God does whatever you want God to do, just take a look at the history of religious schisms
this post was submitted on 14 Feb 2024
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Once I saw this guy on a bridge about to jump. I said, "Don't do it!" He said, "Nobody loves me." I said, "God loves you. Do you believe in God?" He said, "Yes." I said, "Are you a Christian or a Jew?" He said, "A Christian."
I said, "Me, too! Protestant or Catholic?" He said, "Protestant."
I said, "Me, too! What franchise?" He said, "Baptist."
I said, "Me, too! Northern Baptist or Southern Baptist?" He said, "Northern Baptist."
I said, "Me, too! Northern Conservative Baptist or Northern Liberal Baptist?" He said, "Northern Conservative Baptist."
I said, "Me, too! Northern Conservative Baptist Great Lakes Region, or Northern Conservative Baptist Eastern Region?" He said, "Northern Conservative Baptist Great Lakes Region."
I said, "Me, too!" Northern Conservative†Baptist Great Lakes Region Council of 1879, or Northern Conservative Baptist Great Lakes Region Council of 1912?" He said, "Northern Conservative Baptist Great Lakes Region Council of 1912." I said, "Die, heretic!" And I pushed him over.
It's very convenient that God always seems to hate the same people you do.
In the 1100's Pope Innocent II banned jousting under that logic. His reasoning was that jousting was super dangerous and the competitors were risking their lives for no good reason, going against the teachings of the Church.
To enforce it he denied a Christian burial to anyone who died while jousting. People still jousted, but there was an extra "oh shit" factor to causing or receiving a serious hit and it seriously curtailed the sport. Sixty or so years later the ban got lifted.
God, at least according to the Orthodox, Christian understanding, is not a sin calculator programmed to mete out punishment for actions which fit specified criteria. Rather, he is a person (three Persons, technically, but one Being), and he is one who is good and loves mankind, and is intimately familiar with every detail of your life and motivation for your actions. His relationship with each individual is personal, and he acts towards them in full understanding of who they are and where they were coming from. It is not a one size fits all rulebook.
It is not clear to me why anyone would go to hell in that case. My understanding of people is imperfect, as is my capacity for universal love, but I certainly don't want anyone to suffer, especially since I understand that people are responding to incentives and are not themselves perfectly rational beings with absolute control over themselves or the situations they respond to. I can't imagine sending anyone to eternal suffering described as a lake of fire under any circumstances in preference to helping them to grow better, if I had both the power and a necessity for them to be better by some measure.
The Orthodox understanding of hell differs from how it's commonly understood in the West. We understand hell to be essentially the same thing as heaven, only experienced differently. After death, everyone is surrounded by the infinite love and presence of God. For those who are turned toward him in faith, they experience this as the epitome of joy and peace, while those who are turned away from him toward their own sinful corruption experience this as pain. The difference lies not in God but in how the individual, shaped by the choices they have made and the person they have become, receives and experiences him.
In addition, while it is a minority view, universal reconciliation is a perfectly valid Orthodox position, one based on the teachings of venerable Church Fathers such as St. Gregory of Nyssa and St. Isaac of Nineveh. Under this understanding, God's love is ameliorative as well as perfect, and it cleanses and purifies even those who stand in rejection of him. Hell is seen as a state of purification rather than eternal torment, and will eventually bring all created beings into a full and blissful communion with him. Some may have a longer journey to take, but everyone will eventually be saved and experience God exactly as he intended for us.
Wow, that's so much better than fire and brimstone. Still not enough to make me believe in anything, but I can at least understand why a kind and rational person would be ok believing this, vs the eternal hellfire punishment crap.
Someone once asked Stan Lee who would win a fight between The Hulk and wonder Woman. Stan said whoever the writer decided.
Intent matters I think. Jesus did say we'd be judged by our hearts first. A risk taker is someone who doesn't plan the negative outcome but is reckless while someone who self-harms specifically plans it, yet even then I wouldn't say suicide leads to Hell (which isn't fire and brimstone in any canon, mind you, note that the additions of Paul and other associates should be considered non-canonical if they contradict with Jesus, even the Neostoicism movement knew that with the Stoics). You might say it's the reckless people who should be more worried about Hell than those who self-harm. God couldn't not understand the struggle of his genuine humans, and one thing I can confirm is suicide is definitely not a form of "blaspheming the holy spirit", because for a pope to say that is so much of a stretch of things that it ends up opening the way for so much we normally do in life to fit, including martyrdom itself (we actually have a local saint, or saint-to-be, in my area of the world who self harmed quite a bit, and there's a push to make her the saint of such strugglers).
If you are self-harming, we'll pray for you and help how we may, and if someone you know is, do the same for them. I myself am both accustomed to how this part of life feels as well as know such people, one such person coming to mind now who I won't turn down praying about.
Every major religion tends to be extremely flexible about what God will and won't judge. If you're talking about any of the typical monotheistic ones, they're supposed to be all-knowing, all-powerful beings who love you - if that were true none of that shit could happen. Since it does all the time, it clearly isn't, so whatever else seems like an "academic" point.
Which god?
Maybe ask better questions? Invoking a god to explain anything is the death knell of reason.
It depends on which god you're talking about. And even then, it depends on which religion you look at that god through. And even then...there are plenty of other variables. So you should probably ask your preferred religious leader, such as a priest or imam.
So all that aside, based on the 1 scenario you gave, I think the falling off a mountain would be a heaven scenario because it wasn't on purpose. Same with the fentanyl one.
It seems harsh that committing suicide would result in eternal damnation. I imagine that was one of those rules meant to scare people out of doing it before they understood why someone might want to commit suicide and how to support them through it one way or the other.
Thats a hard one. Similarly would they go to valhalla? Its courageous but not exactly battle for the daredevils. Drugs of course would not.
According to Pope Francis, only God knows
Protestants typically adhere to the doctrines sola fide ([salvation] by faith alone) and sola scriptura ([salvation] by scripture alone. This means:
- Your sincere effort to welcome God into your soul should be sufficient for salvation. God knows all you experienced and what effort you are capable of, including if you are overwhelmed with doubt, outrage and despair. It would be unmerciful and unloving of God to present you with overwhelming challenges and then flunk you for failing to meet them.
- Only scripture as you personally read and interpret it is a legitimate guide. Someone else telling you what's important and what isn't? Their opinion. Not valid. Someone suggests this is literal but that is proverbial? You can disagree. Think a given passage feels outdated and out of touch with the modern world? Take it up with God and no one else.
Note that apologists and ministries will opine differently, suggesting that even the most pious Christian has to worry about Hellfire. Catholic apologists will suggest your works for the Church are not quite enough to earn salvation. Not only do they not know, but are motivated to instill doubt, so you might show up to the pews and feed the collections plate. Even churches are capitalist in our capitalist society.
All that said, your nervous system will rapidly cease to function once you die, as will your capacity to sense the outside world, to remember events of your past and to process information. If any of these come back in the afterlife, it's through a different mechanism, and we have zero data on its capabilities. But we do see how the material versions fade slowly with conditions like Alzheimer's or dementia, and there's no sign that the being of any afterlife is connected in any way to the being that materially perished. So you may not be going anywhere.
But then, you won't be disappointed.
Well, god would kill babies, kill the entire planet, smote cities, kill his son, demand killing other tribes, etc. So, I think this uncaring asshole would judge just about anyone as a sinner for any reason if he woke up on the wrong side of his cloud.
Good news, though: there is no god, so you're fucking fine.