03 May '13 22:50>2 edits
Originally posted by sonship
[quote] To be honest, the idea that a perfectly loving, righteous, just, etc God would sentence persons to eternal torture for lack of belief in something seems just impossibly stupid. I don't know if you've noticed but it's 2013. You might want to step out of the dark ages, get with the times and start exercising your brain a bit. In this post we see good e ed if someone rises from the dead." (See Luke 16:19-31 for the full teaching)[/b]
Suppose the truth within man's conscience finally catches up with him ? Suppose he has denied his sinfulness for his whole life against the conviction of his conscience, the word of God and the Holy Spirit. But then confronting the truth which he can no longer suppress his own conscience cries out within him for justice?
In that case hell is a final escape. The pain of being in the light of God is less than the crying out of the God created conscience that he be dealt with because of his transgressions.
In this case the rejector of God finally has a rendevous with his conscience of truth. What he has done is so awful that he himself hates himself. His own conscience cries out for punishment.
Most atheists I know do not hate themselves and do not cry out for agony and suffering and punishment to befall themselves. You seem to have fashioned a pretty absurd caricature of the non-believer here, one which I would think is irrelevant to the discussion.
Most atheists I know do the best they can living by their own lights; they endeavor in their relationships and projects; they are not perfect by any means and they are aware of that and often endeavor at self-reform, but they don't feel any need to prostrate themselves over such things; and it also just happens to be the case that there is not sufficient evidence at their disposal to elicit the belief that any god exists. This is altogether a pretty reasonable characterization of the average atheist. How about sticking to something like this, rather than fashioning some ridiculous caricature of the atheist?
Now if such a state exists, wouldn't it be God's responsibility to disincentivize man from wanting to go there ?
Would it not be God's responsibility that this place totally absent of God is also totally absent from blessing of which God is the source ?
First of all, you seem to be making the same notional error as our friend Suzianne made in one of her previous posts. You act like the atheist believes God exists but just stubbornly refuses to relate with Him or chooses to be separated from Him, or some such. You and Suzianne apparently both missed the memo that the atheist does not believe any god exists in the first place. So, even if in fact the atheist is wrong about that; nevertheless, God's sentencing the atheist to a state of suffering or some such would be in retaliation to simply a lack of belief, not to some choice the atheist makes. That's rather painfully absurd that God would eternally punish a person for lack of belief, which is largely something not even within the person's active control.
Furthermore, even if you were correct that the atheist chooses separation from God, it certainly does not follow that it is God's responsibility to make such a state totally devoid of all blessing. That's absurd. A landlord lives separated from his tenants (and, in fact, many tenants want absolutely nothing to do with their landlords except for contractual relationship), but it certainly does not follow that it is the landlord's responsibility to make living conditions hellish for those tenants.
Then in terms which every human can grasp it could be conveyed that this place "free" from the Source of all happiness should be unpleasant and avoided. And His redemption has furnished a gracious way of avoiding that Godless eternity.
I have no idea why you think God is the source of all happiness. That's absurd, and no atheist has any reason to accept that. There seem to be many and varied sources of happiness for a person. Regardless, this idea that God doesn't impose the suffering on those in hell but that it just happens as a natural consequence of His absence also seems notionally confused. Suffering is not merely a privation of happiness, just like pain is not merely a privation of pleasure.