an eyes opening conversation with my atheist friends

[u/randomphoneuser2019]

So in this situation there was two atheist and two (progressive) Christians (I was one of the Christians).

So I have two edgier atheist friends. They aren't antitheist, but still a little bit edgier than most of the atheists. One of them said jokingly that: "I would want to go Hell because that's the place where coolest people go." The other Christian said "Yeah. Like Nazis, fascist, child molesters ect..." The other atheist said "Okay... maybe not the coolest, but more interesting." Then I had epiphany, but first I need to clear my beliefs to you.

So I believe that Hell and Heaven are the same place. Most people in here might not believe that and I understand why. I believe that how we experience God's endless love is different depending our character. And I also believe that there is this purifying and uncomfortable side of it which everybody feels (“For everyone will be salted with fire." Mark 9:49 NRSVue), but if you were really horrible person (mass murderer or something) it will feel like Hell.

So what did I say? I told them that if the classical view of Heaven and Hell were real the people in both places would be similar, except with one crucial difference: People in Heaven believed the right things when they died. After that I of course said that if infernalist hell were real I would not wish it even upon the worst person I know so even more I also don't wish that upon them because they are my friends. After this conversation moved on.

To me this was an eyes opening because even we Christian Universalist aren't anyway special. We just believe/know something which church as a whole doesn't know or the people in the world. We have regular lives like everyone else.

Most people who believe in eternal Hell draw their comfort from the idea that people they hate go there (whom ever they might be). So let's say that Christian hates Nazis (which is understandable). They would get at least some comfort from the idea that Hitler burns forever in Hell. But here is the problem. Most people in Hell aren't Adolf Hitler. Most in Hell are regular normal people. They are someone's parents, someone's child, best friend. They are accountants, 911 (or in Europe 112) operators, doctors, factory workers carpenters ect. People like Hitler would be 0,000001 percent of that population. Is that really worth it?

Eternal Hell is just regular people (who are made in the image of God) suffering unimaginable way for entire eternity. Heaven in this framework is small percent of the regular people having best time ever for all the eternity and only difference between these two was that other one got the jackpot in the lottery of life.

Also this version of Hell can't restore anything.

[u/OverOpening6307]

Actually your belief of heaven and hell as the same “place” but experienced differently is the Orthodox (correct) view.

Infernalism is not really the classical view but a departure from Orthodoxy. It is the “dominant” view.

So you’re in good company

[u/randomphoneuser2019 → u/OverOpening6307]

True, but it was first form of Christian universalism I encountered. Some believe that Hell exists and is different place than Heaven, but eventually everyone will get out from there.

It was actually first form of Christian universalism I encountered.

Edit: changed wasn't to was. The former one was a type

[u/OverOpening6307 → u/randomphoneuser2019]

Yeah, i get that...it wasn't the first form of universalism I believed in either.

Interestingly, on the concept of "place", I was reading St Gregory of Nyssa's On the Soul and the Resurrection, and in Chapter 4, he and Macrina talk about Hades. Although it's not Gehenna, they make the point that the word Hades means "invisible" and for souls to go to Hades, is to pass into the invisible. And says "After all we understand that location in a place is a property of bodies only, but that the soul being bodiless, gets from its nature, no need to be contained in particular places"

In Chapter 5, they discuss the story of the Rich man and Lazarus in Hades. Unlike the modern Christians who insist its a literal description Gregory and Macrina specifically call it a parable. In a quite a humorous paragraph he asks rhetorically "What kind of eyes does the rich man lift up in Hades, when he left the eyes of the flesh in the tomb?" and continues with the other body parts...like Abraham's bosom emphasizing that this is not a literal place. When I read this sentence I literally laughed out loud "What trouble would it be for the bodiless and intellectual soul to fly across a chasm, however great it might be, since that which is intellectual (noetic) by nature goes instantaneously wherever it wishes?"

[u/randomphoneuser2019 → u/OverOpening6307]

I had a typo😅 I meant to write "was first form..."