The Damned and the Beautiful by Paula S. Fass

But then union with human beings would have been precluded for God, since union requires two wills to unite. If God had not willed to create human beings with free will, then all states of affairs would have been up to God alone. When God creates human beings with free will, God judges it acceptable to him that possibly some human beings might not be united with God and that human beings have control over whether this possibility is actualized. But not every unfulfilled desire of God’s is like this not every unrequited love of God’s is a disappointment for God. If God had an unfulfilled desire about the nature of his whole creation, then perhaps it would be true that he would be disappointed in it. In response, it needs to be said that in some cases God does love unrequitedly but the inference to the conclusion that God is disappointed is invalid. On this view, God loves some people who do not love him.īut someone might suppose that if God loves unrequitedly, Christian doctrine is stuck with the specter of a disappointed God. There are some people who never cease rejecting God. On Christian doctrine, which rejects universalism, this possibility is actualized in some cases. On this view, God is open to rejection by human beings, who are not compelled by suffering or anything else to love God. Universalism is not only not a consequence of God’s love it is not so much as compatible with God’s love. But there cannot be a union of love between two persons, even if one of them is divine, unless there are two persons and two wills to unite. On Christian doctrine, God loves all human beings and desires union with them.

The Damned and the Beautiful by Paula S. Fass