Showing posts with label hell. Show all posts
Showing posts with label hell. Show all posts
Tuesday, February 10, 2026
Thursday, February 05, 2026
Friday, March 30, 2018
Did Pope Francis say there is no hell? Not quite, the Vatican insists
SUSAN MILLER | USA TODAY
4:14 p.m. EDT Mar. 29, 2018
Pope gives boy with down's syndrome gleeful ride
At the beginning of the audience, the Pope's security guards lifted a young boy with Down's Syndrome from the crowd and gave him a spot in the back of the Popemobile. (March 28)
AP
Hell hath no fury like a misquoted pope — especially when it comes to, well, hell.
Three days before Easter, the Vatican tried to tamp down a firestorm over a comment attributed to Pope Francis that hell "does not exist," which would mark a historic break with teachings of the Catholic Church.
AP
Hell hath no fury like a misquoted pope — especially when it comes to, well, hell.
Three days before Easter, the Vatican tried to tamp down a firestorm over a comment attributed to Pope Francis that hell "does not exist," which would mark a historic break with teachings of the Catholic Church.
Pope Francis washes the feet of inmates during his visit to the Regina Coeli detention center where he celebrated Mass in Rome on March 29, …
VATICAN MEDIA HANDOUT, EPA-EFE
The Vatican on Thursday rebuked Eugenio Scalfari, 93, a well-known Italian journalist who is the founder of Italy’s La Repubblicanewspaper.
When asked where "bad souls" end up, according to the article in Thursday’s La Repubblica, Francis reportedly said that those who repent can be forgiven, but those who don't repent simply "disappear."
Monday, August 08, 2016
Harvard-acquired Pentecostal collection offers up ‘gold mine’
BRANDI SIMONS FOR THE BOSTON GLOBE
Bishop Carlton Pearson was once a pastor of a megachurch in Tulsa, Okla., but eventually lost everything after he declared that eternal damnation was a human fiction.
By Lisa Wangsness
GLOBE STAFF
AUGUST 08, 2016
It took years for Bishop Carlton Pearson, a groundbreaking African-American televangelist of the late 20th century, to visit the storage locker in downtown Tulsa, Okla., that contained the remains of his once-vaunted ministry.
In 2004, he had been branded a heretic by his Pentecostal peers for declaring that there was no such thing as eternal damnation, that a loving God would save everybody. His epiphany cost him almost everything: his 5,000-member church, his television ministry, his ranch for troubled kids. As his empire crumbled, his staff stuffed some 300 crates of video footage, music recordings, photos, notes, and financial records into storage.
“It was a corpse lying in a coffin,” he recalled. “The record of my existence on this planet was in these crates. It was devastating. Devastating.”
Now, Harvard plans to exhume that corpse and give it a new life online. Pearson’s media archive, which will be digitized by Andover-Harvard Theological Library over the next two years, will offer scholars a rare unvarnished glimpse inside the closely guarded world of evangelical religious broadcasting — and the careers of some of its most notable practitioners.
Wednesday, September 03, 2014
Biden's warning to ISIS militants: 'We will follow them to the gates of hell'
By Ashley Killough, CNN
updated 6:26 PM EDT, Wed September 3, 2014
STORY HIGHLIGHTS
Of the U.S. journalists' killers, vice president says, "We will follow them to the gates of hell"
"Because hell is where they will reside," he added. "Hell is where they will reside"
Biden referenced 9/11 and the Boston bombings as examples of American resolve
Of the U.S. journalists' killers, vice president says, "We will follow them to the gates of hell"
"Because hell is where they will reside," he added. "Hell is where they will reside"
Biden referenced 9/11 and the Boston bombings as examples of American resolve
(CNN) -- Vice President Joe Biden on Wednesday issued a sharp warning to ISIS militants, saying after the United States is done grieving the death of two American journalists, their killers will have to answer for their actions.
"They should know we will follow them to the gates of hell until they are brought to justice," he forcefully told an audience at an event on the New Hampshire-Maine border. "Because hell is where they will reside. Hell is where they will reside."
Biden opened his remarks in memory of Steven Sotloff, the journalist who was beheaded by ISIS militants Tuesday, two weeks after James Foley was executed in the same horrific manner on video. Foley was from New Hampshire, while Sotloff lived there for boarding school.
ISIS video shows beheading of American journalist
Authorities close to naming ISIS militant
Remembering Steven Sotloff
ISIS blames Obama for Sotloff beheading
Describing the perpetrators as "barbarians," Biden vowed that Americans would not be frightened or intimidated by the heinous acts.
"We came back after 9/11. We dusted ourselves off and we made sure that Osama bin Laden would never, ever again threaten the American people," Biden said. "We came back Boston strong, blaming no one but resolve to be certain that this didn't happen again."
"As a nation, we're united, and when people harm Americans, we don't retreat," he later said. "We don't forget."
ISIS executions heighten fears for Western hostages
The vice president, who's mulling a 2016 presidential bid, made his remarks at the Portsmouth Naval Yard in a speech about the economy. He was accompanied on stage by U.S. Sen. Jeanne Shaheen, a New Hampshire Democrat who's running for re-election this year.
Previewing Biden's trip, the campaign for former Republican Sen. Scott Brown, who's challenging Shaheen for her seat in this year's midterms, released a Web video that shows footage of the vice president supporting President Barack Obama's foreign policy, an agenda the Brown campaign labels a "failure."
'Degrade and destroy'
After Sotloff's killing, Obama faced a chorus of bipartisan calls from Congress to act more aggressively and come up with a concrete strategy to combat ISIS, beyond the already ongoing targeted air strikes.
Speaking Wednesday, Obama addressed his much criticized statement last week that he has no strategy on ISIS. He said he was referring to a military strategy in Syria that "might" require congressional approval.
"Our objective is clear. That is to degrade and destroy (ISIS) so it's no longer a threat," he said. "We can accomplish that. It's going to take some time, it's going to take some effort."
Obama: U.S. won't back down to ISIS
The president said the world needs a regional strategy to defeat the group.
"We've been putting together a strategy that was designed to do a number of things... What we have to make sure is we have a regional strategy in place," he said.
Source: http://www.cnn.com/2014/09/03/politics/joe-biden-isis-gates-of-hell/
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Tuesday, May 31, 2011
Belief that a ‘loving God’ won’t send people to hell draws support, disagreement
Several Oklahoma religious leaders discuss their thoughts about Rob Bell’s book “Love Wins: A Book About Heaven, Hell and the Fate of Every Person Who Ever Lived.”
BY CARLA HINTON
Published: May 28, 2011
Several Oklahoma Christian clergy said they agree with a popular Michigan preacher’s idea to spread the word that God is a loving God, while at least one believes his controversial concepts may not be as far-fetched as some claim.
Rob Bell’s book “Love Wins: A Book About Heaven, Hell and the Fate of Every Person Who Ever Lived” promotes the idea that a loving God would not punish people by sending them to the eternal hell described in Scripture.
Bell, pastor of Mars Hill Bible Church, which has about 10,000 members, in Grand Rapids, Mich., has been criticized by theologians and Christian leaders across the nation because of this idea expressed in the book released March 15. At the heart of the matter is Bell’s assertion that God’s love is so big that the invitation to His grace may extend into the next life so that all can be saved. In other words, the popular evangelical pastor is saying people who reject Christ in life may have an opportunity to receive salvation after death, escaping the punishment of eternal hell that is described in the Bible.
“A staggering number of people have been taught that a few Christians will spend forever in a peaceful, joyous place called heaven, while the rest of humanity spends forever in torment and punishment in hell with no chance for anything better. It’s been clearly communicated to many that this belief is a central truth of the Christian faith and to reject it is, in essence, to reject Jesus. This is misguided and toxic and ultimately subverts the contagious spread of Jesus’ message of love, peace, forgiveness and joy that our world desperately needs to hear,” Bell wrote.
Mixed reaction
Bell’s message has stirred controversy as news of the ideas in the book spread throughout the country in recent months. For example, some LifeWay Christian Bookstores, affiliated with the Southern Baptist Convention, decided not to carry “Love Wins.”
Still, Bell’s book found support.
Richard Mouw, president of Fuller Theological Seminary in Pasadena, Calif., said the book by Bell, a Fuller graduate, was well within the bounds of orthodox or established Christianity and passionate about Jesus.
Mouw told USA Today that the real fight is between “generous orthodoxy and stingy orthodoxy.
“There are stingy people who just want to consign many others to hell and only a few to heaven and take delight in the idea. But Rob Bell allows for a lot of mystery in how Jesus reaches people.”
In Oklahoma, the Rev. Bill Pruett, pastor of St. James Catholic Church, did not say he supports Bell’s message, but he said it does seem to fit within Catholicism’s concept of purgatory. He said purgatory is a process of being purged and cleansed to be prepared for heaven.
“It’s not a place in the physical sense. It’s an experience, an experience of death, basically,” Pruett said.
Pruett said he believes that people go to purgatory when they die to be purged and cleansed “for the God of love.”
Hell, Pruett said, is a place for people who reject all grace — “the question is has it ever happened before? Only God knows.”
Pruett said some people may not see Christ’s grace for what it is until they have experienced purgatory.
“Until you are at that point of death, you don’t see it clearly,” he said. “We all walk by faith and not by sight.”
He said people should not live a moral life to avoid hell. If they do so, they have missed the point of the Lord’s message.
“Jesus came to reveal the Good News, not the ‘terrifying news.’”
People ‘waking up’
Another supporter of the concepts featured in Bell’s book may be familiar to many Oklahomans.
Carlton Pearson was once a popular Tulsa evangelist and pastor of the Tulsa megachurch Higher Dimensions. He also was a protege of the late televangelist and native Oklahoman Oral Roberts.
Pearson shared his agreement with Bell in a recent CNN interview about “Love Wins.”
“People are waking up,” Pearson said. “You’d have thought the guy read some of my books based on some of the comments he’s making.”
Indeed, Pearson also has preached the message that most people will receive salvation because of Christ’s death on the cross and regardless of their faith in Him. His proclamation of that message, which he called the “Gospel of Inclusion” beginning about 2002, drew condemnation from numerous evangelical quarters, including Roberts, who publicly severed ties with the younger preacher.
Also, Higher Dimensions, once 5,000-members strong, began to lose members, and the church building went into foreclosure. Pearson decided to share space with another Tulsa church to hold services for his remaining congregation. Pearson eventually left Tulsa to serve as interim pastor of a New Thought church in Chicago, but he has since left that church and now has a Web-based teaching ministry in Chicago.
Is it ‘universalism’?
Mark Hitchcock, pastor of Faith Bible Church in Edmond, said he has begun preaching a Wednesday night sermon series on the topic of hell because many people have been discussing Bell’s book.
He said he is among the clergy who believe that Bell’s idea about hell is universalism, because it promotes the central idea that all people will receive salvation regardless of their faith in Christ. Hitchcock said universalism is counter to Christianity’s core message that people are saved only through faith in Jesus Christ. Bell’s assertion that people who rejected Christ in life will escape the punishment of hell is counter to biblical teaching, Hitchcock said.
“The Bible does teach that there is a literal place called hell and there will be people there,” Hitchcock said. “Jesus taught more than anyone that there is a hell.”
Hitchcock said Bell is attempting to adapt Scripture to fit what he wants it to say.
Views of God’s love
Hitchcock said Bell’s book is an example of the “ear-tickling” mentioned in 2 Timothy 4, which says that some people will not endure sound doctrine, turning their ears away from truth to myths.
The Rev. Wade Burleson, senior pastor of Emmanuel Baptist Church in Enid, said he agrees with Bell’s central premise about the loving nature of God.
“I admire his intentions to present a good and gracious and loving God,” Burleson said.
But Burleson said he thinks Bell gives false hope to people because they will think they can go to heaven whether or nor they believe in Christ.
Ideas not new
Alan Bandy, the Rowena R. Strickland assistant professor of New Testament at Oklahoma Baptist University in Shawnee, said Bell’s ideas are not new. Bandy also said Bell’s premise is universalism.
He said his concern is that Bell talks about truth being “like a trampoline.”
“It’s not fixed and absolute. It’s flexible. But this is trying to adapt the Bible to our current time to make it more palatable. With a view that truth is stretchy, you can basically say, ‘Well, that’s not what it means.’”
Source: http://newsok.com/belief-that-a-loving-god-wont-send-people-to-hell-draws-support-disagreement/article/3571874#ixzz1NxD7hKYi
.
BY CARLA HINTON
Published: May 28, 2011
Several Oklahoma Christian clergy said they agree with a popular Michigan preacher’s idea to spread the word that God is a loving God, while at least one believes his controversial concepts may not be as far-fetched as some claim.
Rob Bell’s book “Love Wins: A Book About Heaven, Hell and the Fate of Every Person Who Ever Lived” promotes the idea that a loving God would not punish people by sending them to the eternal hell described in Scripture.
Bell, pastor of Mars Hill Bible Church, which has about 10,000 members, in Grand Rapids, Mich., has been criticized by theologians and Christian leaders across the nation because of this idea expressed in the book released March 15. At the heart of the matter is Bell’s assertion that God’s love is so big that the invitation to His grace may extend into the next life so that all can be saved. In other words, the popular evangelical pastor is saying people who reject Christ in life may have an opportunity to receive salvation after death, escaping the punishment of eternal hell that is described in the Bible.
“A staggering number of people have been taught that a few Christians will spend forever in a peaceful, joyous place called heaven, while the rest of humanity spends forever in torment and punishment in hell with no chance for anything better. It’s been clearly communicated to many that this belief is a central truth of the Christian faith and to reject it is, in essence, to reject Jesus. This is misguided and toxic and ultimately subverts the contagious spread of Jesus’ message of love, peace, forgiveness and joy that our world desperately needs to hear,” Bell wrote.
Mixed reaction
Bell’s message has stirred controversy as news of the ideas in the book spread throughout the country in recent months. For example, some LifeWay Christian Bookstores, affiliated with the Southern Baptist Convention, decided not to carry “Love Wins.”
Still, Bell’s book found support.
Richard Mouw, president of Fuller Theological Seminary in Pasadena, Calif., said the book by Bell, a Fuller graduate, was well within the bounds of orthodox or established Christianity and passionate about Jesus.
Mouw told USA Today that the real fight is between “generous orthodoxy and stingy orthodoxy.
“There are stingy people who just want to consign many others to hell and only a few to heaven and take delight in the idea. But Rob Bell allows for a lot of mystery in how Jesus reaches people.”
In Oklahoma, the Rev. Bill Pruett, pastor of St. James Catholic Church, did not say he supports Bell’s message, but he said it does seem to fit within Catholicism’s concept of purgatory. He said purgatory is a process of being purged and cleansed to be prepared for heaven.
“It’s not a place in the physical sense. It’s an experience, an experience of death, basically,” Pruett said.
Pruett said he believes that people go to purgatory when they die to be purged and cleansed “for the God of love.”
Hell, Pruett said, is a place for people who reject all grace — “the question is has it ever happened before? Only God knows.”
Pruett said some people may not see Christ’s grace for what it is until they have experienced purgatory.
“Until you are at that point of death, you don’t see it clearly,” he said. “We all walk by faith and not by sight.”
He said people should not live a moral life to avoid hell. If they do so, they have missed the point of the Lord’s message.
“Jesus came to reveal the Good News, not the ‘terrifying news.’”
People ‘waking up’
Another supporter of the concepts featured in Bell’s book may be familiar to many Oklahomans.
Carlton Pearson was once a popular Tulsa evangelist and pastor of the Tulsa megachurch Higher Dimensions. He also was a protege of the late televangelist and native Oklahoman Oral Roberts.
Pearson shared his agreement with Bell in a recent CNN interview about “Love Wins.”
“People are waking up,” Pearson said. “You’d have thought the guy read some of my books based on some of the comments he’s making.”
Indeed, Pearson also has preached the message that most people will receive salvation because of Christ’s death on the cross and regardless of their faith in Him. His proclamation of that message, which he called the “Gospel of Inclusion” beginning about 2002, drew condemnation from numerous evangelical quarters, including Roberts, who publicly severed ties with the younger preacher.
Also, Higher Dimensions, once 5,000-members strong, began to lose members, and the church building went into foreclosure. Pearson decided to share space with another Tulsa church to hold services for his remaining congregation. Pearson eventually left Tulsa to serve as interim pastor of a New Thought church in Chicago, but he has since left that church and now has a Web-based teaching ministry in Chicago.
Is it ‘universalism’?
Mark Hitchcock, pastor of Faith Bible Church in Edmond, said he has begun preaching a Wednesday night sermon series on the topic of hell because many people have been discussing Bell’s book.
He said he is among the clergy who believe that Bell’s idea about hell is universalism, because it promotes the central idea that all people will receive salvation regardless of their faith in Christ. Hitchcock said universalism is counter to Christianity’s core message that people are saved only through faith in Jesus Christ. Bell’s assertion that people who rejected Christ in life will escape the punishment of hell is counter to biblical teaching, Hitchcock said.
“The Bible does teach that there is a literal place called hell and there will be people there,” Hitchcock said. “Jesus taught more than anyone that there is a hell.”
Hitchcock said Bell is attempting to adapt Scripture to fit what he wants it to say.
Views of God’s love
Hitchcock said Bell’s book is an example of the “ear-tickling” mentioned in 2 Timothy 4, which says that some people will not endure sound doctrine, turning their ears away from truth to myths.
The Rev. Wade Burleson, senior pastor of Emmanuel Baptist Church in Enid, said he agrees with Bell’s central premise about the loving nature of God.
“I admire his intentions to present a good and gracious and loving God,” Burleson said.
But Burleson said he thinks Bell gives false hope to people because they will think they can go to heaven whether or nor they believe in Christ.
Ideas not new
Alan Bandy, the Rowena R. Strickland assistant professor of New Testament at Oklahoma Baptist University in Shawnee, said Bell’s ideas are not new. Bandy also said Bell’s premise is universalism.
He said his concern is that Bell talks about truth being “like a trampoline.”
“It’s not fixed and absolute. It’s flexible. But this is trying to adapt the Bible to our current time to make it more palatable. With a view that truth is stretchy, you can basically say, ‘Well, that’s not what it means.’”
Source: http://newsok.com/belief-that-a-loving-god-wont-send-people-to-hell-draws-support-disagreement/article/3571874#ixzz1NxD7hKYi
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