Grace

Critically assess the view that in Christian teaching, all people will be saved. [40]

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Mainstream Christian teaching explains that not everybody will be saved.  The Catechism of the Roman Catholic Church confirms, “The Last Judgment will reveal even to its furthest consequences the good each person has done or failed to do during his earthly life”.  It quotes the Parable of the Sheep and the Goats from Matthew Chapter 25, confirming that only the good will be saved and rewarded in heaven while the wicked will be sent to eternal punishment in hell.  Further, the Westminster Confession, accepted by most Protestant Christians, also confirms that “By the decree of God, for the manifestation of His glory, some men and angels are predestined unto everlasting life, and others foreordained to everlasting death” showing that it is not true that “in Christian teaching, all people will be saved.” While a few universalists and inclusivists might argue that in Christian teaching, all people will be saved, perhaps selectively quoting certain Bible passages – such as 1 John 2:2 which suggests that Jesus “is the propitiation for our sins, and not for ours only but also for the whole world…” – in practice this is a distortion of Christian teaching.

Firstly, mainstream Christian teaching is that only baptised Christians will be saved.  John 14:6 famously states “I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me!” which strongly suggests that only Christians can be saved and go to heaven.  While Karl Rahner and John Hick might suggest that for all we know, God being omnipotent and omnibenevolent, might give what Rahner called “anonymous Christians” a second chance to accept Jesus and thus be saved through him after death, this is not a mainstream teaching.  In John 3:5 Jesus said “Except a man be born of water and of the Spirit, he cannot enter into the kingdom of God…” which most Christians interpret to mean that Baptism is necessary for salvation.  Indeed, the Roman Catholic Catechism 1257 teaches that “the Lord himself affirms that Baptism is necessary for salvation…” and the Orthodox Churches teach that baptism is the means by which Christians receive the Holy Spirit, which is necessary for Salvation.  While Quakers, including John Hick later in his life, might argue that sacraments are unnecessary, because the outward signs of grace have no power in themselves and may serve to distract from the spiritual signs of salvation within, this is a minority view.  Most Protestants also teach that Baptism is necessary for salvation, being a sign of election.  The Westminster Confession confirms that “much less can men, not professing the Christian religion, be saved in any other way whatsoever…”  Further, some Christians might argue that unbaptised infants might be saved by the grace of God, so why not good people of other faiths.  Even the Roman Catholic Church, which had taught that unbaptised infants go to limbo, not heaven, changed this teaching in 2007.  Yet Roman Catholic teaching still suggests that “Baptism is necessary for salvation for those to whom the Gospel has been proclaimed and who have had the possibility of asking for this sacrament.” (Catechism 1257) and while it admits that God “himself is not bound by his sacraments…” and might decide to save unbaptised people, this possibility is not known to the Church and seems to conflict with Scripture.  For these reasons then, in Christian teaching not everybody will be saved.

Secondly, mainstream Christian teaching is that only good people will be saved and that the wicked will be punished eternally in hell.  Matthew 25 (the Parable of the Sheep and the Goats) makes it clear that at the Last Judgement God will divide people into the good (sheep) and the wicked (goats) and send them for eternal reward or punishment based on how they have treated “the least of these brothers of mine”.  Similarly, Luke 16 (the Parable of Dives and Lazarus) suggests that once we are in heaven or hell, based on our choices in this life towards the most vulnerable, then this fate is eternal and cannot be changed.  In John 13:34-35 Jesus states “A new command I give you: Love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another. By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another.” This suggests that being “in Jesus” and therefore saved depends on good works, which means that those who do not love others will not be saved.  Based on these scriptures, the Roman Catholic Catechism 1022 teaches that “at the evening of life, we shall be judged on our love…”  and 1033 states “we cannot love God if we sin gravely against him, against our neighbour or against ourselves: “He who does not love remains in death. Anyone who hates his brother is a murderer, and you know that no murderer has eternal life abiding in him.” [1 John 3:14-15] Nevertheless, mainstream Christian teaching also makes it clear that salvation does not depend on works.  Rather, we are saved by grace and God’s decision alone, which does not depend on anything we do or choose.  For Roman Catholics, “Grace is favour, the free and undeserved help that God gives us to respond to his call to become children of God, adoptive sons, partakers of the divine nature and of eternal life” so that being Baptised, taking the sacraments and living a good life are evidence that we have been saved by God’s grace.  Yet, for Protestants, it is possible that a person might be baptised and live an apparently good life and yet still not be saved.  The Westminster Confession explains that “others, not elected, although they may be called by the ministry of the Word, and may have some common operations of the Spirit, yet they never truly come to Christ, and therefore cannot be saved.”  God’s decision to save is one of grace and so independent of anything which we do, or how we might appear to others. John Calvin confirmed that “Therefore, as Paul testifies, election, which is the cause of good works, does not depend upon men.” Commentaries on Election and Predestination. In this way it might seem that it is possible that God saves all people by his grace, including those who are unbaptised and even those who live lives of sin.  Yet there are few Christians who would accept this, because the idea that Hitler and Stalin might end up in heaven alongside the Saints conflicts with Justice, which is one of God’s core attributes.  It follows, therefore, that it is wrong to say that “in Christian teaching, all people will be saved.”

On the other hand, some Christians argue that the existence of an eternal hell is incompatible with God’s goodness. Whatever sins we commit in this life are temporary, so an eternal punishment could not be proportionate, which is a core principle of justice.  If hell is not eternal, it would follow that in the end all people will be saved.  Roman Catholic teaching suggests that after we die, we can atone for sin through Purgatory, a temporary hell, before making progress towards paradise and eventually being released into heaven at the Last Judgement.  The Catechism 1030 stated that “All who die in God’s grace and friendship, but still imperfectly purified, are indeed assured of their eternal salvation; but after death they undergo purification, so as to achieve the holiness necessary to enter the joy of heaven.” Yet this still implies that some people – those who die outside God’s grace and friendship – do go to an eternal Hell.  This is also suggested by the Bible, in Matthew 25, Luke 16 and elsewhere.  Karl Barth and later John Hick both addressed this issue, asking how a just God could punish people for temporary sins – however bad – with an eternal punishment.  They came to similar solutions, that God offers all sinners a “way back” after they die, but that God’s gift of grace is freedom which extends to the ability to reject God’s grace and salvation a second time and choose eternal damnation for ourselves.  Despite this, the idea that all people will be saved eventually is not acceptable to all Christians, because it implies that we are saved by our own decision, not God’s.  Barth tried to get around this by saying that it is freedom which is the gift of grace, so when we choose to accept God’s salvation we are saved through grace.  He wrote “The command of God sets man free…” Church Dogmatics p.586 and “The determination of the elect consists in the fact that he allows himself to be loved by God” p.411  Yet for Augustine and Calvin this is unlikely to be acceptable, because it does seem to limit God’s omniscience.  If God gives us freedom as a gift of grace, allowing us to choose to accept the salvation which is offered to everybody or not, then it might suggest that God does not know whether we will accept or not.  It might be that God limits his own knowledge of who will be saved to facilitate his gift of grace, which is freedom.  Yet this implies that God is limited in power, having to choose between giving us freedom and knowing who will be saved. It might be that God does know who will accept salvation – and who will not accept – despite our freedom. Yet this seems close to Arminianism (and so not compatible with Lutheran or Calvinist Protestant Theology) because God’s knowledge of who would accept salvation and his gift of grace in freedom would be simultaneous in God’s timeless nature and God might be seen to choose who to save or not based on whether they will accept.  It follows that mainstream Christian teaching does not embrace the idea that God offers salvation to everybody and freedom as a gift of grace to either accept or reject that salvation.  In the end, some people will not be saved, and this will be by God’s decision alone, according to mainstream Christian teaching. 

In conclusion, it is not fair to say that “in Christian teaching, all people will be saved.”  While there are a few Christians who might like to think that, and while a few Bible quotes taken out of context might imply that, mainstream Christian teaching is united in its view that some people will not be saved.  This will probably include most non-Christians and serious sinners. 

Critically assess the significance of Augustine’s teaching on human relationships before the Fall. [40]

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This AS question from 2018 is possibly the worst I have seen, and the mark-scheme does little to show that it is a reasonable question to have asked students, let alone AS students, in an examination. Nevertheless, because it is a past question student might encounter it and it is certainly worth considering how it might be answered.

St Augustine taught that human beings existed in a state of CARITAS before the Fall, loving God and loving each other as themselves in an ideal state of AMOR or agape and friendship.  In the City of God Book 14 St Augustine described how God “created man with such a nature that the members of the race should not have died”, such as being IMMORTAL and so in no need of SALVATION.  For St Augustine, human beings had BONA VOLUNTAS before the Fall, much the same as what Kant later describes as a GOOD WILL.  Their choices were directed by REASON and they had, therefore, a UNIFIED WILL and not the DIVIDED WILL that characterizes human nature after the Fall.  It follows that, for St Augustine, the whole blame for the FALL and the evil, suffering and death that it caused, lies within human beings and not with God.  St Augustine’s teaching on human relationships before the Fall is, therefore, a highly significant part of his Theodicy and particularly his Free Will Defence; without his teaching about human relationships before the Fall, St Augustine could not explain how God, being OMNIPOTENT and OMNIBENEVOLENT, allows evil and suffering to exist within His creation.   

Firstly, St Augustine’s teaching on human relationships before the Fall shows that the original choice to disobey God and sin was free in the sense that there were ALTERNATE POSSIBILITIES.  St Augustine is clear that with a unified, good will (BONA VOLUNTAS), human beings would have no reason to disobey… it made no sense to do so.  Although St Augustine saw LUST as the explanation for human beings choosing to do what it made no sense to do, he is also clear that “they are in error who suppose that all the evils of the soul proceed from the body”.  If the body was the source of LUST and what caused us to sin, God as the creator of the body would still be responsible for our sin and its consequences, nullifying St Augustine’s Theodicy.  For St Augustine, it was “the sinful soul that made the flesh corruptible”, so the choice to disobey God was internal to Adam as the agent and not determined by any external factor, even his own body.  The fist sin was man having the PRIDE to live according to his own desire and not God’s, so disobeying God and following his CARNAL WILL.  It follows that St Augustine’s teaching on human relationships before the Fall is highly significant, making his THEODICY and particularly his FREE WILL DEFENCE work.   

Secondly, St Augustine’s teaching on human relationships before the Fall shows that everybody is a SINNER in need of SALVATION through God’s GRACE.  For St Augustine, all human beings were “seminally present” in Adam (God “was pleased to derive all men from one individual”), meaning that all human beings were originally created having BONA VOLUNTAS and existing in CARITAS, not just Adam and Eve, and all human beings sinned against God and earned the punishment for sin which is death (Romans 5), not just Adam and Eve.  This shows that all human beings are capable of CARITAS and that AGAPE as a moral imperative has force, being towards something that our PRE-LAPSARIAN STATE shows that we can do.  In this way, we fully deserve God’s punishment in this life and the next for existing in a state of CUPIDITAS.  Indeed, if God did not punish us (harshly) for our CUPIDITY, God could not be just because then there could be no incentive to change and do what we know we should.  Further, St Augustine’s teaching on human relationships before the Fall supports his teaching about the Fall and Original Sin, which in turn supports his teaching that we depend on God’s GRACE for SALVATION and can in no way deserve or earn it for ourselves.  St Augustine utterly rejected PELAGIANISM, pointing out that it limits God’s OMNIPOTENCE (suggesting that we decide who is saved, not God), OMNISCIENCE (suggesting that the future is open and unknown to God) and OMNIBENEVOLENCE (suggesting that God only saves those who deserves it, when in fact His goodness extends to saving all those who don’t deserve it).  St Augustine agrees with St Paul, who wrote

“For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord.”  Romans 8:38-39

If we are saved, then we are pre-destined for salvation by God’s Grace, and nothing on earth can change that. For these reasons as well, St Augustine’s teaching on human relationships before the Fall is highly significant in his wider THEODICY and THEOLOGY for that matter.   

Nevertheless and despite is significance, St Augustine’s teaching on human relationships before the Fall is problematic.  

Notwithstanding the damning consequences of accepting the story of the Fall as conveying deep truth about human nature (Centuries of SEXISM, MISOGYNY and repressed SEXUALITIES flow from the story of the fall, including our pre-lapsarian state – being seen as ARCHETYPAL in the way that St Augustine’s teaching encourages) St Augustine’s teaching about human relationships before the fall depends on seeing the Bible as containing deep truth, when BIBLICAL CRITICISM casts doubt on this.  Textbooks are wrong to claim that St Augustine was a naïve literalist in the modern sense, seeing the Fall as historical, when he was fully aware of the different genres that the Bible contained and was amongst the first to develop rules for the interpretation of scripture, and yet St Augustine did rely on the Bible conveying truth, albeit in a more complex way.

Further, St Augustine’s teaching on human relationships before the Fall and how they relate to human nature today depends on an antiquated notion of how human beings reproduce.  Although Aristotle’s theory from “On the Generation of Animals” that the male is the efficient cause of his children (the woman only providing the material causes) was commonly accepted in St Augustine’s day, making his claim that all humanity was “seminally present” in Adam seem plausible, the discovery of the human ovum in the 17th Century undermined St Augustine’s claim.  It may be that the potential for all life was contained within Adam and Eve, but while Adam was fully culpable for his sin in the Fall, arguably Eve was not. Eve’s relationship with God was secondary and God’s command not to eat from the tree given to Adam before she was created. Eve’s sin would in breaking God’s commandment would be towards Adam, who she had been created to help… but then she thought she was helping Adam as the fruit was “as good for food and pleasing to the eye, and also desirable for gaining wisdom…” If all humanity was not, as St Augustine suggested, “seminally present” in Adam it does not follow that all human beings sinned in his sin or are justly punished in dying for it.

Also, as John Hick pointed out in “Evil and the God of Love” (1966) p173, St Augustine’s attempt to use human nature to explain the fall and justify God in allowing evil and suffering “considered as a contribution to the solution of the problem of evil… only explains obscurum per obscurius.”  Even if we ignore the problems with taking the story of the fall literally in either a historical or scientific sense, St Augustine blaming human nature for the fall – whether in the body or the soul – does little to excuse God from responsibility for the evil and suffering that frail nature causes, because God created that frail nature and God is supposed to be both OMNIPOTENT and OMNISCIENT… in other words he could have done better and should have known how it would turn out.  

It seems that St Augustine’s teaching on human relationships before the Fall is BOTH highly significant AND deeply problematic.   

The extent to which this is true can be seen in Immanuel Kant’s “Religion within the boundaries of reason alone” (1794).  Kant, as a Lutheran, was deeply influenced by St Augustine, but wanted his philosophical system to work without relying on faith.  Like St Augustine, Kant believed that human beings are born FREE, that we choose to do what is wrong against reason and that this has a permanent effect on our moral character, limiting our freedom.  While Kant called what limits the human ability to have a good will RADICAL EVIL rather than ORIGINAL SIN, the concepts are sufficiently similar for Goethe to claim that Kant had “criminally stained his philosophers’ cloak with the shameful stain of original sin.”  For Kant, as for St Augustine, the possibility for human beings to have a good will (BONA VOLUNTAS) is significant, because it ensures that we can do what we rationally know we should do.  Without evidence that it is possible to have a good will, Kant would be arguing that we should do what nobody can do, which is irrational.  Without evidence that it is possible to have a good will, there would be no CATEGORICAL IMPERATIVE or reason to believe that we really are free or that the universe is really ordered as it appears to be.  For Kant, living in an age where Biblical Criticism made taking Genesis literally impossible, Jesus was the evidence that it is possible to have a good will and live in a state of what St Augustine called CARITAS, so in this way through Jesus we are “saved” from despair through the knowledge that in Jesus what we know we should do is possible.  Jesus is the evidence that human nature “before sin” is and can be good and so the evidence that we should be good, despite the otherwise seeming impossibility of having a good will by Kant’s definition.  Despite this, like St Augustine, Kant’s teaching on the good will is deeply problematic because human beings are born and grow up through a state whereby that are not capable of having a good will – childhood.  As children we are bound to do what is right, not out of a sense of duty, but out of fear, deference to authority or habit… all of which would make the “right” action pollute the will as much as an obviously wrong action, and pollute it permanently, holding us back from ever achieving a good will as an adult.  While Jesus shows that it is possible for a human being to have a good will, there is no sense that Jesus was like us subject to ignorance and tutelage as a child or that as an adult his will was encumbered with the effects of childhood choices.  Because of this, Kant’s teaching about a good will is no more convincing than St Augustine’s.  Like St Augustine, Kant asserts our freedom but provides no real evidence that we have ALTERNATE POSSIBILITIES to choose from.  Like St Augustine, Kant asserts that we are morally responsible for not having a good will (BONA VOLUNTAS) and for living in a state of RADICAL EVIL (CUPIDITAS) without evidence that we could ever have done otherwise.  Just as Kant’s teaching about a good will shows that Kant has no basis for postulating GOD (the universe is not fair, so there is no need to believe in God to explain its fairness), St Augustine’s teaching about human relationships before the fall shows that St Augustine has no basis for believing that God is both OMNIPOTENT and OMNIBENEVOLENT in the face of evil and suffering in the world that He created.   

In conclusion, St Augustine’s teaching about human relationships before the Fall is highly significant.  Without this element of St Augustine’s teaching, St Augustine’s THEODICY and particularly his FREE WILL DEFENCE could not work and St Augustine’s wider THEOLOGY of Grace could not work either.  St Augustine’s teaching about human relationships before the fall are crucial in defending the possibility of God being both OMNIBENEVOLENT and OMNIPOTENT, human FREEDOM real and the universe FAIR, so much so that even Immanuel Kant relied on a similar, albeit unsatisfactory and contentious, theory to explain the human condition.  And yet, St Augustine’s teaching about human relationships before the Fall relies on some degree of Biblical LITERALISM and on scientific NAIVITY. It does not provide the needed evidence that human beings are capable of being good or responsible for all the evil and suffering in the world, because as St Augustine put it, all the evils that affect mankind are “either sin or punishment for sin”.  In the end, the very significance of St Augustine’s teaching about human relationships before the fall undermines his wider attempt at THEODICY and THEOLOGY.   

“Augustine’s theory of Original Sin has no place in the 21st Century world” Discuss (40)

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Original sin is increasingly unpalatable in the 21st century world.  The idea that human nature is sinful to the extent that even new babies are in need of salvation and liable to go to hell if unbaptized is difficult to accept in a western, secular society which idealizes childhood, its purity and its innocence. In addition, the number of unbaptized infants who die seems to be increasing with the development of IVF, the rising world-wide use of abortofascient contraceptives and abortions as well as with fewer parents choosing to baptize their children.  Those educated in liberal societies are less and less willing to accept that a God who exacts justice through the fires of hell could be considered good.  Arguably, original sin is even more difficult to accept in parts of the world where infant mortality of a more traditional sort remains stubbornly high.  What Priest would relish informing a bereaved mother that the eternal fate of her unbaptized child is in question?  Muslims have no concept of original sin, so it is easy to see why Christians in Africa would be as likely to want to agree with the title statement as Christians in the UK would be.  The Roman Catholic Church acknowledged the difficulties with original sin in 2007, the International Theological Commission issuing THE HOPE OF SALVATION FOR INFANTS WHO DIE WITHOUT BEING BAPTISED which was widely interpreted as the Church stepping back from original sin so are as it was able to without undermining previous doctrine and the idea of infallibility. Clearly, St. Augustine has an important place in the 21st Century world.  New books about his life and work are published every year, university courses are devoted to his ideas and his work continues to be enshrined in the doctrine of the Roman Catholic Church.  Augustine is one of the four original Latin Doctors of the Church – the Doctor of Grace.  Further, Augustine’s theology is enshrined within the doctrines of Protestant Churches following Luther and Calvin, who were inspired by his teaching on grace and justification through faith alone.  Given that St Augustine has an undeniably important place in the 21st Century world, the statement must be understood to refer to the place original sin has within the thinking of St Augustine.  Is it possible to argue that Augustine’s theology could work without original sin?  Unfortunately, it is not possible and original sin continues to be important, however distasteful some of its implications might be in the 21st century world.

St. Augustine argued that human nature is sinful. In his Confessions, he described how even babies have sinful natures, which show themselves when they have to share their milk. “I myself have seen and known an infant to be jealous though it could not speak. It became pale, and cast bitter looks on its foster-brother… may this be taken for innocence, that when the fountain of milk is flowing fresh and abundant, one who has need should not be allowed to share it, though needing that nourishment to sustain life? Yet we look leniently on these things, not because they are not faults, nor because the faults are small, but because they will vanish as age increases. For although you may allow these things now, you could not bear them with equanimity if found in an older person.” Confessions 1/7:11  This might suggest that sin is part of our god-given natures, but Augustine cannot allow that sin is God’s fault or a necessary part of His creation.  To do so would be to suggest that God is either limited in goodness or limited in power, neither of which would be compatible with Christian faith.  Instead of limiting God, Augustine argued that sin is our human fault; we choose to misuse our free-will and put self-love (cupiditas) ahead of generous love (caritas), falling into sin and earning just punishment from God. For Augustine, we do this both individually and as a human race.  Without original sin, free-will offers an inadequate defence of God’s omnipotence and goodness, given that children suffer as a result of natural evil just as much (or even more) than do adults and don’t seem to deserve punishment on account of their own choices.  Adam chose to betray God, stupidly putting his self-love ahead of the generous love he should have had for mankind and for God.  All people were “seminally present” in Adam, so humanity collectively turned away from God at the Fall.  Following from this, even the tiniest infant deserves all the suffering it might experience because it inherits sin from Adam and cannot deserve grace without salvation through Christ’s atoning sacrifice. Original sin enables Augustine to side-step the problem of innocent suffering by arguing that there is no such thing as innocent suffering.  Without original sin, Augustine would have to fall back on the idea that innocent suffering can be justified, whether through the learning opportunities and growth it might afford (Irenaeus, Hick) or by being offset by the beauty and goodness it enables (Aquinas).  Any attempt to justify innocent suffering by appealing to the ends it serves is distasteful however.  As Kant pointed out, reason demands that we treat humanity “always as an end in itself and never as a means to an end“.  Can we hold God to a lower standard?  Could a God who allows appealing child-cancer as a means to an end, however great that end might be, be a good God?  Still less could that God be good when we consider that He is also all-powerful and so might reasonably be able to create a world in which the innocent suffering is unnecessary even as a means to the end. Without original sin, there would be no way to defend an omnipotent omnibenevolent God against charges of allowing natural evil and the suffering it causes to children.

In addition, Christ’s sacrifice and the salvation it offered would be unnecessary without original sin.  If human beings are only accountable for sins they choose individually, children and any adults who managed to live a sin-free life could go to heaven without grace and without the service of the Church and its sacraments.  Augustine argued against Pelagius and his suggestion that human beings possess the power to attain their own salvation, not least because Pelagianism opens the gates of heaven to good non-Christian and makes Jesus, who clearly said “I am the way, the truth and the life.  No-one comes to the Father except through me” (John 14:6) a liar.  For Augustine as for St Paul and as for most Christians around the world today, partaking in Jesus’ atoning sacrifice is necessary for salvation.  Without original sin it is difficult to see how this could be true, as some people would be free from sin and worthy of salvation without Jesus, faith or God’s grace.  Such a position could not be compatible either with Roman Catholic Christianity, which requires faith in the sacraments of the Church and their power to cleanse people of original sin… “Born with a fallen human nature and tainted by original sin, children also have need of the new birth in Baptism to be freed from the power of darkness and brought into the realm of the freedom of the children of God, to which all men are called. The sheer gratuitousness of the grace of salvation is particularly manifest in infant Baptism. The Church and the parents would deny a child the priceless grace of becoming a child of God were they not to confer Baptism shortly after birth.”  Catechism 1250 Such a position could not be compatible with Protestant faith either, with its emphasis on justification through faith and the necessity of God’s grace.  As Luther wrote… “Man…does not do evil against his will… but he does it spontaneously and voluntarily. And this willingness or volition is something which he cannot in his own strength eliminate, restrain or alter.” (Luther, The Bondage of the Will, p. 102) Further, as Luther wrote in his Preface to the New Testament… “the gospel demands faith in Christ: that He has overcome for us sin, death, and hell, and thus gives us righteousness, life, and salvation not through our works, but through His own works, death, and suffering, in order that we may avail ourselves of His death and victory as though we has done it ourselves.” (Luther, Preface to the New Testament) In this respect Protestant Christian faith and Roman Catholic Christian faith concur; original sin is an undeniable part of human nature.

It is sometimes claimed that Orthodox Christians sustain a faith that is not dependent on original sin. If this was true, Orthodoxy might offer a way to agree with the title-statement and dispense with the theory of original sin.  However, while it is true that St Augustine has less prominence within the Eastern tradition of Christianity and while original sin has no place in Orthodox doctrine, it is wrong to suggest that Orthodox Christians have no concept of inherited sin or that they disagree with other Christians over either the sinfulness of human nature or the necessity of grace and salvation through the Church.  Orthodox Catechisms affirm that Orthodox Christians believe that human beings inherit sin from Adam and need God’s Grace and Christ’s salvation much as other Christians do:  “all have come of Adam since his infection by sin, and all sin themselves. As from an infected source there naturally flows an infected stream, so from a father infected with sin, and consequently mortal, there naturally proceeds a posterity infected like him with sin, and like him mortal.” Catechism of St. Philaret (Drozdov) of Moscow, 168  Orthodox Churches look to the teachings of Church Fathers such as John Cassian who taught that humans have a depraved nature and suffer from inherited sin.  Orthodox Churches also accept the writings of St Paul, on whose ideas about Adam and Christ as the new Adam in 1 Corinthians 15 Augustine based his theory of original sin.  Orthodox Christianity does not, in the end, offer a way of accepting the title statement and agreeing that original sin has no place in the 21st century world, although Orthodox Christians might not place such emphasis on Augustine as the originator of the theory of original sin.

In conclusion, St Augustine’s theory of original sin has an undeniably important place in the 21st Century world.  Although many Christians might wish is was otherwise, in practice it is not possible to sustain belief in a perfect God or the necessity of His grace and Salvation through Christ and the Church without original sin.  To put it quite clearly, if original sin has no place in the 21st Century world, then neither does Christianity.  The Roman Catholic Church has gone as far as is reasonably possible in retreating from teaching that Limbo is the certain destination of unbaptized infants and leaving their fate to the mercy of God, with whom “all things are possible” (Matthew 19:26) and whose ways human beings can scarcely understand after all (Isaiah 55:8-9).