How hell could possibly be justified?

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ANV said:
No, I’m saying that it is not equal.
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Doesn’t have to be, as I understand it. “Sufficient” and “greater than none” are my assumed requisites.

Note that in this case, I do not consider “sufficient” as synonymous with “irresistible”.
 
ANV said:
So it isn’t equally given for everyone or at least by the same obvious ways, since saints and prophets got their grace more obvious and others haven’t got it at all.
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God gives actual graces to all people. It is not equally given for it is not necessarily to be equally given for some have greater tests than others. Also even though given it is rejected by some.
 
STT said:
And who did create them with the desire to have absolute power? To all seriousness, what you are suggesting doesn’t make sense: God creates us with the desire to have absolute power and then punish us for following it.
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God hasn’t created anyone with the desire to have absolute power. He has created us with free will so that we can choose what to believe, how to live and who to love…

Nor does God punish anyone. Our virtues bring their own reward and our vices incur their own punishment. The more selfish we are the more isolated we become. To be lovable we have to make ourselves lovable by being kind and considerate. Ultimately we all get exactly what we deserve: either we have integrity and are wholesome or we become corrupt like rotten fruit and are poisonous…
 
Hell is just reality. If we submit ourselves to God, who is Life Itself, Love Itself, and Reality Itself, we have life in abundance, and joy and peace. If we choose some other unreality, instead, giving preference to our own false sense of good and bad in preference to the only way to peace, joy and life, we are going to be miserable, enraged, and isolated: physically, emotionally, relationally, and psychologically.

Why not some other possibility? Well, other created beings who have no free will have that third possibility, which is inevitable compliance with the reality that is the will of God. We, however, have the extra gift of free will. That which makes immeasurably greater gain possible also makes immeasurably greater loss possible.

The Prodigal Son could not be fulfilled outside relationship with his father. It did not matter how much wealth he was given to squander on wanton and useless things that did no one any good. He chose to feed a bottomless pit of emptiness. There was not enough in the world to fill it up; it was inevitable he would wind up as he did. Someone who gets drunk every day is not “unlucky” if he ruins his health. It is going to happen, eventually.

Likewise, if we have an infinite amount of room for choices rooted in unreality to play out, reality will eventually show the unreality for the black hole of emptiness that it is.

Hell is a permanent state of embracing that emptiness in preference to the reality of God’s inescapable pre-eminence. In order for anyone to freely choose to embrace life, however, the choice to reject life has to be offered, as well, with all its inevitable consequences.
 
tonyrey said:
God hasn’t created anyone with the desire to have absolute power.
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There are evidences to show otherwise, Hitler, etc love power and superiority.
tonyrey said:
He has created us with free will so that we can choose what to believe, how to live and who to love…
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That I agree.
tonyrey said:
Nor does God punish anyone. Our virtues bring their own reward and our vices incur their own punishment. The more selfish we are the more isolated we become. To be lovable we have to make ourselves lovable by being kind and considerate. Ultimately we all get exactly what we deserve: either we have integrity and are wholesome or we become corrupt like rotten fruit and are poisonous…
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So He is unreal?
 
STT said:
[/God hasn’t created anyone with the desire to have absolute power.
There are evidences to show otherwise, Hitler, etc love power and superiority.
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That I agree. I’m delighted! 🙂
Nor does God punish anyone. Our virtues bring their own reward and our vices incur their own punishment. The more selfish we are the more isolated we become. To be lovable we have to make ourselves lovable by being kind and considerate. Ultimately we all get exactly what we deserve: either we have integrity and are wholesome or we become corrupt like rotten fruit and are poisonous…
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So He is unreal?
God cannot be unreal because cosmic justice doesn’t exist by chance, nor does love and goodness…
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I just finished reading Plato’s dialogue Gorgias. It’s an interesting read, especially in relation to the Christian idea of Hell and Purgatory. It’s fascinating to consider how different the modern world view is on the idea of punishment.
 
STT said:
So for example he loved people!?
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There needs to be evidence that he didn’t love his father and mother to reach the opposite conclusion - and even then he may have loved some one else, e.g. Eva Braun, although she did attempt suicide twice during their early relationship! On the other hand they stayed together for sixteen years and committed suicide together…
 
tonyrey said:
There needs to be evidence that he didn’t love his father and mother to reach the opposite conclusion - and even then he may have loved some one else, e.g. Eva Braun, although she did attempt suicide twice during their early relationship! On the other hand they stayed together for sixteen years and committed suicide together…
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By people I meant those who were killed by his commands. You cannot love people and let them die under hunger, as he did with Jews.
 
STT said:
By people I meant those who were killed by his commands. You cannot love people and let them die under hunger, as he did with Jews.
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You have changed the subject. The issue is whether “God creates us with the desire to have absolute power and then punishes us for following it” and you gave Hitler as an example!
 
tonyrey said:
You have changed the subject. The issue is whether “God creates us with the desire to have absolute power and then punishes us for following it” and you gave Hitler as an example!
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No, what I am point is important. He didn’t give up all those lives for nothing. Nazism is an idea that German are superior. They obviously were looking for absolute power. Why then they attack all those countries if you think otherwise?
 
STT said:
No, what I am point is important. He didn’t give up all those lives for nothing. Nazism is an idea that German are superior. They obviously were looking for absolute power. Why then they attack all those countries if you think otherwise?
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You have changed from “he” to “they” and in any case it is off the topic of how hell could possibly be justified…
 
The short answer to the OP is that it would be unjust to destroy anyone because they reject God. Hell has its compensations…
 
STT said:
So you think that it is rational to torture irrational?
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It is the tree choice of the one in hell.

Catechism 1033 … To die in mortal sin without repenting and accepting God’s merciful love means remaining separated from him for ever by our own free choice. This state of definitive self-exclusion from communion with God and the blessed is called “hell.”
 
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