Are you going to Hell

  • Thread starter Thread starter ush
  • Start date Start date
Status
Not open for further replies.
U

ush

Guest
Is anyone here afraid that you’ll go to Hell to be tortured and punished? I’m not. I might go to purgatory but I hope to work for life to make I straight into Heaven.

Please pray to God that he helps you confess all your sins and confess them well.

I pray to the Almighty for all members to confess their sins well.
 
ush said:
Is anyone here afraid that you’ll go to Hell to be tortured and punished? I’m not. I might go to purgatory but I hope to work for life to make I straight into Heaven.
Click to expand...
I tend to think everyone should have a healthy fear of being damned. Many great saints certainly did. There’s only a small handful that were really assured of their salvation while still alive.

Also… “might go to purgatory”??? How is that a might? That just seems outright presumptuous to think you have a plausible chance of ascending straight to heaven.
 
Last edited:
ush said:
Is anyone here afraid that you’ll go to Hell to be tortured and punished? I’m not. I might go to purgatory but I hope to work for life to make I straight into Heaven.

Please pray to God that he helps you confess all your sins and confess them well.

I pray to the Almighty for all members to confess their sins well.
Click to expand...
It is a possibility since we cannot be certain of the state of grace without divine revelation.
 
Socrates92 said:
Also… “might go to purgatory”??? How is that a might? That just seems outright presumptuous to think you have a plausible chance of ascending straight to heaven.
Click to expand...
St. Therese of Lisieux didn’t think so, and taught all her novices that they could go straight to Heaven by simply doing as much good on earth as they could for other people, and putting all their trust in God to take them to Heaven.

Some of the other sisters were aghast and told St. Therese the same thing you just wrote.

St. Therese didn’t budge. She also said that if the other sister thought that souls had to go to Purgatory, then the other sister would probably end up there, because the soul gets exactly what it expects from God.

Today, St. Therese is a great saint and a Doctor of the Church.

The Teaching of St. Therese of Lisieux on Purgatory

Ush, if you are serious about wanting to avoid Purgatory, you may also wish to follow the instructions in this useful little book.

How to Avoid Purgatory, by Fr. Paul O’Sullivan
 
Last edited:
'It is good, however, that even if love does not as yet restrain you from evil, at least the fear of hell does. The man who casts aside the fear of God cannot continue long in goodness but will
quickly fall into the snares of the devil.’ - The Imitation of Christ
 
To be fair, I think it’s also the story (which you are free to believe or not believe as you see fit) that she had to spend a short time (a couple seconds or minutes I believe) in Purgatory. I’ll have to see if I can find the reference.

Of course, it is possible to skip purgatory; traditionally this is the privilege of martyrs and a handful of others, so it is certainly not sinful to hope and strive for it. To say that it is anything less than probable that one will have to spend some time there still strikes me as bordering on presumption.

After all, many other great saints focused on “working out salvation in fear and trembling” . Maybe they were less holy than St. Therese? That’s not implausible, as I think St. Therese traditionally never committed a mortal sin. Or maybe you and St. Therese would argue that these saints (the most prominent I think being St. Paul) were somewhat disordered in this approach? I don’t know… I’m not actually that familiar with St. Therese; maybe I should be.

If you want to dive further down the “rabbit hole”, humility is defined something along the lines as having your intellect and will in tune with the truth. If the truth happens to be that one is in the 7th mansion of holiness, there is no pride necessarily in admitting the fact. By way of example, there is zero pride in Our Lady’s proclamation that “all nations will call me blessed” - that statement is accurate.
I suspect most of us are nowhere near, however. This brings up other questions of faith and hope - humility also implies that we should focus less on our own faults and put more trust in God’s grace. Should a soul do so exclusively, and simply ignore all its past faults? I’m not so sure about this. I think it depends where you’re at.

The spiritual life is supposed to be a progression. The typical person will start out being motivated by a fear of Hell. This is good. It is a virtue. Full stop. It is also, admittedly, imperfect. The goal should be to move beyond that point. If you are beyond that point, well and good. If you are not beyond that point, it is disordered to think that you are, and you are probably being motivated by some degree of pride. I suspect most of us probably aren’t beyond that point. But you are correct to think no one can know for sure where someone else is on that journey. So perhaps I misspoke in my initial response to the OP… I’ll just leave it at that and let you respond to any of my musings…

Cheers! 😃
 
Well, as long as you acknowledge the fact and fight like Hell to destroy said handbasket, then there is still hope for you.
 
Hmm. Well… I hesitate to shake such confidence, in fact what I say doesn’t apply to you or to anyone spacificlly. If salvation were a game of chance, which it isn’t, not at all, but you would have a 33.3 percent chance of going to the pit. So right there you have two thirds of a chance of salvation. A salvation shell game.

I don’t like those odds. Who would but that is what many people do. Christ said the way is narrow. For me it is a daily struggle. I think if there were even a small possibility of hell, one should still put everything they can towards salvation. What is 1% of Eath’s population past and present?

The work in my mind is never finished. I spent most of my life following my appitites, so I have to make up for lost time. But even if salvation were mostly in the bag, my faith asks that I help our Lady help save the souls of others, bring people to her Holy Son’s Table. Lots to think about.

I am glad you trust in Christ. That is a very good thing. Self examination is also good. Presumption, is not. That is something we, especially me, has to keep in mind.
Take care ush!
 
Pattylt said:
I thought the teaching was that we would choose hell, not be sent?

So, I’m not going there.
Click to expand...
Why not go there? Yes, just as Katie said we choose hell by our actions. Confession exists becuase we so often make bad choices. With full knoweledge.
 
Nope, I don’t worry about it. Gods decision not mine. Waaaay above my pay grade. I’m more concerned about doing Gods will here.

Peace and God Bless
Nicene
 
I’m afraid of Hell. While I pray to God and hope for salvation, fear of my soul is still in the back of my mind.
 
Last edited:
I’m confident that I’m not going there, not unless I completely abandon the faith and sacraments for some wicked reasons (God forbid). It’s possible, though, however remotely.
 
Last edited:
Doesn’t that sort of make a mockery of the idea that people “choose” Hell? In the sense that you can only choose something if you are certain of it, otherwise you could claim surprise on the day of judgement, sorry if i sound a bit confusing here but it still makes little sense.
 
oliver109 I expect a lot of people will be surprised on the day of judgement! I read that only 10% of Christians make it to Heaven. I don’t know how the priest knew that but he did and wrote it in a book.
 
Well considering there is zero chance of anyone actually knowing what percentage of people are in heaven I’m gonna have to call balongna on that one.
 
Status
Not open for further replies.
Back
Top