hell

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CuriousM

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Hello (what a way to start a thread about hell huh? šŸ˜› )
Iā€™ve posted here before as Neighbor Ned, but canā€™t remember the information needed to log me in, so i just started a new one. If there is a problem with that let me know.

I am an exjw. Yes, I have had wonderful privilege of being in contact with Jeff Schwehm. Very nice person.

I had thought for certain I would be Catholic, but there have been a few glitches in the whole system and for now am just very happy being pagan. This Does Not mean that for myself I have just taken the entire story of Jesus and tossed it out the window. However there are some things regarding the bible and Jesus that at this point I just have a very tough time with.

Still, I had made a promise to Jeff that I would indeed read the Catechism, and I am. Althogh itā€™s going to take me awhile, lol. BIG BOOK! And at this point in time I feel a little hypocrtical saying the rosary as it begins with creeds I, at this time, canā€™t say without feeling like the worlds biggest hypocrite.

NOW onto my question about hell:
I went to see Bridge to Terabithia. Great movie, but Not at all like you think it would be. In the movie there is a reference to Hell. It does not take over the premise of the movie, it is just a reference that comes up twice.
I have to admit it was a startling one at first.

So I posed the question to two forums this week what their views were on hell.
Jeff S kindly gave me the Catechisms view on hell.

I reposted that for another board that I go to.
The question we were left with is:

What is the RCC final teaching on the Fires of hell?
We understand what the teaching is on how a person ends up in hell.
However, we were still wondering, are the fires of hell literal?
Or are they symbolic of something else?

As a JW we did not believe that the fires of hell were literal. Rather that it was symbolic for eternal death.

I was in the Catholic store this week looking for a commentary on the Rosary. Hey, what can I say, it is still a beautiful string of prayers and the mysteries that it takes you through are undeniably a beautiful way to contemplate Jesus.
Anyhow, there was a Catholic Answers mag in there with a small paragraph on the fires of hell.
I did not get the impression that there is a final teaching of the fires of hell.

So what are your thoughts and does the Church have a final say on the matter?

Thanks in advance and Please feel free to ask me any questions.
I have lurked here many times and feel safe in allowing you to ask me questions as you seem like a nice lot.

Blessings
meagan
 
Hello!

Take a look at this link and let me know what you think and perhaps we can delve more deeply into the subject matter.

God bless,

Kelly
 
CuriousM said:
Hello (what a way to start a thread about hell huh? šŸ˜› )
Iā€™ve posted here before as Neighbor Ned, but canā€™t remember the information needed to log me in, so i just started a new one. If there is a problem with that let me know.

I am an exjw. Yes, I have had wonderful privilege of being in contact with Jeff Schwehm. Very nice person.

I had thought for certain I would be Catholic, but there have been a few glitches in the whole system and for now am just very happy being pagan. This Does Not mean that for myself I have just taken the entire story of Jesus and tossed it out the window. However there are some things regarding the bible and Jesus that at this point I just have a very tough time with.

Still, I had made a promise to Jeff that I would indeed read the Catechism, and I am. Althogh itā€™s going to take me awhile, lol. BIG BOOK! And at this point in time I feel a little hypocrtical saying the rosary as it begins with creeds I, at this time, canā€™t say without feeling like the worlds biggest hypocrite.

NOW onto my question about hell:
I went to see Bridge to Terabithia. Great movie, but Not at all like you think it would be. In the movie there is a reference to Hell. It does not take over the premise of the movie, it is just a reference that comes up twice.
I have to admit it was a startling one at first.

So I posed the question to two forums this week what their views were on hell.
Jeff S kindly gave me the Catechisms view on hell.

I reposted that for another board that I go to.
The question we were left with is:

What is the RCC final teaching on the Fires of hell?
We understand what the teaching is on how a person ends up in hell.
However, we were still wondering, are the fires of hell literal?
Or are they symbolic of something else?

As a JW we did not believe that the fires of hell were literal. Rather that it was symbolic for eternal death.

I was in the Catholic store this week looking for a commentary on the Rosary. Hey, what can I say, it is still a beautiful string of prayers and the mysteries that it takes you through are undeniably a beautiful way to contemplate Jesus.
Anyhow, there was a Catholic Answers mag in there with a small paragraph on the fires of hell.
I did not get the impression that there is a final teaching of the fires of hell.

So what are your thoughts and does the Church have a final say on the matter?

Thanks in advance and Please feel free to ask me any questions.
I have lurked here many times and feel safe in allowing you to ask me questions as you seem like a nice lot.

Blessings
meagan
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I believe Hell is still defined as the absence of the Beatific Vision after death. It could be alternating between intense cold and intense heat as well.
 
The fires of hell may or may not be literal. Those in hell will have resurrected bodies and it is clear from scripture that they will suffer pain in hell. The Book of Revelation indicates that Satan and all of the damned will be thrown into the lake of fire at the end of time.

These references at least show us that there is great pain and suffering in hell. The pain caused by fire to the human body gives us an idea of its intensity this side of eternity. Since none of us have been there it is difficult to go beyond that. Frankly, I think the biblical testimony is plenty graphic and pointed to convince any believer that hell is a place of considerable torment. The exact nature of the pain and torment may exceed our understanding except by way of understanding the nature of fire.

I hope this helps.
 
Contrary to what some fundamentalists might have you believe, God does not send people to hell. Rather people send themselves to hell by the abuse of their freedom. God gave us free choice, and that included the freedom to choose Him, or the terrible choice of rejecting Him, which is hell.

One of the best explanations about hell that I have ever come across is the chapter by that name in The Problem of Pain, by C.S. Lewis. Hell is the state of being utterly self-centered, the image of someone being trapped inside a black hole comes to mind. We see terrifying hinst of this already in this life, for example, the journals left by the gunmen at Columbine, recording their inner darkness. Years later, I was astonished to discover that this is precisely what the Catechism teaches.

Many of the fathers of the early church made a speculation that makes a lot of sense to me: that Heaven, Hell, and Purgatory are really the same thing, the fires of Godā€™s love.

Those who have spent their earthly lives putting God first in heroic ways and are ready to enter fully into Godā€™s presence will experience the fires of that love as the joy that all of us were designed for. Those who have spent their lives in rejection of God will experience those fires as Hell. Most of us, who still need additional cleansing, will initially experience the cleansing fires of Purgtory.

Think of two people, one an classical music fan, and the other devoted to the baser forms of, letā€™s say hip-hop. Then imagine them at a concert of chamber music. It would be heaven for the one and hell for the other, but the music would be the same. Hope this helps.
 
C.S. Lewis also gave an interesting view of hell and purgatory in his book The Great Divorce.
 
Ok well my minor sore throat from yesterday has become a cold or something.
Iā€™m reading the posts but not a lot of it is really clicking at the moment.
Iā€™m going to give myself today to sort of eh, rest and hopefully get better.
And tomorrow (while most of you are at Mass šŸ˜ƒ ) I will read your posts and give them some thoughtful consideration and reply!
Thank you for so many responses!

Blessings
meagan
 
Here is what Sister Lucia wrote about her vision of hell:
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"She opened Her hands once more, as She had done the two previous months. The rays [of light] appeared to penetrate the earth, and we saw, as it were, a vast sea of fire. Plunged in this fire, we saw the demons and the souls [of the damned]. The latter were like transparent burning embers, all blackened or burnished bronze, having human forms. They were floating about in that conflagration, now raised into the air by the flames which issued from within themselves, together with great clouds of smoke. Now they fell back on every side like sparks in huge fires, without weight or equilibrium, amid shrieks and groans of pain and despair, which horrified us and made us tremble with fright (it must have been this sight which caused me to cry out, as people say they heard me). The demons were distinguished [from the souls of the damned] by their terrifying and repellent likeness to frightful and unknown animals, black and transparent like burning coals. That vision only lasted for a moment, thanks to our good Heavenly Mother, Who at the first apparition had promised to take us to Heaven. Without that, I think that we would have died of terror and fear."
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SOURCE
 
Kelly: Iā€™ve printed the article and will give it a read. Thanks for the link on that.

Bob: :confused:

Conan: You said:
Contrary to what some fundamentalists might have you believe, God does not send people to hell. Rather people send themselves to hell by the abuse of their freedom. God gave us free choice, and that included the freedom to choose Him, or the terrible choice of rejecting Him, which is hell.
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This is still God sending them to hell. Becuase the choice given in the beginning was not really a true choice.
Itā€™s like putting a gun to your childā€™s head and saying love me or die.
Which do you think they would choose? Do you think they would really love you? Or would they be choosing out of fear more then anything?

I have listened to a bit of Peter Kreeft before. Thank you for the link. He has an interesting take on things.
Is he Catholic?

Bill: thank you for this. Looks like an interesting read, that too Iā€™ve printed and will read carefully.

Aquina: Hm, this does look pretty scary.

Well, just from the bits of info here, it does sound like the idea is hell is very literal and painful torment awaits the person who rejects god.

Thank you for the (name removed by moderator)ut, if itā€™s ok, Iā€™ll share this with my friends. Iā€™m sure theyā€™ll be interested to read it.
 
Hi CuriousM! I bid thee welcome! šŸ™‚
This is still God sending them to hell. Becuase the choice given in the beginning was not really a true choice.
Itā€™s like putting a gun to your childā€™s head and saying love me or die.
Which do you think they would choose? Do you think they would really love you? Or would they be choosing out of fear more then anything?
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How come? When did God ā€œpoint a gunā€ at us? God gave us his love and we were living happily with him in Paradise. Then we disobeyed him. It was a true choice because we have every reason to obey him and truly love him back.

Right now it still works the same way. He isnā€™t saying love me or I will damn you to hell. I would imagine he would be saying something like this: ā€œI love you and you turned my back at me. I even gave My only son to die for your sins. Why do you rather disobey me? Why are you cutting yourself from me?ā€

I believe Hell is the absence of God. If God is love and everything good, imagine how horrible hell is. I donā€™t see it as some sort of punishment. I see it more like being offered a candy. You can accept it or reject it. You arenā€™t being punished by not not having the candy if you reject it. You shouldnā€™t be looking at this from the ā€œhalf-empty glassā€ perspective but rather ā€œhalf-full glassā€ perspective. Everything good we receive is in a sense a gift of God. I can choose to cut myself from God and all his giftsā€¦and that is Hell.

I hope that makes a bit more sense to you.

Pax Domini! šŸ™‚
 
I believe Hell is the absence of God. If God is love and everything good, imagine how horrible hell is.
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Ok, well I can agree with this. But possibly or probably not in the same sense as what the Church teaches.
I really do not believe in a literal hell.
I do however believe that a person creates their own hell by turning their back on God.
So, I DO see your point. Just not in such a literal way.
How come? When did God ā€œpoint a gunā€ at us? God gave us his love and we were living happily with him in Paradise. Then we disobeyed him. It was a true choice because we have every reason to obey him and truly love him back.
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Either way, you see, itā€™s an ultimatum that is posed by God.
Now, remember, I am thinking of this along the lines of it being a literal hell, torment and anguish and sighing and groaning and the whole 9 yards.

Would you pose that kind of an ultimatum to your child? I doubt it.
NOW on the other hand, you being a loving parent, know that your love for your child far outweighs the love that any other person will have for them. As in the case of the prodigal son, the child goes off, not realzing how good he has it. But soon realizes this and returns.
And the father welcomes him with love and open arms.

So, I suppose my long winded point šŸ˜ƒ is that, in a very non literal way, I can agree with some of the points. But the notion of a physical hell makes less sense.

And in some ways, some might agree with me on this, living in a world void of any God or Goddess for that matter, any ultimate source of justice, is a cold and dark world. The mental anguish of living apart from God is possibly (although I canā€™t guarantee this, as Iā€™ve not had the oppurtunity to test this theory) worse then physical torment.

Hope that makes sense.
 
And in some ways, some might agree with me on this, living in a world void of any God or Goddess for that matter, any ultimate source of justice, is a cold and dark world. The mental anguish of living apart from God is possibly (although I canā€™t guarantee this, as Iā€™ve not had the oppurtunity to test this theory) worse then physical torment.
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Hope that makes sense.
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I canā€™t say, but I believe that thatā€™s why the Bible uses such a harsh language. If it would say that hell is the absence of God, how many people can actually understand what that means? I guess many people, upon hearing this, would go: ā€œCool, does that mean I can do whatever I want to without anyone bothering me about sinning and all that jazz?ā€ I think the Bible is not being literal here precisely because we canā€™t understand the real torment of hell. We are too grounded in the physical world in order for us to understand it (like we canā€™t understand Trinity). That is why I think the Bible is talking about a physical place - so we understand that hell is not a place we would want to end up.
 
What is the RCC final teaching on the Fires of hell?
We understand what the teaching is on how a person ends up in hell.
However, we were still wondering, are the fires of hell literal?
Or are they symbolic of something else?
Click to expand...
Somebody correct me if Iā€™m way off-base here: this is just a soft opinion Iā€™ve arrived at after a lot of prayerful rumination on hell. Like every good Catholic, I believe what the Catechism states, that ā€œ[t]he chief punishment of hell is eternal separation from God.ā€ The fires of hell, then - that is, the physical pains of hell - might not be a punishment, per se, but a mediation of the psychic torment of hell: as it were, a physical pain to distract the damned from the inescapable fact that they are eternally deprived of God and the immeasurably worse psychic torment this would cause them if they were allowed to experience it without some measure of distraction.

Letā€™s seeā€¦now that Iā€™ve stated this, how I can back it up? Well, back to the statement from the Catechism: The chief punishment of hell is eternal separation from God. This makes it clear that ā€œseparation from Godā€ is the chief - that is, primary or principal - punishment of hell. Now ā€œseparation from Godā€ is obviously not the same thing as being aware of, or, at any rate, fully appreciating ā€œseparation from God.ā€ So the psychic torment of the damned (their Armageddon or revelation, as it were) must be at least secondary to the principal punishment, the deprivation of God. But how can the actual deprivation of God be the primary punishment if the damned are not somehow hampered or deterred from despair at their eternal misfortune? - which brings us back again to the ā€œfires of hellā€ as an imposition and positive mediation of their psychic suffering.

Oh well, so much for ruminating. :o At least Iā€™m deathly afraid of hell and determined not to go there!
 
I canā€™t say, but I believe that thatā€™s why the Bible uses such a harsh language. If it would say that hell is the absence of God, how many people can actually understand what that means? I guess many people, upon hearing this, would go: ā€œCool, does that mean I can do whatever I want to without anyone bothering me about sinning and all that jazz?ā€ I think the Bible is not being literal here precisely because we canā€™t understand the real torment of hell. We are too grounded in the physical world in order for us to understand it (like we canā€™t understand Trinity). That is why I think the Bible is talking about a physical place - so we understand that hell is not a place we would want to end up.
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This is very interesting.
How many people can understand absence of God?

:eek:

Ok, I really have to say, you make a point to be considered.

When I think of people who have no problem with adultery or thievery, yet if they are presented with the idea that hell awaits the sinner, perhaps they can adjust their minds to that easier then to realize that their life is empty because they donā€™t recognize their spiritual malnourishment.

Interesting, very interesting ā€¦:cool:
 
[QUOTEOh well, so much for ruminating. At least Iā€™m deathly afraid of hell and determined not to go there!]

šŸ‘

Thatā€™s a good thing I guess.

Wow, Iā€™ve got some serious reading to do!!
 
Iā€™m not sure there is a definitive teaching on hell- other than that it exists, and is a place of spiritual torture until the last judgement- and physical and spiritual torture for eternity, following the resurrection of the body and the final judgement.

One other thing, when you write a thread, please post your question at the very beginning of the first post- that way, when someone holds their mouse over the thread before opening it, they can see what it is. I doubt Iā€™m alone in that I donā€™t really like to not be able to tell what the thread is about before I open it.
 
Hell is described by God in two ways;
  1. As a fire that is never quenched.
  2. As a worm that never dies.
Both have things in common. The fire and the worm both consume a thing.
They both cause suffering and torment to a living body which they are consuming.

Both, in the description of hell, are eternal - never totally consuming the thing to physical oblivion.
=> Hell is like to a continuous consuming of the living person with great suffering without end.
Because a human is a physical entity animated by an immortal soul, after the Last Judgement when your body will be resurrected the suffering in hell becomes an actual physical suffering as well as the spiritual suffering of your soul caused by despair at the loss of God - or whatever.

Conversely;
Unlike the eternal consumption of the body in hell - heaven gives an eternal increase of life in the body and soul, where Life wells up from within, continuously giving Life in abundance to your body and soul.

IMO
 
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