That’s not what the Bible says. Or so most Christians believe. It’s a logical trap that the fundamentalists cannot (it seems) escape, but it’s not what the Bible actually says or what most Christians actually believe.

It really is, in my view, almost psychotic: "you have to think what we think or you’ll be punished horribly you fucker." I honestly don’t quite get it that some people think that’s a picture of a just and merciful God, and I honestly don’t think the Bible really says that. But hey, what do I know? Maybe the Cosmic Torture Artist is really just waiting there in the wings for all of you who don’t think and believe exactly the right things. Me? I think it was the Reformationists’ biggest mistake, even though they had some good objections otherwise to certain bad things going on in the Church (and the Bible pretty clearly says that the people who run the Church are gonna fuck it up now and then, by the way).

God loves us and wants us to be with Him, and He gave us a capacity for reason–reason itself being one of His gifts to us, along with curiosity and wonderment. That capacity is limited because all human faculties are limited, but He didn’t really mean to say we should eject reason and just blindly follow. I truly believe that.

What most Christians actually believe is that we are all flawed and we all fuck up, but God wants to work with us on fixing that stuff and Jesus gave us some answers to help us on that path. Believe it or don’t; I don’t think God will punish you just for doubting. I mean, if nothing else that would just be a horrible waste of energy, y’know?

The truth is that "believe this or be tortured" is NOT mainstream Christian thinking, although some so-called "fundamentalists" insist that it is so. I’m not just speaking as a Catholic; Orthodox and many mainline Protestants will say the same.

I can’t talk to you about theological issues because you just can’t see the logical traps you’ve encaged yourself in.

I answered your question forthrightly: the Church that Jesus established has been wrestling with this question for 2,000 years, but you are uncurious about its answers. That’s pretty much what I expected your answer to be. So you will continue to vainly seek permanent answers from the scriptures when the scriptures were never designed to answer that for you if you didn’t have God’s teachings in mind when you read them. So it goes.

It’s not a matter of lack of respect for you my friend. It’s just out of frustration that you apparently cannot escape from the doctrinal boxes you’ve been raised with. Understand that most Christians don’t see it your way, or don’t. Ultimately I can’t help you if you don’t want to be helped.

But your binary worldview doesn’t work for most of us who’ve read the Bible for ourselves. You’ll just have to live with it until you learn that "sola fide" isn’t even scriptural let alone infallible.

I guess the answer to your question depends on how you interpret the unknowable will of god.  You’re presenting it as believers = reward, unbelievers = punishment.  but it could also be believers = reward, unbelievers = nothing (i.e.: neither heaven nor hell).  Or it could be that belief is just one chit you get to count against your sins, but that it in itself is neither necessary nor sufficient for entry into heaven.  This last bit seems to be Dean’s take.  It really gets to the heart of the faith or works debate.

The answer to them lies in this, to my mind–you have bought into doctrines read into scripture that aren’t there actually.

And this is where I stopped reading…

I asked questions based upon logical assumptions stemming from the existence of an eternal reward. Never once did I say anyone was wrong for questioning hell, or say they’ve misinterpreted Scripture.  I simply held that I feel it’s illogical to believe in eternal reward for belief but not eternal punishment for unbelief and I asked for clarification.

Please, Dean, do not respond to me on this matter.  When the issue of hell (or anything like it) comes up you are always on attack and raw emotion.  My proof?

You couldn’t go two sentences without saying I’m reading Scripture wrong when my reading of Scripture has nothing to do with the topic at hand.

Sentence three you lump me in with some group that is irrelevant to the discussion, sentence four you say I read my beliefs into Scripture rather than the other way around, but then in sentence five you kindly imply that it’s not my fault – I’ve been lied to all my life.

Again, please, do not respond to me on this matter because I will not read you.  Not because I don’t want to hear what you have to say, but because you have to preface your answer with, "Everything you believe is wrong and everyone you’ve learned from has lied to you."

Thank you but kiss my ass.

The Mormon goes to Hell no matter how much good he did, but Hitler is rewarded if he just says "I love Jesus my personal savior?"

The contradictions in your own worldview are every bit as profound as those you claim are unbelievers.  I think the answers are in the scriptures, but you have to know them right–you have to know the RIGHT TEACHINGS–before you can see them.

"Doctrine" just means "teaching" after all. Don’t kid yourself that you ever approach scripture without doctrines, because you do. It’s just a matter of WHOSE doctrines you approach it with. Because doctrines you have, and don’t ever be arrogant enough to think differently.

It seems to me you have a very binary on/off worldview. You’ve bought into certain doctrines which said that when Christ said the only way to Heaven was to believe in him, and therefore, you believe that BELIEF BELIEF BELIEF is what gets you into Heaven or not. Nonsense. That’s not what he said. That’s just a doctrine you yourself read into scripture that isn’t there.

This is Lutheranism and Calvinism writ large: BELIEVE OR PERISH. BELIEVE WHAT WE SAY OR DIE. That is the ultimate result of these doctrines–these teachings.

So if you don’t believe, you will be tortured forever. If you do believe, you will be rewarded.

Is that really a just God you believe in? Or do you only believe it because (A) you’re afraid to NOT believe it, or (B) you think God can never be questioned?

You are a part of a minority sect within Protestantism that says salvation only comes if you fiercely and unquestioningly BELIEVE. The Bible itself says that is false. But you’ve bought into this doctrine anyway: believe and you are saved, don’t believe and you are not. Haven’t you ever wondered at the justice of a God who chooses something so capricious? "Buy into this, or burn you despicable fuckers" is all your faith really boils down to if you buy into that. But that’s not really what Christ said–and I’ve read the same Bible you have, many times, so you might consider that I’ve got a different take on it and actually ASK ABOUT IT before you draw a judgment.

Obama made a point–a very good one–that it’s just  not a part of his worldview that a little Hindu kid who’s never heard about the Bible is going to be tortured forever if he doesn’t "accept Jesus." Here’s a news flash for you: there are billions who haven’t. Do they just DESERVE such punishment?

The actual Church that Christ established has been wrestling with this question for 2,000 years, and they have some anwers. I’d love to tell you about them, if you’ll listen. I suspect you will not, but I can only offer. In any case, here is the basic answer:

NO, it is not acceptable to suggest that someone who just never heard the word will be tortured forever because they didn’t hear it or they didn’t buy it when they did hear it.

NO, it is not acceptable that just "believing" gives you an automatic ticket into Heaven just because you were smart enough to believe.

BOTH are bad answers, and BOTH are not really scriptural, although if you torture the scriptures long enough they’ll say whatever you want. Including both stupid answers.

There are real, live answers to your questions. Do you want them? Or do you want to keep pretending you can just be an infallible interpreter of the scriptures on your own, so you "know the answer" because you’re so fucking smart?

Let me know. I’ve got boatloads to share with you. Answers which start with the scriptures, but do not end with them because the scriptures all by themselves just cannot stand alone. They were never meant to, and Jesus never said they would.

If the idea of eternal punishment for unbelief is unpalatable, why is eternal reward for belief acceptable?

It seems to me they’re two side of the same coin and if you reject one side you must be logically consistent and reject the other.  If one should be forgiven for choosing unbelief, and thusly escape consequence, then shouldn’t the believers be freed from the consequences of their choice as well?

And if you say no, that believers needn’t be relieved of their reward, of what value is the reward if, eventually, everyone’s going to get it anyway?  How is the suffering of the righteous rewarded if the ones that are the cause of that suffering given the same reward after death?

What then, if not eternal damnation, is the consequence of unbelief and a life of sin?  Eternal reward but temporary punishment?  That doesn’t seem logically consistent.

We speak of the mercy of God but God’s mercy is for this side of existence.  He extends His mercy here because it is here that we need it.  And if we reject His mercies here, how is it really a freewill choice to side with Him when being subjected to punishment?  Does not that punishment remove the possibility of a freewill choice?

These arguments against eternal punishment, in my mind, have the effect of negating any real value to the choices we make while we’re alive.  In the name of humanistic survival in the hereafter they devalue what we do today to our fellow man.

I cannot see how a merciful and, most importantly, just God cannot have some kind of eternal punishment to counterbalance eternal reward.

Keep in mind, never once have I said "hellfire" or "torment."  I’m not talking about the specifics of the punishment, just the existence of a punishment at all.

because he does not subscribe to the belief that those who do not accept the Christian faith are automatically damned to hellfire for eternity (including his own mother)

Maybe I missed something during my 12 years at Catholic school, but this does not hold within the Catholic faith.  The only Christians I know that believe this are called fundamentalists.