblical lesson or are you simply trying to be sarcastic to believers?



The "predictive power" is simple, "Works" do NOT justify one in the sight of God. Belief in Christ as one's Lord and Savior is what does that.

Adherence to, and obedience to, God's commands WILL have very positive consequences, just as disobedience and sin will have negative consequences. But the "ultimate predictive power" is Heaven or He11, and we choose our own destination NOT by living by the Golden Rule or by anything other that our relationship(or lack of) with Jesus Christ.

Evolutionists will never "get this" because they don't acknowledge God. Atheists will never get this because they deny the very existence of God. Humanists will never get this because they think humans are "inherently good" and do NOT have an "innate sin nature." Unbelievers will not get this because a "surrendered life" to God, in Christ, is interpreted as not being able to do whatever they want to do...good or bad.

The conclusion, WAT, is arrived at at the beginning when the choice is made concerning God the Creator or Evolution as the "reason" we are here. Then we toss in liberal doses of circular reasoning and it all becomes "very logical," the strong oppress the weak unless they choose not to for their own purposes and expediency.

Mimi....

Did I stick my head out enough to challenge my C.A.'er for the day? I hope so...

cc....back to you

(psstt...I still think I'm right)

Did you mean Deuteronomy 24:1? Or were you talking about Matthew 19:7-9, or Mark 10:4-8? (More or less the same anecdote)

In Matthew 5:31-32 also Jesus also talks about divorce, but doesn't add the comment about why God permitted divorce when giving the law to Moses.

No thanks, FH - I no longer have any desire to "debate" you.

Note: I was not addressing you in any comments on this thread.

Debating someone who, for example, genuinely believes the universe is less than 10K years old, believes that C and radioactive dacay rates have varied over time to give an appearance of an old universe, and that a pair of kangaroos made a round trip hopping from AU to somewhere in the middle east and back is, frankly, futile. I do not have the ability to disengage my cerebral cortex.

I've concluded that you exist in a different universe than I - and this forum is the only conduit.

Additionally, evolutionists do not as a group disregard God. They just disregard YOUR God.

Since you brought it up, I recommend you take a good long look at the "behavior for the radical Islamists." You have a lot more in common with them than you realize.

WAT

WAT & FH -

You are both demonstrating the reason that I usually don't jump in and debate such issues. It has degraded to the point to where the jousting has turned to mud-slinging making you both look..well..immature.

There is no doubt you both sincerely believe what you are saying, but hold to radically differing world views. I have never been privy to a discussion such as this where one party suddenly says "You know...you're right!! I've been wrong all this time!" Nope, just doesn't happen. The spiral is always downwards, never upwards.

Please....just throw your thoughts out there in a respectful way (no matter which "side" of the issue you're on) on let it rest.

Now...both of you go to your room and don't come out until you can say you're sorry!!

I would like to add that cc46 is probably having a tough time right now and I can't see how this debate is helping her. If there is going to be such a debate, can you please get your own thread. I am afraid cc46 is afraid to read her own thread any longer. I know I would be.

traic - both you and Georgia go back and read this from the top and agree that I was sincerely offering input to cc. Just do it, OK?

Then note that FH jumped on me on his own volition after I was specifically responded to by Georgia.

Finally, note my specific statement NOT to desire "debate" and noting debate is futile.

I have nothing to apologize for.

WAT

I don't disagree with your input to cc. And...BTW...we do agree (the end result) of that advice.

However, I think you are too big of a person to add comments like

"I do not have the ability to disengage my cerebral cortex".

Hopefully, you don't take the "I have nothing to apologize for" mentality into your advice to others regarding relationships after you've made such a demeaning comment.

Frankly, I think you do have something to apologize for.

WAT, your closedmindedness for an alleged scientist is, itself, rather revealing about you. Add to that your ad hominum attack on Christianity and God (certainly not the God of Scripture since you flat out deny Creation by any Living Diety), and your "taunts," much less your reasoning have little impact. Furthermore, cc46 IS ASKING A THEOLOGICAL/DOCTRINAL question to which, as an unbeliever, you would seem hardly qualified to comment upon, much less to offer potential help short of "ignore God."

So with all due respect to your "cerebral cortex," you have never proven evolution, much less the non-existance of God. So kindly keep your rhetoric civil or exercise some of your highly prized cerebral cortex and know when to remain silent on issues you have little, if any knowledge or information of merit.



Of course not. You were addressing believers everywhere. I just happen to be one of them.




Okay, I'll do that. How about YOU doing the same as YOUR slams against God (Christian "God" in most of your tirades) are about as tolerant as the Paki's and radical Islamists for the God of the Israelites and the God of the ingrafted Christians.

Perhaps we should toss our "tolerances" on the balance and see just how the scale tips.

By the by...how's Gould doing these days? I understand he might be seeing the reality of things for himself....annihilation or the reality of the existance of the eternal soul. He may be "out of time," but others who are still living are not.

Klunk...Klunk...Klunk....

(Sound of GA banging his head against a wall...)

FGG, okay, let's review, for the sake of "maturity" and "clarity."


So I took WAT up on his "challenge" inherent in both his accusation and his sighing lament "but I'll try again", and followed his "logic" to it's conclusion.



So, FGG, here's something else to consider. If standing on Creation and the God we both know is "mudslinging" and "immature," I will gladly bow out. If answering the challege of an unbeliever is "immature" then should we perhaps capitulate and surrender? Or is perhaps the "more mature" approach to stand FOR God regardless of what others may think or say about you for "believing in such nonsense," whether it is God exists, Jesus IS the Messiah, or that "In the beginning God created...." is real, literal, and true?

Regardless, as I said to WAT, I do not wish to pursue this any further on cc46's thread. If it's to be continued, it should be continued on a different thread.

cc46 is in a spiritual struggle that is directly tied to her Faith. Her faith is founded in her belief and the reality of Jesus, God, the teaching of the Roman Catholic Church as a denomination she has grown up in, and God's commands and teachings contained in the Scripture. It is in that area that she needs input to consider her "options" that will allow her to remain "in the will of God," as she has stated is her purpose as she is grappling with the devastation of infidelity. As you know all too well, divorce from and unrepentant spouse is NOT easy under any circumstances.

But I also sincerely appreciate your effort to be a "peacemaker" between WAT and me.

God bless.

LOL! FGG, stop that!! After all the hard work you've put into fixing up your place I don't want to see you damaging the walls!!

cc:

I love the posts you've received - 2th from "believers" and "non-believers" - who I sense have a clear view of your predicament and have offered compassionate responses. 2 sum them all up, of course, all such issues will always be between you and your deity. I know you will find your answers.

FGG:

That was great! (the first non-CA post, that is! <img src="/ubbt/images/graemlins/wink.gif" alt="" />):

"But yet...for some reason we can return to a (somewhat) agreed upon recognition of right and wrong. How? What is the basis? "

I suspect the "basis" or the 2rning point from our "animalistic" desires 2 "do" everyone in sight 2 following some insipient moral code occurred about the same time our "modern" ancestors developed the ability 2 think in the abstract around 300,000 years ago. This is evident in the art and burial practices of Cro Magnon compared 2 those of their contemporaries, the Neanderthals.

Spiri2ality and Religion, I believe, developed out of this ability as well.

-ol' 2long

As I've decided that you are all immature....I'm just going to stick my tongue out at you all and end this debate right now!! (carefully inserting the left and right thumbs into the respective ears and waving fingers randomly while tongue is displayed concurrently).

What was Leslie Nielsen's line in one of the Naked Gun movies???

Something like: "I'm sure we can discuss this like mature adults...Mr. Poopy Pants"..

BTW - Headbanging was at work where we have a plethora of empty offices into which I can lock myself.

I was a faithful Catholic - went to church every Sunday with my children - their father stayed home - didn't enjoy church - missed all their plays, pageants etc. Did make it to the big things - like first communions etc. He decided he was in love with a co-worker another faithful catholic who had cheated on her husband twice previously - left me - we divorced. 3 months later I get annulment papers - yep - he was the one getting the annulment.

I thought it was pretty funny because the way I understood the purpose of annulment was for short term marriages where children weren't involved or some sort of fraud had taken place. I was shocked and hurt but really didn't think it would go through especially after 26 years of marriage and 3 children. I could have fought it - I know at one point it could have cost me $1,000 to fight it - he had to pay that much at least to get one. My daughter asked me not too - she had seen the hurt I had gone through and knew that it would not be good for me at all - so I didn't.

Much to my surprise it went through - no problems at all and he was the one who cheated - I did inform the church of that in my initial letter I had to write but it didn't matter. They did said my marriage didn't exist in the eyes of the church and congratulations now I could also get re-married in the church like that would ever happen. But they don't see my children as being illegitimate - that's the part I will never understand - if the marriage didn't exist in the eyes of the church how can the children be legitimate? Then I found out the grounds he used - my unplanned pregnancy - which wasn't unplanned even though it was before the marriage and my youngest who is adhd and having to stay to help raise him??? The sad part is he is the one who is the angriest about it because his father treated him so miserably while he was growing up and has asked him why he didn't leave years ago - both my son and I would have been better off - that's the way my youngest sees it.

So I am very dissapointed in the church - do I believe in God - you bet - but not in the church unit anymore.

I'm sorry - that last post didn't help anyone - I was venting - I didn't answer a question or make a point - if it offends anyone I can delete it.

Happy,

don't be sorry. It helped me.

You see I think I've had that problem about trusting the Church for a long time. No problem with God.

So your story is just another one that shows that God and the Church are different things.

Another interesting point is exactly the annulment issue. I cannot understand the concept that the marriage has to be annulled! It existed! it was fine! It was Christian. It shouldn;t be annulled, but it is not Christian to be the spouse of a wayward. And that is my problem.

I don't want an annulment. I want a relief forever from having to be the wife of a husband living with somebody else! I feel guilty! Although I know I'm not. I get the feeling that I'll never shake that feeling unless God lets me. I need some sort of recognition of the situation from somebody.

I have found a priest I can admire for his religious beliefs and behaviours as far as I can observe them. I will eventually speak with him about this, but before I want to have as many issues thought about and options possible. That's just me.

Everyone is welcome to express their view here. It does not offend me. I probably won't answer them now because I'm very busy at work, and don't have much time left to read and think about and answer every post. Next week is sort of a holiday so I hope to "study " this thread properly.

The decision will be personal as will be my position. This is one subject that is very personal.

So all opinions are welcome. Thank you all.