The God of Abraham who destroyed Sodom and Gomorrah and commanded the slaughter of the Canaanites is the God of Christianity as well.
The difference is in the means of forgiveness of sin. There is the love of God but there is also the wrath of God, then as now.
To believe otherwise is to imagine some great cosmic Santa Claus, a grave error.
“”The Old Testament God is the New Testament.””
Of course it’s the same God, but where we differ is Catholicism understands the New Testament revealed in Christ which means many things in the OT are seen as “types”(typology)
Example ...A type (typos in Greek), or “archetype,” often called a “shadow,” “parable,” “allegory,” or “figure” in Scripture, is a person, thing, or action that precedes and prefigures a greater person, thing, or action. That which is prefigured is referred to as an “antitype.” The concept is summarized in Scripture itself:
http://www.fisheaters.com/typology.html
A good article
http://www.uvm.edu/~wstephan/dante/typessay.htm
“”The God of Abraham who destroyed Sodom and Gomorrah and commanded the slaughter of the Canaanites is the God of Christianity as well.””
Their sin destroyed them,God just allowed it to happen because of their free will not to repent and have hardened hearts
Perhaps Saint Thomas Aquinas can help you understand about an unchanging God
But some might be of opinion that God does not love one object more than another; for a higher and a lower degree of intensity of affection is characteristic of a changeable nature, and cannot be attributed to God, from whom all change is utterly removed. Besides, wherever else there is mention of any divine activity, there is no question of more and less: thus one thing is not known by God more than another. In answer to this difficulty we must observe that whereas other activities of the soul are concerned with one object only, love alone seems to tend to two. For love wishes something to somebody: hence the things that we desire, we are properly said to ‘desire,’ not to ‘love,’ but in them we rather love ourselves for whom we desire them. Every divine act then is of one and the same intensity; but love may be said to admit of ‘greater and less’ in two ways, either in point of the good that we will to another, in which way we are said to love him more to whom we wish greater good; or again in point of the intensity of the act, in which way we are said to love him more to whom we wish, not indeed a greater good, but an equal good more fervently and effectually. In the former way then there is nothing to object to in the saying that God loves one more than another, inasmuch as He wishes him a greater good: but, understood of the second way, the saying is not tenable.
Hence it appears that of our affections there is none that can properly be in God except joy and love, though even these are in Him not by way of passion, as they are in us. That there is in God joy or delight is confirmed by the authority of Holy Scripture. I was delighted day by day playing before him, says the Divine Wisdom, which is God (Prov. viii, 30). The Philosopher also says that God ever rejoices with one simple delight.* The Scripture also speaks of love in God: With everlasting love I have loved thee (Jer. xxxi, 3); For the Father himself loveth you (John xvi, 27).
But even other affections (affectiones), which are specifically inconsistent with divine perfection, are predicated in Holy Writ of God, not properly but metaphorically, on account of likeness of effects. Thus sometimes the will in following out the order of wisdom tends to the same effect to which one might be inclined by a passion, which would argue a certain imperfection: for the judge punishes from a sense of justice, as an angry man under the promptings of anger. So sometimes God is said to be ‘angry,’ inasmuch as in the order of His wisdom He means to punish some one: When his anger shall blaze out suddenly (Ps. ii, 13). He is said to be ‘compassionate,’ inasmuch as in His benevolence He takes away the miseries of men, as we do the same from a sentiment of pity: The Lord is merciful and compassionate, patient and abounding in mercy (Ps. cli, 8). Sometimes also He is said to be ‘repentant,’ inasmuch as in the eternal and immutable order of His providence, He builds up what He had previously destroyed, or destroys what He had previously made, as we do when moved by repentance: It repenteth me that I have made man (Gen. vi, 6, 7). God is also said to be ‘sad,’ inasmuch as things happen contrary to what He loves and approves, as sadness is in us at what happens against our will: And the Lord saw, and it seemed evil in his eyes, because judgement is not: God saw that there is no man, and he was displeased, because there was none to meet him (Isa. lix, 15, 16).