God has a sense of humor, but it does not look good for us

boughtwithaprice said:

Let’s take a look at what the secular world is doing. In this forum, we all appear to be defending our interpretation of Christianity, myself included, and it seems to me that we have lost sight of what we should really be fighting for, the Body of Christ, and His glory.

How does glorifying ourselves, glorify God? Did not Paul address this when he asked the question, Is Christ Divided? God forbid!
We lose sight of the fact that being right is not the highest Christian virtue. It is obedience. Our Lord says I desire obedience rather that sacrifice.

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boughtwithaprice said:

Yet we all wish to be obeyed rather than to obey.

We cannot solve this by ourselves, as it seems we are unwilling. This is not a good situation to be in, and the world sees Christianity as a joke. They all say they believe, but do not act as though they do. How could we believe them? Scripture has come true, the word of God is blasphemed among the gentiles because of you. This is not to our glory, but our shame.

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boughtwithaprice said:

Want to know how much shame? Will you listen or harden your heart? We know what scripture tells us to do. Take a look at this article, and tell me that you cannot hear God laughing

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boughtwithaprice said:

The most evil and vile are now advocating for Christian teaching.

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boughtwithaprice said:

Our Protestant brethren may not get the joke, but Catholic and Orthodox should know that the marital act is not to be desecrated.

They are not serious but pro abortionists are advocating for Christian teaching enacted into law. Now that’s funny


Pro-Abortion Ohio Democrats to Introduce ‘Contraception Begins at Erection Act’

Ohio Democrats to Introduce ‘Contraception Begins at Erection Act'

The ‘Contraception Begins at Erection Act' would make it illegal for men to have sex without trying to create a child.

www.breitbart.com

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The sense of ownership in general is always to be encouraged The humans are always putting up claims to ownership which sound equally funny in Heaven and in Hell and we must keep them doing so. Much of the modern resistance to chastity comes from men's belief that they “own” their bodies — those vast and perilous estates, pulsating with the energy that made the worlds, in which they find themselves without their consent and from which they are ejected at the pleasure of Another!…

We produce this sense of ownership not only by pride but by confusion. We teach them not to notice the different senses of the possessive pronoun — the finely graded differences that run from “my boots” through “my dog”, “my servant”, “my wife”, “my father”, “my master” and “my country”, to “my God”. They can be taught to reduce all these senses to that of “my boots”, the “my” of ownership… we have taught men to say “my God” in a sense not really very different from “my boots”, meaning “the God on whom I have a claim for my distinguished services…”

And all the time the joke is that the word “Mine” in its fully possessive sense cannot be uttered by a human being about anything. In the long run either Our Father or the Enemy will say “Mine” of each thing that exists, and specially of each man. They will find out in the end, never fear, to whom their time, their souls, and their bodies really belong — certainly not to them, whatever happens. At present the Enemy says “Mine” of everything on the pedantic, legalistic ground that He made it: Our Father hopes in the end to say “Mine” of all things on the more realistic and dynamic ground of conquest...

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boughtwithaprice said:

As I stated in the OP, the humor would be lost on you. You don’t find it funny that the most anti Christian secularists are now advocating what should be Christian teaching as a solution to their political aims? I think their stupidity is hilarious.

Why don’t some find it funny? As you know, for the first 1900 years of Christianity, in was universally taught that contraception is sinful and marriage is sacred. The libido is an appetite of the flesh that must be mortified as explained in Paul’s letter to the Corinthians and the consequences of failure to bring the libido under control are explained in Paul’s letter to the Romans. Does this cause anyone to be pricked in the heart and beg for repentance? No, the very idea is scoffed and the teaching ignored.
It has gotten so bad that God has now used the abortionists as He used the donkey of Balaam in the book of Numbers.
An Angel of the Lord was standing in the way with a drawn sword to slay Balaam as his ways were perverse to God. God opened Balaam’s eyes so that he could see the angel with the drawn sword. It was his donkey that saved his life but Balaam beat him three times. Balaam did not know his ways were perverse until he was shown.

The abortionists are now wishing to make a law that it is illegal for a man to have intercourse unless he intends to father a child. That is supposed to scare perverse men into allowing women to have abortions. A Christian man would wonder what all the fuss is about because that is how he is living anyway. Purification of the marital act is the solution to abortion

It was a lie when Christians were told that contraception is not sinful. Like Balaam, they think they are fine and do not know their ways are perverse. God is now calling His donkey to tell you that you cannot go that way anymore.

The choice is to ignore the warning and face the wrath of God, beat the donkey and continue on, or there is always the option to repent and follow the path of life.

You remember when God told you about that path. It involves self denial, poverty and contempt, few there-be that find it. The way to salvation is repentance and obedience not lip service. If today you hear His voice, harden not your hearts.

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boughtwithaprice said:

The vision speaks for itself, it does not need me.
Ignore it if you wish, just like Balaam ignored his donkey, until it spoke.


Jesus said that if you even look at a woman with lust, you have committed adultery. The Satanists now want to make that the law of the land and fine you 10,000 dollars for each offense. That is funny

The Christian would have no fear of this law, as it is what we do anyway. Those that would argue against it would want to retain the freedom to disobey Jesus and still think they will go to heaven. That is not funny, that is extremely sad

Our Lord says if you love me, keep my commandments. How could we say we love Him if we argue for the freedom to disobey? Very sad indeed

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boughtwithaprice said:

As I stated in the OP, the humor would be lost on you. You don’t find it funny that the most anti Christian secularists are now advocating what should be Christian teaching as a solution to their political aims? I think their stupidity is hilarious.

Why don’t some find it funny? As you know, for the first 1900 years of Christianity, in was universally taught that contraception is sinful and marriage is sacred. The libido is an appetite of the flesh that must be mortified as explained in Paul’s letter to the Corinthians and the consequences of failure to bring the libido under control are explained in Paul’s letter to the Romans. Does this cause anyone to be pricked in the heart and beg for repentance? No, the very idea is scoffed and the teaching ignored.
It has gotten so bad that God has now used the abortionists as He used the donkey of Balaam in the book of Numbers.
An Angel of the Lord was standing in the way with a drawn sword to slay Balaam as his ways were perverse to God. God opened Balaam’s eyes so that he could see the angel with the drawn sword. It was his donkey that saved his life but Balaam beat him three times. Balaam did not know his ways were perverse until he was shown.

The abortionists are now wishing to make a law that it is illegal for a man to have intercourse unless he intends to father a child. That is supposed to scare perverse men into allowing women to have abortions. A Christian man would wonder what all the fuss is about because that is how he is living anyway. Purification of the marital act is the solution to abortion

It was a lie when Christians were told that contraception is not sinful. Like Balaam, they think they are fine and do not know their ways are perverse. God is now calling His donkey to tell you that you cannot go that way anymore.

The choice is to ignore the warning and face the wrath of God, beat the donkey and continue on, or there is always the option to repent and follow the path of life.

You remember when God told you about that path. It involves self denial, poverty and contempt, few there-be that find it. The way to salvation is repentance and obedience not lip service. If today you hear His voice, harden not your hearts.

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boughtwithaprice said:

Well we are answerable to God. He gave us scripture, but the scripture says lean not to your own understanding, yet most those that claim sola scriptura do just that in matters of morality.
Claiming freedom of conscience is ironic?

How would that be different from relativism or licentiousness? I have encountered those who claim to be Christians that act as though Christian freedom is a license to sin

Freedom of conscience is one thing, as God does not judge us by what we do not know. “Forgive them Father for they know not what they do”, but when does freedom of conscience become willful ignorance?

When do Christians stray from the path of asking, knocking, and seeking to the lukewarm waters of Laodicea from which the Lord will vomit them out of His mouth?

In the Catholic Church, we have a standard, I know not everyone follows it, but it is there. The standard is that, based on the promise of Our Lord to send the Holy Spirt, which He did as evidenced by tongues of fire, the Church cannot err. What is taught by the ordinary magisterium must be given ascent with Catholic faith.

A person may have a doubtful conscience, as I myself had at one time, and I even had a rebellious conscience. We are required to obey while we wrestle with our doubts. We must have the heart of Jacob, who wrestled with God. “I will not let thee go save thou bless me”
We cannot openly contradict magisterial teaching without risking excommunication. Peter was the rock on which Christ built His Church, and the protection of the Holy Spirit was passed on with the laying on of hands, as outlined in Scripture. Apostle means one who is sent, and the Pope alone retains ultimate Apostolic authority. He shares his authority with the Episcopate, which are the Cardinals, Arch Bishops and Bishops. The Bishops in turn share their authority with the priests and decons, all for the building up of the Body of Christ in the kingdom of God.
The Pope holds two keys of the kingdom of heaven as were given to Peter. One is his teaching authority, the other is his political authority. For a Catholic to rebel against his teaching authority is heresy, to rebel against his political authority is schism. Both are equally gravely evil for Catholics.
Since God promised the Holy Spirt and He openly displayed Himself on Pentecost, we rely on the Apostles as our guide for our conscience. We also rely on the sacraments, given by the Church as outlined in scripture, to assist us with grace. Jesus breathed on the Apostles before the Ascension and gave them the power to forgive sins, so when we sin, we confess to one with apostolic authority. Jesus also promised to feed us with “suprasubstantial”, sometimes translated as “daily” bread in the Lord’s Prayer, so we take the Eucharist consecrated by those same apostles.
I can personally testify that I had a doubtful conscience, but when I fully submitted to the Apostolic authority of the ordinary magisterium, the desire for mortal sin, that so easily used to beset me, was gone. I did not expect it and it was surprising, but I have not looked back for over five years and continue to grow in the love of God and neighbor. I even understand why Jesus told us to love our enemies. My enemies are all as a great mirror reflecting on to me all of my defects. If I hate them, I will not learn how God is displeased with me and become self absorbed which is the sin of pride. My enemies often hurt me, yet that pain drives me on to deeper prayer and study, which increases my knowledge and joy of following Our Lord. How could I not love them?


How do you and your fellow believers train a free conscience to accept the things of God? Do you have problems of rebellion or wide spread mediocrity (lukewarmness) in your congregations? Has anyone bought God’s gold tried in the fire? Which is a metaphor for deep wrestling of conscience to arrive at the truth?
Do you accept stagnation in spiritual growth in your fellow believers?

Yes I know that the Catholic Church is full of many we could consider machine like that go through the motions but do not act like they believe at all, but that is not the point or goal of the teaching. Jesus said that there will be tares among the wheat. It is a problem, that I agree

Do you have the same problem?

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BNR32FAN said:

So I completely disagree with this idea that contraceptives are sinful and I’m not aware of any passages of scripture that teach otherwise.

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jas3 said:

Genesis 38:9-10

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Mark Quayle said:

Can you demonstrate logically that Scripture there teaches against contraception? Don't take the verse out of context to do so.

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1. He committed an unnatural act
2. He had a duty to procreate for Tamar to give birth to children in his brother Er's name

jas3 said:

There are two possible causes for why what Onan did was evil:

1. He committed an unnatural act
2. He had a duty to procreate for Tamar to give birth to children in his brother Er's name

Cause 2 is usually cited as being exclusive of cause 1 by those who want to argue in favor of contraception, but there are a couple of problems with this argument. First, it's speculative in that we don't actually have a record of a law requiring this of Onan like we see in Deuteronomy 25:5; the argument extrapolates backward from Deuteronomy and assumes that there was a similar law binding Onan in Genesis. All we have is Judah's instruction to him in verse 8. Second, even if Onan's act was evil due to cause 2, it's not exclusive of cause 1; an act can be evil for multiple reasons. I guess someone could object to cause 1 being valid, but do we really need to go through scriptural condemnations of indulgent behavior?

There's also the fact that Christians prior to the 20th century universally understood the purpose of marital relations to be primarily for procreation, including Protestants; Martin Luther and John Calvin both pointed to the case of Onan as an example of the evil of contraception. Luther in particular held extreme contempt for those who avoided having children for economic concerns. Farther back, the Church Fathers certainly didn't teach that marital relations for pleasure alone were permissible, but this has already been acknowledged. So no matter what tradition you pick - Orthodox, Catholic, or Protestant - the consensus patrum is that Christians should be reserved in their engagement in marital relations and shouldn't subvert the primary object of those relations to the secondary. That may not mean much to certain Protestants who have decided they know better than their forefathers, but it should be meaningful for any Protestant who claims to be traditional.

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Mark Quayle said:

Luther and Calvin have no influence as to why what Onan did was evil. It doesn't matter what Christians prior to the 20th century thought, as to why it was (or was not) evil, nor are their views concerning procreation at issue. Nor do our current opinions and views make any difference as to why he did wrong.

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Bob Crowley said:

This has no connection with the OP's sense of "God's humour", but his post reminded me of CS Lewis's jocular reference to claims of human ownership in "The Screwtape Letters" (Letters from a Senior Devil to a Junior Devil), stating that our claims to ownership sound equally funny in Heaven and Hell.

If you haven't read the book note that "Our Father" in this case is the devil, and the "Enemy" is God.

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jas3 said:

Of course not, but the consistent teaching of Christians for nearly two millennia should have some weight when considering the proper interpretation of Scripture where there could be multiple readings. Like I said, some Protestants (and in all fairness, theological liberals within all traditions) have decided to discard that, to their detriment.

As for your not seeing a link, the question was originally about contraception, but Onan's case (and more generally the warnings against decadence in e.g. Galatians 5:19-21 or 1 Corinthians 6) is of course applicable to any intentional disordered use of our bodies for pleasure.

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jas3 said:

There are two possible causes for why what Onan did was evil:

1. He committed an unnatural act
2. He had a duty to procreate for Tamar to give birth to children in his brother Er's name

Cause 2 is usually cited as being exclusive of cause 1 by those who want to argue in favor of contraception, but there are a couple of problems with this argument. First, it's speculative in that we don't actually have a record of a law requiring this of Onan like we see in Deuteronomy 25:5; the argument extrapolates backward from Deuteronomy and assumes that there was a similar law binding Onan in Genesis. All we have is Judah's instruction to him in verse 8. Second, even if Onan's act was evil due to cause 2, it's not exclusive of cause 1; an act can be evil for multiple reasons. I guess someone could object to cause 1 being valid, but do we really need to go through scriptural condemnations of indulgent behavior?

There's also the fact that Christians prior to the 20th century universally understood the purpose of marital relations to be primarily for procreation, including Protestants; Martin Luther and John Calvin both pointed to the case of Onan as an example of the evil of contraception. Luther in particular held extreme contempt for those who avoided having children for economic concerns. Farther back, the Church Fathers certainly didn't teach that marital relations for pleasure alone were permissible, but this has already been acknowledged. So no matter what tradition you pick - Orthodox, Catholic, or Protestant - the consensus patrum is that Christians should be reserved in their engagement in marital relations and shouldn't subvert the primary object of those relations to the secondary. That may not mean much to certain Protestants who have decided they know better than their forefathers, but it should be meaningful for any Protestant who claims to be traditional.

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jas3 said:

Genesis 38:9-10

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BNR32FAN said:

So procreation isn’t the only reason for marriage that is taught in the Bible.

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BNR32FAN said:

Verse 8

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