The first is that God knew that almost everyone born outside of the scope of Christ's message was going to freely choose to seperate themselves from him. We think of those saved and those damned as a random distribution across times and geographies but that certainly could well be false. God knows the beginning from the end so how he chose to reveal himself could be tailored to his knowledge of how humans across the globe would excercise free will.

I don't happen to subscribe to this view but it does work.

Another option, that more closely aligns with my view is that God's law is written on our hearts. Those that did not hear the Good News will be judged according to the moral law that they intrinsically know. In this view, someone cannot be damned for something they either didn't know or didn't ought to have known. This is sometimes called invincible ignorance.

There are other theories that sit somewhere between those two explanations but that should serve as a good survey.

As an aside your understanding of hell and being damned appears to be formulated from some basic bitch medieval conceptions that were merely meant to communicate the basics to illiterate peasants. Think of hell as seperation from God. God is all just and will never force someone to be with him if they choose to reject him

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=5104189&forum_id=2#44475491)

So everyone who lived in the hundreds of thousands of years BC would never have converted, and then somehow 2000 years ago people suddenly started being open to Christian belief? This seems deeply implausible, but anyway, if God knew that they would reject him and end up damned, why would he still create them?

"Those that did not hear the Good News..."

This doesn't begin to address the problem. It's a carve-out for people who have never heard of Christianity? In this day and age, who on earth lives their whole life without ever hearing about it. You still have the issue of the world's billions of people who have heard about it but sincerely believed that it was not true.

"As an aside your understanding of hell and being damned appears to be formulated from some basic bitch medieval conceptions that were merely meant to communicate the basics to illiterate peasants."

This is some laughable revisionism. Many serious philosophers and theologians, including in modern times, have defended a doctrine of eternal torment. Otherwise, what exactly is it supposed to "feel like" to be in an eternal afterlife of "separation from God"? If the basics were communicated in the form of "it's like being roasted alive" then it can't be too pleasant. Why would anyone choose this over heaven? Is it your view that as soon as anyone ends up "damned" they immediately say, okay fine I'll convert? It's unbelievable that anyone would do otherwise. Or does God say, no, too late? In that case you can't really claim they're still choosing to reject him. So it's not clear how the "separation from God" thing is an improvement on fire and brimstone.

There are many stories of people who reluctantly ended up atheists despite desperately wanting to believe. Consider this personal account from a guy whose PhD studies in theology led him to lose his faith:

https://repository.up.ac.za/bitstream/handle/2263/23321/11appendices.pdf?sequence=12&isAllowed=y

I would be genuinely curious to know your take. Is he lying about having been a Christian? Did he "choose to reject God"? Even if you disagree with the reasoning that led him to atheism, the account of how psychologically devastating the process was should make it obvious that this was no hate-filled wilful rejection.

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=5104189&forum_id=2#44475775)

Because the act of creation and free will brings about a greater good even if some of the created will ultimately reject Him.

"Is it your view that as soon as anyone ends up "damned" they immediately say, okay fine I'll convert? It's unbelievable that anyone would do otherwise. Or does God say, no, too late? In that case you can't really claim they're still choosing to reject him"

Once we are separated from our body we cannot change our decision. Think in our own lives when we sin, its either fleeting passions, a change of habit, and correction of intellectual error. All of those require the body. Absent the body you cannot renege. This is also covered in scripture when the rich man in hell does not repent, but rather just asks for a sip of water.

Thanks for posting that link. It looks to be a classic case of a Reformed Protestant trying to earnestly build his faith tradition from the ground up and realizing that he can't. The solution to that story is not to be an atheist, but to recognize that the Catholic Church has Sacred Tradition and the combining of Reason with Faith in a way that the Protestants simply do not. This quote by him sums it up well:

"You want to keep the faith but you also want to accept the

Bible on its own terms. After all, is not this exactly what the tradition always suggested should be done – sola scriptura? Yet now the problem is that reading the Bible on its own terms seems to lead away from the dogmas of tradition about the Bible! "

This is a guy that read Noah's Ark hyper-literally, went to theology school and found out that the geological evidence did not support their being a world-wide flood. He immediately then swings from one extreme to the other. This happens all the time, unfortunately, with fundamentalist Reformed types.

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=5104189&forum_id=2#44475854)

What exactly is this greater good supposed to be that justifies some people ending up damned? If he knows in advance which people will reject him, he could simply choose not to create those people.

"Think in our own lives when we sin, its either fleeting passions, a change of habit, and correction of intellectual error."

Why does correction of intellectual error require the body? Isn't it just the mind? If you end up in hell for being an atheist, presumably the fact that you are still conscious in the afterlife would prove to you that you were wrong in your atheistic belief that the physical world is all there is, and you could then correct your intellectual error by updating your beliefs to reflect this new evidence and become a Christian. Nothing about that is related to the body.

Alternatively, God could just not separate the damned from their bodies.

"The solution to that story is not to be an atheist, but to recognize that..."

You're ignoring my point. My question was how you reconcile accounts like that with your belief that non-Christians are people who have "chosen" to "reject God." It is clear that ending up where he did was not some deliberate decision to tell God to fuck off. Like I said: "Even if you disagree with the reasoning that led him to atheism, the account of how psychologically devastating the process was should make it obvious that this was no hate-filled wilful rejection."

"He immediately then swings from one extreme to the other."

No he didn't. He explicitly addresses that:

"I really tried to get to the truth of the matter and kept on reading everything from the most fideistic and conservative apologetics to the most critical and heretical radical theology, including the liberal and moderate varieties in between these extremes."

"Though I have dabbled in conservative, liberal and radical theologies, none completely satisfied me and, the more I read, the more questions came home to roost."

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=5104189&forum_id=2#44475987)

Giving those people the option is a good in and of itself. We also have no idea what the impact those people would have on the lives of others around them.

"Why does correction of intellectual error require the body? Isn't it just the mind? If you end up in hell for being an atheist, presumably the fact that you are still conscious in the afterlife would prove to you that you were wrong in your atheistic belief that the physical world is all there is, and you could then correct your intellectual error by updating your beliefs to reflect this new evidence and become a Christian. Nothing about that is related to the body."

Without the body you can't rectify (or make) an intellectual error to be made, since you don't have the conditions for wrong judgments (reasoning with the use of sensation and imagination) are no longer present. The soul’s mode of knowledge upon death is very much like that of the angels: what is known is known all-at-once. I get the impression you don't understand the theology around the soul. Your treating your current state and the state after you die as basically the same except you don't have physical form (e.g. like a ghost). This is not the case in Christian theology.

"You're ignoring my point. My question was how you reconcile accounts like that with your belief that non-Christians are people who have "chosen" to "reject God." It is clear that ending up where he did was not some deliberate decision to tell God to fuck off. Like I said: "Even if you disagree with the reasoning that led him to atheism, the account of how psychologically devastating the process was should make it obvious that this was no hate-filled wilful rejection.""

I think we can have hope that someone of good will who comes to a well-formed, yet incorrect, assumption about Christianity or God's existence can still be saved. Reading his essay/diary/paper, however, I can definitely see someone who ran into the reality that the Reformed theology is bankrupt but decided to throw the baby out with the bath water instead of taking a reasoned approach. Like if tomorrow Pope Francis did something that caused me to question papal infallibility or authority, I wouldn't become an atheist, I would be Orthodox.

""Though I have dabbled in conservative, liberal and radical theologies, none completely satisfied me and, the more I read, the more questions came home to roost.""

By "swing to the other extreme" I mean some iteration of atheism, not that he became some modernist liberal "Christian".

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=5104189&forum_id=2#44476860)

Why is this a good? He can either create those people knowing they'll go to hell or not bother creating them at all. If he knows they're fucked, of what value is it that they once had a different option?

"We also have no idea what the impact those people would have on the lives of others around them."

We're talking about whether people spend an eternity in heaven or in torment. The impact they have for 80 years or so before that surely cannot be of much importance in comparison. "He's going to hell, but he's gonna be a good friend and dad so I'll go ahead and create him anyway" is not believable.

"This is not the case in Christian theology."

Didn't God design/create/set up this system of "the theology around the soul"? Being omnipotent, couldn't he have set it up differently so that you can still rectify errors without a body? You also ignored my point about how he could have set it up so that you still have your body in hell. This is all a bit silly: if he's all-powerful, there's no getting around his ability to rescue people from hell with "uh, that's not how it works in the theology of souls and angels."

"By "swing to the other extreme" I mean some iteration of atheism, not that he became some modernist liberal "Christian"."

He says he tried both conservative apologetics and "moderate" theology. I'm not sure what more it is that you'd have asked of him.

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=5104189&forum_id=2#44476994)

I think that we are coming back to the idea that God can do everything BUT a contradiction (e.g. make a square circle). One very obvious answer here is that God might not be able to both grant free will AND ensure that every person ends their lives in relationship to him. He grants every single person the grace to know him, but by also granting free will he gives people the option to reject him. If he made sure that nobody rejected him, he would eliminate the existence of free will.

"Didn't God design/create/set up this system of "the theology around the soul"? Being omnipotent, couldn't he have set it up differently so that you can still rectify errors without a body? You also ignored my point about how he could have set it up so that you still have your body in hell. This is all a bit silly: if he's all-powerful, there's no getting around his ability to rescue people from hell with "uh, that's not how it works in the theology of souls and angels."

If this truly is your sticking point, along with the first issue, then you can be an annihilationist. I think that view is wrong, but if your acting in good faith here and those are your primary concerns with Christianity, there is school of thought for you.

You might find WLC's opening remarks here helpful:

https://www.reasonablefaith.org/media/debates/can-a-loving-god-send-people-to-hell-the-craig-bradley-debate

"He says he tried both conservative apologetics and "moderate" theology. I'm not sure what more it is that you'd have asked of him."

He needed to eschew Protestantism entirely. The problem is that he stayed within that false bubble. When I hear him talk about the historicity of the OT, for example, thats a clear sign that he didn't even glance at what the Catholic/Orthodox have to say on the issue.

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=5104189&forum_id=2#44478352)

honestly it's confounding that so many people believe there HAS to be some cause of this shit, rather than people just being fucking stupid

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=5104189&forum_id=2#44476181)

so we're all going to become SJWs on the death bed?

"has to do with people becoming spiritual as they age"

the people I know doing yoga and meditation and shit are all in the 20s. older people mostly watch TV

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=5104189&forum_id=2#44477124)

so quickly does the retard resort to accusing others of being retarded

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=5104189&forum_id=2#44477670)

faggot

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=5104189&forum_id=2#44477685)