Are most people going to Hell?

[Lief_Erikson]

It is. Thanks. I love how God guides those that follow him.

 

[summasix]

Scripture says there is a Hell, but where does it say who is in it, or that anyone is even there at all? There is a reason the Church specifically names saints, but not reprobates. There may or may not be a majority of people in Hell. However, I consider myself a believer not only in Sacred Scripture, but also Sacred Tradition. If I recall correctly, the blessed children of Medjugorje saw in a vision that more people were in Purgatory than in Heaven or Hell combined.

 

[Nickkname]

As I understand it, most people are going to Hell. Jesus Himself says so in the Bible when he says that the road to hell is wide, and the gate to Heaven is narrow and few enter it or something like that.

Furthermore, the Catechism says that no one is deemed ignorant of the moral law written in our conscience (or something similar), so people who deliberately and with full knowledge commit adultery, murder, theft etc. are in mortal sin even if they never heard of Catholicism. Right?

olrl.org/snt_docs/fewness.shtml is a sermon by a saint, and here are some quotes:

So is it true that most people are going to Hell?

Thanks!

Speculating about who goes to hell or goes to heaven is not the right of man; only God can judge man and says who goes where.

You must think about your eternity before you start thinking about how many are in hell for eternity. Besides, it’s not your business about the number in hell or the number in heaven. Like Jesus said, “No one but the Father knows who is on his right or who is on his left”. Furthermore, knowledge of how many are in hell will not secure your salvation. Knowledge of Jesus Christ, however, will!

 

[Jimdandy]

Not quite.Jesus sits at the right hand of the Father, and Mary sits at the right hand of Jesus:thumbsup:

If you love the Lord, your God with all your mind, body, soul and strength, and love your neighbor as yourself, well…

I’ll see ya in heaven!!

 

[expectthebest]

Speculating about who goes to hell or goes to heaven is not the right of man; only God can judge man and says who goes where.

You must think about your eternity before you start thinking about how many are in hell for eternity. Besides, it’s not your business about the number in hell or the number in heaven. Like Jesus said, “No one but the Father knows who is on his right or who is on his left”. Furthermore, knowledge of how many are in hell will not secure your salvation. Knowledge of Jesus Christ, however, will!

You may be right about speculation. But, if most of us are really going to hell, I think we should probalby be living in a lot more fear. Scripture also indicates that most go to hell which doesn’t seem to jibe with the love of God in his creation. This is difficult to understand. I could understand a few of the worst going to hell but most of us? I mean, would any of you intentionally conceive a child that you new without a doubt would go to hell? I doubt it. God’s love for us must be many times that of which we, as human, are capable of feeling.

 

[expectthebest]

If I recall correctly, the blessed children of Medjugorje saw in a vision that more people were in Purgatory than in Heaven or Hell combined.

Is this true?

It also makes me wonder how much of what they were shown was symbolic rather than real.

 

[expectthebest]

Well, I’ve posted four in a row, I’d might as well go for another!

What do you all think about this:

I was once in a discussion with a person about the comprehension of God. The discussion context was how one answers that we just can’t understand the mind of God. He answered the question this way:

Man is a finite being. God is an infinite being to even a greater level than infinity since He created infinit to being with. Logically, the finite (man) **can not ** comprehend the infinite (God).

This always seemed to make a lot of sense to me. Now, if one takes this line of thinking and places it in the context of this discussion, one could come to the conclusion that it is impossible for man as a finite being to fully comprehend the infinite nature of Heaven or hell just as it is impossible for us to fully comprehend all the mystical Truths of the Faith (fully God and man, the Trinity, the uncaused first cause, etc.).

Man is absolutely incapable of understanding the mind of God. Devine revelation might help us understand on a very minor level but the ability for man to understand what God understands is the difference between the intellect of a genious and that of an insect; a stupid insect for that matter! Even if God came down to earth and explained all the secrets of the universe, we would still not be able to comprehend what he was telling us. Our minds simply are not capable.

So, just as God knows we cannot gain Heaven by ourselves because of our very nature as a finite being, he must know that we can’t really comprehend hell by the same reason. If we can’t fully comprehend a punishment, how can we give full consent to an action which might deliver that punishment? For example, if I told my 6 month old child that if he did not go to sleep, he would have to write “I will always obey what my parents tell me” 500 times, it would not make any difference because the kid does not have the capability to fully comprehend the punishment for his action.

This line of thinking often makes me wonder if there really isn’t more to judgement after death then what the Church has revealed. Could it be that during judgment, God actually allows us to have a more infinite knowlege of eternity once we are free of our human bodies which allows us to truely decide with at least something approaching full comprehension of what lies ahead? Perhaps the “hell” being talked about is really Purgatory. Not that there isn’t an enternal hell, but as differenciated as a place saved for only the most wretched evil souls in the sense that most would think there is a very big difference between someone who is guilty of using artificial birth control and one who murders a million people. Surely both can’t deserve the same punishement.

Ok, enough for now.

Does anybody have any thoughts or comments about the above statement? Or does everybody just believe that I’m a crackpot?

 

[Lief_Erikson]

God’s love for us must be many times that of which we, as human, are capable of feeling.

Very true.

I mean, would any of you intentionally conceive a child that you new without a doubt would go to hell?

Here’s the tricky thing. If God acted on his foreknowledge that the child would choose hell by preventing the child from ever being conceived, he would be interfering with everyone’s free will. God could allow only those people to be conceived that he knew would choose paradise, but how could their choice really be free if he prevented the conception of anyone who wouldn’t choose paradise? The choice to reject God just absolutely wouldn’t be a real option for anyone who exists. So no one could be truly free. To deny people conception because of foreknowing they’d choose hell would be to deny them the dignity of free will. The possibility of hell is necessary for humans to truly be free.

 

[Nickkname]

1. NEVER believe visionaries until the Church has given her judgmental. Wait patiently for the judgment of the Church, even if it dose not come in your lifetime. You cannot be sure whether a visionary is real or not, no matter what signs or wonders, miracles or conversions take place. So just wait. This goes for Medjugorje.
2. Nobody, neither man or angel, knows the mind of God. I’m reminded of a beautiful story Augustine relates: He was at the beach, pondering the essense of God, when he saw a small child. The child was trying to collect water into a hole he had dug. He asked the child what he was doing, to which the child replied, “I’m trying to fill this hole with the ocean.” Augustine replied, “That is impossible! You cannot possible get all the water into such a tiny hole.” To which the child said, “Then why are you, O finite man, trying to fathom the infinite God?”
3. No one knows who is going to hell or not. That judgment is reserved for God and God alone, even if we think or feel that most or all people will be going to hell or heaven or purgatory or whatever. Since no one knows one’s destiny, one must live always as a child of God. Not as a mercenery, working for pay, nor as a soldier, out of fear of death, but as a child, full of love.
4. “Jesus sits at the right hand of the Father, and Mary sits at the right hand of Jesus.” True, but this dose not mean that we know who is Jesus’ left and who is on his right. So let’s not be judges; let’s just be children of God.

 

[expectthebest]

Very true.

Here’s the tricky thing. If God acted on his foreknowledge that the child would choose hell by preventing the child from ever being conceived, he would be interfering with everyone’s free will. God could allow only those people to be conceived that he knew would choose paradise, but how could their choice really be free if he prevented the conception of anyone who wouldn’t choose paradise? The choice to reject God just absolutely wouldn’t be a real option for anyone who exists. So no one could be truly free. To deny people conception because of foreknowing they’d choose hell would be to deny them the dignity of free will. The possibility of hell is necessary for humans to truly be free.

I disagree. There is a big difference between most going to hell and only a very few going to hell. The Holy Spirit can give as much Grace to any individual as He wants. Certainly, with enough Grace, it would become impossible not to love God.

In addition, I don’t give my children the dignity of free will. They do as I say for their own good. If I knew that by conceiving a child I would be creating a human that would be damned to hell, I wouldn’t do it for the love that I feel for my children. Why would I expect God’s love to be any less? After all, we are “children” of God.

 

[expectthebest]

1. No one knows who is going to hell or not. That judgment is reserved for God and God alone, even if we think or feel that most or all people will be going to hell or heaven or purgatory or whatever. Since no one knows one’s destiny, one must live always as a child of God. Not as a mercenery, working for pay, nor as a soldier, out of fear of death, but as a child, full of love.

Yes, you are correct on an individual basis. However, the Church has the teaching authority to tell us what Scripture means. Jesus used the explanation of the few and the many. Shouldn’t the Church be able to teach us what this means on the basis of humanity and not an individual?

It is also very difficult, and maybe it should be, for someone to live out of love when they know they have a better than 50% chance of being damned. You say to just live the best we can. Well, how far does one take that? This was one of Luthers issues. I don’t believe anyone truely lives the best life that they can. I mean, we could all shut the world out and live in convents and monistaries. This would certainly give us a better chance of not falling into sin. If we are to all do the best we can, how far do we take it?

 

[Lief_Erikson]

I disagree. There is a big difference between most going to hell and only a very few going to hell.

Only a numerical difference. But Jesus said the path to hell is broad and many take it, and the path to heaven is narrow and few take it. I tend to believe him over a visionary.

The Holy Spirit can give as much Grace to any individual as He wants. Certainly, with enough Grace, it would become impossible not to love God.

If people reject the grace of God, no matter how much he offers (and the scripture says he gives the Spirit without limit), it won’t do any good. God can offer a warehouse of food to a starving man, and can multiply that to a billion warehouses of food, but if the person refuses to eat, he’ll die. Unless God force-fed him, which is analogous to the denial of Free Will.

In addition, I don’t give my children the dignity of free will. They do as I say for their own good.

Actually, nothing you do could possibly deny them of the benefit of Free Will. Free Will consists only in the ability to make your own decisions, not in the right to make your own decisions. I have the ability to go and commit murder because I have Free Will, but I have no right to. Your children have the ability to steal cookies, but they have no right to, and the fact that you’d punish them if they do very bad things helps them to grow up properly. There is a big, big difference between the internal ability to choose what one wants and the right to do what one wants. No one, even by torturing someone else into submission, can ever force them to do anything that they don’t choose to submit to of their own free choice. It might be a heavily pressured choice, but no one can get inside someone else’s brain and seize control of it without its consent except God, and he chooses not to.

If I knew that by conceiving a child I would be creating a human that would be damned to hell, I wouldn’t do it for the love that I feel for my children.

Let’s change the scope to something in our own lives. If you had the power to magically seize power over your child’s will and force him to not steal any cookies with a special magic command (assuming magic isn’t evil, here), would you do it? Would you force your child to be your perfectly good child through your magic powers, or would you allow him the ability (not the right, mind) to steal cookies and then take the consequences (a spanking), and learn from them?

And if the answer is that you wouldn’t psychologically brutalize your child in this way, what if your child wanted to do something really grave, like steal somebody’s car? Would you use your magic power to change your child’s will so that he only wants to do right, or would you allow the authorities to punish your child for his action?

I can’t think of any case in our human experience where we’d feel it was legitimate to force someone to think something else through brutalizing their personality by eliminating their Free Will. When I say end their Free Will I’m thinking of the imperio curse in Harry Potter where people are suddenly forced to do what the wizard wants and really have no choice. There’s a big difference between that condition and the condition of a person who does what’s bad and then suffers consequences. They still have the final word on their own actions or thoughts or words, and if they feel pressured into a course, they make the decision to go down that course. No one can make it for them, in the end.

If you chose not to conceive someone because you knew they’d choose hell, you’d be denying the person the ability to make their own mind up about their own fate. Everyone has the ability to make up their own minds- that’s Free Will. No one has the right to choose evil, though. Evil deserves punishment and receives it. The ability to do evil is good, though, for without the possibility of a person choosing evil, all of their righteous acts become robotic.

Why would I expect God’s love to be any less? After all, we are “children” of God.

It isn’t any less. Free Will is a gift because God doesn’t want robots but lovers who choose to love him rather than being forced to love him. Would you like a thousand people surrounding you who care for you as a friend because they’ve made up their own minds that they respect and admire your character, or would you like a thousand robots surrounding you, telling you they’re your friend because that’s what they’re programmed to say?

 

[Nickkname]

Yes, you are correct on an individual basis. However, the Church has the teaching authority to tell us what Scripture means. Jesus used the explanation of the few and the many. Shouldn’t the Church be able to teach us what this means on the basis of humanity and not an individual?

It is also very difficult, and maybe it should be, for someone to live out of love when they know they have a better than 50% chance of being damned. You say to just live the best we can. Well, how far does one take that? This was one of Luthers issues. I don’t believe anyone truely lives the best life that they can. I mean, we could all shut the world out and live in convents and monistaries. This would certainly give us a better chance of not falling into sin. If we are to all do the best we can, how far do we take it?

Like St. Augustine said, “Love, and do what you want.”

 

[emeraldisle]

So, just as God knows we cannot gain Heaven by ourselves because of our very nature as a finite being, he must know that we can’t really comprehend hell by the same reason. If we can’t fully comprehend a punishment, how can we give full consent to an action which might deliver that punishment? For example, if I told my 6 month old child that if he did not go to sleep, he would have to write “I will always obey what my parents tell me” 500 times, it would not make any difference because the kid does not have the capability to fully comprehend the punishment for his action.

Imo the crucial point in understanding Gods judgement re hell is to understand what God has revealed to us in the Scriptures about His character. God is just and He always will be just, He will judge all people justly.

But let him who glories glory in this, that he understands and knows Me, that I am the LORD, exercising lovingkindness, judgment, and righteousness in the earth. For in these I delight,” says the LORD. Jeremiah 9:24
.

 

[summasix]

Only a numerical difference. But Jesus said the path to hell is broad and many take it, and the path to heaven is narrow and few take it. I tend to believe him over a visionary.

True enough. But many and few are not definitive adjectives. By The Lord’s standards, 1 out of 100,000 going to hell may classify as many. In that case I would agree, anybody going to hell is too many.

 

[Lief_Erikson]

True enough. But many and few are not definitive adjectives. By The Lord’s standards, 1 out of 100,000 going to hell may classify as many. In that case I would agree, anybody going to hell is too many.

Quite a twist of the words “many” and “few.” Your interpretation makes their meaning the exact reverse of the definitions of the words.

This also would make Jesus’ statements that the gate to life is narrow and the road hard, and the path to destruction easy, nearly meaningless. The choice of these words suggest that Jesus meant to warn the disciples that it isn’t easy to enter paradise, but if he was really saying that most people make it just fine, then all his dire adjectives in these two verses (Matt 7:13-14) are undermined.

Also, if the statement really meant, “Enter the narrow gate, for even a handful entering destruction is a disaster,” this actually would encourage laxness on the part of the disciples. It certainly wouldn’t encourage anyone to take pains in their spiritual lives. This is one more reason it is unlikely that this was the meaning.

I really, really think that you’ve formed a belief on your own intellect that hell won’t contain many people, and then you’ve interpreted that backward onto the scripture in an extremely unnatural fashion. Most people reading it would never come to that conclusion unless they were purposely trying to find a way around what is clearly stated.

 

[expectthebest]

Only a numerical difference. But Jesus said the path to hell is broad and many take it, and the path to heaven is narrow and few take it. I tend to believe him over a visionary.

No, it’s not just a numerical difference. It’s a general doctrine rather than an individual judgement. There is a big difference.

No one, even by torturing someone else into submission, can ever force them to do anything that they don’t choose to submit to of their own free choice.

I didn’t think the Church taught that doing something under the threat of torture was really a free choice. It’s certainly not concent of the will.

If you had the power to magically seize power over your child’s will and force him to not steal any cookies with a special magic command (assuming magic isn’t evil, here), would you do it? Would you force your child to be your perfectly good child through your magic powers, or would you allow him the ability (not the right, mind) to steal cookies and then take the consequences (a spanking), and learn from them?

And if the answer is that you wouldn’t psychologically brutalize your child in this way, what if your child wanted to do something really grave, like steal somebody’s car? Would you use your magic power to change your child’s will so that he only wants to do right, or would you allow the authorities to punish your child for his action?

If it meant the difference between my child spending eternity in hell or eternity in Heaven, I absolutely would influence his choice in any way that I could. Of course I would. What parent would allow their kid to go to hell if there was anything they could possibly do to keep it from happening? I think any of us would choose Heaven over free will any day.

The ability to do evil is good, though, for without the possibility of a person choosing evil, all of their righteous acts become robotic.

You’d better believe that I’d rather be an unthinking robot then end up in hell for eternity. I’d rather be an unthinking robot then have a less than 100% chance of making it to Heaven. I’d only be unthinking for a short time when Heaven is for eternity.

It isn’t any less. Free Will is a gift because God doesn’t want robots but lovers who choose to love him rather than being forced to love him. Would you like a thousand people surrounding you who care for you as a friend because they’ve made up their own minds that they respect and admire your character, or would you like a thousand robots surrounding you, telling you they’re your friend because that’s what they’re programmed to say?

You are looking at this from a purely human prospective. God created us, as flawed as we are. But, that’s the way he created us. Now we are to believe that our creater will allow most of us to go to hell even though He created as as imperfect as we are. It seems to me that as great as God’s love is, he’s rather make the choice for us then let us end up in hell for eternity.

 

[expectthebest]

Like St. Augustine said, “Love, and do what you want.”

That does not answer anything. For example, would you be ready to cut off your arm with a pocket knife rather than offend God? Most people sin daily so I think for most the answer is no.

 

[expectthebest]

Imo the crucial point in understanding Gods judgement re hell is to understand what God has revealed to us in the Scriptures about His character. God is just and He always will be just, He will judge all people justly.

But let him who glories glory in this, that he understands and knows Me, that I am the LORD, exercising lovingkindness, judgment, and righteousness in the earth. For in these I delight,” says the LORD. Jeremiah 9:24
.

How do you know you’ve done enough to know you’ll be on the good side of God’s judgment?

 

[Jerry-Jet]

Jesus taught that the road to eternal life is narrow and FEW there are that find it.

Why don’t people believe Jesus?