As Saint Julian of Norwich learned in her visions of Christ, the wrath of God is the projection, if you will, of the guilty conscience of sinners. There is no actual wrath on His side, but it appears that way to us when we're missing the mark.
Jan 30, 2022·edited Jan 30, 2022Liked by Sarah Southern
Hell has been explained to me by some very good priests in this way. Humans were made to be eternal beings. The choices we make in life, the doorstep or anteroom of eternity, form us to be either fit for heaven or fit for hell (see C.S. Lewis). One way to understand this is in terms of love relationships. The God who made us adores us. We will be eternally in his presence one way or another. That will either be an experience of the fulfillment of longed-for communion and bliss, the highest bliss possible, or it will be loathsome in the extreme, stuck with a God we can't stand because we have made ourselves through our choices to be people who stand against everything He is. This has to be held with a couple other things, though. One is the theology of the body and of the engrafting of humans into the very Body of Christ, with all the implications of that. Also remember that Jesus told the Father that he had not lost a single one entrusted to him, a single one marked by baptism (equivalent to the lamb's blood on the doorposts that made the angel of death pass over). The other is constant remembrance that the God we worship is the one who proactively allowed himself to be tortured to death so that even though we made the wrong choice there would still be a fresh path back to Him. A God who un-dooms his creatures and joins their life to His eternal Life (look up eternal pericoresis). Oh, and a third: free will. He allows us to choose who we'll be, and for that to be meaningful at all we have to get the thing we choose, whichever it is. This is what makes the wrath of God, hell as described above, real. It's a state we create through choice, and God is a respecter of our choices because He is a respecter of our freedom. And that's because only free beings are capable of Love, and Love is required to participate in the internal life of God.
Honestly, I don’t even know where to begin. These words… I write that often now because in this small group of people I follow, it’s the words that lift me up, make me sigh and give me a little more hope. That little bit is the most important part of hope. I am grateful for you. Thank you, Susan
This was beautiful, real, and so needed. I’m thankful for you and your written words. So much to chew on. I will be saving this and rereading many times over.
As Saint Julian of Norwich learned in her visions of Christ, the wrath of God is the projection, if you will, of the guilty conscience of sinners. There is no actual wrath on His side, but it appears that way to us when we're missing the mark.
Hell has been explained to me by some very good priests in this way. Humans were made to be eternal beings. The choices we make in life, the doorstep or anteroom of eternity, form us to be either fit for heaven or fit for hell (see C.S. Lewis). One way to understand this is in terms of love relationships. The God who made us adores us. We will be eternally in his presence one way or another. That will either be an experience of the fulfillment of longed-for communion and bliss, the highest bliss possible, or it will be loathsome in the extreme, stuck with a God we can't stand because we have made ourselves through our choices to be people who stand against everything He is. This has to be held with a couple other things, though. One is the theology of the body and of the engrafting of humans into the very Body of Christ, with all the implications of that. Also remember that Jesus told the Father that he had not lost a single one entrusted to him, a single one marked by baptism (equivalent to the lamb's blood on the doorposts that made the angel of death pass over). The other is constant remembrance that the God we worship is the one who proactively allowed himself to be tortured to death so that even though we made the wrong choice there would still be a fresh path back to Him. A God who un-dooms his creatures and joins their life to His eternal Life (look up eternal pericoresis). Oh, and a third: free will. He allows us to choose who we'll be, and for that to be meaningful at all we have to get the thing we choose, whichever it is. This is what makes the wrath of God, hell as described above, real. It's a state we create through choice, and God is a respecter of our choices because He is a respecter of our freedom. And that's because only free beings are capable of Love, and Love is required to participate in the internal life of God.
Honestly, I don’t even know where to begin. These words… I write that often now because in this small group of people I follow, it’s the words that lift me up, make me sigh and give me a little more hope. That little bit is the most important part of hope. I am grateful for you. Thank you, Susan
This was beautiful, real, and so needed. I’m thankful for you and your written words. So much to chew on. I will be saving this and rereading many times over.
Love this!!!! So thankful for your words and honesty.