My God-mother said Heaven was in another dimension. I just wonder where that condition that is Heaven and not a location, is found?I don’t recall ever seeing any teaching on this. I recall that, a few years back, Pope John Paul II said something to the effect that Heaven was a condition, not a location. However, I didn’t get into it far enough to find what his point was.
I think he was saying that hell was the condition of being apart from God. Imagine on judgement day when you are finally face to face with your creator. He is so unimaginably beautiful and so full of love. But you were unwilling to accept Him in life so after that one glorious experience of God’s immeasurable love, you would never experience it again, for all eternity. Being separated from God and knowing that it was your own choice, that is hell.I don’t recall ever seeing any teaching on this. I recall that, a few years back, Pope John Paul II said something to the effect that** Heaven was a condition, not a location.** However, I didn’t get into it far enough to find what his point was.
That is not hell according to the Church - but imagination and there are all sorts of ideas as to what heaven and hell are like - twincI think he was saying that hell was the condition of being apart from God. Imagine on judgement day when you are finally face to face with your creator. He is so unimaginably beautiful and so full of love. But you were unwilling to accept Him in life so after that one glorious experience of God’s immeasurable love, you would never experience it again, for all eternity. Being separated from God and knowing that it was your own choice, that is hell.
Is the Catechism,then,scriptural or philisophical or neither or both - twincTwinc,
Are you OK?
You keep on postulating these Philosophical questions on a Sacred Scripture thread. Any definition of place and body are in current use. Don’t ask for a new one of yours, here. If you really want to postulate a new concept of ‘place’ and ‘body’, you need to familiarize your self with past and contemporary philosophical debates on these topics, and then if you still want to, to start a thread in the Philosophy forum, where these questions belong, not here.
Thank you.
God loves you,
Don
This is a quote from Pope JPII’s interpretation of heaven, hell and purgatory.That is not hell according to the Church - but imagination and there are all sorts of ideas as to what heaven and hell are like - twinc
According to the Catholic Encyclopedia, the Church has not taken a definitive stance on whether hell is an actual place or a metaphorical one, so we are free to believe in either theory.The images of hell that Sacred Scripture presents to us must be correctly interpreted. They show the complete frustration and emptiness of life without God. Rather* than a place, hell indicates the state of those who freely and definitively separate themselves from God, the source of all life and joy. This is how the Catechism of the Catholic Church summarizes the truths of faith on this subject: “To die in mortal sin without repenting and accepting God’s merciful love means remaining separated from him for ever by our own free choice. This state of definitive self-exclusion from communion with God and the blessed is called ‘hell’” (n. 1033).
So far as I have determined by my yet limited reading, the Catechism is definitely based on scripture and may contain also some philosophy.Is the Catechism,then,scriptural or philisophical or neither or both - twinc
I think you must be thinking of Revelation 20:14so will the old hell be destroyed along with the earth and heavens and will there be no more hell only new heavens and a new earth [see 2 Peter 3:10 & 15] - surely hell must go as also purgatory or else there will be weeping in heaven and heaven would not then be heaven - for an answer see A Travel Guide to Heaven by Anthony DeStefano - twinc