Father Robert Barron

[Robyn_p]

We do desire that all go to Heaven, this is the will of God, that all may be saved. The affirmation that we hope is actually NOT a very Catholic thing. It’s a very Protestant thing. It’s tied to the double predestination theology of Calvin, just that you don’t take into account Hell. To hope something is to have a base for your hope. Jesus said: Who loves me, keeps my commandments.
One does not keep his commandments. Ergo: One does not love Christ.
And God gives justice to all. If one chooses not to love God, God gives one what he asked. Ratifies one’s choice. It is the greatest Love to accept one’s choice. You cannot get married to someone against his will, can you? Nor can one stand in the presence of God if he doesn’t want to. In fact, one cannot stand God for he loves him and the person doesn’t. One can love darkness more then light. God won’t save someone against their will. God bless!

Right, I see what you’re getting at. I guess I always thought of hope as more of a desire, but you’re right, it has to be founded on something solid to actually be hope.

Still, I don’t think Fr. Barron is saying that he thinks God will override someone’s free will to save them. (Which would be heresy) But I took his comments to mean that he hopes that even if it is at the last moment of death, since every sinner has a possibility of repentance, they will indeed repent, and for that reason he thinks there is a reasonable hope all will be saved.

Again, I disagree with Fr. here, I’m not sure there really is a reasonable basis to assume such a thing, but I also don’t see it as contrary to Catholic doctrine to hold that position either. As long as you don’t deny hell exists and people can indeed go there.

 

[KP3243]

Saint Faustina’s diary gives a vision of hell which is rather frightening so it appears that hell exists, I understood Barron saying what Pope Benedict says Spe Salvi, that there is hope for everyone to be saved because of God’s mercy and purgatory but people still reject God’s love and mercy and choose hell. As for non Catholics, if you think our Lord isn’t going to look at us Catholics and say you sat next to your non-Catholic co worker for how long and didn’t even try to evangelize them and some blame will be on us. I wouldn’t be surprised if they would be allowed into Heaven before us, who could have saved them from a lot of sin. I see God making things interdependent, the final blessing is Go out and proclaim the Gospel to the world. How many Catholics do that?

 

[anixx]

Right, I see what you’re getting at. I guess I always thought of hope as more of a desire, but you’re right, it has to be founded on something solid to actually be hope.

Still, I don’t think Fr. Barron is saying that he thinks God will override someone’s free will to save them. (Which would be heresy) But I took his comments to mean that he hopes that even if it is at the last moment of death, since every sinner has a possibility of repentance, they will indeed repent, and for that reason he thinks there is a reasonable hope all will be saved.

Again, I disagree with Fr. here, I’m not sure there really is a reasonable basis to assume such a thing, but I also don’t see it as contrary to Catholic doctrine to hold that position either. As long as you don’t deny hell exists and people can indeed go there.

I was just saying that it may be misleading. And he is a very read person. He is a great intellect of today’s Church.

 

[Vouthon]

It is of the faith revealed that many go to hell and few go to heaven.

Dear friend

No it isn’t. Pope St. John Paul II spoke on many occasions of a valid and certainly not heretical hope for universal salvation. Owing to God’s universal salvific will, which contrary to Calvinism is dogmatic in Catholicism, it is a hope that we are entitled and indeed commended for entertaining, so long as we do not reject human freewill by quashing the possibility of hell as a “definitive state of self-exclusion” from God.

It would be heresy to deny the possibility of hell, mortal sin or to state that all definitely will attain to salvation. However to entertain a hope, based on God’s universal salvific will, is not heresy.

“…From the death of Christ new life flowers, memory and message of an undying hope: universal salvation…”

His Holiness Pope Saint John Paul II (Stations Of The Cross At The Colosseum, Good Friday 2002)

“…Eternal damnation remains a possibility, but we are not granted, without special divine revelation,** the knowledge of whether** or which human beings are effectively involved in it…”

His Holiness Pope Saint John Paul II (General Audience — July 28, 1999)

Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI stated in Spe Salvi that we could harbour a reasonable expectation that the majority of people are not in hell, although some gravely sinful souls will be. This is in direct conflict to what you claim as Catholic doctrine above:

vatican.va/holy_father/benedict_xvi/encyclicals/documents/hf_ben-xvi_enc_20071130_spe-salvi_en.html

"…With death, our life-choice becomes definitive—our life stands before the judge. Our choice, which in the course of an entire life takes on a certain shape, can have a variety of forms. There can be people who have totally destroyed their desire for truth and readiness to love, people for whom everything has become a lie, people who have lived for hatred and have suppressed all love within themselves. This is a terrifying thought, but alarming profiles of this type can be seen in certain figures of our own history.** In such people all would be beyond remedy and the destruction of good would be irrevocable: this is what we mean by the word Hell**[37]. On the other hand there can be people who are utterly pure, completely permeated by God, and thus fully open to their neighbours—people for whom communion with God even now gives direction to their entire being and whose journey towards God only brings to fulfilment what they already are.

1. Yet we know from experience that neither case is normal in human life. For the great majority of people—we may suppose—there remains in the depths of their being an ultimate interior openness to truth, to love, to God. In the concrete choices of life, however, it is covered over by ever new compromises with evil—much filth covers purity, but the thirst for purity remains and it still constantly re-emerges from all that is base and remains present in the soul. What happens to such individuals when they appear before the Judge?… In this text, it is in any case evident that our salvation can take different forms, that some of what is built may be burned down, that in order to be saved we personally have to pass through “fire” so as to become fully open to receiving God and able to take our place at the table of the eternal marriage-feast…

1. Some recent theologians are of the opinion that the fire which both burns and saves is Christ himself, the Judge and Saviour. The encounter with him is the decisive act of judgement. Before his gaze all falsehood melts away. This encounter with him, as it burns us, transforms and frees us, allowing us to become truly ourselves. All that we build during our lives can prove to be mere straw, pure bluster, and it collapses. Yet in the pain of this encounter, when the impurity and sickness of our lives become evident to us, there lies salvation. His gaze, the touch of his heart heals us through an undeniably painful transformation “as through fire”. But it is a blessed pain, in which the holy power of his love sears through us like a flame, enabling us to become totally ourselves and thus totally of God…"

- Pope Emeritus Benedict ZVI, Spe Salvi, 2007

In this encyclical Benedict XVI argues forcefully that the vast majority of people are neither wholly evil nor wholly good and will thus end up in purgatory, while a minority will end up in the states of hell and heaven respectively (the latter without purgatorial purification but directly).

Encyclicals are magisterial teaching documents of great authority that we are obligated to consider prayerfully and obediently and moreover Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI is a stellar theologian in his own right.

No scripture verse “needs no commentary”. It is surely a Protestant notion to assume that a verse means something ipso facto without reference to the Tradition and the Magisterium. The Catholic Church teaches that scripture has multiple meanings or ‘senses’, not all of them overt. See the Catechism here:

vatican.va/archive/ccc_css/archive/catechism/p1s1c2a3.htm

I should think that Fr. Barron has a better grasp of Catholic doctrine than some seem willing to concede.

I personally concur with others in regarding him as one of the greatest modern preachers of the faith, certainly in North America at the very least.

 

[anixx]

Dear friend

No it isn’t. Pope St. John Paul II spoke on many occasions of a valid and certainly not heretical hope for universal salvation.

There is a tone of difference between we hope for universal salvation and we hope that universally everybody is saved. It’s not the same thing.
Of course we hope for. We have reason for this: the Cross of our Lord.
We hope that, has no reason in it, because of the words of our Blessed Lord.

 

[Vouthon]

There is a tone of difference between we hope for universal salvation and we hope that universally everybody is saved. It’s not the same thing.
Of course we hope for. We have reason for this: the Cross of our Lord.
We hope that, has no reason in it, because of the words of our Blessed Lord.

Truly, I think that you are meddling with semantics of English in a somewhat legalistic manner. I mean no offence by this, it is just my opinion.

Also, another poster stated that few will be in heaven is a doctrine (de fide). Yet Benedict in the aforementioned encyclical argues for a majority in purgatory and a minority in hell.

 

[anixx]

Truly, I think that you are meddling with semantics of English in a somewhat legalistic manner. I mean no offence by this, it is just my opinion.

Also, another poster stated that few will be in heaven is a doctrine (de fide). Yet Benedict in the aforementioned encyclical argues for a majority in purgatory and a minority in hell.

If I recall correctly, he did say: we hope that hell is empty.
Anyway, we need to work out our salvation that Christ brought us on the Cross and we do need to bring the Gospel to all creation and all nations.
Except for this somewhat controversial point, I love the way Catholicism series were made, and another is about to come out. So, can’t wait! God bless you and Fr.Barron!

 

[Robyn_p]

It is of the faith revealed that many go to hell and few go to heaven.

Matthew 7:13 Enter ye in at the narrow gate: for wide is the gate, and broad is the way that leadeth to destruction, and many there are who go in thereat.14 How narrow is the gate, and strait is the way that leadeth to life: and few there are that find it!

Haydock commentary on the same :Enter ye in at the narrow gate, &c. The doctrine of these two verses needs no commentary, but deserve serious attention. Wi.

I actually agree that this verse seems to indicate there are people in hell. But to play devil’s advocate here, the argument could be made that that verse is giving a warning that the way to heaven is difficult, and the way to hell is easy, not necessarily giving the demographics of either heaven or hell. Not sure yet if I agree with that analysis, but it does make me hesitant to say its wrong for a Catholic to hope all men are in heaven, since there are other interpretations that could explain what that verse means.

Same thing with Matthew 25. It could be taken equally as a prediction or as a warning. I personally see it as a prediction, but the warning interpretation seems equally valid to me, and until the Church condemns that interpretation as false, I don’t feel qualified to condemn it either. That doesn’t mean we can say for sure they all men WILL go to heaven either though. But that’s different than hoping.

Just so we’re clear, I do in fact believe there are people in hell right now, and I disagree with Fr. Barron’s logic to the contrary. But as far as I can tell, the Church has never declared that we must believe some men are in hell. For that reason I can’t agree with the claim that that Fr. is distorting the faith, I think it’s a wrong but permissible opinion he has.

 

[Vouthon]

If I recall correctly, he did say: we hope that hell is empty.
Anyway, we need to work out our salvation that Christ brought us on the Cross and we do need to bring the Gospel to all creation and all nations.
Except for this somewhat controversial point, I love the way Catholicism series were made, and another is about to come out. So, can’t wait! God bless you and Fr.Barron!

Amen

 

[jmcrae]

Is this the same Fr.Barron who acknowledges the theoretical possibility that a person might go to hell, but believes that almost no one (if anyone) does? I’m crossing my fingers that they are two separate people with the same last name.

I doubt they are the same person. Father Robert Barron is very orthodox and sticks to the teachings of the Catechism.

 

[Robyn_p]

I was just saying that it may be misleading. And he is a very read person. He is a great intellect of today’s Church.

Ok I see, I misunderstood you, sorry. I thought you said he was distorting the faith, so that’s what I was responding to. But now I see what you mean and I think we are pretty much in agreement. His position certainly could be misleading, if someone thought by him saying that that therefore hell wasn’t a real threat or worry for us. Which is dangerous, and which I think Fr. Barron would adamantly disagree with.

 

[Robyn_p]

If I recall correctly, he did say: we hope that hell is empty.
Anyway, we need to work out our salvation that Christ brought us on the Cross and we do need to bring the Gospel to all creation and all nations.

Except for this somewhat controversial point, I love the way Catholicism series were made, and another is about to come out. So, can’t wait! God bless you and Fr.Barron!

I know right? I’m looking forward to his new series. Looks pretty good.

 

[Vouthon]

But as far as I can tell, the Church has never declared that we must believe some men are in hell. For that reason I can’t agree with the claim that that Fr. is distorting the faith.

You are right, the Church has never declared definitively that anyone is in hell. We can presume, as Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI does, that some people may have chosen to exclude the grace of God so completely from their lives that they are in hell, while the majority will pass through purgatory. Nonetheless there is no list of damned people as their are canonized saints, therefore it is a valid and open reason for hope.

On the question of that passage in Matthew, an authority on Catholic theology no less great than Fr Reginald Garrigou-Lagrange, O.P. (1877 - 1964), consulter of the Holy Office, whose most famous student was Pope John Paul II, believed that there would be more saved than damned, although he stated that this was speculative and uncertain since we could never know either way (ie God has not revealed anything on this definitively):

The number of the elect is known only by God. “The Lord knoweth who are His.” The liturgy says that this number is known to Him alone. [666] This is reaffirmed also by St. Thomas. [667] The end of the world will come when the number of the elect is complete, when the succession of human generations has reached its goal.

This number in itself is very great: “I heard the number of them that were signed (of the servants of God), a hundred forty-four thousand were signed, of every tribe of the children of Israel… After this, I saw a great multitude which no man could number, of all nations and tribes and peoples and tongues, standing before the throne and in the sight of the Lamb, clothed with white robes and palms in their hands”…

When we speak of men exclusively, we do not know, first of all, if among the worlds scattered in space the earth is the only one that is habitable…

Thus, following many others, Pere Monsabre [674] remarks: "If these words were intended for all places and for all times, then the opinion of the small number of the elect would triumph. But we are permitted to think that they are meant, directly, for the ungrateful time of our Savior’s own preaching. When Jesus wishes us to think of the future, He speaks in another manner. Thus He says to His disciples: ‘If I be lifted up from the earth, I will draw all things to Myself.’ [675] ‘The gates of hell shall not prevail against (My Church).’ [676] And showing us the results of the last judgment, He says: ‘The wicked shall go into everlasting punishment, but the just into life everlasting.’ " [677]

Monsabre continues: “Remark that He does not tell us definitely the number of the good and of the wicked. To those who demanded a clear pronouncement, He was content to reply: ‘Strive to enter by the narrow gate; for many . . . shall seek to enter and shall not be able.’ The rigorists will tell me possibly that Jesus here hides the mystery of His justice, in order not to frighten timorous souls. As for myself, I prefer to think that He hides here the mystery of His mercy, that we may avoid presumption.” [678]…

To conclude: some insist on the mercy of God, others on the justice of God. Neither one side nor the other gives us certitude. And the reasons of appropriateness which each invokes differ very much from the reasons of appropriateness invoked in favor of a dogma which is already certain by revelation, whereas here we are treating of a truth that is not certain.

Restricting the question to Catholics, we find the doctrine, generally held especially since Suarez, that, if we consider merely adults, the number of the elect surpasses that of the reprobate. If adult Catholics do at one time or another sin mortally, nevertheless they can arise in the tribunal of penance, and there are relatively few who at the end of life do not repent, or even refuse to receive the sacraments.

But if we are treating of all Christians, of all who have been baptized, Catholic, schismatic, Protestant, it is more probable, theologians generally say, that the great number is saved. First, the number of infants who die in the state of grace before reaching the age of reason is very great. Secondly, many Protestants, being today in good faith, can be reconciled to God by an act of contrition, particularly in danger of death. Thirdly, schismatics can receive a valid absolution…

Further, among non-Christians (Jews, Mohammedans, pagans) there are souls which are elect. Jews and Mohammedans not only admit monotheism, but retain fragments of primitive revelation and of Mosaic revelation. They believe in a God who is a supernatural rewarder, and can thus, with the aid of grace, make an act of contrition. And even to pagans, who live in invincible, involuntary ignorance of the true religion, and who still attempt to observe the natural law, supernatural aids are offered, by means known to God. These, as Pius IX says, [679] can arrive at salvation. God never commands the impossible. To him who does what is in his power God does not refuse grace. [680]

We cannot arrive at certitude in this question. It is better to acknowledge our ignorance than to discourage the faithful by a doctrine which is too rigid, to expose them to danger by a doctrine which is too superficial.

The important thing is to observe the commandments of God. St. Augustine [681] said, and the Council of Trent repeats: “God never commands the impossible. But He warns us to do what we can, and to ask of Him the grace to accomplish what we of ourselves cannot do, and He aids us to fulfill what He commands.”

Let us put our confidence in Jesus Christ, “the victim of propitiation for our sins,” [684] “the Lamb of God, . . . who taketh away the sin of the world.”

 

[Seraphignatius]

Dear friend

No it isn’t.

We have already seen that it is.

Pope St. John Paul II spoke on many occasions of a valid and certainly not heretical hope for universal salvation. Owing to God’s universal salvific will, which contrary to Calvinism is dogmatic in Catholicism, it is a hope that we are entitled and indeed commended for entertaining, so long as we do not reject human freewill by quashing the possibility of hell as a “definitive state of self-exclusion” from God.

I never said God had no universal salvific will, and i would be just as quick to point out that error to those who espouse it as I am this one. I do hope for the salvation of all in the sense there is no person i do not hope shall be saved but not in the sense that I make the lord a liar by saying that there is no one or only a relative few who are not saved.

It would be heresy to deny the possibility of hell, mortal sin or to state that all definitely will attain to salvation. However to entertain a hope, based on God’s universal salvific will, is not heresy.

Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI stated in Spe Salvi that we could harbour a reasonable expectation that the majority of people are not in hell, although some gravely sinful souls will be. This is in direct conflict to what you claim as Catholic doctrine above:

vatican.va/holy_father/benedict_xvi/encyclicals/documents/hf_ben-xvi_enc_20071130_spe-salvi_en.html

As I’ll explain, your quotation below doesn’t say that though.

In this encyclical Benedict XVI argues forcefully that the vast majority of people are neither wholly evil nor wholly good

I agree.

and will thus end up in purgatory,

Non sequetor! He didn’t say this, and it doesn’t follow from the premise.

while a minority will end up in the states of hell and heaven respectively (the latter without purgatorial purification but directly).

100% of all people ever will end up either in heaven or in hell. I have no good source to speculate what proportion will go to purgatory on the way to heaven.

Encyclicals are magisterial teaching documents of great authority that we are obligated to consider prayerfully and obediently and moreover Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI is a stellar theologian in his own right.

Agreed.

No scripture verse “needs no commentary”. It is surely a Protestant notion to assume that a verse means something ipso facto without reference to the Tradition and the Magisterium. The Catholic Church teaches that scripture has multiple meanings or ‘senses’, not all of them overt. See the Catechism here:

I seriously doubt that good Father Haydock meant that it was somehow beyond the teaching authority of the Church. I think he was saying that its meaning as handed down by tradition and interpreted by the magisterium was in agreement with what was apparent in reading it.

I should think that Fr. Barron has a better grasp of Catholic doctrine than some seem willing to concede.

I think he has been greatly influenced by the novelties of a certain dutch theologian.

I personally concur with others in regarding him as one of the greatest modern preachers of the faith, certainly in North America at the very least.

If it pleases you to believe so. I take a contrary view for reasons stated.

There is a tone of difference between we hope for universal salvation and we hope that universally everybody is saved. It’s not the same thing.
Of course we hope for. We have reason for this: the Cross of our Lord.
We hope that, has no reason in it, because of the words of our Blessed Lord.

Correct.

 

[Seraphignatius]

Also, another poster stated that few will be in heaven is a doctrine (de fide).

I said it was of the faith revealed (Fides Divina; i.e. contained in the deposit of faith.) not of the faith defined (De Fide Definita). A third and intermediary level of Dogmatic explication would be of the faith universally held (Fides Catholica).

I actually agree that this verse seems to indicate there are people in hell. But to play devil’s advocate here, the argument could be made that that verse is giving a warning that the way to heaven is difficult, and the way to hell is easy, not necessarily giving the demographics of either heaven or hell. Not sure yet if I agree with that analysis, but it does make me hesitant to say its wrong for a Catholic to hope all men are in heaven, since there are other interpretations that could explain what that verse means.

Perhaps if he hadn’t said, “and many enter thereat”.

 

[anixx]

It is a fact that dying in a state of mortal sin sends the soul directly to hell. This is Church teaching.
An adulterer, a child abuser, an active homosexual, and all the parade of the likes, will not inherit the Kingdom of God, according to saint Paul, or in accordance with Church teaching from above. Look around guys. Most of them are in a state of mortal sin and happily profess it.

 

[KjetilK]

We do desire that all go to Heaven, this is the will of God, that all may be saved. The affirmation that we hope is actually NOT a very Catholic thing. It’s a very Protestant thing. It’s tied to the double predestination theology of Calvin, just that you don’t take into account Hell. To hope something is to have a base for your hope.

Can you actually provide any proof of this, on a semantic level? I agree with you that hope relies on some kind of foundation. In Heb. 11:1, for instance, is is said that our Christian hope relies on our faith.

But in and of itself, the word ‘hope’ doesn’t say anything about the nature of such a foundation. I might say that I hope that a friend of mine will come visit me, based on my desire to meet that person and ‘hang out.’ Can you give any reason for you belief that desire – in this case the desire that all may be saved – cannot provide a foundation for hope? If you cannot, and if you acknowledge that this desire is acceptable, which you do, then you also have to accept that a person hopes that all may be saved. In fact you should then yourself hope that all may be saved.

And what do you mean, specifically, when you use the term ‘Protestant’? Calvinistic? Lutheran? Baptist? Pentacostal? ‘Non-denominational’? Or what?

 

[anixx]

Can you actually provide any proof of this, on a semantic level? I agree with you that hope relies on some kind of foundation. In Heb. 11:1, for instance, is is said that our Christian hope relies on our faith.

But in and of itself, the word ‘hope’ doesn’t say anything about the nature of such a foundation. I might say that I hope that a friend of mine will come visit me, based on my desire to meet that person and ‘hang out.’ Can you give any reason for you belief that desire – in this case the desire that all may be saved – cannot provide a foundation for hope? If you cannot, and if you acknowledge that this desire is acceptable, which you do, then you also have to accept that a person hopes that all may be saved. In fact you should then yourself hope that all may be saved.

And what do you mean, specifically, when you use the term ‘Protestant’? Calvinistic? Lutheran? Baptist? Pentacostal? ‘Non-denominational’? Or what?

A clarification of semantics is here:

There is a tone of difference between we hope for universal salvation and we hope that universally everybody is saved. It’s not the same thing.
Of course we hope for. We have reason for this: the Cross of our Lord.
We hope that, has no reason in it, because of the words of our Blessed Lord.

I was referring to the double predestination: which states that God predestines some to Heaven, others to Hell, without taking into consideration your own will. Doesn’t matter what you do in life you end up where God wants you to end. Doesn’t matter your the most Holy man on the planet, if God predestined you to Hell, you’re going to Hell. And the other, you can do all the wrong, evil, immoral things you want, if God predestined you to heaven, you get to Heaven. It is the removal of free will of humans and of Justice of God.

 

[Vouthon]

It is a fact that dying in a state of mortal sin sends the soul directly to hell. This is Church teaching.
An adulterer, a child abuser, an active homosexual, and all the parade of the likes, will not inherit the Kingdom of God, according to saint Paul, or in accordance with Church teaching from above. Look around guys. Most of them are in a state of mortal sin and happily profess it.

The Church teaches that it is not the right of any man to judge the souls of other human beings. We can only see external acts. We cannot get into their heads and discover what they are actually feeling inside, their circumstances, their level of maturity, their psychological state or innumerable other factors that could lessen or increase their culpability.

We do not know who is in a state of mortal sin:

vatican.va/archive/ccc_css/archive/catechism/p3s1c1a8.htm

1861 Mortal sin is a radical possibility of human freedom, as is love itself. It results in the loss of charity and the privation of sanctifying grace, that is, of the state of grace. If it is not redeemed by repentance and God’s forgiveness, it causes exclusion from Christ’s kingdom and the eternal death of hell, for our freedom has the power to make choices for ever, with no turning back. However, although we can judge that an act is in itself a grave offense, we must entrust judgment of persons to the justice and mercy of God

I therefore have a very serious qualm about this statement of yours:

Most of them are in a state of mortal sin and happily profess it

This seems shockingly judgemental to me and even magical - how could you possibly know something that only God, not even His Church, knows?

 

[Seraphignatius]

The Church teaches that it is not the right of any man to judge the souls of other human beings. We can only see external acts. We cannot get into their heads and discover what they are actually feeling inside, their circumstances, their level of maturity, their psychological state or innumerable other factors that could lessen or increase their culpability.

We do not know who is in a state of mortal sin:

vatican.va/archive/ccc_css/archive/catechism/p3s1c1a8.htm

I therefore have a very serious qualm about this statement of yours:

This seems shockingly judgemental to me and even magical - how could you possibly know something that only God, not even His Church, knows?

I believe the phrase he was likely looking for is “public, grave, manifest, sin”.