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The Cappadocian Fathers and the baptism of fire

  The Cappadocian Fathers and the baptism of fire “Through the Holy Spirit comes our restoration to paradise, our ascension into the kingdom of heaven, our return to the adoption of sons, our liberty to call God our Father, our being made partakers of the grace of Christ, our being called children of light, our sharing in eternal glory, and, in a word, our being brought into a state of all fullness of blessing, both in this world and in the world to come, of all the good gifts that are in store for us, by promise hereof, through faith, beholding the reflection of their grace as though they were already present, we await the full enjoyment. If such is the earnest, what the perfection? If such the first fruits, what the complete fulfilment? Furthermore, from this too may be apprehended the difference between the grace that comes from the Spirit and the baptism by water: in that John indeed baptized with water, but our Lord Jesus Christ by the Holy Ghost. “ I indeed ”, he says, “ ba...
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Afterlife without God

  Afterlife without God “Such is the nature of these things. Now when the dead have come to the place where each is led by his genius, first they are judged and sentenced, as they have lived well and piously, or not. And those who are found to have lived neither well nor ill, go to the Acheron and, embarking upon vessels provided for them, arrive in them at the lake; there they dwell and are purified, and if they have done any wrong they are absolved by paying the penalty for their wrong doings, and for their good deeds they receive rewards, each according to his merits. But those who appear to be incurable, on account of the greatness of their wrongdoings, because they have committed many great deeds of sacrilege, or wicked and abominable murders, or any other such crimes, are cast by their fitting destiny into Tartarus, whence they never emerge. Those, however, who are curable, but are found to have committed great sins — who have, for example, in a moment of passion done some ...
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On Antinatalism

  On Antinatalism Antinatalism is the view that for human beings it is better to have never having been born. While the word itself is recent, the view isn’t. It is one of those views that once you think about it seriously ceases to seem to be absurd. Indeed, all human beings will die at a certain moment and some of them experience in their life extreme level of suffering. Indeed, it seems to me that only a thoughtless person would not question if, in some cases, it is not better to having come into this world. To be honest, there is perhaps an argument that, assuming that there is no afterlife, this life is quite asymmetrical with regards to happiness and suffering. For instance, hurting oneself can take only a fraction of a second whereas healing can take long time (and far too often healing is never complete). Or a cerebral stroke can make us paralyzed or disabled and, clearly, in a very short time renders us incapable of things that took a lot of time to be learned and so on....
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The Judgment of God and the reception of God’s presence by the human soul

  The Judgment of God and the reception of God’s presence by the human soul While describing the Eastern Orthodox view of Judgement, eastern Presbyter George Metallinos wrote that: “Paradise and hell are not two different places. (This version is an idolatrous concept.) They signify two different situations (ways), which originate from the same uncreated source, and are perceived by man as two, different experiences. Or, more precisely, they are the same experience, except that they are perceived differently by man, depending on man's internal state. This experience is: the sight of Christ inside the uncreated light of His divinity, of His "glory". From the moment of His Second Coming, through to all eternity, all people will be seeing Christ in His uncreated light. That is when "those who worked good deeds in their lifetime will go towards the resurrection of their life, while those who worked evil in their lifetime will go towards the resurrection of judgment...
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The state of the Tathagata after death and the extinguished flame

  The state of the Tathagata after death and the extinguished flame In the Aggivacchagotta sutta (Majjhima Nikaya, 72), a discourse present in the Pali Canon of the Theravada tradition, there is the following exchange between the Buddha and the disciple Vacchagotta, who is striving to understand the teaching of the Awakened One: What do you think, Vaccha? Suppose a fire was burning in front of you. Would you know: ‘This fire is burning in front of me’?” “Yes, I would, worthy Gotama.” “But Vaccha, suppose they were to ask you: ‘This fire burning in front of you: what does it depend on to burn?’ How would you answer?”  “I would answer like this: ‘This fire burning in front of me burns in dependence on grass and logs as fuel.’”  “Suppose that fire burning in front of you was extinguished. Would you know: ‘This fire in front of me is quenched’?” “Yes, I would, worthy Gotama.” “But Vaccha, suppose they were to ask you: ‘This fire in fro...
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Hope and Justice VII: the Epistola Apostolorum and other apocryphal texts

  Hope and Justice VII: the Epistola Apostolorum and other apocryphal texts In the Apocryphal text, the ‘Epistola Apostolorum’, there is the following exchange between Jesus and his disciple:  “…Whoso then hath kept my commandments shall be a son of the light, that is, of the Father that is in me. But because of them that corrupt my words am I come down from heaven. I am the word: I became flesh, and I wearied myself (or, suffered) and taught, saying: The heavy laden shall be saved, and they that are gone astray shall go astray for ever. They shall be chastised and tormented in their flesh and in their soul. And we said unto him: O Lord, verily we are sorrowful for their sake. And he said unto us: Ye do rightly, for the righteous are sorry for the sinners, and pray for them, making prayer unto my Father. Again we said unto him: Lord, is there none that maketh intercession unto thee ( so Eth. )? And he said unto us: Yea, and I will hearken unto the prayer of the righteous...
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A comparison between the thought of Theophilus of Antioch and Irenaeus of Lyons

  A comparison between the thought of Theophilus of Antioch and Irenaeus of Lyons In what follows, I compare the thought of Theophilus of Antioch and Irenaeus of Lyons about two topics: the presence of a good intent in the banishment of Adam and Eve from paradise and the consequent banishment from immortality for humankind and the use of the analogy of blindness to describe the inability of sinners to have a proper relationship with God [1] . Both Theophilus and Irenaeus flourished in the second half of the second century and they both began their theological activity in Asia Minor, which might explain the similarities.   Banishment from Paradise and immortality [2] Theophilus: "And God showed great kindness to man in this, that He did not allow him to remain in sin for ever; but, as it were, by a kind of banishment, cast him out of Paradise, in order that, having by punishment expiated, within an appointed time, the sin, and having been disciplined, he should afterwar...
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