Topic:  Do people go to hell?

Source of this posting: Moderator response

Date originally posted: March 20, 2003

Moderator who originally posted this source: Father Phillip

Question:  Hi My question is a simple one. I would appreciate a simple answer please. Do people go to hell? Again I would appreciate a simple answer to the question. Thank You Alex Choi

Answer: 

Thank you, Alex, for you question.

The simple answer to your question is: Maybe.

Who goes to heaven and who goes to hell is exclusively in the hands of our Almighty and Loving God. And since our finite minds cannot fathom all the depths of God, we cannot say with utter, complete simplicity precisely what God's will is on this matter.

As a student at Columbia (not a bad school if you can't go to UNC-Chapel Hill!), you probably know that a significant difference exists between "simple" and "simplistic."

Simple is, according to Saint Thomas Aquinas, an attribute that can be predicated -- accurately -- only of an absolutely simple reality. And God is the only ABSOLUTELY SIMPLE reality. That is to say, God is simply love. God is simply truth. God is simply justice. God is simply compassion. God is simply forgiveness...and so forth.

The problem, as you can easily see, is that we human beings are not simple. We are complex realities -- "admixtures" of a complex matrix of characteristics, abilities, shortcomings, talents, gifts, insights, etc. So, predicating an absolutely simple attribute of human beings is impossible.

For example, we almost always have some kind of mixed motive. I am a priest because I love God AND because I feared the consequences of not obeying God's call. That's a pretty "mixed motive." My mixed motive doesn't disqualify me from being a priest; rather, it just makes me a pretty typical human being.

So, when we can predicate "simple" of a reality -- which we can do of God -- we are, so to speak, predicatin the highest possible "compliment". We are saying, in a manner of speaking, that though we can't really understand it, God's Reality is so magnificent that it does not admit of even a shadow of complexity -- God is simply love; God is simply truth; God is simply compassion...and so on.

On the other hand, since you and I are complex, composite beings -- made up of really good things as well as things which are not nearly so good -- we can't predicate absolutely simple answers or postulates of our condition or situation.

And since that is surely the case, we have a tendency to look for "simplistic" answers to our questions. In this context, "simplistic" answers are those which attempt -- and always fail! -- to give an "easy" answer to a question that cannot be answered easily in our world.

"Simple" is a good thing; "simplistic" is not a good thing.

At Columbia, surely, you've learned in your Professional graduate program that issues and topics require much thought, research, study, and experience to understand thoroughly. That's the purpose of an education. Any attempt to reduce the complexity of your field to a "simple" answer is, in fact, a way of giving into the desire for a "simplistic", "easy" answer.

And so with your question about whether people go to hell.

Is it possible that people go to hell? Yes, absolutely.

Do we human beings make choices that rightly and justly deserve hell? Yes, absolutely.

Do we know whether the justice, mercy, compassion, truth, and love of God actually allow people to go to hell? No, we don't know.

Moreover, we CAN'T know. Our finite selves are just not capable of knowing what the infiinite God does.

Sorry, Alex, that I couldn't give you a simple answer to the question. But I strongly believe that a "simple answer" would be running the risk of being "simplistic." The majesty of our God and splendor of our Catholic Christian faith "simply" :-) prevents me from trying to reduce either to a simplistic answer!

Thanks so much for coming to Catholic QandA.org and for struggling to understand the gift of faith in your own life!

Keep me and us in your prayers and be assured that you are in ours!

Blessings,
Father Phillip