Tony Jones tackles the subject of Judas Iscariot and what he refers to as "Christian universalism." His discussion rubs up against a discussion we had here earlier about the desire for some notion of ultimate, eschatological justice, the unbiblical idea of Hell and what I called "the Hitler Question."
In that earlier post, I noted that I do believe in some form of ultimate accountability — eschatological justice that can address the injustices of this world. I also noted that what this might look like was something about which I could only speculate. We Christians have done a great deal of speculating about Heaven and Hell — imagining with such vivid detail that most of us seem to have forgotten that nearly all of that detail is pure speculation (and the rest is mostly impure speculation).
But allow me to reflect for a moment on some of that speculation. I want to consider for a moment two traditionally held beliefs about Heaven and their implications.
First is the usual belief that Heaven is a place of healing and restoration. The blind will see, the deaf will hear, the lame will walk and run and leap and dance. All that is fallen or broken, cursed or damaged, warped, stunted, diseased, deformed, crushed, twisted, disordered, destroyed, lost or missing will be made whole.
That's a beautiful and joyous image. Charles Wesley captures some of that beauty and joy in one of my favorite hymns:
Hear him ye deaf, his praise ye dumb
Your loosened tongues employ
Ye blind behold your savior come
And leap ye lame for joy.
The second point is related to the first: Heaven will be free of sin. The idea here is not that we will all be on our best behavior there in the unmediated presence of God. It's more than that. The idea is that we will no longer be fallen, sinful creatures.
Put those two things together and the cumulative effect is terrifying.
Do you see where I'm going with this? Take away every sinful attitude, every capacity for contempt, disdain and disregard and everything that might mute or muzzle conscience. Then take away every physiological or psychological impediment to memory and empathy.
Do you see what I mean by terrifying? Some of you, perhaps, may have attempted to approach something like this as an effort to fulfill two of the "12 Steps." The eighth and ninth of those steps read as follows:
8. Made a list of all persons we had harmed and became willing to make amends to them all.
9. Made direct amends to such people wherever possible, except when to do so would injure them or others.
Not easy. And progressively more difficult as the process leads one to an increasing awareness and honesty about the harm and injury we have done to others — directly or indirectly, by commission or by omission.
Now imagine attempting that same process with complete, unfettered and unfiltered honesty, and with perfect memory, and with access to comprehensive, big-picture knowledge that our current, limited perspectives do not fully allow.
Terrifying. Even if you're a saint — a Francis of Assisi or a Gandhi who treads lightly in this world, loving as best as anyone can or could, avoiding and minimizing every harm to every neighbor, stranger or enemy, every creature and sacred thing — even then this prospect of perfect, unencumbered memory combined with perfect, unencumbered empathy is terrifying.
And this is Heaven we're talking about — not Hell, not purgatory. This is our common notion of reward, not of judgement, and yet it seems as though it might be judgement enough — an almost unbearable judgement, survivable only if accompanied by an overwhelming and overflowing mercy.
Speculation, only speculation. A guess and a wild guess at that. But in any case, there it is — my wild guess as to how the problem of eschatological justice might be resolved. It's a better guess — more logical, more biblically supportable — and a far less wild guess than the unbiblical human invention of Hell.
Addendum: For an earlier, longer discussion of the unbiblical and utterly unliteral invention of Hell, please see H – E – double hockey sticks.
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