The Orthodoxy of Eternal Torment: HELL NO!!

At no point in my life would I have ever thought that I would write in the defense of an old-school, Bible belt, TBN-Pentecostal minister -who is deeply rooted in Oral Roberts University. I would have given a strong no if asked to do this a few weeks ago. Amazingly, the story of Carlton Pearson has inspired me to do just this.

Feel free to listen to the entirety of the radio. It is rather interesting. But here’s the skinny: Pearson was born, bred, and thriving in Bible-belt, turn-or-burn, Pentecostalism. Getting other people away from hell was his job. He had full-time mega church ministry complete with a spot on TBN. He was a spiritual protégé of Oral Roberts and mentor to T.D. Jakes. One day, Pearson had a mystical experience and realized that he could no longer believe in Hell. He abandoned this doctrine in favor of Universalism (everyone goes to heaven. There is no hell.), and consequently found himself ostracized by his congregation and his peers. He was branded a heretic, and is regarded as such today.

I should probably remove any doubts or confusions about what I am actually defending here. I am not, of course defending TBN itself or Oral Roberts University. This will become even clearer later. Furthermore, I am not defending universalism itself. Neither am I defending Pearsons current ministry at a Unitarian church. I think Unitarianism is silly. One of my favorite stories, that turned into running joke, was the dead-locked Unitarian church meeting: they couldn’t agree to a statement of faith. What I am defending is premise that universalism (whether right or wrong) is not a heresy, or a violation of faith. Conversely, I am saying that a belief in hell is not an essential for Christianity.

Now back to the story. Pearson was a successful, humorous, and loved minister. He, a black man, lead a church that integrated both black and white people in a place like Tulsa. He rubbed shoulders with the best of the fundies. He also was not dumb. He was well read and understood Greek. However, not everything was right. In the late 1990s he had particular experience. In Pearson’s own words:

I was watching the evening news [covering conflict in Rwanda] I’m watching these little kids with swollen little bellies, it looks like their skins is stretched across their skeletal remains, their hair is kinda red from malnutrition the babies are got flies in the corners of their eyes and their mouths. They reach for their mother’s breasts and the mother’s breasts looks like a pencil, hanging there…there’s no milk…and I say, “God, I don’t know how you can call yourself a loving sovereign God, and allow people to suffer this way and then suck them right into hell.” (which was what my assumption) and I heard a voice within me say, “So that’s what you think we’re doing?” [I answered] “That’s what I’ve been taught.”

Pearson felt that God asked him, rhetorically, if you think they’re going to hell, then why not go preach the Gospel to them? This was too much for Pearson to accept, as he had already been a minister for forty years. He knew he couldn’t save the whole world. What he believed, after this short conversation with God, was that humans make their own hells –but God eventually brings everyone into his presence. God’s work of salvation and atonement applies to everyone. He said, “for the first time in my life I did not see God as the inventor of Hell.”

This led to some problematic conclusions. If there is no hell, there is no need to accept Jesus to escape it. Likewise, there was no need to go to church. Everyone is going to heaven. This led to some serious problems. His church attendance shrank. Pearson and his pastoral staff parted ways, because they could no longer understand each other. Those who followed him were considered damned by many. He eventually moved his church, where his congregants are accosted by others who feel like they still need to be saved. Oral Roberts became silent on his association with him now. T.D. Jakes became distant.

Why believe in hell? There were a number of answers that kept coming up in the radio show. One of them was that even though believing in hell is an offense, people needed to remember that God makes the rules. Even if we don’t like it, we must not re-write the Bible whether we like it or not. This is not a good reason to believe in hell. First, no one is re-writing the Bible. Pearson and many universalists believe that their interpretation of the Bible is right. It is no more of a re-writing of the Bible than anything else that Pentecostal movement has done. Secondly, “God makes the rules” is an idiomatic way of saying, “Things are right or wrong because God says so.” This is one answer to the Euthyphro question. It is not an premise that all Christians accept. It has to be decided before people feel they can use it to brute force a belief in Hell’s orthodoxy.

There is another reason why it is really important to believe in hell: it keeps people coming to your church. This was clear, as when Pearson denounced hell, many people left. One youth pastor, who still attends Pearson’s church, commented that a fear of hell is one of the first things he remembered learning. It was through this fear that he kept going. Later, he said that if you remove the “requirements” and the threat of hell a church will thin out and some people will be “out of a job.” Even as he described all this, he chuckled at it.

Why does this not strike more people as absurd? Hell is the appeal to fear that keeps people loving God? Personally, I cannot imagine serving God out of a fear of hell anymore. I will say this of fear appeals: If your church needs a cosmic appeal to fear to keep people motivated to attend, serve, and evangelize, than you need to really re-think the church and what the Gospel is. Christianity is supposed to offer good things to the world. Faith is to be sustained by love and hope. Appeals to fear will eventually wear off, but a church that offers love to the world will be sustained and fulfill its mission for the Gospel, and no The Gospel is not simply “keep people out of hell.”

What about the alternatives? What about people who still attend Pearson’s church? What I have noticed about both Pearson and his one of his congregants is that they seem sensitive to Christian charity. Pearson’s experience with the Rwandans on TV was motivated out of a need to understand God’s love in the face of evil. His church, right now, has opened the door to people who were ostracized by their families and the charismatic Christendom of Tulsa. When one of his congregants was accosted by those who criticize Pearson and his church, she realized how insensitive such kind of evangelicalism really is. Though it irritates her, she feels compassion for the people who still are motivated by a fear of hell.

There is another irony. People who ostracize Pearson and his followers are still following one of his former protégés, T.D. Jakes. T.D. Jakes still holds the to the doctrine of hell, but his oneness Pentecostal background has made him hazy on the Trinity. Though Jakes says he believes in the Trinity, his descriptions sound more like modalism to me and many others. This really bothers me. How is it that a belief in hell is considered an essential for faith, but the Trinity can be replaced with modalism in everything but name? This demands an entire blog in itself, but I am still stunned that dogma about hell is more important too many people than The Trinity.

Now is Pearson a wrong or right in his universalism? That’s not the point of this blog. The point of this blog is to show that I think there is a serious problem. Dogma about hell should not be not an essential for the Christian faith if its justifications are fear appeals or “God says so.” Furthermore, those who insist on it hurt their case when they fail to show Christian charity, whether that be by ostracizing people like Pearson or accosting members of his church. Hell is not an essential Christian doctrine. Let no Christian worship because of fear of it.

The Suffering of Haiti and the Silence of God

Recent events in the news have finally forced me to blog again about the problem of evil. In addition to the dementia and influence of Pat Robertson, there was a tragic earthquake in Haiti. While in either situation we ask, “how could God let this happen?” I prefer to focus on Haiti.

Yes, I am opening this blog a little tongue and cheek, but in all seriousness I do want to talk about the problem of evil once again. Specifically, I want to talk about theodicies. A “theodicy” is an attempt by Christians to explain why God allows evil. Theodicies come in many shapes and sizes, and are vigorously argued. When it comes to Haiti, I will present two common theodicies, which will in turn open up for a bigger problem of theodicy in general.*

One type of theodicy might be called the “sovereignty theodicy.” In the sovereignty theodicy, nothing happens without at least God’s consent. God is never surprised by any event. God, who sees the entire picture, works everything out for his own good justice in the end. Evil is part of this process. This will even extends to humans, as our suffering (and reaction to other people’s suffering) will make us more holy or Christ-like. This theodicy might be summed up as saying, “God works out everything for his own good, and our good in the end.” The bitter medicine of evil and suffering will not compare to glories that await us and the world to come.

Of all theodicies, I like an idea of theodicy in which evil is part of a cycle of growth for Christians and for a future glorious new creation. Nonetheless, I think this theodicy faces a big problem. It makes God a utilitarian: a certain amount of evil, for a greater amount of good. Why would God need to do this? I recognize that utilitarian is something that human beings need to do. Jack Bauer must occasionally (frequently) torture someone in order to save many lives. Though he (hopefully) knows what he is doing is wrong, he understands that there will be a great good that will come of it. Jack Bauer does this trade-off because his power is limited. If he could save lives without having to torture someone he would, but as it is plastic bags and bamboo shoots are the only. God’s power is not limited. So why is evil necessary?

There is another problem with this kind of theodicy: God must make some people victims in order to make other people better. Consider the following, there is a great amount of “good” that has come out of the horrendous tragedy of the Haiti earthquake. Among other things, Christians are getting together to express Christian love in a very tangible way. Undoubtably, many will come back with a fresh perspective on poverty, suffering, and Christian service. Of course, for this kind of Christian growth to happen, many people had to die or at least endure terrible suffering. Why must some people die in order to deepen the spiritual lives of the living? It seems like the Haitians are getting the short end of stick. Again, this is a kind of utilitarian trade-off that doesn’t make sense to if God is omnipotent.

There is another theodicy that can be called the free-will theodicy. This is one of the most common ones heard in everyday evangelicalism. All evil comes from sin, and sin comes from our free choices. God could override our free-will, but wants Christian to love him willingly and “not be robots.” There is something so supremely good about free will, that it justifies the side effect of evil.

Those who know me well know that free will is a pretty big deal for me, but I still don’t think this justifies evil and suffering, especially in relation to Haiti. First, the tragedy of Haiti is not totally the result of human sin. We may have misused our free-will to create the economic and social conditions of Haiti, but human sin did not bring the earthquake. Furthermore, this still faces the same problem as the sovereignty theodicy: a utilitarian tradeoff. Why would an omnipotent God need to have some people suffer in order that others might exercise their free will? Couldn’t an omnipotent God have set up a universe in which free-will of one person did not involve causing others to suffer?

Any Answer at all?

Now I get to the big problem. There is a possibility that I think all Christian need to face: that we might not have access to a theodicy at all. Why would God allow the earthquake in Haiti? We simply do not know. For some, I think that this may threaten the Christian faith. I do not think so, because although we cannot know the answer it does not mean that the answer is not there. God’s reasons may simply be hidden from us. God may simply be silent on this matter.

But is strange for God to be silent on this matter. For Christians, God has obviously spoken on a great many things. So presumably, God could simply tell us why evil exists in the world. Yet we do not quite something so clear and unambigious, and are left to coming up with theodicies on our own. The best answer we ever get from God is same answer that we see at the end of the Book of Job, “who are you to ask these kinds of questions?”

Honestly, that seems to be the world that we live in, but what does that mean for Haiti?

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*I credit Nicholas Wolterstorff for pretty much everything that I am saying in this blog. See his article, “Silence of the God who Speaks” for a more detailed discussion of what I am condensing here.

Darkening Counsel Without Knowledge

I’d like to do a post before it gets too far into February. One of my previous posts was on the subject of theodicy. This one will be on the same subject, but examined in light of a few verses of Job. The Book of Job raises one important question: is a theodicy even possible?

There first needs to be some definitions. There is a distinction between a defense and a theodicy. A defense is a response to some argument against the existence God via the problem evil. A defense aims only to defeat the argument, but does not need to justify God allowing evil. For instance, a non-theist might argue that an all-loving and all-powerful God can’t logically co-exist with evil. The theist may give several reasons why such an argument isn’t sound. For instance, there may be other logically constraining reasons why God can’t create a world without evil. A response like this doesn’t mean that we know that these reasons are there. That would be a theodicy. Rather, a defense only shows that the non-theist hasn’t given good enough reasons to reject God because of evil.

Theodicy is what we are more used to. This approach claims to actually vindicate God, by showing how evil and God co-exist. These invoke very good reasons, and put the burden of proof on the non-theist to explain why they are inadequate. Theologians offer several arguments. Some may say that God seeks to honor free-will. Others say that evil and suffering are actually part of God’s love. One of the most famous is Leibnizian approach: God must create the best of all possible worlds, and this is it. (I have never liked that theodicy.) In any case, a theodicy says the reasons why God exists with evil are no mystery. We know these reasons and they are very, very, good.

This brings me to the Book of Job. It has been a good long time since I have read it in its entirety, but it deals with the problem of evil in a dialogue form. Job suffers. Job demands that God explain himself. Job’s friends give him all kinds of reasons why God isn’t unjust and so on. In otherwords, his friends offer theodicies. God finally and unexpectedly speaks at the end of the book. The long passage is summed up in the first few verses.

”Who is this that darkens counsel by words without knowledge? Gird up your loins like a man, I will question you, and you shall declare to me.” Job 38:2-3 NRSV

The questions go on further in a way that is probably familiar to most people reading this. In the end, Job confesses to “have uttered what I did not understand.” He repents, and shuts up.

What might this passage imply about theodicy? Maybe that theodicy is a misguided project. Yes, Christians have every reason to defend our beliefs about God against atheists, but I am not certain that we can ever know why God allows evil. It may be perhaps presumptuous for us to ask and even more presumptuous for us to say we know.

Of course, there could be a theodicy out there that is morally, intellectually, and emotionally satisfying. Maybe we really do need one. In a future blogs, I hope to review a few of these. For now, the question remains open.

A problem with the problem of evil

One of my favorite classes this first semester of grad school was “God and the Problem of Evil.” In short, philosophers ask how a God who is all-loving, all-powerful, and all-knowing can co-exist with all the evil that we see in the world. I came to the conclusion, and argued in a long paper, that much of the problem is how the term “God” is understood in this question. It often seems that non-theists and Christians have a different understanding of the term and both seem to miss this miscommunication. I will outline the problem and give a suggestion as to how the problem of evil changes given the specific definition of “God.”

A fellow by the name of William Rowe demonstrated the non-theist’s definition of God. He argued for “restricted theism.” This meant that there exists an all-loving, all-powerful, and all-knowing (otherwise known as the three omni’s) being, but with nothing beyond this simple definition. No sacred scriptures. No special revelations. No prophets. No Jesus. God, so defined by restricted theism, is a being with the three-omni’s and nothing else.
From here Rowe explained the problem as he sees it. He first gives vivid examples of the kind of evil we see, such as a little girl who is raped and murdered. He then argues that it is not reasonable to believe that God exists. Theists usually answer that God has reasons that are far beyond our comprehension (“noseeum” reasons) for allowing evil, but Rowe finds this inadequate for two reasons. First, by being beyond our comprehension these reasons are irrational. Secondly, God seems apathetic and distant from our suffering.

The problem with Rowe’s argument, and those non-theists like him, is they insist on working with a definition of “God” that is far to restricted. It is so restricted that very few theists actually believe in such a god. In a way, people like Rowe are batting at position that doesn’t exist, or that exists only their minds.
If Christians are going to respond to the problem of evil, we do so with our definition of God. The Christian God became man in the person of Jesus, otherwise known as the incarnation. What is properly said about Jesus, can also be said about God. This cannot be abstracted or removed without changing the definition of god as “restricted theism” wants us to. Christians do believe in the three omni’s, but not merely the three omnis.

This changes the problem of evil significantly. Rowe asks why humans suffer so much evil while God is sitting around doing nothing. Christians point to something else. According to Christianity, God himself was human and suffered evil at the hands of his enemies during the crucifixion. Now instead of the question being, “why do humans suffer so much evil?” we now have to ask, “why do humans, and God, suffer so much evil?”

The implications of this go beyond this blog, but I think it is important to sum up the correct starting point. Non-theists often define god as “a being with the three omi’s and nothing else.” Christians, in contrast, will say “God is a being who took on human flesh in the person of Jesus Christ and has the three omnis as well.” The problem of evil simply cannot be looked in the same way in light of this. The non-theists, as well as Christian apologists, need to keep this in mind when responding to the evil we see in the world.

Thanks for reading.