BLOGGING TOWARD SUNDAY…

One final word on the matter of hell and I will let it rest.  In my research on the subject, the very best comments I read were from Martin Marty of the Chicago Divinity School, and an author with whom I frequently find myself in agreement.

Marty said in the June 3 edition of the Christian Century:

The question of hell relates to themes of divine judgment, “the wrath of God,” the calling to account and the like.  Loading up those themes with this glamorous, colorful, mythosymbolic, ever-changing (also with the scriptures) envisioning, so subject to caricature and so useful for terrifying children, does not advance belief in the God revealed as a God of love.  Does it advance morality?  I prefer the piety of the St. Bernard tradition.  In a vision, an angel announces that she is going to torch the pleasures of heaven and quench the fires of hell, so people will start loving God for God’s own sake.

When I read those words, I thought immediately of the closing lines of my favorite choir anthem, Jane Marshall’s My Eternal King:

Not with the hope of gaining aught, not seeking a reward, but as thyself hast loved me, O ever loving Lord, e’en so I love thee, and will love, and in thy praise will sing, solely because thou art my God, and my eternal king.

So here is my last word on hell:  we cannot and must not try to scare people into heaven.  We can only love them there.Â

Filed under: Blogging Toward Sunday