Let's Talk About Hell

[Shin]

Sin is more terrible than Hell, truly understood.

If something troubles you too much, to the point where it puts you in a dangerous state, don’t dwell on it till you can handle it.

 

[John_of_Woking]

Lost Wonderer,

Following your line of thinking, would it be more fruitful for the more “educated” (as in more intellectually focused) Catholics to read modern philosophy manuals, etc INSTEAD of books like Preparation for Death or The Imitation of Christ?

.

If hell exists it only makes sense to warn people about it! Thus I agree that the spiritual classics need circulating - even to the educated!

I would even dare say that Tan Books’ publication “Hell and How to Avoid it” is more likely to impel metanoia than the intellectual peaks of Ratzinger, Von Balthaser e.t.c. Although maybe that’s just me

 

[Ridgerunner]

I said “often” because that’s the truth. Wish it wasn’t.

My ideal is to become like St. Therese of Lisieux, who was so confident of her love for God that she absolutely did not fear hell at all. Not at all! She said that even if she had committed every sin there was to commit, she wouldn’t fear it.

Now, that’s something to which one ought to aspire, and I do.

 

[Victorious]

My ideal is to become like St. Therese of Lisieux, who was so confident of her love for God that she absolutely did not fear hell at all. Not at all! She said that even if she had committed every sin there was to commit, she wouldn’t fear it.

But that’s not all there is to the story of St. Therese. She went through a very black period of the most severe temptations against faith, where she found no consolation whatsoever in even the thought of heaven, and where it seemed to her that everything she had previously believed and delighted in was a cheat and a deception.

 

[dostoyevskyfan]

I think most “new atheists” as they are called, fail to understand the basic tenets of the Catholic faith. The average “atheist” you find on a college campus hasn’t read anselm, descartes, augustine, aquinas, let alone the New Testament. They just assume it’s all mythology and delusion. In this respect they aren’t really “atheists” with respect to Roman Catholicism since you can’t reject belief in a God you don’t know or don’t understand (in at least as far as Christ intended us to understand). They need clarification and teaching more than anything else.

While I agree with the poster who said that telling a nonbeliever about hell is an ineffective scare tactic and will quickly be written off as delusion,…most likely followed by a discussion of the philosophical problem of Hell which will then lead to the non-believer to labeling God as “unjust” (by his own impefect human standards) and then persisting in their rejection of our Faith,** the best we can do, from the perspective of their consciousness is convince them of the very real* possibility *of Hell, and explain that Perfect Justice requires it. **(Do you actually know one “righteous person”? I don’t.)

You can save many souls by reading about Blaise Pascal’s wager. I am convinced that it is the only way to transition stubburn, proud, nonbelievers in a post enlightenment age. It will save many souls. Please take my advice as someone who has had so many conversations with atheists and christians of other demoninations and use it for the glory of God. Do not fail to mention hell to everyone you encounter.

 

[Ridgerunner]

But that’s not all there is to the story of St. Therese. She went through a very black period of the most severe temptations against faith, where she found no consolation whatsoever in even the thought of heaven, and where it seemed to her that everything she had previously believed and delighted in was a cheat and a deception.

Oh yes! But that’s not the same thing as a fear of hell.

I have sometimes thought about Jesus’ cry from the cross “My God, My God, why have you foresaken me”. How could His “human self” ever come to that, one wonders. And what, then changed? And I have sometimes thought Ste. Therese’s temptation (like Mother Teresa’s) was of that nature; the hardest temptation of all for one who has loved God the most fully. The utmost trial of heroes and true saints. Ordinary people like me can’t help but wonder, not so awfully much about the nature of the “dark night”, but of the counter-voices in it and the nature of the turning point or points in it.

It’s remarkable to me (and I think I’m right about this) that neither Ste Therese nor Mother Teresa had any “consolations” for a very long time. Ste Therese, I think, even said they were like “sweets” one gives a baby or a child, but which one outgrows. Absolutely amazing.

 

[dostoyevskyfan]

ridgerunner:

That quotation from Our Lord is from Psalm 22, which was a poetic foretelling of the passion divinely dictated to David. Christ did not actually think that he had forsaken himself or that the mystical “Father” of the trinity had forsaken him, nor was he going through some sort of existential despair, although his mental agony must have been enormous. He recited that line because it revealed to the learned men of the time, the pharisees who cheered for his crucifixion, that he was actually the messiah indicated by scripture (OT prophets such as Isaiah, Daniel, Micah, etc).

Despite all this, the Pharisees still denied that he was the annointed one(out of pride, even though it was blantantly obvious) and went as far as to record it, writing him permanently out of the Jewish faith, and sadly affecting future jewish generations. Also, and sadly, this is why our Lord has need of Hell in the first place.

 

[Ridgerunner]

ridgerunner:

That quotation from Our Lord is from Psalm 22, which was a poetic foretelling of the passion divinely dictated to David. Christ did not actually think that he had forsaken himself or that the mystical “Father” of the trinity had forsaken him, nor was he going through some sort of existential despair, although his mental agony must have been enormous. He recited that line because it revealed to the learned men of the time, the pharisees who cheered for his crucifixion, that he was actually the messiah indicated by scripture (OT prophets such as Isaiah, Daniel, Micah, etc).

Despite all this, the Pharisees still denied that he was the annointed one(out of pride, even though it was blantantly obvious) and went as far as to record it, writing him permanently out of the Jewish faith, and sadly affecting future jewish generations. Also, and sadly, this is why our Lord has need of Hell in the first place.

I realize that is one understanding of it. It is not the only one. For whatever it’s worth, a priest once explained it in terms, yes, of the prophecy, but also of Jesus’ nature, which was fully human and fully divine. In other words, He could feel the human emotion of despair notwithstanding His divine knowledge that there was nothing about which to despair.

No doubt there have been scholarly theological treatises all over that utterance. Not being a theologian at all, I do not pretend to know all of the arguments.

Again, not being a theologian or in any way learned in theology, I am not trying to invite a theological dust-up. But I am at least mildly intrigued by your statement that Our Lord “needs” Hell. Hell is a total negative, except to the extent that it is a self-affirmation of the damned as preferable to the presence of God, which still seems like an ultimate negation to me. I cannot see why God, in any manner, “needs” a negative, let alone a total one.

 

[dostoyevskyfan]

But I am at least mildly intrigued by your statement that Our Lord “needs” Hell. Hell is a total negative, except to the extent that it is a self-affirmation of the damned as preferable to the presence of God, which still seems like an ultimate negation to me. I cannot see why God, in any manner, “needs” a negative, let alone a total one.

When I spoke of “need”, I did not mean it in an emotional context or in that Hell is essential to the being of God, only that it emerges out of logical necessity, much like the direction “North” has no “need” of the direction “South” but is understood by its negation. I too have no authority to interpret scripture and am a layperson. That being said, “Why have you forsaken me?” would be good for contemplative prayer, and I may try it sometime. No doubt it has a plenitude of meanings like many things Christ said. Cheers.

 

[Lifeisawesome]

Many of you will appreciate this…

A Hellish Backup Plan

 

[At_Trent]

.

If hell exists it only makes sense to warn people about it! Thus I agree that the spiritual classics need circulating - even to the educated!

I would even dare say that Tan Books’ publication “Hell and How to Avoid it” is more likely to impel metanoia than the intellectual peaks of Ratzinger, Von Balthaser e.t.c. Although maybe that’s just me

The mention of Hell makes some very uncomfortable, as you see here. I don’t understand that. Hell is a dogma of the Roman Catholic Church.

 

[hxcCatholic413]

The mention of Hell makes some very uncomfortable, as you see here. I don’t understand that. Hell is a dogma of the Roman Catholic Church.

I feel that if more people were aware of Hell this current secularism that we our battling daily would be caught in a choke hold.

 

[Elijah_Baley]

I feel that if more people were aware of Hell this current secularism that we our battling daily would be caught in a choke hold.

Hear, hear!

 

[Pug]

The mention of Hell makes some very uncomfortable, as you see here. I don’t understand that. Hell is a dogma of the Roman Catholic Church.

Dogmas can seem mysterious, though. The Trinity makes me uncomfortable, for example. Anything I try to do to understand it seems to tend to modalism or something, which obviously would cause me some alarm. I tend to deal with that by not trying to understand it too often. I’m fine with people mentioning it, though. But still, you don’t see me on many Trinity threads.

I think the modern person probably finds trying to understand hell to be a challenge, perhaps like I find the Trinity a challenge. Also, I think the way the modern world is, with the issues before it, makes the idea of hell to be something that it will occur to them to question and want to make sense of, whereas unless one has been talking to a Muslim or a particular type like a Christadelphian or whomever, the Trinity doesn’t draw so much heat. So if you mention hell, they are stuck saying to themselves, “I have no idea how to deal with hell and the concept of, say, justice simultaneously”. So that makes them uncomfortable.

 

[At_Trent]

I feel that if more people were aware of Hell this current secularism that we our battling daily would be caught in a choke hold.

Hear, hear!

Yes, if we ever needed to hear of it from the pulpit, these times we live in are as good as any. I can’t even find a job where foul language and promiscuity doesn’t hang in the air.

It’s a filthy Godless world for the most part.

 

[At_Trent]

Dogmas can seem mysterious, though. The Trinity makes me uncomfortable, for example. Anything I try to do to understand it seems to tend to modalism or something, which obviously would cause me some alarm. I tend to deal with that by not trying to understand it too often. I’m fine with people mentioning it, though. But still, you don’t see me on many Trinity threads.

I think the modern person probably finds trying to understand hell to be a challenge, perhaps like I find the Trinity a challenge. Also, I think the way the modern world is, with the issues before it, makes the idea of hell to be something that it will occur to them to question and want to make sense of, whereas unless one has been talking to a Muslim or a particular type like a Christadelphian or whomever, the Trinity doesn’t draw so much heat. So if you mention hell, they are stuck saying to themselves, “I have no idea how to deal with hell and the concept of, say, justice simultaneously”. So that makes them uncomfortable.

Pretty fair assessment of the Average Joe. Seems everything these days pends on proof.

I wouldn’t do well trying to understand the Trinity and Hell. Our Faith teaches they are real, and I just accept it. I have no choice

 

[Pug]

Pretty fair assessment of the Average Joe. Seems everything these days pends on proof.

I wouldn’t do well trying to understand the Trinity and Hell. Our Faith teaches they are real, and I just accept it. I have no choice

I’m the same as you that way. Mysteries are things one must accept, even if we can’t figure them out. I’m not too concerned. God understands them. I try to deal with the things I do understand. Though, every so often I work on different issues, to study the faith and stuff.

 

[fons_vitae]

That’s what makes them effective because once you take the supernatural out of the picture. All believers have left is human philosophy and moral theory. Why not use them?

We do. St. Thomas Aquinas famously used classical Pagan, Jewish, and Muslim philosophers to elucidate Catholic truths. In my opinion, if you dive into the prominent “human” philosophy at just about any point prior to the Early Modern period, you’ll find at least some Catholic-style elements with a desire for the true, the good, and the beautiful.

 

[hxcCatholic413]

I’ve been thinking a lot lately on this topic. I feel that we live in a watered down society where faith and morals have been thrown out of the window. Its gotten to the point where the truth is hard to find…like finding a needle in the haystack in a sense. Now we might know the truth, but society is telling us that we are wrong. It comes to a point where some think they know the truth, but in fact it’s a skewed version of it.

There’s no question that there is many innocent victims within this spiritual battle that we are facing. I feel that this happy go lucky attitude is not working and is leading others in a spiraling downslope. Even if we discuss Hell to others they think we are crazy and delusional quite similar to telling college students that pre-marital sex is wrong.

We can cultivate morality in our society by teaching our children at a very young age about it, but we can’t stop out of the blue when they turn lets say 13. People with egos tend not to listen to the truth, but those that are down and out are more susceptible to it. This is why I find great peace when working with the homeless and other individuals who are going through hard times. Perhaps they should start playing “Life is Worth Living” by Bishop Fulton J. Sheen on mainstream networks. Just a suggestion. God Bless!

 

[nice2000]

I always wonder why more Priests do not give sermons on Hell. I voted “daily”.

When I do speak about Hell to others (which is seldom), because people think you are crazy if you talk about it too much…but when I do speak on it. I remind those that “We all live forever, we either going to live forever in Hell or Heaven” It is our time here on earth to make the choice. Would we rather live forever in Hell, always thirsty, flesh constantly burning over and over, nashing of teeth amongst other hell dwellers or would we rather live in Heaven in peace and sing “Holy Holy Holy” with joy, never thirsty (the only thirst we urge for is the blood of christ), never hungry (the only hunger we urge for is the body of christ), never get sleepy, never have to ever use the bathroom again, never to have sex again. To me this is joy.