The success of this hoax is largely due to its appeal to the consumer mindset that governs the Western way of thinking. As it seems quite widespread, I thought I might cast some light on the issues mentioned.
The Third Vatican Council ...
There is no such council.
We must recognize that religious truth evolves and changes.
In the Great Traditions, 'religious truth' neither evolves nor changes. Authentic 'religious truth' is founded in the Absolute, in that which transcends the personal narrative.
The idea that religions 'evolve' is founded on a fundamental failure to comprehend what religion is, or indeed what truth is. In the Philosophical relativism of the West, it has long been recognised that 'truth' increasingly takes second place to personal narrative — there is no truth as such, there are only those truths that are true because I choose to accept them as such.
The same error assumes God likewise 'grows' or 'evolves', it assumes God as an extension of the physical world, that God is subject to space and time and thereby contingency. Its an anthropomorphic projection, as such a God is and can only be the exemplar of how one conceives oneself.
Truth is not absolute or set in stone.
Again, truth is treated as a product.
The church no longer believes in a literal hell where people suffer.
I think the Church believes, and Pope Francis himself has stated his own belief, in hell. Whether the author understands what Catholicism understands is dubious.
The consumer desire is for a God who 'evolves' to meet and match the world, that is a God who changes to accommodate me. The appeal of such a God is obvious.
The moral dimension is utterly missing, but then 'morality' is at best a dubious concept in marketing. Moral values are determined largely by the profit margin.
It's not so much an evolution as a repackaging, or a rebranding. The majority of the US denominations are founded on and shaped by commercial interest: the broader the popular appeal, the more successful the product. For the broadest popular appeal, you want a God that rewards the most, for the least effort.
The God of the consumer is basically a projection of a personal exemplar. I could be as good as God if I so chose, but I'm not, but that's OK because God accepts me as I am.
This doctrine is incompatible with the infinite love of God.
No it's not. It's just that the doctrine of justice is incompatible with consumerism.
The above would assume it's OK to rape, pillage, murder, etc., because the infinite compassion of God will forgive, which is patently nonsense, and patently self-serving. It's a version of God with the greatest consumer appeal.
In a wider context, it's OK for high-cost consumer cultures to thrive at the expense of the rest of the world, because we make cars and burgers and personal computers available in return. It's not my fault if you can't afford them.
Then, you make 'giving' worthwhile because there is a benefit to me — I feel good about myself, and God loves me.
God is not a judge but a friend and a lover of humanity
Who says a judge cannot be a friend or lover?
Again, a rampantly self-serving notion: "If you really love me, you'd accept me for what I am" — therefore God has to change to accommodate me, not the other way round.
Like the fable of Adam and Eve, we see hell as a literary device.
The trouble is that people assume 'a literary device' is not worthy of serious contemplation. It's a literary device, therefore it is not true, that which is alluded to is a fantasia rather than something comprehended by the transcending intellect.
Because the material mind can only perceive the material as possessing any reality, and any value ... the material is validated by its very materiality. This is one of the reasons for the lack or failure of moral insight, the material mind operates entirely pragmatically.
What is missed by the material mindset is the very thing the metaphor alludes to. The function of the metaphor (like that of the myth, the parable, the analogy) transcends the material, were that not the case then metaphor would not be necessary and its object would possess a comprehensible materiality.
The contemplation of the metaphor is not not merely an intellectual exercise, and its fruit is not a clever insight into human nature.
The function of the metaphor is akin to a koan. But then the materialist purchases a book of 'solutions' to the koans, as if knowing the answer is the point. As if by parroting the answer, they are illumined.
Hell is merely a metaphor for the isolated soul...
Here the assumption that a metaphor possesses no intrinsic value.
... which like all souls ultimately will be united in love with God
Ah, the Credo of the Materialist: Nothing really matters, because I get the Reward in the end. The Mantra of the Materialist is: "Gimme"
God is changing and evolving as we are
Again, the anthropomorphic God which is simply 'my ideal me'.
For God lives in us and in our hearts.
God is that what we want that we as yet have not got.
When we spread love and kindness in the world, we touch our own divinity and recognize it.
'That's why we do it ... not for your sake, but for mine.'
Again, rampant self-serving materialism in which everything is reduced to the pragmatic. There is no such thing as altruism in this world, man is incapable of selfless good, everyone has an agenda.
The Bible is a beautiful holy book, but like all great and ancient works, some passages are outdated.
Yes, it needs to be repacked for the spiritual tourist ... and it needs to get rid of the bits I don't like, or doesn't understand my situation ...
