Why did the RLDS start giving the priesthood to women? There is a common belief amongst mainstream LDS that the reason the Community of Christ (formerly the Reorganized Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints) started ordaining women with the priesthood is because they ran out of male descendants from Joseph Smith to lead the church.

What's the real reason that the RLDS started ordaining women?

Whatever the RLDS Church's actual motivations, the 1984 decision to ordain women didn't exactly come out of nowhere, according to the Encyclopedia of Mormonism's entry on the RLDS Church:

Section 156:9-10 meant that the church would now move ahead with women's ordinations, a breakthrough foreshadowed by events dating back to 1970. Local pastors had been initiating priesthood calls for women since 1974, but no clear precedent permitted actual ordination. Now, the conference's approval of section 156 created the context for the ordination of women, the first ones being ordained November 17, 1985.

Despite this, the decision was still quite controversial, and precipitated many churches breaking away from the RLDS Church.
William D. Russell, a historian and an RLDS member, makes a case in his article "Grant McMurray and the Succession Crisis in the Community of Christ" that the decision had nothing to do with running out of male descendants of Joseph Smith:

President [Wallace] Smith introduced the document that became Section 156 of the Doctrine and Covenants, approving the ordination of women and also announcing plans to build the temple. After a long debate, delegates approved it by a vote of approximately 80-20 percent. Some thought Wallace B. Smith—having three daughters and no sons—had introduced women's ordination to allow one of his daughters to succeed him. But since Wallace ultimately recommended a male successor outside the family [W. Grant McMurray], it appears that Section 156 was not based on this motivation. Although Wallace has never, to my knowledge, publicly discussed the background to this revelation, he clearly believed the male-only priesthood was based on culture and tradition, not divine will.

Here is the relevant portion of D&C 156:

The following is also presented as the voice of the Spirit:
...
I have heard the prayers of many, including my servant the prophet, as they have sought to know my will in regard to the question of who shall be called to share the burdens and responsibilities of priesthood in my church. I say to you now, as I have said in the past, that all are called according to the gifts which have been given them. This applies to priesthood as well as to any other aspects of the work. Therefore, do not wonder that some women of the church are being called to priesthood responsibilities. This is in harmony with my will and where these calls are made known to my servants, they may be processed according to administrative procedures and provisions of the law.


Is there a doctrine or Biblical justification that explains why God chose the number 7 to be so significant? Do any major traditions in Christianity hold any sort of formulated doctrine or is there some Biblical justification tossed around that explains God's a priori reason for choosing 7 to be significant was?

I'm specifically curious about the source of 7's significance, not the how (in other words, I'm not looking for examples of significant 7s (covered in Why is the number seven special? and on Judaism.SE here) or for how these play out, but for why God picked the number in the first place.)

As I understand it, the significance of the numbers 1 and 3 can both be derived from the Trinity. One God, three Persons. But what is the source of 7? Why God chose seven instead of, say, nine. Or five or eleven, which are also primes (in the mathematical system we use). God seems to have chosen 7 to be significant before Creation. He chose 7 to be the number of days in a week. This means that any significant 7 post-creation (including the length of a week) is a significant 7 for the same reason. Before God created the universe, He picked out 7 to be one of His significant numbers.

To clarify a bit further, if God decided that 9 was the number of perfection for whatever reason, then we probably would have had an 8-day work week and the 9th day would be the Sabbath. The number of the beast would probably have been 888 instead of 666. Pentecost probably would have come 82 days after Passover (50 = 7*7+1, 82=9*9+1).

If there is truly no source for this and no Christian tradition has forwarded any explanation, the answer may very well be "none". However if more than one doctrine exists, please explain what the different suggestions are and how they end up on different tracks.

I don't think you'll find dogma from any major tradition insisting that God pre-ordained the number 7, that it's integral to His nature, or anything of the sort. In fact, scripture suggests the contrary.  Consider first God's consecration of 7 as the symbol of perfection. It's the final event (or detail) of the first creation account.

Genesis 2:1-3

  1 Thus the heavens and the earth and all their array were
  completed. 2 On the seventh day God completed the work he
  had been doing; he rested on the seventh day from all the work he had
  undertaken. 3 God blessed the seventh day and made it holy,
  because on it he rested from all the work he had done in creation.

So, right off the bat, regardless of whether we assume the creation story is allegorical or literal, we can already start to make a case that God consecrated the number post-creation. He works for six days, and once everything is to His liking, he declares perfection, which just to happens to be on the 7th day. Seven thereby symbolizes perfection. Nowhere else (that I can think of) does God directly reveal 7 as a symbol of perfection; it is seemingly deduced from creation, God's reflection on the 7th day that His work is perfect.

Those preferring the allegorical reading might suggest that the story takes place in 7 days because the Jews already used 7 to symbolize perfection, or because certain prevalent natural harmonies in the universe made 7 significant, etc.. Those preferring a literal reading can start to sense that God didn't pre-consecrate 7; that consecration occurs distinctly after God creates everything. And in either case, the consecration of 7 as perfection occurs at a particular point in time in the story -- in fact, it's the point in time itself, according to the story, that defines the number of perfection, which "ends up" being 7.

Now, one could (and should) object here and suggest that, since God is omniscient and omnipotent, He could simply have planned to make all things in 6 days and declare perfection on the 7th. He was eternally aware of 7's perfection. And that's a fair point.

Thus, we turn to Jesus' own words to weigh in on our speculation. The first story in gospel of Mark wherein Jesus is challenged with a question about the Sabbath is significant. Upon being caught disrespecting Sabbath law, Jesus rebuts with a pretty revealing statement.

Mark 2:27-28

  27 Then he said to them, “The sabbath was made for man,
  not man for the sabbath. 28 That is why the Son of Man is
  lord even of the sabbath.”

This statement points all the way back to creation. The Jews revere the number 7 as the symbol of perfection on account of God's mandate for a Sabbath. And now Jesus is telling the Jews that God made the Sabbath for them.

The point is simultaneously subtle and glaring. God doesn't need a Sabbath. And God doesn't need 7 to mean anything. We do. Therefore, for our sake, God chooses the number most beneficial and recognizable to our nature to signify perfection and denote cycles of rest and worship.

God choose seven to serve human nature, not His own. More to it, God doesn't need symbols or special numbers. We do. God just gives us what we need (or ask for) to help us stay on track.


According to the Bible how does one receive the gift of the Holy Ghost? Does one automatically receive the Holy Ghost after they accept Christ or does it have to be received through the laying on of hands as spoken of in Acts 8?

Acts 8:14 Now when the apostles which were at Jerusalem heard that Samaria had received the word of God, they sent unto them Peter and John:
15 Who, when they were come down, prayed for them, that they might receive the Holy Ghost:
16 (For as yet he was fallen upon none of them: only they were baptized in the name of the Lord Jesus.)
17 Then laid they their hands on them, and they received the Holy Ghost.

Acts 8:15 actually provides the answer:

  “Who, when they (Peter & John) were come down, prayed for them, that they might receive the Holy Ghost”

Prayer is the key ingredient that enabled the reception of the Holy Spirit, however, there is more to the story, because there was one there that believed that the laying on of hands was the agent of release of the Holy Spirit rather than prayer and his name was Simon beginning in verse 9 lets focus on Simon and ultimately Peter’s response:

  But there was a certain man, called Simon, which beforetime in the same city used sorcery, and bewitched the people of Samaria, giving out that himself was some great one: To whom they all gave heed, from the least to the greatest, saying, This man is the great power of God. And to him they had regard, because that of long time he had bewitched them with sorceries... Then Simon himself believed also: and when he was baptized, he continued with Philip, and wondered, beholding the miracles and signs which were done… And when Simon saw that through laying on of the apostles' hands the Holy Ghost was given, he offered them money, Saying, Give me also this power, that on whomsoever I lay hands, he may receive the Holy Ghost. But Peter said unto him, Thy money perish with thee, because thou hast thought that the gift of God may be purchased with money. Thou hast neither part nor lot in this matter: for thy heart is not right in the sight of God. Repent therefore of this thy wickedness, and pray God, if perhaps the thought of thine heart may be forgiven thee. For I perceive that thou art in the gall of bitterness, and in the bond of iniquity.

Simon wanted to subjugate the Holy Spirit to himself.  This is always a sign of a false teaching for then God would be confined to the availability of a man for the laying on of hands. We know that Jesus Christ Himself sends the Holy Spirit.

  Ephesians 1:13 In whom ye also trusted, after that ye heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation: in whom also after that ye believed, ye were sealed with that holy Spirit of promise

So the answer to this question is that prayer was the effective agent and only Simon the Sorcerer believed that it was subject to the laying on of hands.

When Cornelius and his guests received the Holy Spirit it was without laying on of hands and prior to baptism.

  Acts 10:44 While Peter yet spake these words, the Holy Ghost fell on all them which heard the word.


Was this (allegedly gay) marriage in a Catholic Church valid? The Spanish newspaper El Pais wrote an article the other day (with an awful clickbait, I must say), where it told the story of two women married by the Catholic Church in 1901. The story goes that they were married by a local priest, with one of the woman disguised as a man (as one of her dead cousins, in fact). The priest did not know the situation, and hence the marriage received official approval. The article claimed then that this is "the first (and only) official gay marriage in the Catholic Church" (title of the clickbait), and which has yet not been annuled.

Two things come to my mind. First, the marriage act probably stated the name of the (dead) cousin, and hence, the two women were actually never married (i.e. they couldn't prove it, since they didn't have a certificate to the name of both women). Second, as one of the spouses was dead, the marriage was invalid. Thus, there was never a valid marriage anyway, and thus there is nothing to annul. Is this the case?

Indeed. It's not possible for anyone but a man and woman of age to marry themselves (the sacrament of marriage is actually contracted by the couple, technically speaking, the priest being only a witness). Anything else is not the sacrament of marriage but something else: therefore they not only were not married, but could not have been married. One does not need an annulment to prove this, only proof that both parties are female, or both parties are male.
@K-HB found a canon in the Code of Canon Law which contains a definition of marriage:

Code of Canon Law
Can. 1055 §1 The marriage covenant, by which a man and a woman establish between themselves a partnership of their whole life, and which of its own very nature is ordered to the well-being of the spouses and to the procreation and upbringing of children, has, between the baptised, been raised by Christ the Lord to the dignity of a sacrament.
...

It goes on to define what matrimonial consent is, too:

Can. 1057 §1 A marriage is brought into being by the lawfully manifested consent of persons who are legally capable. This consent cannot be supplied by any human power.
§2 Matrimonial consent is an act of will by which a man and a woman by an irrevocable covenant mutually give and accept one another for the purpose of establishing a marriage.

And for something from the catechetical realm, here is a portion from Ludwig Ott's Fundamentals of Catholic Dogma on Matrimony (Book IV, Section VII, 1):

Christian marriage is that Sacrament in which two marriageable people of different sexes associate in an undivided life-communion by mutual agreement for the generation and education of offspring, and in which they receive grace for the fulfillment of the special duties of their state.

The Catechism of the Council of Trent (or, the Roman Catechism) gives a definition of marriage:

The conjugal union of man and woman, contracted between two qualified persons, which obliges them to live together throughout life

In his famous Encyclical on Matrimony, Arcanum (a highly recommended read), Pope Leo XIII wrote (Arcanum, 5):

... And this union of man and woman, that it might answer more fittingly to the infinitely wise counsels of God, even from the beginning manifested chiefly two most excellent properties - deeply sealed, as it were, and signed upon it-namely, unity and perpetuity. From the Gospel we see clearly that this doctrine was declared and openly confirmed by the divine authority of Jesus Christ. He bore witness to the Jews and to His Apostles that marriage, from its institution, should exist between two only, that is, between one man and one woman; that of two they are made, so to say, one flesh; and that the marriage bond is by the will of God so closely and strongly made fast that no man may dissolve it or render it asunder. "For this cause shall a man leave father and mother, and shall cleave to his wife, and they two shall be in one flesh. Therefore now they are not two, but one flesh. What, therefore, God hath joined together, let no man put asunder."

Many more sources could be adduced, but to put it more simply: the Church knows of no sacrament intended for or concerning the union of two of the same sex.


Did the first Christian believers keep the Sabbath and if so on which day? According to Colossians, there appears to be some disagreement amongst the first century church on whether to keep the Sabbath:

Colossians 2:16
Therefore do not let anyone judge you by what you eat or drink, or with regard to a religious festival, a New Moon celebration or a Sabbath day.

Did the first century church keep the Sabbath?
And if so which day was it on? The Jewish Saturday or the new Christian Sunday?

The writings of the early Christians make it clear that Christians abandoned the Jewish custom of worship on the Sabbath (seventh day) and instead held the first day, which they called the Lord's Day, to be the sacred day of worship.  One of the simplest explanations on the subject comes from Tertullian, around 200 AD:

  But why is it, you ask, that we gather on the Lord's Day to celebrate
  our solemnities?  Because that was the way the Apostles also did.

  -- De Fuga in Persecutione, XIV: 11

This was not an innovation of the second century AD, as a full century earlier, (101 AD,) we find Ignatius saying:

  Those who were brought up in the ancient order of things have come to
  the possession of a new hope, no longer observing the Sabbath, but
  living in the observance of the Lord's day on which our life was
  sprung by him and his death.

  -- Epistle to the Magnesians, Chapter 9

And just in case there is any confusion as to the identity of the Lord's Day, we can turn to Justin Martyr. (140 AD)

  And on the day which is called Sunday there is an assembly in the same
  place of all who live in cities or in country districts; and the
  records of the apostles, or the writings of the prophets, are read as
  long as we have time.

  ...

  Sunday is the day on which we all hold our common assembly,
  because it is the day on which God, when he changed the darkness and
  matter, made the world; and Jesus Christ our Savior on the same day
  rose from the dead.

  -- Apologies 1:67

And again from Justin Martyr, we see that Christians did not keep the Jewish holy days:

  We neither accord with the Jews in their peculiarities in regard to
  food nor in their sacred days.

  -- Apologies Sec. 21

So yes, it's clear from the historical record that the first-century Christians, such as Ignatius, had organized worship meetings on the Lord's Day (Sunday), and that they did not consider observance of the Jewish Sabbath important, it having been fulfilled by Christ with the rest of the Law of Moses.


Did the coins at the time of Jesus have distinct images and inscriptions? At Matthew 22:18-21(NIV) we read:

"... But Jesus, knowing their evil intent, said, “You hypocrites, why are you trying to trap me?  Show me the coin used for paying the tax.” They brought him a denarius, and He asked them, “Whose image is this? And whose inscription?”

“Caesar’s,” they replied.

Then He said to them, “So give back to Caesar what is Caesar’s, and to God what is God’s.”

My question is : did the coins used by Jews at the time of Jesus bear two different types of images and inscriptions in order to indicate the usage meant of the coin ?  To elaborate, were there distinct  images and inscriptions on the coins meant for being offered at the Temple of God ? What were those like ?

Yes, during Jesus' lifetime, coins in the Roman Empire bore the likeness of the Emperor - who happened to be Augustus, also known as Tiberius, for most of Jesus' life.

These are actual Roman coins from Jesus' lifetime, bearing the image of Augustus Cæsar.

-  Source

Contrary to popular belief, coins bearing the image of a pagan were not inherently considered contaminated or unfit for use in the Temple:

  When Jews traveled to Jerusalem from other lands, they brought money for room, board, and souvenirs. Most importantly, they were required to pay the annual half-shekel tribute to the temple. The currency they had would be of their native land or acquired in trade along their way.

  Money changers performed a key service when they converted the varieties of local coinage into the required tribute of silver shekels or half-shekels of Tyre (Tosefta Ketubbot 13:20, Exod 30:11-16). Many writers have suggested that the Tyre currency was preferred because it did not defy the Decalogue by depicting the graven image of a foreign king, and that is true. But the Tyre coins portray a pagan god of Tyre, Melqarth-Herakles—which was certainly even more offensive!

  Images on coins, however, do not contaminate them even for payment to the temple. The Mishnah explains that money is unclean only if it is used for another purpose, such as for jewelry (Mishnah Kelim 12:7). The law stated that the temple must not be shortchanged in any way, so the silver coins of Tyre were most likely mandated because they were of good silver and true weight at a time when many coins were debased or lightweight.
  -  Source

Coin used at the Temple:


How do Jehovah’s Witnesses explain the unique wording of Colossians 1:15-17 in the NWT? Compare the wording of the NWT and the NKJV at Colossians 1:15-17

NKJV says

  15 He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn over all creation. 16 For by Him all things were created that are in heaven and that are on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or [a]principalities or [b]powers. All things were created through Him and for Him. 17 And He is before all things, and in Him all things consist.

NWT says

  15  He is the image of the invisible God,the firstborn of all creation;16  because by means of him all other things were created in the heavens and on the earth, the things visible and the things invisible,whether they are thrones or lordships or governments or authorities. All other things have been created through him and for him. 17  Also, he is before all other things,and by means of him all other things were made to exist,

How do Jehovah’s Witnesses explain the usage of the word “other” in these verses? And what support for bringing this word into the text is there among Greek language aficionados?

Summary of Jehovah's Witness Teaching: Jehovah God is the Creator (Revelation 4:11).  He is without beginning or end, and he is almighty (Psalm 90:2).  Jesus, on the other hand, had a beginning (Colossians 1:15- 16).  Colossians 1:15 calls Jesus “the image of the invisible God.”
Extracts from the 15 September 2005 Watchtower article (pp. 4-7) ‘Who Is Jesus Christ?’

Since all created things had a beginning, there was a time when God was alone. Countless ages ago, however, God became a Creator. Who was his first creation? The last book of the Bible identifies Jesus as “the beginning of the creation by God.” (Revelation 3:14) Jesus is “the firstborn of all creation.” That is so “because by means of him all other things were created in the heavens and upon the earth, the things visible and the things invisible.” (Colossians 1:15, 16) Yes, Jesus was the only one directly created by God himself. Therefore, he is called God’s “only-begotten Son.” (John 3:16) The firstborn Son also bears the title “the Word.” (John 1:14) Why? Because before being born as a human, he served in heaven as one who spoke for God.
“The Word” was with Jehovah God “in the beginning,” when “the heavens and the earth” were created. He was the one to whom God said: “Let us make man in our image.” (John 1:1; Genesis 1:1, 26) Jehovah’s firstborn Son was there at his Father’s side, actively working with him. At Proverbs 8:22-31, he is represented as saying: “I came to be beside [the Creator] as a master worker, and I came to be the one he was specially fond of day by day, I being glad before him all the time.”  https://wol.jw.org/en/wol/d/r1/lp-e/2005681

Jehovah's Witnesses view Jesus as the instrument of Jehovah God, the Creator:

Not a co-Creator. The Son’s share in the creative works, however, did not make him a co-Creator with his Father. The power for creation came from God through his holy spirit, or active force. (Ge 1:2; Ps 33:6) And since Jehovah is the Source of all life, all animate creation, visible and invisible, owes its life to him. (Ps 36:9) Rather than a co-Creator, then, the Son was the agent or instrumentality through whom Jehovah, the Creator, worked. Jesus himself credited God with the creation, as do all the Scriptures.—Mt 19:4-6; see CREATION.  Source: Insight on the Scriptures volume 2, Jesus Christ - https://wol.jw.org/en/wol/d/r1/lp-e/1200002451?p=par#h=7

Because they see Jesus as a created being, they have added the expressions “by means of him” and “all other things” and “created through him” into the text of Colossians 1:15-16.
It is my understanding that the Christian Greek Scriptures of the New World Translation is based on the Westcott & Hort Greek text.  The Kingdom Interlinear Translation of the Greek Scriptures acknowledges the fact that the NWT of the Christian Greek Scriptures is “a translation of the Westcott and Hort Greek Text, first published by them in the year 1881.”
Dr. Hort [1] had leanings towards Unitarianism as is made very clear by his associations and his avid support for Dr Vance Smith, the renowned Unitarian scholar on the Revision Committee of 1881. [2]
I am unaware of any other source that would justify the additions made to Colossians 1:15-16 that appear in the New World Translation.
[1] With regard to the Revision Committee, there were two opposite schools of biblical criticism: on the one side Drs Westcott and Hort, and on the other Dr Scrivener.  https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=bwkIAwAAQBAJ&pg=PA502&lpg=PA502&dq=Dr+Hort+Dr+Vance&source=bl&ots=tNaIqD89lF&sig=ACfU3U0PgmTidS1zBS5XSwe-MFpPpLrUUw&hl=en&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwjX0Lufw9boAhUSY8AKHbdFCCgQ6AEwA3oECAwQNw#v=onepage&q=Dr%20Hort%20Dr%20Vance&f=false
[2] Dr Vance Smith, Unitarian scholar was (controversially) invited to join the revisers.
https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=pZceAAAAQBAJ&pg=PA88&lpg=PA88&dq=Dr+Vance+Unitarianism&source=bl&ots=PTdj-RFSi_&sig=ACfU3U0r2riTnZfW8sQmpJ4exyhIjqTiKg&hl=en&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwiI1Jr-xNboAhV_QEEAHeTBC0kQ6AEwB3oECAsQQQ#v=onepage&q=Dr%20Vance%20Unitarianism&f=false


What does "in the image of God" mean? Genesis 1:26:

  Then God said, “Let us make mankind in our image, in our likeness, so that they may rule over the fish in the sea and the birds in the sky, over the livestock and all the wild animals, and over all the creatures that move along the ground.”

Does this mean humans look like God, complete with hands, feet, and sexual organs?  Or is it referring to something else?

There are differing traditions about this. Only in Eastern Orthodoxy have I run into a very specific definition, where 'Image of God' is treated like a term of art with a specific, well defined meaning.

Generally speaking, most Christians interpret it to mean that we share in the spiritual reality with the spiritual beings, and traits specific to God (spiritual traits, since God is Spirit) belong to man. Such things then do not belong to other creatures, which may or may not include the angels. What traits these are vary from interpretation to interpretation, but they may include:

Ability to create
Reason
Having a 'spirit'
Being able to have the indwelling of the Holy Spirit

In Eastern Orthodoxy, there is a specific definition that is sometimes offered (though it does not exclude the above.)

Each human is unique, as God is unique (being one!)
Each human is relational, that is, he exists only in relation to others, as God is Trinity in himself and thus even if there is no other, God is 'in relation' via the persons of the Trinity
Each human has free will, as God has free will.


What might the capitalization of the word "church" indicate? Does capitalization of the word "church" matter, or is it more of a personal preference?

It is obvious why the Bible or Christian is capitalized; they are proper names. A lowercase bible may refer to a reference book, manual, or textbook. Christian is capitalized, presumably because it is a proper name for follower of Christ.

The Church is referred to as the "Bride of Christ" throughout the NT. It's capitalization simply reflects it's status as a proper noun, subject to capitalization.


Church/denomination with highest young adult attendance? Which denominations (churches) have the highest attendance of young adults (say ~16 to ~32) as a percentage of the congregation?

If statistics aren't available, then in your experience, what are some churches with high young adult attendance?

Note: any insight from any country would help, but I'm mainly interested in the "next generation's" adoption of Christianity in the U.S. and Western Europe. This is for research.

By experience in my area (Ohio), it appears that non-denominational (Baptist with a little 'B' generally) contemporary services tend to draw in young adults.  I'd feel safer to say that if your age group is 18 to 32.  16 year old are still under control of their parents.  At 18 they can choose where to go and more parents do not object since at least they're attending some church.

Catholic churches also have a good crowd, but those are usually people who were raised Catholic and attending service is a tradition.  Unchurched people are more inclined to join a church as mentioned above.


Do Jehovah's Witnesses use different language for theological reasons? They don't have churches: they have Kingdom Halls (though it's not wrong to refer to a Kingdom Hall as a type of church).

They don't have hymns: they have Kingdom Songs (though it's not wrong to refer to a Kingdom Song as a hymn).

They don't have priests; they have elders (maybe this one is more understandable: they're not alone in having elders, and not having priests is a theological point).

They divide the Bible into the "Hebrew (and Aramaic) Scriptures" and the "Christian Greek Scriptures" (not just the "Greek Scriptures", to prevent possible confusion with the Septuagint).

Are any of these differences actually theologically meaningful?

I can't verify the accuracy of this post, but the origin of "Kingdom Hall" is given here (and I would imagine that the phrase "Kingdom Songs" has a similar origin).

  The name Kingdom Hall was suggested in 1935 by J. F. Rutherford, who
  was then president of the Watch Tower Society. In connection with the
  Society's branch facilities in Honolulu, Hawaii, [...] When James
  Harrub asked what Brother Rutherford was going to call the building,
  he replied: "Don't you think we should call it 'Kingdom Hall,' since
  that is what we are doing, preaching the good news of the Kingdom?"
  Thereafter, where possible, halls regularly being used by the
  Witnesses gradually began to be identified by signs that said "Kingdom
  Hall." -- Proclaimers Chap 20, p. 319

As to the "Hebrew (and Aramaic) Scriptures" and the "Christian Greek Scriptures" , again, I'm not sure of the accuracy of the Wikipedia article I'm about to quote, but the citations point to the original Watchtower publication.

Wikipedia offers this:

  The translators use the terms "Hebrew-Aramaic Scriptures" and
  "Christian Greek Scriptures" rather than "Old Testament" and "New
  Testament", stating that the use of "testament" was based on a
  misunderstanding of 2 Corinthians 3:14.[29] When referring to dates in
  the supplemental material, the abbreviations "B.C.E." (Before the
  Common Era) and "C.E." (Common Era) are used rather than BC and AD.

You've already answered the question of "Elders" yourself.


What was the purpose of creating the world? Why did God create a world?
Was the act of creation for some profit, or did God in His grace create world only because it was good?

  Genesis 1 (KJV)
  And God called the dry land Earth; and the gathering together of the
  waters called he Seas: and God saw that it was good.

We don't know!

Unfortunately, the Bible doesn't tell us why he created the world, simply that he did create it.

Lonely
One speculation (and it is pure speculation) is that he created the world in order to have other beings with free will that would love him.  We can see this in the fact that there are things we can do to please God. From that concept, we can expand it a bit to assume that the things he finds pleasing is the reason that he actually created us.  So, in essence, the speculation is that he created us so that we could love him and choose to follow him.

Self-glorification
Another theory (eg speculation) is that he wanted to bring glory to himself.  The argument goes that all created things reflect God's glory (per Psalm 19:1 for example), in particular mankind (per Genesis 1:26);  since the creation reflects His glory, then he must have created them for the purpose of reflecting his glory.

The problem with these theories is that they use the process of logical induction to come to these conclusions.  In fact these thoughts are a very weak induction.  It's like saying "I've only seen a green frog, therefore all frogs must be green."

These theories attempt to attribute thoughts to God based on our understanding of his creation. This, in my opinion, is a very dangerous road.

Summary  (TL;DR)
We don't know why God created the world because he never told us.  We do have ideas including the two I mentioned above. However, these ideas, as I mentioned, are pure speculation and we must be careful not to presume that we know the mind of God.

  Isaiah 55:8 NWT
  “For the thoughts of YOU people are not my thoughts, nor are my ways YOUR ways,” is the utterance of Jehovah.


Drawing of a Christian helping his own assailant A few years back I saw a drawing of a Christian priest helping his own assailant to get up.
It was on a wiki page that I cannot remember.

I am hoping that some one here knows the page, and maybe even know a longer story behind that drawing.

There are likely many drawings of similar content, but I suspect by far the most famous one is this drawing of Dirk Willems, which was published in the book Martyrs Mirror in 1685.

It illustrates the true story of Dirk Willems who had escaped from prison (where he was being persecuted for his faith), but when his persuer broke through some thin ice, Dirk turned around to rescue his persuer, only to be taken back into custody then killed for his faith in 1569.


How does the Swedenborgian Church interpret Psalm 110:1 and Mark 15:34? This question is about two passages: Psalm 110:1 and Mark 15:34.

In Psalm 110:1, King David wrote, according to the KJV:

  The Lord said unto my Lord, Sit thou at my right hand, until I make
  thine enemies thy footstool.

...and here according to the American Standard Version:

  Jehovah saith unto my Lord, Sit thou at my right hand, Until I make
  thine enemies thy footstool.

When on earth, Jesus applied this passage to himself in Matthew 22:41-45 (ASV):

  41 Now while the Pharisees were gathered together, Jesus asked them a
  question, 42 saying, What think ye of the Christ? whose son is he?
  They say unto him, The son of David. 43 He saith unto them, How then
  doth David in the Spirit call him Lord, saying, 44 The Lord said unto
  my Lord, Sit thou on my right hand, Till I put thine enemies
  underneath thy feet? 45 If David then calleth him Lord, how is he his
  son?

The passage in Mark 15:34, on another hand, records Jesus' expression when near death (here according to the KJV):

  And at the ninth hour Jesus cried with a loud voice, saying, Eloi,
  Eloi, lama sabachthani? which is, being interpreted, My God, my God,
  why hast thou forsaken me?

According to the answer to this other question, the Swedenborgian view of the relationship between Jesus and God is that God (i.e. his Father) is his soul within him.

To the question about whom Jesus was talking to when praying, the answer states:

  Jesus was talking to himself, and specifically, to his own soul, which
  was the Father within him.

The questions I would like to ask are:

If God is a component inside Jesus, then how is the command to sit
"at God's right hand" to be interpreted?
How is the notion of God as a component inside Jesus reconciled with
the seeming authority structure in Psalm 110:1 (describing an
invitation from a higher authority to a lower authority to sit at
his right hand)?
How is the notion that God is the soul within Jesus reconciled with
Jesus' expression that apparently indicated that God had at that
point "abandoned" him?

Introduction: The metaphorical nature of the Bible
Here are two key principles in the method of Bible interpretation used and taught by Emanuel Swedenborg (1688–1772):

Within the literal meaning of the entirety of Swedenborg's canon of the Bible there is a spiritual meaning, accessed through a system of "correspondences" or particular symbolism of each person, place, object, and event in the literal meaning.
The literal meaning commonly speaks in terms of human and earthly appearances rather than the way things are in spiritual and divine reality. (See my article, "How God Speaks in the Bible to Us Boneheads.")

In particular, the Bible commonly speaks about God in terms of human concepts of space and time, directions such as right and left, and various personalities such as Moses, David, and Elijah. However, time and space are properties of the physical universe, whereas God is a divine being. Therefore any attribution to God of things such as "right hand" or "Son of David" or even "Son of God" are not speaking about literal spatial relations or about biological lineages, but are human appearances and metaphors used to describe various divine aspects of God.
The right hand of God
Although the Bible commonly speaks of God as having various human body parts, such as eyes, ears, nostrils, a right hand, and so on, it should be clear that the infinite core being of God, called "the Father" in the Bible, does not have a physical body or physical form as human beings do, such that someone could literally sit at God's right hand.
In the Bible, the right hand is commonly associated with power. For example:

Your right hand, O Lord, glorious in power—your right hand, O Lord, shattered the enemy. (Exodus 15:6)
Jesus said to him, "You have said so. But I tell you, From now on you will see the Son of Man seated at the right hand of power and coming on the clouds of heaven." (Matthew 26:64)
"But from now on the Son of Man will be seated at the right hand of the power of God." (Luke 22:69)
God put this power to work in Christ when he raised him from the dead and seated him at his right hand in the heavenly places, far above all rule and authority and power and dominion, and above every name that is named, not only in this age but also in the age to come. (Ephesians 1:20–21)
He is the reflection of God's glory and the exact imprint of God's very being, and he sustains all things by his powerful word. When he had made purification for sins, he sat down at the right hand of the Majesty on high, having become as much superior to angels as the name he has inherited is more excellent than theirs. (Hebrews 1:3–4)

Accordingly, Swedenborg interprets "the right hand of God" not as a literal right hand, but rather as God's omnipotent power. For example, in interpreting the opening verses of Psalm 110 and Jesus' quoting of it in Matthew 22:44, Mark 12:36, and Luke 20:42–43, Swedenborg writes:

Anyone who does not know that the expression "right hand," when used in reference to Jehovah, means almighty power will gather no other idea from these the Lord's words than that the Lord will sit on His Father's right hand and have dominion in the way that one sitting on a king's right hand on earth has. But the internal sense shows what one should understand in those places by "sitting at the right hand," namely God's almighty power. Hence also the expressions "sitting at the right hand of power" and "at the right hand of the power of God." (Arcana Coelestia #8281:2)

Jesus sitting at God's right hand
In Swedenborg's understanding of the Bible and of the nature of God, then, Jesus "sitting at the right hand of God [the Father]" does not mean one figure or person of God sitting to the right of another figure or person of God. Rather, it means God's core divine nature ("the Father") exercising its power through God's human nature ("the Son"); or another way of saying the same thing, God's divine love, or good, ("the Father") exercising its power through God's wisdom, or truth, ("the Son"). Swedenborg writes:

The fact that these statements [in Psalm 110:1-2, 5] refer to the Lord [Jesus Christ] is his own teaching in Matthew 22:44. His dominion over the hells is described there by "sitting at the right hand," for "the right hand" means the power that divine truth springing from divine good possesses. The hells and the evils and falsities coming from them are the enemies that were to be made as His footstool; they are also the enemies in whose midst he was to have dominion. (Arcana Coelestia #10019:5, links added)

And another commentary on Psalm 110 in the same work:

But since the declarations in this Psalm each contain secrets that have to do with the Lord's conflicts when he was in the world, and those secrets cannot be revealed without the internal sense, let a brief explanation of them be supplied. "Jehovah said to my Lord" means that the subject is the Lord when he was in the world. "Lord" here is used to mean the Lord's divine humanity, as is clear in Matthew 22:43-45; Mark 12:36; Luke 20:42-44. "Sit at my right hand" means the almighty power of divine good, exercised through divine truth, the Lord being divine truth at that time, and divine truth being that with which he entered into and won the battle. For the meaning of "sitting at the right hand" as a state of power, and in reference to the Divine as almighty power, see Arcana Coelestia 3387, 4592, 4933, 6948, 7518, 7673, 8281, 9133; and the fact that all the power that good possesses is exercised through truth, Arcana Coelestia 6344, 6423, 8304, 9327, 9410, 9639, 9643. (Arcana Coelestia #9809:3, links added)

In other words, in Psalm 110:1, "Jehovah/the LORD" (Hebrew יְהוָה) refers to the Father, or God's core divine nature, which is divine love, while "to my Lord" (Hebrew לַֽאדֹנִי) refers to the Son, or God's human nature, which is divine truth, and was Jesus when he was incarnated in our world.
The command to "sit at my right hand," then, means that God's divine love acts through God's divine truth in accomplishing its victory over the power of the Devil, evil, and hell (which are synonymous in Swedenborg's theology). This phenomenon of the Father acting by means of the Son, who is divine truth, can be seen in various passages in the New Testament, such as:

In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God. All things came into being through him, and without him not one thing came into being. What has come into being in him was life, and the life was the light of all people. The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness did not overcome it. . . . And the Word became flesh and lived among us, and we have seen his glory, the glory as of a father's only son, full of grace and truth. . . . No one has ever seen God. It is God the only Son, who is close to the Father's heart, who has made him known. (John 1:1–5, 14, 18)
Do you not believe that I am in the Father and the Father is in me? The words that I say to you I do not speak on my own; but the Father who dwells in me does the works. (John 14:10)
And Jesus came and said to them, "All power in heaven and on earth has been given to me." (Matthew 28:18)

So it is Swedenborg's teaching that everything done by the core divine being, which is divine love, and is called "the Father" in the New Testament, is done through the divine humanity, which is divine truth, and is called "the Son" in the New Testament. The Son "sitting at the right hand" of the Father is a metaphorical representation in human physical and spatial language of this relationship between God's core divinity and divine humanity, in which the one acts through the other to accomplish everything it does.
So in concrete terms Jesus sitting at the Father's right hand means God's omnipotence acting in and through God's human presence as Jesus Christ in the world and in the lives of individual human beings.
If there are not two (or three) "persons" of God, there is no question of an authority structure. Rather, it is simply the way the one God, who is the Lord God Jesus Christ, exercises omnipotent power from divine love through divine truth.
Jesus' cry on the cross
Jesus' cry on the cross, "My God, my God, why have you forsaken me" (Mark 15:34) could be a whole separate question of its own, but here is the short version:
While Jesus was in the world, he had both an infinite divine nature from God and a finite human nature from Mary. During the course of his life on earth, his awareness alternated between those two parts of his being. And also during the course of his life on earth, through inner battles against the Devil, called "temptation" in the Bible, he gradually put away all of the finite human nature from his human mother and replaced it with a divine human nature that was God's divine humanity, or the glorified Jesus Christ.
The cross was Jesus' final battle against the Devil and the forces of evil. And when he cried, "My God, my God, why have you forsaken me" he was having his final experience of his conscious awareness being in the last remaining vestiges of his finite human nature from Mary, in which state he could feel separation from his inner divine nature, which was God.
When he rose from death, he left behind those last vestiges of that temporary finite human nature from Mary, and was at that point fully divine and fully one with the Father. For a fuller explanation of this, see my answer to the question, "How does the Swedenborgian Church explain passages where Jesus talks/prays to the Father?" (also linked in the question above).
He was also, of course, quoting the opening line of Psalm 22, a Psalm that tells metaphorically of Jesus' battle against and victory over the powers of evil—which is the exact task he was completing on the Cross.


What is the old covenant of Hebrews 8:6? But in fact the ministry Jesus has received is as superior to theirs as the covenant of which he is mediator is superior to the old one, since the new covenant is established on better promises. ~ Hebrews 8:6 (NIV)

I realize that the short answer is probably "the Mosaic Covenant", but is this covenant the Hebrew vow to adhere to the entire Law, and God's promise to establish them as the chosen people, or is there more to it than I know (which isn't very much, frankly)?  Although I find many, many instances of "covenant" in the O.T., I can never really find a summation, or an entry I can point to and say, "Ah, there it is.  That is the covenant between God and the Jewish people."  Of course, I have been known to look right at something and not see it.

It also occurs to me that, according to the context in which the above quotation exists, the old covenant could be between the priesthood and God, because Hebrews 8 begins

1 We... have... a high priest, who sat down at the right hand of the throne of the Majesty in heaven, 2 and who serves in the sanctuary, the true tabernacle set up by the Lord, not by a mere human being.

I think it is as easy as you suspect.
Hebrews does focus on the superiority of the New Covenant a little more from the ceremonial perspective than does some of the other Epistles, as this had more meaning to a Jewish audience. However this superiority of the blood of Christ, versus blood of bulls only has meaning as it satisfies the moral demands of the broken laws under the Mosaic Law. So it would be untrue to think any other covenant was being referred to besides the Mosaic Covenant, as that is the only Old Covenant there is.  It is the condemnation of the Mosaic moral law specifically that Jesus the High Priest has removed. Jesus, by offering his own body and soul upon an altar, removed the curse of the law, whereby he was so pleasing to God that he was ‘raised up’, higher than the angels that we might rest in forgiveness forever. This is absolutely what Hebrews argues at length by various convincing arguments tailored to a Jewish audience.
The Old Covenant is the covenant God made with Israel under Moses often called the Mosaic Covenant. It was an agreement between God and Israel that they would vow to keep all the commands provided by Moses.  These laws include all those laws recorded in the first five books of the Bible and summarized under the Ten Commandments. Ceremonially the highest point of this law was the high priest and all his functions.
As this is the case we find the tablets actually called the 'covenant laws':

As the Lord commanded Moses, Aaron put the manna with the tablets of the covenant law, so that it might be preserved. (Exodus 16:34, NIV)

As the Priesthood was fully integrated with the commands and equally part of that covenant it was ratified in blood: (This is a 'Ah..there it is' location.)

Moses took half of the blood and put it in bowls, and the other half he splashed against the altar. Then he took the Book of the Covenant and read it to the people. They responded, “We will do everything the Lord has said; we will obey.” Moses then took the blood, sprinkled it on the people and said, “This is the blood of the covenant that the Lord has made with you in accordance with all these words.” (Exodus 24:6-9, NIV)

Naturally in Hebrews when referring to the Old Covenant both the commands and ceremonies are involved. First respecting ceremonial the Covenants are compared:

The blood of goats and bulls and the ashes of a heifer sprinkled on those who are ceremonially unclean sanctify them so that they are outwardly clean. How much more, then, will the blood of Christ, who through the eternal Spirit offered himself unblemished to God, cleanse our consciences from acts that lead to death, so that we may serve the living God!
For this reason Christ is the mediator of a new covenant, that those who are called may receive the promised eternal inheritance —now that he has died as a ransom to set them free from the sins committed under the first covenant. (Hebrews 9:13-15, NIV)

Second respecting the commands, the Covenants are compared:

Now if the ministry that brought death, which was engraved in letters on stone, came with glory, so that the Israelites could not look steadily at the face of Moses because of its glory, transitory though it was, will not the ministry of the Spirit be even more glorious? If the ministry that brought condemnation was glorious, how much more glorious is the ministry that brings righteousness! For what was glorious has no glory now in comparison with the surpassing glory. And if what was transitory came with glory, how much greater is the glory of that which lasts! (2 Corinthians 3:7-11, NIV)
This is the covenant I will establish with the people of Israel after that time, declares the Lord. I will put my laws in their minds and write them on their hearts. I will be their God, and they will be my people. (Hebrews 8:10, NIV)

Of course the Old Covenant also included the theocracy, as God was a citizen as it were of Israel and its civil King. This also is included in the Old Covenant and is superseded by the New:

For he himself is our peace, who has made the two groups one and has destroyed the barrier, the dividing wall of hostility, by setting aside in his flesh the law with its commands and regulations. His purpose was to create in himself one new humanity out of the two, thus making peace (Ephesians 2:14-15, NIV)

This is the Old Covenant the writer of Hebrews refers to, the entire Mosaic Law.


What is "Spiritual Warfare"? What is spiritual warfare? And how is it different from malefic ("black") magic?

One Evangelical Christian sums it up with, Prayer should not be spellcasting. God is not your djinni.

1 Pet 5:8, KJV:

  Be sober, be vigilant; because your adversary the devil, as a roaring lion, walketh about, seeking whom he may devour

Eph 6:12, KJV:

  For we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places.

1 Thess 5:17, KJV:

  Pray without ceasing.

Throughout the NT believers are encouraged to always remember that we are fighting a battle against the forces of evil. The term "Spiritual Warfare" is generally used by those who acknowledge and undertake to accept this calling, "enduring hardness, as a good soldier of Jesus Christ".

Regarding comparisons to "black magic", I would lovingly wish to draw your attention to Jesus' response to similar accusations He faced in Matt 12:22-32. In light of these words from Jesus such terms should not be bandied about since the implications are so very severe.


Is the Vulgate the official version of the bible for entire Catholic Church, or just the Latin Church? The Latin Vulgate is considered to be the official version of the bible of the Roman Catholic church. I'm wondering if this means it is only the official version of the Roman Catholic Church, or does it include the Eastern Catholic Churches as well.

If it is only the official version of the Latin church, do the individual Eastern Catholic Churches have their own official versions as well? (Eg. Perhaps the official Melkite version is the Septuagint, while the official Chaldean version is the Peshitta etc)

The 4th Session of the Council of Trent on the Canonical Scriptures authorized "the old Latin vulgate" as the official edition of the whole Church:But if any one receive not, as sacred and canonical, the said books entire with all their parts, as they have been preserved to be read in the Catholic Church (prout in ecclesia catholica legi consueverunt), and as they are contained in the old Latin vulgate edition; and knowingly and deliberately contemn the traditions aforesaid; let him be anathema.The phrase I emboldened shows that no new books can be introduced int the canon of Holy Scripture.

"the said books" are:

  Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, Deuteronomy; Josue, Judges, Ruth, four books of Kings, two of Paralipomenon, the first book of Esdras, and the second which is entitled Nehemias; Tobias, Judith, Esther, Job, the Davidical Psalter, consisting of a hundred and fifty psalms; the Proverbs, Ecclesiastes, the Canticle of Canticles, Wisdom, Ecclesiasticus, Isaias, Jeremias, with Baruch; Ezechiel, Daniel; the twelve minor prophets, to wit, Osee, Joel, Amos, Abdias, Jonas, Micheas, Nahum, Habacuc, Sophonias, Aggæus, Zacharias, Malachias; two books of the Machabees, the first and the second. Of the New Testament: the four Gospels, according to Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John; the Acts of the Apostles written by Luke the Evangelist; fourteen epistles of Paul the apostle, (one) to the Romans, two to the Corinthians, (one) to the Galatians, to the Ephesians, to the Philippians, to the Colossians, two to the Thessalonians, two to Timothy, (one) to Titus, to Philemon, to the Hebrews; two of Peter the apostle, three of John the apostle, one of the apostle James, one of Jude the apostle, and the Apocalypse of John the apostle.

It is not just the canon (books) but the translation itself of "the old Latin vulgate" that is free from error, as Pope Pius XII writes in his 1943 encyclical Divino afflante Spiritu §21:

  this special authority or as they say, authenticity of the Vulgate was not affirmed by the Council [of Trent] particularly for critical reasons, but rather because of its legitimate use in the Churches throughout so many centuries; by which use indeed the same is shown, in the sense in which the Church has understood and understands it, to be free from any error whatsoever in matters of faith and morals; so that, as the Church herself testifies and affirms, it may be quoted safely and without fear of error in disputations, in lectures and in preaching; and so its authenticity is not specified primarily as critical, but rather as juridical.

Thus, Eastern Catholic rites, too, must recognize "the old Latin vulgate edition" as free from error. This does not mean, though, that all rites cannot use other editions.


According to Catholicism, what are angels and what are they for? I am a Roman Catholic and believe in angels, so I would like to know more about angels and their characteristics. It would be very useful if answers are related with biblical comparisons.

What is an angel?
What is their purpose?
Where they will be?
How many are there?
What do they look like (a spirit/physical body)?

A thorough answer would occupy volumes as this article shows: Angels | New Advent. The following serves as an introduction

A good summary and introduction is found in the Catechism of the catholic Church 328-336. In part (sans footnotes)

  I. THE ANGELS

  The existence of angels - a truth of faith

  328 The existence of the spiritual, non-corporeal beings that Sacred Scripture usually calls "angels" is a truth of faith. The
  witness of Scripture is as clear as the unanimity of Tradition.

  Who are they?

  329 St. Augustine says: "'Angel' is the name of their office, not of their nature. If you seek the name of their nature, it is 'spirit';
  if you seek the name of their office, it is 'angel': from what they
  are, 'spirit', from what they do, 'angel.'" With their whole beings
  the angels are servants and messengers of God. Because they "always
  behold the face of my Father who is in heaven" they are the "mighty
  ones who do his word, hearkening to the voice of his word".

  330 As purely spiritual creatures angels have intelligence and will: they are personal and immortal creatures, surpassing in
  perfection all visible creatures, as the splendor of their glory bears
  witness.

This answers but two of your bullet points

Where they will be? I do not understand. Their abode is the heavens but they go wherever God's want them to accomplish his will which is done in heaven.
How many are there?

I quote from the New Advent article

  The number of angels

  The number of the angels is frequently stated as prodigious (Daniel
  7:10; Apocalypse 5:11; Psalm 67:18; Matthew 26:53). From the use of
  the word host (sabaoth) as a synonym for the heavenly army it is hard
  to resist the impression that the term "Lord of Hosts" refers to God's
  Supreme command of the angelic multitude (cf. Deuteronomy 33:2; 32:43;
  Septuagint). The Fathers see a reference to the relative numbers of
  men and angels in the parable of the hundred sheep (Luke 15:1-3),
  though this may seem fanciful. The Scholastics, again, following the
  treatise "De Coelesti Hierarchia" of St. Denis, regard the
  preponderance of numbers as a necessary perfection of the angelic host
  (cf. St. Thomas, Summa Theologica I:1:3).


Did Mary stay with Elizabeth till the birth of John the Baptist? We read at Luke 1:36 that Elizabeth was six months pregnant when she was visited by Mary. We also read at Luke 1:56 that Mary stayed with Elizabeth for nearly three months. Read together, these two verses mean that Elizabeth had either completed or was in the final month of her pregnancy the day Mary went back to her home.  One is, therefore, curious to know if Mary stayed with Elizabeth till John was born. Evangelist Luke, having once been a doctor, ought to have highlighted that Mary stayed with Elizabeth till the birth of the latter's  son, just to emphasize the helping hand Mary had extended to her . My question is: Are there any Catholic traditions which conclusively state that Mary in deed stayed with Elizabeth till the birth of John the Baptist ?

Cornelius à Lapide, S.J.'s commentary on Luke 1:56:

There is a question here whether the Blessed Virgin remained until the nativity of John. Theophylact, Euthymius, Jansenius maintain that she did not.
They prove this

because the Blessed Virgin came in the sixth month, and remained, as it were, three months (Vulg. quasi tres menses), therefore she departed before the ninth month was completed, and therefore before Elizabeth gave birth to the child;
because after the departure of the Virgin, S. Luke relates the birth of the child, without making any mention of the Virgin;
and chiefly, because it was not fitting that the Virgin should be present at the birth;
because it was proper that she should avoid the crowd which would gather together at the birth.

The contrary opinion is equally, and even more, probable; and is maintained by Origen, S. Ambrose, &c.—

because it would have been discourteous to remain up to the birth and leave immediately before it;
because at the time of the birth Elizabeth most needed the presence, help, and consolation of the Virgin;
because the Virgin remained three months for this very purpose, that she might behold, embrace, and bless John, the wonder of the world, and the forerunner of Christ, and on the other hand that John when born might behold and venerate the mother of the Lord, and Christ the Lord in her. Whence Bede says, “Mary remained until, Elizabeth’s full time having come, she saw the nativity of the forerunner of her Lord, on account of whom chiefly she had come.”

Private revelation among the mystics holds this latter opinion, too. See the end of ch. 9 of The Life of Mary as Seen by the Mystics.
Direct quotes from St. Ambrose, Theophylact, and St. Bede appear in St. Thomas Aquinas's Catena Aurea on Luke 1:56:

St. Ambrose: Mary abode with Elisabeth until she had accomplished the time of her bringing forth; as it is said, And Mary abode, &c.
Theophylactus: For in the sixth month of the conception of the forerunner, the Angel came to Mary, and she abode with Elisabeth three months, and so the nine months are completed.
St. Ambrose: Now it was not only for the sake of friendship that she abode so long, but for the increase also of so great a prophet. For if at her first coming the child had so far advanced, that at the salutation of Mary he leaped in the womb, and his mother was filled with the Holy Spirit, how much must we suppose the presence of the Virgin Mary to have added during the experience of so long a time? Rightly then is she represented as having shown kindness to Elisabeth, and preserved the mystical number.
St. Bede: For the chaste soul which conceives a desire of the spiritual word must of necessity submit to the yoke of heavenly discipline, and sojourning for the days as it were of three months in the same place, cease not to persevere until it is illuminated by the light of faith, hope, and charity.
Greek exegesis: For it is the custom for virgins to go away when the pregnant woman brings forth. But when she reached her own home, she went to no other place, but abode there until she knew the time of her delivery was at hand. And Joseph doubting, is instructed by an Angel.


What did Aquinas do for recreation? Question: What did St. Thomas Aquinas do for fun? We know that he was a brilliant mind who wrote many good works. However, even he himself says that games and having fun are good for one's soul (I am not sure these are exact words, but he said something in that style). There is this quote attributed to him

  Now this relaxation of the mind from work consists on playful words or deeds. Therefore it becomes a wise and virtuous man to have recourse to such things at times.

So, what was he doing to have fun, how did he play? If we do not have information, is there any educated guess? How did Dominicans, in general, have fun in those times?

St. Thomas Aquinas discusses recreation in his question on the modesty of the outward movements of the body (Summa Theologica II-II q. 168). In Article 3 on "Whether there can be a virtue about games?," he writes (co.):

Just as man needs bodily rest for the body's refreshment, because he cannot always be at work, since his power is finite and equal to a certain fixed amount of labor, so too is it with his soul, whose power is also finite and equal to a fixed amount of work. Consequently when he goes beyond his measure in a certain work, he is oppressed and becomes weary, and all the more since when the soul works, the body is at work likewise, in so far as the intellective soul employs forces that operate through bodily organs. […] Now just as weariness of the body is dispelled by resting the body, so weariness of the soul must needs be remedied by resting the soul: and the soul's rest is pleasure
sicut homo indiget corporali quiete ad corporis refocillationem, quod non potest continue laborare, propter hoc quod habet finitam virtutem, quae determinatis laboribus proportionatur; ita etiam est ex parte animae, cuius etiam est virtus finita ad determinatas operationes proportionata, et ideo, quando ultra modum suum in aliquas operationes se extendit, laborat, et ex hoc fatigatur, praesertim quia in operationibus animae simul etiam laborat corpus, inquantum scilicet anima, etiam intellectiva, utitur viribus per organa corporea operantibus. […] Sicut autem fatigatio corporalis solvitur per corporis quietem, ita etiam oportet quod fatigatio animalis solvatur per animae quietem. Quies autem animae est delectatio

Although intellectual and spiritual pleasures are greater than sense pleasures, contemplatives can still grow weary of contemplating too long due to weariness of the body.
Community meals and especially feast days are certainly times for recreation.
The Primitive Constitutions of the Order of Friars Preachers (c. 1228) demands rest on Sundays and feasts, in accordance with the 3rd Commandment:

On Sundays and special feasts, they shall refrain from writing manuscripts. Likewise we forbid servile work on Sundays; for example, to carry stones, collect wood, and so on.

St. Thomas did recreate in the parlor with his fellow Dominican brothers, but not excessively. From the Ystoria sancti Thome de Aquino by William de Tocco (1323), his first biographer (translation from Saint Thomas Aquinas: The Person and His Work by Torrell, O.P., p. 33):

he had the habit since youth of immediately leaving the parlor or meeting, whatever it might be, when, in their common recreations, his interlocutors diverted the conversation toward subjects other than God and what is ordered to him.

St. Thomas did have a sense of humor, too. See Joseph M. Magee's Thomistic Humor Page, esp. Quodlibet q. 12 a. 20 ("Whether truth is stronger than either wine, the king, or woman."), to which I'd add Summa Theologica II-II q. 189 a. 1 ad 5:

it is not necessary for one to be an ass before being a mannon oportet quod aliquis prius sit asinus quam sit homo

☺


Is it immoral to allow children to believe in Santa Claus? St. Nicholas, who is one of my favorite saints, is well known for his charitable witness to the Gospel.  His legendary reputation, along with his feast days, have carried his spiritual presence down through the centuries to our present day.

I'm fully knowledgeable of the origin and evolution of Santa Claus.  In the last 100 years or so the "Santa Claus" recognized on the Coca Cola can has been heavily commercialized. The majority of children in America spend the first years of their lives believing that he is as real as the UPS man.

From what I've noticed, the common characteristics of "Santa" are:

Lives in the North Pole
Employs elf labor
Travels in a sleigh pulled by 8 magically propelled flying reindeer
Successfully delivers billions of toys to billions of children in an 8 hr period
Enters into houses via chimney
Eats cookies

None of these characteristics are true realities.

I assume that its a universally accepted Christian truth that anything purported to be true but is not is a lie.

I also assume that its a universally accepted Christian truth that anyone who knowingly and willing purports a lie is committing a sin.

Is causing or allowing children to systematically/wholeheartedly buy into the commercialized element of Santa Claus within the context of the birth of Christ a sin? Even if its a little "white" lie, is it a sin?

What I mean by "causing" or "allowing" are things like taking children to "mall Santa" and confessing their desires.

I know that by this point I might be sounding like Ebenezer Scrooge, but I'm approaching this from an absolutely moral angle that is free from nostalgia.

Is it a lie or not?

Could it be argued that by conditioning a child's intellect into believing in a false invisible person - this could later undermine the child's faith in a real invisible person like Jesus Christ (or St. Nicholas).

P. S. Christmas is my favorite time of the year and I can't wait until Midnight Mass!

This is not the entire answer, however, I'd like to give you a perspective that may inform the answer. I grew up in a Christian home, where Santa Clause was forbidden, whereas my wife grew up in a Christian home where Santa Clause was a celebrated and beloved part of the holiday.

When I read you question, I could almost here the voice of my mother speaking it. All of the reasons you gave were the reasons that they gave me for not believing. Beyond that (and implicit in your question I think), they also thought that if you were disillusioned of the fantasy of S.C. then you would be more easily disillusioned of your belief in God. Perhaps that was bit of what they experienced growing up, though their parents were not particularly religious.

My experience as a child was One of increasing apprehension and extreme burden carrying the HUGE weight of a terrible secret that I could not let any of my friends in on. I really cannot express the horror I felt, after carrying that burden for so long when inevitably my peers began to find out and started 'letting the cat out of the bag' to the other kids. I have vivid recollections to this day of Christmases in the 2nd and 3rd grade when this was happening.

It may be that not every kid is going to react that way, and I have no doubt it totally depends on the personality of individual kids. However, in my case, I believe it lead to a kind of resentment of parents having to carry around the burden of (what I began to think of, at the time, very young) as my parent's increasingly unfounded faith. When other kids got excited about Halloween candy and costume, I had to look forward to was a night with the lights outs, hearing the doorbell ring and hiding, whilst my mom wold sneak a peek out the window and bad mouthing the parents of any kids she happened to recognize. I spent Christmas hoping my parents would not catch me watching the S.C. history channel special when it aired on the TV, and tip toeing around the question, 'what is S.C. bringing you for Christmas?'. The answer by the way, was 'nothing, I don't believe in S.C.' when an adult ask me in front of my parents, to the considerable shock of the asker, the pride of my parents and the embarrassment of myself. And if another kid ask me at school, the answer was the same as any normal kid. Notice how the burden of my parents having to tell a lie, shifted to me (the child) having to lie? I doubt my parents wanted to field the calls from an upset teacher (or a mad parent) any more than I wanted to reveal the terrible secret.

Long story short, I realized in my mid teens that I did not believe in God, and only came to faith much later. How much did this aspect in my upbringing influence this sad part of my life? I couldn't say, probably not heavily, but certainly was part the entire package of life experiences that lead me down the wrong path.

My wife grew up in believing in S.C. until one day she figured it out, but kept up pretenses for the sake of her parents and younger brother. She never wavered in her faith, and is a extremely devoted Christian to this day.

So all of that doesn't really answer your question. What should the Christian response be here? Certainly, the will of God overrides whatever embarrassment or discomfort that you, or your kids might feel because of it.

Romans 12:2 - NIV
Do not conform to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God's will is--his good, pleasing and perfect will.

I think most Christian ethicists would agree that, as you said, telling some something that is not the truth, for what ever reason, is still a lie, and therefor a sin. I believe that Augustine says that telling an untruth, even if you believe it to be the truth, is still a sin.

So I am genuinely conflicted. I have read Mark Driscoll's article here (http://marshill.com/2010/12/13/what-we-tell-our-kids-about-santa-pastor-mark-for-the-washington-post) where he managed to find some middle ground. It is worth a read for sure. He suggest redeeming SC, telling the child he is real, in a way, through the person of St. Nick, and downplaying the commercialism that is so endemic around the celebration of the birth of Christ. At the same time it allows the child to participate in Santa as part of Christmas celebration, but the parent is being truthful at the same time.


How do people become the sheep that Jesus speaks of in John 10? In my daily Bible study, I've been working through the book of John, and have come to the point where Jesus makes several references to the sheep of His sheepfold. Today's passage, below, which marks 'citizenship' in Jesus' sheepfold as a prerequisite for belief in Him, made me wonder:
"Does the Bible describe the means by which we may become sheep at any point?"
Coming from a Calvinist standpoint, my assumption (lacking evidence to the contrary) is that this 'citizenship' in Jesus' sheepfold is a natural outworking of election/predestination. However, my knowledge is limited, and I'd appreciate other perspectives.

  22 At that time the Feast of Dedication took place at Jerusalem. It was winter, 23 and Jesus was walking in the temple, in the colonnade of Solomon. 24 So the Jews gathered around him and said to him, “How long will you keep us in suspense? If you are the Christ, tell us plainly.” 25 Jesus answered them, “I told you, and you do not believe. The works that I do in my Father's name bear witness about me, 26 but you do not believe because you are not among my sheep.

Assuming I haven't missed the answer as I read through the book, and the other Gospel accounts, I'd be especially interested in answers from denominations or believers who hold an Arminian view of salvation.

As you answer, please be distinct in differentiating means from markers, i.e. if you believe that, "My sheep hear my voice," is a mark of those who are His sheep, please indicate this (either implicitly or explicitly), and the same for if you believe that people become sheep by hearing Jesus' voice.

Thank you for taking the time to answer and/or comment.

ADDED FOR CLARIFICATION:
Thanks for the comments, and the answers, everybody. To address the commenters, the question is indeed regarding one of the parts of the 'order of salvation'. To be saved, we must believe in the sense that Jesus speaks of here (among other things). From my understanding of this passage and this concept, we will not believe if we are not of Jesus' sheepfold, so therefore, being in His sheepfold is necessary for this 'stage' of salvation, so to speak.
I would assert that this is because we are elected, and so we don't choose to be in Jesus' sheepfold, and cannot do anything to get into His sheepfold. However, a theological view that opposes the doctrine of election would, I assume, require some means of getting into His sheepfold.
What I want to know is whether there is any means described in the Bible by which one may do such a thing?

I've also added emphasis to the parts of the original question that concern this issue to give a little contextual clarification to what I was trying to say. Apologies for the confusion.

In these "What would an Arminian say about..." questions, it's important to first denote what kind of Arminian you're talking about. There are 5 points of Arminianism:

Human Free Will - This states that though man is fallen, he is not incapacitated by the sinful nature and can freely choose God.  His will is not restricted and enslaved by his sinful nature.
Conditional Election--God chose people for salvation based on his foreknowledge where God looks into the future to see who would respond to the gospel message.
Universal Atonement--The position that Jesus bore the sin of everyone who ever lived.
Resistable Grace--The teaching that the grace of God can be resisted and finally beaten so as to reject salvation in Christ.
Fall from Grace--The Teaching that a person can fall from grace and lose his salvation.

Not everyone that calls themselves an Arminian agrees with all 5 points--that's why we hear people call themselves "3-point" Arminians, "2-point" Calvinists, and so on.

Within the context of the passage in John 10, the 5-point Arminian perspective would say that hearing and following Jesus are what makes someone a sheep, and that the sheep can essentially "leave" the flock at any time by ceasing to hear and follow.

  John 10:25-28 ESV Jesus answered them, “I told you, and you do not believe. The works that I do in my Father's name bear witness about me, but you do not believe because you are not among my sheep. My sheep hear my voice, and I know them, and they follow me. I give them eternal life, and they will never perish, and no one will snatch them out of my hand.

The Arminian would furthermore cite the subsequent verses as evidence to their claim: Jesus is adjuring the same Jews to believe in the works, that you may know, and essentially become sheep.

  John 10:37,38 ESV If I am not doing the works of my Father, then do not believe me; but if I do them, even though you do not believe me, believe the works, that you may know and understand that the Father is in me and I am in the Father.”


If God is a Trinity, are Father and Son manifestations of Divinity without being spirits? If God is a Trinity of Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, does this mean that Father and Son are manifestations of Divinity without being spirits, so that only the Holy Spirit is a spirit?

Please answer according to the Catholic Church.

Both God the Father and the Holy Spirit are spirits.

For example, catholic.com states,

  ... verses, such as John 4:24, where Jesus teaches us: "God is spirit, and those who worship him must worship in spirit and truth." This means God has no body, because a spirit is, by nature, an incorporeal being.

  The Church Fathers, of course, agreed, and loudly declared the fact that God is an unchangeable, immaterial spirit who has an entirely simple ("incomposite") nature

  It is true that Jesus, who is God, assumed an earthly body when he was born of the Blessed Virgin, and that this body, now glorified, continues to exist. But since the Lord only took on human flesh in these "last days," and since God has always existed, without beginning or end, we must still conclude that having a body is not part of God’s unchangeable nature: he exists in eternity as pure spirit, even though he chose for the Son to also take on a human nature in addition to his bodiless, timeless, divine nature.

Source: http://www.catholic.com/tracts/god-has-no-body

God the Son existed as a spirit before his incarnation as Jesus of Nazareth.

And, to be exact, none of the persons of the Trinity are "manifestations of God"; each person of the Trinity is God.


If God is all knowing then why didn't he prevent Adam and Eve from sinning? God in the Christian faith is said to be the all knowing, everlasting God. But if God is all knowing then why didn't he prevent Adam and Eve from eating from the tree of Good and Evil, or perhaps just not put it in the garden? I mean, God knew that they would disobey him, so why give Adam and Eve access to the tree?

Later on in the book of Genesis it is said that God regrets ever have making humans and floods the earth to get rid of them. Well, didn't God know that humans were going to turn out this way?

Why Did God Create the Universe (or, at least, Humanity)?

The answer to that will speak to your question about God's foreknowledge.

I will propose an executive summary: the purpose of humanity1 is to
know and love God. (Jn 17:3) The testimony of the Scripture is at least compatible
with this idea, though I find more than just circumstantial evidence in
support of it, what's written in the Bible does not say precisely that.

If we accept this (unproven here) conclusion, then God gave humans
free will in order that they might be capable of genuinely loving him.
True love is voluntary, so in order for us to be capable of loving God,
we also had to be capable of something else, including rebellion/sin.

So, even though God knew what choices we would make, if he actually
wanted people to love him, then he had to give them the chance
to do so. Otherwise, our entire existence would have been merely a
thought experiment that didn't turn out well—but that's not why God
created humanity. He wanted us to know and love him.

Even though God knew that not everyone would choose to love him, he
still wanted those who would love him to get to do so.

1 Technically, God created us for his pleasure (Rev 4:11), but this is not entirely informative. If you consider Genesis 1-3 and Revelation 21-22, the idea that how things will be in the end is similar to how they were in the beginning, and that God's desire for us has been the same all along. In Eden, God walked among humans and talked to them. That closeness ceased after humans sinned, but that intimacy is restored again after the resurrection. Jesus summed up eternal life this way: "that they may know [God]." (Jn 17:3).


According to LDS (Mormon) teaching, what is the relationship between Jesus and Lucifer? What does the LDS/Mormon church teach about the relationship between Jesus and Lucifer? Are they beings on the same level or of the same origin? What are their natures? What texts are used to teach specifically about the relationship between them?

The LDS theological view is that God, the Eternal Father, created all spirits, including Jesus the Firstborn, Lucifer, and all the rest of us, as His spirit children. Further, God is a separate being from Jesus and the Holy Ghost, who are all individual personages.

These three beings constitute the godhead, which is different from the usual Trinity belief.

These teachings are in harmony with at least the following scriptures:

Col. 1:15 (Jesus the Firstborn of every creature, image of the Father)
Isaiah 14:12-14 (Lucifer-son of the morning-rebellion)
D&C 76:25-27 (Lucifer, an angel in the authority of God, fell)
D&C 93:21 (Jesus is the Firstborn)
Moses 4:1-4 (God tells Moses what happened in the pre-mortal life with Lucifer)

For context: there was a council in heaven regarding God's plan for all His spirit children. God's plan was presented, and a Savior was needed to fulfill it. Jesus was Chosen by the Father to fulfill that role.

Satan opposed, declaring his plan, which was contrary to the will of the Father. War ensued between "the dragon" (Satan) and the Christ's followers, which war is still ongoing today, here in mortality. It's a sibling rivalry, if you will, which Jesus and His disciples will win in the end.


Matthew/Luke Generations missing between Rahab and David While some people are interested in where the generations are different, my problem comes from where they are the same, to wit:

Boaz,
Obed,
Jesse,
David

Now Rahab is listed as the mother of Boaz. My understanding is that this is the same Rahab mentioned in the book of Joshua as the harlot of Jerico. If true, then both Matthew and Luke list only four generations covering the approximately 400 year period of the judges. There is no way (under normal circumstances) you get only four generations over that period of time unless you want to claim people were still regularly living 200-300 years during this time.

In fact, my NKJV claims there were 11 generations during this time. So my question is: why would both Matthew and Luke fail to mention the 6-8 missing generations that must have occurred during the period of the judges? Small thing I know, but it has bugged me for years and I have never seen it addressed anywhere. TIA

My study bible (The NIV Study Bible by Zondervan) notes that it was a common ancient practice to "telescope" a genealogy -- i.e. to skip over generations when building the list.  In the introduction to 1 Chronicles (where you'll also find a number of "missing" generations in its numerous genealogies), it states:

  The most common type of fluidity in Biblical materials is telescoping,
  the omission of names from the list.  Unimportant names are left out
  in order to relate an individual to a prominent ancestor, or possibly
  to achieve the desired number of names in the genealogy.

Another point to note is that the Hebrew and Greek words commonly rendered in English as "father" & "mother" and "son" & "daughter" did not always refer to the direct parent or the direct offspring of an individual.  Based on context they could and did refer to more distant ancestors or descendants.

In our own time, lacking knowledge of these ancient historical and literary conventions, we have a tendency to be overzealous in our literalism and create difficulties or contradictions where they don't exist.  It's similar to the way we assume an ancient history is presenting a purely sequential chronology of events, when in fact ancient authors would often organize their material out of time sequence to put interrelated or thematically-similar events together in the account.


Children of Adam and Eve What is the differentiation between " sons of God" and "daughters of men" referred to in Genesis  6:1-2. Is it that there were extra-terrestrial human-like beings at the beginning of creation on earth ?

From the KJV Bible,

Genesis 6:4
4 There were giants in the earth in those days; and also after that, when the sons of God came in unto the daughters of men, and they bare children to them, the same became mighty men which were of old, men of renown.

The sons of God are differentiated from sons of man because their height or stature was greatly different. They are the giants or Nephilim, as some versions (e.g. NIV) call it.

Genesis 6:4
4 The Nephilim were on the earth in those days—and also afterward—when the sons of God went to the daughters of humans and had children by them. They were the heroes of old, men of renown.

I quote from Ellicott's commentary:

(2) The sons of God. . . . —The literal translation of this verse is, And the sons of the Elohim saw the daughters of the adam that they were good (beautiful); and they took to them wives whomsoever they chose. Of the sons of the Elohim there are three principal interpretations: the first, that of the Targums and the chief Jewish expositors, that they were the nobles, and men of high rank; the second, that they were angels. St. Jude, Jude 1:6, and St. Peter, 2 Ep., 2Peter 2:4, seem to favour this interpretation, possibly as being the translation of the LXX. according to several MSS. But even if this be their meaning, which is very uncertain, they use it only as an illustration; and a higher authority says that the angels neither marry nor are given in marriage. The third, and most generally accepted interpretation in modern times, is that the sons of the Elohim were the Sethites, and that when they married for mere lust of beauty, universal corruption soon ensued. But no modern commentator has shown how such marriages could produce “mighty men . . . men of renown;” or how strong warriors could be the result of the intermarriage of pious men with women of an inferior race, such as the Cainites are assumed to have been.
The Jewish interpreters, who well understood the uses of their own language, are right in the main point that the phrase “sons of the Elohim” conveys no idea of moral goodness or piety. Elohim constantly means mighty ones (Exodus 15:11, marg.). (Comp. Exodus 12:12, marg., Exodus 21:6; Exodus 22:8-9, where it is translated judges; Exodus 22:28, 1Samuel 2:25, where also it is translated judge.) In Job 1:6 the “sons of Elohim” are the nobles, the idea being that of a king who at his durbar gathers his princes round him; and, not unnecessarily to multiply examples, the “sons of the Elim,” the other form of the plural, is rightly translated mighty ones in Psalm 29:1.

When you read on, it says that the Sethites are among the descendants of Cain. They were boastful and advanced rapidly in the arts or army.
About the Giants, the commentary has this to say:

(4) Giants.—Heb., Nephilim, mentioned again in Numbers 13:33, and apparently a race of great physical strength and stature. Nothing is more probable than that, at a time when men lived for centuries, human vigour should also show itself in producing not merely individuals, but a race of more than ordinary height. They were apparently of the Cainite stock, and the text carefully distinguishes them from the offspring of the mixed marriages. The usual derivation of the name is from a root signifying to fall; but Lenormant (Origines de l’Histoire, p. 344) prefers pâlâ, which means “to be wonderful,” and compares the Assyrian naptû, “unique in size,” often found in the cuneiform inscriptions as the denomination of an ogre.
The same became mighty men.—Heb., They were the mighty men that were of old, men of name. “Gibborim,” mighty men (see Genesis 10:8), has nothing to do with stature, but means heroes, warriors. It is also generally used in a good sense. The children of these mixed marriages were a race of brave fighting men, who by their martial deeds won for themselves reputation.

So, the sons of God are from the descendants of Cain, who are great in stature (which can be known as Giants to inferior men), strength and they were noble/heroic. They are definitely not aliens or angels.


What was done with animals WITH defects? A quick search reveals that the phrase "without defect" appears at least 46 times in the Old Testament. What happened to the animals that had defects? What is a defect, and were they fit for consumption by people?

I think Malachi offers a little more insight into this:

  When you offer blind animals in sacrifice, is that not evil? And when you offer those that are lame or sick, is that not evil? Present that to your governor; will he accept you or show you favor? says the LORD of hosts. - Malachi 1:8 ESV

These are animals that would not be eaten or bred due to illness or other problems.  The idea is that it's not really a sacrifice if it has little value to begin with.


Was God living in darkness before the creation of light? After reading this question, another question came to my mind. If God created the light only after the creation of the universe, then does it mean there was no light in Heaven?

If we read the context in Genesis 1:1-5 carefully, the light created in Genesis 1:3 seems to be the light that we have here on earth, which consists of seven colors. God has already existed long before the universe was created. If there was no other form of light in Heaven before the creation of this universe, that would mean there was no light in Heaven and God was dwelling in darkness. But 1 John 1:5 says, "God is light". This could mean that the light in Heaven and the light we have on earth are not the same.

  This is the message we have heard from him and declare to you: God is
  light; in him there is no darkness at all. (1 John 1:5, NIV)

If God is light, then what was the need to create light again? Does it mean the light that God naturally has is different from the light that God created in Genesis 1:3?

Was God living in darkness before He created the light?

I believe the consensus interpretation of the Fathers to be:

The "light" that is continually attributed to God's nature is its own concept, which we commonly speak of using "optical" language. God has never been without it. Its absence is spiritual darkness.
The "light" of Genesis 1:3 refers principally to the creation of certain spiritual things - heaven, the angels, etc.
Secondarily, this "light" is some sort of primordial energy, which may include the kind of light that we experience in everyday life, but isn't limited to that. (This is not necessarily cleanly distinguishable from the spiritual light of the previous bullet point, though; we with our scientific knowledge want to say that light is just a simple matter of physics, but the Bible was not written in the time of Maxwell.)

In the Bible, light is associated above all with God, as in your quotation from 1 John. This light illuminates us, so that being "in darkness" means being dissociated from God (in a state of sin, deprivation, etc.) and being "in light" is the opposite. Some more examples from the New Testament (NRSV) are John 1 (or actually pretty much anywhere in John):

  In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God. All things came into being through him, and without him not one thing came into being. What has come into being in him was life, and the life was the light of all people. The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness did not overcome it. There was a man sent from God, whose name was John. He came as a witness to testify to the light, so that all might believe through him. He himself was not the light, but he came to testify to the light. The true light, which enlightens everyone, was coming into the world.

Ephesians 5:

  For once you were darkness, but now in the Lord you are light. Live as children of light— for the fruit of the light is found in all that is good and right and true. Try to find out what is pleasing to the Lord. Take no part in the unfruitful works of darkness, but instead expose them. For it is shameful even to mention what such people do secretly; but everything exposed by the light becomes visible, for everything that becomes visible is light.

and 1 Thessalonians 5:

  But you, beloved, are not in darkness, for that day to surprise you like a thief; for you are all children of light and children of the day; we are not of the night or of darkness.

Moreover, heaven, the angels, and the saints are all described in terms of light, for example in the Revelation. It would appear that 1 John 1:5, "God is light", should be talking about this kind of light, as opposed to the electromagnetic phenomenon that resembles it. This interpretation is supported by the writings of the Fathers. For example, Augustine reads the creation of light in Genesis 1 as mainly referring to the creation of the heavenly realm and its angels (City of God 11.7, 9):

  Under the name of light the holy city was signified, composed of holy angels and blessed spirits. [...] When God said, Let there be light, and there was light, if we are justified in understanding in this light the creation of the angels, then certainly they were created partakers of the eternal light which is the unchangeable Wisdom of God, by which all things were made, and whom we call the only-begotten Son of God; so that they, being illumined by the Light that created them, might themselves become light and be called Day, in participation of that unchangeable Light and Day which is the Word of God, by whom both themselves and all else were made.

Similar remarks can be found in Basil's Homilies on the Hexaemeron, Chrysostom's Homilies on Genesis, and so on. Ambrose, in Exposition of the Christian Faith 1.13(79), has a particularly relevant comment: "Think not, then, that there was ever a moment of time when God was without wisdom, any more than that there was ever a time when light was without radiance." God could certainly not have been living in spiritual darkness. The heavenly city, created under the name of "light", should be understood as reflecting the glory of God's eternal "light". (The optical metaphor of reflection is very common in these writings.)

It is true that Augustine (et al.) also see in Genesis 1:3 the creation of "ordinary" light, though they are at a loss to explain exactly what it means for light to exist without some light-giving body (only created in verses 14-19). Augustine says: "What kind of light that was, and by what periodic movement it made evening and morning, is beyond the reach of our senses; neither can we understand how it was, and yet must unhesitatingly believe it." (11.7). Basil  suggests that the light here created was, at least, a special sort of light of indescribable beauty (2.7). In contemporary speculation, and certainly up to the scholastic period, the light meant some kind of abstract energy, not limited to what we perceive as visible light. It is primordial light, analogous to the primordial, unformed, chaotic matter of Genesis 1:2; writers of this period were strongly influenced by Plato's Timaeus and its account of the progressive formation of all things from "raw" substance, the ylem.


Why do Christian's associate Jesus as the son of God? Hi to the Christian community.

I've always wondered why Christian's associate Jesus as the son of God? Let me elaborate. I am Muslim, and in Islam we believe that God has no partner. He is alone.

  Praise be to Allah, Who hath not taken unto Himself a son, and Who hath no partner in the Sovereignty, nor hath He any protecting friend through dependence. And magnify Him with all magnificence. (Chapter (17) sūrat l-isrā (The Night Journey))

In Christianity Jesus is referred to as 'Son of God'. To have a son - God had to have some sort of sexual relation right? If Jesus is a human, what is God? Could someone please 'kindly' explain? Thanks and would appreciate any clarification.

Not all denominations of Christianity give the same answer to this question. But probably all Christians can agree that we believe Jesus to be the Son of God, because he said he was, and the Scriptures repeatedly tell us that's who he is:

  "For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that
  whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting
  life." (John 3:16)

See, "Jesus Christ, Divine Sonship" for many more scriptures.