Leaving Anhedonia

Agony of 15th Century Japanese Converts Should Haunt Us All

I remain haunted, almost obsessively so, by the agony of the Japanese converts who lamented their relatives being eternally tormented in hell.

I keep returning to the anguish of these Japanese Christian converts discussed in chapter five of Dale Allison’s Night Comes, where he tackles the question of hell and his struggle to reconcile a belief in hell with a loving God.

As I wrote in Part I, Allison is part of a growing number of liberal Christians who have an undying “antipathy” against the doctrine of eternal damnation.

One of the most devastating passages in chapter 5 is how the hell doctrine upturned the lives of fifteenth century Japanese converts to Christianity.

These pious Japanese Christians, who converted at the hands of Jesuit missionaries, lived the rest of their lives obedient to Christ, but not in a state of joy; rather, they lived in torment and anguish over the belief that their relatives had perished in the bowels of hell. Their despair was recorded by Saint Francis Xavier. As Allison quotes:

“One of the things that most pains and torments these Japanese is, that we teach them that the prison of hell is irrevocably shut, so that there is no egress therefrom. For they grieve over the fate of their departed children, of their parents and relatives, and they often show their grief by their tears. So they ask us if there is any hope, any way to free them by prayer from that eternal misery, and I am obliged to answer that there is absolutely none. Their grief at this affects and torments them wonderfully; they almost pine away with sorrow. But there is this good thing about their trouble—it makes one hope that they will all be the more laborious for their own salvation, lest they, like their forefathers, should be condemned to everlasting punishment. They often ask if God cannot take their fathers out of hell, and why their punishment must never have an end. We gave them a satisfactory answer, but they did not cease to grieve over the misfortune of their relatives; and I can hardly restrain my tears sometimes at seeing men so dear to my heart suffer such intense pain about a thing which is already done with and can never be undone.”

I feel someone should write a piano suite, an opera, a symphony, or some other lament about this unbearable sorrow. 

When Smart People Go Crazy and Are Still Influential

Like a lot of people, I read Michael Scheuer's best-selling book Imperial Hubris and felt edified by someone whose experience in national intelligence gave a critical eye on American foreign policy. 

At a certain point, I wondered if he had gone crazy. People whom I once thought were credible seem suspect if they become champions or apologists of racist and fascist political figures. And at some point, I read somewhere that Scheuer was doing just that. 

But apparently his decline started earlier. In this 2014 Daily Beast piece by David Frum titled, "Michael Scheuer's Meltdown," we see that Scheuer has indeed become crazy evidenced by his call to assassinate Barack Obama and David Cameron. Scheuer's support of current demagogues reinforces the notion that he has indeed gone crazy.

I had a flash to Michael Scheuer a few days ago in a completely different context: religion. 

Since 1979, when at 17 I became afraid of hell, I embarked on the naive notion that perhaps I could free myself from this fear if I could formulate in my mind that non-believers were smart and believers were less smart. 

I was so ignorant that I was hopeful that I could read enough books from skeptics who could show me that religious belief was the result of stupidity, madness, or both.

But as I read more and more, I discovered you could be super smart and by all appearances completely sane, or just as sane as anyone else, and be a believer.

Soon enough, I had to abandon the idea that I could rid myself the fear of hell by dismissing believers as stupid.

There were writers smarter than I am making the case for Christianity: Augustine, Aquinas, Pascal, C.S. Lewis, Peter Kreeft, Jerry Walls, Marilynne Robinson, N.T. Wright, Timothy Keller, Alan Jacobs, Dale Allison, Rufus Jones, David Bentley Hart, David Dark, and I could go on.

Of course, there is a spectrum of Christian faith with primitive fundamentalism on one end and more liberal interpretations on the other. I notice Jerry Walls, for example, tries to sneak in universalism in his amazing book Heaven, Hell, and Purgatory in which he shows the evolution of C.S. Lewis' belief in hell, which came to embrace the idea of purgatory. Many could say that a belief in purgatory is the precursor to universalism, but I digress. 

My point is that I have often doubted myself or what I really believe or what is at my core because I worry that I am innately depraved, too irrational, too crazy, or too whatever to trust myself. Therefore, I better get my hell insurance if So And So, a very smart person, is defending hell. 

But I got to thinking: How can I trust some other person any more than I can trust myself? How do I know the person whose judgments are affecting fundamental choices I'm making in my life? Would such a change be authentic anyway?

And what if this person whose ideas are influencing me has pulled a Michael Scheuer, that is to say has gone crazy even after drawing me to him with his apparent powers of reason?

The larger point is something Elaine Pagels talks about over and over when she quotes from The Gospel of Thomas: You must find the truth within yourself or perish. 

 

Jim Gaffigan Feels So Badly About Himself He Has to Believe There Is a God That Will Forgive Him

When one cultivates a worldview that addresses their psychological and spiritual condition, one may be tempted to embrace atheism as the philosophy of reason, materialism, science, and what Julia Sweeney calls naturalism. She is a naturalist, and I find her critique of religion a compelling one.

However, atheism appears inadequate to address our spiritual condition.

For one, I did not see in atheism an antidote to the human default setting for selfishness and for worshipping idols that results in our self-destruction.

For two, even if I were to concede that I could create a moral foundation without God, my atheistic philosophy would not address my interior landscape, my psychological underpinnings that too often work against me.

Atheism does not have a sufficient language to address the moral dissolution of the Id.

Atheism doesn’t have a story that explains why we are corrupt here on earth even as we long to connected to our higher self in Heaven.

Christianity and other major religions have notion of a Fall, sin, forgiveness, and atonement.

Or let me quote the Catholic comedian Jim Gaffigan who said on Bill Maher’s HBO show Real Time that he has no choice to believe in God because he feels so badly about himself and is overcome with so much self-loathing that he needs to believe that there is a divine force willing to forgive him.

Many of us, myself included, can identify with Gaffigan’s psychological disposition.

Like Gaffigan, I feel so overwhelmed by my avarice, gluttony, and selfishness that at times I wonder that only a miracle of God could abolish these odious traits. Or at least keep them in check. 

Why Pascal's Wager Is Not Bulletproof

The world’s major religions have a dualistic view of the world, the Flesh and the Spirit. People’s spiritual development helps them weaken Flesh, their selfish impulses, and helps them grow stronger in the Spirit, their altruistic, charitable inclinations.

But which religion is the best one? The major religions make competing claims. Christianity and Islam have warnings of hell. The famous Pascal’s Wager from the Christian philosopher Blaise Pascal proposes that it is better to be a Christian and have hell insurance than not be a Christian and face the eternal consequences if one ends up being wrong in the end.

But as Martin Gardner points out in The Whys of a Philosophical Scrivener, Pascal’s Wager does not protect one from the Muslim hell, so Pascal’s proposition is only based on if the Christian hell is true but no other doctrine of perdition. Therefore, if one is looking for hell insurance--and who isn’t?--Pascal’s Wager is not bulletproof.

 

David Bentley Hart and Other Writings on Universalism

Here's a compendium of universalist arguments. Hart plays down the doctrine of eternal damnation in his writings. All I can say is wow. 

Everyone Needs a Philosophy for a Fuller Life

 

During the holidays, ironically enough, people dive into an eating frenzy like some Dionysian festival of gluttony and drunkenness resulting depression and emptiness, what I call a bloated, self-loathing hangover.

 

Their metabolic state is all jacked up. The insulin is elevated. They’re in a condition of pre-diabetes or worse. Their life feels empty and meaningless. They feel like they have no self-control, they’re not agents of free will, just slaves to their tyrannical appetites.

 

They’re physically and spiritually depressed and they make a New Year’s resolution to go on a diet and exercise, and for a while they’re depression subsides as the disciplined life makes them feel better. If they find a nutritional and exercise philosophy that is life-lasting, they can turn out to be healthier and happier, but if they just glom on to the latest fad, they’re happiness will be short-lived, and they’ll fall back into their indulgent-depressive cycle again.

 

Some people find long-term results in going on a low-carb ketogenic diet; others enjoy equal success, not watching the carbs, but eating mostly plant foods.

 

What connects both groups of people together is that they have fully embraced a lifestyle change that has become a permanent part of their behavior.

 

In other words, they are consistent.

 

Being consistent, their body chemistry is in balance, as opposed to having elevated insulin levels, and they’re less likely to fall back into depression.

 

I started thinking about people who find a consistent life plan to improve their fitness and how this connects to the broader need for a life philosophy that addresses the need consistency in all areas of one’s life.

 

A healthy life philosophy of life gives you three things:

 

One. Discipline.

Two. A moral framework

Three. Meaning

 

Without discipline, a moral framework, and meaning, life is an exercise in futility and a trainwreck waiting to happen.

 

So, McMahon, what life philosophy are you espousing?

 

I don’t claim to know all the answers here. I just want to make something clear:

 

I know practicing Christians, Jews, Muslims, Buddhists, Stoics, evolutionary biologists, humanists, and political activists, who politically and spiritually have conflicting views, but they have three things in common.

 

One. Discipline, a consistent application of their principles to all areas of their life

Two. A moral framework that gives perspective and proportion to everything they do

Three. Meaning, a sense of life purpose

 

In the absence of a philosophy, one’s life is like Living During the Holidays, reckless self-abandon with eating, drinking, spending money, pursuing pleasure and on a psychological or spiritual level one has elevated insulin resulting in a general malaise, just like the dude who eats pizza and donuts becomes helplessly depressed, shackled to his bed, and soon to be featured on an Oprah makeover show where a helicopter frees him from his house and lands him in a hospital where he undergoes bariatric surgery.

 

Draws and Problems of Christianity

Draws:

Christianity says we’re all individuals with souls and God cares about us. This belief influences our notions of justice, law, morality, and shared destiny.

More specifically, Christianity tells us our default setting is on self-centered, willful, consumerist, comfort-seeking hedonists who live a life of shallowness.

I sense the Bible is right. There is a moral ark and there are floods that can overtake us. We can see these floods as sinfulness. We can also see, if we’re addicts or addictive personality types as I am, as addiction.

I’m drawn to the idea that suffering is a gift from God. Suffering equals humility and seems an antidote to bitterness and entitlement.

I’m drawn to the notion that my personal transcendence in moments marked as “Moscone Night,” “Pop Lit Day,” and “Taco Bell Night” are like Pascal’s “Night of Fire” and these moments point to our Maker. We were born to be with him, to love him, and to commune with him.

I’m drawn to the idea that we are here to serve others and that by lowering ourselves we raise ourselves. In other words, I have not seen divine guidance ore than Christ.

Problems

What Christ do we speak of? Do we speak of Christ as Calvin saw him in a Calvinistic doctrine? Do we see Christ as Augustine saw him in a similar way? What about free will Christians and the god of hell? What happens when we interpret Christ’s words about hell literally? Can we see them more as restorative punishments as universalists would argue?

What about the creepy god Dan Barker describes in the attic as he tortures non-believers in the basement? Is that Christianity’s real god or a Straw Man?

What about all the creepy passages in the OT chronicled by Dan Barker and others? Do not these passages evidence tribalistic “bros” and he-men? Is not the Bible a mixed bag?

Is it not arrogant to think someone has found the way and others are lost and to say one’s miracles are legit but other religions’ miracles are frauds and ludicrous fairy tales?

The struggle continues.

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What Kind of Jesus You Worship Determines What Kind of Christian You Are

As I read Thomas Talbott’s book The Inescapable Love of God, I am learning three schools of Christianity in relation to hell:

Christianity #1: Calvinism: Calvin and Augustine believe in limited election with eternal hell and no second chances.

Christianity #2: Arminianism: C.S. Lewis, especially early C.S. Lewis, Jerry Walls, and others believe in a free will doctrine in which God loves everyone, but free will makes it so God cannot save all. Some choose to go to hell. This belief can lead to the idea that, as C.S. Lewis wrote, hell’s bars are from the inside. In other words, hell’s inhabitants choose hell over heaven. This is a far cry from Calvinism, but Talbott argues that hell is so hideous that no reasonable person would choose it after getting a taste of it. I tend to agree with Talbott here.

Christianity #3: Universalism. Thomas Talbott, Sharon L. Baker, Bradley Jersak, Robin Parry (Gregory MacDonald), and others take the narrative thread of God’s triumphant unconditional love and argue that this love is incompatible with doctrine of eternal hell.

By necessity, passages about hell, many coming from Jesus and Revelation: outer darkness and lake of fire with weeping, wailing and gnashing of teeth are interpreted as restorative punishments or purgatory.

There is even evidence that free will hell god theists such as late C.S. Lewis and Jerry Walls came to believe in purgatory as a way of opening the door to universalism since the doctrine of hell is so odious. That eternal hell is heinous can be argued in many ways, but here’s one: William Lane Craig tries to argue, fatuously, that God must erase the saved people’s memories so they won’t be able to contemplate the tortures their loving God is doing to their unsaved loved ones.

What About Me?

I find myself having my sympathies lying with the universalists. If there is a loving God to be found in the Bible, it’s in the universalist interpretation.

I’m agnostic in that I don’t know if I can confidently interpret Jesus’ words and other biblical writers’ words about hell as anything less than the eternal varieties embraced by orthodoxy versions mentioned in versions #1 and #2 above.

But I don’t think I could be orthodox in that sense. Even if I tried, I could not, like liberal Christian Dale Martin cannot, believe in the eternal hell god. For me, hell has to be restorative.

Also I can’t worship a God who is compelled to torture us in hell forever unless he is appeased by a blood sacrifice.

Further, I cannot worship the God Dan Barker describes as a deity in the attic who tells us to play with him in the attic while the people that rejected him are tortured in this god’s basement.

Perhaps the universalists are right. Perhaps Dan Barker’s god is a Straw Man.

I find myself angry that I have been crushed by the Dan Barker definition of god for so many decades. This god is in alignment with Augustine and Calvin, and I hate this god. I agree with Sharon Baker and Thomas Talbott that if you worship an evil God, you become in way part of that God’s evil. I don’t want to be an apologist for and an aider and abettor of the eternal hell god.

But forsaking this god doesn’t give me license to be a hedonist or a bitter nihilist. Like when Viktor Frankl was released from the camps, he got on his knees and asked his Maker to save and renew him as he started his new life. I do believe in such a Maker, one that Talbott writes of and that Quaker Rufus Jones writes of in Fundamental Ends of Life.

So my struggle continues.

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Jerry Walls Evolving Views of Hell Suggests He May be a Hopeful Universalist

Excellent blog post on Jerry Walls' evolving ideas on hell. This interview is from Rachel Held Evans' website. 

Here is Evans' interview with Edward Fudge. 

And Evans interview with universalist Robin Parry. 

If Only N.T. Wright's Moral Dissolution Theory of Hell Were So Tidy

I’ve been reading authors with Christian universal sympathies such as Gregory MacDonald (The Evangelical Universalist), Sharon Baker (Razing Hell), Bradley Jersak (Her Gates Will Never Be Shut), and Peter Enns (in The Bible Tells Me So he doesn’t argue for universalism but he does include Baker’s Razing Hell in his recommended reading list).

First of all, I love these authors. I love their inability to lose hope for a loving God who in incapable of torturing God for eternity. But I’m of two minds about their arguments. While part of me sees how they integrate the notion of universalism with other parts of the Bible to create a cohesive narrative about God’s plan, a lot of their interpretations seem tortured and creative, a violation of Occam’s Razor.

There are others who make me feel better about my “hell problem.” Novelist Anne Rice is too liberal in her love of Jesus to call herself a “Christian.” She thinks for herself. Then there’s the blogger who calls himself The Christian Agnostic. He is a self-defined universalist, and I like him.

But then there’s me. I get so unhinged. I read and listen to N. T. Wright talk about hell, and he makes some good point. Like C.S. Lewis’ The Great Divorce, Wright’s hell doctrine is about the human who rejects God and rather than become his good self he decomposes in his sin. Having left God’s Ark, this reprobate soul becomes consumed by the seven deadly sins until he loses his recognizable humanity.

But the narrative isn’t so tidy. What about Viktor Frankl, a Jew, who when released from the camps got on his knees and asked God to help him start his life over? Without a Christian faith, did Frankl go down the hellish path of moral dissolution as N.T. Wright describes?

I’m reminded of a student, an atheist, who told me and the class that when her mother was dying of cancer in Vietnam, her five rich Christian brothers and sisters didn’t lift a finger to help their mother, but this atheist, with modest funds, flew back to Vietnam and cared for her mother till her death.

Then I think about Elizabeth Anderson, author of “If God Is Dead, Is Everything Permitted?” She argues that much in the Bible is immoral and that morality comes from evolution, not some tribalistic warlord God whose cruelties and barbarism are too lengthy to chronicle. I’m of two minds about Anderson. Is she committing a Straw Man? Isn’t the God of the universalists a good God? Of course, Anderson isn’t refuting the universalists’ conception of God, but the orthodox one, the one in which God tortures the unsaved forever. Even N.T. Wright’s psychological theory doesn’t do much to mitigate the cruelties of such a God. Nor does C.S. Lewis’ evolved hell theory in The Great Divorce.

Another challenge I have is Christianity's binary universe. There are the saved and the damned. And here on Earth there are the salt and light of the earth over here and the godless dehumanized wicked heathens over there. Is this binary view tenable? Or is it the inaccurate, over simplified view from a religious cult?

But there's more. Is psychological health just a matter of common sense as a secular humanist might argue? Is that all I need is some common sense? Often I wonder if I am the broken souled sinner roiling with greed, concupiscence, and self-pitying narcissism, to mention but a few of the sins that possess me. 

So where am I in light of all this conjecture? Scared? Depressed? Feeling tempted to jump off the Ark? The struggle continues.

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