Honestly, it's one of the best facts about life that major religions like Christianity and Islam are false. There is no hell, no billions of people suffering eternal conscious torture. Simple non-existence after death is literally infinitely better. — Counter Apologist (@CounterApologis) August 2, 2018 I have often heard atheists express sentiments like this, so […]
hell
Depersonalizing the Damned: Hell and the humanity of those who go there
Let’s return to a discussion of the doctrine of hell and in particular, the concept of hell as eternal conscious torment. According to this concept, to end up in hell is to end up in a state of eternal alienation from God, one which results in unimaginable physical and spiritual/psychological torment. And that torment never ends. […]
N.T. Wright and the Universalist Strawman
Christian universalism is the doctrine that eventually all creatures will be reconciled to God and each other through the reconciling work of Jesus Christ. While universalism has been a minority report throughout the history of the church it has often been misunderstood and even caricatured by non-universalist Christians. This trend continues unabated into our own […]
Does Christianity promise that everything sad is going to come untrue?
Today I visited a church in which the speaker addressed the problem of evil. Near the end of the sermon, he appealed to this famous quote from The Lord of the Rings: “I thought you were dead! But then I thought that I was dead myself! Is everything sad going to come untrue?” The speaker then […]
Now I Lay Me Down to Sleep: Evangelism and the Ethics of Scaring the Hell out of Children
Father John Furniss, a nineteenth-century Catholic evangelist, became renowned as the “Apostle to the Children.” Father Furniss (and yes, that was his real name) was infamous for his lurid descriptions of children in hell. Consider this excerpt from his 1861 bestselling collection of nightmarish bedtime reading, The Sight of Hell: “See on the middle of that red-hot floor […]
Would a loving God send people to hell?
I just wrote an article for Christian Post on this topic. You can read it by clicking here.
Hellrazed? The Book!
Five years have passed since Kevin Miller’s provocative documentary Hellbound? was released. The film explores concepts of the afterlife (in particular, the doctrine of eternal conscious torment), and how they shape the life and belief of the church here and now. I met Kevin at that time as I had the privilege of hosting the film’s […]
What is the most difficult Christian doctrine to defend?
In my 2008 book Faith Lacking Understanding I identify three types of objection to Christianity: Logical objections Plausibility objections Moral objections Next, as I work through the Apostles’ Creed I identify examples of each type of objection. For example, the doctrine of the Trinity is subject to logical objections. Meanwhile, the doctrine of particular divine action within […]
Read Chapter 14 of What’s So Confusing About Grace? and find out how to be damned by a cookie
You can read the chapter at my blog confusedaboutgrace.com.
Does God demand love under threat of damnation?
A reader emailed the following question to me. With permission, I’m reproducing and responding to the question here: One recurring thought I keep having that I’d be interested in reading your thoughts on relates to the nature of salvation vs punishment and the way in which Scripture seems to call us to respond to God. Now, […]
TWU Today Archives Part 2: A Defense of Annihilationism
This article, published in the TWU Today Newspaper on January 23, 1996, represents one of my first forays into theological writing. Provocatively titled “Who in hell lives forever?”, the article provides a succinct summary and defense of the case for annihilationism, the doctrine that the reprobate cease to exist in hell.
The Problem with Hell in One Cartoon
I’m a long time fan of Gary Larson’s comic strip The Far Side and this cartoon is one of my favorites. Not only does it capture the bizarre, off-beat humor for which The Far Side is justly famous, but it also succinctly summarizes a problem with the conception of God punishing people eternally in hell. How so? Well, let’s start with […]
The Unimaginable Torments of Hell
On January 3, 2015 the Jordanian pilot Muath Al-Kasasbeh was burned alive by ISIS. A video of the murder was later released online, evoking horror and outrage worldwide. The other day I was in a conversation with a friend who told me he had watched the video of Al-Kasasbeh’s murder … and immediately regretted it. […]
Sin Junkies: addiction, punishment, and the new problem of hell
In December, 2015 America’s new drug czar, Michael Botticelli, gave a revealing interview with 60 Minutes’ Scott Pelley. The interview included this exchange: Scott Pelley: Are you saying that the way we have waged the war on drugs for more than 40 years has been all wrong? Michael Botticelli: It has been all wrong. Blunt force didn’t […]
