Hell
Dear Bro. Ignatius,
Thank you for your wonderful service.
I was very interested in your reply re. God present in Hell and coming from a very intelllectual and Scholastically minded family I have always been told that Hell is the absence of God. How did theology go from that to "God is everywhere including Hell".
Your fantastic answer makes a lot of sense and I appreciate your analogy which makes the issue very clear. Does this explanation, then, help one understand the Balthsarian and other very Orthodox theologians (such as Prof Regis Martin in his book "The Suffering of Love") view that Christ actually went to hell - "he emptied himself" to experience the abandonment of God for our sake. Thus being able to redeem us from sin?
Thanking you in anticipation and God Bless.
Mary
QUESTION from Mary on May 15, 2004
ANSWER by Bro. Ignatius Mary, OLSM on May 19, 2004
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Dear Mary: Theology BEGINS with the three-in-one Godhead, the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit (the Trinity) and with the three essential attribute of the Trinity: Omnipresence, Omniscience, and Omnipotent. (all present [is everywhere], all knowing, and all powerful). Any other theology must be interpreted upon this foundation. Christ did not go to the hell of the condemned, he went to the hell of the saints. The word "hell" in this instance is the "Hades" which means the place of the dead. Hades is a temporary place that was divided into two parts. One part was the place the condemned went awaiting judgment. The other part was called "Abraham's Bosom". This was the limbo of the Old Testament saints. Between the Cross and the Resurrection Jesus went to Abraham's Bosom to "set the captives free", that is Jesus brought the Old Testament saints out of the hell of the saints and brought them into heaven. As for the hell that we commonly think about -- where the devil and the condemned go to, that hell is more a state of mind than a material location. Remember at the end of the world, this material existence will pass away. Our resurrected bodies and the resurrected bodies of the condemned will be reunited with our souls and then we will be ushered into heaven or hell, as the case may be. But these bodies are not biological organisms and neither heaven or hell is a physical material place as we understand "place". God loves all people, even those in hell. God is everywhere, even with those in hell. The problem is that those in hell refuse to see the light of God. God does not withdraw Himself, the people withdraw from God, put on blinders of their pride, ego, sin, etc. and cannot see or experience God as a result. This is where he get the imagery of hell being the absence of God. It is not that God is literally absent, for He is present everywhere, but that we are absent of the desire to receive the light of God. Here is the remarks from Pope John Paul II on Heaven, Purgatory, and Hell
God Bless, |