Could Heaven and Hell be the Same Place?

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Iirc, hell was just tiny, fitting easily between blades of grass. The travel primarily involved them getting bigger.
 
catholicray said:
how heaven could be unbearable for certain people. For example if you had not forgiven those who had committed terrible crimes in this life and then you had to spend eternity with them
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This type of feeling is incompatible with Heaven. The communion of saints enjoy the Beatific Vision, which you are underestimating. The soul is transformed and not capable of such resentment.
 
I’m not really sure either heaven or hell is thought of as a place at all, but rather as a state of mind. Then again, maybe both.
 
HopkinsReb said:
Iirc, hell was just tiny, fitting easily between blades of grass. The travel primarily involved them getting bigger.
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Correct. Lewis said in the forward that he borrowed that idea of travel from a science-fiction writer — an American, I think, whom he didn’t name.
 
I think you may have misunderstood me. To be clear those enjoying the beatific vision would have no torment in the presence of any being because they have forgiven and given up judgment to the lord. On the other hand if you have brothers whom you have not forgiven, “judge not lest ye be judged”, it could be torment for you to enter into a place where all beings are present and to see someone you have not forgiven actually saved and enjoying heaven. What I am saying could use some tightening but it is the general idea.
 
You should read the rest of the responses. No one is claiming that this is true we are merely considering the possibility. There is in fact biblical evidence that supports the possibility as well as a lack of clear teaching from the Church that opposes it. Either way the question is open rather than decided.
 
No one gets to heaven without being perfect in charity and whoever is not when they die and not in the state of mortal sin is purified in purgatory. So, the person in your example who had not forgiven various people in life on earth which is quite dangerous as Jesus taught us in the Our Father “forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us” would most likely be purified of their imperfections in purgatory before reaching heaven assuming they die in the state of sanctifying grace. Heaven is a place and state of perfect happiness and love of God and our neighbor so there won’t be anybody there holding personal grudges or grievances and such like against anybody else in heaven.

Forgiveness doesn’t necessarily entail the cancellation of due justice and punishment for the crimes of criminals. Every sin carries with it a penalty or punishment either temporal or eternal. In confession, God forgives us our sins but not necessarily all the punishment consequent upon our sins. The priest normally gives us some satisfactory penance to do such as say a few Hail Mary’s but this may not cancel all the temporal punishment we need to satisfy for. The indulgenced works the Church offers us is another way of satisfying for our temporal punishment that has accrued to us or which we can offer for the souls in purgatory. It is also possible depending on our cooperation with God’s grace and dispositions to have all the punishment we have accrued from our sins to be cancelled such as in confession or outside of it by the degree of our contrition and love for God.

Normally, the more one grows in the love of God the more do they take upon themselves works of penance to satisfy for their own sins as well as others because they are more aware and love the goodness of God’s justice which demands satisfaction for sins as we see in the passion and death of Jesus. Thus, various saints had mystical visions of the souls in purgatory and they say the souls there actually do not want to enter heaven until they have satisfied for their sins because love of God involves loving and doing what he wills and so paradoxically in a way they love their suffering in purgatory because they know this is God’s will and the infinite good of his justice.
 
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Yes this is more along the lines of what I was thinking. I don’t think it has ever been defined that hell is strictly a separate location. It is defined as a state of being of self exclusion by the Catholic Church. The human sense of location is probably irrelevant in eternal space and time.
 
I do agree that while we naturally think of us as being in Heaven or Hell, from a spiritual non material existence, it is more conducive to think of Heaven or Hell as being in us.

I think in general the thought process of thinking of existence beyond the material does give the believer a different perspective of the importance of one’s own ‘spirituality’ which to me at least seems more healthy if accepted in a mature fashion.
 
What will be heaven like;wil not one get bored;how can one live there forever even if God is present,any work there…etc are questions which normally arise if we look in an earthly perspective which only is possible for us now.But heaven and life there is unimaginable to human beings.As stated in 1 cor 2:9 heaven is what
" eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, neither hath it entered into the heart of man, what things God hath prepared for them that love him"
So don’t imagine anything which is unimaginable to human mind and unnecessarily waste time.
 
joseie said:
So don’t imagine anything which is unimaginable to human mind and unnecessarily waste time.
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Well, the point of The Great Divorce is not to show what Heaven and Hell are like, but rather to suggest why some people go to one place and others to the other. Lewis is trying to show why the lost would choose to remain lost even when salvation is offered to them. His depictions of Heaven and Hell are meant only to suggest to the reader the states in which their inhabitants dwell; they are not meant to be eyewitness reports of what we can expect to find in the hereafter.
 
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What are your biblical justifications of your personal stance, along with any Church teaching please.
 
catholicray said:
What are your biblical justifications of your personal stance, along with any Church teaching please.
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That is explained in Qur’an and Hadiths. I am not Christians and no much aware of Bible. Just those verses:

23 And in hell he lift up his eyes, being in torments, and seeth Abraham afar off, and Lazarus in his bosom.

24 And he cried and said, Father Abraham, have mercy on me, and send Lazarus, that he may dip the tip of his finger in water, and cool my tongue; for I am tormented in this flame.

25 But Abraham said, Son, remember that thou in thy lifetime receivedst thy good things, and likewise Lazarus evil things: but now he is comforted, and thou art tormented.

26 And beside all this, between us and you there is a great gulf fixed: so that they which would pass from hence to you cannot; neither can they pass to us, that would come from thence. (Luke-16)
 
I appreciate your response. We have already contemplated that verse in this thread. I’ll share something with you from this thread.

And another angel, a third, followed them, saying with a loud voice, “If any one worships the beast and its image, and receives a mark on his forehead or on his hand, he also shall drink the wine of God’s wrath, poured unmixed into the cup of his anger, and he shall be tormented with fire and brimstone in the presence of the holy angels and in the presence of the Lamb . And the smoke of their torment goes up for ever and ever ; and they have no rest, day or night, these worshipers of the beast and its image, and whoever receives the mark of its name.”

Revelation 14:9-11

Notice they are tormented in the presence of God. God resides in heaven.

Also the Catholic Catechism defines heaven as a “State of Being”.

What do you think about that verse in Revalation? Does heaven have to be physical in the human sense? Could the verse you provided refer to physicality symbolically?
 
catholicray said:
I appreciate your response. We have already contemplated that verse in this thread. I’ll share something with you from this thread.

And another angel, a third, followed them, saying with a loud voice, “If any one worships the beast and its image, and receives a mark on his forehead or on his hand, he also shall drink the wine of God’s wrath, poured unmixed into the cup of his anger, and he shall be tormented with fire and brimstone in the presence of the holy angels and in the presence of the Lamb . And the smoke of their torment goes up for ever and ever ; and they have no rest, day or night, these worshipers of the beast and its image, and whoever receives the mark of its name.”

Revelation 14:9-11

Notice they are tormented in the presence of God. God resides in heaven.

Also the Catholic Catechism defines heaven as a “State of Being”.

What do you think about that verse in Revalation? Does heaven have to be physical in the human sense? Could the verse you provided refer to physicality symbolically?
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There are metaphor in verses. We cannot take meaning literaly.

God is in everywhere ofcourse by power and will and with all attributes. But as physically God is not in any where because God is always out of time and space. God is also on the world by becoming manifest with divine attributes. For instance wev are alive. Eternal life of God become manifest through our souls and body. Ofcourse our life is not direct life of God but some kind reflect. And also we have mind, seeing, hearing, power etc… All these come from God. God is more close to us than ourselves. God is not in Heavens or Hell. If you think that Lamb is God but I do not know. We believe that Jesus was a human so He will be in Heavens with body. Heavens as a position is superior than world and universe. Becoming manifest for God is much more in Heavens.

In Qur’an God use a term “throne of God”. But God has no any place or material. That means (just one of interpretation!) God act in that place without any physical law. My English is poor to mention the case exactly. Sorry.
 
Genesis315 said:
I think there was a couple Fathers who held this idea and it has become quite popular among Eastern Catholic and Orthodox Christians in modern time. Basically the idea is that the fire of God’s love blissfully transfigures those who are open to it and turned toward God and torments those who cling to their sins, turned away from God.

I don’t think there is anything wrong with this idea, as long as we acknowledge the permanence of it.
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There is the same concept in the West.

The idea is that people in hell are kept “further” away from God in order to reduce their torment. But, God is painful to anybody who has’t been made clean.

There was been private revelation talking about this. The banishment of the damned to hell is - actually - yet another work of God’s mercy. If the damned were kept in Heaven it would be much, much worse from them.
 
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