Activity

Penal substitution is the idea that Christ died to take the punishment for our sins. This idea pits God the Father against God the Son. It implies that God the Father is wrathful against humanity and not loving. Also, it would mean that we inherit guilt for Adam and Eve’s sin. In this talk Orthodox priest Father Peter Farrington talks about why we do not inherit guilt for Adam’s sin and why humanity never owed God an infinite debt. He explains that Christ died to destroy the ontological forces of death that entered into the world by Adam’s sin. He analyses how the writings of the Greek Church Fathers do not support penal substitution. He explains that the Orthodox Church is opposed to the heresy of penal substation and teachings something quite different. Dr. Farrell talks about these issues in his member’s webinar on Corporate Personhood and in his book “God, History, and Dialectic”. As many of you know, he reiterates the need to become theologically literate to understand how western culture, law, economics, and many other disciplines developed in the west. Indeed, Orthodox theology has the potential to nourish traditional western culture and help it flourish again.