The problem of hell solutions?

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Ignatiusmeansfire

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What possible sin made by an human of finite knowledge and understanding during our relatively short time here on earth can merit the punishment of eternal suffering in hell?

For those who have not encountered the problem before you can read more about it here Problem of Hell - Wikipedia

But i have not yet recieved a satisfactory and logic answer in accordance to Catholic doctrine. CS Lewis is reasoning that the doors of hell are closed from within. Which i could see as reasonable, but our father in church made it clear that Lewis angelican views is not in line with Catholic doctrine in this matter.

What are your views on the matter?
 
I love C.S. Lewis but remember he was Anglican, though before he died he was pretty close to converting.
It isn’t inherently bad but his theology is sometimes a little Calvinist based in certain areas, especially earlier in his life.
 
As for your question. This has went through my mind before. I’m not an expert by any means on this category but if I had to take a swing at it, I would say God created mankind to live with Him in paradise. Basically heaven on earth. By disobeying God, it wasn’t really that God condemned mankind so much as mankind chose Satan and in turn chose death and sin and all of the vices that lead to it.
We seem to always say God did that, God sent them to hell etc; but fundamentally I think this is wrong. God wishes noone to go to hell. Mankind chooses it themselves. Hell is a complete separation from God which was chosen by the individual. We get allusions to it being a “lake of fire” or “the pit” etc etc in scripture , but the Church never says what hell actually is. It could be pitch black for all we know. Most of our view of heaven and especially hell in my opinion comes from the popular early second century apocryphal text the Apocalypse of Peter which led to other writings expanding on it, such as the third century Apocalypse of Paul and influenced the view of hell in the middle ages and some say inspired Dantes Divine Comedy and largely this is what our view is today.
Some say why cant God give someone in hell another chance? How do we know that someone in hell is so blocked off from God that he would even want one?
This stuff has been debated for millenia. I would recommend Saint Thomas Aquinas, he delves into a lot of this stuff.
I know it was short and maybe not the answer you were looking for, but I think thats how I view it anyways.
I don’t think we can believe in annihilation but as for what hell really is we don’t know besides some mystics who have claimed to have glimpsed it. Heaven is kind of the same. We have glimpses but it’s probably only a fraction of it and more than likely our minds couldnt even comprehend it.
 
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Ignatiusmeansfire said:
What possible sin made by an human of finite knowledge and understanding during our relatively short time here on earth can merit the punishment of eternal suffering in hell?
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I think if you read the following it may be helpful to you.

The Heresy of Hell as Self-Inflicted Charles Robertson, a bit long, but I’ve just finished reading it, and thought it was very good.

The last part starting at " Towards a Resolution" , in particular the second paragraph commencing with “Faced with the objection, then, that infinite punishment is not proportionate to our finite sins, we must do two things.”

The passage this article quotes from - Summa Contra Gentiles is in the link below -
Chapter 144 THAT BY MORTAL SIN A MAN IS ETERNALLY DEPRIVED OF HIS ULTIMATE END
 
What possible good can a finite human being accomplish that merits eterenal life?

There you have it.
 
Ignatiusmeansfire said:
What possible sin made by an human of finite knowledge and understanding during our relatively short time here on earth can merit the punishment of eternal suffering in hell?
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What possible good made by a human of finite understanding during our relatively short time here on earth can merit the reward of eternal bliss in heaven?

If you’re going to make the claim that God is unjust for allowing hell, then you’re going to have to make the similar claim that He’s unjust for allowing heaven. Is that really where you’re going with this?

But, if it isn’t… then if it’s just for God to choose to allow heaven, then how can you say it’s unjust that He allows hell?

So, either it’s all bad (and that implies that God isn’t god), or it’s all good (and there’s no problem of evil).

On the other hand, if you want a more conventional answer, I think I would point out that you’re making an error of category. You’re equivocating the ‘duration’ of temporal life with eternity (which doesn’t have duration, per se). So, the argument itself fails on its face: you can’t compare the two as if they’re equivalent.

And, even if you thought you could, then you’d be stuck on another dilemma: what about inequalities in different persons’ lifetimes? Is an eternal judgment that’s reached in 20 years just, as compared to one that’s reached in 80 years?

Clearly, the answer cannot be found in an approach that attempts to measure duration.

And, if duration isn’t in play, then “human lifetime =/= eternity” isn’t a valid approach in addressing this so-called “problem.”

(Edited to add:
LOL! I just looked up and saw that po18guy essentially made the same point!)
 
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Good answer, thanks! I’ll look more into Aquinas on the matter. And i agree we know little about hell, and sometimes even priest seems to think they know more then they do about it.

Although i struggle with the perspective that mankind chooses it themselves, in some regards. During our lifetime, we have the possibility to move closer or further away from God. But when we die we lose this continuous struggle to be better and are judged. This for me raises the problem, what is the purpose of Hell, defined as a place without God, when those people are not given the possibility to redeem themselves? We are also so much lacking in understanding and i see so many people we live far from God in their lives, but they also do not have much more wisdom then a child. Are they judged without hope? If one of them realizes Gods love the moment after their death, is there no hope that they can work to love God and get closer? Maybe i am naive, i don’t know. I just feel many people might not really have an honest chance to find Jesus in this life. I myself converted after a life without Christ, but not many do.
 
As an answer to your and po18guy’s question “What possible good can a finite human being accomplish that merits eterenal life?”

I don’t really agree that counter argument breaks the original question. With regards to God being infinitely just i do agree, it is not reasonable for a human to be able to “earn” either infinite bliss or punishment by a finite sin or good. Although, we also do know that God is good. And hence it is not illogical to reason that God could be so good that he gives us the infinite joy of being close to him forever because he loves us, even though we definitely does not deserve it. He has already done it once, by giving us his Son. Why not again?

It feels harder to argue that God with the attribute of goodness could deviate from that just to exercise perfect justice in a negative manner. To give a person more good than they deserve seems to be aligned, but to condemn them to more punishment then they deserve seems hard.

About the temporal vs eternal question, i do not think we have a good enough understanding of eternity either in the physical or metaphysical realm to say eternity does not have duration. This is a highely debated topic. Although i’m inclined to agree with you that for me the most probable reasoning would place hell outside of our physical timespace and hence outside of our understanding of time.

As the the last comment about how long a person has had a “chance” to have a just ruling i do disagree. Any time spent wether 10 minutes or 100 years is still infinitely short in comparison to eternity, but as reasoned above, not even of relevance if they are not possible to compare.

My problem lies mostly in understanding the first paragraph though. A good God should logically be able to give us more then we deserve, but less? What is the purpose of suffering in hell? Suffering in our lifes now have purpose, does suffering in hell have purpose?
 
Ignatiusmeansfire said:
What possible sin made by an human of finite knowledge and understanding during our relatively short time here on earth can merit the punishment of eternal suffering in hell?
Click to expand...
Are you asking what sins deserve eternal suffering in hell? Or are you asking is it even possible for a human to be fully guilty of a sin that deserves eternal suffering in hell?
 
Difficult to say. In legal terms, of course he was. Did he understand the full consequences? I don’t know.

Still, he will likely have commited mortal sin and be sent to hell. But have not the boy who mastrubated and didn’t repent not also commited mortal sin? With my very fallible human logic it seems illogical to say these two sin both merit the same punishment with no possibility of repentence.
 
'For a sin to be mortal , three conditions must together be met: “Mortal sin is sin whose object is grave matter and which is also committed with full knowledge and deliberate consent.” Straight from the Cathechism.

Would you say the boy fulfills those requirements? Would you say Hitler does? If Hitler, but not the boy, why?
 
Great reply, read the article and it answered alot of my questions. Thanks alot!
 
Ignatiusmeansfire said:
committed with full knowledge and deliberate consent.
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because there can be a lot of doubt in whether or not a ‘boy’ has full knowledge of the gravity of masturbation.

There can be no doubt that Hitler knew that killing innocent people was wrong. He did it anyway with full knowledge and deliberate consent.
 
I wholeheartedly agree with you. There is a big difference, but then back to the point, if the boy was older, let’s say a man of 50, who really did have full understanding of the gravity of masturbation. Would you still say his sin merit the same punishment as that of Hitler? This was the discourse i was looking for.
 
From what we’ve been told by the saints, his punishments won’t be the same as Hitler’s.

Yes, they will both suffer the fire, and they will both suffer the eternal separation of God, but multiple saints have attested that the individual sufferings of Hell differ in relation to the sins that cause them. It also seems that the damned suffer in proportion to the gravity of their sins.

At the end of the day though, whether it’s masturbation or murder, the underlying issue is the rejection of God that sin represents, and it’s that rejection which lands you in Hell.
 
Thanks for the answer. Guess you are right. Still hard to comprehend the reality that a sin as “minor” as masturbation could lead you to an eternity without God. But maybe simply the act of denying God whatever the form is really enough to merit the distance forever, still, it’s no teaching for the faint-hearted.
 
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