H
HabemusFrancis
Guest
As we all know the dogma of Hell is one of the hardest things to accept about Catholocism.
For years the idea of Hell existing and people actually going there turned me off from the Catholic Church, and even belief in God.
I didn’t believe it, because I thought it seemed unfair, and I thought to myself “God would never be that mean to anyone,no matter how bad they were.”
As it stands I do believe in Hell, and the awful possibility that anyone alive right now could go there forever. What made me believe in it though?
The more I grew in faith, the greater contrast I was able to see with my past life, and the big difference in life style between people who prized and valued “doing God’s will” and being religious, and those people who were not religious at all, and who never gave “God’s will” a second thought.
Based on what I saw of my own experiences and the experiences of family and friends, who chose not to follow or seek to discern God’s will, I was honestly scared.
The lives, relationships, and values of people who have turned from God seemed terrible in hindsight, sometimes blatantly filled with envy, pride resentment and selfishness. The lives such people (including me at one time) choose for themselves are often Hellish, and void of the hope,generosity, flexibility, happiness and peace those with a connection to God have.
The internal, mental place some people choose to go to is often “Hellish” in the extreme, but it is self imposed. Don’t such people choose to go "there "of their own free will?
I honestly think people who are alive can "go to Hell’ or “Go to heaven” any time they like. We are allowed a small sliver of a glimpse of our eternal fate, based on how we choose to live our lives. Even if Hell has not a spark of true fire in it, the sentence of “Eternity without God” truly scares and sickens me, not because of the warnings of any priest or saint, but because of the fruits of sin and in absence of God in my own lives and in the lives of others.
Any thoughts?
For years the idea of Hell existing and people actually going there turned me off from the Catholic Church, and even belief in God.
I didn’t believe it, because I thought it seemed unfair, and I thought to myself “God would never be that mean to anyone,no matter how bad they were.”
As it stands I do believe in Hell, and the awful possibility that anyone alive right now could go there forever. What made me believe in it though?
The more I grew in faith, the greater contrast I was able to see with my past life, and the big difference in life style between people who prized and valued “doing God’s will” and being religious, and those people who were not religious at all, and who never gave “God’s will” a second thought.
Based on what I saw of my own experiences and the experiences of family and friends, who chose not to follow or seek to discern God’s will, I was honestly scared.
The lives, relationships, and values of people who have turned from God seemed terrible in hindsight, sometimes blatantly filled with envy, pride resentment and selfishness. The lives such people (including me at one time) choose for themselves are often Hellish, and void of the hope,generosity, flexibility, happiness and peace those with a connection to God have.
The internal, mental place some people choose to go to is often “Hellish” in the extreme, but it is self imposed. Don’t such people choose to go "there "of their own free will?
I honestly think people who are alive can "go to Hell’ or “Go to heaven” any time they like. We are allowed a small sliver of a glimpse of our eternal fate, based on how we choose to live our lives. Even if Hell has not a spark of true fire in it, the sentence of “Eternity without God” truly scares and sickens me, not because of the warnings of any priest or saint, but because of the fruits of sin and in absence of God in my own lives and in the lives of others.
Any thoughts?
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