Hell - final destination

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Mordocai

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Dunno where to put this, so if a moderator needs to move it, of course do so.

God is of course all-merciful and all-just, all wanting us to go through His door of mercy instead.

But I have a very very difficult time believing that a lot of people go to hell. why do i believe this?

My view (and PLEASE PLEASE correct me if im wrong) is that God will give us light to repent and even when we die, we can still repent at his feet and beg mercy.

like take ur average joe, who’s living in mortal sin and doesnt care about Jesus. i feel that God will still give them the grace of final repentance. now, i know im skating on thin ice, and my instincts and right reason are telling me im dead wrong, so i just wanted ot get a discussion going on basically what it takes to go to hell.

God has just made such a huge impact on my life, and has given me so much mercy (and im so undeserving of it) and if He does it for me, i figure “well why won’t He do it for them too?” their glory in heaven may be little compared to a saint since all a person’s life was filled with sin, but…i dunno im just kinda confused 🙂 help!
 
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Mordocai:
Dunno where to put this, so if a moderator needs to move it, of course do so.

God is of course all-merciful and all-just, all wanting us to go through His door of mercy instead.

But I have a very very difficult time believing that a lot of people go to hell. why do i believe this?

My view (and PLEASE PLEASE correct me if im wrong) is that God will give us light to repent and even when we die, we can still repent at his feet and beg mercy.

like take ur average joe, who’s living in mortal sin and doesnt care about Jesus. i feel that God will still give them the grace of final repentance. now, i know im skating on thin ice, and my instincts and right reason are telling me im dead wrong, so i just wanted ot get a discussion going on basically what it takes to go to hell.

God has just made such a huge impact on my life, and has given me so much mercy (and im so undeserving of it) and if He does it for me, i figure “well why won’t He do it for them too?” their glory in heaven may be little compared to a saint since all a person’s life was filled with sin, but…i dunno im just kinda confused 🙂 help!
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No you cannot repent after you die. You have your chance while you are still alive only through the Sacrament of Reconciliation.
When you die you soul is immediately judged (The Particular Judgment) on its state at the time of death.
 
Mordocia,

I share your confusion. The privious two posters did not answer your question directly IMO. The answers you received are typical of the answers I get when posing this same dilemma. It’s almost as if the true context of the question simply doesn’t sink in when asked.

I do understand Thistles answer. It seems pretty clear that there is no repenting after death. This concept of a last minute opportunity to repent though may still be valid. God can do anything, of course, so it may be possible that in the final millisecond of life one is given special graces and may be able to see more clearly and repent before death. I don’t believe there is anything in the CCC or Gospels that refute this possibility.

Puzzleannie directed you to a link that basically states that Hell does in fact exist. Which of course wasn’t your question. Although the point is well taken that you should search out documents to read on this. Unfortunately though I suspect you may be as disillustioned as me as to what you find.

C.S. Lewis’s book “The Great Divorce” is a magnificient read about Hell. Although the book doesn’t seem to agree with the concepts of Hell we are taught about. I like to think Lewis’s rendition of Hell holds some truth.

Unless I am mistaken you are concerned about the eternal life of those who for one reason or another never grasped onto an orthodox or devout religious life. Further, this of course describes most everybody relatively speaking.

I see a paradox which has never been satisfactorily answered for me.

We are told we should be in Peace with Christ. We are told not to be anxious as we await the coming of our Lord. YET, our faith, many passages in the Bible and the CCC when taken literally (which is the way we are to take them) illude strongly to the vast majority of people going to Hell. I ask how this can be?

There is not a single issue IMO, danced around/ side stepped as much as this one.
 
I once thought I was the only one with this question 😉 God has led me to a conclusion that partially settles it, although I still get into my “well, yeah but what if…” mode once in a while…but I realize that some things are just best left as mysteries, and think myself silly for trying to make sense of God and His Ways in my own limited human way.

Life is like a test. You don’t get to say “oh nevermind I’m sorry I bombed the test, but I see what I did wrong now, so can I still get an A?”

I’m sure there is nothing our blessed Lord would want more than to have everyone in Heaven with Him…but He would then very likely need to take away our gift of free will.
God gives every person a chance to come to Him. He calls to us, even though we may ignore Him or choose not to recognize Him. He gives us opportunities throughout our lifetime, He “stands at the door and knocks”. It is the way in which we respond to His call that basically decides our fate. Although it may often seem like He picks and chooses favorites, He doesn’t. And suppose a person doesn’t know about God or ever hear of Him, I don’t believe he will go to Hell. Purgatory maybe, because it was ignorane, not choice, that prevented him from coming to God.

God bless.
 
" i feel that God will still give them the grace of final repentance."

Every moment that you are alive is that grace of final repentance.

A few random ideas that might help:

~People who go to hell wouldn’t want to go to Heaven anyway- they would find the holiness of the Lord to be oppressive and insulting. The Lord isn’t going to force to you hang out with Him for all eternity.

~Do most people really love God? Or do they just want to feel good? Heaven won’t be a feel good party, it will be a total communion with God. If you love God, then of course that communion will feel good, but if you don’t love God, then how can you be in that communion?

~This is an incorrect view of Heaven/Hell, but a funny idea nonetheless: What if Heaven and Hell were the same place? It would be like two music fans at a Mozart concert… except one of the fans only likes rap music. Thus, one would be in Heaven, the other in Hell. In the same way God’s light might feel energizing and loving to one person, and burning and comdemning to another.
 
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Mordocai:
Dunno where to put this, so if a moderator needs to move it, of course do so.

God is of course all-merciful and all-just, all wanting us to go through His door of mercy instead.

But I have a very very difficult time believing that a lot of people go to hell. why do i believe this?

My view (and PLEASE PLEASE correct me if im wrong) is that God will give us light to repent and even when we die, we can still repent at his feet and beg mercy.

like take ur average joe, who’s living in mortal sin and doesnt care about Jesus. i feel that God will still give them the grace of final repentance. now, i know im skating on thin ice, and my instincts and right reason are telling me im dead wrong, so i just wanted ot get a discussion going on basically what it takes to go to hell.

God has just made such a huge impact on my life, and has given me so much mercy (and im so undeserving of it) and if He does it for me, i figure “well why won’t He do it for them too?” their glory in heaven may be little compared to a saint since all a person’s life was filled with sin, but…i dunno im just kinda confused 🙂 help!
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You have correctly stated Church teaching! See the Catechism (Paragraphs 846, 847, and 848).
 
Nothing I’m about to say is Catholic dogma but I don’t see anything contrary to my theory and the Church. How I look at it is that God does not judge us by where we are in the journey (when we die) but that it is more important which direction we are going. If we are not yet righteous but would be if either we had more time or had not yet heard the Word of God, I think that we’re ok.

That’s not to say that we aren’t judged by the final state we are in before we die. But if someone hasn’t heard the Word of God and would in truth progress towards God if they were revealed the Truth, I think that the state they are in is ok. After all, Moses never made it to the promised land, but he would have gone there if God allowed him. Sure he was punished, but it was only temporal.
But I have a very very difficult time believing that a lot of people go to hell.
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I disagree completely by this statement though. The gate of heaven is narrow as Jesus Himself described and all the saints have confirmed in their understandings. This is not to say God is unmerciful. People choose to go to hell.
 
This has been discussed in another thread-why do some people seem to receive the grace to ‘hear’ ‘see’ God when others don’t? my own family, one of very lukewarm catholics think i am ‘wierd’ for being so deep in the faith. I often wonder, why do I feel the tug of the faith so strongly, that I make herecluen efforts to live a good life, that I devote considerable time to prayer,that when I was deep in Mortal sin, I started for no reason I can disern start going again for mass after years of not going?

I used to think grace was like the rain, that it fell on everyone. It was for us to take advantage of it- I don’t think so anymore…I may be wrong.
 
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radhika:
I often wonder, why do I feel the tug of the faith so strongly, that I make herecluen efforts to live a good life, that I devote considerable time to prayer,that when I was deep in Mortal sin, I started for no reason I can disern start going again for mass after years of not going?

.
You may have hit on a point here radika. Those of us who were “deep in moral sin”, may have witnessed a taste of hell. Maybe when you have had a taste of hell you run faster and further from it.
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After re-reading my original post, I see that it is very easy to misunderstand what I’m saying. The third poster (not including me, the OP) got it right on though.
I just have difficulty knowing that humanity has deprived itself so much, and that the devil has gained control of so many people. I want so much for everyone to go to heaven.
How much more does God want that too…
But I mean, so many people don’t make God the center of their lives or holiness in Christ the object of their desire. And because of this (and the state of their soul at death) they go to hell.
I like to think this too…
That God really DOES give everyone a LOT of grace to repent throughout their life. But we’re SO adept at ignoring it.
I remember before my reversion… I was so stupid! It was a constant call to come back home. But in retrospect…
Was I given enough grace or was I not given enough? And I think that question is a bad one to ask, since, I mean we expect God to do everything. “well if God is real, He’ll make Himself known”
(Well He made Himself known to me, that’s for sure!) and “If God wants me to be holy, He’ll let me know, I just don’t think you gotta be perfect to get to Heaven”

I often say “people don’t realize how difficult it really is to get to Heaven”
And it really, really is very hard.

But I guess what I’m getting at is this earth shaker…
WHY is it so difficult to get to Heaven?

We as humans want the easy way out, but you know what I’ve discovered?
What we REALLY want is the most difficult challenge in the world, and that is conquering ourselves.

God Bless,
Mordocai
 
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