Hell And Raphael

[Hassan]

[quote name='Raphael' date='30 December 2009 - 02:17 AM' timestamp='1262157432' post='2027447']


Why do people choose to believe rather silly stereotypes about Catholics?[/QUOTE]


Be very specific, what stearotype have I be duped into believeing?

Was it my belief that God used to deem it a fitting punishment for engaging in witchcraft that one be burned alive, or my belief that the penalty for dying in a state of mortal sin leads to eternal damnation without the possability of redemption, whose chief punishment is the unimanigable torment of being totally seperated from God and thus everything good, but which is accompanied by the accidental pains of the flesh, usually described in terms of fire and burning?





[QUOTE]God wills the salvation of all. However, if one of His creatures is bringing about the death of many others, we believe that defensive killing is justified. Do you think self-defense is not justified? How about defending the innocent aside from yourself from death? We are to use whatever means we can to avoid killing a person who is putting others in danger of death, but if it comes down to it, killing is justified.[/QUOTE]


You God does not only allow killing for self defense. He also permits the wholesale slaughter of women and children who happen to be raised in societies which worship the wrong diety. We don't need to get into that barbarism, but the scope of accecptable killing in you God's eyes extend considerably beyond mere self defense in response to immediate physical dange and no other options avaliable.




[QUOTE]How much more so when it comes to the death of the soul! How could we believe that people spend eternity in hell for falling into the evil of witchcraft and not propose capital punishment if all other means fail?[/QUOTE]


So if you deem it necessary to kill to stop someone from endangering his or other souls with mortal din and thus eternal death of the soul, killing them can be justafied? God help us if many people every seriously believe such non-sense again.




[QUOTE]Now, as it turns out, capital punishment is rarely if ever either necessary or practical in our day and age, but in some times and places it was.[/QUOTE]


Why? Firstly the Torah doesn't specify that the offender must be trying to entice others with into joining them in their sin, which collapses the main thrust of your justification. Secondly, what exactly is it about our day and age which makes it that the punishments are no longer needed?




[QUOTE]Jesus loves all as if each one was the only one, but that also means that He will defend the many innocent against the few guilty.[/QUOTE]


This is a pretty weak defense, no offense.

[Resurrexi]

The title of this thread is amusing.

[Apotheoun]

[quote name='Hassan' date='30 December 2009 - 12:52 AM' timestamp='1262159572' post='2027452']
Was it my belief that God used to deem it a fitting punishment for engaging in witchcraft that one be burned alive, or my belief that the penalty for dying in a state of mortal sin leads to eternal damnation without the possability of redemption, whose chief punishment is the unimanigable torment of being totally seperated from God and thus everything good, but which is accompanied by the accidental pains of the flesh, usually described in terms of fire and burning?
[/quote]
You have been duped into thinking that hell is being "totally separated" from God, which is an idea that is foreign to Eastern Catholicism.

[Nunsense]

[quote name='Apotheoun' date='30 December 2009 - 07:07 PM' timestamp='1262160425' post='2027457']
You have been duped into thinking that hell is being "totally separated" from God, which is an idea that is foreign to Eastern Catholicism.
[/quote]

I would be interested to know what the Eastern Catholicism view of hell is since I know basically nothing about EC. I have had some thoughts about hell that don't necessarily include being totally separated from God, but thought that this was the Church view... really very interested to hear more about this from all sides please, the Roman and the Eastern beliefs! Thanks.

[OraProMe]

[quote name='Apotheoun' date='30 December 2009 - 03:07 AM' timestamp='1262160425' post='2027457']
You have been duped into thinking that hell is being "totally separated" from God, which is an idea that is foreign to Eastern Catholicism.
[/quote]

Please don't derail this thread again with your stuff. Hardly anyone on Phatmass is an Eastern catholic. Can't you just create a separate thread for this topic?

What thread are these original quotes from Raphael taken?

Also I was thinking about the horrid punishments and acts that God condones last night too (similar to what Hassan mentions). I kind of got in a loop...ordering the execution of people for such small things is so wrong...thus God can't exist...but if God doesn't exist absolute morality doesn't exist....so if absolute morality doesn't exist those things in the old testament aren't actually wrong they're just things....so does that mean god exists...but if he does he's such an ass for condoning that stuff...he doesn't exist....but then morality doesn't either...so then....

you get the idea. I never really could get out of this loop. Trying to prove the non-existence of God by pointing to the immorality of his laws doesn't really work for me given that his non-existence would leave the world devoid of meaning and any objective morality anyway.

Gah, maybe someone can explain this stuff better.

Edited December 30, 2009 by OraProMe

[KnightofChrist]

[quote name='OraProMe' date='30 December 2009 - 08:11 AM' timestamp='1262178708' post='2027484']
Please don't derail this thread again with your stuff. Hardly anyone on Phatmass is an Eastern catholic. Can't you just create a separate thread for this topic?
[/quote]

What is wrong with him stating the Eastern catholic understanding on the topic of hell which is the topic of this thread?

[Apotheoun]

[quote name='OraProMe' date='30 December 2009 - 06:11 AM' timestamp='1262178708' post='2027484']
Please don't derail this thread again with your stuff. Hardly anyone on Phatmass is an Eastern catholic. Can't you just create a separate thread for this topic?[/quote]
I just do not buy into the idea that Catholicism can be pigeonholed into the views of a single sui juris Church, which is what Hassan's comment attempts to do. Catholicism is a lot larger in scope than many people are willing to admit.

Edited December 30, 2009 by Apotheoun

[Ziggamafu]

[quote name='OraProMe' date='30 December 2009 - 08:11 AM' timestamp='1262178708' post='2027484']
Please don't derail this thread again with your stuff. Hardly anyone on Phatmass is an Eastern catholic. Can't you just create a separate thread for this topic?
[/quote]

Apo is not derailing. He is offering an explanation of Hell, which is not a separate topic. I do understand that the OP is specifically trying to engage Raph, however, and I'm not sure that Raph agrees with Eastern theology concerning Hell.

I wish all of the best posts explaining Orthodox / Eastern theology could be collected and pinned somewhere for easy linking / quoting.

[Brother Adam]

[quote name='Apotheoun' date='30 December 2009 - 04:07 AM' timestamp='1262160425' post='2027457']
You have been duped into thinking that hell is being "totally separated" from God, which is an idea that is foreign to Eastern Catholicism.
[/quote]

Hell is existence outside of experiencing the divine indwelling presence of God. In my reading during eschatology we were taught there there is still a sense of God's reality in hell, but a sense of the fallen. Von Balthasar in his short discourse on hell explains it best.

I don't mind you sharing about Eastern Catholicism, but I tire of the implied focus on how much superior EC is, and how often you highlight the differences instead of the fact that the Church is one body.

[cmotherofpirl]

[quote name='OraProMe' date='30 December 2009 - 09:11 AM' timestamp='1262178708' post='2027484']
Please don't derail this thread again with your stuff. Hardly anyone on Phatmass is an Eastern catholic. Can't you just create a separate thread for this topic?

What thread are these original quotes from Raphael taken?

Also I was thinking about the horrid punishments and acts that God condones last night too (similar to what Hassan mentions). I kind of got in a loop...ordering the execution of people for such small things is so wrong...thus God can't exist...but if God doesn't exist absolute morality doesn't exist....so if absolute morality doesn't exist those things in the old testament aren't actually wrong they're just things....so does that mean god exists...but if he does he's such an ass for condoning that stuff...he doesn't exist....but then morality doesn't either...so then....

you get the idea. I never really could get out of this loop. Trying to prove the non-existence of God by pointing to the immorality of his laws doesn't really work for me given that his non-existence would leave the world devoid of meaning and any objective morality anyway.

Gah, maybe someone can explain this stuff better.
[/quote]
Eastern catholic thought on the topic is just as valid as western, so it belongs here, not in some seperate thread.

[OraProMe]

Repetition really isn't neccesary.

edit: Brother Adam probably worded it better than I. It does get tiring to see so many threads turn into a debate between east vs. west. Hassan was not an Eastern Catholic, Raphael is not an Eastern Catholic, few of the members here are Eastern Catholics...so I really don't see what relevance Eastern theology has to this thread. However if Apo's intentions were to merely state his tradition's thoughts on the matter and leave it at that, then great.

Back on topic?

Edited December 30, 2009 by OraProMe

[Apotheoun]

[quote name='Brother Adam' date='30 December 2009 - 08:24 AM' timestamp='1262186660' post='2027503']
Hell is existence outside of experiencing the divine indwelling presence of God. In my reading during eschatology we were taught there there is still a sense of God's reality in hell, but a sense of the fallen. Von Balthasar in his short discourse on hell explains it best.

I don't mind you sharing about Eastern Catholicism, but I tire of the implied focus on how much superior EC is, and how often you highlight the differences instead of the fact that the Church is one body.
[/quote]
Nothing can exist in separation from God, unless you believe that God is not omnipresent, for as St. Paul said, "In Him we live and move and have our being," [Acts 17:28, see also 1 Cor. 15:28] and he did not limit this truth to the saints in heaven.

P.S. - Even St. Thomas Aquinas using Aristotelian philosophy recognized that nothing created could exist autonomously, which is why he held that God was not merely the efficient cause of creation, but was the existential efficient cause of creation, which means - to put it crudely - that God keeps creation in existence from moment to moment stretching forever into the eschaton.

Edited December 30, 2009 by Apotheoun

[Apotheoun]

[quote name='OraProMe' date='30 December 2009 - 08:37 AM' timestamp='1262187421' post='2027507']
Repetition really isn't neccesary.

edit: Brother Adam probably worded it better than I. It does get tiring to see so many threads turn into a debate between east vs. west. Hassan was not an Eastern Catholic, Raphael is not an Eastern Catholic, few of the members here are Eastern Catholics...so I really don't see what relevance Eastern theology has to this thread. However if Apo's intentions were to merely state his tradition's thoughts on the matter and leave it at that, then great.

Back on topic?
[/quote]
The fire of God's being, which is the joy of the saints, is also the very thing that causes the pain of the damned. Heaven and hell are not places, but are instead different ways of experiencing God's burning presence, for God is light to the saints and fire to the damned.

As I said in a another post: "Hell is the communion with God, who is a consuming fire (Hebrews 12:29), experienced by the damned. So, from an Eastern Christian perspective, the damned - like the saints - will grow closer and closer to God throughout eternity. In other words, the saints and the reprobate have the same end (i.e., God), but where they differ is in how they experience that ever-moving communion with divinity (θείῳ, which is sometimes translated as 'brimstone,' i.e., the divine incense), which is the very joy of the saints and the very pain of the damned."

[Apotheoun]

[quote name='Brother Adam' date='30 December 2009 - 08:24 AM' timestamp='1262186660' post='2027503']
I don't mind you sharing about Eastern Catholicism, but I tire of the implied focus on how much superior EC is, and how often you highlight the differences instead of the fact that the Church is one body.
[/quote]
My post does not imply any superiority of the East over the West, but rather highlights the fact that there are different approaches, and that it is wrong to assert that only one approach is truly Catholic, which is the mistake that Hassan made in his original post.

[Thy Geekdom Come]

[quote name='Apotheoun' date='30 December 2009 - 03:07 AM' timestamp='1262160425' post='2027457']
You have been duped into thinking that hell is being "totally separated" from God, which is an idea that is foreign to Eastern Catholicism.
[/quote]
Western theology, too, although I'd say it's been a common misconception. How could anything that exists be completely separated from God?

[Thy Geekdom Come]

[quote name='Hassan' date='30 December 2009 - 02:52 AM' timestamp='1262159572' post='2027452']
Be very specific, what stearotype have I be duped into believeing?

Was it my belief that God used to deem it a fitting punishment for engaging in witchcraft that one be burned alive, or my belief that the penalty for dying in a state of mortal sin leads to eternal damnation without the possability of redemption, whose chief punishment is the unimanigable torment of being totally seperated from God and thus everything good, but which is accompanied by the accidental pains of the flesh, usually described in terms of fire and burning?[/quote]

Your belief that death is worse than sin.

As a matter of justice, every sinner is deserving of hell. We must start with that truth. A witch is a sinner and deserving of hell, the same that I am a sinner and, apart from God's mercy, deserving of hell. Now I mention God's mercy because He is gracious enough to intervene and offer forgiveness, which has been bought at the price of the blood of His only Son. I have accepted in principle God's forgiveness and try to make it mine (however feeble my attempts may often be) by living out my faith through hope and love. God has, I hope, no reason to strike me down. However, if I continue in sin, it would be both just and merciful of God to strike me down where I stand; just because I deserve it and merciful because He will not be letting me destroy myself further. Now, if I am scandalizing the people around me, then it is even more just and even more merciful, not only for me, but for them. If my entire society is corrupted (as were many of the societies of the Old Testament), then it is also just and merciful to take out all of Sodom, for instance. Yes, children die in the process, but remember: God foresees all and we can be hopeful that He has acted mercifully by removing from this life children who otherwise may have destroyed themselves through sin. We can also be hopeful in the salvation of those innocent children.

Those who believe death is worse than sin tend to obsess over this, but for those of us who do not wish to sin and would rather die, it is clearly an act of God's justice and mercy together.

[quote]You God does not only allow killing for self defense. He also permits the wholesale slaughter of women and children who happen to be raised in societies which worship the wrong diety. We don't need to get into that barbarism, but the scope of accecptable killing in you God's eyes extend considerably beyond mere self defense in response to immediate physical dange and no other options avaliable.[/quote]

Answered above.

[quote]So if you deem it necessary to kill to stop someone from endangering his or other souls with mortal din and thus eternal death of the soul, killing them can be justafied? God help us if many people every seriously believe such non-sense again.[/quote]

It is not mine to judge when it is appropriate, but the authority is given to civil leaders to make those judgments in line with the Church's principles regarding the death penalty. Given the widespread acceptance and use of the death penalty at that time (which makes good sense in context) and the risk of bringing ruin on a Christian community turned to self-destructive sin, which would also lead to the downfall of that society (keeping in mind that society was based on the Church), a witch would be posing a huge risk to society. Now, God's mercy demands that all other avenues be tried first, and so trying to convert the witch should first be attempted. Prayer should be used. I suspect in many cases exorcism was used.

[quote]Why? Firstly the Torah doesn't specify that the offender must be trying to entice others with into joining them in their sin, which collapses the main thrust of your justification. Secondly, what exactly is it about our day and age which makes it that the punishments are no longer needed? [/quote]

Sin by its nature spreads. It doesn't need to be the offenders intention to entice others into joining him/her. Secondly, the death penalty on witches would now do more harm than good, only likely to lead more people into curiosity and involvement in the occult. Furthermore, witches are not generally as harmful as they were then (most of them are tree-hugging crazy people with daddy issues), not malicious devil-worshiping folks. Although sinful, they simply aren't the downfall of society at the moment.

[quote]
This is a pretty weak defense, no offense.
[/quote]

Coming from a person who thinks God is weak, I'll take that as a compliment.

[Thy Geekdom Come]

[quote name='Apotheoun' date='30 December 2009 - 11:14 AM' timestamp='1262189651' post='2027516']
The fire of God's being, which is the joy of the saints, is also the very thing that causes the pain of the damned. Heaven and hell are not places, but are instead different ways of experiencing God's burning presence, for God is light to the saints and fire to the damned.

As I said in a another post: "Hell is the communion with God, who is a consuming fire (Hebrews 12:29), experienced by the damned. So, from an Eastern Christian perspective, the damned - like the saints - will grow closer and closer to God throughout eternity. In other words, the saints and the reprobate have the same end (i.e., God), but where they differ is in how they experience that ever-moving communion with divinity (θείῳ, which is sometimes translated as 'brimstone,' i.e., the divine incense), which is the very joy of the saints and the very pain of the damned."
[/quote]
Dr. Bergsma taught this view and I loved it then as much as I love it now. It was also supported in Spe Salvi.

[goldenchild17]

[quote name='Brother Adam' date='30 December 2009 - 09:24 AM' timestamp='1262186660' post='2027503']
Hell is existence outside of experiencing the divine indwelling presence of God. In my reading during eschatology we were taught there there is still a sense of God's reality in hell, but a sense of the fallen. Von Balthasar in his short discourse on hell explains it best.

I don't mind you sharing about Eastern Catholicism, but I tire of the implied focus on how much superior EC is, and how often you highlight the differences instead of the fact that the Church is one body.
[/quote]

+1 (in spirit)

[Nunsense]

[quote name='Apotheoun' date='31 December 2009 - 03:14 AM' timestamp='1262189651' post='2027516']
The fire of God's being, which is the joy of the saints, is also the very thing that causes the pain of the damned. Heaven and hell are not places, but are instead different ways of experiencing God's burning presence, for God is light to the saints and fire to the damned.

As I said in a another post: "Hell is the communion with God, who is a consuming fire (Hebrews 12:29), experienced by the damned. So, from an Eastern Christian perspective, the damned - like the saints - will grow closer and closer to God throughout eternity. In other words, the saints and the reprobate have the same end (i.e., God), but where they differ is in how they experience that ever-moving communion with divinity (θείῳ, which is sometimes translated as 'brimstone,' i.e., the divine incense), which is the very joy of the saints and the very pain of the damned."
[/quote]


Ok - now this resonates with my very being, and I surely hope that it is not contrary to Rome's teachings because it states almost exactly what I have felt about hell for a long time. The fire of love, which is so sweet to the saints, has got to cause great anguish to those who are not purified of all evil, hence the reason Purgatory hurts as well (not only not having the Beatific Vision, but feeling God's burning love while still impure).

St John of the Cross described purification of the soul (in this life) as being like the burning of a log of wood, with all of the impurities rising out first, before the log becomes consumed to the point that it is one with the fire. If one were rejecting God's mercy (in hell), then this fire of love would be an eternal torment.

Thank you Apo for explaining that view. I love it!

[Thy Geekdom Come]

[quote name='nunsense' date='30 December 2009 - 04:30 PM' timestamp='1262208619' post='2027584']
Ok - now this resonates with my very being, and I surely hope that it is not contrary to Rome's teachings because it states almost exactly what I have felt about hell for a long time. The fire of love, which is so sweet to the saints, has got to cause great anguish to those who are not purified of all evil, hence the reason Purgatory hurts as well (not only not having the Beatific Vision, but feeling God's burning love while still impure).

St John of the Cross described purification of the soul (in this life) as being like the burning of a log of wood, with all of the impurities rising out first, before the log becomes consumed to the point that it is one with the fire. If one were rejecting God's mercy (in hell), then this fire of love would be an eternal torment.

Thank you Apo for explaining that view. I love it!
[/quote]
I can confirm that it is not at odds with Rome. In fact, Spe Salvi applies the same thinking to purgatory in article 47.