RE: On Hell and Forgiveness
August 28, 2018 at 12:58 pm
(This post was last modified: August 28, 2018 at 1:03 pm by Aroura.)
Here is why this matters to me, even though I don't believe in heaven or hell:
These beliefs and ideas affect real people. I'm not saying no free-will at all for this argument, but understanding that behaviors have causes help us to both prevent bad behaviors, and to help people who already exhibit them.
The idea that someone chooses to be evil and someone else chooses to be good leads us to stuff people in prisons and not care what happens to them. The idea that God will sort out all inequality in the end leads us to care less about inequality right now, right in front of us. The idea that people are sinful leads many to believe that whatever people are suffering in life they have somehow deserved, somehow earned. And if that isn't the case, then it's still ok, because God will sort it out when we all die.
Not all Christians fall into this, naturally. There are of course many Christians, even a couple on this very forum, who care what happens to the ones I am talking about. But I hope those people can look around themselves and recognize that many people, so very many, use these ideas to soothe themselves and not only take no action to help, but actively shun the ones I'm talking about.
I think in order to help people here, now, in this life, we need to understand how and why people do what they do. And that means we need to look at it without the lense of the mystical. I don't say, or even mean, fake. I mean whatever you wish to call the soul, free-will, and other things of the spiritual realm. Fine, let God deal with that stuff, but we need to deal with real people, and help them instead of coming up with excuses why we should discard them.
These beliefs and ideas affect real people. I'm not saying no free-will at all for this argument, but understanding that behaviors have causes help us to both prevent bad behaviors, and to help people who already exhibit them.
The idea that someone chooses to be evil and someone else chooses to be good leads us to stuff people in prisons and not care what happens to them. The idea that God will sort out all inequality in the end leads us to care less about inequality right now, right in front of us. The idea that people are sinful leads many to believe that whatever people are suffering in life they have somehow deserved, somehow earned. And if that isn't the case, then it's still ok, because God will sort it out when we all die.
Not all Christians fall into this, naturally. There are of course many Christians, even a couple on this very forum, who care what happens to the ones I am talking about. But I hope those people can look around themselves and recognize that many people, so very many, use these ideas to soothe themselves and not only take no action to help, but actively shun the ones I'm talking about.
I think in order to help people here, now, in this life, we need to understand how and why people do what they do. And that means we need to look at it without the lense of the mystical. I don't say, or even mean, fake. I mean whatever you wish to call the soul, free-will, and other things of the spiritual realm. Fine, let God deal with that stuff, but we need to deal with real people, and help them instead of coming up with excuses why we should discard them.
“Eternity is a terrible thought. I mean, where's it going to end?”
― Tom Stoppard, Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead
― Tom Stoppard, Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead
