From: "Peter B. West" <>
Newsgroups: aus.religion.christian
Subject: Re: Original Sin (was Re: Warning: J.E. van den brink)
Date: Fri, 24 Apr 1998 00:49:48 +1000

Michael Smith wrote:
> 

  ....

> Before discussing "Original Sin" it might be wise to define some terms.
> 
> When Adam and Eve first sinned, in Eden, they introduced sin into the
> formerly perfect world.
> 
> Some people use this as a starting point for a doctrine of universal
> sin: "all sin because Adam and Eve sinned first".

Why should we sin because our first parents did?  In this view, Adam and
Eve did have freedom, and misused it.  But if we are like them, then we
have that same freedom, and we reproduce the same drama in our own
lives.  This implies that each of us is born with the capacity to live
completely sinless lives.  If we are genuinely free, then surely many of
us are leading such perfectly sinless lives.  And if this was available
to Adam and Eve without the grace of Christ's sacrifice, then it is
available to us without the grace of His sacrifice.

If, however, we are all subject to sin, then we are somehow changed from
the original design.  How do we inherit this change?

> Others use it as an ending point: "Adam and Eve sinned first because it
> is in man's nature to sin."

This implies that human beings had and have, by design, no freedom not
to sin.  It is a flaw in the glass, and if Adam and Eve were our first
parents, did we not inherit this flaw from them?

> The Roman Catholic church take this further.  (Others may do this too,
> but I have not encountered it).  They say that each of us is born
> already guilty of Adams sin, and in need of forgiveness before we have
> had an opportunity to sin ourselves.  This "original sin" can only be
> cleansed by baptism.
> 
> This last doctrine is, in my opinion, completely without biblical
> support.

The Church, as I understand it, teaches that there are two consequences
of the Fall for every human being.  Firstly, there is now a flaw in our
nature which pre-disposes us to sin, in a way in which our first parents
were not.  This is called `concupiscence'.  Concupiscence is not cured
by baptism and confirmation, i.e., by the cleansing of all sin, and the
gift of the Holy Spirit.  Certainly, in our baptism and receiving of the
Holy Spirit, we receive abundant graces of virtue and conversion, which
give us great advantages in our struggle with concupiscence, but it is
certainly not eliminated.

This seems paradoxical.  Why such a monumental event as the Incarnation,
Crucifixion and Resurrection, if concupiscence is not to be eliminated? 
The answer seems to lie in the tremendous change in the human condition
which came about through the sacrifice of Christ - the coming of the
Holy Spirit.  With the coming of the Spirit, human beings are once again
in that intimate relationship with God which characterised the Garden;
we walk with God in the cool of the evening.

We exist in this happy state in spite of personal sin.  Although baptism
washes away all of our personal sins in blood of the Lamb, we have no
sooner cleared the ledger than they begin to accumulate again.  Yet this
can happen (up to a point) without rupturing this relationship with
God.  And even beyond that point, when we are in a condition of grave or
mortal sin, the sacrament of reconciliation is available to restore our
relationship with Him.

How is this possible?  What prevented this relationship between God and
Man?  Why was it not possible, for example, for young children, innocent
of any personal sin, to enter the Holy of Holies?  Why were babies not
regarded as the most holy of human beings, still in intimate
relationship with God, until they began to succumb to the flaw of their
nature?

What prevents this is not concupiscence, but the stain of original sin. 
>From the Catechism of the Catholic Church, para 404.

`...all men are implicated in Adam's sin, as all implicated in Christ's
justice.  Still, the transmission of original sin is a mystery that we
cannot fully understand.  But we do know by Revelation that Adam had
received original holiness and justice not for himself alone, but for
all human nature.  By yielding to the tempter, Adam and Eve committed a
_personal sin_, but this sin affected the _human nature_ that they would
then transmit _in a fallen state_.  It is a sin which will be
transmitted by propagation to all mankind, that is, by the transmission
of a human nature deprived of original holiness and justice.  And that
is why original sin is called "sin" only in an analogical sense: it is a
sin "contracted" and not "committed" - a state and not an act.'

It is the restoration of this holiness by the grace of Christ that
enables the re-establishment of our intimacy with God, in spite of our
remaining concupiscence.

The foregoing is my own reading, by the way.  The Catechism is on-line
for those who want read exactly what the Church says.
 Part One, Paragraph 7.
The Fall, paras 385-421.  (Paragraph 7 refers to a paragraph of the
Creed.)

As in so many of the points of contention between the Catholic Church
and Protestants, the doctrine which is "completely without Biblical
support" turns out to be the development of the logical consequences of
the Church's understanding of the Biblical record.  The Church also
relies on its Tradition as a second, and equally important, form of
Divine Revelation, but that is not the issue here.  The question is
simply: is the doctrine of original sin a logical and consistent
development of what we have from the Bible?

Yours faithfully,
-- 
 __ /__   Peter B. West         Looking for work...
   /     http://www.uq.net.au/~zzpwest       See C.V. on my home page.
  /     "Lord, to whom shall we go?"