Will Joe Biden hurt God?

[The Mikado]

Trump: "Take away your guns, destroy your second amendment, no religion, no anything. Hurt the bible, hurt God. He's against God, he's against guns."

Just seeing if you all agree with Trump on this one.

[afleitch]

I'm annoyed at a straight man having such a cool superpower. We gays apparently cause hurricanes but don't have the Pullmanesque ability to kill god.

[Chunk Yogurt for President!]

Of course not.

[Fuzzy Bear]

He's not going to hurt God; that's not possible.

https://news.yahoo.com/trump-says-biden-is-against-god-202649148.html

Donald Trump tends to blather whenever he ventures into religious, spiritual, and theological topics, and he sounds ridiculous at times when he does so:

“He’s following the radical left agenda: take away your guns, destroy your Second Amendment, no religion, no anything, hurt the Bible, hurt God,” Trump said during a campaign visit to Ohio. “He’s against God, he’s against guns.”

This is an example of Trump's "unadorned speech".  It sounds like the reply of the "Man On The Street" in a place like Staten Island or The Villages in Florida, some ordinary guy with a high school education who just got a mic put under his nose and was asked, "What do you think of Joe Biden?".  Someone who goes to church but isn't theologically sophisticated.  It's easy to dismiss people like this and it's easy to laugh at a major politician who speaks like this.

But in this case, Trump is entirely right.  Biden IS against God (or, at a minimum, appears to be)  Biden doesn't think he is, and I suspect he really doesn't mean to be, but there is no evidence whatsoever of where Joe Biden ever rejected a political position he's taken solely because in prayer and meditating on God's Word, he chose to align himself with Scripture rather than the Democratic Party.  Indeed, his position over the years on abortion and on family has taken on greater distance from his chosen church (the Roman Catholic church).  If anyone thinks I'm full of crap, please explain to me ways in which Biden has become more in line with Scripture, or even Catholic Church tradition over time.

“Joe Biden’s faith is at the core of who he is: He’s lived it with dignity his entire life, and it’s been a source of strength and comfort in times of extreme hardship,” Biden spokesman Andrew Bates said in a statement. “Donald Trump is the only president in our history to have tear-gassed peaceful Americans and thrown a priest out of his church just so he could profane it — and a Bible — for his own cynical optics as he sought to tear our nation apart at a moment of crisis and pain.”

The comment about tear gassing "peaceful Americans" is a lie.  Biden knows it, but doesn't repudiate it.  "Thou shalt not bear false witness against thy neighbor."  Joe might do well to start by correcting the statements of his own hired mouthpiece.  More to the point:  The idea that Joe Biden's faith is "at the core of who he is" is laughable.  This is not being judgmental, but it is a statement that points out fact of Biden's life that are true.

Biden identifies as a Roman Catholic, yet he's denied communion by Catholic priests for his stance on abortion:

https://www.foxnews.com/politics/biden-on-being-denied-communion-im-a-practicing-catholic-i-practice-my-faith

"Sadly, this past Sunday, I had to refuse Holy Communion to former Vice President Joe Biden," Rev. Robert Morey said in a statement on Monday. "Holy Communion signifies we are one with God, each other and the Church. Our actions should reflect that. Any public figure (emphasis added) who advocates for abortion places himself or herself outside of Church teaching. As a priest, it is my responsibility to minister to those souls entrusted to my care, and I must do so even in the most difficult situations. I will keep Mr. Biden in my prayers."

Now I'm not a Roman Catholic, and my church would not deny communion to Biden if he came to Church.  Holy Communion takes on different meaning for Catholics based on the Doctrine of Transubstantiation.  That being said, it's a little hard to believe that “Joe Biden’s faith is at the core of who he is: He’s lived it with dignity his entire life, and it’s been a source of strength and comfort in times of extreme hardship.” when his political positions place him in the position where priests of his own Church deny him Communion.  Would a man who's faith was as important to him as Joe Biden's mouthpiece says Biden's faith is be in a position where he was denied Communion for breaking with the church on the issue of abortion, a core issue of the Roman Catholic Church?

Someone who is a man of faith ought to manifest their faith in the form of dissenting from the orthodoxy of their political party at some point.  When has Biden done that?  He has chosen the orthodoxy of the Democratic Party over the orthodoxy of the Roman Catholic Church whenever the two came in conflict.  I'd like to see examples of where this was not so.  Rep. Tony Hall (D-OH) was a Born Again Christian and a pro-life liberal; the most massive FF in Congress, and the same coudl be said of Rep. Bart Stupak (D-MI), Democrats who, at heart, I am most like, politically.  Neither of these men would be welcome to run as Democrats today.  They were examples of what Biden's spokesperson is talking about.  Rep. Jim Bunn (R-OR) voted against the 1995 Welfare Reform bill because he believed it would encourage abortion, a greater evil.  Bunn would take some flak, but he'd be more welcome today as a Republican than Hall and Stupak would be welcome as Democrats, and that's sad.

[MASHED POTATOES. VOTE!]

I didn't know mere mortals can "hurt" God.

[Fuzzy Bear]

I didn't know mere mortals can "hurt" God.

The sinful acts of man do break God's heart.

[Penn_Quaker_Girl]

I didn't know mere mortals can "hurt" God.

The sinful acts of man do break God's heart.

Welp, I've definitely disappointed God quite a bit over the past year.

[100% pro-life no matter what]

I didn't know mere mortals can "hurt" God.

The sinful acts of man do break God's heart.

Welp, I've definitely disappointed God quite a bit over the past year.

None of us can possibly live up to God's standards for us, which is why none of us can earn salvation by works.  It's only because of penal substitution- because Christ died for us on the cross- that those who put their faith in Him can go to Heaven.

[Associate Justice PiT]

I didn't know mere mortals can "hurt" God.

The sinful acts of man do break God's heart.

Welp, I've definitely disappointed God quite a bit over the past year.

None of us can possibly live up to God's standards for us, which is why none of us can earn salvation by works.  It's only because of penal substitution- because Christ died for us on the cross- that those who put their faith in Him can go to Heaven.

     While my church does not teach PSA, I totally agree with the thrust of your post here. Too many people in the world today think that their acts will carry them and that if they are just generally nice people then they are assured a ticket into Heaven. We are saved by the sacrifice of the Son of God, and not by our own deeds.

[Clarko95 📚💰📈]

We can only hope.

[John Dule]

The idea that grown men would subject this sort of question to serious discussion is, quite frankly, comical.

[Hindsight was 2020]

He's not going to hurt God; that's not possible.

https://news.yahoo.com/trump-says-biden-is-against-god-202649148.html

Donald Trump tends to blather whenever he ventures into religious, spiritual, and theological topics, and he sounds ridiculous at times when he does so:

“He’s following the radical left agenda: take away your guns, destroy your Second Amendment, no religion, no anything, hurt the Bible, hurt God,” Trump said during a campaign visit to Ohio. “He’s against God, he’s against guns.”

This is an example of Trump's "unadorned speech".  It sounds like the reply of the "Man On The Street" in a place like Staten Island or The Villages in Florida, some ordinary guy with a high school education who just got a mic put under his nose and was asked, "What do you think of Joe Biden?".  Someone who goes to church but isn't theologically sophisticated.  It's easy to dismiss people like this and it's easy to laugh at a major politician who speaks like this.

But in this case, Trump is entirely right.  Biden IS against God (or, at a minimum, appears to be)  Biden doesn't think he is, and I suspect he really doesn't mean to be, but there is no evidence whatsoever of where Joe Biden ever rejected a political position he's taken solely because in prayer and meditating on God's Word, he chose to align himself with Scripture rather than the Democratic Party.  Indeed, his position over the years on abortion and on family has taken on greater distance from his chosen church (the Roman Catholic church).  If anyone thinks I'm full of crap, please explain to me ways in which Biden has become more in line with Scripture, or even Catholic Church tradition over time.

“Joe Biden’s faith is at the core of who he is: He’s lived it with dignity his entire life, and it’s been a source of strength and comfort in times of extreme hardship,” Biden spokesman Andrew Bates said in a statement. “Donald Trump is the only president in our history to have tear-gassed peaceful Americans and thrown a priest out of his church just so he could profane it — and a Bible — for his own cynical optics as he sought to tear our nation apart at a moment of crisis and pain.”

The comment about tear gassing "peaceful Americans" is a lie.  Biden knows it, but doesn't repudiate it.  "Thou shalt not bear false witness against thy neighbor."  Joe might do well to start by correcting the statements of his own hired mouthpiece.  More to the point:  The idea that Joe Biden's faith is "at the core of who he is" is laughable.  This is not being judgmental, but it is a statement that points out fact of Biden's life that are true.

Biden identifies as a Roman Catholic, yet he's denied communion by Catholic priests for his stance on abortion:

https://www.foxnews.com/politics/biden-on-being-denied-communion-im-a-practicing-catholic-i-practice-my-faith

"Sadly, this past Sunday, I had to refuse Holy Communion to former Vice President Joe Biden," Rev. Robert Morey said in a statement on Monday. "Holy Communion signifies we are one with God, each other and the Church. Our actions should reflect that. Any public figure (emphasis added) who advocates for abortion places himself or herself outside of Church teaching. As a priest, it is my responsibility to minister to those souls entrusted to my care, and I must do so even in the most difficult situations. I will keep Mr. Biden in my prayers."

Now I'm not a Roman Catholic, and my church would not deny communion to Biden if he came to Church.  Holy Communion takes on different meaning for Catholics based on the Doctrine of Transubstantiation.  That being said, it's a little hard to believe that “Joe Biden’s faith is at the core of who he is: He’s lived it with dignity his entire life, and it’s been a source of strength and comfort in times of extreme hardship.” when his political positions place him in the position where priests of his own Church deny him Communion.  Would a man who's faith was as important to him as Joe Biden's mouthpiece says Biden's faith is be in a position where he was denied Communion for breaking with the church on the issue of abortion, a core issue of the Roman Catholic Church?

Someone who is a man of faith ought to manifest their faith in the form of dissenting from the orthodoxy of their political party at some point.  When has Biden done that?  He has chosen the orthodoxy of the Democratic Party over the orthodoxy of the Roman Catholic Church whenever the two came in conflict.  I'd like to see examples of where this was not so.  Rep. Tony Hall (D-OH) was a Born Again Christian and a pro-life liberal; the most massive FF in Congress, and the same coudl be said of Rep. Bart Stupak (D-MI), Democrats who, at heart, I am most like, politically.  Neither of these men would be welcome to run as Democrats today.  They were examples of what Biden's spokesperson is talking about.  Rep. Jim Bunn (R-OR) voted against the 1995 Welfare Reform bill because he believed it would encourage abortion, a greater evil.  Bunn would take some flak, but he'd be more welcome today as a Republican than Hall and Stupak would be welcome as Democrats, and that's sad.

Okay there are a couple things to unpack here. First and foremost the protestors that got tear gassed were being peaceful so ironically you just engaged in the same bearing of false witness that you accused Biden of doing. Second, the use of the priest who is denying Biden communion as a smoking gun of Biden’s religious soul is ridiculous because that priest is ultimately human as the rest of use and I have seen up hand plenty of priests use the pulpit to push their political ideology. There is also the fact that there are plenty of liberal movements who you hate like BLM that have had religious figures support them so what this priest the ultimate judge of someone’s religious soul but not Rev. William Barber?

[Okay, maybe Mike Johnson is a competent parliamentarian.]

Catholics can get denied communion for all sorts of reasons, formal cooperation with the intrinsic evil of abortion not least of all. It's reason #2 why I would never run for non-local office as a Democrat myself, reason #1 being my lack of patience with protocol. Joe Biden is probably just as sincere a Christian as most of us, which is to say not very; I suspect Fuzzy Bear in his more penitential moods would agree with that formulation.

[Former President tack50]

I didn't know mere mortals can "hurt" God.

The sinful acts of man do break God's heart.

Welp, I've definitely disappointed God quite a bit over the past year.

None of us can possibly live up to God's standards for us, which is why none of us can earn salvation by works.  It's only because of penal substitution- because Christ died for us on the cross- that those who put their faith in Him can go to Heaven.

     While my church does not teach PSA, I totally agree with the thrust of your post here. Too many people in the world today think that their acts will carry them and that if they are just generally nice people then they are assured a ticket into Heaven. We are saved by the sacrifice of the Son of God, and not by our own deeds.

To be honest, while I don't really consider myself a Christian (so maybe I should not be commenting but oh well), I am always very surprised by this kind of take.

It always feels "off" to me that your actions in this world don't really matter and that you will be saved exclusively by your faith in God.

Too many unambiguously bad actions have been performed in the name of God for me to truly believe in something like that. I definitely think your actions should also weigh on whether you get a ticket ot heaven or not? (Faith should obviously be a pre-requisite, but is should not be the only requisite). You should indeed represent your faith by doing good deeds.

And the counter argument to this, while I get where it is coming from, always feels like a "No true Scotman" type fallacy at worst; or like "putting the cart before the horse" in some way at best.

[Associate Justice PiT]

I didn't know mere mortals can "hurt" God.

The sinful acts of man do break God's heart.

Welp, I've definitely disappointed God quite a bit over the past year.

None of us can possibly live up to God's standards for us, which is why none of us can earn salvation by works.  It's only because of penal substitution- because Christ died for us on the cross- that those who put their faith in Him can go to Heaven.

     While my church does not teach PSA, I totally agree with the thrust of your post here. Too many people in the world today think that their acts will carry them and that if they are just generally nice people then they are assured a ticket into Heaven. We are saved by the sacrifice of the Son of God, and not by our own deeds.

To be honest, while I don't really consider myself a Christian (so maybe I should not be commenting but oh well), I am always very surprised by this kind of take.

It always feels "off" to me that your actions in this world don't really matter and that you will be saved exclusively by your faith in God.

Too many unambiguously bad actions have been performed in the name of God for me to truly believe in something like that. I definitely think your actions should also weigh on whether you get a ticket ot heaven or not? (Faith should obviously be a pre-requisite, but is should not be the only requisite). You should indeed represent your faith by doing good deeds.

And the counter argument to this, while I get where it is coming from, always feels like a "No true Scotman" type fallacy at worst; or like "putting the cart before the horse" in some way at best.

     Faith is actualized in a turning away from sin and a turning towards God. We must wish to fulfill God's will and live our lives in a way that is pleasing to Him. Good acts are not salvific, and it is impossible that they could be since our actions always fall short of the glory of God. But the intention to do good is paramount to having a true living faith in God.

     You are right that Christians in the past have done much evil. Everyone has done evil in their lives and everyone has earned condemnation. Yet we are not all condemned. If we feel sorrow for our evil deeds, ask God for forgiveness, and pick ourselves up again, we will be forgiven. But the key is to feel sorrow, to understand that what we have done is wrong, and understand that redemption is a grace of God and not of our own acts.

     If you keep living your life in faith and repentance, always rejecting and confessing bad acts when you commit them, you should find that you begin doing fewer bad things and more good things. At that point you are closer to God, not because of the good deeds you perform, but because of the life that produces those good deeds, which is being transformed by the glory of God.

     Does that help explain my point of view?

[Former President tack50]

I didn't know mere mortals can "hurt" God.

The sinful acts of man do break God's heart.

Welp, I've definitely disappointed God quite a bit over the past year.

None of us can possibly live up to God's standards for us, which is why none of us can earn salvation by works.  It's only because of penal substitution- because Christ died for us on the cross- that those who put their faith in Him can go to Heaven.

     While my church does not teach PSA, I totally agree with the thrust of your post here. Too many people in the world today think that their acts will carry them and that if they are just generally nice people then they are assured a ticket into Heaven. We are saved by the sacrifice of the Son of God, and not by our own deeds.

To be honest, while I don't really consider myself a Christian (so maybe I should not be commenting but oh well), I am always very surprised by this kind of take.

It always feels "off" to me that your actions in this world don't really matter and that you will be saved exclusively by your faith in God.

Too many unambiguously bad actions have been performed in the name of God for me to truly believe in something like that. I definitely think your actions should also weigh on whether you get a ticket ot heaven or not? (Faith should obviously be a pre-requisite, but is should not be the only requisite). You should indeed represent your faith by doing good deeds.

And the counter argument to this, while I get where it is coming from, always feels like a "No true Scotman" type fallacy at worst; or like "putting the cart before the horse" in some way at best.

     Faith is actualized in a turning away from sin and a turning towards God. We must wish to fulfill God's will and live our lives in a way that is pleasing to Him. Good acts are not salvific, and it is impossible that they could be since our actions always fall short of the glory of God. But the intention to do good is paramount to having a true living faith in God.

     You are right that Christians in the past have done much evil. Everyone has done evil in their lives and everyone has earned condemnation. Yet we are not all condemned. If we feel sorrow for our evil deeds, ask God for forgiveness, and pick ourselves up again, we will be forgiven. But the key is to feel sorrow, to understand that what we have done is wrong, and understand that redemption is a grace of God and not of our own acts.

     If you keep living your life in faith and repentance, always rejecting and confessing bad acts when you commit them, you should find that you begin doing fewer bad things and more good things. At that point you are closer to God, not because of the good deeds you perform, but because of the life that produces those good deeds, which is being transformed by the glory of God.

     Does that help explain my point of view?

Yeah it is a pretty good explanation. I still don't really agree but I do understand it a bit more. Thanks!

[Okay, maybe Mike Johnson is a competent parliamentarian.]

To expand on the remark I made last night, the issue with denying John Kerry or Joe Biden or whoever communion over abortion isn't with the concept, it's that, in the United States, it's almost always a decision undertaken by right-leaning priests or bishops in the context of Presidential election cycles; thus it's difficult to take seriously as a moral statement. In other countries it's probably different; Japan for example has a left-leaning bishops' conference and I could swear I once heard of some Catholic LDP lawmaker getting denied communion over something to do with Nippon Kaigi. But that's not how this works in America.

I mentioned in this post that other than a few fairly low-profile Republican "wets" there are practically no current American politicians or political commentators who provide a thoroughgoing orthodox Catholic perspective on public life. (And if you go looking for ones who do, you tend to find "integralists" who are wildly at variance with American society on foundational cultural issues like respect for individual rights and a roughly equal social role for women.) And I stand by that assessment.

So if we were going to systematically deny communion to any politician who broke from Catholic social teaching, we'd deny it not only to people like Biden but to Paul Ryan (who has said he thinks that trickle-down economics constitutes a preferential option for the poor), Bill Barr (who has an Immanuel Kant-like obsession with imposing the death penalty), Jeb Bush (who's explicitly denied the Pope's right to issue moral teachings on the economy), etc. etc. etc. To say nothing of all the pro-choice Catholic Democrats who don't become Presidential nominees! Even if we're only denying communion to politicians who formally cooperate with intrinsic evils we're still down John Kelly, Joe Biden again, the 2018 Trump-lite incarnation of Joe Donnelly, and Ken Cuccinelli, all over mass deportation--yes, Veritatis Splendor teaches that deportation is intrinsically evil.

I'm not saying that this shouldn't be done; if anything, I think most Catholics who hold political office should generally decline from presenting themselves for communion anyway. Some sort of betrayal of principle is almost inevitable for anybody wielding political power. Emperor Constantine was a massive HP, but he was very wise not to get baptized until he was on his deathbed.

[PSOL]

yes, Veritatis Splendor teaches that deportation is intrinsically evil[/b].

May you explain this in more detail to a non-Catholic?

[Okay, maybe Mike Johnson is a competent parliamentarian.]

yes, Veritatis Splendor teaches that deportation is intrinsically evil[/b].

May you explain this in more detail to a non-Catholic?

Veritatis Splendor is a 1993 encyclical by John Paul II that was meant to repudiate various then-fashionable ideas in Catholic moral theology. These included (what JP2 saw as) moral relativism and in some cases also a form of virtue ethics that was overdeveloped to the point of discounting specific moral choices. Among other things, the encyclical strongly affirmed that there are "intrinsically evil" actions; lots of Catholics use this phrase to mean "super duper evil" but in fact what it means is an action that can't be undertaken even for the greater good. (That is to say, there are actions that are always wrong but whose wrongness is not particularly severe; for example, a white lie. Left-leaning theologians (such as yours truly!) will often argue that some of the classic Catholic sexual hobbyhorses, like masturbation, also fall into this category.) A passage in the encyclical takes a parade of horribles from the Vatican II document Gaudium et Spes and clarifies that they are to be understood as intrinsic evils:

The Second Vatican Council itself, in discussing the respect due to the human person, gives a number of examples of such acts: "Whatever is hostile to life itself, such as any kind of homicide, genocide, abortion, euthanasia and voluntary suicide; whatever violates the integrity of the human person, such as mutilation, physical and mental torture and attempts to coerce the spirit; whatever is offensive to human dignity, such as subhuman living conditions, arbitrary imprisonment, deportation, slavery, prostitution and trafficking in women and children; degrading conditions of work which treat labourers as mere instruments of profit, and not as free responsible persons: all these and the like are a disgrace, and so long as they infect human civilization they contaminate those who inflict them more than those who suffer injustice, and they are a negation of the honour due to the Creator".

(emphasis mine)

Of course, defining some of these words is a tricky thing, and "deportation" is one such word; some, such as the well-known apologist Jimmy Akin, argue that the intention of the Vatican II Council fathers couldn't possibly have been to establish that (for example) deporting a nonagenarian Nazi war criminal to stand trial in Germany is inherently morally wrong. But it's broadly accepted among moral theologians that the term does include any deportation of people who don't pose a danger to the host society, as well as any deportation motivated by ethnic animus.

[Sprouts Farmers Market ✘]

Joe Biden is a GREAT Christian. But if he does die, God will be hurt by the SECULAR REVIVAL

[The Mikado]

https://twitter.com/ryanstruyk/status/1307473573049700355

So much for omnipotence. Trump makes God sound pretty weak.

[All Along The Watchtower]

We shall see, tonight!

[Indy Texas]

If anyone thinks I'm full of crap, please explain to me ways in which Biden has become more in line with Scripture, or even Catholic Church tradition over time.

Caring for the poor and the weak.

Not telling lies.

Caring about others before caring about yourself.

Being faithful to your spouse.

Not taking advantage of others in pursuit of money.

The problem with people like you is that you think the be-all-end-all of Christianity is:

1. No abortions.

2. Not putting male reproductive organs anywhere other than female reproductive organs.