Jophiel wrote:
Kelvyquayo wrote:
Everyone seems happy with Christianity as long as it's message is empty and neutered.
[...]
THIS is why I have such ill will toward the Catholic Church.. because they say things like this and the rest of the world shrinks back from everything to do with Christ...
Why don't they see that?
Picking and choosing which sin is worse, such as what the Pope's statement is doing, is surely not teaching the message of Christ. Everyone here seems to be saying that they are happy with Christianity as long as they don't actually talk about the meaning of the Gospel. Making a statement like "
Gays will destroy humanity" is surely not preaching the Gospel... but I know you know this.. whatever, Yuck it up.
As far as people claiming that those that try to teach the Gospel is an act of unkindness.. well.. would you see it as unkind if I abruptly woke you up from the loveliest dream you'd ever had if I woke you up to tell you that there was a bomb in the room about to explode? Even if I had to dump ice-water over your head and have you react by punching me in the face; it would be worth saving your life..
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IIRC, that's an invention of the early church. I think the whole point of hell was originally just eternal separation from God, not actual eternal torture. Something similar to Sheol, or whatever.
Scripturally (in my understanding) suffering and torment of the unsaved is
NOT eternal.
Revelation ch20 says that when it is all said and done that Hell with be disgorged of the souls of the tormented and that they will essentially be made into nothing.. blinked out like a flame on a candle. This is the "second death".
However by this time those unsaved souls will know the and understand what eternal glory that they have chosen to give up on; that is where the torment comes in.
But no, when the eternal perfected universe is fully instated the God of Love isn't going have a dirty little secret in the basement where people are suffering forever...
God can choose to forget the sins of the forgiven
(those that choose to believe in the Cross) Surely he can choose to forget those that rejected His forgiveness and when God forgets something it ceases to exist.