There's a difference between God's ordaining will and God's permissive will.
God does not ordain evil, but He DOES permit evil.
God does not ordain death come into the world, but He DOES permit it.
So, when we say "God wills X", that doesn't necessarily mean God wanted it to turn out that way. It's just that He permitted it to turn out that way because WE apparently wanted it.
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So, how would you reconcile the following with the idea that "God is love?" And, with Pope Benedict's Regensburg address, in which he says that Allah might be so all-powerful that he can act contrary to himself, that he can act unreasonably, but the Judeo-Christian God, while all-powerful, being the Logos — Truth — cannot act contrary to Himself, God cannot be both God and Not-God.
“Only in the cities of these peoples that the Lord your God is giving you as an inheritance, you shall not leave alive anything that breathes. But you shall utterly destroy them: the Hittite and the Amorite, the Canaanite and the Perizzite, the Hivite and the Jebusite, as the Lord your God has commanded you, so that they may not teach you to do according to all their detestable things which they have done for their gods, so that you would sin against the Lord your God”(Deuteronomy 20:16–18, NASB).
God is love.
God chastises the sons whom He loves (God isn't nice).
When God ordains something, HE acts.
When God permits something, HE does NOT act, other persons do.
As for why this command appears in the OT, we don't know.
What God does is not necessarily always understandable to the human intellect, nor is there any reason to think it would be understandable. Just as an ape might not understand why a vet causes him pain by injecting the ape with an antibiotic, so I don't know why that passage appears in Scripture.
What I *DO* know, because the Catholic Church tells me, is that even if I suffer, it is not because God is evil, or permits evil, or is incapable of conquering evil, but rather God knows what I do not, and He is establishing something good for me.
Nothing lives except by the grace of God -- God need not even strike me down to end my life, he need only cease willing that I exist.
This life is a gift, not just one that began so many years ago at birth or conception, but every single continuous moment, and like any gift it is utterly gratuitous: we do not merit it, cannot possibly merit it, and can never possibly pay God back for it. He doesn't owe it or anything else to us.
If it isn't unjust for God to order the end of my life by his creatures, the blood clot or the tumor or the tornado, why is it unjust for God to end the life of Canaanites by his creatures, the Israelites?
The Ebola virus has nature, being and operation. It derives these, receives these from the Creator. "Is there disaster in the city, and the Lord has not done it?" asks the prophet Amos.
I think it is only theologically accurate to say that God permits sin and in no way causes it.
Death is a substantial change. God is the First Cause. When we die, it is the Lord who has brought it about.
Please see:
http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/12510a.htm
Who is this guy? Steve, you are brilliant and articulate. You left out mention of the fact that the United States actually hired mercenaries to fight for China (The Flying Tigers), which in turn led to the "surprise attack" on Pearl Harbor when, in fact, we had launched a secret war against the Japanese since 1931...about a decade before Pearl Harbor. American Mercenaries, one Frenchman, and One Canadian numbering about 120 or so were paid 4 times the wages of the president(FDR)+$500 bonus for each Japanese plane shot down. I, myself, was Jesuit educated and attended the University of Santa Clara and St. Ignatius. I would REALLY like to read more stuff you have written. I am sad that you have given up on being an AMERICAN, I believe this country is still able to be salvaged. I will never renounce my American citizenship. I wholeheartedly agree that this country has lost its way for more than 50 years now, perhaps as far back as the Spanish-American war and possibly before but I have no proof. I do believe that this Fr. guy from Notre Dame is a complete moron and should be held accountable for his writings. He is definitely not of the Jesuit order. It should be worthy to note that he is NOT an AMERICAN though he teaches here and that his book is merely the rantings of some backwater Australian pawn with an obvious agenda but look at our new "bouncer" of a Pope? I do not believe Obama was correct in apologizing. I can tell you that I once stood at the Atom bomb museum in Hiroshima(the only young white American male) and felt great remorse and shame when a busload of Japanese schoolchildren came in as I was gazing at the melted piles of eyeglasses and the "shadow" that was all that remained of one man who was obliterated near the epicenter where the museum is located. Something must be done, I agree. I am one of thousands if not millions of Americans who, upon learning the truth about our fifth column, would gladly lay down his/her life to return to decency. I hope that you will continue to write. I would buy your book. I would vote for you if you ran for President. I would die for you as well. I hope that means something to you. I want a different world for my son than the one that has been left for him by the baby boomers. I would do anything to help change it just a little bit but there is this "by any means necessary" thing going on within the enemy camp that has bogged me down. I have found bliss in the copious amounts of cheap narcotics available everywhere but this, too, is no longer enough for me. Please excuse me for not using more HTML codes.
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