The Evangelical Universalist Forum

The sad testimony of the daughter of a Calvinist apologist

That’s fine. Johnny rescinded himself from the forum sometime later over his temper issues, canceling his account – that’s why it says “username” now. The ad/mods chose to leave his posts in place because otherwise it would make a bunch of threads he had posted in confusing about who was discussing what and why.

Not everyone here is hostile to Matt Slick (I’m not, for example, and I invited him here back when I was commenting, per member request, on a piece he wrote against universal salvation. He declined.) A lot of people blame Calvinism and Calvinists for feeling emotionally scarred, and some members post here from that pain. The ad/mods have tried to balance the freedom to speak on that with encouragement to tone things down and get past the emotional pain to work with Calvinists (from whom many of us have come after all, though not myself) as brothers in Christ.

The protection of Calvinists from angry diatribes was in fact one main reason why we (the admins, mods, and site owners) instituted the rule you quoted, although we’re flexibly patient about enforcing the rules.

My apologies, too, if there was a bit of delay in your post showing up. All posts from new members automatically go to the spamcatcher net until ad/mods can check over them to make sure they aren’t selling essays or shoes or drugs or (the new hotness in recent weeks since Thanksgiving) Russian hacking tools which are guaranteed to get past any Captcha security. (Insert irony here, since those tools can’t get past this type of security. :wink: ) After a few more posts (if you care to do so) the system will trigger over to letting your posts in automatically instead. Until then you could have a day or two (or three over any weekends) of delay. I habitually check the spamnet every workday morning, but more randomly on the weekends; other ad/mods are more random about it than that (since I’m pretty steady on my checking schedule).

I would say welcome to the forum, but I know you’re upset so that doesn’t seem altogether appropriate. (So was Johnny, in a long-term way.) Many of us here do regard Calvinists as brethren in Christ, however, myself and the other ad/mods and site owners included – even when many Calvinists don’t regard us as their brethren in Christ. (But some do.)

Thank you very much for the warm welcome, Jason.

Apologies for replying to your post so late. I’m not great at keeping up with forums etc.

Very gracious of you to put into effect protection plans for the much maligned Calvanists! I did laugh a little when I read that.

Shame my introductory post was so heated, but also that the intended recipient probably won’t ever read it.

Wishing you all a joyful Christmas rejoicing in Christ our saviour.

Best

Rob

Praise God for the blessed assurance of our salvation through the Incarnation and the cross!

Amen!

According to Slick:

“Universalism is the teaching that all people will be saved.”

“…universalism, in and of itself, does not automatically void salvation.”

https://carm.org/universalism-is

“May the Lord point them to Jesus so that they may repent and leave behind the dangerous doctrine of universalism that nullifies the gospel.”

https://carm.org/why-i-closed-universalism-discussion-board-carm

Is there a contradiction there?

I kinda wish Slick and others would unpack what that actually means, so that those who oppose Universalism don’t shrug off the saying as trite and without foundation. I like to give folks this, based on Aquinas, and point out that it is for ALL humans, and indeed the Cosmos as well:
" " What the scriptures teach is that man failed the gardening task and ruined God’s creation, but that God graciously came, as a friend and
cooperator, to help him salvage and recreate. In choosing that way to help man with his original goal God gave man’s life a new goal - that of fellowship with God himself as friend. The journey of this life is no longer simply a journey to the fulfilment of man’s nature, for that journey has been taken up into a journey into the presence of God HImself, into the good and happy state which God himself is.
This is Thomas’s preferred way of describing the relationship between what later commentators called man’s natural and supernatural ends. He does not talk, as they do, of man first knowing God as author of nature, and then as author of supernature. Rather he consistently talks of God, known to man’s learning as the author of nature, becoming through God’s teaching the object of his happiness . The word translated ‘happiness’ has more the sense of ‘happy state’ or ‘blessed state’, meaning a state which has blessedly happened or turned out well - a state of goodhap rather than mishap. It corresponds to the Aristotelian word ‘eudaimonia’, which some modern scholars translate as ‘flourishing’. When Thomas uses happiness as a name for God himself he is thinking of God as fulfilled life; and this explains why he talks of happiness as being accompanied by delight, rather than as consisting in it.

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