"Q. Can people really go to Hell?" A Response to This Question from a Priest

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Bushum said:
If people couldn’t go to hell wouldn’t God’s entire plan of salvation be a waste of time?
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So, Christ was sent to save us from the Father’s wrath? From the Father’s condemnation? This “father” sounds strikingly Zeus-like.
 
stpurl said:
Apparently somehow we ‘deserve’ heaven no matter what our supposedly ‘one time sins’ are. How is it that our one time ‘good actions’ are then enough to give us eternal bliss?
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As is made fairly clear in the Genesis narrative, Adam and Eve were made in the “image and likeness” of the divine. If that’s true, it’s no small fact. It follows that our parents and all their descendants are divine image-bearers, which entails that they are made for glory, not unending suffering and torment. St Thomas Aquinas teaches (rightly) that humans are made for beatitude—it is their final end, that for which they were made and can be satisfied. So yes, being bound for heaven is completely natural given all this prior theology, and being bound for hell would be rather unnatural to the human.
 
So what you’re arguing is that our nature somehow ‘entitles’ us to heaven no matter how we act? That actions in which we continually, with full knowledge, consent, grave matter, defy God are somehow ‘unnatural’ to us and that our refusal to submit to God (part, by definition, of our 'image and likeness that supposedly makes us reach for and be 'made for glory) is ‘unnatural’?
 
stpurl said:
So what you’re arguing is that our nature somehow ‘entitles’ us to heaven no matter how we act?
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Since I didn’t say any of that, then no. Here is the rationale: Your nature makes you destined for heaven and beatitude as your final end. Surely you wouldn’t argue that being a divine image-bearer makes you destined for unending suffering and torment, right…? What is glorious about that status? Hell is perfectly inglorious.

I’m not sure how often we act with “full knowledge,” not entirely sure what that would look like. But yes, defying God (who you were made for) is utterly unnatural for a human. It is contrary to her base-state, her destiny as a human, etc.
 
No matter how much I read about hell from the Christian perspective, I’m still not sure whether Catholics, or rather the Church, believes there is an actual physical or psychological torture involved, perhaps both, and whether the torture is mainly because people finally realize they are separated from Gd for eternity. If the latter is true, wouldn’t the fact they are emotionally tortured mean they are repenting for having chosen evil and selfishness rather than good and that they realize at last that Gd is the choice they should have made? If, on the other hand, they persist in opposing Gd in hell, then how would they experience psychological torture? Can anyone explain this seemingly paradoxical notion?
 
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Just an observation. I’ve seen and read numerous threads on the topic of Hell on CAF over these last seven years. And it has become crystal clear to me that the belief in the heresy of universalism is becoming more and more prevalent among many Catholics today. And that my friends is a very, very dangerous trend.

Contrast that with what many of the Doctors of the Church, (including Aquinas, Augustine, Bellarmine, Jerome and Chrysostom to name just a few) said about the fewness of the saved. Me?..I’ll stick with the Doctors! These Saints are without question the most brilliant minds the Catholic Church has ever known! By the way, of the 36 Doctors of the Church, 13 of them talk about the fewness of the saved. Again, some of the responses in these “Hell” threads over the years are alarming!
 
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goout said:
How is free will a justification for eternal punishment?
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I have no idea. Apologetics argue that since we have free will, we are allowed to abuse it, and therefore eternal punishment is justifiable. It is a huge leap.
goout said:
To the extent we abuse this freedom to choose, we choose slavery.
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I would argue the “Hell” system is akin to slavery. You can do what you want, as long is it is what I want, or else you get a beating. Loving people do not act in this manner, why would we suspect that Love itself would?
 
Yep said:
I’d also say Christians treat eternal Hell as intuitive, like they are old fogies defending the Old Logic, that liberals don’t want to admit. The fact of the matter is, you only get eternal hell through divine revelation of some kind. Pagan Greeks, Hindus, ancient Jews and Buddhists among others didn’t believe in eternal Hell. Either you burned through your good and bad actions, or your just ended up a shade. Heck, some even make it to perfect happiness. Or in the case of Hindus and Buddhists, we all get eternal happiness. It just takes a while.
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If you are interested in the historical knowledge of the ideas of the ancient world towards the afterlife, especially early Christianity, Bart Ehrman has a book coming out, in probably 6 to 8 months, which will be exploring this.
Yep said:
The thing is, I’m actually a fan of retributive justice, but it has to actually be justice.
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This is the only thing that would make sense in the context of the New Testament. In the context of the OT, eternal torture would not seem very out of line.
 
meltzerboy2 said:
If the latter is true, wouldn’t the fact they are emotionally tortured mean they are repenting for having chosen evil and selfishness rather than good and that they realize at last that Gd is the choice they should have made?
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Let’s not confuse regret for changing heart.

They regret the decision causes pain, but would not choose otherwise for it.
 
laylow said:
You can do what you want, as long is it is what I want, or else you get a beating.
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That is not how God operates.
If you want to be with God, he is there.
If you want to be apart from God, you are free to do that.
God is not going to force himself upon anyone. The decision to stay apart from God causes pain, but the sinfulness of the person will not let them choose otherwise.

How many works of literature have we that depict a character that knows the right thing, knows it would give them what they long for, but cannot overcome their own selfishness and make the right decision.
 
I understand. Still, why would the decision they made cause emotional pain and regret if those in hell want to be separated from Gd? Why do they suddenly realize what they are missing? That is, unless the pain is physical rather than emotional.
 
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  1. 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).
“Eternal damnation”, therefore, is not attributed to God’s initiative because in his merciful love he can only desire the salvation of the beings he created. In reality, it is the creature who closes himself to his love. Damnation consists precisely in definitive separation from God, freely chosen by the human person and confirmed with death that seals his choice for ever. God’s judgement ratifies this state.
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source: 28 July 1999 | John Paul II
 
Is the CCC saying that the will of those in hell to be separated from Gd does NOT persist and that they regret having made this choice? Based on what other posters have said, I thought the will to be separated does persist.
 
The Church does not view free will as anarchy. It is the free choice between good and evil, right and wrong, we are free to choose to obey or disobey God’s will.

God knows what choice we will make but of course it is a logical fallacy to say that this means we cannot have free will.
 
The Catechism itself says
1022 Each man receives his eternal retribution in his immortal soul at the very moment of his death, in a particular judgment that refers his life to Christ: either entrance into the blessedness of heaven-through a purification or immediately, – or immediate and everlasting damnation.
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1472 To understand this doctrine and practice of the Church, it is necessary to understand that sin has a double consequence. Grave sin deprives us of communion with God and therefore makes us incapable of eternal life, the privation of which is called the “eternal punishment” of sin. On the other hand every sin, even venial, entails an unhealthy attachment to creatures, which must be purified either here on earth, or after death in the state called Purgatory. This purification frees one from what is called the “temporal punishment” of sin. These two punishments must not be conceived of as a kind of vengeance inflicted by God from without, but as following from the very nature of sin. A conversion which proceeds from a fervent charity can attain the complete purification of the sinner in such a way that no punishment would remain.
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We understand that there is no change of heart. How this is to be understood exactly is not clear… the soul ‘knows’ what it deserves.
 
laylow said:
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goout:
How is free will a justification for eternal punishment?
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I have no idea. Apologetics argue that since we have free will, we are allowed to abuse it, and therefore eternal punishment is justifiable. It is a huge leap.
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What do you mean that hell is “justifiable”.
If I run over an elderly woman at a crosswalk, is her death something that is made real by “justifications”, or is it simply a real consequence of actions?

Choices and actions have real consequences. God does not have to invent consequences by arbitrary notions of “justice”. We choose them.
And if that is not palatable, then don’t expect to experience peace, joy, or love. Those are all chosen freely, just like rejection, isolation, anger, despair.
 
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Bushum said:
I am going to answer that with your own words.
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Fair enough. I likewise should have put an equal amount of effort into my initial reply to your question.

Here’s another go at it.

“If people couldn’t go to hell wouldn’t God’s entire plan of salvation be a waste of time?”

No.
 
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