The Problem of the Unevangelized

[CatholicSoxFan]

I’ve been thinking about the problems of inclusivism vs. exclusivism, and I think the problem of the fate of the unevangelized can be reduced to a simple dilemma which I have a hard time addressing:

Are there souls who did not hear the Gospel and go to Hell, and that would have accepted the Gospel and went to Heaven had they heard the Gospel?

If yes; isn’t this a problem with the love of God? If we are to take seriously the passages which say God wants all to go to Heaven, wouldn’t He take all measures to save said souls, including having them hear the Gospel?

If no; don’t we run into problems with the justification for missionary work? What urgency is there in missionary work if the souls that you reach with the Gospel would be saved either way? Sure, doing missions could be done to improve the societies which you reach, but it seems there isn’t the same urgency in missionary work if no eternal souls are on the line.

It seems this dilemma forces you to accept either the worst problems with exclusivism or the worst problems with inclusivism.

 

[edwest2]

When Christ sent His disciples out, they met people who believed and others who did not. Every one of us, including lay people, is called to evangelize.

biblehub.com/romans/10-17.htm

biblehub.com/romans/10-14.htm

There are people who may casually talk about God as if they would about any mundane subject. But if someone tells them that God is real, that believing in Jesus Christ and being baptized will give them the hope of eternal life with Him, that could change a person’s life. People pick up on what’s going on around them. They observe, and sometimes accept both good and bad things for themselves. We don’t know who will really have ‘the ears to hear’ or just tune us out or decide it’s nonsense, but we are called to spread the Gospel.

Now, God knows each one of us can only do so much. Just pray to God for strength and be a good witness.

God bless,
Ed

 

[polytropos]

Are there souls who did not hear the Gospel and go to Hell, and that would have accepted the Gospel and went to Heaven had they heard the Gospel?

I think the actual answer to this question is: not necessarily, but possibly (and perhaps probably).

One of the issues is the analysis of counterfactuals (ie. what “would” happen in different circumstances). There is no decided analysis of such statements; what is usually regarded as the best theory (that of David Lewis) has known counterexamples, I believe.

Counterfactuals of freedom are central to Molinism, and the Molinist solution actually would provide a plausible mechanism for the answer to this question to be no: ie. it might be possible that no one who could go to Heaven does go to Hell.

What if you don’t don’t accept Molinism? If you take a relatively conservative stance on modality (as Aristotelians tend to do) and accept libertarian free will, then the answer may be yes, but since Molinism is false, it is (at least plausibly) not the case that God can arrange circumstances such that everyone who “could” be saved would be saved, because he wouldn’t necessarily be creating using “middle knowledge” (ie. counterfactuals of freedom–one may reject Molinism because he doesn’t think such counterfactuals could exist, for instance).

If yes; isn’t this a problem with the love of God? If we are to take seriously the passages which say God wants all to go to Heaven, wouldn’t He take all measures to save said souls, including having them hear the Gospel?

God wants all to go to Heaven antecedently. If Molinism is false, then people’s acting freely will not be consistent with God arranging the circumstances such that everyone who could go to Heaven in some alternate circumstances does go to Heaven. (If we take seriously the rejection of Molinism, though, this will also mean that the people going to Hell could go to Heaven even if they did not hear the Gospel, as is the case. Their going to Hell, if they go to Hell, is not because they did not hear the Gospel in the sense that hearing the Gospel will have been neither necessary nor sufficient for them to go to Heaven. Perhaps we should just say that if Molinism is false, then the counterfactuals will probably not be well-defined.)

If no; don’t we run into problems with the justification for missionary work? What urgency is there in missionary work if the souls that you reach with the Gospel would be saved either way? Sure, doing missions could be done to improve the societies which you reach, but it seems there isn’t the same urgency in missionary work if no eternal souls are on the line.

No.

On Molinism, part of the circumstances in which some person seeks forgiveness and lives out the Gospel might be that you bring the Gospel to him. (And God, foreseeing this, arranged other circumstances so that you would freely undertake missionary work.) There may not be “souls who did not hear the Gospel and go to Hell, and that would have accepted the Gospel and went to Heaven had they heard the Gospel”–because you did missionary work, so that all such souls heard the Gospel and went to Heaven!

(For reasons explained above, I don’t think this case is likely to arise for those who reject Molinism.)

The only case I might find a little troubling, which is not to say that there is no resolution, is where one accepts Molinism but holds that the answer above is yes. There may still be logical constraints that force such an answer despite God’s foreknowledge of counterfactuals of freedom. (I personally have reservations about Molinism, but the Catholic Church does not forbid it.)

 

[Servant19]

I’ve been thinking about the problems of inclusivism vs. exclusivism, and I think the problem of the fate of the unevangelized can be reduced to a simple dilemma which I have a hard time addressing:

Are there souls who did not hear the Gospel and go to Hell, and that would have accepted the Gospel and went to Heaven had they heard the Gospel?

If yes; isn’t this a problem with the love of God? If we are to take seriously the passages which say God wants all to go to Heaven, wouldn’t He take all measures to save said souls, including having them hear the Gospel?

If no; don’t we run into problems with the justification for missionary work? What urgency is there in missionary work if the souls that you reach with the Gospel would be saved either way? Sure, doing missions could be done to improve the societies which you reach, but it seems there isn’t the same urgency in missionary work if no eternal souls are on the line.

It seems this dilemma forces you to accept either the worst problems with exclusivism or the worst problems with inclusivism.

I think you are narrowing down God to have only conversed to mankind through Jesus Christ and the Gospel.

If a broader view might be explored, we would come to the conclusion that since the beginning of time, God has always offered salvation to humanity through His Chosen Ones. It is the only mericiful, loving and just approach for an All-Loving, All-Merciful and All-Just Lord and Creator.



.

 

[CatholicSoxFan]

I think you are narrowing down God to have only conversed to mankind through Jesus Christ and the Gospel.

If a broader view might be explored, we would come to the conclusion that since the beginning of time, God has always offered salvation to humanity through His Chosen Ones. It is the only mericiful, loving and just approach for an All-Loving, All-Merciful and All-Just Lord and Creator.



.

Well my question was from a Christian/Catholic perspective, and biblically speaking religious pluralism is out of the question.

 

[Servant19]

Well my question was from a Christian/Catholic perspective, and biblically speaking religious pluralism is out of the question.

Sure friend

But can you see the philosophical problem when viewed from just one point of view?

.

 

[oldcelt]

Let’s look at one group of unevangelized…the first North American’s. They had managed quite nicely for millennia, until people from Europe came bearing the “truth.” Along with that truth came disease, weapons, intolerance and Manifest Destiny.
Within two hundred years they had been driven into small pockets and onto land that we graciously “gave” them. Their populations were dramatically reduced, and their cultures nearly destroyed…they have never recovered.

All-in-all, I think they would have preferred to remain among the unevangelized.

 

[WestonGrant]

Counterfactuals of freedom are central to Molinism, and the Molinist solution actually would provide a plausible mechanism for the answer to this question to be no: ie. it might be possible that no one who could go to Heaven does go to Hell.

That’s the camp I’m in. I know that none of us are privy to God’s mind and we’re further below him than ants are below us. But, to my way of thinking, this explanation best preserves God as both Truth and Love without being heretical. So this is my explanation of choice.

 

[CatholicSoxFan]

Let’s look at one group of unevangelized…the first North American’s. They had managed quite nicely for millennia, until people from Europe came bearing the “truth.” Along with that truth came disease, weapons, intolerance and Manifest Destiny.
Within two hundred years they had been driven into small pockets and onto land that we graciously “gave” them. Their populations were dramatically reduced, and their cultures nearly destroyed…they have never recovered.

All-in-all, I think they would have preferred to remain among the unevangelized.

The treatment if the natives by the Europeans, while it was awful and needs to be remembered, is not relevant to the theological problem I presented in this thread.

 

[Xuan]

Well my question was from a Christian/Catholic perspective, and biblically speaking religious pluralism is out of the question.

Hi CatholicSoxFan.

From a Catholic/Christian perspective, people who have not received the Gospel can indeed attain Heaven. And for those who have received the Gospel, it is certainly no guarantee that they will attain Heaven. The Catechism of St. Pious X spells it out quite clearly. First it defines what the Soul of the Church is and what the Body of the Church is:

22 Q: In what does the Soul of the Church consist?
A: The Soul of the Church consists in her internal and spiritual endowments, that is, faith, hope, charity, the gifts of grace and of the Holy Ghost, together with all the heavenly treasures which are hers through the merits of our Redeemer, Jesus Christ, and of the Saints.

23 Q: In what does the Body of the Church consist?
A: The Body of the Church consists in her external and visible aspect, that is, in the association of her members, in her worship, in her teaching-power and in her external rule and government.

Answer 29 tells us that even if one has not received the Gospel and is not a member of the Body of the Church, he can still be united to the Soul of the Church and thus attain Heaven.

29 Q: But if a man through no fault of his own is outside the Church, can he be saved?
A: If he is outside the Church through no fault of his, that is, if he is in good faith, and if he has received Baptism, or at least has the implicit desire of Baptism; and if, moreover, he sincerely seeks the truth and does God’s will as best he can such a man is indeed separated from the body of the Church, but is united to the soul of the Church and consequently is on the way of salvation.

Note that it says “implicit desire of Baptism.” That means he might never have heard about Baptism.

Pope John Paul II also spelled it out quite clearly:

Normally, “it will be in the sincere practice of what is good in their own religious traditions and by following the dictates of their own conscience that the members of other religions respond positively to God’s invitation and receive salvation in Jesus Christ, even while they do not recognize or acknowledge him as their Saviour (cf. Ad gentes, nn. 3, 9, 11)” (Pontifical Council for Interreligious Dialogue – Congregation for the Evangelization of Peoples, Instruction Dialogue and Proclamation, 19 May 1991, n. 29; L’Osservatore Romano English edition, 1 July 1991, p. III).

Of course this doesn’t mean that there’s no point in evangelizing. The more knowledge a person has, the better chances he has in conforming himself to God and in attaining Heaven.

Xuan

 

[fred_conty]

I can only speak from knowing myself.

If I had not been evangelized, I cannot see any good coming from that for me. I honestly would dred not being evangelized. I can say that I would not be the person I would want to be without it.

I really thank our dear Lord from the bottom of my heart.

Praise be to God forever.