One more thing before I hit the hay (gee, once you start, it's hard to stop).

How can we know that Trinitarian Divine Reality unless our sins are dealt with and taken away. Without Holiness no man can see the Father. 1 John 2:1-5 is pretty clear on this too. Therefore the main purpose of Christ's sacrifice is to remove the "curse" of sin, and only by doing so can we enter into the identification and knowledge you describe.

I'll certainly consider your posts more fully but I think our differences are rooted in our approach to scripture. I adhere pretty strictly to the word and I see that you come from a tradition/thought process (whatever) that diverges somewhat. No matter.

Be assured, despite my insistance on divine judgement etc, my experience of God's love and the bliss I feel in His fatherly presence is no less powerful for that.

Now, if I can drag myself away from the computer zzzzzzz.

It's a fine line between a toxic religion and a healthier form, and it seems to me much as a tightrope walk where I could, and sometimes do fall off on one side or the other. I've gone back and forth alot and am still earnestly seeking some middle ground which might be comfortable for myself and others.

I went to Doctor Karl Menninger's fine classic from 1970, What Ever Became of Sin? The word was alrady passing from our vocabulary, and
the good doctor noted that no president had made mention of national sin and the need for collective repentance since 1953. Eisenhower had quoted Lincoln, our most theological president.
Can you imagine the reaction if George Bush were to suggest a national day of repentance? Reagan instituted a national day of prayer and the churches did fill up for a few months after 9/11.

There is a long history of toxic religion in
the American culture, from Puritanism to Jansenism
and w.c. has pointed out the damaging psychological effects, as the Founder of the Christian faith did so poignantly.

All the way over on the other side we have this long tradition of attempts to deal with the problem, from Mary Baker Eddy to Neale Donald Walsch, from Norman Vincent Peale to Doctor Robert
Schuller and from Emmet Fox to Matthew Fox.

Dealing with fear as the most basic element seems to achieve a good result, and is shared by twelve step programs, psychology and The Course in Miracles varieties of "spiritual psychotherapy"

What exactly is sin and is it the fear which leads to sin or does sin lead to fear? What is the human condition? What is sin? Individual and collective,
societal and personal, religious and secular? Is the bible a second rate source of answers fron an ancient culture or a message of love and the answer to how we deal with sin and fear?

caritas,

mm <*)))))><

I just think we're in danger of sanitising the gospel in accordance with liberal trends in society. I don't in any way advocate a return to Puritanism or have any interest in the fundamentalism prevalent in American Christianity. I simply maintain, in accordance with the Psalmist, in accordance with Christ Himself, that God's law is eternal and shall never pass away.

Stephen and Michael:

I certainly don't want to fall into some kind of exchange like what may be more appropriate on some other threads. On this one, we've entered an area where each gropes with the most cherished interpersonal concerns, and persuasion, to me, can quickly become pretty heavy handed . . . I know, I've been guilty of it a few times, at least. Of course, political topics usually find interpersonal concerns embedded pretty deeply, hence the intensity. But here a spirit of exploring is probably the only respect, as we're dealing both with mystery too deep to penetrate with the mind, and our spiritual paths. I think we're o.k. so far . . . how to you both feel about it?

Good exchanges. . . and keep going. Part of what you're doing is recognizing different ways of understanding what Christ accomplished through his death, descent and resurrection. I've shared something on this topic at length in the Christian Mysteries series; you can link to it through its forum. We are reflecting on deep mysteries here, so I think there are many ways to approach and understand them.

I'll jump in on one point, and that concerns the idea of God and feelings. Granted the anthropomorphic dangers involved . . . nevertheless, I do believe there is a feeling dimension in God. I think that maybe the reason we feel is because, as images of God, God feels. Process theologians have reflected on this deeply and have explored the idea that God feels deeply what is going on in creation . . . grieves injustice, is angry with oppression, etc. We see all this going on in Jesus and it's hard to pass it off as only the human part of his nature responding. Something of divine delight, compassion, frustration and sadness breaks through at times as well. Recalling that in Christianity, we believe God is like Jesus rather than the other way around, I think we have a strong basis for believing in a feeling God. Mystics from other traditions -- like Paramahamsa Yogananda -- have affirmed the same based on their own experience.

What I don't believe about the feeling God is that this connotes the kind of judgmentalism that we generally move into with our emotional reactions. God can be disappointed, for example, without being rejecting, or even angry without closing off the relationship. I think there are times when God communicates His feeling to us to provoke a feeling response in us; Jesus does this all throughout the Gospels.

When the Scriptures speak of the wrath of God, then, I think it's referring to perceptions we come to based on projections out of our fear and shame, but there could also be something coming from God as well. God most unapologetically hates sin; Scripture is clear on this. So what would happen if, through empathic absorption, Christ became sin, as 2 Cor. maintains? (See the Christian Mysteries slides). How would God look upon such a victim? Surely, God wouldn't be completely duped into forgetting who is bearing the sin, and why . . . hence, the eventuality of the resurrection. Something to ponder . . . and wonder over . . .

"So what would happen if, through empathic absorption, Christ became sin, as 2 Cor. maintains? (See the Christian Mysteries slides). How would God look upon such a victim? Surely, God wouldn't be completely duped into forgetting who is bearing the sin, and why . . . hence, the eventuality of the resurrection."

Hence grace penetrates the darkness completely, knows it thoroughly, and as Christ becomes separation (my view of original sin), the breach is healed, since Christ's light is everlasting and merged with His perfect human will in death.

And so, for me, Pride, if we conceive of this as the basis of original sin in the traditional way, is a conflict between the fear of separation and the impetus for individuation; this seems to be one interpretation of the Garden story. Christ's life answers the dilemma: how to individuate, i.e, take up our own cross, and return to God.

Amen and on the same note...

http://www.americancatholic.or...er/aug2002/Bible.asp

Man made interperetations can fall short and the Father Heart of God is beyond imagination.

As Art Linkletter said, "Kids say the darndest things." I read a story today about a 2 1/2 year old who met her grandfather for the first time and looked up at him and said, "Be gentle."

"Be gentle with what?"

"With yourself."

caritas,

mm <*))))))><

w.c.

It occured to me last night in my dreams that, without retracting anything I've said, I should really be sharing in the joy you feel in finding God as Abba. It is a truly wonderful relationship.
He is a Father to the fatherless!

I also see God as the Most High, the Lord of Hosts, the Ruler of heaven and earth and find that the various aspects of His Person revealed in these terms are equally thrilling and open up relational possibilities that are quite awesome. Christ's sacrifice gives us entrance into the divine court, into the heavenlies where God reigns in glorious majesty.(I love Daniel's vision of the heavenly court). Perhaps part of my insistance on God as judge relates to the sovereign authority I find He exercises there.

I'm reading a novel called "The Child in Time" by Ian McEwan, a wonderful English prose writer, about a father whose child is stolen from right under His nose. It led me to think about the joy in heaven whenever one of the lost ones is found. I think the Father takes delight in your finding Him.

w.c.

What then is your view of the Father's role at Calvary? I refer again to Isaiah 53:10,

"It pleased the Lord to bruise Him; He has put Him to grief."

And to Psalm 22,

"My God, my God, why have you forsaken me? Why are You so far from helping?"

From these and more I see the Father taking an active role in the sufferings of Christ, a deliberate withdrawal of His presence, a deliberate paining of Christ which amounts to judgement for the sin He became. Ofcourse, He is not duped into forgetting who He was, but, in as much as it was the Father's will, scripture indicates that it was the Lord who put Him to death.

from w.c.: Hence grace penetrates the darkness completely, knows it thoroughly, and as Christ becomes separation (my view of original sin), the breach is healed, since Christ's light is everlasting and merged with His perfect human will in death.

Yes! It is the Father's rejection of sin that leads him to experience alienation from the Father and go the way of all sinners him to Sheol -- i.e., the realm of the separated. And way deep down in that realm of darkness, the Light of his inseparable bond with the Father finally shines forth, opening the way through this metaphysical cul-de-sac. From thence he can rise to new life, and sinners with him.

from Stephen: From these and more I see the Father taking an active role in the sufferings of Christ, a deliberate withdrawal of His presence, a deliberate paining of Christ which amounts to judgement for the sin He became. Ofcourse, He is not duped into forgetting who He was, but, in as much as it was the Father's will, scripture indicates that it was the Lord who put Him to death.

Does my pgh above seem faithful to this understanding, even if it doesn't emphasize a punitive motive?

I'm not really hearing a major conflict in views between w.c. and Stephen here, fwiw. Stephen seems to be emphasizing the Father's rejection of sin as consistent with God's purity and justice; w.c. seems to be attuned to the goodness of Abba, Jesus' trust in Abba, and psycho-spiritual dynamics unfolding during this time.

Christ's crucifixion is a great, muti-faceted mystery, opening us to many levels of revelation and meaning, I believe. I tried to explore several in my book, Jesus on the Cross: Why? and have since come to appreciate several new angles.

It's wonderful to think of the resurrection as "the Light of His inseparable bond with the father" shining forth. Equally to think of it as the triumph of Christ's moral glory over the sin that He took on.

Mirroring MM's reflection, is separation from God the same as original sin or does original sin lead to separation from God? My view tends to drift towards the latter based on the formula that disobedience leads to alienation. The opposite, alienation leading to disobedience, is impossible because God loves us. Therefore sin is an act of will, an act of disobedience, a rebellion. There doesn't seem to me to be any other explanation for separation that precludes God abandoning us. It's like: Free will - disobedience - sin - separation. Original sin isn't being separate, it is the choice to be separate.

As for any argument for or against a God who punishes His children, I throw in this quote from "The Child in Time":

"There (is) no richer field for speculation assertively dressed as fact than childcare."

I guess my cover is blown here a little bit, since I tend to think of Adam and Eve's disobedience as simply playing out the design of creation, as a story about individuation, its perils, and the need for the Cross so that individuation and union with God are fulfilled. Of course, they had a choice, but it was/is the choice of the child not yet matured, who rebels against the control of the parent and finds a scary and undpredicatable world awaiting him, who turns back to God, but never before again in the naivete of not knowing he is naked. This is just like a child losing his narcissistic power, his entitlement of being served at all times, and now must grow up to serve, to till the field himself.

I know this is much more a psychological interpretation than a classical theological one, but the struggle to know what original sin is, which nobody seems subjectively at ease with, may stem from just what surrender to God can mean:

Surrender to God as abdication of the will due to shame, or surrender to God as consent of the will via intuition of being. Catholic theologians locate original sin, and any subsequent sin, in the will. But in terms of the bigger picture, sin is as integral to knowledge of Christ as His own revelation. I view sin as part of this revelation: the human tendency to seek consciousness (pleasure, escape from death) outside its uncreated Source. Sin is the way of the creature, and so for me it's more an opening to the plan of Grace since before time than a monstrous substance unto itself; it is darkness, but only as a lack of light. Otherwise, most people turn the notion into essential depravity of the human soul.

"What then is your view of the Father's role at Calvary? I refer again to Isaiah 53:10,

"It pleased the Lord to bruise Him; He has put Him to grief."

And to Psalm 22,

"My God, my God, why have you forsaken me? Why are You so far from helping?"

God is always seeing the bigger picture, and only doing what His Son wills. Jesus didn't have to suffer. He could have stepped aside from the Cross, hence the drama of the Garden (the second Garden, which Adam and Eve couldn't bear in their undifferentiated wills, IMO).


"From these and more I see the Father taking an active role in the sufferings of Christ, a deliberate withdrawal of His presence, a deliberate paining of Christ which amounts to judgement for the sin He became. Ofcourse, He is not duped into forgetting who He was, but, in as much as it was the Father's will, scripture indicates that it was the Lord who put Him to death."

Again, it was Jesus' choice to know the fullness of human suffering, which includes the experience many of us have had in despair, when there seems to be no light at all. Jesus' lament is man's lament, and this was/is His deep connection to us. He suffered sin (consciousness without God), but was the Uncreated God Himself, who exists both within and outside time, and so God's turning away was the only way Christ, His Unbegotten, could know man's sense of separation. Jesus' will couldn't turn away from God, so God did only what He could do to bring the Godhead into full identification with its creation.

quote:

I guess my cover is blown here a little bit, since I tend to think of Adam and Eve's disobedience as simply playing out the design of creation, as a story about individuation, its perils, and the need for the Cross so that individuation and union with God are fulfilled. Of course, they had a choice, but it was/is the choice of the child not yet matured, who rebels against the control of the parent and finds a scary and undpredicatable world awaiting him, who turns back to God, but never before again in the naivete of not knowing he is naked. This is just like a child losing his narcissistic power, his entitlement of being served at all times, and now must grow up to serve, to till the field himself.

w.c., as you probably know, the Jungians have made this point for some time, and the process philsophers have said something similar. Problem is (in terms of the Judeo-Christian tradition), the condition in which the first parents existed (as taught in traditional theology) was one in which ongoing growth in individuation, culture, etc. was also possible, and in a context of a state of natural beatitude. It's quite possible that God always planned to send the Christ, but to "upgrade" human consciousness yet another step when the time was right. After the fall, the mission became one of redemption and upgrading.

I know I'm often pointing to essays by Jim Arraj, but this one is superb in exploring different models that have been proposed in recent decades. As you'll see none of them adequately account for the reality of sin and evil quite so well as the traditional one. It's a thoroughly researched essay and worth inching through. I'll share his fantasy of human beginnings and original sin below:

I like to imagine a small band of hominids living somewhere in Africa some 50,000 years ago. These hominids, anatomically like modern humans, were much more intelligent than we might expect. They could make a variety of tools, had tamed fire, engaged in communal hunting, had a rudimentary type of communication, and so forth. They stood at the very threshold that separates true human beings from even the most intelligent hominids.

Then two children were born to this band, children who were the first true humans because God gave them spiritual souls. They would have been nurtured by their hominid parents, and would have learned the quasi-culture of the band, but they were truly different. In the depths of their spiritual souls flashed creative intuitions that lay at the roots of abstract language, art, innovative technology, and genuine self-consciousness and freedom, and an awareness of God. As these children grew, they soon outpaced their parents and were drawn to each other. They instinctively recognized each other as different from the rest of the band. They could look into each other�s eyes and see true self-awareness.

As their intuitions began to flower, they realized that they were being called by God to build a human community that would dwell in God�s presence. This calling could have taken place in the depths of their hearts without necessarily being accompanied by elaborate conscious conceptualizations. But they rejected this calling, and freely and knowingly turned away from God. They frustrated in its tenderest beginnings the role they were meant to play in transmitting both nature and grace to their descendants.

The conclusion of Experiment 3. The demise of the doctrine of original sin has been greatly exaggerated. Neither the sciences of nature nor historical criticism have demonstrated fundamental flaws in it. What has happened is that the sciences have created an atmosphere in which theologians felt compelled to reevaluate the doctrine of original sin, and so they often put aside the traditional formulations, but failed to come up with new ones that would truly express what is at its heart.

In the mystical path, we have to give up all our own knowledge, since God cannot be known via our own faculties. Adam and Eve set out on the path of individuation, where the will is eventually understood as belonging to God through Christ, leading to mystical knowledge/surrender. But it is a path with a process, and so we are all exiled from the Paradise of our infancy, and try again and again to return through knowledge, which was the beginning of individuation/separaton itself. We can't return to this innocense, but must mature, and this is, for me, one message of the Cross for creatures. We die to our knowledge over and over again, and in all other respects, which John of the Cross teaches us in his poetry.

Just a thought that occured:

Original sin may be God's grief for His humans not knowing His love, and hence the need for the incarnation. IOW, God knew that a creature capable of knowing him would also choose to utilize this knowing capacity in all ways possible, which included separation from Him. I don't see God despising man for this, but turning it into a new path through Christ i.e, the tree of everlasting life. Knowledge outside of being known by God is death, the separation of the creature from its Source, and this limited capacity is partly what brings us to the mystical path, since our wills are never satisfied with even our highest knowledge.

"God is always seeing the bigger picture, and only doing what His Son wills. Jesus didn't have to suffer. He could have stepped aside from the Cross, hence the drama of the Garden (the second Garden, which Adam and Eve couldn't bear in their undifferentiated wills, IMO)."

What then of Christ's plea: "Nevetheless not my will but thine be done" - a complete surrendering of His will to God's, and "If it is possible, let this cup pass from me" - Christ, in His despair, wishing the cross away but knowing that it is His purpose, knowing that it is impossible for the cross not to figure in His life?

Also, "God (doing) only what He could" to bring humanity to Him doesn't fully account for the depth of suffering that Christ went through and the Father's role and responsibility for that suffering.

Personally I find it impossible to talk about all this in terms of individuation and other psychotherapeutic concepts. Its just so far removed from what I see to be going on, too much of a twist on the theological approach which, I think, fully illuminates the Christian faith.

By the way, perhaps the Adam and Eve story represents a period of innocence and communion with God in early human experience, lasting for however long, until such time as disobedience crept in thus inducing the fall that spread to the whole of humanity.

"What then of Christ's plea: "Nevetheless not my will but thine be done" - a complete surrendering of His will to God's, and "If it is possible, let this cup pass from me" - Christ, in His despair, wishing the cross away but knowing that it is His purpose, knowing that it is impossible for the cross not to figure in His life?"

This is what I mean by abdication of will due to shame versus surrender/consent of will via intuition of being. Jesus' complete surrender was still His to give at all times, not automated by God the Father. Without a will of His own to contend with, the statement "Not my will but Your will be done" would never have arose. The same with "If possible, let this cup pass from me." In His humanity He certainly didn't want to suffer torture He knew awaited Him, and yet He not only knew His purpose, but His union with Father, which fortified his human will to make the full consent. Simply intellectually knowing the purpose of the tragic event probably couldn't have sustained Him alone. Moreover, His supernatural powers could have enabled Him to ease His suffering at any time, and yet it seems he surrendered these as well.

And so Jesus could have sinned, or His life and redemptive action would have been pointless, or impossible ontologically. All along the way it was a question of his consenting to God, and not without a struggle. Catholic theologians don't locate sin in the emotions or the intellect, but in the will. And so Jesus' suffering was about His free will being offered over and over again to the Father for the sake of the world.

Once again overwhelmed and speachless. Phil, I appreciate you bringing Arraj back into it over and over again, as being rather thick and slow requires continual return to meditation on these truths and mysteries. Jung said that the Mass could penetrate the unconscious through it's many repetitions of the mysteries.

As far as sin residing in the will rather than the emotions or intellect, this is confirmed over and over again in my experience and through observing others. When the will lines up with God,
emotions and intellect and physical health tend to follow.

-------------------------------------------------

Off an a little tangent, Menninger describes
our current criminal justice system in the Whatever Became of Sin? book. 90% of these individuals are not violent. They make no contribution while warehoused in this manner and it is extremely expensive and wasteful in human and financial terms. Only China has more people locked up.

Menninger says that this state of affairs resulted from turning "sins" into "crimes" and seeking to punish rather than rehabilitate.
How would you imagine God feels about all these stinky, abusive social leper colonies?

caritas,

mm <*))))><

Glad you enjoyed the Arraj quote, Michael. He's razor sharp on this one, I believe.

from Stephen: By the way, perhaps the Adam and Eve story represents a period of innocence and communion with God in early human experience, lasting for however long, until such time as disobedience crept in thus inducing the fall that spread to the whole of humanity.

Ditto. See my post above, Stephen. I think we're saying the same thing.

A complete surrendering of His will to the Fathers would mean that His will would be in perfect alignment with the Fathers and since the Fathers will is perfect then Christ's will is perfect making it impossible for Him to sin.

w.c. you don't make sense to me. You say the Father was only doing the Son's will, then you seem to contradict that by talking about Christ surrendering His will. If you're not tangled up in knots then I certainly am. I don't see how Christ's life and redemptive action would be pointless unless He could have sinned. Where do you get that from?

I really don't want to go down that road. There are certain issues that are fixed in stone and one of them is Christ's sinlessness. Best if I drop out here. Suffice to say He could only have borne the guilt of the whole world if He was unaffected by it through sinless perfection and a nature that was free of the possiblity. If Christ is God, how can God sin, that's impossible. Simple as that.

Here's my take on the subject, Stephen, and I'll then leave it alone, unless you post on the subject again:

Jesus had free will, no less than any other human being. His intellect was more endowed, clearly, allowing Him to know His Divine/Human Nature, and this surely must have helped Him consent to His Father. Nevertheless, scripture seems to suggest he learned, discovered the fullness of His Divine/Human Nature over time and through experience. But even if he had a clear understanding of His identity from the start, He still exercised His will like other human beings did. We see this in His struggle with Satan in the desert temptations. He was tempted, implying free will and the need to choose.

To have a free will is to have the capacity to sin. "Surrender" is a verb, a process coupled with intellectual, emotional and mystical knowing, and so Jesus consenting to the Father's will was also the Father responding to Him, as the second person of the Trinity. Both seem equally true to me.

The mystery we're wrangling over is one that theologians have debated from the start. What I'm familiar with is that Jesus was both God and man, with attributes and capacities common to both natures. I agree with you that Jesus was sinless, but His being fully human gave him freedom of choice. If Jesus didn't have the freedom to choose, He couldn't have known human suffering so fully, and this is why He was the second Adam, knowing human guilt intellectually and emotionally but without a fallen will.

The issue of Jesus being able to sin is one that's been debated through the centuries. I'll post a few links that go over both sides of the issue:

http://www.biblehelp.org/jesussin.htm
"I believe that when Jesus was tempted He had a real choice in His response. I believe that when He was tempted, He felt the same frustrations and pressures that we do. I believe He had a realistic choice to yield to His temptation. I believe that the temptations Jesus faced had the same potential of being overwhelming as they are to us. I believe that as a result, He could say to us, "I know what you are feeling; I went through the same thing."

http://www.keyway.ca/htm2000/20000527.htm
"The 'temptation of Christ' was not a farce - it was for real. Satan didn't try to get Jesus to sin because he knew that it wasn't possible, but because he knew that it was possible. The Messiah was tempted, truly tempted, but did not sin. He did for us what we cannot do for ourselves."

http://www.letusreason.org/Doct3.htm
"Could Jesus have sinned in his humanity while being God in the flesh. We need to understand that he was one person. If his humanity was separate it could have willed to do just as Adam did. While He had the choice to sin He did not have the ability. The humanity of Christ could never be separate from or unsupported from His deity. With Adam there was only one nature with Christ he was supported by and anointed by deity as the Son of God."

http://www.garnertedarmstrong..../could_jesus_sin.htm
"Christ was tempted. Therefore, He experienced desire in many directions, which, if He had followed those temptations to their ultimate conclusion in either thought or deed, He would have committed sin! But He overcame each temptation as it occurred! Did He do so easily, like a champion weightlifter, picking up a mere 20 pound weight?

"No, the Bible shows Christ had to WRESTLE with His own inclinations, that He had to STRUGGLE to overcome temptation!"

- and many other links - (do a google search for "Could Jesus have sinned")

-------

I see the pros and cons of both sides of the arguments, but I think the point about him being one person with two natures means that it would have been impossible for him to have sinned, as the divine nature that was an integral part of his personhood negated that possibility. Nevertheless, I think he fully experienced what it was like to be tempted--the feelings and pull were real, although in a man lacking the sinful inclinations that the rest of us are born with, and a divine nature that could not sin. He also experienced the full consequences of sin on the cross and so has the deepest personal understanding of sin that any human has ever known. The Bible makes it clear that Jesus knows the human condition completely, but that in him, we have a rock/bulwark against sin because he is divine.

Fwiw, I don't think those who argue that Christ could have sinned are detracting from what he has won for us. There's a sense in which his victory can be regarded as all the greater for having chosen as Adam did not. I don't know that this view is seriously heretical -- certainly not in spirit.

Phil:

It is actually easier, in one sense, to see Jesus in the way you describe, unless we imagine that His will was so infused with intimate awareness of the Father via His Divine Nature that its natural inclination, coupled with a human nature not fallen, would be surrender to what He knew most naturally. Whereas we, like Adam, are naturally inclined to separate our awareness from God just in the process of human development. This much is certainly our nature. And so Jesus' human nature during his human development was continually drawn into His Divine Nature as the primary influence in His choices. And so, at least at this point, I still see Jesus as having been capable of sinning, but without the inclination that we have. His Divine Nature wouldn't have negated the possibility of sin (His unfallen human nature still allowed this possibility), but generated an inclination to continual consent to the Father.

Could you nuance this a bit?

And my real concern is with how we view, and treat, ourselves via whatever understanding of Jesus we have. There is danger of a real heavy-handedness in seeing Him as incapable of having sinned. We could simply say He stands in for us, yet this often leads to our own perfectionism, rather than to humility. IOW, while we admit we sin, we have little contact with the humanity of Christ, who was so at home with "sinners," especially those who knew they had clay feet. He didn't like to see people shaming themselves, or trying to be perfect out of self-loathing, as was clearly the case with many of the religious of His day.

From all of this, so far, I get a clearer sense of how original sin is located in the will, the intention to be separate from God, which occurs just in our being born. And human development, which is development of our fallen nature, is naturally inclined to individuation. Yet who would say that individuation is a bad thing? as its malformation brings out some of the most destructive tendencies in our fallen nature. So the most maturely developed human being would have an increased sensitivity to fallenness, an awareness of his/her limited ability to live compassionately. The mistake would be to disengage from the individuating process out of some premature sense of spiritual obligation, rather than let it emerge from the growing awareness of one's existential crisis.