A
ANV
Guest
Then what difference does death make in order to go to heaven or hell, in the line of time, why it couldn’t happen before death that you need death in order for your fate to be decided.
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W
Wesrock
Guest
Because we exist and act temporally and still have free will and are responsible for those actions.
T
TK421
Guest
@ANV:
As finite & mortal creatures who exist within space and time, this is how our lives unfold. God exists in all times & places and knows us before we existed, as we currently are, and where we are going to go after our death.
To use an imperfect analogy: pretend you are a 2-dimensional dot that exists on a geometric ray. You move forward through your life until you reach a point where you move into the hereafter. God exists above and around the 2D plane and can see your point of origin as well as everything further along.
In our mortal lives, one very significant event that occurs is our transition from the womb into the rest of the material universe. In our first stage in life, the entire universe as we know it is inside of a dark womb. Then we exit the darkness and become part of a nearly infinitely larger world. In death, we will likewise transition into an infinitely larger world, and the life we currently have will in comparison be just as limited and small as our existence inside of the womb. In this life we start to do little things that are pleasing to God, but our real vocation of doing good begins after our bodily death.
As finite & mortal creatures who exist within space and time, this is how our lives unfold. God exists in all times & places and knows us before we existed, as we currently are, and where we are going to go after our death.
To use an imperfect analogy: pretend you are a 2-dimensional dot that exists on a geometric ray. You move forward through your life until you reach a point where you move into the hereafter. God exists above and around the 2D plane and can see your point of origin as well as everything further along.
In our mortal lives, one very significant event that occurs is our transition from the womb into the rest of the material universe. In our first stage in life, the entire universe as we know it is inside of a dark womb. Then we exit the darkness and become part of a nearly infinitely larger world. In death, we will likewise transition into an infinitely larger world, and the life we currently have will in comparison be just as limited and small as our existence inside of the womb. In this life we start to do little things that are pleasing to God, but our real vocation of doing good begins after our bodily death.
T
tee_eff_em
Guest
I’m not sure it really has bearing on your question*, but:
Does God love us all equally?
(* Which I am not sure I understand in any case?)
tee
Does God love us all equally?
(* Which I am not sure I understand in any case?)
tee
F
fhansen
Guest
The dimension of time gives us that very opportunity: to be tested, refined, perfected. Its not a matter of simply making it to heaven or hell, but to grow in justice, to grow in love, to become more like God. To ultimately choose good over evil, life over death. This world is sort of an incubation chamber-for saints!
F
ffg
Guest
Key item to understand for a Catholic perspective -
Catholicism has the tools, explains, and demonstrates how you can be happy and at peace starting NOW…
Regardless of the curveballs that life throws at you, today.
Sure there is a later situation since we all die, but Catholicism, is not just about later, it’s about now.
We are made in our nature, for our nature.
This concept is important since a key point to ‘God’ is that He is reasonable.
If we live this life well, in line with God’s plan for us (in the nature for which we were made), we have no reason to think later will be without relationship with God.
Catholicism has the tools, explains, and demonstrates how you can be happy and at peace starting NOW…
Regardless of the curveballs that life throws at you, today.
Sure there is a later situation since we all die, but Catholicism, is not just about later, it’s about now.
We are made in our nature, for our nature.
This concept is important since a key point to ‘God’ is that He is reasonable.
If we live this life well, in line with God’s plan for us (in the nature for which we were made), we have no reason to think later will be without relationship with God.
E
ericc
Guest
You are running a race. Death is merely the stop watch to tell you to stop running. While you are still running, your report card is not ready yet. As in any competition, it’s not over till the whistle blows. Your report card is ready when the whistle blows. However, while you are still running, you can affect the marks that go into the report card. Initial merit points can be erased by subsequent demerits and vice versa. It is how you end the race that counts ultimately.
E
ericc
Guest
Surely NOT. Otherwise we will all be equally “well-treated”. There are those created for baser objectives and some for nobler objectives. And there is no compelling reason why he should love all equally, after all, not all of us love Him with the same intensity either. Some even don’t.I’m not sure it really has bearing on your question*, but:
Does God love us all equally?
(* Which I am not sure I understand in any case?)
tee
S
seagal
Guest
You can’t decide how much God loves you based on how well you live in this life. We weren’t made for this life. St. Theresa of Avila was quoted as saying “Dear Lord, if this is how you treat your friends, no wonder you have so few!”
T
TK421
Guest
God is Love and has an infinite love towards every person, therefore an equal love. Anything less than infinite would be a finite love, and God does not (and cannot) have finite love or a love with limitations in what it is capable of doing.
Not everybody loves God equally, or loves him at all.
U
USMC_Convert
Guest
Ask your guardian angel, he has already been tested and included in the Kingdom, see what he says…of course they (Angels) being spirits didn’t die, they simply went on in heaven or were thrown out. Just as we don’t really die, we simply have a new birthday into the kingdom of heaven. Note, when Jesus talks about death He only really talks about it for those that actually go to hell. So the question really becomes, why would you choose death over life?
J
John_Martin
Guest
Reciprocal Love is the Justice of God:
In Love, the LORD pours his whole being into all that is not God (into us).
And thus what is due to God is the pouring of the whole being back into God.
For physical creatures, this means death (desired or not)
For spiritual creatures, this means eternal fire (desired or not - hell for Satan, eternally aflame in the love of the Angels, as is already noted with the Seraphim)
Justice is giving to another what is due to them - what is due to God is the pouring out of our whole life into him.
Death means the pouring out of life into God as God poured his whole life into us, for everyone.
We are, as humans, not simply material creatures, but spiritual who interface with others materially. When we die, our bodies fall lifeless, and our soul faces fire, just as the Angels and just as the devils.
Some of us enter the fire knowing it is the LORD we are giving our life into.
Others refuse to step into the flame but eternally see it as death to enter, yet it is all around, for now they see God everywhere, where on earth they refused to see God everywhere. They do not pour their life into God in reciprocal love, which is justice.
With Jesus, we have the One Son of God and Son of Man who poured his life into the Father willingly in love as our “redeemer”, meaning that with his death God considered that reciprocal Love has fully happened. With “reciprocal Love” as far as God is concerned, there is no end, but it is eternal. The Father is eternally pouring his whole life and being into the Son; the Son is eternally pouring his whole life and being into the Father. This LOVE is the Holy Spirit. As our Redeemer, Jesus gives to us who believe in him his Body and Blood. As his Father eternally pours his whole life and being into the Son, this also includes pouring his Spirit into the Body and Blood of Jesus where it is today (and it is in us, for we ate and drank it). We have his Spirit eternally being poured into us as we daily and eternally pour our life into him in our service (for we are Servants of our LORD).
He is our redeemer in that he took that place of death that would have eternally ended us, and began us in the eternal return of reciprocal love of our eternal Father. The fact of God loving us first is that he transferred us into this eternal reciprocation from our being as creatures who could not eternally love, eternally give our life into another.
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