My first thought on reading that was “murder is a sin”, which makes the priest seem unwilling to risk hell to save the children.
(Incidentally, I have seen actual attempts at answering that question, mostly revolving around theories as to why God didn’t simply have us be born directly into heaven.)
Yes—to which I’d say “aren’t christians supposed to sacrifice themselves for others? what—you wouldn’t even sacrifice yourself (a known sinner) to guarantee that these babies go to heaven? What if your one life could save ten babies? twenty?...”
Indeed, hence my noting it “makes the priest seem unwilling to risk hell to save the children” in my comment.
However, if we’re going to actually discuss the problem, I’m going to point out that this whole system was supposedly set up by a benevolent superintelligence. Attempting to subvert it is, presumably, contrary to your own value system, even if no-one can quite articulate why.
In other words: if it sends you to Hell, God wants to discourage it. God is all-knowing, all-powerful and Friendly; do you really want to fight him on this?
Yes—to which I’d say “aren’t christians supposed to sacrifice themselves for others? what—you wouldn’t even sacrifice yourself (a known sinner) to guarantee that these babies go to heaven? What if your one life could save ten babies? twenty?...”
Please don’t train the Christians to shut up and multiply. The holy war that inevitably followed would destroy us all.
Reading that, I thought: “I bet people asking questions like that is why ‘Original Sin’ got invented”.
Of course, the next step is to ask: “Why doesn’t the priest drown the baby in the baptismal font, now that its Original Sin is forgiven?”
…
My first thought on reading that was “murder is a sin”, which makes the priest seem unwilling to risk hell to save the children.
(Incidentally, I have seen actual attempts at answering that question, mostly revolving around theories as to why God didn’t simply have us be born directly into heaven.)
Yes—to which I’d say “aren’t christians supposed to sacrifice themselves for others? what—you wouldn’t even sacrifice yourself (a known sinner) to guarantee that these babies go to heaven? What if your one life could save ten babies? twenty?...”
Indeed, hence my noting it “makes the priest seem unwilling to risk hell to save the children” in my comment.
However, if we’re going to actually discuss the problem, I’m going to point out that this whole system was supposedly set up by a benevolent superintelligence. Attempting to subvert it is, presumably, contrary to your own value system, even if no-one can quite articulate why.
In other words: if it sends you to Hell, God wants to discourage it. God is all-knowing, all-powerful and Friendly; do you really want to fight him on this?
Please don’t train the Christians to shut up and multiply. The holy war that inevitably followed would destroy us all.