{
  "export": {
    "source": "https://urth.darkrealm.vip/thread/urth/3183",
    "note": "Exported from an unofficial mirror of a public mailing list. Copyright in each message remains with the person who wrote it.  Email addresses are obscured as `user at host`, the form the original archive published. This file was rebuilt from parsed fields rather than retained headers, so it is faithful in content but not byte-exact.",
    "addresses": "obscured as 'user at host'"
  },
  "archive": "urth",
  "thread": {
    "id": 3183,
    "subject": "catholic acceptance of genesis",
    "messages": 2,
    "voices": 2,
    "first": "2002-04-20T16:09:13+00:00",
    "last": "2002-04-22T16:31:25+00:00"
  },
  "messages": [
    {
      "message_id": "<urth-v0204-726@digest.urth.net>",
      "from": {
        "name": "maa32",
        "address": "maa32 at dana.ucc.nau.edu"
      },
      "date": "2002-04-20T16:09:13+00:00",
      "subject": "(urth) catholic acceptance of genesis",
      "in_reply_to": null,
      "reply_link": null,
      "blocks": [
        {
          "kind": "text",
          "depth": 0,
          "text": "A few things I wanted to say that are probably already obvious.  One of them \nis that the Severian's parallels with Christ are painfully painfully obvious, \nbut the one miracle that can't be rationally explained by the power over time \nthat the other miracles of Severian can be explained by (except in UoTNS) \noccurs when the water changes to wine at the beginning of Claw.  What is going \non here?  Bringing people back to life can be seen as a reversal of time in a \nlocalized area, certainly a power that the hierodules might be able to grant \ntheir servant.  However, that is so explicitly different it seems to be \ntransmutation rather than transtemporality. Later in Urth, the return of the \nchild's limb to normal seems to smack of transmutation as well, but I always \nassumed it was a return to life of the reproducing and developing cells that \nhad failed to be completed.  Or is he creating new matter? I think there is a \nbig difference between creating matter and controlling time, and an imitator \nof Christ is not likely to have either of those capabilities (from my \nexperience). Of course, since Gene says Severian is imitating Christ, well \nthen, I guess that's the interpretation we have to go with.\n\nAlso, from a Catholic perspective, I don't think the presence of the rainbow \nis important to Urth of the New Sun's flood.  It is merely a symbol - there is \nthe idea that the first 11 chapters of Genesis or so are simply a story that \nhelps justify the ways of God to man in a a primitive fashion that primitive \nman could understand; its literal truth is not as important as its functional \ntruth.  I think this is pretty well accepted by Catholics, who insist that \ndivinely inspired does not equal literal truth, but rather symbolic \nexplanation, or something like that.  I think the Pope's statement that \n\"evolution might be more than a theory\" certainly tends to undermine a strict \nCatholic adherence to the literal nature of scripture.  (And I think a \nscientist who works with the textbook definition of \"theory\" might get an \nimmense kick out of the Pope's statement).\n\nMarc Aramini"
        }
      ]
    },
    {
      "message_id": "<urth-v0204-751@digest.urth.net>",
      "from": {
        "name": "Dan'l Danehy-Oakes",
        "address": "ddanehy at siebel.com"
      },
      "date": "2002-04-22T16:31:25+00:00",
      "subject": "RE: (urth) catholic acceptance of genesis",
      "in_reply_to": "<urth-v0204-726@digest.urth.net>",
      "reply_link": "subject",
      "blocks": [
        {
          "kind": "quote",
          "depth": 1,
          "text": "Marc: a few gentle semantic corrections ... You wrote:\nAlso, from a Catholic perspective, I don't think the presence of the\nrainbow  is important to Urth of the New Sun's flood.  It is merely a\nsymbol - there is  the idea that the first 11 chapters of Genesis or\nso are simply a story that helps justify the ways of God to man in a\na primitive fashion that primitive man could understand; its literal\ntruth is not as important as its functional truth.  "
        },
        {
          "kind": "text",
          "depth": 0,
          "text": "First, I would say that, for a Catholic, the entire Bible is literally\n_true._ However, it is not necessary _factual_. This is functionally\nequivalent to what I believe you are trying to say, but a more useful\nway of making the distinction.\n\nSecond, never say \"merely a symbol\" wrt Catholicism; the whole \nCatholic practice is based on symbols that actually implement the \nreality they symbolize, a/k/a \"sacraments,\" symbols of grace which\nactually serve as vessels of the grace which they symbolize.\n\nSymbols are not, to a Catholic, \"mere.\"\n\nYours for semantic hygiene, "
        }
      ]
    }
  ]
}