Most of you are going to hell and there’s nothing you can do about it.
Some of us are going to heaven and there’s nothing we can do about it.
Isn’t that good news?
Calvin, like Luther, misunderstood what the Scriptures and Tradition say about Heaven and Hell, salvation and damnation, and, most importantly, Providence.
Divine Providence means God in His all-powerful Love and Mercy guides history and the Universe to the final consummation, when He will vanquish all evil and create a new Heaven and new Earth.
It dose not mean some are destined for Heaven and others for Hell: That would contradict free-will, which is God’s free and undeserving gift to us for our greater good, i.e., His grace for us.
We can abuse every grace of God, so we can use free-will for evil, and by doing so, damn ourselves to Hell. But if we use free-will as we should, living through, with, and in God, than we shall be saved: Not by our own efforts, but by God’s grace, Who alone is our Salvation. We only co-operate with Him in doing His Will, which includes - believe it or not - sharing in His beatitude forever in Heaven.
Those who commit sin, who abuse the graces God gives them, and who, by their sins, separate themselves from God (as is the effect of sin), go to the eternal separation from God, which is Hell. Those who live through God, with God, and in God are united with God, and so, go to the eternal communion with God, which is Heaven.
A lot of this hogwash about “some are saved, others are damned, but it’s okay, it’s not your fault, God only wills some saved, not all” is based on a misunderstanding of the word “elect” in the Epistles of Saint Paul. By elect is not meant individuals who are better or higher or freer than others, nor dose it mean individuals who will be saved while everyone else is damned, nor dose it mean individuals who are favored by God: Rather, “elect” means, quite simply as the Scriptures teach, those individuals who have been elected by God to Catholicism - or, in other words, those whom God has chosen to be members of the Church. As Jesus put it, “It is not you who choose Me but I who choose you.”
This dosen’t mean God dosen’t elect everyone, though, it only means not everyone chooses to adhere to God’s call or hears God’s call. A lot of people blame God for everything, while they forget that they themselves are the cause of evil and suffering; they forget they have free-will and a fallen human nature, so they say, “it is not my fault but God’s!” No, it is not God’s fault: He calls everyone to election, He wants everyone to join His Church - if not on Earth, than at least in Heaven (and some must enter Purgatory before entering Heaven, and the Church is there too, as the Church Suffering). So it is not a matter of God not calling and willing all to be saved, rather, it is a matter of individuals not responding to God’s call or adhereing to His Will.
But why not? He only wills us to love and, in return for the little sufferings which we must bear - making sacrifices here, carrying crosses there - we receive a superabundant, a divine, reward: Eternal and absolute happiness, a share in the beatitude of God Himself! Who in their right mind, when they know the truth, reject such an awesome grace?
It’s not that difficult, Rob, just turn the “thinking switch” to "on."
