Catholics & Inerrancy

I don’t see how this resolves the issue. If one is going to invoke poor signal strength in the message, then either Jesus also had the same issue or should have clarified that previous writers got things wrong. If the writers can get a flawed message then the idea of blindly following their writings is horrific.

I cannot begin to wrap my head around what thought process it takes for someone to believe that a God can be made flesh, speak to his followers and not have an obligation to point out where writings are in error, misleading, or deceptive. Certainly an omniscient being would have to know how those writings would be misused over the centuries, to not speak up on the matter if they are in actuality in error, misleading, or deceptive would make such a being culpable and a party to later atrocities.

So all the rest of the moral teachings of the Bible are suspect? Which just seems to bring everything back to if the Bible can be wrong in complete swatches of text, where is the justification for viewing it as nothing more than the work of tribal myth. Where is the authority?

If the testable portions of the Bible fail spectacularly, then what new tests are available once you opt into your view of the Bible? If no new tests are available, then how is what you say any different than wishful thinking?

When a believer uses the Bible to make a point based on the Bible they’re using the Bible in an authoritative way. When I asked where is the authority, I am asking that given we know that parts of the Bible are incorrect then by what objective metric can be used to determine what is any parts are correct. If the writers were wrong about so much of what they wrote, why should anyone believe they were correct about any of their incredible statements?

I don’t recall using ‘law’. ‘Road map’ sounds suspiciously close to ‘following a prescribed path’. Perhaps you wish to expand on the differences you see between the two terms? Is it your position that when the writers of the Bible go beyond the above they’re simply offering opinions? If so, how does opinion become a ‘map’?

Which I think is obvious by the inability of so-called followers to reliably convey the so-called messages. But that puts us back to why follow the book if the message is corrupted? It also raises the problem of either Christ had uncorrupted information or why trust Christ’s messages? Couldn’t someone just as easily point to all the problems of ‘love of God’ to show the opposite?If as people claim here that there is much that is incorrect in the Bible, then it would seem fair to raise ‘signal to noise ratio’. The Bible also contains pertinent lessons for we certainly should not follow. I’m confused, are you saying it makes more sense if you remove Jesus, or perhaps you’re saying if you remove an anthropomorphic God, or something else?

When I use authoritative I mean in the sense of, because the Bible says so. The Bible is often used as an authority on topics. Even those who grant the Bible may not be inerrant often site it as a reference for moral authority. ‘Love your neighbor’ isn’t really a lengthy laundry list of morals. The writers of the new testament give additional moral teachings. If the Bible is not inerrant why should anyone believe that the Bible writers are passing along a message from God, rather than their own beliefs?

That post was not a comment specifically about the Bible (though it would encompass the writers of the Bible if we assume they're no better connected than currented followers). Dogmafood suggested that God might find it difficult to communicate with his followers.A problem with this line of thought is clearly that God’s current followers fare poorly in communicating a consensus of messages by any reasonable objective standard. So either the communication is incredibly rare, or the current communication is incredibly flawed. If God’s message is this poorly discerned then it seems to me silly for anyone to say that they actually know God’s message. If the Bible is demonstratively errant and if modern followers cannot demonstrate they are actually in communication with God, then it seems frankly evil to claim what God wants.

So ignore inconsistencies as a problem by saying they’re not the important parts, but that agreement is proof of the miraculous? Why not believe all the stories of which there is but one account? Since they cannot be inconsistent with their own telling? Can you clarify this? How can we know which parts are right and which are wrong?

What I am saying is that it seems objectively correct that that there is no message or that there is no objective way to ferret out which messages or of God. This being the case there is no discernable way to determine between a flawed Bible inspired by God and a flawed Bible which is not inspired by God. But yet that is exactly what we’re told he does do. Miracles to some and not others. Grace to some and not others. Messengers to some and not others. Born in Christian countries to some and not for others.