The Council of Nicea

@bigdogg said
I, too, am skeptical about 'miracles', but that wasn't my point.

I'm focused on interpreting the story itself - what is the author trying to convey?

NIV gives this:
5 When Jesus had entered Capernaum, a centurion came to him, asking for help. 6 “Lord,” he said, “my servant lies at home paralyzed, suffering terribly.”

This doesn't sound like mere fear, although it is ...[text shortened]... ity, perhaps.

It's not a huge point; I just found your interpretation of the story a bit bizarre.

Freud treated cases of psychosomatic paralysis. ‘Miracle’ explained (away).

@kellyjay said
If you have something to add to the conversation add it, I been studying this for years. You think I have missed something highlight what I am lacking!

What are you lacking? Any comprehension that people who don’t share your faith have meaningful lives.

@moonbus said
Maybe he fears that if he answers a simple “yes” you’ll pounce on him with some non-trivial contradiction you’ve discovered somewhere in the sacred scrolls.

You have something to say about the topic?

@kellyjay said
You have something to say about the topic?

I've said what I thought needed to be said. The Bible is a snapshot in time, frozen at 325 AD. Christianity has moved on since then.

@moonbus said
I've said what I thought needed to be said. The Bible is a snapshot in time, frozen at 325 AD. Christianity has moved on since then.

The Bible is a revelation from God, the fact it doesn’t change or needs to says something, and those that think it should change also speaks volumes, as well as when they think they know better.

@kellyjay said
The Bible is a revelation from God, the fact it doesn’t change or needs to says something, and those that think it should change also speaks volumes, as well as when they think they know better.

If God ever spoke to mankind, then in a manner in which the recipients would understand. The revelation of which you speak spoke to mankind as he was in the first few centuries AD, still believing in kobolds, faires, witches, demons, goblins, magic, and having little or no knowledge about basic physical processes (such as the fertilization of a woman's ovum). Humanity has moved on since 325 AD. In 325 AD it was easy for people to believe in a virgin birth because people had not the slightest inkling about chromosomes and how sperm fertilize ova. Today, it is no longer possible to pass off this kind of story as biological fact. If no man's sperm fertilized Mary's ovum, then her offspring would only have had half the requisite number of chromosomes (i.e., the offspring would not be viable) OR the offspring would have been an exact duplicate, a clone, of Mary, and therefore female. This is only one example; endless others could be cited where literal-factual interpretations simply do not work. Mankind is ready to hear different things in different ages, so the revelation is updated, not because the first revelation was wrong but because mankind is ready to hear an update. Just look at Ex 22:18 if you doubt that. Every mainstream Christian church knows this and proclaims that the revelation is on-going. Don't hang back with the brutes! It's not 325 AD any more.

-Removed-

I think he does believe that; the inerrancy of Scripture is, after all, one of the Five Fundamentals of Evangelical Christians. He's just shy of saying so in this forum.

However, as any Catholic bishop, or Greek or Russian Orthodox patriarch, will tell you, the Bible is tertiary.

@moonbus said
If God ever spoke to mankind, then in a manner in which the recipients would understand. The revelation of which you speak spoke to mankind as he was in the first few centuries AD, still believing in kobolds, faires, witches, demons, goblins, magic, and having little or no knowledge about basic physical processes (such as the fertilization of a woman's ovum). Humanity has mov ...[text shortened]... roclaims that the revelation is on-going. Don't hang back with the brutes! It's not 325 AD any more.

Out of curiosity, God could have fixed any chromosome problem, right?
If that's what He wanted to do?

@moonbus said
If God ever spoke to mankind, then in a manner in which the recipients would understand. The revelation of which you speak spoke to mankind as he was in the first few centuries AD, still believing in kobolds, faires, witches, demons, goblins, magic, and having little or no knowledge about basic physical processes (such as the fertilization of a woman's ovum). Humanity has mov ...[text shortened]... roclaims that the revelation is on-going. Don't hang back with the brutes! It's not 325 AD any more.

God’s creation does not stop being His creation due to the passage of time. Neither does our views alter reality as it is. The beginning of everything sets the tone for what we should say is natural or not.

For those who ignore the questions surrounding origins have nothing to compare what reality should and should not have in it. They are simply saying what they want as true, what they can’t say is it started this way so we can rule out somethings with cause knowing how it all started. God’s creation allows for some remarkable things in spiritual life and the spiritual world.

@chaney3 said
Out of curiosity, God could have fixed any chromosome problem, right?
If that's what He wanted to do?

Out of curiosity, do you suppose God manipulated the Electoral College to get Trump into the White House, even though he lost the popular vote to Clinton?

Sure, an omnipotent being can do anything, by definition. But that not only explains nothing, it defeats any attempt to explain anything at all if you’re just going to fall back on “God’ll fix it.”

There is zero evidence that God manipulates molecules or ‘fixes’ chromosome problems.

@moonbus said
Out of curiosity, do you suppose God manipulated the Electoral College to get Trump into the White House, even though he lost the popular vote to Clinton?

Sure, an omnipotent being can do anything, by definition. But that not only explains nothing, it defeats any attempt to explain anything at all if you’re just going to fall back on “God’ll fix it.”

There is zero evidence that God manipulates molecules or ‘fixes’ chromosome problems.

Wow.
You sound really hostile here.
Why?

@chaney3 said
Wow.
You sound really hostile here.
Why?

The evidence is from the story of Mother Mary.
Any chromosome issues, God would fix.

@chaney3 said
The evidence is from the story of Mother Mary.
Any chromosome issues, God would fix.

But this can be the answer to any objection. Any counter-evidence from the real world can be dismissed with 'God took care of it'.

Worse, you shut down your own internal truth-seeking apparatus this way.