Heaven and Hell - Products of the mind?

[Ars Goetia]

In my opinion, the modern concept of hell was developed as a means of control through fear. At the time of translation, only those in power had the privilege of literacy. The average man had no choice but to trust the translations as read aloud to them in church. The ruling class have simply never had the best interests of the people at heart. These translations were read aloud and they inspired fear. Should you not comply, should you not follow these commands, you will burn for eternity - that was the message. Critical analysis was not a priority and fear ruled, as it always will, when power is in play.

I definitely agree there. Most Christians don't realize how lucky they are. There are thousands of preserved copies of the New Testament and enough recorded quotations of scripture in early Church writings that we could still have the New testament without a single manuscript. Moreover, it was originally in the most widely used written and studied language of the ancient Mediterranean. More than any other religion, we have the means to critically examine our original teachings. I feel sorry for Buddhists who need to rely on texts written hundreds of years after the death of their founder. Christianity doesn't have that problem but in many ways it may as well. Current majority views on Hell and sin have been actively distorted and taught devoid of their original historical and linguistic background. As a result you end up with doctrines which contradict the texts they're based on and are mainly crafted to maximize power.

We all cherry pick from various philosophies consciously or otherwise. My problem comes when someone allows ancient text to dictate their every move, though of course, they are welcome to spend their time on this earth as they choose.

We agree there as well. I think the Bible has many great moral lessons, more than any other book in my opinion. At the end of the day though, the New Testament was based on only 3 years of Jesus' teaching as well as limited by the price and length of a papyrus parchment. Anyone who sees it as a be all and end all to ethics is limiting themselves. Even before considering other texts, how many millions of pages have been written by priests and scholars debating the nature of the Bible's lessons?

In any case, I do believe that there is some objective morality but I doubt that humans will ever discover it. At least not in this lifetime. I find it more fulfilling to see it something to strive towards together. Having it served up on a silver platter in a single unimpeachable text doesn't seems very satisfying.

You've given me something to think about so I appreciate the information. Мир вам.

That's all I was really hoping to do. If there's something you want to follow up on then feel free to ask and I'll try to answer. Stay safe and take care, we're living through a strange time.

 

[Fistbeard_McThunderaxe]

One day some guys ate funny mushrooms and fell down a rabbit hole into the enffable nature of conciousness and reality. Afterwords they assigned objective truths to their subjective experiences in order to convince others what they saw had bearing on the material world. Eventually organized religion evolved to a profit off of the original claims that got retconned over the years.

 

[Slap47]

The Christian idea of unchanging cosmic justice is interesting. Most western Christians follow modern secular values but still believe in heaven and hell.

Christians recently freaked about a pastor condemning a gay suicide victim at his own funeral. The pastor warned them not follow the young man to hell. However, despite both suicide and gayness being clearly defined as sinful, most people condemned him.

On the other hand, if a person followed the Bible and stoned a gay person to death most people would probably declare that the guy throwing the stones would be sent to hell.

It's so selective that I can't understand it. You kept the idea of unchanging cosmic justice but apply subjective morality.

 

[Ars Goetia]

It's so selective that I can't understand it.

I'll try and offer an explanation. You're other point provides a great starting point for that.

On the other hand, if a person followed the Bible and stoned a gay person to death

They wouldn't be following the Bible if they did do that. There's a common misconception that Christians are bound by the laws in the Torah, the first 5 books of the Bible. They aren't though. In Matthew 5:17-18 Jesus reassured his Jewish audience that he was not going to simply destroy the law but fulfill its purpose through completing his aim. Essentially, following the Resurrection there was no reason to continue following the Jewish laws as it no longer had a purpose. As for the purpose, the laws were gradually implemented throughout the Torah as way to make people comply with the commandments. The laws failed as noted in Daniel, Isaiah, and Ezekiel as well as being something that can be seen throughout the events of the Old Testament in general. This is explored more fully in the Epistles with Paul in Romans 13:8-10 saying that love alone fulfills the commandments and not the laws. There's a lot more to the theology behind this but that's the basic Christian belief.

Whether Leviticus 20:13 actually concerns homosexuality is a bit murky especially in light of the LXX but looking at how Jesus interacted with the laws illustrates a more general point. Jesus prevented the execution of an adulterer in John 8 whose death was required under the laws in Leviticus 20. Instead of letting her be stoned he said that only those without sin could fulfill the punishment. This effectively saved her life. More interestingly though, Jesus is taught to be both God and the only human (unless you're Catholic) without sin. Therefore he was the only being who could carry out the execution required of the law. However, he didn't turn around and stone her himself. Instead he refused to condemn her and sent her on her way. You can see in this story how the condemnation of sin but forgiveness for sinners replaced the earlier punishments from Jewish Law.

 

[Get_your_kicks_with_30-06]

In Matthew 5:17-18 Jesus reassured his Trump's Chosen audience

following the Resurrection there was no reason to continue following the Trump's Chosen laws as it no longer had a purpose.

You can see in this story how the condemnation of sin but forgiveness for sinners replaced the earlier punishments from Trump's Chosen Law.

The fucking word filter lmao. This is amazing.

 

[Zero Day Defense]

I appreciate you taking the time to correct me on thos points. I could be so kind, could you recommend some sources

That's going to be difficult-- my knowledge of the Eastern churches comes from a variety of academic and anecdotal sources and is a compilation of knowledge over a few years. Despite-- to my understanding-- being an Evangelical, I found Dr. Ryan Reeves helpful in discussing what occurred in at least the Western and Eastern Roman Empire.

Your argument is that universalism wasn't important or popular enough to be addressed but, also, when it was addressed it was neither important nor popular

No, I argue that given the nature of calling councils, it's far more likely that until about the time it was addressed, it wasn't important or popular enough to be addressed. See here:

If universal salvation wasn't addressed until the Fifth Ecumenical Council, while that could mean that it was accepted before it wasn't (such is a rather cynical viewpoint), it more than likely means that until then, the Church ecumenical didn't see it as an impediment to its functions because it wasn't actually popular enough to warrant more than stern warnings and excommunications.

I even stress the precondition when I say it the first time.

In fact, St. Augustine claims that it was popular.

And St. Augustine could be wrong, could be speaking particularly from his own senses, or could have been deliberately hyperbolic. At the end of the day, we're still talking about one man.

In addition, he wrote many works which included arguments against both universaism and other alternative views of salvation.

That doesn't mean enough-- St. Augustine was an extremely prolific writer, and any of those writings are way more than a single letter. "Many works included arguments against alternative views of salvation" is vague as heck, and doesn't take into account what he was talking about that necessitated an affirmation of orthodox eschatology as a building block to another argument that may have not been innately eschatological.

I'll argue that if it were heretical before the teachings of Augustine in the west

A heresy is only recognized as heresy in the face of dogma-- the term denotes teaching that is not only not orthodox, but promotes factions (hence the etymology of the term). Teaching can be wrong and harmful and recognized as such without it being heresy because nobody needs to convene a council to formally condemn the teaching under the weight of dogma.

Aside from how many preached it, who preached is an equally important question.

Categorically false. Individual Church Fathers regarded as teachers of the faith are capable of being wrong or otherwise misguided, and it's particularly in the liturgy that teaching is vindicated. While St. Augustine is very much a venerable saint in the Eastern churches, it's also a common refrain from the Eastern churches that Augustine-- while not necessarily wrong in his approaches-- promoted what coalesced into an excessively legalistic approach to sin and salvation.

You absolutely cannot point to individual venerated saints and not recognize the teaching of the Church they were a part of. To the point, you cannot speak of St. Gregory of Nyssa speaking positively of universalism and not consider that he was consistently venerated during and after his death by the same Church that contradicted him, and you especially cannot point to St. Gregory of Nyssa and ignore just about every other contemporary venerated saint on the same matter.

If universalism was unofficially considered heretical and was only tolerated since it was it was not popular or controversial enough to be decided at a council

The argument isn't that it was tolerated-- it's that action needed not extend beyond a reprimand, correction, or excommunication.

then why was he allowed such a prominent role in the second ecumenical council? Did the Churches simply allow a heretic to have authority over deciding the core teachings of Christianity only because his particular brand of heresy was just not popular enough to dispute?

1. Not only does heresy have to be dogmatically declared such, a heretic has to actively be confronted about teaching heresy and refuse to relent.

2. You're presumably referring to St. Gregory of Nazianzus, who was one of the presidents of the Second Ecumenical Council. In fact, I can't find anything to suggest St. Gregory of Nyssa was a part of the Second Ecumenical Council.

3. This isn't my argument.

Secondly, there is St. Paul. Throughout his epistles he preached universal salvation.

Why didn't you start with talking about Paul?

Secondly, I'm not too interested in splitting hairs and word meanings about a language I largely haven't studied-- all the same, neither the Catholics nor the Orthodox, nor any of their direct or indirect schismatic cells, have ever affirmed what you assert regarding St. Paul, and a "plain" (recognizing that anyone brings in biases when reading anything, and the question is not about being biased, but about having the right biases) reading of St. Paul's epistles don't exclude the idea of eternal damnation and appear to naturally imply it.

 

[Ars Goetia]

You're presumably referring to St. Gregory of Nazianzus, who was one of the presidents of the Second Ecumenical Council. In fact, I can't find anything to suggest St. Gregory of Nyssa was a part of the Second Ecumenical Council.

My understanding was that both attended. I have double checked and found a few sources to affirm that. I'll spoiler them below since I don't think it would be productive to continue to continue an argument based on Gregory of Nyssa. As you point out, Paul is more pertinent.

Spoiler: Sources

The Second Ecumenical Council - Content - Ecumenical Patriarchate: Holy and Great Council

The Second Ecumenical Council Held in Constantinople in 381. Under Emperor Theodosius the Great. 150 Bishops were present. The Macedonian Controversy Macedonius, somewhat like...

www.orthodoxcouncil.org

Saint Gregory of Nyssa | Byzantine philosopher and theologian

Saint Gregory of Nyssa, ; feast day March 9), philosophical theologian and mystic, leader of the orthodox party in the 4th-century Christian controversies over the doctrine of the Trinity. Primarily a scholar, he wrote many theological, mystical, and monastic works in which he balanced Platonic and

www.britannica.com

https://www.st-philip.net/files/Fitzgerald%20Patristic%20series/Gregory-Nyssa_soul_and_resurrection.pdf

Internet History Sourcebooks Project

Gregory of Nyssa - Greek Orthodox Archdiocese of America

www.goarch.org

neither the Catholics nor the Orthodox, nor any of their direct or indirect schismatic cells, have ever affirmed what you assert regarding St. Paul

I disagree on how much that matters. You need to look at the basis of a belief not who holds it. The arrest and prosecution of Jesus by the Sanhedrin is probably the most dramatic example of a religion badly misinterpreting its Holy Texts. I care more about what the writers of the New Testament actually believed rather than what any church teaches they did. You would need to be willfully ignorant to believe that any religion throughout history doesn't interpret scripture in some way to suit itself.

a "plain" ... reading of St. Paul's epistles don't exclude the idea of eternal damnation and appear to naturally imply it.

We'll have to respectfully disagree on that then I suppose. Still, I don't understand how verses like 1 Corinthians 15:22 or Romans 5: 15-21 can be read any other way than to say that all will be saved. I can't compute why anyone can read all will live in Christ and say that implies or allows for eternal damnation. There are plenty more verses from both Paul and the pseudepigraphic epistles but if you have time then I would suggest re-reading Romans 11 concerning the reconciliation of Israel.

As you say though, splitting hairs won't get us anywhere. I just want to leave you with some of the implications of eternal damnation. God desires to save all (Ezekiel 18:23, Matthew 23:37, 2 Peter 3:9), God has the power to save all (Job 42:2, Psalm 115:3, Matthew 19:26) and Jesus was sent to save all and reconcile all of creation to God (John 4:42, Luke 15:3–10, Romans 11:15). If even a handful are damned then God's will is unfulfilled and Jesus failed. Also, all that Jesus said about saving sinners, acting as doctor to the sick, and as a Good Shepherd? That all gets disregarded as soon as you die. At the end of time, the Good Shepard won't save his lost sheep but instead torture them endlessly. Also, we're not even just talking about a handful. If salvation occurs through faith alone and that faith must be in this life then the vast majority of all humans who have ever lived and currently live will be eternally damned. Why should anyone then worship Christ the cruel and marginally successful Messiah?

There are so many bizarre implications that flow from eternal damnation. God wishes to save all but instead chooses to eternally torment those who he didn't save rather than give a second chance. Despite wanting to save all yet only doing so through faith, God does not show himself to all people so all would be saved. God forgives all who are truly penitent yet only before they die, after that he's content to torment them endlessly. More than that, if God wants to save all and the current situation means that that won't happen then why has he not done something more since the crucifixion? I don't think any of this will convince you but at least think about how you reconcile these issues.

I found Dr. Ryan Reeves helpful in discussing what occurred in at least the Western and Eastern Roman Empire.

Thank you very much for the recommendation.

 

[Zero Day Defense]

I disagree on how much that matters.

I think it matters a whole lot. The Bible, all the way down to what even constitutes it, isn't just a collection of books that gives rise to an belief system-- in fact, it isn't even particularly that. It's a book of a community, for that community, and principally needs to be understood in context of said community. It's said community that determined that A) these documents were representative of their belief, and B) these documents were given to them by the messengers of their faith. You can't unmoor said collection from a community and then talk about what it means; for example, the OT is rife with euphemisms-- the way that the Hebrew would describe circumcision could not, without the context of the community, be specifically understood as excising the foreskin; by itself, the description is vague enough that you could, if you wanted, interpret it as cutting skin off the nose instead. Paul in particular isn't just writing instruction manuals (the epistles we have are clearly non-exhaustive regarding the faith and don't instruct much on routine)-- he's writing principally to people that knew him, and knew what he meant.

Of course, for the purposes of this discussion, it wouldn't be worthwhile to discuss which community has the correct context to accurately understand Paul's letters, as well as the NT and OT overall. On the other hand, that wouldn't be necessary because there just isn't any Christian community that teaches or taught universal salvation until who knows how recently.

You would need to be willfully ignorant to believe that any religion throughout history doesn't interpret scripture in some way to suit itself.

This statement doesn't make any sense.

A religion isn't a person-- it's comprised of people that make up a community of adherents of that religion.

Secondly, assuming that you mean to speak of the presbytery and related parties, you're making a character assumption you can't wield, let alone prove. That's to say,

Thirdly, the exact same can be said of you, and there'd be more ground to it; that multiple communities, many of which disagree with each other, still agree on this matter doesn't just suggest that multiple communities agree on the matter, but it also alludes to there having been thousands of eyes on the verses you claim are demonstrations of Paul's belief in universal salvation for hundreds of years-- many who knew the language in which Paul wrote as their own, some even contemporaries of contemporaries of Paul (as opposed to hundreds of years away).

But they still come to the same conclusion-- that eternal damnation has always been a part of orthodox eschatology, and was taught by the apostles.

Meanwhile, you betray much that would suggest that you take this position to "suit [yourself]"-- as increasingly meaningless as it may be in protracted discussions to throw scriptural citation after scriptural citation, you yourself don't bother to start with what's actually said, but rather citations of God's character and stated intentions according to the scriptures, and then you reason from there that "if God wants all to be saved, then all indeed will be saved"...

...to the exclusion of various rejoinders Jesus gives in his parables about the unworthy being cast into the darkness where there's weeping and gnashing of teeth (Matthew 8:12, 13:42, 13:50, 22:13, 24:51, 25:30; Luke 13:28), Jesus' warning that the unrighteous-- even some who call him "Lord"-- will be renounced in the Final Judgment (Matthew 7:21-23), Paul's enumerations about who will not inherit the kingdom of God (1 Corinthians 6:9-10) and even Paul's fears about himself failing to do what he seeks to lead others to accomplish (1 Corinthians 9:27). Why would he worry about this nearly as much as he does if everybody has no choice but to be saved?

Others read these repeated warnings (and more) and come to the conclusion that eternal damnation for the unrighteous is warned, and yet they're just interpreting their scriptures to "suit themselves" (even though they'd be better suited, naturally, to not have to worry about the risk of eternal damnation or scare people away with the rejoinders for active piety). But you read other verses (seemingly without reading the ones I've just mentioned) and come to the conclusion of something ultimately easier to not only swallow, but practice, and you're the one that's not operating in the way you accuse others of doing?

We'll have to respectfully disagree on that then I suppose. Still, I don't understand how verses like 1 Corinthians 15:22 or Romans 5: 15-21 can be read any other way than to say that all will be saved.

I didn't know that the entirety of the Pauline corpus consisted of 1 Corinthians 15:22 and Romans 5:15-21 and that there was no surrounding context to these verses. I also wasn't aware that these verses were specially conceived in and continue to exist in a timeless void, devoid of any surrounding context, without hundreds-- if not thousands-- of consonant discussions of said verses to refer to.

I'll also ignore Romans 5:18 where it interchanges "many" and "all" for paralleling purposes, and that hyperbole isn't a foreign concept to Paul (e.g. 1 Corinthians 13:1-3).

As you say though, splitting hairs won't get us anywhere. I just want to leave you with some of the implications of eternal damnation. God desires to save all (Ezekiel 18:23, Matthew 23:37, 2 Peter 3:9), God has the power to save all (Job 42:2, Psalm 115:3, Matthew 19:26) and Jesus was sent to save all and reconcile all of creation to God (John 4:42, Luke 15:3–10, Romans 11:15). If even a handful are damned then God's will is unfulfilled and Jesus failed.

I reject your conclusion.

Throughout the scriptures, it's constantly demonstrated that God allows man to choose. God allowed Adam and Eve to eat of the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil, after they were warned by Him that they would die if they did. He allowed Cain to murder Abel. He allowed the evil of man to mount enough to warrant Him cleansing the earth. And he allowed Israel to repeatedly turn away from Him to other gods, to their detriment, even after He warned them of the consequences.

He wanted Adam and Eve to not eat of the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil. He didn't want Cain to murder Abel. He didn't want that man pile up their sins so greatly that He "had to decide" to wipe nearly all of them out. And He didn't want Israel to repeatedly turn away from Him to other gods. We know this because His desires would be demonstrated in the commandments He gave.

Ultimately, He gives man freedom of choice. In the OT, the covenant that God made with Israel was their salvation, however incomplete it was, and they repeatedly spurned it. With your first and second premises, will you then say that God failed because many Israelites perished when they perished of their own volition? Fundamentally, has He failed mankind by allowing Adam and Eve to bring suffering and death upon creation?

No. Because inherent to any of His desires for mankind are that they want what He wants, and if they don't, then that's to their detriment. God chose to provide salvation for mankind in this way-- how does He fail if not everyone is saved? Did He ever indicate any expectation that all would have faith in Him that was defied?

Also baked into your stance is a necessary belief that "Heaven" and "Hell" are only "the Good Place" and "the Bad Place", respectively, rather than the future you chose and your disposition to a God you are truly unable to hide from at that point. Will God coerce a soul into giving what can only be freely given despite their desire to not do so? Because being "in Heaven" isn't just about being in a location, which is why it's only promised to the righteous.

If salvation occurs through faith alone and that faith must be in this life then the vast majority of all humans who have ever lived and currently live will be eternally damned.

You don't know that, and the proper Christian understanding is that that's not in any man's paygrade to say (since we don't even know that of ourselves until we get to that point, and we don't know about the disposition of the deceased at the time of their death)-- that's a decision that's ultimately God's.

Also, all that Jesus said about saving sinners, acting as doctor to the sick, and as a Good Shepherd? That all gets disregarded as soon as you die. At the end of time, the Good Shepard won't save his lost sheep but instead torture them endlessly.

At that point, they're not His sheep-- they're goats (Matthew 25:31-46).

Also, we're not even just talking about a handful.

It doesn't matter how many we're talking about. Jesus outright says that the way to destruction is wide and many go through it, but the way to life is narrow and few take it. (Matthew 7:13).

God wishes to save all but instead chooses to eternally torment those who he didn't save rather than give a second chance.

Jesus asserts through his parable of "Lazarus and the Rich Man" that there would be numerous chances even for the living, but the issue isn't the amount of chances they have but how they've chosen to live their lives that prevents them from listening even to someone they knew rose from the dead (Luke 16:27-31).

Despite wanting to save all yet only doing so through faith, God does not show himself to all people so all would be saved.

"Faith" in God isn't merely acknowledging that God exists-- it's recognizing Him for who He is and trusting Him in that capacity. It wouldn't matter if He showed Himself to other people-- that wouldn't ensure that everyone would then have faith in Him.

God forgives all who are truly penitent yet only before they die, after that he's content to torment them endlessly.

You presume that God's the one doing the torturing, rather than the spiritual distance of the unrighteous soul from God.

 

[Shield Breaker]

Hell is, for lack of a better term, metaphysical separation from God, who is basically existence and consciousness itself. The guys in the example may be absolutely evil, however they still have the slimest connection to God while they are alive, because they have consciousness.

Sever that connection through sin, which it is likely they have done, and they will basically enter non-existence upon death. Those of us who honestly strive to avoid sin as best we can, will continue to exist after death, albiet in a form we have great difficulty undetstanding because in life we exist in a very limited set of dimensions

Forget all the fire and brimstone versions of Hell, they are inaccurate.

Not quite. Hell is separation from God, but not the end of existence. It is the end of Hope, the kind of which goes beyond what is experienced with depression. With depression, after all, you can hope death ends the despair and suffering. In hell, there's not even that. It would be as if you were a blind, deaf quadriplegic cut off from the rest of the world and unable to die. You are stuck in the deepest, darkest pit of despair and hopelessness, beyond anything you have experienced on earth, and you can never escape.

 

[Slap47]

I'll try and offer an explanation. You're other point provides a great starting point for that.

....

You can see in this story how the condemnation of sin but forgiveness for sinners replaced the earlier punishments from Trump's Chosen Law.

But we got to this point through secular changes and the religion adapting to new societies. Circumcision? Abandoned because the Romans didn't like it. Killing gays? Strictly relaxing on the Lords day? Abandoned due to the secularization of society.

This holistic idea that the old testament has no value has only come around due to secularization making the book seem barbaric. As early as 1950 it was fine to publicly hold the view that they should be executed.

Even then, the new testament still makes homosexuality a sin and prescribes execution. People ignore that but still believe in heaven and hell despite being fine with gays.

 

[Ars Goetia]

But you read other verses (seemingly without reading the ones I've just mentioned) and come to the conclusion of something ultimately easier to not only swallow, but practice, and you're the one that's not operating in the way you accuse others of doing?

I've given this a lot of though to what you have said and concluded that you're right. The reasons for my conclusion were emotional and not logical. I originally was going to write a long reply going through each of your points but part way through I realized the sheer weight of history and theology that I was trying to argue against. I will say that I did not and have not ever said that anyone should practice their faith any differently. Whatever the destination, I always believed that the path was the same though longer for some. It wasn't that it was easier to "swallow", it was the only reason why I was a Christian. I'll lay out my bias as it informed most of what I was trying to argue. I'm not entirely certain on the specific rules on what is considered powerleveling. I'll try and keep things fairly general. If I fail then by all means report this post if it violates forum guidelines.

I come from a religious family. My Father and myself (until relatively recently in my life) were the only exceptions. My Father was an atheist who hated religion in general, Christianity especially. Jesus himself makes clear in John 3:18, John 3:36, John 14:6 that he will be damned. This point is driven home in many other verses like Revelations 21:8 or really any passage to do with belief. This also the doctrine of virtually every Church in the world. My Father had me late in his life and our family was poor. He worked 15 hours a day for 6 days of the week and only took Christmas day and at most a month off every few years. He earned very little but what he did earn allowed my family to live and for me to get a good education. When he finally retired in his 70s he was a frail and dying man. Everything I have now, I credit to him. He sacrificed so much of his life for me. To know that his ultimate fate is to be tormented forever leaves me empty inside.

It's not just my Father, though he's who I have the greatest emotional tie with. There are so many people who were dealt a bad hand in life. You say elsewhere that no one can be sure who will be damned except God. I would never say that about anyone without a specific scripture saying "x" will definitely go to Hell. However the passage you quote, Matthew 7:14, makes clear that relatively few will be saved. That so many should deserve eternal torment for beliefs held in a lifetime which comparatively lasts a blink of an eye is something so unjust to me that it seems absurd. Perhaps to God it all makes sense, but I'm not God. I even have trouble taking my mind off the temporary suffering of people and animals on this Earth. That any idea of "Paradise" could carry the ever-present knowledge that so many people are suffering and will continue to suffer eternally is to me contradictory. I don't think (and I hope that this is the case) that I could ever turn a blind eye to the suffering of others. I wanted to believe in universal reconciliation because I didn't want to turn my back on God. Thank you for giving me the clarity to know how foolish I am. I suppose I just wanted to hope against hope that there could be a happy ending for everyone.

I still believe in God but I suppose it doesn't really matter to me anymore. If by some miracle everyone can someday see salvation then that would be nice. Looking at thing realistically though, my best hope is to be damned. That way I can be with my Father so that he doesn't need to spend his eternity alone as well as in pain.

I was wondering whether to include what I was going to write as a defense of universalism. I decided against that. I've already wasted enough of your time on my stupidity. I want to apologize to you @Zero Day Defense for that. I also thank you for your patience.

 

[Jan Ciągwa]

Divine reward/punishment are answers to the fact that there's no such thing as "justice" in nature, physics, life or math.

EDIT: also LOL at the idea that God has nothing better to do than reee about sex positions, sex partners and whenever somebody doesn't pay him attention. Makes God look like a dangerhair twittard. Hell, Woody Allen could star in a movie about a scientist who observes a terrarium through a telescope and lookingglasses away ants that had gay sex at some point.