“Wide is the path to heaven and narrow is the path to hell.” Count this among the things that Jesus never said, but many of us Christians act as if he did. The primrose path to heaven is paved with, at best dismissal, at worst open mockery of “fire and brimstone” preachers. Give us the Good News they say and let’s not focus on childish fears like hell. In our satirical heave-ho however we might easily overlook the fact that we would also see the most famous Preacher Who ever walked the face of the earth as a fire and brimstone guy. For all of our avoiding of the topic, Jesus spoke an awful (in the truest sense of the word) lot about hell. Perhaps then it is time to examine just how much we should focus on hell. This post is not about going around threatening everyone with hell. Most people carry enough hell around with them currently that they really do need to hear the Good News—at first. But at a certain point we must all maturely face the eternal Bad News in order to grow in our spiritual lives.
“Mature” Christians and Hell
Herein lies part of the problem—we think that mature Christians need not think much of hell. Even if that we true, which it is not, we conclude that since mature Christians need not think of hell, then we can skip that step. But an examination of the spiritual lives of many of the saints reveals that a number of them received visions of hell. St. Faustina, St. John Bosco, St. Catherine of Siena, and even the great mystical Doctor of the Church, St. Theresa of Avila all were given mystical experiences of hell. The latter described her visitation in stark terms:
I felt a fire in my soul…My bodily sufferings were unendurable. I have undergone most painful sufferings in this life… yet all these were as nothing in comparison with what I felt then, especially when I saw that there would be no intermission, nor any end to them…I did not see who it was that tormented me, but I felt myself on fire, and torn to pieces, as it seemed to me; and, I repeat it, this inward fire and despair are the greatest torments of all…I was so terrified by that vision – and that terror is on me even now while I am writing – that though it took place nearly six years ago, the natural warmth of my body is chilled by fear even now when I think of it.
Since the saints are the healthiest of all Christians we must then admit that turning our gaze towards hell is a healthy thing to do. We must admit that it is only our immersion in modern psychology which insists that guilt is the greatest evil that keeps us from doing so. Guilt is natural and thus a tool God has given man for his perfection. It is meant to stimulate sorrow for sin, the principle of all of our growth in holiness.
The journey of the spiritual life can be summed up as a journey of love; a journey from a love of self to the love of God. We may love God, but until we are honest enough to admit that we still love ourselves more, we will never progress. We must grow to the point where we love God more than self. For most of us, this journey will take a lifetime.
The standard Act of Contrition reflects this as well—we tell God that we are sorry because we fear His just punishments (love of self, leading to a fear of hell) and most of all because we have offended Him Who is All Good and worthy of all our love (love of God, leading to filial fear, that is the fear of offending His goodness). Until we are free of inordinate self-love, that is, love of self more than love of God, we “need” the fear of hell to keep us moving.
Meditating on Hell Regularly
This healthy fear of hell comes about, in imitation of the saints, by meditating on hell itself. In an age where most sin is “normal” it becomes especially important so that we can grasp the horror of sin. This is why Our Lord uses such descriptive language. It is not just that it “scares the hell out of us” but that, in catching a glimpse of the horror of what we deserve, we can fall more deeply in love with the Giver of eternal life. Fear of hell then is a necessary foundation for the filial fear that follows.
Obviously not all of us will be given visions of hell like the one from St. Theresa described above. Those descriptions, especially St. John Bosco’s, are helpful for us. Dante’s Inferno can also be very helpful.
Before closing it is worth examining one of the intellectual obstacles to meditating on hell—its eternity. If we are not careful, we can allow this intellectual obstacle to lead us to conclude hell is not really that bad. The occupants of hell suffer most because they have lost their true good—God Himself—and they hate Him for it. They know the truth that it was their choice that put them there, but because their will is fixed they can never repent. They simply go on hating. They also suffer other torments as well. The point however is that all of these torments are eternal. Quite obviously we have nothing in our experience that maps back to eternity. But we can begin to grasp its eternal horrors when we think about our pains and sufferings in this life. No matter how much pain and suffering we are experiencing, we always have in the back of our minds that they will be over eventually. This awareness brings with it a certain hope and its accompanying comfort, perhaps the only comfort we have at a given time. Now, imagine that hope being removed and you become aware of the fact that never, ever, will the pain end. This would lead to perpetual despair without any hope of relief. Even the most minor of irritations would be unbearable if it never ended. This is why Dante affixes a sign at the entrance of his Inferno that reads “Abandon all hope ye who enters here.” Please God that living in this time of hope, we will be spurred to love Him and desire to see Him face to face.