Go to Hell - Stay there forever

[Thorolfr]

We all - including great saints - have the capacity to commit serious sins.

We do all our praying, Mass going, confession attending, receiving of the Eucharist etc to strengthen our relationship with God and in so doing reduce the chance of us committing a serious sin, or if we somehow did slip and do something bad, we would repent of it immediately, beg God’s forgiveness and be open to his mercy.

This makes sense if someone was raised Catholic and has had a lifetime to learn what is sinful and what isn’t and has been going to Mass and confession, etc. But most of the world’s population aren’t Catholic and many of them are probably doing things that the Catholic Church considers to be mortal sins for Catholics, yet are considered perfectly acceptable according to their culture or upbringing. So, do all these people not go to hell because they didn’t even know they were sinning?

 

[Tis_Bearself]

I am sure God takes their personal situations of ignorance into account. I myself have been told by a priest in confession that certain things weren’t sins because I didn’t know they were sinful when I did them, and I’m a cradle.

 

[CelticWarlord]

People on this forum seem to be obsessed with the idea that somebody is walking around being good as gold and then they somehow commit one little “mortal sin”, don’t get to confession for 3 days and die on day 2…

Outstanding. But I can assure you, it’s not just people on this forum.

 

[yankeesouth]

This heresy is really baffling.

The once saved always saved protestant notion is pretty attractive so a liberal in the Catholic Church who dissents from a teaching of Jesus will easily fall into this error. I talked to this woman who was going into the abortion mill and she flat out told me that Jesus loves her and understood why she was having this abortion so I need not be concerned for her soul. (I replied that right now I am more concerned for the life of the child.)

Anyway we see this kinda play out in the Church with liberals who teach primacy of conscience.

 

[Latin]

God made us in His image with an intellect and will–He does not destroy our will, but respects our choices.

Seems like you believe Genesis315 that our free wills are INDEPENDENT from God’s will.
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The core of the matter is to understand, our free wills are NOT INDEPENDENT from God’s will, our free wills are God’s gift of AIDED FREE WILL. – What God wills for us, that is what we freely choose.

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OUR UNAIDED FREE WILL ONLY GOOD FOR LYING AND SIN

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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GOD ALWAYS THE FIRST CAUSE OF OUR WILLING AND CHOOSING

We must make it very clear, our free wills are AIDED GIFT OF GOD, NOT an unaided gift of God and it is NOT INDEPENDENT from God’s will. - ALWAYS depends on God’s will.

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308 The truth that God is at work in all the actions of his creatures is inseparable from faith in God the Creator.
God is the first cause who operates in and through secondary causes: For God is at work in you, both to will and to work for his good pleasure.
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St. Thomas also 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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CCC 2022; “The divine initiative in the work of grace PRECEDES, PREPARES , and ELICITS the free response of man. …”

In other words, when God commands, He capacities the hearer to respond.
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Our cooperation with the grace of God is produced (not just enabled) by God’s operation.

Yet our ability to respond is also His gift of efficacious grace.

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As you see above Genesis315, there is NO such thing as an independent free will from God’s will, our free wills are 100 % depends on God’s will and our FREE WILL CHOICES are 100 % caused by God’s will.

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307 God thus enables men to be intelligent and free, causes in order to complete the work of creation, to perfect its harmony for their own good and that of their neighbors.
Though often unconscious collaborators with God’s will, they can also enter deliberately into the divine plan by their actions.

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Probably most of the time we do what we want to do and we don’t even realize we are cooperating with God’s efficacious graces and unknowingly we do exactly what God wills us to do.
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God bless

 

[Saxum]

The once saved always saved protestant notion is pretty attractive so a liberal in the Catholic Church who dissents from a teaching of Jesus will easily fall into this error.

I agree that the OSAS fallacy is attractive; that is why people want it to be true. Nobody wants to consider the possibility that they might go to Hell. Unfortunately, that possibility is very real. Wishful thinking won’t make this less true. Any Catholic who chooses to believe this error has chosen to become a heretic. And as it says clearly in Satis Cognitum, a person who rejects even the smallest part of one doctrine has rejected the whole and has placed themselves outside of the Catholic Church.

 

[oliver109]

How is the possibility of going to Hell very real if it is a choice, I could choose to visit Venezuela but the possibility of me going there is not very real as it is simply not somewhere I strongly want to go to, I can live my life in confidence and near certainty that I will not visit Venezuela.

 

[JimG]

I guess that the analogy is that because of original sin, most of us are imbued with a strong desire to visit Venezuela.

 

[Genesis315]

I think some distinctions need to be made. As you say, we have free will because God will’s it. Likewise, we obey the commandments with the help of grace.

But we should keep in mind the following errors are also definitively condemned by the Church:

2.The grace of Jesus Christ, which is the efficacious principle of every kind of good, is necessary for every good work; without it, not only is nothing done, but nothing can be done.

9.The grace of Christ is a supreme grace, without which we can never confess Christ, and with which we never deny Him.

10.Grace is the working of the omnipotent hand of God, which nothing can hinder or retard.

11.Grace is nothing else than the omnipotent Will of God, ordering and doing what He orders.

12.When God wishes to save a soul, at whatever time and at what ever place, the undoubted effect follows the Will of God.

13.When God wishes to save a soul and touches it with the interior hand of His grace, no human will resists Him.

14.Howsoever remote from salvation an obstinate sinner is, when Jesus presents Himself to be seen by him in the salutary light of His grace, the sinner is forced to surrender himself, to have recourse to Him, and to humble himself, and to adore his Savior.

15.When God accompanies His commandment and His eternal exhortation by the unction of His Spirit and by the interior force of His grace, He works that obedience in the heart that He is seeking.

16.There are no attractions which do not yield to the attractions of grace, because nothing resists the Almighty.

17.Grace is that voice of the Father which teaches men interiorly and makes them come to Jesus Christ; whoever does not come to Him, after he has heard the exterior voice of the Son, is in no wise taught by the Father.

18.The seed of the word, which the hand of God nourishes, always brings forth its fruit.

20.The true idea of grace is that God wishes Himself to be obeyed by us and He is obeyed; He commands, and all things are done; He speaks as the Lord, and all things are obedient to Him.

21.The grace of Jesus Christ is a strong, powerful, supreme, invincible grace, that is, the operation of the omnipotent Will, the consequence and imitation of the operation of God causing the incarnation and the resurrection of His Son.

25.God illumines the soul, and heals it, as well as the body, by His will only; He gives orders and He is obeyed.

30.All whom God wishes to save through Christ. are infallibly saved.

31.The desires of Christ always have their effect; He brings peace to the depth of hearts when He desires it for them.

38.Without the grace of the Liberator, the sinner is not free except to do evil.

39.The will, which grace does not anticipate, has no light except for straying, no eagerness except to put itself in danger, no strength except to wound itself, and is capable of all evil and incapable of all good.

40.Without grace we can love nothing except to our own condemnation.

Unigenitus - Papal Encyclicals

 

[Latin]

I think some distinctions need to be made. As you say, we have free will because God will’s it. Likewise, we obey the commandments with the help of grace.

According to what God wills for us, He provides us the sufficient and efficacious graces and we act according to His sufficient and efficacious graces.

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THE MYSTERY OF PREDESTINATION John Salza

Hence, a sufficient grace has an operating effect only ( empowering the will to act),

whereas an efficacious grace has both an operating and cooperating effect ( applying the will to act).

Sufficient grace remains an interior impulse, whereas an efficacious grace produces an exterior act.

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Sufficient grace gives man the potency to do good, but efficacious grace is required to move him from potency to act.

Therefore, sufficient grace is insufficient to move him to act, the power remains in potency and is never actualized.

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When God wills a person to perform a salutary act (e.g., prayer, good works), He grants him the means (an efficacious grace) that infallibly produces the end (the act willed by God).
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If God wills to permit a person to resist His grace, He grants him a sufficient, and not an efficacious, grace.

The distinctions between these graces reveal that God is responsible for man’s salvation. End quote.

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When our wills aided with sufficient grace, we always infallibly and FREELY reject the grace and we every time FREELY commit the acts of sins.

When our wills aided with efficacious graces, we ALWAYS FREELY and infallibly reject the temptation of sin and we every time FREELY choose the good.

But we should keep in mind the following errors are also definitively condemned by the Church:

That Encyclical is a very good entertainment, many of them Soteriological Facts.

I will study them. Thank you that Encyclical.

God bless

 

[NoelFitz]

Thanks for all the repliies, which are much appreciated. I hope to give a more considered post when I am less busy.
Having seventy contributions so far, it seems I have opened an issue of interest to many here.

God of mercy and compassion,
Look with pity upon me

God bless.

 

[Latin]

If even one person in all Christian history would reject God’s call to heaven, would end up in hell or if would end up in hell for any reason, God would instantly lose His omniscience,

The Catholic Church affirms predestination as a DE FIDE Dogma (the highest level of binding theological certainty).

CATHOLIC ENCYCLOPEDIA Predestination of the elect.

Consequently, the whole future membership of heaven, down to its minutest details, with all the different measures of grace and the various degrees of happiness, has been irrevocably fixed from all eternity.

Nor could it be otherwise. For if it were possible that a predestined individual should after all be cast into hell or that one not predestined should in the end reach heaven, then God would have been mistaken in his foreknowledge of future events; He would NO LONGER be omniscient.

Rom.8:30; Those whom he predestined he also called, and those whom he called he also justified, and those whom he justified he also glorified.

As you see above Gab123, in Catholic Soteriology and in the Scripture, every predestined IRREVOCABLY SAVED.

Nor would God permit evil at all, unless He could draw good out of evil.
Evil, therefore, ministers to God’s design

While I agree, there is human logic above what you have said, but the way God deals with us is different, God knows how much virtue He infused into us.

1 Cor.4:7; For who makes you different from anyone else? What do you have that you did not receive? And if you did receive it, why do you boast as it you have not received it?

God is interested in our works as it is described in CCC 307.

307 God thus enables men to be intelligent and free, causes in order to complete the work of creation, to perfect its harmony for their own good and that of their neighbors.
Though often unconscious collaborators with God’s will, they can also enter deliberately into the divine plan by their actions.

The way our free will works, I explained it in great details in my above posts No. 46, 65, 70.
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God bless

 

[lilypadrees]

God doesn’t want us to spend eternity in Hell. He wants us to be with Him. But He will not force His Will on us.

He gave us free will with which we can choose to accept or reject Him. If we choose to accept Him and live our lives in accordance with His Will for us, the reward is Heaven. If, on the other hand, we choose to reject or deny Him, and we don’t wake up and change our hearts before we leave this world, He will sadly turn away from us and send us where He never wanted us to go.

 

[runningdude]

I cannot see how a good God would create a being who will suffer for all eternity, especially if that person had a morally good life, except for one unforgiven mortal sin.

That is the issue. A mortal sin is one that is both objectively grave, and one that the sinner bears full moral culpability. In these circumstances, one did not live a moral life. They made a conscious choice to destroy their relationship with God.

I won’t say it is a “rare” circumstance that one commits a true mortal sin, but it is a difficult criteria. Even eternal damnation from a true and deliberate mortal sin can be overcome immediately with a true and deliberate act of contrition (one must still go to confession to licitly receive communion following a grave sin even with perfect contrition).

One simply does not accidentally end up in hell due to the whims of chance.

 

[John_Martin]

Our LORD is the fire, “hot as Hell”; the Seraphim are ablaze as they gaze on Him.

When we die we will approach the fire of His being and either pour our life into Him, turning bright and aflame, like a burning Bush in surprise that instead of being consumed we are now “alive in the extreme”, either that or try to flee a fire that looks like death, try to flee a fire that looks like the destruction of all we have craved and all we have grabbed in trying to enforce our own life and satisfaction, so an eternity of fleeing the LORD, instead of offering oneself into the inferno of his being. Entering the Fire is Life though it looks like death; remaining outside the fire is eternal dreadful flight from apparent death.

John Martin

 

[Rob2]

I have a problem with God’s mercy and love, and it is hell.

@NoelFitz , it may help you to reflect on what the Catechism says : " The Church prays that no one should be lost: “Lord, let me never be parted from you.” If it is true that no one can save himself, it is also true that God “desires all men to be saved” ( 1 Tim 2:4), and that for him “all things are possible” ( Mt 19:26). "

As Hans Urs Von Balthasar asks in the title of his book " Dare we hope that all men be saved ?"

Yes , I dare hope and do hope that all be saved .

 

[Vico]

fantasising about having sex with someone’s wife

The thought occurring is merely temptation. The sin is in not banishing the impure thought (however, it may take a few seconds to recognize it). Baltimore Catechism:

Q. 1318. Are impure thoughts and desires always sins?
A. Impure thoughts and desires are always sins, unless they displease us and we try to banish them.

 

[Gab123]

The Catholic Church affirms predestination as a DE FIDE Dogma (the highest level of binding theological certainty).

The problem is that people misinterpret the Catechism of the Catholic Church the same way people misinterpret the Bible. When the Church teaches about Predestination , which refers to the God’s plan of salvation for individuals, it is not teaching Double predestination , which is the erroneous belief that God also actively chooses people for damnation. Predestination is a Biblical doctrine and official Church teaching, whereas Double predestination is condemned heresy.

Predestination to heaven is contingent on us responding to God’s grace. The different end (heaven or hell) is dependent on us. As Jesus warned:

“Not everyone who says to me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter the kingdom of heaven, but the one who does the will of my Father who is in heaven. On that day many will say to me, ‘Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in your name, and cast out demons in your name, and do many mighty works in your name?’ And then will I declare to them, ‘I never knew you; depart from me, you workers of lawlessness.’-Matt. 7:21-23

God wills for all to be saved (1 Tim. 2:4), but that salvation is contingent on our choice to respond to His grace. Thus, Salvation is a gift; but like any gift, it can be lost, squandered or altogether rejected. Therefore, predestination of heaven is for those who love God and chose the road to heaven. You are predestined to get to Minneapolis if you get on the bus that leads to Minneapolis; you are certainly free to change your mind and get off the bus before it arrives. Unrepented sin means you’re on a road that leads to hell.

As for free will, all of our choices have ramifications. An old analogy is this:

A) The farmer is destined to be killed by the wolf, provided the farmer forgets to take his rifle.
B) The wolf is destined to be killed by the farmer, provided he remembered to take his rifle.
C) The farmer is destined to remember to take his rifle, provided his wife prayed that he have a safe journey.
Etc.

Salvation is contingent on us responding to God’s grace and acting upon it. God is constantly calling on us to repent of our ways, to avoid occasions of sin, to pray, to forgive, to love and serve neighbor etc.

Paul sums it up here:
Or do you not know that wrongdoers will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived: Neither the sexually immoral nor idolaters nor adulterers nor men who have sex with men nor thieves nor the greedy nor drunkards nor slanderers nor swindlers will inherit the kingdom of God. And that is what some of you were. But you were washed, you were sanctified, you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and by the Spirit of our God. 1 Cor. 6:9-11

For the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord. Rom. 6:23

 

[Latin]

Yes , I dare hope and do hope that all be saved .

Because of the Theological Facts below, I dare hope too and do hope that God saves everyone.
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CCCS 1996-1998; 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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No ONE rejects God’s Predestination to eternal life in heaven. – DE FIDE Dogma.

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John 6:44; No one can come to me unless the Father who sent me draws them.

While St. Thomas says that man turns to God by his own free will, he explains that free-will can only be turn to God, when God turns it.

John 15:16; You did not chose Me, but I chose you.

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Theological Fact:
Our Predestination to Heaven coming TOTALLY from God’s decision and surpassing ALL power of human intellect and will and Predestined to Heaven with an absolute decree.

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Theological Fact:
No ONE rejects God’s Predestination to eternal life in heaven. – DE FIDE Dogma.

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Theological Fact:
Excerpt from the Catholic Encyclopedia Predestination of the elect: For the absolute predestination of the blessed is at the same time the ABSOLUTE will of God NOT TO ELECT a priori the rest of mankind (Suarez), or which comes to the same, to EXCLUDE them from heaven (Gonet), in other words, NOT to save them.

Moreover, in order to realize infallibly his decree, God is compelled to frustrate the eternal welfare of all excluded a priori from heaven, and to TAKE CARE that they die in their sins. End quote.

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Theological Fact:
For all those whom God EXCLUDED from heaven and toTAKE CARE that they die in their sins solely God bears the culpability.

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The whole Catholic Church is praying to God (1058) for the reason that God to save everyone.

Because of the above Theological Facts I have confidence in God that He saves everyone by answer the prayers of the Catholic Church.
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God bless

 

[LawyersGunsAndMoney]

I won’t say it is a “rare” circumstance that one commits a true mortal sin, but it is a difficult criteria.

My sense is that committing a true mortal sin is much harder than most people on CAF assume.