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Ockham Called; He Wants His Nominalism Back


Let's talk about this. I do not agree that there is only one hero in the Bible. I also do not agree that your kids are becoming atheists because they are burned out on trying to obey. Frankly, your kids are burned out because the theological system that you and they labor under fosters pride. Some of them will never escape the "iron couch of introspection" and will forever be the victims of their own sinful self-awareness, because grace is only favor; it is neither required nor likely that anyone will become more holy by believing that the only reason they are holy is because the Father looks at them and sees Christ. The others will cut out the middleman; if they are ever and always reckoned righteous by an alien righteousness that has nothing to do with them, why waste the time and effort becoming more holy? They'll be antinomians, and they'll probably enjoy themselves in a certain sense. In any case, they're all proud.

The gospel is not, "God loves you because of Christ." It's more like, "See how much God loves us in the light of Christ?" The glory of the New Covenant is the fullness of the revelation of Jesus Christ for all people, not just the children of Abraham. Moreover, the demands of this covenant are actually more difficult than anything expected of his people in the Old Testament. But the grace of it is not only God's unending favor and mercy, but the power, through the Holy Spirit, (through the Church and the sacraments) to live lives of purity and love that we could only imagine if we had been living in earlier times.

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