Catholic Info
Traditional Catholic Faith => General Discussion => Topic started by: Brennus on February 04, 2019, 12:12:00 PM
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Dear All,
I was wondering if any of the well-read posters on here might know the answer to a question that occurred to me today (when reading about the New York abortion law.)
1) Catholics do not believe in the assurance of salvation without a private revelation. Therefore, we always pray for our salvation and fear Hell (which I say is salutary.)
2) A traditional priest once told me that we may hate the devils and the people in Hell ( -- come to think of it, I'm rather sure that was the Father Poisson mentioned recently on this blog who told me that.)
3) Can we, maintaining a healthful fear of Hell and remaining diligent about our own salvation, nonetheless, be grateful that Hell DOES exist and that these unspeakable evils will be answered, eventually, with eternal, just, damnation?
What say ye?
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I may not understand so may not be looking at this the way you are, but I'm not going to be grateful for hell while I'm living and might screw up and end up spending eternity there. Nope, not grateful for hell, not at all.
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There was a story I heard from the life of St Catherine of Sienna. When she learned of the damnation of a certain person, she prayed to God to make an exception and allow this person to go to Heaven. God heard her prayer and allowed this soul to go to Heaven. However this person's sufferings were so much the greater in Heaven that he begged and pleaded with God to allow him to return to Hell.
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In a sense I agree. As we know, God is infallibly just and fair. Therefore only those who deserve to go to Hell can go there. While we all fear going there, we can still acknowledge that if we do it's because of our own faults and that it's what we deserve.
In a world where, to quote Shakespeare, "to do harm is often laudable," and "to do good sometime accounted dangerous folly", it's comforting to know that complete and perfect justice will eventually be served to all souls.
So yes I'd agree. We should fear Hell, but we can also be grateful for it and recognise that God made it for a reason.