Why do non-believers go to Hell?

[Mr Spinkles]

Here is what I am hearing in the Christian forums about God sending people to Hell for lack of faith:

God loves everyone....yet He will send people to Hell if they do not believe He exists before they die. He will send people to Hell unless they abandon their own reasoning and simply believe He exists based solely on what is written in some specific ancient texts--and only those to whom God gives grace can possibly have such faith (God does not give everyone His grace, though He loves everyone...quite a paradox).

Meanwhile, countless other religions besides Christianity expect people to do the same.....and God expects all humans, whom He loves, to 'guess' to have faith in the correct religious texts, the Christian ones (rather than the Jewish or Muslim texts/interpretations, for example). Otherwise He will not let His children into heaven when they die, even though He loves them, and even if they repent.

This is silliness. If God loved everyone, He wouldn't care whether we believe He exists or not, much less make that the one and only criteria for getting into paradise and avoiding eternal hellfire.

This is why religion is so out and out silly most of the time. It isn't about looking for truth, or questioning, or learning--it's about conforming, and religion is not above using scare tactics like heaven and hell to get people to conform, even if these dogmas contradict other dogmas (such as a loving God).

 

[Green Gaia]

My Universalist side, says No. Universalism means universal salvation; all of us are going to "Heaven" when we die no matter what you believe or don't believe, and no matter what kind of person you were in this life. No one goes to "Hell" because there is no such phyiscal thing.

Now I hear the Christians gasping, "If you do not fear God, hell, or eternal damnation, what is your incentive to act morally and responsibly?"

We feel that people who live moral and ethical lives usually do so because they have a sense of responsibility to themselves and to others. Our incentive is that we want to live in a more sane, peaceful, and just world than the one we have at present, and we wish to pass on a better world to succeeding generations. To hold that moral and ethical living only occurs because people fear hell or damnation is to demean those who seek to lead morally and ethically responsible lives.

:hi:

 

[Lightkeeper]

Very well said, Maize. :clap:

 

[Corban]

Here is what I am hearing in the Christian forums about God sending people to Hell for lack of faith:


your misunderstanding is because you are looking at false beliefs vailed in the title of "Christianity" of course false beliefs will not make sense, so let me clear up some of these for you, and tell you not what Christians believe, but what Christ has said

"God loves everyone....yet He will send people to Hell if they do not believe He exists before they die."

In the end we will be judged by our thoughts words and deeds, interpreted in the light of knowledge we had. everyone. even those who have never heard of Christ, have some concept of right and wrong and God will judge them by how they lived according to the concept they had, we all have withing the light of Christ, some call this a conscience, it helps us distinguish between right and wrong and God can guide us by His holy spirit as to what's right, we will be judged by how we respond to that and live according to the things we know.

and yes people do need to accept Christ to go to heaven, but many people never get that chance here, God is a fair God and not a respector of persons, so how can that be? simply put, everyone will have a fair chance to accept Christ either in this life or in the life to come, everyone will have the opportunity to hear the message of Christ and respond to it.



T"his is silliness. If God loved everyone, He wouldn't care whether we believe He exists or not,"

God does care if we believe in Him, because a man is saved no faster than he gains knowledge, when we learn a correct principle and live according to it, we are saved from the bad consequences of disobeying. God wants us to be happy, the only way to find real lasting happiness is by following the commandments of God, so He wants everyone to have that chance

 

[Mr Spinkles]

Maize, Lightkeeper-- finally, some rational Christians...I gain more respect for Unitarians all the time.

Corban-- the following statements make no sense:
1) God is all powerful, and wants everyone to go to heaven, but is unable to let people into heaven if they do not believe.
2) God is all powerful, and wants us to believe in Jesus etc., but would prefer not to provide any more evidence than a few ancient writings.
3) God has provided plenty of evidence to prove Jesus died for our sins etc., and people who do not beleive this know deep down that it is true, but simply do not 'want' to be saved.

If Allah, God, Sheva, or whoever exist, and they love me, and the only way I can get into heaven (and I do want to get into heaven, if there is one) is if I believe they exist, then the solution is very simple....give me something to believe in other than a few ancient texts, which EVERY other religion also provides.

It all sounds like 'thoughtcrime' to me...George Orwell wrote a book on the subject called 1984.

 

[Corban]

Maize, Lightkeeper-- finally, some rational Christians...I gain more respect for Unitarians all the time.

Corban-- the following statements make no sense:
1) God is all powerful, and wants everyone to go to heaven, but is unable to let people into heaven if they do not believe.
2) God is all powerful, and wants us to believe in Jesus etc., but would prefer not to provide any more evidence than a few ancient writings.
3) God has provided plenty of evidence to prove Jesus died for our sins etc., and people who do not beleive this know deep down that it is true, but simply do not 'want' to be saved.

those statmenents don't make sense because you don't understand the purpose of this life. Why are we here? it is by no accident we are on this earth, it is all part of God's eternal plan for us. We lived before we were born as spirit sons and daughters of God. we progressed as far as we could in that state, but needed a physical body and a chance to prove ourselves for further progression. God created this world as a place where we could come to obtain a body, and prove ourselves away from the presence of God. there are two types of learning, learning just with our minds, and then putting that learning into practice. I could read books on playing the piano and study many great piano players, but i would not learn to play until i actually got on a piano and practiced. i could study about courage, but i would not become courageous until i was put into a position where that would be tried. So in our past existance we learned all we could and now we are here to have real expereinces to grow and learn and become more like our Heavenly Father. If God just wanted everyone to get into Heaven, if that was his final goal, then certainly He could do that, but that is not His final goal. I liken this life to school. If the final goal of school was merely to give everyone a diploma, then it would be easy to just hand one to everyone, but like this life the real purpose is to learn, and God would do us no service by merely graduating everyone withought learning.

the reason God does not just imbue everyone with a knowledge of Jesus, but only gives us past scriptures and writings and more sublte things to go by, is because we would gain nothing from having Jesus merely proved to us, it would not help us become better, the true test of this life is to find the truth accept it and live according to it, it wouldn't be much of a test, and would help us become stronger if everything was just proved to us. It is up to us to take the knowledge we have and make a decision, God has given us sufficeint knowledge to go by, if we are honest in our intent and our desire to find truth we can recognize it when it is found.

This life is the time to prepare to meet God, it is the time to decide what type of people we want to be,

 

[Mr Spinkles]

If you want all your creations to go to heaven, why would you create them in such a way that you know they are not perfect, then give them a test which you know not all of them will not pass? Sounds like God just got bored and needed something to do.

The need for any 'test' whatsoever is humorous, as God would know what the results of any test will be ahead of time...meaning there is no point in actually carrying out any 'test' of any sort.

Also, the test itself makes no sense...so God does not imbue us all with knowledge of Jesus, even though He wants us to go to heaven and that is the only way....again, this makes no sense. Providing more evidence would only strengthen, not weaken, peoples' belief, just as evidence strengthened peoples' belief that the Earth revolves around the Sun.

I am beginning to seriously question whether some have put much thought into this issue, or whether they merely accept what they have been taught.

 

[Ceridwen018]

*POP*

Ah! My bubble! ***** Spinkles!

***MOD EDIT***

Language.

 

[true blood]

The problem here is most think "hell" is an actual place with rooms where people are eternally punished and if you're bad you go there and if you're good you go to heaven. Interesting idea but its just not the truth. The true meaning of the word hell comes from the word hades which is defined meaning "the grave". So if you don't believe in God or understand his plan then go for it, its your birthright. Live your life however you choose, but make the most of it as best you can, because, in the end, if you don't know the true God, you'll just be dead.

I think its interesting that some feel that God should of made us all robots unable of saying "no". If that was the case, it would of been extremely boring, however when God created us he gave man the ability of saying "yes" or "no".

 

[Alaric]

I think its interesting that some feel that God should of made us all robots unable of saying "no". If that was the case, it would of been extremely boring, however when God created us he gave man the ability of saying "yes" or "no".

Do you really believe that everyone is equally able to say 'yes' or 'no'? Seems to me that the gullible people born in a Christian society are the only ones getting the eternal life. I, for example, have not turned my back on God - He simply faded from my sight the more I learned and the more questions I asked. Now, there are thousands of gods out there vying for belief, and if I had to spend my life investigating the viability of each one, I would never get around to doing anything else. Why should God punish me for His own ineptitude in making Himself a plausible object of belief? It is simply objectively unjust for God to treat believers and nonbelievers differently.

 

[true blood]

You don't think people have the ability to say "yes" or "no"?

 

[Alaric]

Have you said 'yes' or 'no' to the gods worshipped by some small tribe in the depths of the Amazonian jungle? Have they had a chance to say 'yes' to the God you happen to worship? If the Bible sounds like ridiculous nonsense to someone, should they be punished for not ignoring that and instead blindly accepting that particular faith? Do you think the souls of our ancestors should be eternally punished (or not accepted to God) for believing that the world was flat?

 

[true blood]

It's interesting that God's Word explains how our ancestors will be judged according to what administration they lived in. From the time before the "commandments", to the time of the "commandments", (even those living during this time that weren't subject to the commandments aka the Gentiles have their own unique judgement), and even judgement during the present Age of Grace. It even explains how people during the Age of Grace who never had the chance to hear of Christ will be judged, and after Christs' return will be a new administration of judgement. What do you mean by eternally punished? And what does believing the earth was flat have to do with spiritual matters?

 

[Mr Spinkles]

I think its interesting that some feel that God should of made us all robots unable of saying "no". If that was the case, it would of been extremely boring, however when God created us he gave man the ability of saying "yes" or "no".

See, this is precisely the kind of silliness I am getting at. First of all, it would not be boring if everyone said yes, because there are a billion other things that make life interesting other than a person's stance on whether or not God exists. We would not be "robots" just because we all thought God existed.

Secondly, even if the world was very boring, who cares? It would be better to have a boring earthly existence where everyone goes to eternal paradise than have a "lively" earthly existence of questioning where most of the Earth's population goes to hell. You make God sound like some kind of sadistic kid playing with ants for entertainment, rather than a loving parent.

 

[Master Vigil]

And another thing true blood, you are limiting your god when you say it would be boring. If god was omnipotent, then god would have the ability of making us able to just say yes and keep it from being boring. If not, god would be limited, and we all know you can't have a limited god.

 

[Alaric]

And what does believing the earth was flat have to do with spiritual matters?

Because belief in the Christian God is no different to any other belief about how the world works. We all believe in different things for different reasons, yet God punishes those who don't happen believe in Him. Given that I find the reasons for believing in God very poor, what right does God have to punish me? You can't claim that I must 'open my heart' or 'read such-and-such a book' without simultaneously suggesting that I do the same for all other religions. Right?

 

[true blood]

Spinkles, we each have our opinions. You think if God created man without the ability to say "no" wouldn't be boring and I think it would be more interesting to have the ability to say yes or no. We wouldn't even have these forums to discuss such matters and I'm sure some of us find it quite enjoyable, silly...maybe, but some people would say that even being silly is enjoyable. I didn't know loving parents completely control their children as you put it. Mine certainly did not and I love them more for it.

Vigil, I don't see how a man can limit God. I was stating my own opinion how I think if we were all "robots" that it would be kinda boring and you're able to state otherwise. Maybe you think it would be more enjoyable being a robot...who really cares?

Alaric, I don't really understand your statement that the Christian God isn't different then any belief of how the world works. And please state how God punishes someone? All the bible states is that those who believe in him are rewarded? Is not being rewarded a punishment...to you? I suggest and support that everyone read whatever books they can get their hands on, including the bible and then make their decision. Now if you don't believe in the resurrections then shut off your computer and go live life to the fullest.

 

[Ardhanariswar]

reincarnation.

 

[Paraprakrti]

This is silliness. If God loved everyone, He wouldn't care whether we believe He exists or not, much less make that the one and only criteria for getting into paradise and avoiding eternal hellfire.

One might say that God loves you so much that He has given you the proper facility to be an atheist.

God doesn't manifest material universes due to His desire alone. God's desire is to please our desires. If we desire to forget God, then God makes us forget Him. This is God's love.

If you desire to know God and to associate with Him Personally, then you follow what He prescribes. If you are sincere then you will be given proper facility.

 

[Ceridwen018]

That seems like selective wish granting to me. I desire a million dollars, yet have seen nary a penny.

I think that Christians think that Atheists choose to not believe in god, and in fact, that they might not want to. This is a serious misconception. As Alaric put it elsewhere in these forums, and this is not a direct quote, 'I wouldn't say that I've turned my back on god, so much as he has faded from my sight in my search for truth.'