God present in hell and your story
Dear Brother John-Paul Ignatius,
You wrote in a post titled, "Mary Questions", that "There is no place God is not at, even hell." What does this mean? I thought hell was a place where the absence of God was apparent. If He IS there, what is He doing there? Does He just not make himself known?
Thank you very much in advance for answering this.
God bless,
P.S. I have searched and searched this site everywhere for something you wrote a while back (a short bio of your life where you explained how you were destined for hell before God showed you your sinfulness in the mirror and you slowly converted back to Him) but can't seem to find it anywhere. I know someone who is going through something very similar and I know would benefit from your story. Could you please direct me to the link for this article which I'm hoping will be helpful to him also. Thank you very much.
QUESTION from Shirley on May 10, 2004
Shirley
ANSWER by Bro. Ignatius Mary, OLSM on May 11, 2004
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Dear Shirley: The article of our faith is that God is omnipresent. That means God is everywhere. Those in hell have God all around them. The issue is not that God is "not there", but that those in hell refuse to see Him or to allow His love to touch them. There is a natural phenomenon that illustrates how this is possible. Have you ever been reading a book, or watching a movie, and be so into it that you do not notice anything around you. Someone may even call your name and you don't hear it or notice it. This is because your attention is focused on the book or movie and are "lost" in the book or movie and thus the rest of the world is ignored. So it is with those in hell. Their focus is totally on themselves and their condition, and so much so, that they do not know God is right there. They refuse to allow the light of God to touch them. Sadly, this "focus" of those in hell are permanent. On the story of when God gave me a vision of the state of my own soul and my own hell I do not think is on the website. I have written some abstracts of a book I am writing on my spiritual journey, but that was not on the website. Those abstracts were distributed in some of our mail lists. Perhaps that is where you saw it. I am still trying to finish this book. It will be available online when finished.
God Bless, |