Christianity and hell.

Is it true that Christians are taught that if you don't believe in Jesus then you're going to hell?

This guy who's christian was telling me that.

Honestly, what kind of god would banish his children to hell because of something like that? Different people have different beliefs. Christianity isn't the only RIGHT religion in the world, although people seem to think that.

 

It depends on which Christians you're talking about. Catholics have found a loophole so that non-Christians including Muslims can get to Heaven if they're trying their best in the context of their own religion, except to qualify they have to be "invincibly ignorant". This doesn't mean they have to be real dumbasses, but it means their circumstances make it impossible to accept Jesus and the Catholic church (e.g., they were raised Muslim). As far as children are concerned, the Catholics used to have "Limbo" where unbaptized babies would go and be happy without going to Heaven, but I understand they no longer have that. I don't know what happens to the babies now, but I'm sure they don't go to hell, and I hope they wern't just put out on the street. The so-called "mainline" protestant Churches also take a liberal view toward the subject, if they still believe in Hell at all. Some Protestants are "Universalists", meaning that they believe everybody can be saved, Christian or not. But it is true that fundamentalists and most, if not all, evangelicals tend to believe that anyone who doesn't believe in Jesus will burn in hell. And it's not God's fault. Blame the preachers.

 

Hell is your mentality of Self Conciousness.
So, techincally, your already there.

 

Unless you're already in heaven!

 

Of course!

 

I've read that in early Christianity the actual visions of hell weren't all fire and brimstone, it's just going to a place that isn't heaven, while people that go to heaven get to be in presence of god and such, the people in hell are forever cut off from god.

 

I don't know what early Christianity you mean, but Jesus talked about "fires" and St. Paul said it's "better to marry than burn", so they seem to have had something hot in mind--unless they were speaking metaphorically.

 

WTF!!:rolleyes5 Who decides this stuff?!

 

Theologians and the Pope, I guess. Probably, they were asking the same question we were and saying to themselves, surely God doesn't send unbaptised babies to hell, but since they're unbaptised and haven't accepted Jesus or any other religion, they probably don't go to heaven either, so where do they go? To a special place, called Limbo, where they dance under a stick for all eternity, accompanied by Calypso steel bands. (I made the last part up).

 

That is as believable as the rest of the mess that is organized religion.

 

After my last post, I did some research and found that what I said before wasn't entirely accurate. Limbo has never really been part of official Catholic doctrine, since it never had papal or magisterial approval, although St. Thomas Aquinas among other great theologians accepted it and Pope Pius VI condemned the belief that the infants go to hell. Elimination of Limbo isn't official either. The International Theological Commission (ITC) in Rome said that there are "many reasons for hope" that unbaptised infants go to Heaven, but that hasn't been officially approved by the Pope, although he allowed the findings to be published. The whole controversy has to do with the idea that unbaptised infants haven't been cleansed of original sin by baptism, but haven't done anything wrong on their own to deserve hell either. In Limbo, they enjoy an eternity of perfect natural happiness, but don't have the supreme joy of knowing God. The ITC holds out the hope that they may do the latter. So Catholics are free to believe unbaptised infants go either to heaven or limbo, whichever Catholic believers prefer. What they're not supposed to do is believe that unbaptised infants go to hell.

 

God is about relationship, and he's provided that way through Jesus. As our heavenly parent, he wants what's good for us. He swats us if we do something that doesn't lead to growth in him. Wouldn't any loving parent do similar?

 

The main thread of Catholicism doesn't include limbo, oblivion, etc. Those are imports from elsewhere. The Catholic church believes that it is the ark, like Noah's ark, and you've got to be in it to not drown. Various people in various parts of Roman Catholicism may hold different views, but those are not the official teachings of RC.

 

We're talking babies and hell here, not swats. What do you think happens to people who haven't been baptised?

 

FAITH and BELIEF are God Given graces, if you NEVER believed, or never heard the gospels, there is mercy for this. I obviously wont quote it, but thats written in the bible... at least thats the way I interpret it. However, if at some point in your journey, your consiousness does elevate and you DO believe and God gives you the grace of Faith, THEN, there is a major problem with "giving up" on it. At least that's the way I take it... I agree with the point that a lot of write in here that a lot of this simply has to do with how your CONSCIOUS THOUGHTS operate.

And no I don't think if Jesus was here he would want he followers to adopt radical attitudes, where they go around judging everybody and ramming there ideals down people's throats either.

However, once you have been given the PERSONAL gift of TRUE faith, not BLIND faith, like I have. You see the world MUCH, MUCH, Differently. You personally KNOW, the only way out is to TRY to live a decent life, honoring Human Dignity, your own, as well as, for all those around you, b4 anything else. And deep down you just know that the best play book of all time telling you how to do that is the Gospels.

So in closing, I think your friend is 1/2 right.

Christians should not be going around trying to preach and impose the CONVERSION of beliefs, they should go around trying to practice and preach the lifestyle. That would benefit everybody a lot more in my humble lil old opinion.

 

Well put.

 

If the Christians believe in the existence of a "heaven" and "hell", how come no one has come back and shared with us what this place called "heaven" and this place called "hell" actually looks like?

Actually, the whole Christian concept of an all-powerful, all-loving? Father is flawed.

This "all-loving" Father must be one cruel, sadistic father, to create a place of eternal damnation for his own children, who for one reason or another pisses him off...

 

There have been people who have claimed to do just that (See the 90 minutes in Heaven post in the Christian Sanctuary). I'm skeptical. Traditionally, Heaven and Hell are places you don't come back from--see Dante's Divine Comedy, especially Inferno ("Abandon Hope All Ye Who Enter Here"). It's a one-way ticket.

 

Or perhaps, the reason why they don't come back, is because there is no such thing as a "heaven" or "hell", other than as states of mind.