HELL

[Catholic_Lady]

@CL: Since even Catholics can't agree on the most basic properties of hell, what makes you confident that (a) it is real at all and (b) your idea is the correct one?

Ah, but we can agree on the basic property of Hell. It's a complete separation from God due to a rejection of God, it's eternal, and it's a pretty miserable thing. That's the basic premise, and that's the important part. 

Whether we believe it's a physical place, or a state of being, or whatever, is really not important in the grand scheme of things. 

Like I have said, none of us know exactly the details of what Hell will be like. It is not illustrated in Church doctrine. We can only speculate, and we can have different opinions and different ideas, as long as we don't drift away from the important, original premise - that it's complete separation from God.   

I am not 100% confident that my understanding of Hell is the "correct one," or even if the correct one has been speculated upon by anyone yet. But it does make the most sense to me, so it's what I personally think is true.

[pocaracas]

Hell was an invention of the church, a means of control.  Nothing more, and nothing less.  

Do you have any evidence of that?

My guess is that the concept of a place where evil people go after dead predates christianity...
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hell#Polytheism

Welcome to the forum - where atheists don't believe what other atheists say!!

[Homeless Nutter]

A punishment cast by God, is what I said.

<sigh>
And yet your church said:

612 Jesus solemnly proclaims that he "will send his angels, and they will gather . . . all evil doers, and throw them into the furnace of fire,"613 and that he will pronounce the condemnation: "Depart from me, you cursed, into the eternal fire!"

That is STILL in the official teachings.

What changed? God decided to pick up a phone after 2000 years and informed the Funny-hats, that - no, he won't be personally condemning anyone? Why now?

[Catholic_Lady]

A punishment cast by God, is what I said.

<sigh>
And yet your church said:

612 Jesus solemnly proclaims that he "will send his angels, and they will gather . . . all evil doers, and throw them into the furnace of fire,"613 and that he will pronounce the condemnation: "Depart from me, you cursed, into the eternal fire!"

That is STILL in the official teachings.

What changed? God decided to pick up a phone after 2000 years and informed the Funny-hats, that - no, he won't be personally condemning anyone? Why now?

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.

[Salacious B. Crumb]

If we're supposed to follow every word of the bible, doe you wear polyester and cotton garments, GC?

If it pleases you go ahead, personally I like natural cotton, but do wear man made material as well. By the way if you want to live the OT laws for the Israelites be my guess, it will become what you are judged by. I like and eat many sea foods the Israelites weren't allowed to, I love rabbit, pork and other things the Israelites weren't suppose to eat, why, because those laws were not ever intended for the Gentiles. You're such a silly little girl.

GC

Yes, silly little Beccs.. God inspires people to write evil laws for the Israelites, but not the gentiles?

Ephesians 6:5-8 5 Slaves, obey your earthly masters with respect and fear, and with sincerity of heart, just as you would obey Christ. 6 Obey them not only to win their favor when their eye is on you, but as slaves of Christ, doing the will of God from your heart. 7 Serve wholeheartedly, as if you were serving the Lord, not people, 8 because you know that the Lord will reward each one for whatever good they do, whether they are slave or free.

Titus 2:9-10 9 Bondservants are to be submissive to their own masters in everything; they are to be well-pleasing, not argumentative, 10 not pilfering, but showing all good faith, so that in everything they may adorn the doctrine of God our Savior.

In case you didn’t know, bondservants are slaves, but other bible versions use slave.

I love all the ranting and ravings for me to look at Paul and not the OT. What’s the difference? There’s also similar verses in colossians, peter, romans, and galatians. Screw your bible! You have to believe slavery is ok to be a christian, unless you are a pick and choose type of christian.

[Godscreated]

 This is why the Bible is the authority and not man made doctrine, belief in the scriptures as truth from the first word to the last is the only way to understand and make sense of God's plan.

GC

Every bible I've ever seen looks to have been printed here on earth in a conventional manner.  The language is English (in the ones I've seen), a language spoken here on earth.  By all accounts the authors were all men.

So make the bible your authority if you will but what you're holding onto there is entirely manmade.  When what you believe in is supernatural and yet all any of you can point to are natural things, there is no virtuous point of view to claim.  [As opposed to the part of your statement which I bolded.]

 You really believe God's going to set up a printing press and print Bibles in a language only God can understand, you're being a bit out on the limb aren't you?
The Bible is printed by man because it's for man, not God and it printed in nearly all languages on earth, so open your eyes and see truth instead of the biased deceit you prefer.

GC

[Godscreated]

You keep telling yourself that GC. Wouldn't want you to start to doubt your faith. That would be truly frightening.

Which is why, of course, it's contradictory.

It's not contradictory and I don't say things to help myself maintain a belief, it's totally for you guys. My belief is sealed in my heart by God because I wanted that.

GC

[Catholic_Lady]

On a softer note,

[Iroscato]

On a softer note,

[Homeless Nutter]

Like the article explained, the catechism here is quoting Jesus speaking figuratively. [...]

So when Jesus says he will condemn evil doers - he means what? I can understand, that the fire and sulfur sh*t may be symbolic/metaphorical and hell doesn't LOOK like that, but how am I supposed to understand his condemnation - as a "figure" for what? However you twist this - his intent is pretty clear.

As I said before - you can interpret hell however you like, since it's a made-up place. The fact that catholics don't feel comfortable with the traditional vision of hell anymore, suggests that they're trying to adapt their BS to the modern times, which is probably a good thing... Or maybe a bad thing.

Give it another 50 years and - who knows - Hell may be abolished altogether...