(September 18, 2016 at 4:40 pm)Catholic_Lady Wrote:(September 17, 2016 at 7:52 pm)mcolafson Wrote: Greetings,
I have to say that I am interested in Christianity and the Bible. In their philosophical and psychological aspects.
One of this how Love and Fear are woven together.
I don't say that this is not possible. In the USSR people were afraid of Stalin (or rather they were terrified). Yet, when he died (maybe He would be more appropriate ?), multitudes went on the streets to pay last tribute to the Leader (Father of the Nations, the Teacher, etc), and many were trampled to death (some sources say 2 thousand people were dead)...
Nevertheless, I can understand toothaches or hemorrhages sent by the hypothetical sky-Father.
If you catch a child playing with matches, it may a good idea to spank him. But better is to keep matches of child's reach.
But the idea of Hell...
If you play with matches, you are a naughty boy and I will burn you with cigarettes for eternity?
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or wait, sin means separation from our Heavenly Father. All sin. Ted Bundy's killling of women is a sin. And stealing of your class-mate's eraser when you were in the second grade is Sin, too. You probably forgot about that eraser. And your classmate also forgot it. But for stealing of that eraser, your loving Father is going to send you to a torture chamber for Eternity!
Btw, are there parents here?
There are different levels of sin depending on how serious they are. Stealing classmate's lunch money is what we'd call a venial sin. Killing innocent women, is a grave sin.
Venial sins hurt our relationship with God, but do not separate us from Him, thus not resulting in Hell.
A grave sin, on the other hand, has the potential to become a mortal sin... which does cut us off from God.
For a grave sin to be considered a mortal sin, the person who committed the grave sin must have done so with full knowledge and consent of the will. This means the person must be fully aware that what they are doing will cut them off from God, and do it willingly anyway with the intent of being cut off from God. Also, there must be 0 remorse. So if a completely blanked out insane person killed someone, he has committed a grave sin. But since he did not have full knowledge and consent of the will, his grave sin does not go up to the level of being a mortal sin, and thus does not cut him off from God.
Hell is not a physical place. It is a state of being consciously and willfully separated from God in the other life. Only the person himself can choose to exist in this state of being.
Hm, how many criminally insane people surround God?
