Calvinism encourages abusive sentiments

Discussion in 'Non-Anglican Discussion' started by Religious Fanatic, Dec 26, 2018.

  1. Religious Fanatic

    Religious Fanatic Well-Known Member

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  2. JoeLaughon

    JoeLaughon Well-Known Member Anglican

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    As always the devil is in the details. I'd love to see how this "study" defines "Calvinism", the seminaries they picked folks from and how they defined "against equality of women."
     
  3. anglican74

    anglican74 Well-Known Member Anglican

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  4. Botolph

    Botolph Well-Known Member

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    Look I know where you are coming from, however God is a God of Justice in all its shapes and forms. Whilst we have allowed the call for social justice to be abducted by the looney left, even those at the far end of the ridiculous right need to have some concern for justice. Justice in the end is about fairness, and whilst when it comes to the distribution of resources we may well debate what constitutes fairness. For all of us as Christians, and indeed Anglican Christians, we believe that God is Just, and he want us to behave justly.

    He has shown you what is go0d, and what does the Lord require, but to do justice, and to love kindness, and to walk humbly with your God.
    Micah 6:8 typed from memory so it may not be quite right.​
     
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  5. Tiffy

    Tiffy Well-Known Member

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    Modern definitions of 'Social Justice' may not be themselves 'just' and undeserving of support, but the very notion of opposing 'justice' itself not being considered in any way 'abusive' makes my hackles rise.

    That kind of abdication of Christian duty conjures visions of Nazi 'law courts', where 'justice' was supposedly dispensed according to Nazi philosophy, but was actually 'dispensed with completely', by a crooked and evil judicial system. Exactly the kind of spiritual wickedness in high places that the church is called to struggle against, not tacitly support.
     
  6. anglican74

    anglican74 Well-Known Member Anglican

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    You're equating justice and "Social Justice"... The two are not equivalent, or even related!

    Social justice is a fabricated concept that was invented in the Soviet Union for the purpose of destabilizing Latin America and United States in the 1950s, and it's defined as, redistribution of wealth, celebration of minority at the expense of dominant culture... LGBT instead of being defined as sinful, is celebrated just for being a 'minority'.. or for you in Australia - promoting the Native tribes at the expense of actual Australians)

    It's called Cultural Marxism, and these tactics are intended to create division and political destabilization within a country, and do not have a lot to do with actual Justice

    To relate this to Anglicanism, you will find plenty of Anglican divines talking about justice, but never about social Justice.. In fact social justice (and the underlying marxism) is explicitly rejected in the Articles of Religion:

     
    Last edited: Jan 4, 2019
  7. Tiffy

    Tiffy Well-Known Member

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    I take your point that there is 'Social Justice' which may be a purely political term for a political aim of undermining true justice in society.

    However, there is such a thing also as a Christian drive toward a just society, which is entirely in keeping with the teaching of Our Lord Jesus Christ regarding the quality of social justice to be expected in The Kingdom of God. To abdicate our responsibility to bring social justice into physical reality is the same as abdicating our responsibility to want God's will to be done on earth as it is in heaven. God's answer to the question "Am I my brothers keeper", is "Yes you are, you murdering SOB Cain". The New Testament equivalent to Cains cheeky question was: "Who is my neighbour"?

    Surely you did not deliberately intend to imply that Native Australians or Native Americans are not actual Australians or Americans, or am I mistaken? I hope so.
     
    Last edited: Jan 4, 2019
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  8. Botolph

    Botolph Well-Known Member

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    I think justice is a broad concept, and to reduce the idea of justice by removing the social and cultural aspects of it is to fail. I grew up in a world where justice was understood as a purely a concept of law and judicial process, and that of course is not enough to understand justice as a divine imperative. I believe Christians should be concerned about social justice, and we should be concerned that the idea is marketed by the looney left that Social Justice is their property, because quite frankly it isn't, and indeed much of what they promote lacks fairness.

    The notion that every child who runs in a race, or who didn't run in the race should get a prize is not just, it is just niceness that robs the winner of any sense of accomplishment. The idea of education providing equality of outcomes is not just, it is just a massive disincentive to effort. The idea that there should be equality of opportunity in education however is just, because we need our brightest and our best to have the tools to excel both for them themselves and for the good of all.

    Many of the ancients spoke of justice, including Micah, Plato, Socrates and Thomas Aquinas. This should be an area of great concern for all those who want to pray thy will be done, thy kingdom come. What is the right thing to do in any given situation is often difficult to discern. The question of the recognition of the ancient inhabitants of a nation, often all but a remnant is not easy, but it is important. The questions of homophobia, gay hate, and the gay hate defence are also not just.

    Cultural Marxism is not the same a Social Justice, and I think that their attempt to steal the concept and the term also lacks justice and fails to recognise the truth of history.
     
  9. AnglicanAgnostic

    AnglicanAgnostic Well-Known Member

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    Yes it's hard to please everyone. I like the statement from Helder Camara an RC Archbishop in Brazil.

    "When I give food to the poor, they call me a saint. When I ask why they are poor, they call me a communist."
     
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  10. anglican74

    anglican74 Well-Known Member Anglican

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    It was enough for the people of God for 4000 years, and for the English Common Law and for the Ancient Roman Classical civil law for thousands of years...

    Even despite your well-appreciated caveat, I want to challenge the basic premise that such a thing as social justice even exists

    The fact that one person earned $10 and another has earned $100 is not a matter of injustice

    Jeff Bezos having made $100 billion was not accomplished through any kind of injustice or malfeasance

    I thoroughly dispute that a concept like social justice (as contrasted with justice proper) exists or has a right to exist, and I have the greatest theologians and jurists and philosophers on my side ..

    Agreed!






    Yes social justice was deployed by the KGB in Latin America in the 1950s... in the 1940s not a single RC bishop spoke of social justice or having sympathy with communist views — but in the 1950s many RC bishops suddenly started using that language, and it destroyed the Latin American church and severely destabilized the American hegemony, which the Soviet Union was able to exploit by moving in and establishing Marxist governments across Nicaragua, Cuba, and more
     
    Last edited: Jan 4, 2019
  11. anglican74

    anglican74 Well-Known Member Anglican

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    Duplicate..
     
  12. Botolph

    Botolph Well-Known Member

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    Yet a person who earns (I use the word loosely) 3000.00 a minute and belittles those who will not work for 10.00 a day, and manages her affairs so that she pays 3000.00 a year in tax and claims subsidies of 100000000.00 a year suggests to me that there may be a concept of social justice.
     
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  13. Tiffy

    Tiffy Well-Known Member

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    Many of the arguments for a Laissez-faire economic system, without prudent restraint on greed disguise themselves under a 'costume' of beneficence and a pretense of 'justice'.

    It is harder for a rich man or woman to enter the Kingdom of God than for a camel to get through the eye of a needle. Just about every principle of Kingdom behavior is violated by unbridled capitalism of the kind encouraged by 'right wing trickle down theorists'. The opposite to greed however is not communism, it is a spirit of voluntary generosity. God loves a cheerful giver and despises those who withhold their due tithe.

    The notion that the historically Jewish / Roman / Saxon / Norman / Victorian / American etc. economic systems were 'good enough for God', is a fantasy of denial and greedy wishful thinking on behalf of their comfortably wealthy 'aristocrats'.

    Christ came to comfort the discomforted and discomfort the comfortably off. Matt.11:5. Luke 4:18-19.

    Nothing at all there for the rich apart from an opportunity to be generous with what they already have.

    With a promise that they will experience difficulty with even that.
     
    Last edited: Jan 5, 2019
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  14. AnglicanAgnostic

    AnglicanAgnostic Well-Known Member

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    I always remind rich Christians (and so should you) of Matthew 6:19-21.




    Lay not up for yourselves treasures upon earth, where moth and rust doth corrupt, and where thieves break through and steal:

    But lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust doth corrupt, and where thieves do not break through nor steal:

    For where your treasure is, there will your heart be also.