"A Calvinist dystopia"

That framework is only sustainable, I think, because our knowledge is incomplete and imperfect. Calvinists know that some few are among the elect, and that Jesus’ atonement is not for all/most. But Calvinists have no way of knowing, with certainty, who the elect might be.

If that knowledge were available — if it were obvious and certain — then Calvinism would not last another generation. It would collapse partly due to ethical incoherence and partly due to ethical horror.

For an example of what I mean by ethical incoherence, here again is a quote we discussed recently from Calvinist pastor and blogger Kevin DeYoung. What he’s describing here is that idea of “limited atonement,” but DeYoung explains that with unvarnished candor:

    It’s not true to say that God loves everyone. Certainly not in the same way that He loves His children. And this is perhaps the best way to get at the question and why it’s striking to us. Does God always work for the joy and the happiness and the good of His children? Yes. Does He want to see all of His children come to believe in faith in Him? Yes. Will God in the end see that all of His children believe in Him, rejoice in Him, belong with Him forever? Yes. Are all people God’s children? No.

Some people are God’s children and some people are not. Legal equality, justice, the Golden Rule, universal human rights and human dignity are still necessary in this framework, but only because of our incomplete and imperfect knowledge. Better knowledge, more complete knowledge, would allow us to stop treating all people equally because, in this scheme, people are not equal. There would be no reason to treat everyone the same because, according to this doctrine, everyone is not the same.

Some are loved by God, others are not. Some are God’s children, others are irredeemably damned. If we knew for certain who was who, then our ethics would be transformed — reshaped to align with the character of God that this scheme suggests. Ethics, in other words, would revert to something more like the ethnic cleansing of Jericho and Ai.

By ethical horror I mean parents and children. Limited atonement is quite limited. The gate to salvation is narrow, but the gate is wide that leads to destruction. Most people, in other words, are not among the elect. And thus most children are not among the elect.

Calvinist parents can cope with the implications of that only because our incomplete knowledge allows room for denial. Complete knowledge would make that impossible. Parents — most parents — would know that the children they are raising are preordained for eternal conscious torment. They would know that the children they love are not loved by God as the children of God.

A majority of the population would come to see — to know — that they possess a greater capacity for love than God does. I don’t think any religious system could long survive such horrifying knowledge.

http://www.patheos.com/blogs/slacktivist/2012/10/13/theology-science-fiction-a-calvinist-dystopia/

Several problems:

i) In Calvinism, everyone is entitled to equal justice. Elect and reprobate are both entitled to equal justice. However, everyone is not entitled to equal mercy, for the simple reason that no one is entitled to mercy. Sinners have forfeited the right to demand forgiveness.

ii) A presupposition of unconditional election is that sinners are naturally equal. The elect aren’t morally or naturally superior to the reprobate. The elect were chosen despite their iniquity, which they share in common with the reprobate.

iii) Keep in mind that Fred Clark has politically correct, UN-style definition of justice. He calls himself “a snarky, liberal, tree-hugging, pro-choice, pro-GLBT, peacenik, commie, evolutionist.”

http://www.patheos.com/blogs/slacktivist/about/

Sure, his choice of terms is a bit tongue-in-cheek, but you get the picture. So there’s no doubt that by his radically chic yardstick, Calvinism is unjust. But then, by his yardstick, many passages of Scripture are morally deplorable.

Notice the increasingly popular linkage between the rejection of Calvinism and the rejection of OT ethics: “Ethics, in other words, would revert to something more like the ethnic cleansing of Jericho and Ai.”

i) Once again, this illustrates the fact that people like Fred aren’t just attacking Reformed theism. They are attacking OT theism. Biblical theism.

ii) Keep in mind that God didn’t order the execution of all pagans. He only commanded the execution of pagans in the Promised Land, who chose to stay and fight.

iii) Since the new covenant doesn’t have a category for ritually clean geography, even if we knew who the reprobate were, that wouldn’t logically lead to purging the reprobate from our midst. Under the new covenant, there is no holy land in that sense. In the new Eden/new Jerusalem, the world will be purified. But that’s something God will do on Judgment Day. 

“The gate to salvation is narrow, but the gate is wide that leads to destruction.”

That doesn’t single out Calvinism. That’s not specific to limited atonement or limited election. Rather, that’s a general proposition about limited salvation. Not everyone will be saved. Some are damned.

“A majority of the population would come to see — to know — that they possess a greater capacity for love than God does.”

In a sense, that’s true. For instance, the wife of a murderous dictator may be devoted to her husband. She adores her sadistic, homicidal husband. But God doesn’t share her affection for the murderous dictator.

Likewise, the mother of a serial killer may continue to love her vicious son. God doesn’t share her maternal instinct.

Sinners can love the wrong things. A greater capacity for love is not inherently virtuous. It all depends on what you love. Some people love evil.

i) Now let’s move on to Fred’s main point. What if the elect knew who the elect were? What if the elect knew who the reprobate were? What if we could intuitively detect which is which? How would that discernment affect the way we treat the reprobate?

ii) Fred combines this with foreknowledge of a person’s eternal fate. It’s not just a matter of knowing who is reprobate. It’s a matter of knowing what that entails.

But in that case, framing the issue in terms of election and reprobation is a distraction. The heart of Fred’s hypothetical doesn’t lie in knowing who is reprobate, but in knowing–or foreknowing–who is hellbound. Fred’s hypothetical doesn’t single out Calvinists. Fred’s hypothetical is applicable to any orthodox Christian who believes in hell. How would you treat someone you knew was bound to be damned?

That’s an interesting hypothetical. But that’s a philosophical question rather than a theological question. A curious speculation.

iii) Let’s approach the answer indirectly. First of all, there’s the general question of how we’d adjust to life if we knew the future. There are fictional stories which explore that theme. The way this plays out is that a character who knows the future will be depressed. He can’t enjoy the present, for the present is overshadowed by his prescient perception of all the bad things which will befall friends and relatives. These scenarios are fatalistic. He knows the future, but he can’t change the outcome. At best, he can prevent a particular tragedy, but his intervention will simply postpone the tragedy. When fate is blocked, it takes an alternate route.

iv) To some degree, this has real-world analogies. There are parents whose child was born with a fatal degenerative disease. The doctor tells them their child will die in roughly so many years. They live with that fateful knowledge. It haunts them.

Similarly, you may have a friend or relative who’s diagnosed with incurable cancer.  You know he’s doomed and he knows he’s doomed.

v) In principle, there are two opposite ways of responding. One way is to make the most of the remaining time. Because the time is short, you spend more time with your doomed friend, child, parent, sibling.

vi) Another way is to keep your distance. Avoid getting too attached, because that will make the separation more painful.

vii) Let’s shift to the hypothetical situation of knowing in advance who is going to hell. If that’s someone you care about, your days will be full of foreboding. One question is whether you know something he doesn’t. In this hypothetical, do you know he is doomed, while he is blissfully ignorant of his dire fate? Would you tell him, or would you keep that to yourself?

viii) If we knew their fate, that would cast a shadow over our time with them. That would darken our days. On the other hand, we wouldn’t take them for granted. We wouldn’t act as if they will always be a part of our lives. We’d be less inclined to neglect them.

Their foreseen plight would tend to evoke compassion. We’d feel sorry for them.

ix) It would also be humbling. We’d vividly realize that it could just as well be us. We don’t deserve God’s grace.

x) Of course, we’d see still be seeing the reprobate for what they are, not what they will become. If we saw their hellish character in full bloom, that would be repellent.

Knowledge of a person’s future can cut both ways. If you knew the kind of man that Joseph Stalin would grow up to be, you’d certainly look at him differently. At the very least, you’d be ambivalent.

xi) Atheists typically think all of us are doomed. All of us are living in the shadow of oblivion. Everyday the long lethal shadow edges closer. We know ahead of time that we are going to die, and when we die, that’s it. The threat is inexorable. 

xii) This, in turn, can lead to a ruthless posture when there’s a conflict between your survival and another’s survival. If, sooner or later, everyone will pass into oblivion, then what’s wrong with killing somebody to buy yourself extra time?

What does Fred believe? Does he believe in the immortality of the soul? The resurrection of the body? Given how liberal he is, why would he believe in one or both of those pillars of the afterlife, when he rejects Biblical eschatology in general?