At what level does the existence of heaven justify the existence of hell?
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STT
Guest
What if there is no God.
Mohamad and his family suffered a lot.
We all rise from dead at the end of time.
Buddha performed miracles Miracles of Gautama Buddha - Wikipedia. Koran is Mohamad’s miracle.
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STT
Guest
Why? He said that Beatific Vision is just a hallucinations. Are you saying that a all powerful and all knowledgeable being, God, cannot convince His creatures?
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STT
Guest
No I give them vision to prove that I am God. All problem are solved.
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STT
Guest
So you are saying that God cannot convince His creature that He is God?
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STT
Guest
You cannot choose to not believe when there are sufficient reasons.
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fhansen
Guest
I don’t think Adam had knowledge of hell. But he certainly rejected God as God, preferring himself to God as the Church teaches. To deny God’s authority in one’s life is to deny His status as God. That act is therefore also an act of unbelief, which is why the entryway back to God for man is simply faith to begin with.
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umamibella
Guest
circular argument , a person will repeat that statement and another will repeat there is God.
There are better intellectual arguments.
Nothing like being nailed to a Cross. The man also married, Jesus did not.
No, Buddha is reported to have done supernatural feats by gaining that power. Power not attributed to another.
A miracle is a thing attributed solely to God, to the Power of God.
Huge difference.
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Dan_Defender
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Seems to me that Heaven and Hell were realities before humankind. Because the angels had made their choice and their fate sealed.
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RepetantCatholic
Guest
Well, your post got derailed as often happens online and I often suspect on purpose. You ask a good question, but from experience in this life you are not going to find any answers online. Which is why I recommend you pray, read the Bible, and read books by authorized Saints to answer questions like yours. It’s all been asked and investigate before.
I will write that what I learned from life is when presented with a highly theoretical “What if,” come in with experience, which is what I was trying to share with my response. As some philosophers would say, theoretically, “I reject your claim,” or “I reject your assumptions,” or “I reject your framing of the question.”
Let’s take an example and shed some light on it with experience not theory. Supposing there is a period on Earth where Ten Billion go to Hell, but Six Billion go to Heaven. OK, the way you frame that question it would look as if that was unjust or in some way God failed. That is because your framing of the question assumes Utilitarianism, which is atheist, in that what is the GOOD, the highest Good, is the most benefit for the most people with minimum cost to the fewest. OK, I reject Utilitarianism from experience in life and as a religious person and instead favor a moral Good in that what is Good is the individual dignity, sovereignty and respect for each individual person whose value cannot be weighed or numbered. I hope that makes sense.
So, relooking at the question if Six Billion people ended up in Heaven while Ten Billion ended up In Hell, what I would understand was happening (from my own life experience not a theoretical model) is that, that Six Billion largely lived painful lives of injustice and oppression at the hands of that Ten Billion. Which is why, the concept of Evil must come into play. Utilitarian’s reject the concept of Evil. In your framing, which I bolded, the numbers matter not the person. From life experience, I would know in that particular period there was a high degree of Evil adopted by the majority and, and that Evil implies a lot of suffering to Good.
Does that make sense? I can go further but tl;dr I reject the hypothetical as a what if, instead from life experience Evil is not benign but in action causing suffering to Good that is why Evil cannot reside in Heaven no matter how great their numbers.
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Latin
Guest
THIS IS AS FOLLOWS THE TEACHINGS OF THE CATHOLIC CHURCH ON OUR SO CALLED FREE WILL
The Council of Sens (1140) condemned the idea that free will is sufficient in itself for any good. Donez., 373.
Council of Orange (529)
In canon 20, entitled hat Without God Man Can Do No Good. . . Denz., 193; quoting St. Prosper.
In canon 22, says, “ No one has anything of his own except lying and sin. Denz., 194; quoting St. Prosper.
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CATHOLIC ENCYCLOPEDIA Divine Providence explains;
Life everlasting promised to us, (Romans 5:21); but unaided we can do nothing to gain it (Rom.7:18-24).
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GOD AIDES OUR FREE WILL AS FOLLOWS
Fundamentals of Catholic Dogma by Ludwig Ott;
For every salutary act internal supernatural grace of God (gratia elevans) is absolutely necessary, (De fide dogma).
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Fallen man cannot redeem himself, (De fide dogma). – It is God’s responsibility to save ALL OF US.
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COUNCIL OF TRENT Session 6 Chapter 8
. . . None of those things which precede justification - whether faith or works - merit the grace itself of justification.
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CCCS 1996-1998; Justification comes from grace (God’s free and undeserved help) and is given to us to respond to his call.
This call to eternal life is supernatural, coming TOTALLY from God’s decision and surpassing ALL power of human intellect and will.”
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Without the special help of God the justified cannot persevere to the end in justification, (De fide dogma). – It is God’s responsibility TO KEEP US SAVED by His grace of Final Perseverance.
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CCC 308 For God is at work in you, both to will and to work for his good pleasure.
Far from diminishing the creature’s dignity, this truth enhances it.
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Aquinas said, "God changes the will without forcing it . But he can change the will from the fact that he himself operates in the will as he does in nature,” De Veritatis 22:9. 31. ST I-II:112:3. 32. Gaudium et Spes 22; "being …
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CCC 307 God thus enables men to be intelligent and free, causes in order to complete the work of creation, … Though often unconscious collaborators with God’s will, they can also enter deliberately into the divine plan. They then fully become “God’s fellow workers” and co-workers for his kingdom.
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CCC 2022 The divine initiative in the work of grace precedes, prepares, and elicits the free response of man.
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St. Thomas teaches that all movements of will and choice must be traced to the divine will: and not to any other cause, because Gad alone is the cause of our willing and choosing. CG, 3.91.
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As we see above, God is the CREATOR, CAUSER/ DETERMINER of our Aided Free will, and we all freely will what God wills us to will and we all freely do what God wills and CAUSES us to do.
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There is a supernatural intervention of God in the faculties of the soul, which precedes the free act of the will, (De fide dogma). – So, who is going to reject God and goes to hell then, no one.
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God bless
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BarbTh
Guest
I agree
We humans are inclined to a sort of anthropomorphism CATHOLIC ENCYCLOPEDIA: Anthropomorphism
We humans are inclined to a sort of anthropomorphism CATHOLIC ENCYCLOPEDIA: Anthropomorphism
- sort of give God human qualities etc. and asking Him to abide by our standards etc. We are finite, God is infinite. We tend to do this not as some sort of approximation, but rather as definite and actual. We can falsely assert that God must and does abide by our assessments, arguments whatever, even as we can assert that God is the Infinitely Unknowable !
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Latin
Guest
CCC 313 “NOTHING CAN COME BUT THAT THAT GOD WILLS.”
Catholic Encyclopedia : Evil
“But we cannot say without denying the Divine omnipotence, that another equally perfect universe could not be created in which evil would have no place.”
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If God would willed, He could create all of us like He created Mary, with the privilege of immunity from sin and in this world would be no one commit even a single act of sin.
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CCC 310 But why did God not create a world so perfect that no evil could exist in it? With infinite wisdom and goodness God freely willed to create a world in a state of journeying towards its ultimate perfection, 314 through the dramas of evil and sin. – God willed to created the dramas of evil and sin for our benefit.
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THE REASON GOD CREATED THE DRAMAS OF EVIL AND SIN.
Life without suffering would produce spoiled brats, not joyful saints.
Our struggle and tribulation while journeying towards our ultimate perfection through the dramas of evil and sin is the cost which in-prints the virtue/ nobility into our souls – the cost of our road to nobility and perfection.
In this world man has to learn by experience and contrast, and to develop by the overcoming of obstacles (Lactantius, “De ira Dei”, xiii, xv in “P.L., VII, 115-24. St. Augustine “De ordine”, I, vii, n. 18 in “P.L.”, XXXII, 986).
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As we see above, we are all sinners because God willed to create us to be sinners for good reason, for the benefit of the entire human race.
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CATHOLIC ENCYCLOPEDIA: Free Will explains;
“God is the author of all causes and effects, but is not the author of sin, because an action ceases to be sin if God wills it to happen. Still God is the cause of sin.
God’s omnipotent providence exercises a complete and perfect control over all events that happen, or will happen, in the universe.”
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CATHOLIC ENCYCLOPEDIA Divine Providence explains;
His wisdom He so orders all events within the universe that the end for which it was created may be realized.
God preserves the universe in being; He acts in and with every creature in each and all its activities.
He directs all, even evil and sin itself, to the final end for which the universe was created.
Evil He converts into good (Genesis 1:20; cf. Psalm 90:10); and suffering He uses as an instrument whereby to train men up as a father traineth up his children (Deuteronomy 8:1-6; Psalm 65:2-10;
Evil, therefore, ministers to God’s design (St. Gregory the Great, op. cit., VI, xxxii in “P.L.”,
http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/12510a.htm
CCC 324 Faith gives us the certainty that God would not permit an evil if he did not cause a good to come from that very evil, by ways that we shall fully know only in eternal life.
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CCC 313; St.Thomas More, shortly before his martyrdom, consoled his daughter: “Nothing can come but that that God wills. And I make me very sure that whatsoever that be, seem it never so bad in sight, it shall indeed be the best.” 182
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God bless
Catholic Encyclopedia : Evil
“But we cannot say without denying the Divine omnipotence, that another equally perfect universe could not be created in which evil would have no place.”
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If God would willed, He could create all of us like He created Mary, with the privilege of immunity from sin and in this world would be no one commit even a single act of sin.
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CCC 310 But why did God not create a world so perfect that no evil could exist in it? With infinite wisdom and goodness God freely willed to create a world in a state of journeying towards its ultimate perfection, 314 through the dramas of evil and sin. – God willed to created the dramas of evil and sin for our benefit.
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THE REASON GOD CREATED THE DRAMAS OF EVIL AND SIN.
Life without suffering would produce spoiled brats, not joyful saints.
Our struggle and tribulation while journeying towards our ultimate perfection through the dramas of evil and sin is the cost which in-prints the virtue/ nobility into our souls – the cost of our road to nobility and perfection.
In this world man has to learn by experience and contrast, and to develop by the overcoming of obstacles (Lactantius, “De ira Dei”, xiii, xv in “P.L., VII, 115-24. St. Augustine “De ordine”, I, vii, n. 18 in “P.L.”, XXXII, 986).
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As we see above, we are all sinners because God willed to create us to be sinners for good reason, for the benefit of the entire human race.
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CATHOLIC ENCYCLOPEDIA: Free Will explains;
“God is the author of all causes and effects, but is not the author of sin, because an action ceases to be sin if God wills it to happen. Still God is the cause of sin.
God’s omnipotent providence exercises a complete and perfect control over all events that happen, or will happen, in the universe.”
.
CATHOLIC ENCYCLOPEDIA Divine Providence explains;
His wisdom He so orders all events within the universe that the end for which it was created may be realized.
God preserves the universe in being; He acts in and with every creature in each and all its activities.
He directs all, even evil and sin itself, to the final end for which the universe was created.
Evil He converts into good (Genesis 1:20; cf. Psalm 90:10); and suffering He uses as an instrument whereby to train men up as a father traineth up his children (Deuteronomy 8:1-6; Psalm 65:2-10;
Evil, therefore, ministers to God’s design (St. Gregory the Great, op. cit., VI, xxxii in “P.L.”,
http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/12510a.htm
CCC 324 Faith gives us the certainty that God would not permit an evil if he did not cause a good to come from that very evil, by ways that we shall fully know only in eternal life.
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CCC 313; St.Thomas More, shortly before his martyrdom, consoled his daughter: “Nothing can come but that that God wills. And I make me very sure that whatsoever that be, seem it never so bad in sight, it shall indeed be the best.” 182
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God bless
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EugeneCharles
Guest
There are Billions or maybe trillions or much more of people/souls, all who have live and all who have left but mostly, they are good. Thank God!
Heaven and hell, plus purgatory for sure won’t be empty.
I have a quite doubt the population in purgatory, there are Billion Catholics who offer Masses, Rosary, and prayers that might empty it. But surely, there are still many sinners like us who could end up there and many sinners like us is still there. GOD has mercy though!
Heaven and hell, plus purgatory for sure won’t be empty.
I have a quite doubt the population in purgatory, there are Billion Catholics who offer Masses, Rosary, and prayers that might empty it. But surely, there are still many sinners like us who could end up there and many sinners like us is still there. GOD has mercy though!
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Mmarco
Guest
False. You cannot recognize the Truth if you are not willing to accept the Truth. God has give us sufficient elements to know His existence, His infinite love and goodness, but if you are not willing to accept the Truth, you will never be convinced and nothing will be sufficient for you. As I said, you would be unable to prove that a beatific vision is not an hallucination, therefore also a beatific vision has to be accepted by faith as a vision of the true God.
You must understand that the existence and the goodness of God is the most fundamental truth and the knowledge of this truth is to be accepted by faith.
If you try to deduce such truth from something else, you are implicitly considering that something else as a more fundamental truth, which is absurd. On the other hand, reason fully confirms what we believe by faith and provides solid and strong arguments supporting our beliefs.
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lelinator
Guest
Indeed it did, and I thought that it started out with such promise. But as you say, that often happens online. However, I don’t necessarily consider it to be a bad thing. After all, if all something teaches you is patience, then surely it wasn’t for nought.
That’s what I appreciate more than anything. So thank you. People often misunderstand, that I value their responses not for the certitude with which they’re held, but for the sincerity and humility with which they’re offered.
Indeed it was framed that way, and indeed your answer did make sense. But to me, the question doesn’t go away even if one frames it in the sense of moral good. Is it morally right that so many should suffer, even if one cloaks that suffering in the veil of justice? Is there a point where even if something is morally justified, it can still fail the test of being morally good, because the greater moral good is forgiveness?
To me, the forgiveness that Christ manifested on that cross is a far greater moral good than any justice could ever hope to achieve. And to seek justice in spite of that sacrifice only diminishes that sacrifice’s value.
And didn’t Christ also suffer? And yet He forgave. Is it because forgiveness, and not justice, is the greater moral good?
But if this is the case, then who among us shall get there?
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