Interesting read

"Why We Need Hell" is an interesting article by Frederica Mathewes-Green.

Highlights:

This idea, that both heaven and hell are experiences of the same divine presence, is startlingly different from contemporary assumptions. But even more so is the next idea: hell is not a punishment. We assume God’s justice means settling the score; that each sin must have its payment, either in Christ’s blood or human writhing in hell. We can even sort of like the idea. Surely God will torture murderers and rapists and bad guys, and anyone who ever did us a wrong turn. Justice, we think, means finally getting even.

But as St. Isaac points out, God isn’t "just" in that calculating sense. "How can you call God just," he says, when you consider the parable of the workers paid for a full day when they worked only an hour? Or the parable of the Prodigal Son, restored fully to his father on the basis of mere repentance? St Isaac concludes, "Do not call God just, for his justice is not evident in the things concerning you."

God is not looking for repayment, but repentance. What heals a broken relationship is sincere love and contrition. What’s wrong with us isn’t a rap sheet of bad deeds, but a damaged heart, a soul-sickness, that plunges us into fearful self-protection, alienation from God and others. Paradoxically, this leads to death: "whoever would save his life will lose it" (Matthew 16:25).

This sickness elicits not God’s fury but his indomitable love, much like the urgent, grieving love a parent has for a wandering child. (Jesus’ parable was about the Prodigal Son, not the Indignant Accountant.) "It is not that God grows angry with us," said the 3rd century Desert Father, St. Antony the Great, "but it is our own sins that prevent God from shining within us."

Read the whole thing, here.