Compartmentalization due to hell

[Magnanimity]

I do not believe that the so-called “free will argument” for hell answers the problem at all adequately,

This is true, but in the same way that Alvin Plantinga used to quip that for the atheist, naturalistic evolution was the “only game in town,” so too, for the eternal-Hell apologist, the free will defense (FWD) is the only game in town. Ultimately, I think it fails as sufficient to account for the totality of every pertinent factor, it does have a prima facie reasonability to it. But when one presses the problem, as you certainly have in this thread, the FWD begins to strain credulity.

Thus, I’ve, of necessity, gravitated toward a more penal, Augustinian-Thomistic understanding of retributive punishment for sin

Interesting. The more uncomfortable I’ve become with the teaching of an eternal-Hell, the more I’ve gravitated away from Sts Augustine and Thomas A. I find their views (on this particular issue) to be repulsive, though I do adhere to Thomism in a great many areas.

given that we know there is a hell, that the latter is probably closer to the truth. When I was Orthodox

So, there’s seemingly no end to recent Orthodox contributions to universalism. Most of these contemporary universalists are quick to point out the universalist leanings of the early church (Gregory of Nyssa, Origen, Clement, etc). And the Catholic universalists (Rahner and Von Balthasar) will claim that the bleak vision of Hell that the Catholic Church still entertains was begun in earnest by St Augustine. And owing to his influence over the Catholic church of the Middle Ages, St Augustine’s views on Hell held firm with rare exceptions.

When you were Orthodox, were you not acquainted with the recent widespread Orthodox leanings in the universalist direction? And, what do you make of the key Catholic 20th century theologians being universalists of one stripe or another? I guess what I’m asking is, despite what the CCC teaches on Hell, what do you make of this wide historical variety of understandings (East and West) on the topic of Hell?

 

[Gorgias]

Well, there is a problem with Heaven. Ask the elder brother in the parable about the prodigal.

He’s not in heaven, nor was his brother in hell. (Remember, in hell, there’s no coming back to Dad for forgiveness.)

 

[Vico]

… Thus, I’ve, of necessity, gravitated toward a more penal, Augustinian-Thomistic understanding of retributive punishment for sin in hell for the necessity of the demonstration of the full attributes of God (his mercy toward the Just and his wrath toward the Wicked) …

In order to share divinity with us for eternity such that we attain the Beatific Vision, a person must be confirmed in charity, and this necessitates a free will choice, since love must be freely given – indeed it cannot be forced.

Catechism

1996 Our justification comes from the grace of God. Grace is favor , the free and undeserved help that God gives us to respond to his call to become children of God, adoptive sons, partakers of the divine nature and of eternal life. 46

2002 God’s free initiative demands man’s free response , for God has created man in his image by conferring on him, along with freedom, the power to know him and love him. The soul only enters freely into the communion of love. …

1028 Because of his transcendence, God cannot be seen as he is, unless he himself opens up his mystery to man’s immediate contemplation and gives him the capacity for it. The Church calls this contemplation of God in his heavenly glory “the beatific vision”: …

1045 … The beatific vision, in which God opens himself in an inexhaustible way to the elect, will be the ever-flowing well-spring of happiness, peace, and mutual communion.

 

[Pug]

True, the younger is forgiven. But I was getting at how people get upset about how God hands out forgiveness, just as people get upset about how God does not hand it out.

For example, they might not want their neighbor, who has been dissolute or selfish for the bulk of his life, to be able to go to heaven (or even worse, skip purgatory).

 

[o_mlly]

I would not allow my 16 month old to play in traffic even if that was her will because I cherish her (and her mother) above anyone else .

Nor would I. But I think what we mean is we teach our children not to play in traffic (Divine Revelation). And we do everything to prevent the child from doing so (Prophets). And we would save the child even by throwing ourselves in front of an oncoming bus (Incarnation/Redemption). But we would not imprison the child to save the child (free will). We want the child to become like us (be perfect as your heavenly father) and will on its own to never play in traffic.

We do believe hell exists. The population there is uncertain.

 

[Yep]

Hello all,

Has anybody else listened to the Sed Contra podcast episode on hell/salvation/universalism? Summed up, a bunch of Thomists end up agreeing that God could save all people freely, but he chooses to torture many people for eternity for the greater good even at the sacrifice of the personal good of some. Since salvation is a gratuitous gift, God is not unjust at all for not giving it to some or many. And because our natural nature is not meant for eternal happiness, instead because eternal happiness is a supernatural grace, the torture that God doles out is completely just. God is not more unjust doing what he does to those in Hell than what he does to chickens. Listen to the podcast, it’s really interesting.

However, the reason why I bring it up is that it is the most logical defense of eternal Hell I have ever heard at any point at any time. At least from the Catholic perspective. The free will defense falls flat for anyone I’ve ever met who does not simply assume it must be true. However, Hell makes a lot of sense if God doesn’t actually love humanity in general and he is very conditional in how he loves.

Which is why I’m a universalist of course, because that God would be evil. However, if you can’t get it out of your mind… To be honest, you just need to change your mind. If you don’t than it is entirely rational to be scared for the world in the hands of an angry and vengeful God.

Which I don’t think God is, but I think that would be logically necessary if you believe in eternal damnation as depicted by many Catholics. I’m happily open to being wrong, but I currently don’t I am.

 

[Gorgias]

Hell makes a lot of sense if God doesn’t actually love humanity in general and he is very conditional in how he loves.

Wow. You really changed the playing field there fast, didn’t you? That God is just does not imply that God doesn’t love or that God only loves conditionally. You seem to be taking the Thomists’ position and are conflating it with something they didn’t say!

 

[Yep]

Hmm, I don’t think I misinterpreted them. Possibly they and I have a different definition of love. I define love as willing the good of the other for their own sake. And since in Sed Contra’s view is that God chooses not to fulfill the individual good of some or many, ie hell, as a free choice of God when could choose to fulfill their individual good, ie be with God.

Since according to Sed Contra God chooses against their specific good, it seems logical to say that God does not love those who he damns.

Let me know where you think the holes in the argument are.

 

[Gorgias]

Since according to Sed Contra God chooses against their specific good, it seems logical to say that God does not love those who he damns.

It’s not God who chooses, it’s the person himself who chooses. God merely accepts that choice. Therefore, it doesn’t bear on the question of whether God loves.

 

[Pug]

It does bear on who gets loved more by God, I think. The child who gets chosen is perhaps loved more. (this is a predestination topic, so Catholics are not all in agreement).

 

[Yep]

Thanks for the reply!

From my assumptions about human nature, it seems impossible for a human to choose Hell. My assumption is that people always choose a good. Even when they do terrible things. For example, often when someone commits the evil of suicide, they are seeking the good of mental or physical peace. Or when someone commits genocide, it is for the good of a future stable society. When people choose, they always choose a good.

So, if Hell does it exist and people choose it, it must be a state of enjoying good things that are not directly God himself. Beauty, interpersonal love and peace among other things. If it is full of these things it seems a little less Hellish. However, even if it is Hellish to experience the good of interpersonal love and peace, that would be a problem still. Because God is reflected in good things, at least in my view of the world. And God is supposed to be absent from Hell. All Good comes from God.

So, to summarize, I don’t think people can choose Hell because if there is a good thing there, God is there. And if there is no Good thing there, then it simply can not be chosen, but instead must be forced on you.

You could take the often quoted Eastern orthodox view that Hell and Heaven are how you relate to God, and not his absence from you. However, I think this is a weak argument. It’s unclear to me how experiencing the pure unadulterated loving holiness of God would not be the best thing ever, after which you would abandon all else and cling to his cloak. God is stronger the any drug and any other interpersonal love, so it’s a little unclear to me how this would not bring you to Him upon contact. Unless of course He chooses to do otherwise.

What do you think?

 

[AlbMagno]

Have you thought that, while people may choose “good”, it may not be a universal good? There have been some times when I sinned intentionally because I thought the result was good for me (pleasure) while also knowing that it was a sin… so, when one sins, even if someone is choosing a good for themselves, it doesn’t mean that they are ignorant to its universal moral status; and, in the end, that is was God judges according to Perfect Justice, because if people were just choosing the good without seeing the bad side they wouldn’t be mortally sinning (no knowledge).

 

[Gorgias]

It does bear on who gets loved more by God, I think. The child who gets chosen is perhaps loved more.

It’s the other way around – the question is who loves God more, not whom God loves more.

And, I think I’d say that God loves those who love Him differently, not more, than those who reject Him.

When people choose, they always choose a good.

No. Augustine would say that people always choose a perceived good, although they can be mistaken.

The question then comes down to whether they’re culpable for their sinful choices.

And if there is no Good thing there, then it simply can not be chosen, but instead must be forced on you.

I would disagree. People do choose things that aren’t good, without having them forced on them. We see it all the time, in the dysfunctional things people freely choose.

 

[0Scarlett_nidiyilii]

So, with all of that being said, does anyone else feel like they have to compartmentalize this portion of theological speculation away in order to pursue religion in their lives?

No.
Because I trust in God’s mercy. I trust He doesn’t play “gotcha”, and He understands that we don’t all start out with an equal playing field—some people are smarter than others, some came from abusive or chaotic situations, or had wretched catechesis.

At the same time, I have to take issue with the idea that we’re cosmic toddlers darting into traffic. We’re perfectly capable of deciding right from wrong and then acting on it. We’re perfectly capable of deciding to develop our spiritual life, or pick up a book and learn stuff, or to refrain from being a selfish jerk.
We’re also perfectly capable of making amends when we do screw up.

In Catholic theology, mitigating circumstances are a valid concept. Jesus Himself said that to whom much is given, much will be expected.

So I trust that what happens in the afterlife will be just.

 

[Yep]

That’s a good point, " The question then comes down to whether they’re culpable for their sinful choices." Of course I’d say that people are and that God actively chooses to punish them (us) for our sins. However, since I believe in universal salvation, I believe that the punishment is corresponds to what the sin was and is not infinite in duration (speaking about eternity is difficult without using time and space statements, please forgive that).

God chooses to punish us against what we might want, that’s my position at least. But it is a just punishment as it corresponds to what we have done. It’s unclear to me how you can believe in the just punishment of Hell without God getting his hands involved at some point and choosing what will happen to us. And since he created and sustains all, he is in a sense involved in everything.

Its also unclear to me where this whole “people choose Hell” actual comes from. As a convert, it was always clear to me that people in the Church believed this because they couldn’t stomach God choosing to punish people as we acknowledge each time we go to confession “I fear your just punishments.”

And at the end of the day, after all the justifications for Hell are laid out most parents I knew growing up were more loving and just are than the God being justified. And because people are not better than God, I view eternal Hell argumentation as perpetually skating on the edge of the absurd.

 

[Gorgias]

since I believe in universal salvation

Just to quibble: are you saying that God saves all, indiscriminately and uniformly, or are you arguing for the proposition that God might save each of us individually? Only one of these is ‘universalism’.

the punishment is corresponds to what the sin was

All sin is sin against God. God is infinite. How is all mortal sin not worthy of eternal punishment? (Conversely, love of God is love of the infinite; how is love of God not worthy of eternal bliss?)

is not infinite in duration (speaking about eternity is difficult without using time and space statements, please forgive that).

LOL! Yeah… it’s hard to stay away from temporal allusion, in this context! I think you get it, though: ‘duration’ isn’t relevant to contexts of ‘eternity’. Duration speaks to ‘past’ and ‘future’, whereas eternity is an eternal ‘now’.

Its also unclear to me where this whole “people choose Hell” actual comes from.

We choose sin. That is, we choose to reject God. In a sense, it’s like saying “I can’t believe that you chose to say ‘no’ to $300 million!”, when what you mean is “you chose to not buy a lottery ticket, which meant that you were saying ‘no’ to the $300 million.” It’s indirect, but if choosing one thing implies choosing the consequence, then a person who rejects the thing can be said to have rejected the consequence. Therefore: “people choose hell”.

most parents I knew growing up were more loving and just are than the God being justified.

The reason that this notion doesn’t hold up to scrutiny is that you’re comparing parents’ actions toward children to God’s actions toward adults.

 

[Pug]

the question is who loves God more, not whom God loves more.

I was thinking in Thomist terms when I said that. I’ll provide a quote that might help with what I was thinking Summa First part Q20:

I answer that, Since to love a thing is to will it good, in a twofold way anything may be loved more, or less. In one way on the part of the act of the will itself, which is more or less intense. In this way God does not love some things more than others, because He loves all things by an act of the will that is one, simple, and always the same. In another way on the part of the good itself that a person wills for the beloved. In this way we are said to love that one more than another, for whom we will a greater good, though our will is not more intense. In this way we must needs say that God loves some things more than others. For since God’s love is the cause of goodness in things, as has been said (Article 2), no one thing would be better than another, if God did not will greater good for one than for another.

I’ve never thought about if one person might love God more than another. Offhand, I’d say yes. But I am inclined to attribute such a happening as ultimately due to God.

 

[o_mlly]

I’ve never thought about if one person might love God more than another. Offhand, I’d say yes. But I am inclined to attribute such a happening as ultimately due to God.

The love of God, I think, is not to will Him good for He is Goodness itself. Rather the love of God is to will to be united with Him. That’s a binary choice. Those who love God in this manner do not love Him more or less than others. Love of neighbor becomes the same willed union with God replacing ourselves with our neighbors.

 

[Pug]

o_mily, just a thought in responses, for me, on those rare times when my sentiments engage correctly, part of the love seems to be a drawing of my gaze, like beauty draws a gaze. I feel there is variation to the intensity of this, perhaps due something in my will.

But yes, a choice is a choice, either you chose it or you don’t. Maybe lesser, incongruous, choices linger around until you ditch them or God removes them.

 

[Gorgias]

I was thinking in Thomist terms when I said that. I’ll provide a quote that might help with what I was thinking Summa First part Q20:

So, in respect to the person, no difference in the love. In respect to the good to which the person attains, there’s a difference.

Thomas is famous for saying, “well, you can call it XYZ, if you want” while at the same time saying “it ain’t actually XYZ”… which is what he’s doing here.