I deserve to die a horrible death?

[rosejmj]

Well, I’d rather not go to hell because I don’t follow something that I have no way of knowing is true ie Catholicism. I also don’t agree with all Catholic morality, especially regarding sexuality and contraception. I think I’m just conflicted. I don’t know what to believe and I’m afraid that if what I choose not to follow happens to be true I’ll be in hell. I want reasons not to believe and yet religion always brought some comfort and security and it’s scary not thinking you know what’s after death

 

[SPBlitz]

I want reasons not to believe

So this is a bit challenging, since it means that any answer we give - even if it happens to be a good one - you’ll immediately be hostile to, since you don’t want it to be a good answer. You’ll want it to be false. Puts those who are trying to help you in a bit of a tough position.

 

[0Scarlett_nidiyilii]

I think I’m just conflicted

Fair enough.
Catholicism is extremely counterculture, and make no mistake, you will get crap for being a believer.
In some countries it will cost you your life.

At the same time there are some really good books explaining the “whys” of belief.

Mere Christianity by CS Lewis is good.
Handbook of Christian Apologetics by Peter Kreeft is also good.

 

[stpurl]

It’s a tough time now for sure. And as for the whole sexuality and contraception, as one who hit her teens in the swinging 70s there really isn’t anything I don’t know about temptation, about conflicting answers (even from the priests), and wanting to feel comfort and security.

But let’s just assume we’re god. We want to make beings who are good. . . But just having something good—anything good—means there is always going to be a possibility that somebody will misuse it and make it not good. Heck, ice cream is good, but eat too much and you’ll get sick. Or one can say sex is good, but if you just have sex sex sex indiscriminately you’ll wind up feeling empty, it won’t ever feel that you have found ‘the right one’ because it will always be this call for, “but I haven’t found the PERFECT person yet’, so even something good like sex can wind up causing you pain and anguish instead of pleasure (and that’s not even taking into account disease).

It’s not so easy to create good without there being opportunities to have evil. . .in fact, it’s impossible unless you create beings who will ‘never sin’.

God did, in fact, create three beings who were without sin —Adam, Eve, and Mary. Despite Adam and Eve being created without any stain of sin, they still sinned. So being originally ‘sinless’ isn’t a guarantee. Mary was the only person who was ever created sinless and did NOT sin, and that was through her personal choices, choices just as hard for her as they would be for any of us, where she chose ‘right’.

So God in creating us did everything ‘right’, and Adam and Eve went wrong. But we still, every one of us, can choose at every given ‘choice’ in our life, to do right.

Is it easy? Heck no. But have many people done it? Heck yes. The saints —and it was hard, and some of them sinned a lot before they wised up, like St. Augustine—but even though some of them had done some rotten things, they still wound up saying yes to God. They persevered. They fell, they went to confession, they rose back up. . .

We have help. We have God, His angels, His saints, His Church. The so-called limits aren’t meant to keep us from having fun, but to keep us from hurting ourselves and others. The gravity of sin is like a warning beep that we are in danger, and confession and repentance brings us back from the danger. And God gives that to us! (Yes most places a priest will still be available for confession).

The beauty of the faith is that for 2000 years we have had incredibly smart and loving people who have had the same kind of questions and worries you have had, and they have approached the Holy Spirit and gotten answers. The Church is the guardian of those answers. We don’t have to reinvent the wheel about what is right and wrong. We aren’t slaves to the fashion of the moment or what some celebrity or guide says is right ‘for the times’. We have some solid absolute moral guides that won’t let us down.

 

[CTBcin]

Maybe he has a guilty conscience.

The phrase about “deserving a horrible death” are included in St. Alphonsus Liguori’s version of the Stations of the Cross. It’s a fairly common (and intense) version of the stations.

 

[njlisa]

The martyrs die horrible deaths. But they do it out of charity and fidelity.

For example, St. Maximillian Kolbe chose to die in a starvation bunker to spare another man’s life. While he was in the bunker, he comforted his fellow prisoners. Today, he continues to comfort and inspire us.

 

[IsaiahSpirit]

Amen.
(BTW, thankfulness to so many posts offering recommendations to devout credible sources which help on this difficult journey on earth.)
GOD allowed humanity in freewill to choose less than Holiness,
to be wise in our own eyes; but GOD in GOD’s Mercy let this be a lesson
for those who, by Divine Favor always knocking at the door of every heart&mind, to choose thankful participation in JESUS Beloved Redeemer’s Merits; to grow in Holiness on life’s journey to Heaven.
GOD gives Divine Favor to grow in GOD’s Peace which surpasses all human understanding - so we grow less afraid of GOD because of our human lack of understanding mistrusting our all Benevolent Caring Humble Powerful GOD.
~
GOD let us get to any situation we find ourselves in Providence (Acting and Allowing Will of GOD); and GOD will by Divine Favor led decision to truly seek GOD, accept objective morality Always True since GOD doesn’t change;
thus our rationalizations for sin, sexual or otherwise grow less. We become less anxious, less afraid of the afterlife - and wait in Joyful Hope for meeting GOD at each of our afterlives and the end of time as we know it.
~
Yes, we have 2,000 years of those going through similar tribulations and troubled consciences, rationalizations toward sin - but choosing by Divine Favor always by GOD seeking each of us - diligent growth in Holiness.
~
One of the best prayers we can pray is to understand objective virtue over sin, while asking, seeking, and knocking for credible sources. For we know, this helps imitation of Christ’s Cheerful Self-Giving Humble nature to be a blessing to our neighbor in Spiritual and earthly needs which go hand in hand.
~
Peace.

" Rejoice in the Lord always. I will say it again: Rejoice! Let your gentleness be apparent to all. The Lord is near. Be anxious for nothing, but in everything, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God. And the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus."
“Finally, brethren, whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is of good repute, if there is any excellence and if anything worthy of praise, dwell on these things.” - Philippians 4:4-8

 

[Mike_from_NJ]

The fact of the matter is, every sin is an offence against God, who is all-good and worthy of all our love.

Maybe we should teach God the compassion in our hearts so he knows to not consider someone who offends us as worthy of a horrible death and eternal torment.

 

[PennyinCanada]

I also don’t agree with all Catholic morality, especially regarding sexuality and contraception. I think I’m just conflicted.

I believe that many people have left the church because the pill allowed them to have sex without consequences and without commitment. Recreational sex with dating.

We are being sifted like wheat right now. Make the decision, are you in or not? You might come before Jesus much sooner than you think.

Luke 22:31 "Simon, Simon, Satan has asked to sift all of you as wheat.

 

[ioannes_pius]

Of course.

 

[rosejmj]

one can say sex is good, but if you just have sex sex sex indiscriminately you’ll wind up feeling empty, it won’t ever feel that you have found ‘the right one’ because it will always be this call for, “but I haven’t found the PERFECT person yet’, so even something good like sex can wind up causing you pain and anguish instead of pleasure (and that’s not even taking into account disease).

I have no desire to sleep around. I’d love to be able to enjoy intimacy within a serious dating relationship however

 

[rosejmj]

I get how blasphemy could be an offense against God, but how is say telling a white lit, or being lazy offending God ?

 

[Mike_from_NJ]

I get how blasphemy could be an offense against God, but how is say telling a white lit, or being lazy offending God ?

I guess the idea might be similar to a parent raising a child and then the child wastes the love, time, and effort in being raised on laziness.

But I agree with you that these things don’t warrant a horrible death or eternity in Hell. In fact, I’ll go a step further to stay that even if such things offend God he should do what good people do: Show compassion and not seek revenge for offense big or small. Hurting someone for offense is petty and not good.

 

[PennyinCanada]

Show compassion and not seek revenge for offense big or small.

God is not seeking revenge. Scripture tells us to be ready to meet the Lord. To give an account for our life. What did we do with our talents?

Matthew 25​

The Parable of the Wise and Foolish Virgins​

25 “Then the kingdom of heaven shall be likened to ten virgins who took their lamps and went out to meet the bridegroom. 2 Now five of them were wise, and five were foolish. 3 Those who were foolish took their lamps and took no oil with them, 4 but the wise took oil in their vessels with their lamps. 5 But while the bridegroom was delayed, they all slumbered and slept.

6 “And at midnight a cry was heard: ‘Behold, the bridegroom [a]is coming; go out to meet him!’ 7 Then all those virgins arose and trimmed their lamps. 8 And the foolish said to the wise, ‘Give us some of your oil, for our lamps are going out.’ 9 But the wise answered, saying, ‘ No, lest there should not be enough for us and you; but go rather to those who sell, and buy for yourselves.’ 10 And while they went to buy, the bridegroom came, and those who were ready went in with him to the wedding; and the door was shut.

11 “Afterward the other virgins came also, saying, ‘Lord, Lord, open to us!’ 12 But he answered and said, ‘Assuredly, I say to you, I do not know you.’

13 “Watch therefore, for you know neither the day nor the hour [b]in which the Son of Man is coming.

And another parable…

Matthew 22:11-14​

11 “But when the king came in to see the guests, he noticed a man there who was not wearing wedding clothes. 12 He asked, ‘How did you get in here without wedding clothes, friend?’ The man was speechless.

13 “Then the king told the attendants, ‘Tie him hand and foot, and throw him outside, into the darkness, where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.’

14 “For many are invited, but few are chosen.”

 

[Vico]

… Why are we bled constantly for being imperfect and sinful and told we deserve a painful death and even hell and that we should be grateful for the opportunity to not go to hell?..

By nature, humans do not receive heaven (the Beatific Vision) because that is only possible through demonstrating love, which only is possible through the gift of grace given by the Holy Trinity that one cooperates with, at least by the time of death.

Catechism of the Catholic Church

1730 God created man a rational being, conferring on him the dignity of a person who can initiate and control his own actions. "God willed that man should be ‘left in the hand of his own counsel,’ so that he might of his own accord seek his Creator and freely attain his full and blessed perfection by cleaving to him."26

Man is rational and therefore like God; he is created with free will and is master over his acts.27

1870 “God has consigned all men to disobedience, that he may have mercy upon all” (Rom 11:32).

 

[Annie]

Why are we bled constantly for being imperfect and sinful and told we deserve a painful death and even hell and that we should be grateful for the opportunity to not go to hell?

Christ, Who was completely perfect, died a painful death.

How can we, who are anything but perfect–because we so often choose the selfish way, the easy way, the fun way–deserve a less painful death than the one Christ got?

Did He die so we could just do whatever we want? No. He died so we could get into Heaven. But it’s not a free ride. Christ didn’t die so we could do whatever we want and still slouch on into Heaven.

In order to get to Heaven, our souls need to be clean. (And we even get a second chance in Purgatory if they are not all that clean!)

You could say that we participate in the shaping of our souls. God sends us things in our lives which will, if we cooperate, make our souls beautiful and perfect, but all too often, our souls are shriveled and ugly because of what we do.

God may have allowed us to be made in a certain way, but He also sends all the help we need to overcome those weaknesses. We just have to accept and use that grace to do so.

He did not have to send his son to die. I would have been fine if he did not

You think!!! Christ died to open the Gates of Heaven so we would even have a chance at getting in. Without Him, no one not even the most perfect, could enter Heaven.

As long as people don’t get sent to hell that don’t deserve it.

People don’t get sent to Hell if they don’t deserve it.

God judges each of us with perfect justice and with perfect mercy. He sees into our hearts so He knows exactly where we were at when we committed this sin or that act of charity. He knows one person didn’t know any better than to commit that sin, or was scared not to, or whatever, and He knows that rich man only gave money to charities because he got a tax break and a big write-up in the news when he did that.

God would be evil to make us imperfect and Inclined to sin and make that fact the reason he sends us to hell when we haven’t committed grevious crimes.

Who said God sends people to Hell for less than grievous crimes? One of the criteria for being guilty of sinning mortally (ie, enough to be sent to Hell) is precisely that it be “grave matter.”

But maybe your problem is what counts as grave matter? Having sex really doesn’t seem anywhere near as bad as stealing a lot of money from a charity, but it counts as grave matter.

And that is a subject about which books could be written, so I won’t try to answer it here, but you might try praying about it, just asking God, why is having sex outside of marriage so seriously wrong in Your eyes?

Continued…

 

[Annie]

I should not have to earn not being tortured for all eternity though.

Consider this: someone hires me, should I not have to do something to avoid being fired?

If we were to follow our natural inclinations, never holding ourselves back from doing what we want, we would totally deserve to go Hell, because we would just become worse and and worse.

You are young, you probably haven’t seen this sort of thing happen yet, but when we give in to our desires over time, we gradually become less able to resist our desires. We sink and become worse. The cute and exciting guy who drank a bit much in high school either becomes a drunkard who destroys a lot of good things in his life or at some point says, I don’t want to go there, and he stops.

The problem is that you have seen the cute guys, and you have seen the old drunks, but you haven’t seen the transition.

And you haven’t seen that God rewards not the success in overcoming the evil in ourselves but the perseverance. Read this story about a man who did just that.

 

[TK421]

Why would being a murderer mean that you deserve to die but doing other things doesn’t?

Murder can usually be explained through psychological and socioeconomic conditions that push people to the brink of doing something gravely evil. Yes, it’s a grave sin, but it’s presumptuous to think that we or any average person is necessarily morally better than a murderer. We stand on the shoulders of those who raised us and formed us. If life circumstances were different, maybe we would be the one who is a murderer.

 

[Latin]

You have a question Rosejmj, and Catholic Theology has the answer.

Catholic Encyclopedia : Evil
“But we cannot say without denying the Divine omnipotence, that another equally perfect universe could not be created in which evil would have no place.”
.
CCC 310 But why did God not create a world so perfect that no evil could exist in it?
With infinite wisdom and goodness God freely willed to create a world in a state of journeying towards its ultimate perfection, 314 through the dramas of evil and sin. – God created the dramas of evil and sin.

.
THE REASON GOD CREATED THE DRAMAS OF EVIL AND SIN

Life without suffering would produce spoiled brats, not joyful saints.

Our struggle and tribulation while journeying towards our ultimate perfection through the dramas of evil and sin is the cost which in-prints the virtue/ nobility into our souls – the cost of our road to nobility and perfection.

In this world man has to learn by experience and contrast, and to develop by the overcoming of obstacles (Lactantius, “De ira Dei”, xiii, xv in “P.L., VII, 115-24. St. Augustine “De ordine”, I, vii, n. 18 in “P.L.”, XXXII, 986).
.
In His training program God designed every obstacles down to its minutest details, and He also designed His aids for us down to its minutest details, the way He aides us that we will able to overcome every our obstacles.
.
At the end of our training program in this earth, we will be joyful saints in heaven.

.
CATHOLIC ENCYCLOPEDIA: Free Will explains;

“God is the author of all causes and effects, but is not the author of sin, because an action ceases to be sin if God wills it to happen. Still God is the cause of sin.
God’s omnipotent providence exercises a complete and perfect control over all events that happen, or will happen, in the universe.”
.
God’s will is the cause of all things, every event that happen or will happen in the universe.
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Nothing that is outside of God’s creating, sustaining, and governing will.
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Aquinas said, "God changes the will without forcing it . But he can change the will from the fact that he himself operates in the will as he does in nature,” De Veritatis 22:9. 31. ST I-II:112:3. 32. Gaudium et Spes 22; "being …

As God Himself operates in our wills, we don’t even have to know we are FREELY cooperating with His will. – CCC 307, CCC 308, etc.
.
God Designed every our acts, includes the acts of every our sins, Decreed and Preordained from all eternity. – CCC 310, CCC 314, etc.
.
So, why would God punish us or would throw us into hell when we FREELY will what God wills us to will, and we FREELY do what God wills and causes us to do?
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The truth is, God does not punish us, He is training and teaching us.
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God bless

 

[Latin]

There are two kind of free will, Libertarian free will and Aided free will.

LIBERTARIAN FREE WILL
Libertarian free will is basically the concept that, metaphysically and morally, man is an autonomous being, one who operates independently, not controlled by others or by outside forces.
.
AIDED FREE WILL
The divine initiative in the work of grace precedes, prepares, and elicits the free response of man.
.
Only God has Libertarian free will no one else, God has given us aided free will.

.
Libertarian free will would be useless for us.

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 that 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.

.
CATHOLIC ENCYCLOPEDIA Divine Providence explains;
Life everlasting promised to us, (Romans 5:21); but unaided we can do nothing to gain it (Rom.7:18-24).

.
GOD HAS GIVEN US AIDED FREE WILL AS FOLLOWS

Fundamentals of Catholic Dogma by Ludwig Ott;

For every salutary act internal supernatural grace of God (gratia elevans) is absolutely necessary, (De fide).
.
Fallen man cannot redeem himself, (De fide). – It is God’s responsibility to save ALL OF US.
.
Without the special help of God the justified cannot persevere to the end in justification, (De fide). – It is God’s responsibility TO KEEP US SAVED.

.
For Augustine says (De Civ. Dei v, 1) that the "Divine will or power is called fate.
But the Divine will or power is not in creatures, but in God. Therefore fate is not in creatures but in God.

The Divine will is cause of all things that happen, as Augustine says (De Trin. iii, 1 seqq.). Therefore all things are subject to fate.

The same is true for events in our lives. Relative to us they often appear to be by chance.
But relative to God, who directs everything according to his divine plan, nothing occurs by chance.

Hence if this divine influence stopped, every operation would stop.
Every operation, therefore, of anything is traced back to Him as its cause. (Summa Contra Gentiles, Book III.)
.
St. Thomas 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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As God himself operates in our wills, we are freely cooperating with His graces, without even knowing it.
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God’s will is the cause of all things, every event that happen or will happen in the universe.
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God bless