If God is omnipotent, wouldn't he be able to create an environment in which everyone retains free will, but still goes to heaven?

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Why can’t God make it so that, despite our free wills, we are still able to live our lives in such a way that everyone voluntarily accepts God’s grace?
 
Because what you’re describing is a contradiction in terms. You want God to make it so that we all go to heaven–which we must freely choose to do–without interfering with our free will?

But to make it inevitable that we go to heaven, our free will must be interfered with. And so you’re proposing that God make the world to interfere with our free will without interfering with our free will. That doesn’t make sense.

What are you really asking?

-Fr ACEGC
 
Allow me to rephrase my question, with slight alterations. God could have created humanity in such an environment that there is clearly no reason to choose anything but to pursue His gifts while also giving us the ability to choose for ourselves. Why wouldn’t he? Is it because it wouldn’t be as satisfying to have us choose Him due to our common sense, rather than thought out discernment?
 
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Again, you’re not making much sense.

What is “an environment that there is clearly no reason to choose anything but to pursue his gifts?” Unless you’re referring to paradise, which God did create. There wasn’t any reason but to choose to pursue God’s gifts. Man, who was endowed with reason so as to know truth and thus use his free will to choose God’s gifts, acted without reason in choosing against God.

So you’re either asking why doesn’t God make things such that our free will is interfered with and heaven is inevitable, which doesn’t make sense, or else why didn’t God make paradise, which he did, and we ruined it by acting against our nature–which is rational. So I’m not sure what the question accomplishes.
 
Why can’t God do the impossible? Why can’t God create self contradictory situations?

And even ignoring that argument, why wouldn’t God put each human in Paradise? God determines our fate on an individual basis, and so why not give each individual human their chance in Paradise? Also, pardon me if I’m coming across as rude or aggressive or illogical. I am just curious, and I don’t mean to be offensive.
 
calvinh said:
why wouldn’t God put each human in Paradise?
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This is kind of the same question we get every week on here.
“if God is omnipotent, all-good and all-loving, then why didn’t he just put us all in Heaven already or make it so we go there automatically and don’t do evil and evil doesn’t happen because He’s God and he can do that and why should we have to live with evil and why should we have to do any work?”

God COULD do that but he CHOSE to do things the way he’s doing them.
So that we have a chance to learn and so that we freely choose to be with him rather than just automatically get made to do it or forced to do it.

People who freely choose things and work for them tend to value them more and often learn really important lessons from doing the work. People who just get handed stuff often don’t value it at all and learn nothing.
 
I didn’t mean paradise as in Heaven. I meant the Garden of Eden, to clarify.
 
I don’t take you as being offensive, but please don’t take it as offensive if I push you if you’re not making sense.

God can’t do the impossible because the impossible is that which is by definition non-being. God is creator. He doesn’t uncreate. To act contrary to his nature would mean he’s not truly omnipotent and thus not God. Not being able to do the impossible is not a limitation on God, it is rather a function of his perfection.

I don’t buy the premise that God determines our fate on an individual basis, since that denies free will.
 
I meant that God determines who goes to heaven and who goes to hell upon our deaths. I wasn’t arguing for predestination.
 
It doesn’t matter what you meant by Paradise. For purposes of analysis, each one is the same, as each one is a perfect place where people would be happy, would have no pain, and would be in the presence of God.
 
It is not the same, as in the Garden of Eden, they still had the option to sin, whereas once you’re in heaven, it is believed (to my knowledge) that there’s not the option of sin.
 
That’s not how it works. Heaven or hell are based on what we have chosen, whether we die in the friendship of God or not, something we must choose or reject. You make God’s judgment sound arbitrary, when really it’s the consequence of our actions.
 
Well it is ultimately God’s decision. It would clearly make sense for God to judge our going to heaven or hell based on our actions, but it is really his decision.
 
So you think if someone deserved hell, but God decided differently, he’d send that person to heaven? But God is just, and so to act in that way would be unjust, and he wouldn’t really be God.

Where did you get your idea of God from?
 
Surely God has the ability to send someone to a different location than the one a person chose based on their acts, whether he exercises that ability or not, which the faith teaches he wouldn’t do, due to his justice. But that’s beside the point anyway. The point is that, if God wants everyone to have their own decision for them to go to heaven or hell, why wouldn’t he put us all in the same situation, so that our decision is based solely on our own free will, and less on our environment? Would you argue that the decision is based solely on our free will, and not at least partially by our environment?
 
It wouldn’t be an “ability” for God to override the free will he gave us.

And now you’re circling back around to repeating your original argument.

It’s bedtime. More tomorrow, maybe.
 
@calvinh, Welcome to Catholic Answers Forums! It’s nice to see you jumping right in.

I don’t think environment is key. You see humans living in all different kinds of environments, from wealth to poverty, from peace to anarchy, from high-tech to third world, from good families to broken, and you see disorder and sin everywhere. What environment has ever stopped humans from sinning?

I think it’s just human nature. Could God have created humans with a better nature, more closely aligned with his will, more loving? Maybe, but I’m not sure. In that alternative creation, what would be lost?
 
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Because, He wants us to chose Him w our free will. He doesn’t want robotic choices. He wants passionate friends who desire to spend time w Him. We chose to reject evil, to chose HIM. We are giving up things that can feel good, for Him, who is good. SIGH!
 
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