www.byzcath.org Forums General Discussions Town Hall God hates sinners?

This is something I posted in my blog [angelfire.com] , but I wanted to post it here to get yall's feedback...

God hates sinners?

I just got my May issue of New Oxford Review yesterday. The NOR, for those who aren't familiar with it, is an extremely conservative, borderline-traditionalist magazine that is known for courageously attacking modernism and other problems in the Church. I don't always agree with the views expressed by the editor, Dale Vree, but I applaud his fortitude in bringing problems in the Church to light.

In this issue, Mr. Vree says something that really dismayed me. He claims in response to a letter that God loves repentant sinners, but hates unrepentant ones-- that God's love is conditional. To say that God's love is unconditional, the editor argues, is to say that "no repentance is needed", and that this would "lead us down the path to the false doctrine of universal salvation." I think this is an example of how, in trying to combat one error, we can fall into the opposite one.

First of all, the idea that God "hates" anyone is not only heretical, but downright blasphemous. Scripture says that God is love; Love cannot hate. He loves all people, equally and unconditionally. He loves Adolf Hitler just as much as He does Mother Theresa. Hard to imagine, I know, but then God is God, and we are not. Humans may love conditionally, God doesn't.

Really, does the God Who stepped into time, became one of His creation, and suffered and died at the hands of His creatures to save them sound like a God Who "hates"? Not only that, but He taught us to love unconditionally... would a God Who loves only conditionally demand that His creatures love even their enemies? Would He not have taught instead that we only have to love those who are good to us? Would God ask us to love more that He does Himself?

Yes, there are verses in the Old Testament that mention God's "anger" and "hatred." This is an example of the Old Testament writers' imperfect attempt to describe the indescribable... they must not be taken to literally mean that God has emotions that change like ours do. He doesn't.

As for the idea of God's unconditional love leading to the idea of "universal salvation", this is a non sequitir. It doesn't follow that because God loves each and every person, each and every person will be saved. God loves us, yes, but we have free will-- we can reject Him and choose spiritual death for ourselves. God doesn't "send" anyone to hell, we must freely choose to go there. So yes, repentance is needed... we must choose God, and we must become more and more like Him. This transformation through repentance and prayer is what we call in the Eastern Church theosis. There is no theosis, and therefore no salvation, without repentance.

The problem with this "God's love must be conditional, because otherwise everyone's saved" mentality is that it's based on a warped understanding of salvation; it presupposes that salvation is contingent upon God's love for us, rather than upon our love for God. God loves Hitler and Mother Theresa the same; the difference is in their response to His love.

I think your post is wonderful. It quickly and more than adequately responds to the problems in the original article and informs the reader of the appropriate theology instead. (Great job, I might add!)

If that's what Dale Vree wrote, he is off the mark. You are on the right track in your understanding. The people at NOR all came over from High-Church Anglicanism (Anglo-Catholic), and they might not completely have "their arms around" the orthodox understanding of God's love.

Dear Wondering,

Thank you! I plan on sending this, with some minor changes, to the NOR, and I prayed for guidance in writing this.

God bless,

Karen

Hi,

Thanks for your input. I thought that Dale Vree was "off the mark" too... I know that the Roman Catholic Church has never taught that God literally "hates", or that His love is reserved for those who love Him-- to my knowledge, the Anglican Church doesn't teach this either. I was therefore pretty shocked when Vree said this. Honestly, my first thought was, "Is he off his rocker?"

I applaud the NOR's efforts to combat modernism and the "Zeitgeist", but in their zeal for orthodoxy, they're going off the tracks...

God bless,

Karen

I think that repentant sinners love God, while unrepentant sinners hate him.

This would have been a better way for the editor to make the correct point. Especially, because some unrepentant sinners do eventually repent. Note that Constantine the Great finally was baptized on his death bed. The only truly unrepentant sinners are those already in hell.

Does God hate them, I think he loves those in Heaven too much to keep the bad ones with them. Just like when one of my kids is being a brat and hitting and biting the others, that kid goes to his room for a time out so as to not hurt the others and to be punished for what he/she did. I think that hell is the eternal "time-out" with all of the other offenders who also hate God.

This is only an analogy, and with all analogies, this one isn't perfect.

Exactly.

I like your hell-as-eternal-time-out analogy, too-- one that is actually self-imposed.

God bless,

Karen

There's one thing that I'm ashamed of being a Kansan is living in the same state as the mean old man Fred Phelps and his followers of hateful folks. :rolleyes:

SPDundas
Deaf Byzantine

Would this be the "Westboro Baptist Church" bigots?

They hate EVERYBODY... gays, Jews, Catholics, everyone except... well, themselves. Sad.

God bless,

Karen