Taffer

To clarify from the start: I'm referring to all Christian who believe any number of people -or souls- will suffer the worst torment theoretically possible for all eternity.

How do people stand believing or even knowing this? How are they able to look unbelievers into the face without bursting into tears?

I didn't mean to poke fun at Christian's mental stability with the last. Consider this: Hell is the worst pain you can imagine off the top of your head, multiplied by infinity. It is irrevocable and permanent. Going to hell -presuming it exists- is most definitely the worst possible thing that could happen to you, ever. Making a concious decision to go there is incredibly tragic since the one deciding cannot imagine just how horrible the place is.

Some Christians reason that going to hell is one's own decision; They can't help it if people don't choose to listen. This sad resignation is the thing I can't understand. If damnation lasts for all eternity and can't be revoked, wouldn't it easily be worth a puny lifetime to convert even one soul? If you're going to cavort in heaven anyway due to your beliefs, wouldn't it be fitting to dedicate your short time on earth to trying to save people infinite pain? After all, our lifespan on Earth is literally nil compared to the Christian afterlife. It is a fact that there are unbelievers on the planet. How is it that people who believe in this version of the afterlife (and who believe themselves saved by their very belief) aren't frantically striving to convert the infidels?

I see somebody hanging off a cliff. I don't care if this person, by some mad whim, thinks he'll be just fine if he drops. I run over and try to drag him back to safe ground with all the strength at my disposal.

As for people who actually feel glee at the thought of others burning, I really hope they haven't thought it over this way yet. If they have, sincerely believing it and feeling pleasure at the thought borders on inhumanity.

christ-on-a-stick

The greatest evil masquerading as the greatest good.

tdekeyser

Good point Taffer-

I often wondered this myself. I even told a group of Xians that if I were a Xian, I would NOT pray for an "A" on my test or have a great marriage or whatever, I would only pray for ONE thing:

"God, I pray to you now with all my heart. Please rid the universe of Hell and find a new way to get people to believe in you. You are the most powerful ever, please do as my prayer asks, amen"

Xians think I'm crazy for wanting such a ridiculas thing!

I'm glad I'm an atheist!

lpetrich

Actually, such theologians as Tertullian and St. Thomas Aquinas had gone on record as stating that the inhabitants of Heaven will get great pleasure from watching the sufferings of those who were sent to Hell.

Spaz

One of the reasons I became an atheist was my mom telling me how she didn't want to go to hell for not going to church anymore. Thinking highly of someone that would do something like that sickens me.

lpetrich

From this page on Heaven and Hell:

HEAVEN IS FOR “SNUFF FILM” LOVERS?

For centuries, Christians believed that the heavenly few would see and even rejoice at the sight of hell’s multitude being eternally tortured. Augustine, Tertullian, Thomas Aquinas, and Jonathan Edwards are just a few of the towering Christians in ages past who argued that such a belief was both Scriptural and just:

AUGUSTINE
They who shall enter into [the] joy [of the Lord] shall know what is going on outside in the outer darkness…The saints’… knowledge, which shall be great, shall keep them acquainted…with the eternal sufferings of the lost.
[The City of God, Book 20, Chapter 22, “What is Meant by the Good Going Out to See the Punishment of the Wicked” & Book 22, Chapter 30, “Of the Eternal Felicity of the City of God, and of the Perpetual Sabbath”]

TERTULLIAN
What a spectacle…when the world…and its many products, shall be consumed in one great flame! How vast a spectacle then bursts upon the eye! What there excites my admiration? What my derision? Which sight gives me joy?...as I see...illustrious monarchs...groaning in the lowest darkness, Philosophers…as fire consumes them! Poets trembling before the judgment-seat of…Christ! I shall hear the tragedians, louder-voiced in their own calamity; view play-actors…in the dissolving flame; behold wrestlers, not in their gymnasia, but tossing in the fiery billows...What inquisitor or priest in his munificence will bestow on you the favor of seeing and exulting in such things as these? Yet even now we in a measure have them by faith in the picturings of imagination.
[De Spectaculis, Chapter XXX]

THOMAS AQUINAS
In order that the happiness of the saints may be more delightful to them and that they may render more copious thanks to God for it, they are allowed to see perfectly the sufferings of the damned…So that they may be urged the more to praise God…The saints in heaven know distinctly all that happens…to the damned.
[Summa Theologica, Third Part, Supplement, Question XCIV, “Of the Relations of the Saints Towards the Damned,” First Article, “Whether the Blessed in Heaven Will See the Sufferings of the Damned?”]

JONATHAN EDWARDS
The sight of hell torments will exalt the happiness of the saints
forever…Can the believing father in Heaven be happy with his unbelieving children in Hell? I tell you, yea! Such will be his sense of justice that it will increase rather than diminish his bliss.
[“The Eternity of Hell Torments” (Sermon), April 1739 & Discourses on Various Important Subjects,
1738]

During America’s “Great Awakening” the popular hymn writer, Isaac Watts (1674-1748), even set Christians’ feet to tapping with this crisp little verse:

What bliss will fill the ransomed souls,
When they in glory dwell,
To see the sinner as he rolls,
In quenchless flames of hell.

This “abominable fancy” was based on various Bible verses:

The righteous shall rejoice when he sees the vengeance.
- Psalm 58:10

Let the wicked perish at the presence of God…But let the righteous…rejoice before God: yea, let them exceedingly rejoice.
- Psalm 68:2-3,22-23

In Isaiah 30:31-33 a human sacrifice takes place (the “man” who is killed represents the nation of Assyria), and the act is accompanied by festival songs, gladness of heart, the sound of the flute, tambourines and lyres. Moreover, “the Lord” performs the sacrifice.

And they shall go forth, and look upon the carcasses of the men that have transgressed against me.
- Isaiah 66:24

A man suffering in “Hades” sees another man luxuriating in “Abraham’s bosom,” and vice versa.
- Luke, chapter 16

Ye shall see Abraham, and Isaac, and Jacob, and all the prophets, in the kingdom of God, and you yourselves thrust out.
- Luke 13:28

They shall be tormented with fire and brimstone in the presence of the holy angels, and in the presence of the Lamb: And the smoke of their torment shall ascend up forever and ever…Rejoice over her, thou heaven, and ye holy apostles and prophets; for God hath avenged you on her… And again they said, Alleluia. And her smoke rose up for ever and ever.
- Revelation 14:9-11; 18:20, 19:3

Having such “inspired” verses behind it, this teaching did not grow out of favor with orthodox Christian theologians until the age of the Enlightenment when, for instance, Thomas Burnet punctured it with a prick of irony:

What a theater of providence this is: by far the greatest part of the human race burning in flames forever and ever. Oh what a spectacle on the stage, worthy of an audience of God and angels! And then to delight the ear, while this unhappy crowd fills heaven and earth with wailing and howling, you have a truly divine harmony.
[De Statu Mortuorum & Resurgentium Tractatus, 1720]

- E.T.B. (Ed Babinski)

my dog earl

It would be the worst case of child abuse ever if parents let their children choose to believe or not to believe.

Demigawd

One way quite a few Christians get rid of this pesky point, and thus can get a good night's sleep, is the "reasoning" that God doesn't put anyone in Hell. The person himself does.

So, if a person chooses Hell, why should a Christian care?

Proctors_Gambit

I was lurking over at a Christian BBS and reading a chap called Jesus4chosen tell the others how glad he was that God punishes women who have abortions.

Seems some Christians as least do relish the idea of sinners roasting in hell, while they watch on from heaven.
Kind of eternities biggest "I told you so", and they can't wait.

Frankly, if people like that go to heaven, but a kind, loving non-believer will go to hell, why would anyone worship the guy that made the rules?

-Gambit

spacedOut

If Christians REALLY believed in the possibility of Hell, why would they risk having children? Jesus himself predicted that the majority of us would head down the road of destruction.

How could parents bring a new, innocent child into this world if they really believed the chances were better than not that this child would suffer eternally after physical death.

It would seem the greatest example of irresponsibility...but again, I don't think they really believe it.