Eternity as Uninterrupted Flow: A Reflection on Heaven, Ecstasy and the Difficult Work of Being-in-Time

  

Abstract

In Western philosophy and theology it is traditional to think of movement as an imperfection, as a sign that something lacks being (ousia). There is movement in time and only in time. In eternity, which is timeless duration, there is no movement. In the following this formula is inverted and an alternative sense of “movement” explored. Time impedes movement; eternity is unimpeded flow. In time it is possible to step back, to hold oneself in reserve, to change one’s mind, to have a charge of heart. To renew one’s devotion to God. To initiate once more one’s love for God. To build a character. To add merit upon merit. But when our time is over and we enter into eternity, our real movement begins. From this point on there is an unending movement in which what we are manifests itself continually and necessarily. If by “movement” we mean change or process then there is no movement in eternity. But “movement” can also mean flow. In time alone it is possible for things to have stasis—for things to hold themselves back, for the natural flow of things to be impeded. Stasis is an imperfection, a lack of ek-stasis. Eternity is uninterrupted movement/flow.

 

Eternity as Uninterrupted Flow

In the next life our fundamental orientation cannot be altered. The trajectory of our will remains fixed; we are unable to veer further up or down, further to the left or to the right. The condition in which we find ourselves after death determines the direction we go. We soar or sink toward our heart’s treasure. Such, at least, is the majority Christian view.[1]

For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also. (Mt 6:21, NIV)

In the next life there is no such thing as “movement”, if by that we mean a change of heart—either conversion to the light or a falling away. Nonetheless, in heaven there is a continual unfolding of who we are in relation to God and others. (Is there some sort of dynamic “unfolding” of things in hell? I don’t know. I’m not interested in that here). The unfolding of things in heaven is never exhausted. Manifestation follows upon manifestation for all eternity, in an ending act of parousia (the full presence of God and His Truth).

In heaven there is uninhibited dynamism and activity. How could it be otherwise, given that, in the words of Hans Urs von Balthasar, the triune God is eternal Ereignis, unending Event of Love? In heaven we orbit around God. Or rather, we spiral ever-inward into the infinitesimal centre of God. We plummet forever into God the absolute vortex, God the thrice-holy “white hole” at the centre of everything. As flames of love we fall into God helplessly, and our helplessness is beatitude, ecstasy, unspeakable joy.

But in time our movement into the Good (or into sin) is discontinuous. It is broken up into discrete, accumulated moments of decision. Time thrusts us forward, again and again, into the next test, the next situation. What will I choose? Will I accept this grace or reject it? Will I continue in this fashion or change course? Will I succumb to this temptation or will I resist? Will I take the path of least resistance, following my weaker nature? Or will I obey the promptings of grace? Only on rare occasions in this life does a person completely “lose herself” in ecstasy—and when she does, it is only for a while. The ecstatic “loss of oneself” is never perfect in this life, as it is for those in the full presence of God.

We do not want to be annihilated. But we do want to lose ourselves in love. Our fundamental desire to “let ourselves go” in response to the ultimate Good defines us as persons made in the image of God. The state of holding ourselves in reserve, in distrust, in existential uncertainty, or in regimented self-control—that is not our destiny. The condition of having to choose to give oneself over, again and again each moment, in a renewed expression of our commitment to love, over-against whatever resistance remains in our nature—that is not our final destiny either.

Is this the predicament that lovers are attempting to overcome in their erotic love—the predicament of being-in-time? Is this the motivation for the various addictions and other attempts to achieve some form of ecstasy or state of complete rest? Our desire to be immersed in the flow of eternity, no longer journeying through time as a pilgrim? We tire from walking. Constantly overcoming gravity and friction can be gruelling work. We want to let go and stop fighting. We want to fall and glide. The alcoholic reaches for a bottle of wine. The porn addict falls into a moving image. And so on. We are looking for uninterrupted flow; we want to fall into a single object or experience and let everything go. We need consolation for the struggle of being-in-time. There is pain and tension in not being able (yet) to lose oneself.

This is why hope is necessary. Without the supernatural virtue of hope, could any of us delay the spiritual gratification of total release? Could any of us resist the temptation to lose ourselves prematurely and plummet into some inner-worldly object?

Perfect freedom is being so possessed by the divine Beloved that one no longer has free-will. To be sure, volition remains in the next life. Acts of the will shall continue in eternity. We repeat our loving “yes” to God and to everything He loves, over and over, forever. But this “yes” is not a free-will decision against a possible “no”. In heaven, “no” is no longer possible. The “yes” emerges from us necessarily; it is a wave surging through us unstoppably. It is indeed our yes—we put our personal stamp on the love that flows through us. We do the agreeing, the affirming, the loving, the consenting (though it is God who does all this in first place—we add our names in second place). But in heaven there is nothing left in us by which we could possibly resist the incessant waves of love surging through our being. In that state of perfection (perfect holiness), what could possibly impede the flow of love into us and through us? What could halt the flow of our praise?

In heaven we can no longer “stand back” and choose between various options. We cannot hold some calculating mind or self-determining liberty in reserve. The time for decision-making between good and evil—or between stronger and weaker correspondence to grace—is over. Everything we do and say in heaven is ours (this “doing” is not work, for there is nothing left to overcome within or without ourselves). To be sure, all of our doing and saying in heaven is, in the first place, the doing and the saying of God—God acting in us, God passing through us and back to Himself. God loving Himself, God uttering Himself in and through His beloved creatures. Even so, everything that happens to us and in us and through us—all of this is willed by us. It happens freely. We allow it to happen. But our allowing happens necessarily—we cannot do otherwise. And this is our joy, this is our true freedom—that we cannot do otherwise than love, for all eternity.

This is consummate union with the Beloved: having neither the slightest impurity nor the slightest capacity to hesitate or swerve in our love for Him. Finally, a person now is a lover of God—she has been given ousia, confirmed in unchanging being. Whereas in time, the person had to choose again and again to love God, merely imitating the eternal form, the ousia of the lover. In time, the eternal flow of love—the unending, continuous, ecstatic and necessary movement of love—is merely hinted at in and between the moments. We touch upon that flow and begin to be drawn into its movement whenever we behold someone beautiful or participate in something glorious; our soul then sprouts wings (as in Plato’s Phaedrus); we recall the ecstatic flow for which each of us is destined. Perfect flow is the absence of hesitation, the absence of self-reserve, the ecstatic inability to hold anything of oneself back. It is the total involvement of oneself—the ecstatic breaking-forth releasing every last drop of the mystery of our being—in the unending Now of Love. A perfectly fluid yielding of oneself, a maximal fluidity that is impossible as long as we are in time. In time we choose and shape our final condition in step-wise fashion; in eternity our final condition unfolds and we plummet helplessly into our heart’s treasure.

Moments in time are divided from each other, thus breaking up the flow of eternity. Eternity still manages to break into time; even now we can begin to participate in its flow. By grace—and what grace!—we are allowed to “practice” that flow for ourselves, as apprentice saints. Yet free-choice remains, and the glory of eternity is shrouded (these two facts are connected). We enter into the flow but we can also drop out of that flow again in some way. The flow of the Holy descends into our midst—but then withdraws. Mundane realities and practical necessities impose themselves again. Perhaps the grace was only given to us for a certain time. Or perhaps we begin to reflect too much on ourselves, or on peripheral things—or worse, we begin the descent into sin. In any case, to be wholly and continually immersed in—and completely unable to withdraw from—the perfect flow of eternity is our final destination. It is not our experience of being-in-time.

There is a sense, then, in which time interrupts movement. In time it is possible to step back, to hold oneself in reserve, to change one’s mind, to have a charge of heart. To renew, time and again, one’s devotion to God. To initiate once more (in response to God’s prevenient grace) one’s love for God. To build a character. To add merit upon merit—or to heap coals upon our heads.

Do not store up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moths and vermin destroy, and where thieves break in and steal. But store up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where moths and vermin do not destroy, and where thieves do not break in and steal. (Mt 6:19-20, NIV).

But when our time is over, and we enter into eternity, our real movement begins. It is an unending movement in which what we are (in relation to God and others) manifests itself continually and necessarily.

The continual unfolding of oneself before God and with others cannot be stopped. All the same, it is the person who wills it. A person wills this manifestation necessarily, forever, on the basis of who and what he is. This manifestation of oneself does not take any glory away from God. For the creature who speaks and acts on the basis of holiness—the dignity of every citizen of heaven—glorifies God in everything.

If by “movement” we mean change or process (including the process of maturing) then there is no movement in eternity. But “movement” can also mean flow. And this precisely is what eternity is: uninterrupted flow.

 

 

---

[1] For a Catholic articulation see the Catechism of the Catholic Church §§393, 1023-1029, 1033-1037. For the view of Thomas Aquinas, refer to Summa Contra Gentiles Book 4, §95 or this useful commentary by Edward Feser.

 

Freedom vs Freedom: One Example of Equivocation in "That All Shall be Saved"

 

While reading David Bentley Hart’s That All Shall be Saved, one thing that stood out for me (apart from the book's many positive qualities) is Hart's tendency to equivocate. Without warning or comment he will slide between different meanings of the same term in the same argumentative sequence. Here's one particularly telling example, from pp. 178-79.

 

For those who worry that this all amounts to a kind of metaphysical determinism of the will, I may not be able to provide perfect comfort. Of course it is a kind of determinism, but only at the transcendental level, and only because rational volition must be determinate to be anything at all. Rational will is by nature the capacity for intentional action, and so must exist as a clear relation between (in Aristotelian terms) the “origin of motion” within it and the “end” that prompts that motion—between, that is, its efficient and final causes. Freedom is a relation to reality, which means liberty from delusion. This divine determinism toward the transcendent Good, then, is precisely what freedom is for a rational nature.

 

Here Hart defines freedom as a certain “relation to reality” which implies “liberty from delusion.” He also defines it as the “divine determinism” of the rational will or the person “toward the transcendent Good.”

 

This is rather confusing. Let’s begin with the second definition (freedom as the “divine determinism” of the rational will toward the Good). Hart appears to be saying that freedom is the intrinsic orientation of a person (or the rational will, or a rational nature) toward God, the transcendent Good. Following that definition, a person has freedom even when he is caught up in sin and delusion. For surely, Hart does not want to say that sin and delusion remove a person’s basic orientation toward the Good (for his argument here rests on the claim that a person can never extinguish his basic orientation toward the Good). Nor does Hart deny that sin and delusion are possible for a human person in this life. He explicitly affirms that possibility later on (p. 179):

 

That is not to deny that, within the embrace of this relation between the will's origin and its end in the Good (what, again, Maximus the Confessor calls our "natural will"), there is considerable room for deliberative liberty with regard to differing finite options (what Maximus calls the "gnomic will") and considerable room in which to stray from the ideal path.

 

But if a sufficient condition for having “freedom” is being a rational nature that is intrinsically oriented toward the Good, and if this sufficient condition is fulfilled—and the person still “free”—even when he is caught up in sin and delusion, then freedom does not mean liberty from delusion. And yet Hart says, in the first defining sentence, that “freedom is a relation to reality, which means liberty from delusion."

 

Perhaps we need to go back and re-interpret Hart when he says that “divine determinism toward the transcendent Good … is precisely what freedom is for a rational nature.” I assumed above that, for Hart, the “divine determinism toward the transcendent Good” is just the person’s intrinsic orientation toward the Good (and that the orientation is “divine” in the sense that it is caused by and directed to God). But as we just saw, this assumption doesn’t fit with Hart’s other claim that “freedom means liberty from delusion.” So let’s make a different assumption. Perhaps what Hart means is that a person is free—and conditioned by a certain “divine determinism toward the transcendent Good”—inasmuch as he is liberated from sin and delusion. If that is the case, then what Hart means by freedom in this passage is perfect liberty from sin—the inability to sin (non posse peccare) (See Augustine, Enchiridion on Faith, Hope and Love, ch. 28, §105). On this definition of freedom, a person is “free” insofar as he is able to love God and unable to reject God.

 

For the sake of clarity--which is always necessary in a theological or philosophical debate--I will refer to freedom in this sense (non posse peccare) as “true freedom*” (the reader should not automatically assume that when Hart writes “true freedom” he means “true freedom* as defined here).

 

“Freedom” appears in two consecutive sentences in the quoted passage. “Freedom is a relation to reality, which means liberty from delusion. This divine determinism toward the transcendent Good, then, is precisely what freedom is for a rational nature.” One would assume that Hart doesn’t mean freedom in two different senses here. To slip from one definition or understanding to another, in such a short space, with no warning, while making an argument about freedom, would indicate a momentary lapse of reason, if not philosophical incompetence. It would be uncharitable to assume that Hart’s logic is flawed in that way. So let's assume that Hart doesn’t flit from one meaning of “freedom” to another from one sentence to the next. What then does he mean by “freedom”? He means “true freedom*” (non posse peccare). What else could he mean, given his claim that “freedom is a relation to reality, which means liberty from delusion”?

 

From here we should go back and reinterpret Hart’s claim that “This divine determinism toward the transcendent Good … is precisely what freedom is for a rational nature” (my emphasis). By “divine determinism toward the transcendent Good”, Hart must mean something over and above the intrinsic orientation of a person toward God. For by “freedom” Hart means true freedom* (such at least is our working hypothesis). And presumably, Hart doesn’t want to say that, by simply being oriented toward the Good as a rational nature, a person has true freedom* and is therefore unable to sin!

 

Unfortunately, this cannot be right. For Hart says later on (on the same page--p. 179):

 

yes, there is an original and ultimate divine determinism of the creature’s intellect and will, and for just this reason there is such a thing as true freedom in the created realm.

 

There is no indication in that statement, or in the paragraphs immediately preceding it (these concern the “natural end” of the will), that Hart is distinguishing between the intrinsic orientation of the person toward God on one hand, and the “divine determinism” of the person (or his/her intellect and will) on the other. And why would Hart qualify said “divine determinism” as original if he understood it to be some further condition of grace or liberation that might be added to the person over and above her intrinsic orientation toward God?

 

As it turns out, then, Hart does flit from one understanding (definition/sense) of “freedom” to another in the space of just two sentences! “Freedom is a relation to reality, which means liberty from delusion. This divine determinism toward the transcendent Good, then, is precisely what freedom is for a rational nature.” In the first sentence, “freedom” is true freedom*: the spiritual condition of being so liberated from disorder and illusion that one necessarily (yet voluntarily) loves God above all things (non posse peccare). In the second sentence, being intrinsically oriented toward God as created spirit is a sufficient condition for having “freedom”—indeed it is “precisely what freedom is for a rational nature”—and this freedom is not true freedom*, for it is compatible with sin and delusion.

 

If there is another way of interpreting the quoted passage that does not involve Hart in either self-contradiction or equivocation in respect to the meaning of “freedom”, perhaps Hart or one of his defenders should come forward with it. I think it's more likely that Hart didn't think through the meaning and implications of his two "definitions" of freedom in this particular sequence, and so wrote something that he didn't really mean.

 

What makes this unsettling is the fact that the equivocation occurs across two sentences in a row, where a particular term is being explicitly defined! To make things worse, in the second case Hart says he is being "precise": "This divine determinism ... is precisely what freedom is for a rational nature [my emphasis]."

 

To be fair, there are other passages concerning freedom in the book; Hart isn't always this unclear in his use of terms. (See, e.g., pp. 36-38).

The Source of the Disagreement Between Universalists and Infernalists: A Pared Down Follow-Up

This is a shorter (< 1000 words) and simpler version of the main argument contained in my previous post. I approach things from a slightly different angle here, however, and the wording is different.

The animals going in were male and female of every living thing, as God had commanded Noah. Then the LORD shut him in. 

Gen 7:16 (NIV, my emphasis).

Painting by Jan van 't Hoff.

 

      I begin with two theses:

(1) Our hearts are restless until they rest in God 

      [A truth made famous by Augustine in his Confessions. Cf. Points (8) and (9) in the previous post].

(2) God is able to put each created person into a situation that would non-violently necessitate her acceptance of the love of God and infallibly secure her salvation.

To say that God “is able” to put each created person into the situation described above is to say that for a created person to be in that situation and be necessitated non-violently to accept the love of God, does not involve any inherent contradiction. One can be “non-violently” necessitated to accept the love of God in the sense that under certain conditions, one cannot help but turn to God in love. It is understood that this turning to God in love is voluntary—it is willed whole-heartedly, with sufficiently clear knowledge that there is genuine consent—and perfective—for loving communion with God is the deepest desire of each person, and its realisation represents one’s final perfection. “Voluntary” does not imply libertarian free-will—i.e., the simultaneous ability to will X and not-X under the same conditions.

The first thesis supports the second. The reason that God is able to non-violently necessitate our love for Him is that we are made for Him—our essential will is oriented to the Good, which is God.

It is traditional Catholic teaching that, while the saints in heaven love God voluntarily, they are not free (with libertarian free-will) to turn away from God. To enjoy the beatific vision is to be in a situation that non-violently necessitates one’s total adherence to God. However, someone who accepts (2) is not thereby committed to

(3) The only situation that could non-violently necessitate a person’s acceptance of the love of God and infallibly secure her salvation, is having a vision of God (and the Truth) that is equal to the beatific vision in clarity, if not in duration.

For it is conceivable that a person could be gifted with a certain “intervention”—say, an abundant outpouring of grace, coupled perhaps with an abundantly clear vision of her soteriological situation—without (yet) having the sort of vision described in (3), where this “intervention” non-violently necessitates the person’s acceptance of the love of God and infallibly secures her salvation. Nor does (2) commit one to

(4) The only situation that could possibly secure a person’s salvation non-violently and infallibly, is one that non-violently necessitates immediate and total adherence to God.

For it is conceivable that the situation that secures the person’s salvation infallibly is one that puts him immediately (and necessarily) onto a path of conversion and/or purification which will inevitably lead to total adherence to God.

In the previous post I defined “infernalism” as the view that (i) all created spirits exist forever (no person is annihilated), (ii) hell exists, (iii) some human persons/souls go to hell after their time on earth has ended, and (iv) whoever goes to hell (after their particular judgement) remains there forever in conscious torment. Can an infernalist consistently accept theses (1) and (2) above? He certainly can. For (2) is consistent with

(5) While God can put each created person into a salvation-securing situation, He need not, and in fact, He chooses not to.

A “salvation-securing situation” is a situation that non-violently necessitates the person’s acceptance of the love of God and infallibly secures their salvation. My argument turns on this point. If memory serves me, (5) represents the  position taken in Fr William Most's book, Grace, Predestination and the Salvific Will of God (2004).

Note that (5) is consistent with (6), the claim that God puts some people into a salvation-securing situation:

(6) There is a (non-empty) set of created persons such that for each member M of this set, God puts M into a salvation-securing situation.

Point (5) is even consistent with (7), the claim that God has decreed to put some people into a salvation-securing situation regardless of any individual merit of theirs:

(7) There is a (non-empty) set of created persons such that for each member M of this set (i) God puts M into a salvation-securing situation and (ii) God’s (eternal) decision to do so is not responsive to any previous merit of M.

“Previous merit” is merit attained by the person when he acted with free-will temporally prior to the salvation-securing situation. Previous merit is foreseen by God—it is temporally “previous” with respect to the salvation-securing situation, but not in respect to God’s knowledge.

It is conceivable that some of those who happen to fall into the category described in (6) do not fall into the category described in (7). Suppose someone is so faithful to God in her free-will responses to grace across her life that God deems it fitting to put her (eventually) into a salvation-securing situation. Suppose also that God wouldn’t have put that person into a salvation-securing question if she hadn’t been so faithful. In that case, God decision to put the person into a salvation-securing situation is responsive to a previous merit of that person.

I subscribe to infernalism. I also subscribe to (1), (2), (5) and (7). In my view, our hearts our restless until they rest in God (point 1), and while God is able to put each created person into a salvation-securing situation (point 2), He chooses to do this for some people only (point 5). In some or all of these cases God’s decision to do so is not responsive to any previous merit in the person concerned (point 7). Point (7) is not essential to my main argument, however.

This much should be abundantly clear by now: simply pointing out the truth of the first two theses above is no argument in favour of universalism. In order to refute infernalism, the universalist has to refute (5) by introducing a further premise or set of premisses.

Where the Chasm Really Lies: A Libertarian Infernalist Responds to Fr Aidan Kimel

[Warning: The following “blog entry” (!) turned out to be almost 6000 words. I guess I'm going to have to convert it into an actual journal article ... ]

 Christ and the Rich Young Ruler, by Heinrich Hofmann, 1889

 

~ 1 ~

In a blog post responding to recent reviews of David Bentley Hart's That All Shall be Saved, Fr Aidan Kimel writes:

“The infernalist needs to demonstrate, not just assume, that it is possible for a human being to extinguish within himself all desire for the Good.” [Quotation 1]

He also writes:

“Even when we reject God, we are seeking God. An unquenchable desire for deifying union with our Creator constitutes who we are as human beings. For this reason, no person, no matter how wicked and vicious, can definitively close himself to the gracious influence of his Creator. His desire for the Good is ineradicable.” [Quotation 2]

I respond to these claims below. It is not my intention to evaluate or respond to the entire post from which these quotation were taken—let alone to review or evaluate Hart’s book as a whole. First some groundwork. An infernalist is someone who believes that

(1) all created spirits exist forever (no person is annihilated),

(2) hell exists,

(3) some human persons/souls go to hell after their time on earth has ended, and

(4) God has decreed that whoever goes to hell (after their particular judgement*) shall remain there forever in conscious torment.

*For human persons, the particular judgement follows immediately after one’s time on earth has ended. There are a number of testimonies of people who claim that they died and found themselves in a place that they describe as being hell, but who were revived either through natural means or miraculously. Some even report that they were shown what would have been their place in hell if God did not give them another chance in a revived life. I am firmly of the belief that at least some of these people are faithfully reporting a real experience and that the latter is spiritually “objective”—that it was not merely an hallucination caused by, say, a temporary lack of oxygen in the brain, and that their interpretation of the experience is largely correct (they were in hell, not purgatory). Suppose I am right on this. Suppose that that some people have indeed come back to life after finding themselves in hell after (temporary) death. Because God knew that these souls would be given another chance at life, they were not subject to their particular judgement this time around, properly speaking. They were merely “visiting” hell, if you will. To “go to hell”, as I am defining it, is to enter hell after one has been judged by God (the particular judgement). To visit hell is not yet to “go to hell” in the sense I am using here—though I assume it is possible for a human person to visit hell and then actually go to hell after an unrepentant (second chance at) life.

From (4) it follows that

(5) Whoever goes to hell remains there forever in conscious torment.

For whatever God decrees, necessarily comes to pass (this follows from my definition of a divine decree). Thus (4) rules out the possibility of conversion or purification as a way of getting out of hell and into heaven; it also rules out annihilation. One might attempt to make sense of (4) by saying that

(6) The damned are effectively trapped in hell on account of some special positive action of God—apart from this restraining action, such souls would be able to find their way out (through a change of heart, for example).

But a more satisfactory explanation is to say

(7) The only metaphysically possible way for a soul to get out of hell, given the soul’s condition upon its entrance into hell, would be through a special divine intervention.

Keeping to (4) and (7), one might say that God ensures that the damned stay in hell, not by actively keeping them there by some positively restraining action, but by never intervening so as to retrieve them or provide them with a lifeline. On this view, the damned in hell are left forever to their own devices—devices which are forever impotent for their salvation (God continues to sustain them in being, however).

A universalist believes that hell exists but denies that hell is forever for any person—human or angelic—who goes to hell. Every spiritual entity that goes to hell passes through hell (perhaps after aeons upon aeons), eventually to end up in heaven. Universalists agree with

(1) all created spirits exist forever,

(2) hell exists, and

(3) some human persons/souls go to hell after their time on earth has ended.

But they reject

(5) whoever goes to hell remains there forever in conscious torment

and therefore also

(4) God has decreed that whoever goes to hell shall remain there forever in conscious torment.

In place of (4) the universalist says: God has decreed that anyone (human or angel) who goes to hell shall not remain there forever in conscious torment—they shall pass through the purifying fires of hell on the way to heaven.

~ 2 ~

Now to return to the first claim in question:

“The infernalist needs to demonstrate, not just assume, that it is possible for a human being to extinguish within himself all desire for the Good.”

Fr Kimel agrees with David Bentley Hart that

(8) The human person is fundamentally oriented toward the Good (which is God)

And that

(9) The human person requires the beatific vision in order to be perfectly happy.

This, in fact, is the view of Thomas Aquinas. However, universalists reject Aquinas’s claim that

(10) It is possible for a created person (angelic or human) to set himself in opposition to God forever, and to do this voluntarily.

(This claim is common in the Latin West and is not unique to Aquinas). I accept (10) and understand it to mean that there are created persons who, while not being predestined to hell in the Calvinist sense, are able to reject God freely and definitively. Hell is a genuinely possible destination for them, since God has not infallibly predestined them to heaven (though he gives them sufficient grace to be saved), and their circumstances in life will give them sufficient opportunity to accept or reject God.

In my view not every human person is in this category—I believe that some are never given the opportunity to reject God definitively, which defiance is the only way they could have deserved hell (think of severely mentally disabled persons and children who die early). However, I think the possibility described in (10) applies to the vast majority of human persons, and this is enough for (10) to be true.

Universalists are baffled as to how a person who is radically and dynamically ordered toward God (point 8), could possibly oppose God voluntarily and do this forever (point 10). There’s a lot that one could say on this point. In this post I simply indicate a way forward in the discussion. I begin with a question:

Is it possible for a human person, in this life, to take a definitive stance on something? Is it possible for someone to commit her whole self to something or to someone, in a once-and-for-all act of will?

It would seem so. Otherwise what could it mean to take a vow, to make a solemn promise, or to give one’s word? Surely, if a person is sufficiently mature psychologically, he is able to take a stance, to make a statement that is meant to apply not just for the present moment, but for the rest of his life.

When in the marriage ceremony a man promises to be faithful to his wife until death, we take him at his word. To be sure, there are many cases in which it would be reasonable to be dubious about a man’s sincerity or his ability to keep such a noble promise. But that is beside the point. The point is that the ability to enact a solemn commitment is within the realm of human possibility, at least where humanity is shaped by culture and affected by grace.

Suppose, however, that the above is not within the realm of human possibility. That would mean, for example, that a man cannot transcend the present moment and promise sincerely and realistically to be faithful to his wife (and future children). The best a man could do is say, “I don’t know how things will be in the future. I have no idea what my feelings will be, or where I’ll stand in relation to you as time goes on. My beliefs might change, or my love might pass away. I’m not going to promise something that I can’t promise. After all, the future me is in the future; I have no control over that non-existent person right now. The best I can do is will stay with you now, through this night, while my desire and attraction for you lasts. We will have to play it by ear. Every day, indeed every moment, I will have to keep you updated.”

Indeed, such a man could not even promise to keep his partner updated! (I say “partner”, because it is inaccurate to say that this woman would truly be his “wife”). If he can’t be reasonably sure about his future self, then neither can he be reasonably sure about his ability and willingness (in the future) to be decent enough to inform his partner that he is leaving.

In truth, however, it is possible under certain conditions to take our life as a whole, to encompass all of the moments (or future moments) in our lives from a transcendent standpoint, and to give ourselves over more or less unconditionally to a person, or to a cause, or to an idea. A husband, for example, does not merely give one moment to his wife, and then the next, and then the next, keeping her perpetually updated about the status of his love in each moment. Rather, a husband qua husband has committed his whole self though future time to his wife (“till death do us part”). (The self-donation is not so radical that the husband literally worships his wife—only God deserves that—but the point remains).

To be faithful to a promise or vow is something quite different to merely shaping a series of moments in one’s life, one after the other, as if the series of moments were merely accidentally connected. In this scenario it just so happens that the man adopts the same positive attitude to his wife in each moment. Or perhaps there is a natural continuity of attitude, but this continuity has not been appropriated, elevated and announced in a solemn vow. In any case the series of moments is not gathered together intentionally as one whole life (into the future) given over in advance.

After a promise is made, to give oneself in each moment, as time passes, is to confirm and fulfill the promise made in the beginning. The solemn vow transcends the moments; it stands above the moments (and the ones who made the vow) as a subsisting, holy thing which calls for its perpetual fulfilment. The vow stands to the moments as the soul stands to the body. (Everything I’ve said about the marriage vow above can be applied to the solemn vow of a religious person, mutatis mutandis).

Dietrich von Hildebrand speaks about the “super-actuality” of love. In the details of life, through the various circumstances, as spouses confirm their ongoing love for each other in different ways, love is “actualised” again and again—it is expressed anew in the moment. However, this actuality does not arise from mere potential understood as a privation—from a lack of actuality—for their love is a superabundant source of actuality, a wellspring that continually brims to the surface in time (assuming they are faithful to their promise and stay close to the divine source of love). There is an all-embracing fullness and total intentionality in their love that transcends moments in time and gathers them together in advance, even as the spouses are blind, more or less, to what they will have to face in the future (e.g., the unanticipated chaos of raising children!).

(Von Hildbrand doesn’t claim that love is only super-actual once a promise or vow has been made. All forms of love, and indeed all modes of response to value, can be super-actual, even without there being some sort of promise or commitment. He also indicates in his Ethics that sinful attitudes are super-actual.)

~ 3 ~

The universalist might reply as follows: Very well. Even in this life, people can and often do commit themselves to something or someone with a super-actual attitude of approval or consent. They freely “mark” themselves as being totally for such-and-such, where this being-for transcends in advance the various moments in which it is to be lived out. But from that it does not follow that

(11) Human persons can enact a super-actual attitude that amounts to a total rejection of God.

Assuming such a rejection of God is possible, it would involve a type of commitment that could not be reduced to an instantaneous attitude or stance, or even to a homogenous series of such attitudes or stances. However (argues the universalist), the total rejection in question would go directly against the ontological grain of the person (see point 8 above). And such a thing is impossible.

My response as follows. I agree that the total rejection in question would go against the ontological grain of the person rejecting God. But from this it does not follow that (11) is false. In my view, (11) is true, as is the following claim (which adds more detail):

(12) It is psychologically possible for a person to commit himself totally and super-actually to something other than God (some idol or collection of idols) in such a way as to oppose the charity of God totally and super-actually.

Let this be called the Mortal Sin Thesis or MST. Here “psychologically” is used in the Scholastic sense, referring to the spiritual faculties of the human person. Hence “moral psychology.”

A universalist might object to my use of “totally” in MST (point 12) as follows. In respect to some object or end X, if a person cannot commit himself to X totally and in such a way that his commitment is deeply and objectively good for him—if the person’s total commitment to X would not accord with his fundamental nature (including his natural will) as a person—then it is impossible for him to commit himself to X totally, after all. For his basic nature and orientation will never “go along” with the commitment. The act may still be possible, but the person acting thus will do violence to himself (while second nature is mutable, altering one’s basic nature is out of the question); it will be an act—and then a super-actual stance—of self-contradiction, a certain “contortion” of oneself. But the person is fundamentally oriented toward God (point 8). Therefore it is impossible for a person to commit himself totally to anything other than God.

I agree that there is a sense in which God is the only object to which we can give ourselves “totally”—if “totally” means “self-consistently”, in accordance with one’s natural orientation. To sin, to reject God, is to do violence against oneself and frustrate one’s deepest longings. But that does not make MST false. My point in MST is that the person is a “totality” or “whole” that is structurally able to give itself as a whole. A person is able to give a definitive YES or NO to something, where this stance and “word” of the whole self then becomes super-actual. This “word” of the self might align with one’s deepest nature or it might contradict it—but that is another matter.

Granted, in giving oneself to an idol, there is not the “true freedom” of abiding in the truth and living as a child of God. But from that it does not follow that nobody is personally responsible when they commit an act of idolatry (or any sin). I am not “truly free” when I sin, because radical attachment to anything other than God is spiritual slavery. Nonetheless, I can still be responsible, with libertarian freedom (free will as the concurrent ability to will X or not will X) for my sin. Sin contradicts the objective moral order, and one’s God-given structure as a human person—but that does not mean that the sinner qua sinner loses libertarian freedom, personal responsibility. A sinner is still in possession of himself; on the day of judgement he will be unable to plead insanity. In every morally significant act, and therefore in every sin, there is an “enactment of self”. The sinner gives himself over to some loved object; he is able to do so because he is in possession of himself (to repeat: he has not lost his mind in such a way that in his defence he could plead insanity). So yes: sin is slavery and violence to self, and “true freedom” can only be found in loving obedience to God. Indeed, Augustine is right to say that the most perfect freedom is the freedom of the saints in heaven, who are unable to sin. But none of that contradicts the fact that sinners on earth are responsible for their sin in that (1) they are in possession of themselves as persons (while self-possession can be lost in moments of insanity or while one’s brain isn’t functioning as it should, it is false to say that a sinner qua sinner loses possession of himself), (2) they are therefore able as intelligent beings to give themselves over to an object that is taken to be good and (3) they are not, as a rule, determined by circumstances to will as they do in the moment.

The following should also be noted. It is possible to commit oneself in an attitude and course of action that is mortally sinful, and for that super-actual attitude to abide in the soul as unrepented mortal sin, without that meaning that every single aspect and moment of one’s life is consistent with that attitude. In order to be in mortal sin, it is not necessary to have “narrowed” or “simplified” one’s life, with a certain perverse “perfection”, into the single-minded pursuit of sin. It is one thing to consent fully—to deliver oneself over—to a sinful attitude in the act of (mortal) sin. It is another for this consenting “word” of sin to become incarnate in every detail of one’s life. This is an inverted mirror image of how it is with our salvation. It is one thing to consent fully—to deliver oneself over—to Jesus in a sincere act of repentance and conversion. It is another for this consenting “word” of repentance and conversion to become incarnate in every detail of one’s life.

Finally, does “total” rejection of God (in MST) mean that God is hated under every aspect? That would mean that God is seen by the person under every aspect—under every divine perfection, and under every relation to creatures (e.g., as Creator and as Lord)—and hated by that person under each of those aspects. Or does it mean that God is hated under every known aspect? That would mean that the person in question hates God under all the aspects under which he knows God. In both cases the answer is no. The “totality” referred to here is the totality of the person who rejects God. In mortal sin a person withdraws himself-as-a-whole away from the love of God, in the act of delivering himself-as-a-whole over to some illicitly desired object.

 

~ 4 ~

That should do to clarify the meaning of MST. Now to defend it. Suppose MST is false. In that case there is no such thing as a mortal sin; all sins are venial. One cannot become radically opposed to God (in second nature or gnomic will). But then why do some people go to hell, even if only temporarily (as per universalism), so as to be purified by fire? On this view, hell is reduced to a lower stage of purgatory. And because mortal sin is impossible, the “sin and darkness” from which Christ saves turns out to be far less serious as a spiritual condition, and far less offensive to God (here “far less” indicates a difference of type). Salvation turns out to be little more than spiritual “fine-turning”—a number of adjustments in a soul whose fundamental stance vis-à-vis God has never been incorrect.

The other problem with rejecting MST is that it flies in the face of the moral facts. Many people—too many people—have engaged in evil with a depth and intensity which is horrifying, and with an intentional seriousness which is truly frightening. There is such a thing as a demonic attitude. How else can we do justice to the phenomena without invoking the language (if not the dogmatic theology) of the “demonic”? Consider the serial rapist, the sadistic torturer, or one who hates a people so much as to commit genocide? Surely, these people have given themselves over to evil with a certain “totality” and “definitiveness”. If these monsters were to turn back to the light, this would involve something far more radical than their being cleansed of a few venial faults, or their being corrected for a few unfortunate mistakes! They have turned themselves completely inside-out, as it were; they need to be radically converted so that they are spiritually open to the Good again. In their state they are not simply “imperfect”. No—they are spiritually ruined. The appropriate instinctive response to their spiritual state is horror and repulsion (which is not to say that one can’t show spiritual mercy to a ruined soul).

I am not claiming that as long as a person does not descend to such “diabolical” depths of sin, he has not rejected God and is safe from hell. Nor am I claiming that a person is not spiritually ruined until he participates in diabolical sin. My reason for focussing on the diabolical was to make the following point. Clearly, a theologian who rejects MST cannot do justice to the phenomena: the diabolical, the monstrosity of certain expressions of evil. The truth is, sometimes people utter a “word” in their speech and in their actions which is not merely imperfect, but is radically opposed to the Word of God. How else can we justly evaluate the speeches of a Hitler, or the mass violence committed by a communist dictator? These anti-words are uttered with full commitment. Those who speak these anti-words are completely serious. These people mean what they say and do. They are “insane” in the sense that their thoughts and actions are quite at odds with divine wisdom and natural law. They are “insane” in the sense that they are hell-bent on a state of mind and course of action that is self-destructive and whose intended outcome is impossible (for there is no rest for the wicked, and evil cannot prevail against the will of God). But from this is does not follow they are not responsible for their wicked attitudes and deeds in the way that a legally insane person is not responsible (assuming the legal judgement is correct).

In summary, if MST is false, then no person—not even a demon—could utter a radically negative, anti-Christian word in speech and/or action. Nobody could speak an anti-Christian word and really mean it; nobody could not put themselves into their anti-Christian word, in full commitment. But such evil does occur. People become what they channel, what they say and do, what they devote themselves to. People can be overtaken by and committed to an anti-word. Therefore MST is true.

 

~ 5 ~

Where does that leave the universalist? One option is to say

(13) For one who is bathed in the loving presence of God—God effectively showing and giving himself as the infinite Good—it is psychologically impossible to commit oneself (in that situation) totally and super-actually to something other than God in such a way as to oppose the charity of God totally and super-actually.

Following this line of thought, there is such a thing as diabolical evil, and this is far more repulsive and offensive to God than falling into sin in a moment of weakness, or doing what one “hates to do” (Rom 7:15). But the condition that makes diabolical evil possible is the withdrawal of the loving presence of God. If God were to show himself to a person as the Good (infinite love) with sufficient intensity and clarity, such a person could not, under those conditions, continue to oppose the charity of God. The super-actual attitude of diabolical evil would lose its grip; the person would necessarily begin to turn back to the light.

Here the universalist might say that the superabundant presence of God’s love—the presence which, it is claimed, makes continued opposition to God impossible—amounts to parousia and (on the side of the person) the beatific vision. However, it is not necessary to go that far, and the equation of being “bathed in the loving presence of God” with parousia is not essential to (13).

As I see it, there is nothing to stop an infernalist from agreeing to (13). All that an infernalist has to say is

(14) God allows some people to die in a state of radical opposition to God, and to face him in that state for their particular judgement, where this judgement determines their final destination (heaven or hell).

This does not contradict the claim that everyone has sufficient grace and a generously fair opportunity to turn to God and be saved. It does not imply the Calvinist doctrine of the “rebrobate” (that because of an infallible decree of God, those who go to hell could not possibly have avoided going to hell). But given (13), it does imply that

(15) God allows some people to die and face him for their particular judgment without being bathed in so much divine love that, if previously they opposed him, they now convert (or begin to convert) to him necessarily.

In other words, an infernalist can agree that an extraordinary and abundant outpouring of God’s love on a person just before death (or just after death) would necessitate even the most hardened sinner’s conversion to God and infallibly effect their salvation—but if an infernalist does agree, he must deny that God grants this extraordinary grace to everyone who dies in radical opposition to God.

Regarding the angelic spirits, some infernalists might agree (i) that an extraordinary and abundant outpouring of God’s love on a fallen angel at some point (say, the end of time) would necessitate even Satan’s conversion to God and infallibly effect his salvation—but it they do agree, they will have to deny that God grants this extraordinary grace to any fallen angel (for no infernalist thinks that the fallen angels might be saved). Alternatively, he can agree (ii) that an extraordinary and abundant outpouring of God’s love on the angels would have prevented all of them from falling (a hypothetical scenario which, for the infernalist at least, is far less problematic than the conversion of fallen angels)—but if he does agree, he must deny that God granted this extraordinary grace to all angels, given that some angels fell (which nobody denies).

Someone might object: but God has poured out his love in an extraordinary and abundant way—first in the Old Covenant, but most perfectly in Christ. Moreover, all the angels must have known the abundant love of God, even before some of them fell. My response: I grant that God’s displays of love are “extraordinary” and “abundant” in comparison to finite love, in comparison to what we deserve, and in comparison to anything we might have anticipated. However, even all of this did not suffice to secure, infallibly, the salvation of every person (man and angel), even though it secured, infallibly, the genuine possibility of salvation for every person. This was not through some fault or omission of God, but is an expression of his perfect wisdom and justice. In this discussion above, the “extraordinary and abundant outpouring of God’s love” is something over and above both (i) the abundant displays of God’s mercy in salvation history and (ii) the continuous promptings or invitations of God throughout a person’s life, both directly and indirectly (through circumstances and created means), which nonetheless respect the free-will of the person.

At this point, the disagreement between the universalist and the infernalist turns from questions about moral psychology to questions about the economy of grace.

Does God grant an extraordinary grace of conversion (as above) to everyone who dies (or who is about to die) in radical opposition to God?* If not, how is that compatible with the infinite love and mercy of God? If so, how is that compatible with the infinite holiness and justice of God?

* A universalist might say that this extraordinary grace of conversion is given before a soul goes to hell (thus preparing it for the process of purification in hell), or alternatively, that it is given at the end of the soul’s time in hell (thus ending the process of purification).

I can’t see how a universalist could reasonably reject infernalism simply on the basis given above—i.e., that it is psychologically impossible (against MST) for a person to oppose the charity of God, given that every person is radically oriented toward the Good. For it is unreasonable to deny that diabolical expressions of evil are possible. What is reasonable is the claim that diabolical expressions of evil are only possible as long as the person in question is not flooded with an extraordinary outpouring of grace—an outpouring that would necessitate his conversion or infallibly prevent his fall into evil. And so the disagreement (real or apparent) over moral psychology turns out to be a red herring. If my judgement is correct, the real point of contention concerns the three italicised questions above.

 

~ 6 ~

Let me return now to the two quotations. Fr Kimel claims that “The infernalist needs to demonstrate, not just assume, that it is possible for a human being to extinguish within himself all desire for the Good” [Quotation 1]. My respectful response is as follows. In order to give oneself over to diabolic evil and assume a super-actual state of opposition to God (as explained above)—is it necessary to extinguish within oneself all desire for the Good?

Suppose Fr Kimel says yes. In that case either (a) it is impossible for anyone (human or demonic) to give himself over to diabolic evil and oppose God super-actually or (b) such evil is possible and it is possible to extinguish within oneself all desire for the Good. Obviously Fr Kimel is not going to accept (b). I’m almost certain that he wouldn’t accept (a) either. For he writes: “An unquenchable desire for deifying union with our Creator constitutes who we are as human beings. For this reason, no person, no matter how wicked and vicious, can definitively close himself to the gracious influence of his Creator.” [Quotation 2, my italics].

But if the answer is no, the infernalist does not need to demonstrate “that is possible to extinguish within himself all desire for the Good” after all! All he needs to demonstrate is that it is possible to enter the next life in the super-actual state of opposition to God, and to remain helplessly fixed in that state forever.

A universalist will then reply that God, being infinite love, would not allow such a thing to occur—God reveals his goodness to every dying (or dead) person with sufficient clarity and intensity so that he is unable to remain fixed in his state of opposition.

The infernalist disagrees. In one version of infernalism (the one I favour), it was God’s will that, for some created persons (perhaps most), their entrance into heaven depends on their accepting freely, with libertarian freedom, the gift of grace (i.e., amply sufficient grace, but not necessitating grace). God wants to be glorified in souls who choose him freely (in the libertarian sense)—which is to say, even in the absence of an overwhelming revelation of God’s goodness. For the infernalist, there is no contradiction between this order of things on the one hand, and the infinite love of God on the other.

Fr Kimel writes [Quotation 2]: “Even when we reject God, we are seeking God. [1] An unquenchable desire for deifying union with our Creator constitutes who we are as human beings. For this reason, [2] no person, no matter how wicked and vicious, can definitively close himself to the gracious influence of his Creator. His desire for the Good is ineradicable.”

I believe I have written enough to show that the second claim does not follow from the first. In order for the conclusion to follow, one of the following has to be added to the argument:

(16) The person’s innate capacity for God, or (in other words) his structural dynamism toward the Good, is sufficient in itself to ensure that he does not fall into the state of mortal sin.

(17) The person’s innate capacity for God, or (in other words) his structural dynamism toward the Good, is sufficient in itself to ensure that he does not remain in the state of mortal sin indefinitely.

Premise (16) is obviously false. There is such a thing as diabolical sin (a particularly clear example of mortal sin), and Jesus wasn’t sent merely to save us from the superficial imperfections of a soul whose factual orientation of will (super-actual stance) remains righteous and true. No, the salvation spoken of in the Bible means a radical correction; it effects a radical transformation of the person.

If (17) is true, there is a certain self-saving “elasticity” about the soul. A soul that has fallen into sin naturally and automatically “snaps back” into righteousness. But this is obviously false to the facts—and it is hardly compatible with the Gospel!

Suppose Fr Kimel adds the following instead as the premise of his argument:

(18) The person’s innate capacity for God, or (in other words) his structural dynamism toward the Good, is sufficient to ensure that he does not remain in the state of mortal sin indefinitely in the face of an extraordinary and overwhelming revelation of God’s goodness.

But in that case the conclusion is not that “no person, no matter how wicked and vicious, can definitively close himself to the gracious influence of his Creator”, as above. Rather, the conclusion is that

(19) No person, no matter how wicked and vicious, can definitively close himself to the gracious influence of his Creator if this “gracious influence” is poured out in such an overwhelming fashion as to make resistance to God psychologically impossible.

Such a conclusion is hardly remarkable. In fact, it is trivial. It does nothing to refute infernalism. One can be an infernalist and accept (19) unreservedly and consistently.

 

© Brendan Triffett, 2021.

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