ONLY GOD CAN MAKE THOUGHT CRIMES!


In A Catechism of Christian Doctrine, Question 177, we read, “The sins against Faith are all false religions, wilful doubt, disbelief, or denial of any article of Faith, and also culpable ignorance of any of the doctrines of the Church”. Apologetics and Catholic Doctrine, Part 1, tells us that God never suffers anybody to lose their faith and that it is lost only through a mortal sin of refusing to believe any more and is lost by the laziness of not reading Catholic books and reading what has not been permitted by the Church and by talking religion with others of a different religion or marrying one of them or ceasing to believe on account of scandals in the Church or by pride that wants to prove everything by reason and won’t be satisfied by faith or by neglecting prayer and the sacraments (pages 224-226). Thoughts that question the faith are to be thrust out of our minds like impure temptations (page 227).
 
Jesus condemned doubt as a sin. He said that God will only do you the favour of answering prayer if your faith is unwavering.

 


When accused of using Satan's power to cast out demons, Jesus retorted by saying this was a heinous blasphemy.  In Matthew 12, he makes blasphemy the worst possible act or crime. It can only be that bad if it is suggesting that a teaching needs ridiculing or ridicules itself.  It is about reminding you that some teachings deserve only reverence even if they are wrong!  Not a line of the Bible says anything against condemning people or praising a God who condemns them when these people commit the crime of having the wrong beliefs. You must judge person by their deeds first and foremost. Beliefs are to be corrected and getting personal and judging must be kept out of it. Condemning holders of beliefs for their beliefs amounts to creating thought crimes.
 
Jesus claimed to be the way, truth and the life (John 14:6) - that is, he gives us the life of God and we experience God living inside us. It follows then that he came to be truth and life for us. It follows then that once you believe in him and experience his life-giving power you have no excuse for departing from the faith or any part of it. The New Testament claims to be the truth and that those who believe have the truth (2 Timothy 6:3,4). So it is forbidden for the Christian to say, “I believe I have the truth”. The Christian must say, “I have the truth.” There is no doubt that Christianity advocates stubborn arrogance.

 

Truth is naturally intolerant of error so if you have the truth then tolerating those who differ or their views would be wrong.

Controllers and dictators wish they could make laws banning thought crimes. But it is not possible. So many of them manipulate others to be their own jailers who fear a God who will punish them for thinking immoral thoughts or thoughts that cast doubt on the truth of their religion. Only a God can make thought crimes. The right to think freely is such a fundamental right that anything that possibly could be used to diminish or destroy that right is to be condemned outright. It's a solid reason to reject belief in God. A God who supervises what you think and who will punish you if you think heretically or immorally is a tyrant by default. He is seen as offering a benign dictatorship but what is benign about God being a thought policeman? And a dictator is a dictator no matter how much good she or he does.
 
The one ingredient necessary to all recipes for mind control, is convincing people that wilful doubt regarding the required doctrines of a religious or political faith is not just inappropriate or mistaken but immoral.
 
Only religion can claim that doubt and hesitation with regard to what it says you should believe is immoral and claim it with a straight face. Politics has to condition people in a crafty way but it cannot demand that people agree with it. Religion can.
 
As people will soon see that there is something badly wrong if they are not allowed to query if their faith is actually correct or plausible, it is necessary for the mind-controllers to manipulate them to make them believe that they believe and renounce doubt of their own free will. The best and most dangerous form of mind-control requires encouraging a person to feel they are free.
 
When a religion lets members question, it has answers for them. Questioning does not mean you are doubting but only seeking to find out the basis for your beliefs and to find out more about the beliefs.
 
When a doubt appears and cannot be answered to your satisfaction, religion will say the answer is there but we don't have it yet. It is a mystery. If the facts contradict the doctrines religion will say that both are true and are in paradox. So it will tell you to accept the doubted doctrine just because God allegedly said it is true. You will be asked to accept it on faith.
 
The ban on doubt seeks to persuade people to immunise their beliefs against the truth or anything that proves them wrong or far-fetched.
 
The faith that results is not much of a faith. We feel that the wife who stops herself seeing her husband is unfaithful does not have faith in him the way a

sensible wife sees how faithful her husband is.

 

FINALLY

 

If you want to indulge your ego and get your human religion accepted as the truth and treated as the truth regardless of whether it is true or not then you need to condemn thought crimes and you need to say there is a God who gives us revelations in order to do that. Thought crimes and dictatorship - even if benign - go together. The foundation of religion is its claim to be sacred to a God of truth. Thus religion is bad in principle.
     
BOOKS CONSULTED
 
A Catechism of Christian Doctrine, Catholic Truth Society, London, 1985
A Common Faith, John Dewey, Yale University Press, Connecticut, 1968
A Primer of Necessary Belief, Dawson Jackson ,Victor Gollancz Ltd, London, 1957
Apologetics and Catholic Doctrine, M H Gill and Son Ltd, Dublin, 1954
Faith and Ambiguity, Stewart R Sutherland, SCM Press, London, 1984
God and Philosophy, Antony Flew, Hutchinson, London, 1966
In Defence of the Faith, Dave Hunt, Harvest House, Eugene Oregon, 1996
On Being a Christian, Hans Kung, Collins/Fount Paperbacks, Glasgow, 1978
Oxford Dictionary of Philosophy, Simon Blackburn, Oxford University Press, 1996
Reason and Belief, Bland Blanschard, London, George Allen and Unwin Ltd, 1974
Reason and Religion, Anthony Kenny, Basil Blackwell Ltd, Oxford, 1987
The Balance of Truth, EI Watkin, Hollis & Carter, London, 1943
The Case Against Christ, John Young, Falcon Books, London, 1971
The End of Faith, Religion, Terror And The Future Of Reason, Sam Harris, Free Press, London, 2005
The Faith of a Subaltern, Alec de Candole, Cambridge University Press, 1919
The Fundamental Questions of Philosophy, A.C. Ewing, Routledge and Kegan Paul, London, 1985
The Future of Belief Debate, Ed Gregory Baum, Herder and Herder, New York, 1967
The Student’s Catholic Doctrine, Rev Charles Hart BA, Burns & Oates, London, 1961
Unblind Faith, Michael J Langford, SCM, London, 1982
What is Christianity? Very Rev W Moran DD, Catholic Truth Society of Ireland, Dublin, 1940
What is Faith? Anthony Kenny, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 1992



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