"God is good, dispassionate, and immutable. Now someone who thinks it reasonable and true to affirm that God does not change, may well ask how, in that case, it is possible to speak of God as rejoicing over those who are good and showing mercy to those who honor Him, and as turning away from the wicked and being angry with sinners. To this it must be answered that God neither rejoices nor grows angry, for to rejoice and to be offended are passions; nor is He won over by the gifts of those who honor Him, for that would mean He is swayed by pleasure. It is not right that the Divinity feel pleasure or displeasure from human conditions.
He is good, and He only bestows blessings and never does harm, remaining always the same. We men, on the other hand, if we remain good through resembling God, are united to Him, but if we become evil through not resembling God, we are separated from Him. By living in holiness we cleave to God; but by becoming wicked we make Him our enemy. It is not that He grows angry with us in an arbitrary way, but it is our own sins that prevent God from shining within us and expose us to demons who torture us. And if through prayer and acts of compassion we gain release from our sins, this does not mean that we have won God over and made Him to change, but that through our actions and our turning to the Divinity, we have cured our wickedness and so once more have enjoyment of God's goodness. Thus to say that God turns away from the wicked is like saying that the sun hides itself from the blind." +Anthony the Great (251-356 AD)
Such a God hardly fits the Protestant notion of a bloodthirsty, Dagonesque monster demanding the personal satisifaction of the death on the Cross of His Son because He is offended by our sins.
RC Piety includes an apology for sort of offering personal insult to God in the act of contrition. And I would maintain, as I said earlier, that God is "at least personal" (which requires a re-assmenet of what "personal" means and that both the OT and the Incarnation gice permission, as kind of a hermeneutic, to talk about and to God in a personal way. SO, I'm wanting to pick my way carefully through this. I don't see how anyone can disagree with +Anthony, and when I tried to articulate the "Satisfactory" doctrine I talked about justice rather than insult -- bearing in mind that for a long time, it seems, all matters of justice were "personal" in the sense that a misdeed offended some individual and/or the king (or "king equivalent"). The idea of a quasi-hypotstasized "justice" is pretty sophisticated, I'd suspect.
Luke 15:
...4 "Suppose one of you has a hundred sheep and loses one of them. Does he not leave the ninety-nine in the open country and go after the lost sheep until he finds it? 5 And when he finds it, he joyfully puts it on his shoulders 6 and goes home. Then he calls his friends and neighbors together and says, 'Rejoice with me; I have found my lost sheep.' 7 I tell you that in the same way there will be more rejoicing in heaven over one sinner who repents than over ninety-nine righteous persons who do not need to repent.8 "Or suppose a woman has ten silver coins[a] and loses one. Does she not light a lamp, sweep the house and search carefully until she finds it? 9 And when she finds it, she calls her friends and neighbors together and says, 'Rejoice with me; I have found my lost coin.' 10 In the same way, I tell you, there is rejoicing in the presence of the angels of God over one sinner who repents.
... 31" 'My son,' the father said, 'you are always with me, and everything I have is yours. 32. But we had to celebrate and be glad, because this brother of yours was dead and is alive again; he was lost and is found.' "
Cordially,
Nothing like the good old Laconic brevity, Kolo. Sure you are not part Spartan?
Anthony the great needs to spend some time with Dr E's Random Scripture generator as well. Scripture says He gets angry. Anthony's response is "no he doesn't" without giving an alternative understanding - just Scripture says that but it isn't so. Sorry, that doesnt' work. Scripture says it. Now WHY does it say it and how can it be so if he is immutable? The article I posted above does a better job of explaining this - but again, I see us getting in trouble because we are trying to explain in human terms a God who is above full understanding and explanation. Scripture says God has emotions. That shouldn't be swept under the rug. And your strawman of Protestant belief is just that, a strawman. Our understanding of God is far more complex than that -for He is far more complex.
"He is good, and He only bestows blessings and never does harm"
Let's see: There's Noah and the flood; Lot and Sodom and Gomorrah; Moses and Pharoah plagues/firstborn death/ Red Sea; Joshua and the "longest day"; Gideon and the 300; David and Goliath; Assyria and the Northern tribes; Chaldea and the Southern tribes; the Crucifixion; Peter and Ananias and Sapphira. Did I leave anything out?
True enough. My only comment is that we approach God on several levels. The Act of Contrition that we say in penance goes, in part, "I detest my sin because it offends you, Lord". My mental picture is that it is Christ being offended by my sin at His passion. However, it is innatural at this point to separate the Son from the Father, and so the penitent begins to think that he offended the Father. This view is perhaps theologically flawed but it nevertheless has a merit of allowing to concentrate on the penance and not on the workings of the Trinity.
I wonder if saying something like "The Father was offended through the Person of the Son" is incorrect.
I will study St. Anselm as soon as this thread dies down a bit.