Firstly let me start by saying I am here only to learn, I fully expect an answer to these question and have no agenda other than to have my questions answered.
That being said here is the story, I got into an arguement/discussion with a christian (non-catholic) and many many questions about christianity have popped into my mind. That day i went and have since been gathering information on other religions and now have two catechismal books but these have prompted some more questions. Here they are -
What was THE PRIMARY reason that G-d created the world? What was mans original mission in the world, and what is his current mission?
If G-d became a man in order to give up his life to save me from my sins, what happened when he took his life back? (or he died to save us from sin, and resurected to conquer death, but in my mind wouldnt his resurection cancel his salvation from sin by dying?)
What Exactly is heaven? What is it like, how are the righteous rewarded in heaven,
what EXACTLY is hell?
I’ve got my catechismal books, where do i go to learn more? the deeper stuff?
The old Baltimore Catechism reads: “God created us to love and serve Him in this life so that we can be happy with Him forever in Heaven.” We believe that God created the world for the benefit of man. God created man as the one creature who could love Him back. This is the greatest gift God could give him. We believe that love is diffusive of itself. Since God is pure, unlimited love, it is understandable that He would create creatures who love. Man was created to love God above all else as the First Commandment testifies. This was and is man’s mission. We are all about God. Everything about us speaks of Him, our origin and our term.
God could have redeemed man any way He chose. He could have done it by just willing it. But He chose to demonstrate His love in a manner that would be somewhat comprehensible to man. For us to acknowledge that God’s love as infinite remains an abstraction for us since none of us has ever experienced anything that is infinite. But we do know what pain is like. By enduing the pain of His passion, He gives us a window into what His infinite love is. We at least get some inkling into how impossible it is to wrap our finite minds around such a divine love. By His passion He also demonstrates something of the magnitude of evil disobedience to an infinitely good God in fact is! That He resurrected was inevitable because He is God. But Good Friday, for us, is the absolute center of history.
Heaven is simply being able to fully appreciate who God is—THE infinite Good. It is an unlimited experience. When I say fully, I mean fully for human beings. In Heaven we will know God as He knows us. We will never know God and He knows Himself.
Hell is to know what one will forever not have in not having God in Heaven.
You mention that you have "catechismal’ books. If you don’t have “The Catechism of the Catholic Church.” you need to get that one. You can read it on line (usccb.org/catechism/text/)
But having the book is easier to use.
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