Annihilation isn’t “existential euthanasia” but rather “spiritual suicide” as is all sin. Annihilation is the end of the path of a sinner who does much harm and never repents. It is the logical result of continuous sin. God is life, if we set ourselves against life, we die. God graciously gives us many chances to avoid this terrible end. May none of us end this way!
Let’s consider a thought experiment. It seems to me we are talking about what is fair justice. And, who is more qualified to know what is true justice than God? You said yourself we need God to solve this problem of dispensing true justice for us. Yet, in a sense we are putting God on trial for his sense of justice in this thread. We are trying to put on the mind of God to judge God so to speak. Which sounds a bit like a dog trying to wear his master’s slippers, read his newspaper and smoke his pipe.
Love does not and cannot reject the existence of the beloved; that is an act of discrimination. Even if the sinner is discriminating against the value of his own existence, God cannot discriminate because that would mean created people have no value if they sin or suffer in hell which contradicts the eternal value that God gave them in the first place.
Though not accepted as part of the Jewish canon, the book of Sirach is in Catholic bibles. What do you make of this (chapter 12)?
The council of Trent insists that this is a text inspired by God. I just so happened to be reading this last night. Why would God follow precisely the opposite path by “giving” eternal life to those who have made themselves his enemies? According to Jesus Ben Sirach, God hates sinners, so why would he support them forever?
I just so happened to be reading those passages last night. The Torah and prophets are full of God’s promises to totally destroy evildoers, not sustain them forever and grant them eternal life!
I do not presume to judge God of course. I am judging the Catholic Church’s teachings about God. Two very different things. The Catholic Church is not God, and does not have God’s authority (in my opinion). You disagree, that is fine. I am merely pointing out that the Catholic Church’s teachings about God make him seem cruel and/or insane, like a vicious jilted lover who tortures the one who spurns his advances. I think it is wrong! I will engage your thought experiment:Let’s consider a thought experiment. It seems to me we are talking about what is fair justice. And, who is more qualified to know what is true justice than God? You said yourself we need God to solve this problem of dispensing true justice for us. Yet, in a sense we are putting God on trial for his sense of justice in this thread. We are trying to put on the mind of God to judge God so to speak. Which sounds a bit like a dog trying to wear his master’s slippers, read his newspaper and smoke his pipe.
So the best thing I think is to ask God to solve the problem for us. Since we can not appeal to any authority higher than him.
Now, the thought experiment is this. if you were God what would you do with the unrepentant wicked? If they were to be forever unrepentant would you annihilate them? Or would you separate them and put them somewhere where they could no longer hurt anyone else except themselves? Which is more merciful? To allow them to exist, but in a state of perpetual depravity, or to extinguish them for all eternity?
Before you answer consider this. Do you prefer life in prison over the death penalty? Life in prison isn’t that great. You live in a small cell. You don’t have your freedom. Yet, many people consider that better than the death penalty. But, those prisoners are suffering. Shouldn’t we just end their suffering by putting them all to death? Or do you recognize that life is precious and we should not extinguish it? That it is better for them to live in their present condition than to end it? Perhaps that is not so different from God who may recognize the preciousness of life, even in prison.
Jesus says to not judge at all. He says in fact that God will judge us by the very judgments we make. Trying to diffuse your own judgment by spreading it out amongst a group of people will likely not help you live in peace in the short or long term.
In my thought experiment there is two choices. One is to extinguish a life and the other is to maintain it. These are both two logical possibilities that God could take, regardless of Catholic doctrine. Even though you may prefer the death penalty your preference (or mine) does not determine what God will actually do. If God does choose to sustain their existence then he has to put them somewhere.
You know, it is interesting. No one, except for a poster named Pope_St_Leo ever argues for the orthodox Roman Catholic teachings about hell. Everyone wants to let something give here or there. Maybe the damned enjoy themselves, or maybe hell is “locked from the inside.” Those are heterodox opinions! This is not the pot calling the kettle black, I’m merely pointing out that Catholics shouldn’t hold those opinions.
Betcha didn’t know that!Notice God didn’t say, “if you eat from it, I will torment you endlessly forever.” It is a great mercy and wonder that God didn’t allow Adam and Eve to die right then and there. He wanted to give humanity a second chance. By eating of the fruit, they decided that they and all of humanity (by extension) wanted to “lean the hard way” and so we have this life full of evil. Hopefully we will each learn our lessons and have a place in the World to Come. If we choose not to learn, if we embrace ignorance, then God will allow us to die, as he said would happen.
You make some compelling mistakes. Let’'s see what answers you get b4 you become Catholic.You know, it is interesting. No one, except for a poster named Pope_St_Leo ever argues for the orthodox Roman Catholic teachings about hell. Everyone wants to let something give here or there. Maybe the damned enjoy themselves, or maybe hell is “locked from the inside.” Those are heterodox opinions! This is not the pot calling the kettle black, I’m merely pointing out that Catholics shouldn’t hold those opinions.
Hell is permanent, endlless, torment of body and soul with no possibility of redemption or escape. It is most certainly “locked from the outside” (according to Catholic teaching). In fact, some people (the “reprobate”) are pre-destined to go there, since God has withheld from them the efficacious grace to attain heaven.
You seem to be admitting here, although obliquely, that you believe hell is prima facie pointless, but that you have a hope that there is “some purpose in mind” which seems to be based on your conjecture that God wouldn’t “give up on anyone.”
To me, the reality isn’t that God is giving up on someone and then has to go out of his way to “extinguish” their lives, but rather that the people themselves have given up on God, and he lets them fall back into the oblivion from whence they came. God creates us out of nothingness. We are literally made out of nothing itself, and it is only God’s power that sustains our existence in each and every moment. He only has to “let go” and we cease to exist, permanently, as if we never were.
Life is an undeserved gift. If we throw it back into God’s face by persistent serious sin for which we never repent, we die, permanently. We can’t reject the author of life and still live, unless God dominates us and enslaves us. God is not a torturer or slave master!!!
Notice God didn’t say, “if you eat from it, I will torment you endlessly forever.” It is a great mercy and wonder that God didn’t allow Adam and Eve to die right then and there. He wanted to give humanity a second chance. By eating of the fruit, they decided that they and all of humanity (by extension) wanted to “lean the hard way” and so we have this life full of evil. Hopefully we will each learn our lessons and have a place in the World to Come. If we choose not to learn, if we embrace ignorance, then God will allow us to die, as he said would happen.
This is how I view it anyway. What do I know though? I’m an apostate. Who cares what I think?
I am not going to argue what is or isn’t correct Catholic doctrine on hell. I have for instance never heard anything official on whether hell is locked from the outside or not. But I have heard a number of Catholic theologians talk about hell as being a state that they have locked themselves into, like for instance Dante’s inferno where Satan is frozen rather than burning, locked in his own self. But anyways that is not my emphasis in this thread, but to look at the issue from a philosophical view which includes considering the different possibilities.You know, it is interesting. No one, except for a poster named Pope_St_Leo ever argues for the orthodox Roman Catholic teachings about hell. Everyone wants to let something give here or there. Maybe the damned enjoy themselves, or maybe hell is “locked from the inside.” Those are heterodox opinions! This is not the pot calling the kettle black, I’m merely pointing out that Catholics shouldn’t hold those opinions.
Hell is permanent, endlless, torment of body and soul with no possibility of redemption or escape. It is most certainly “locked from the outside” (according to Catholic teaching). In fact, some people (the “reprobate”) are pre-destined to go there, since God has withheld from them the efficacious grace to attain heaven.
You seem to be admitting here, although obliquely, that you believe hell is prima facie pointless, but that you have a hope that there is “some purpose in mind” which seems to be based on your conjecture that God wouldn’t “give up on anyone.”
To me, the reality isn’t that God is giving up on someone and then has to go out of his way to “extinguish” their lives, but rather that the people themselves have given up on God, and he lets them fall back into the oblivion from whence they came. God creates us out of nothingness. We are literally made out of nothing itself, and it is only God’s power that sustains our existence in each and every moment. He only has to “let go” and we cease to exist, permanently, as if we never were.
Life is an undeserved gift. If we throw it back into God’s face by persistent serious sin for which we never repent, we die, permanently. We can’t reject the author of life and still live, unless God dominates us and enslaves us. God is not a torturer or slave master!!!
Notice God didn’t say, “if you eat from it, I will torment you endlessly forever.” It is a great mercy and wonder that God didn’t allow Adam and Eve to die right then and there. He wanted to give humanity a second chance. By eating of the fruit, they decided that they and all of humanity (by extension) wanted to “lean the hard way” and so we have this life full of evil. Hopefully we will each learn our lessons and have a place in the World to Come. If we choose not to learn, if we embrace ignorance, then God will allow us to die, as he said would happen.
This is how I view it anyway. What do I know though? I’m an apostate. Who cares what I think?
Or even consider the possibility that an immortal soul can not die or cease to exist. My understanding of Catholic theology is that God did create the universe out of nothing. And that each time a person is conceived God creates a new soul. That is why we call it procreation. We partipate in the creation of a new person physically and God supplies the soul.
By omnipotent I meant omnipresent. My bad.
Otherwise we are machines manufactured and operated by mindless molecules…:idea:
Why? Does God force us to go to Heaven? Might is not right…
How do you explain the words of Jesus?
Not all deterrents are morally acceptable. Kim Jong Un executes the family members of suspected dissidents. Saddam Hussein would publicly humiliate, torture, and execute any who opposed him. Is God in their company, by threatening to expose us to endless torment, and sustain us in that torment, if we refuse to love him?
OK, this is an interesting response. If you are right, then you have a point. If we intrinsically exist forever, then hell could be considered unavoidable. There are other problems with hell, but you may have posed a defense against the accusation that it is miraculously prolonged by God.
This seems like a false dilemma to me.
Thanks for your contribution. Yes, I agree in some ways. To me, a “total separation from God” would mean that particular being would cease to exist. This is precisely what I am arguing here, but it seems the Orthodox have taken another way out?