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I was having a discussion with a friend today about the nature of eternal reward or punishment from God. Now we are both Catholic so the discussion was centered in that context but of course feel free to add any thoughts to eternal reward/punishment outside a Catholic/Christian mindset of judgment, God, etc...
So my argument was that it makes more sense to me, and that I would prefer, a situation where eternal punishment/reward doesn't exist at all in the sense that one can change their relationship/status with God through free-will even after death. So any example would be if one looked at an individual who was a great sinner, again in the Catholic/Christian mindset in my debate with my friend, would naturally be sent to hell. Could they not after death, assuming their mind was still wholly intact even though their body was not, realize their sins, seek forgiveness and redemption and be granted it as an individual who was still alive could be granted redemption, or would they be forever stuck in hell regardless of how pure their soul, ie mind, may become after death. Likewise could an individual who was very pious in life still be tempted and perhaps fall from God's gracious after being granted access to heaven?
Personally I would like to believe that God would always be willing to forgive sins, regardless of if the person were alive or dead so long as whatever requirements one may believe God has for forgiveness are met. This would be be because I assume and again would like freewill to be preserved in the afterlife as it is on Earth, however if someone has the same freewill in death as they did in life than naturally they could also reverse from God and fall away from him.
My friend argued that in Heaven one would be so consumed by the love of God that there would be no way one could turn away, and likewise in Hell one would be so consumed by hate that there would be no way one could turn away. However that would mean a fundamental change in the nature of a person's free-will in that it is for all practical purposes removed as there is no real-choice regarding this matter. And it would mean a change in the nature of temptation, as one rarely turns away from God directly but rather a fall from God is normally, in my opinion, done through a series of other actions and temptations one can rationalize as not being sinful but gradually wear away at one's relationship with God.
In my opinion the love one must for God to be accepted in Heaven is valuable in that is freely given, one makes a conscious choice rather than being "hooked" on it like a drug, an analogy my friend did not enjoy.
One can also look in Christian tradition at the story of Lucifer, who being an angel was present in Heaven and fully exposed to God's love still rejected it, in his case through Pride, so wouldn't that mean for humans in heaven the same situation could repeat itself?
I also argued that sin itself could be a means to God, that whatever sin one commits(because as Catholics we believe no one is without sin in some form), a far greater sin would not be to learn from it as use it as a foundation to strengthen one's faith. For example a murderer has committed a terrible sin but it would be a greater one in my opinion that when he conducts a self-examination of himself and realizes his actions were sinful does not seek to learn from them to better understand himself, the nature of human beings and the universe in general as it relates to his sin, and how it avoid committing that sin again.
So in other words he uses his experiences in life, sinful or otherwise, to better understand how he came to sin with the purpose of avoiding sin in general in the future. And by better understanding sin, why and how he and people in general sin, he has placed himself in a position where it is more difficult to sin again and thus his relationship with God is strengthen as he sins less.
I hope everyone understands what I'm trying to get at, its difficult to put into words in some places and the argument was in a Catholic mindset but I think its an interesting question regarding the place of freewill in whatever afterlife we may see.
So my argument was that it makes more sense to me, and that I would prefer, a situation where eternal punishment/reward doesn't exist at all in the sense that one can change their relationship/status with God through free-will even after death. So any example would be if one looked at an individual who was a great sinner, again in the Catholic/Christian mindset in my debate with my friend, would naturally be sent to hell. Could they not after death, assuming their mind was still wholly intact even though their body was not, realize their sins, seek forgiveness and redemption and be granted it as an individual who was still alive could be granted redemption, or would they be forever stuck in hell regardless of how pure their soul, ie mind, may become after death. Likewise could an individual who was very pious in life still be tempted and perhaps fall from God's gracious after being granted access to heaven?
Personally I would like to believe that God would always be willing to forgive sins, regardless of if the person were alive or dead so long as whatever requirements one may believe God has for forgiveness are met. This would be be because I assume and again would like freewill to be preserved in the afterlife as it is on Earth, however if someone has the same freewill in death as they did in life than naturally they could also reverse from God and fall away from him.
My friend argued that in Heaven one would be so consumed by the love of God that there would be no way one could turn away, and likewise in Hell one would be so consumed by hate that there would be no way one could turn away. However that would mean a fundamental change in the nature of a person's free-will in that it is for all practical purposes removed as there is no real-choice regarding this matter. And it would mean a change in the nature of temptation, as one rarely turns away from God directly but rather a fall from God is normally, in my opinion, done through a series of other actions and temptations one can rationalize as not being sinful but gradually wear away at one's relationship with God.
In my opinion the love one must for God to be accepted in Heaven is valuable in that is freely given, one makes a conscious choice rather than being "hooked" on it like a drug, an analogy my friend did not enjoy.
One can also look in Christian tradition at the story of Lucifer, who being an angel was present in Heaven and fully exposed to God's love still rejected it, in his case through Pride, so wouldn't that mean for humans in heaven the same situation could repeat itself?
I also argued that sin itself could be a means to God, that whatever sin one commits(because as Catholics we believe no one is without sin in some form), a far greater sin would not be to learn from it as use it as a foundation to strengthen one's faith. For example a murderer has committed a terrible sin but it would be a greater one in my opinion that when he conducts a self-examination of himself and realizes his actions were sinful does not seek to learn from them to better understand himself, the nature of human beings and the universe in general as it relates to his sin, and how it avoid committing that sin again.
So in other words he uses his experiences in life, sinful or otherwise, to better understand how he came to sin with the purpose of avoiding sin in general in the future. And by better understanding sin, why and how he and people in general sin, he has placed himself in a position where it is more difficult to sin again and thus his relationship with God is strengthen as he sins less.
I hope everyone understands what I'm trying to get at, its difficult to put into words in some places and the argument was in a Catholic mindset but I think its an interesting question regarding the place of freewill in whatever afterlife we may see.