Ask a Traditional Catholic

[Randy Carson]

We are Catholic because we believe that God exists and that Jesus is His son. We believe that Jesus promised to build a church and that the Catholic Church is that church.

We are not necessarily Catholic because it makes us feel good - though it does because it does feel good to be doing what God expects of us.

But why is that a problem? Don't all humans have similar feelings?

We help little old ladies across the street because it makes us feel good.
We donate kidneys because it makes us feel good.
We fight and die for our countries because it makes us feel good.

No one likes suffering...whether it is giving up a seat on a bus to a pregnant woman or being beheaded by ISIS because of our faith in Jesus.

Doing the right thing because it is the right thing to do does make us feel good. That just means we're human.

Christians aren't any different from anyone else in that regard, are they?

Doesn't address my question. What if god wasn't offering eternal salvation, would you still be willing to submit to him? Is it really doing the right thing? Submitting your to a god that holds eternal torture over your head hardly seems like doing whats right for the sake of doing whats right.

If there were no heaven and no hell, then what would be the purpose of paying any attention to God at all? What you're proposing is that there would be no consequences for ANY of our decisions (beyond our valuation of their effects on others). You would be completely free to do whatever you want (according to the dictates of your own conscience), because in the end, it all comes to nothing anyway. So, sure...ignore God...He's irrelevant.

But that's NOT this situation in which we find ourselves. (It is the situation you believe to be the case, but that is a problem owing to your lack of faith.) We have been shown the alternatives (heaven & hell) as well as the loving nature of a God with whom we may have a personal relationship. God is love, He loves us, and He is lovable. Choosing to do what God wants because we love Him and desire to be with Him for eternity makes sense in that context.

However, there have been many saints whose experience of God's love was SO profound that they were able to say they would willingly endure the pains of hell for eternity if that was what God wanted.

I can honestly say that I'm not at that level.