HELL

[abaris]

"There's nothing in Catholic doctrine that says Hell is a "punishment" God casts on us." 

Which, of course, is pure semantic.

[Catholic_Lady]

"There's nothing in Catholic doctrine that says Hell is a "punishment" God casts on us." 

Which, of course, is pure semantic.

Think of it this way. Let's say a person murders someone and spends the rest of their lives regretting it miserably, to the point of severe depression and suicidal thoughts. Even if the law never found out this person was guilty and never put them in jail, the person is still being punished by their own actions. 

I'm not equating this in any way to Hell, I'm just showing how a person can be punished by their own choices, rather than by someone else.

[abaris]

Think of it this way. Let's say a person murders someone and spends the rest of their lives regretting it miserably, to the point of severe depression and suicidal thoughts. Even if the law never found out this person was guilty and never put them in jail, the person is still being punished by their own actions. 

I'm not equating this in any way to Hell, I'm just showing how a person can be punished by their own choices, rather than by someone else.

OK, let's just say, the church was more honest about it when I was a child. There was no doubt in anyone's mind that god would dish out the punishment. The priests made sure of that at every given opportunity. They loved to talk about it, more than they loved talking about Jesus.

Now they wear a nicer face - I'm even tempted to call it a mask - trying to keep the blame from god. But the message remains the same. Eternal suffering for a short life. And supposedly the same kind of punishment for Stalin, Hitler or any random guy, who loved to jerk off or offended the commandments in any other petty way. Or for simply not believing.

But the church is flexible, I concede that. In the Middle Ages they invented purgatory, which worked as intended. As a giant mint to create riches by selling letters ofd indulgence. Kind of a limbo, which, when I was a child, was also supposed to be the place where kids went if they happened to die before they were baptized. Which, of course, happened a lot in previous centuries. And which again was turned into a money making machine, since you could buy them out.

By the way, the German word for purgatory is "Fegefeuer", which again has fire in it. They certainly love their flames.

[Godscreated]

[quote pid='1037549' dateline='1441076554']

---

 The Bible is not a man made book/teachings, penned in man's hand yes but not man's teachings. What I said above really applies to those who want to know God or those who think they may want to find God.
 There are terrible things in the Bible, why, because though it's not a history book it is the history of man and his sinful desires that result in things not very pleasant. If a person doesn't start at the beginning of the Bible and see God as the loving God He is then one will manipulate the scriptures to suit their own desired beliefs. The Bible is like a fine tapestry, it's a woven work that has to be studied as a whole or it want make sense. Like a tapestry you pull out some of the threads and you will damage it, ie. it's meaning of truth. Just like the way you see the Ten commandments, you say they do not tell us to honor each other, I say you are pulling out threads to make an argument to reject them. I see them telling us to honor each other by, "You shall not murder." "You shall not commit adultery." "You shall not steal." "You shall not bear false witness against your neighbor." "You shall not covet anything your neighbor has." How are these things not honoring others, it's written all over them, unless you blind yourself to this truth. There is so much more about how the scriptures fit, but that would take many pages and no one read them anyway so I'll stop here because I believe it answers most of your question. Maybe not to your satisfaction but, it's the truth.

GC

---

Yes, there are terrible things in the bible and…. guess what?!  God commands people to do those things! There’s one major reason not to believe in it.

Because God asks the Israelites to do certain things discredits the Bible, are you saying there's no truth in it? God did tell His people to do things that seem terrible to us, but it's relative to God's plan to redeem mankind. We do not have the ability to see the future and God does so He understands the best route to redeeming man. We're not asked to understand everything God does, we are to have faith that He will do what's best for us.

If a person over the age of 10 starts at the beginning, without any pressure to actually believe in it, they would close the book by page 2. The book makes no sense in reality, how it exists today in the non-fiction section blows my mind.

Wrong, a 10 year old would enjoy many of the stories in the Bible, however we do not ask our 10 year old's to go at things by themselves, unless we don't care, is that what your saying we should let the young run their lives without guidance, would be kinda irresponsible.

If by fine tapestry, you mean evil, and filled with bullshit, ok, I’ll go with that.

Oh, I seem to have mistaken you for someone who wanted to have decent conversation, sorry I saw you in that light, why, because you know I didn't mean that, a fine tapestry is something good to look at and take in.

No, I’m not pulling out threads, I read the book, you are the one pulling out the threads and creating your own book, in your own mind, to your liking.

Yes you are and deliberately. The commandments I gave you were some of those threads you removed so you didn't have to see how God meant for us to treat our fellow man. See you want to believe the 10 Commandments were directed at people to do for themselves, when they were intended as the way we are to respect others, your short sighted self indulgence has lead you down the wrong path. I take the Bible as a whole, I do not over look or look past any of it, what I do not understand I research to find the answer with God's help. You're making accusations about me that are not true, so stop seeing doing what you do.

 I hear many say the bible is the word of god, and you are meant to follow everything in it (it also says this in the bible). If i pick and choose certain verses from a book inspired by god, there shouldn’t be anything wrong in it, but clearly there is. Yes, those other commandments you mention are just fine, but I don’t believe in the whole thing, because of the other reasons that I mention, that you fail to absorb into your mind.

I understand completely what you mean, you do not want to do the work to see God's truth, when you find something that disagrees with your life style you dismiss it. When you find something disagreeable to you in scripture you drag it down instead of trying to find out the truth.

I’m not the one who is blind here, you have repeatedly shown yourself to be blind to everything bad in scripture. Either that, or you have to make some ridiculous excuse to how it doesn’t apply to you, or how I’m reading things out of context. I can see that there is good and evil (commanded by god) in it, YOU CAN’T.

God commands no evil, that is just your opinion as a sight limited human, if God commanded evil He would be sinful and God says He can not sin. As for those scriptures you need to provide a couple to start with and I'll answer them, I've always have, I'm not afraid of the scriptures and the truths they hold, like atheist are.

And, yeah, you’re right, it isn’t to my satisfaction or does it fit my morality. And, if you think it’s the truth, you’re the one that has to be blind and immoral.

Now your acting like a child, you have no idea what I can see and what I believe is moral or immoral, so grow up.

GC


[/quote]

[Cyberman]

Lol @ GC telling someone else to grow up

[rexbeccarox]

GC, I read plenty of books at the age of ten without guidance. I practically ate books. There's no way my parents would have been able to keep up.

[Salacious B. Crumb]

[quote pid='1037549' dateline='1441076554']

---

 The Bible is not a man made book/teachings, penned in man's hand yes but not man's teachings. What I said above really applies to those who want to know God or those who think they may want to find God.
 There are terrible things in the Bible, why, because though it's not a history book it is the history of man and his sinful desires that result in things not very pleasant. If a person doesn't start at the beginning of the Bible and see God as the loving God He is then one will manipulate the scriptures to suit their own desired beliefs. The Bible is like a fine tapestry, it's a woven work that has to be studied as a whole or it want make sense. Like a tapestry you pull out some of the threads and you will damage it, ie. it's meaning of truth. Just like the way you see the Ten commandments, you say they do not tell us to honor each other, I say you are pulling out threads to make an argument to reject them. I see them telling us to honor each other by, "You shall not murder." "You shall not commit adultery." "You shall not steal." "You shall not bear false witness against your neighbor." "You shall not covet anything your neighbor has." How are these things not honoring others, it's written all over them, unless you blind yourself to this truth. There is so much more about how the scriptures fit, but that would take many pages and no one read them anyway so I'll stop here because I believe it answers most of your question. Maybe not to your satisfaction but, it's the truth.

GC

---

Yes, there are terrible things in the bible and…. guess what?!  God commands people to do those things! There’s one major reason not to believe in it.

Because God asks the Israelites to do certain things discredits the Bible, are you saying there's no truth in it? God did tell His people to do things that seem terrible to us, but it's relative to God's plan to redeem mankind. We do not have the ability to see the future and God does so He understands the best route to redeeming man. We're not asked to understand everything God does, we are to have faith that He will do what's best for us.

If a person over the age of 10 starts at the beginning, without any pressure to actually believe in it, they would close the book by page 2. The book makes no sense in reality, how it exists today in the non-fiction section blows my mind.

Wrong, a 10 year old would enjoy many of the stories in the Bible, however we do not ask our 10 year old's to go at things by themselves, unless we don't care, is that what your saying we should let the young run their lives without guidance, would be kinda irresponsible.

If by fine tapestry, you mean evil, and filled with bullshit, ok, I’ll go with that.

Oh, I seem to have mistaken you for someone who wanted to have decent conversation, sorry I saw you in that light, why, because you know I didn't mean that, a fine tapestry is something good to look at and take in.

No, I’m not pulling out threads, I read the book, you are the one pulling out the threads and creating your own book, in your own mind, to your liking.

Yes you are and deliberately. The commandments I gave you were some of those threads you removed so you didn't have to see how God meant for us to treat our fellow man. See you want to believe the 10 Commandments were directed at people to do for themselves, when they were intended as the way we are to respect others, your short sighted self indulgence has lead you down the wrong path. I take the Bible as a whole, I do not over look or look past any of it, what I do not understand I research to find the answer with God's help. You're making accusations about me that are not true, so stop seeing doing what you do.

 I hear many say the bible is the word of god, and you are meant to follow everything in it (it also says this in the bible). If i pick and choose certain verses from a book inspired by god, there shouldn’t be anything wrong in it, but clearly there is. Yes, those other commandments you mention are just fine, but I don’t believe in the whole thing, because of the other reasons that I mention, that you fail to absorb into your mind.

I understand completely what you mean, you do not want to do the work to see God's truth, when you find something that disagrees with your life style you dismiss it. When you find something disagreeable to you in scripture you drag it down instead of trying to find out the truth.

I’m not the one who is blind here, you have repeatedly shown yourself to be blind to everything bad in scripture. Either that, or you have to make some ridiculous excuse to how it doesn’t apply to you, or how I’m reading things out of context. I can see that there is good and evil (commanded by god) in it, YOU CAN’T.

God commands no evil, that is just your opinion as a sight limited human, if God commanded evil He would be sinful and God says He can not sin. As for those scriptures you need to provide a couple to start with and I'll answer them, I've always have, I'm not afraid of the scriptures and the truths they hold, like atheist are.

And, yeah, you’re right, it isn’t to my satisfaction or does it fit my morality. And, if you think it’s the truth, you’re the one that has to be blind and immoral.

Now your acting like a child, you have no idea what I can see and what I believe is moral or immoral, so grow up.

GC

[/quote]

Here’s the deal GC.. I’m glad that you step up to the plate to engage in conversation, but when you say things that you can’t back up over and over again such as: 1)God did tell His people to do things that seem terrible to us, but it's relative to God's plan to redeem mankind, 2)We do not have the ability to see the future and God does so He understands the best route to redeeming man, it sort of makes me not want to respond. You claim something, and then, I’m supposed to accept it, because I can’t argue against it. I’m a little tired of that. I understand that you believe in this stuff, and I can actually understand where you’re coming from, in a few of the responses that you just made, but I don’t believe in your book, simple as that.

The part where you said the 10 year old would enjoy the stories of the bible, I’d have to disagree. Actually, my cousin is around that age, and his dad has been teaching him about the bible recently (he wasn’t heavily indoctrinated so he can actually think for himself), and came to me and said how it all doesn’t make sense and that he saw too many evil things in it. So, I’m not wrong. Yes, they should read it and decide for themselves. When you say someone should guide them, you actually mean completely brainwash them, whether you agree with me or not. Children should be allowed to decide if they want to believe in something of this nature or not. Don’t make this dishonest comparison about not guiding them through the bible, means that people don’t care. In my opinion, if you cared, you’d let them decide for themselves, not tell them that they’ll go to hell if they don’t believe in some book put together by men, and those men picked and chose whatever books that they felt was right.

The part where you say that I don’t want to see god’s truth is just another example of something that makes no sense. If I saw a reason to be believe that the bible was absolutely true, I wouldn’t deny it, but I see many reason to believe that it’s not. And, all the other parts where you stick up for the bible, again, I don’t agree with that morality. Thanks, but no thanks. If a god actually let me know that I would need to accept this book, and see that this is somehow objective, and there’s a plan greater than my mind could see, and something that needed to be followed or I’d suffer for eternity, I guess I’d have to give it another chance. Since your god has failed at letting me know what objective morality is and so on, I have to go by what I feel is right. I feel sorry for you and if you have kids that you are teaching these things to them, that I consider evil, but that’s my honest opinion. Can you get it through your head that I need a lot of evidence, and your god hasn’t given me a shred to go on. All the so-called evidence that you claim exists, isn’t even contemporaneous when this man supposedly lived. I don’t want to hear seek him (we’ve been through that), blah blah blah, unless you have new, undeniable evidence that the bible is the word of god, then you’ve got nothing! All you have is your beliefs, and the only people that you can convince are the poor innocent kids that will believe everything you say at such a young age.

[Ravenshire]

Imagine having a close friend who is all powerful. Most of us would probably not be able to help but feel resentment towards Him when a loved one died, or when we asked for something that didn't happen.

I don't think I'd feel resentment toward an friend who had the powers your gawd is supposed to have. After all, he/she would be able to explain to me why the bad shit had to happen in a way that I would be certain to understand. Something your gawd seems incapable of.

[Ravenshire]

Like the article explained, the catechism here is quoting Jesus speaking figuratively. The Encyclopedia of Catholicism as well as other Catholic sources specifically say that biblical images of Hell are not to be taken literally.

How very.... Christian. Anything the buy-bull says that the church authority doesn't like, well that's just allegorical.

[Nay_Sayer]

I'm repeating something i already said but, I'd take hell over an eternity with a grown up version of Anthony Fremont.