Consequences

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I was only using MiB as an example; I thought up the concept years before the movie came out. And "worse back-up"? No theory about the creation of the universe has any back-up; why shouldn't it at least be interesting?

 

I'm just saying what I've been told - I'm not an authority on the subject by any means, and haven't been involved in any religion for around the last 10 years of my life. However, seeing as how I was an altar boy for a long time, and I attended a Jesuit (which is a denomination of Catholic scholar-priests) University, I'd like to think I know a little about what I'm talking about.

As far as I've been told, ANY sin, no matter how grevious, can be forgiven if you are sincere in your repentence. Supposedly, God knows if you are truly sincere, and not just paying lip service and saying you're sorry, when you really aren't. In fact, one of the points of receiving last rites is for the priest to absolve you of all sins, so you go without sin to the afterlife. The caveat on all of this is that you truly have to feel sorry for what you did, and if given the opportunity to do it again would not commit the sin again.

I guess the point is in repentence, not the severity of the sin. A "lesser" sin will not be forgiven if the sinner is not regretful of his actions, while even very grevious sin will be forgiven if you're truly sorry for what you've done. Or to look at it another way, the system is setup so that everyone fails. No one can live their entire life without ever sinning. So the premise here is that since you can't be perfect, you'll be forgiven for inevitably coming up short, so long as you feel bad about what you did.

 

I've always heard that blasphemy against the Holy Spirit was an unforgivable offense. But the requirements are quite remarkable:

A person must have personally seen/spoken with God while being filled with the Holy Spirit. After such a experience, the individual must then turn against God. Basically, this is a person who has personally received PROOF of God's existence and then denied it. God is willing to forgive anything done as a result of a lack of faith (which is ultimately the definition of a sin). Faith is the belief in something that cannot be proven to be true -- once a person receives proof of God this becomes knowledge and faith is a thing of the past. Such a sin is more like an angel of God turning against Him -- hence, no forgiveness.

The only name associated with this is Cain -- not even Judas committed blashamy against the Holy Spirit.

Granted, this is from the perspective of my Mormon upbringing....

 

OK, but as you said, these are a rather remarkable set of circumstances. Practically speaking, I don't think too many people will ever find themselves in this situation, although I admit that I have not heard of this in Catholic theology. It still appears that for all practical scenarios no sin is so heinous that it cannot be forgiven.

 

Mormon doctrine teaches that God has been through what we are to go through and has a body of flesh and bone, akin to Jesus Christ after his own Ressurection.

On unpardonable sin:

What Bruno says is true. At the Judgement seat, you will have that perfect witness and knowledge of Jesus Christ, and if you still deny him, then your sins cannot be forgiven.

I have also heard that shedding Innocent blood may be such an unforgiveable sin. I think I can find a reference for this in Mormon Scripture given time.

I'll reserve comment on Judas until I can look further into it. But From what Bruno said, Judas did not deny Jesus, but though he betrayed him to the authorities, I believe he still testified that he was the Christ...

 

Gnarff: Religions forgive/absolve you of sins in the name of God. However, that forgiveness is based on whatever factors that particular religion requires. Having a clergy absolve a person of their sins is required by some religions, others (like the Mormon church) believe forgiveness is between the individual and God -- however, the Mormon church does require confessing of sins and restitution as a part of this. The Mormon church will often require certain atonement for some offenses (such as dismembership and excommunication). The atonement must be done before the CHURCH can forgive you and fully accept you back. The Mormon church does not grant forgiveness or accept you back for shedding innocent blood (the real dilemma is how does a person make restitution for such an offense), they believe it is a sin only God can forgive.

As far as Judas is concerned... none of the apostles had the 'perfect witness and knowledge of Jesus Christ' as you mention (which requires seeing Christ in all his glory and being filled with the Holy Spirit). They all relied on faith. Since there was no perfect witness, blasphemy against the Holy Spirit could not have occurred. Naturally, this is according to Mormon Doctrine....

 

How do you define innocent blood? By my logic, that's Jesus and Him only. We are all deserving of death because of our sins, so no one is really innocent. (maybe abortions count)

@Gnarff:
I didn't know that about mormonism. I'm learning a lot here. So when did God go through all this? And where? Presumably this has to be pre-creation, so how does that work? Or am I totally missing the point?

 

Actually, wasn't there a part in the Nwew Testament where Peter and one or two other Disciples were given that opportunity? They went forth and testified of Jesus Crhist after that.

Abortion would count (but I don't think they go after people for such in case of rape, incest or endangerment of the mother's health). Likewise a child under the age of 8 counts because they are not considered to be accountable until that age. I guess any outright murder for selfish reasons (like robbery or wanting the guy's wife) would count as long as the guy hadn't caused a danger to yourself or your family.

There is a scriptuer that states that "Worlds without wonder have I created". There probably were worlds before this one, and likely worlds that will exist after this one has passed away. I guess all the details won't be known until after we've dies and received our audience with Jesus Christ and God the father...

 

@Gnarff:
So you're adressing innocents in relation to the shedding of blood only? If one kills a man for no reason, his blood was relatively innocent? Interesting.
I'm assuming this scripture is a mormon text, because I don't remember it anywhere in the protestant Bible. An interesting idea, though.

 

No, he's referring to the Bible, but the Bible for Mormons is slightly different than for Protestants or Catholics, as sections of it have been rewritten by their Prophets. I'm sure there are subtle differences between the Cathlic and Protestant ones as well.

 

Yes, the Catholic Bible is called the Apocrypha(sp). It has all the books of the protestant Bible, but it also has a number of OT and intertestimoial books that neither the Jewish scholars before Christianity, nor the protestant scholars after the reformation could find validation for (proof of who wrote them or when). Despite this problem, many protestant historians still look to these books as historical documents, though not usually the most accurate. They are valuable evidence of how at least some of the people felt during a ~400 year time when the protestant Bible is silent.

So that isn't in the Book of Mormons? What book is it from then? And how re-written are we talking about?

 

It is from the Mormon version of the Bible. I think the majority of the re-writes come from one of their founding members, a man named Joseph Smith.

I gotta defer to either Gnarff or T2B on that one. I'm not nearly familiar enough with the text to inform you on what scale it differs from the Catholic Bible.

 

The passage I believe is in the Doctrine and Covenents, a book of latter day revelations, most received by Joseph Smith, but a few parts recorded by other prophets (Official declaration 2 was written by Spencer W. Kimball in the late 1970's).

We use, for the most part the King James version of the Bible, but some parts have been editted to correct errors in translation as revealed to Joseph Smith in the early days of the Church. Some passages are quite different...

There is also the Book of Mormon, translated from plates of Brass as a record of people from Jerusalem that came to the Americas about 600 years before Christ and died out about 400 years after. It is another witness of Jesus Christ, and tells of His visit to these people too.