Chastisement

I understand and agree with what you said but it is still a hard teaching.
Here is the point I struggle with: are you telling me that there are SO many bad people in the world that so few would survive this that they think they are alone? That the streets would be littered with bodies that rot in the sun? Does this visage not terrify you? Is that what a loving God would do?
You said it yourself. God is Loving, God is Just. So yes, to punish those who live for sin and despise God is Just (and Loving even in the sense that it might protect those who still adhere.) But God is also Just, and Loving. He has both qualities perfectly. And it is hard for me to fathom why a being of such perfect mercy, wisdom and love would "litter the streets with dead bodies." That sounds like the work of an evil entity to us humans living in the world.
You cannot tell me that most average people are evil enough to warrant this; most men and women are predisposed towards good and have the Natural Law written in their hearts by the holy spirit. How then do you reconcile this?
As for Sodom; the Old Testament God is the same God as in the New Testament. He may seem very harsh when read by modern people but it is not so because those who did die were not in Hades forever; Jesus went to hell and brought the worthy to heaven. And a lot of the OT has allegorical readings or components.
So you tell me, why would God in this day and age elect to deal with us in such a violent, decidedly non-loving way when he could, in his power, just snap his fingers (so to speak) and simply make the evildoers vanish? There's no need for bodies rotting in the streets, nuclear blasts (these visions sound like nuclear war) and destroying absolutely everything. It just seems… too intense.

Doublepost, because I had a thought:
Maybe these saints meant not that God is /causing/ these horrible things to happen directly, but rather, that he is permitting them. If we nearly genocide ourselves in nuclear war, then I think I could better swallow this teaching because then it would be a consequence of our actions (allowed and permitted by God) rather than a direct upset and intervention.

This makes no sense! Didn't Christ say in the parable of the weeds that if he were to uproot the cockle, the wheat would also get uprooted and so he has to wait until the Last Day which is where the angels will gather up the cockle in bundles and throw them into the fire? How can Christ kill his enemies and the unrepentant sinners so soon when he said he couldn't do that in the parable?

St. Bridget's prediction seems to concern the year 1960, correct? Nothing happened though.

But yeah, the descriptions of the Chastisement are inconsistent. One describes angels instantaneously cutting everyone down. One describes fire. Two describe darkness. One describes a great wind (I've seen this explanation of the apocalypse before. It's caused by the Earth suddenly turning on its axis and the air above the Earth resisting that sudden motion or something. Basically, the Earth periodically does this every 7000 years or so such that at one point, Sudan was the North Pole but then, if the Earth does this periodically, then it's not God that does this)

You have the wrong mindset my friend. We are gods creation, the created, gods product so to speak, we are products. Due to the happenings in the Garden of Eden we have become faulty, not suitable for the purpose our manufacturer intended.

Depending on your viewpoint its either incredibly lucky or highly unfortunate that God didn't just discontinue us and started over fresh; now with that in mind let's continue on.

Yes. Look around you, your friends, your family, peoole on the street. His many if them can go by one day without committing even only one grave sin? What about half a day? One hour?

Lust. Envy. Sloth. Greed. All mortal sins, all committed countless times a day. You have to struggle immensely every day to get these under control if you are a devoted christian and you will still fail many times and need to confess. Now how would regular people fare, how non christians? The grave sins stack up immensely, making you evil in the eyes of God and the wages of sin is death, as is clarified in the Bible many times so God is justified in punishing as He sees fit.

It absolutely does, but what does it matter? God will do what He will.

See above, people living in grave sin are faulty and choose to turn away from God, since God is Good by default it is they who are evil and their bodies in the street will serve as a reminder of that fact.

I'm sorry but you don't seem to go out very often or know that many people or you wouldn't post such a naive sentence. Count yourself blessed that you can still believe something like that.

Because its long overdue. What would people learn if the worst offenders were just gone? Theyd be like 'neat' and continue their lives. Humanity, at its core, is sadly far more receptive to punishment than it is to praise and if you open your eyes and really look at the world you will find that it is in such a terrible state that probably only literal fire from heaven will cause at least a few people to wake up.

Tl;Dr You are a faulty product. The Bible is your manual to get fixed. Use it or be discarded to Hell.

In Genesis, God sent and Angel of Death to slay the firetbornmof every family in Egypt that did not mark their door with lamb’s blood. He is infinitely just, and had warned them time and time again to let His people go. Destruction at the hand of the Lord is a natural consequence of sin. Think of it as taking a piss on a high-voltage cable; what happens next is your own fault.

Wait is she saying she saw them wreaking havoc in physical forms?

Attached: 71C855B7-14C4-4C98-8273-0563CEA7822F.jpeg (499x505, 72.29K)

It says, "By their fruits you will know them."
Also, in a bad marriage, you're not supposed to divorce, but to work it out and stay together. And when your son turns away from you, you are to pray for him and love him truly when he decides to return.
If we know them by their fruits, and men are the fruit of God, his creation, what then does it say when you write here that they are defective? No creation is defective. We're all as we were meant to be, created perfectly and with the correct facilities to find the truth. Either we're perfect or we have design flaws. We cannot have design flaws because we were made by a perfect designer.
By their fruits you will know them. What, then, does it tell me that the fruits of this faith I'm about to be baptized in is slaughter of most of mankind, corpses piled high in the streets? That's not justice. That sounds thoroughly ignorant of the good that dwells in us. We all have the capacity to be good. Are we all? No. Will this lead to just punishment? Yes. Does that mean wanton slaughter can in any way be reconciled with a loving, patient father?
Do you kill your son if he doesn't obey you? No? Then why would our father?

The only way I can reconcile what these saints were saying is in three possible explanations but it feels like I'm reaching.
1) They are speaking in allegory. Violent death might be a symbol for death of the soul. It's easy for the soul to be dead (in mortal sin.) They might just be talking about that.
2) The violent deaths and corpses are real, but don't prevent sinners from repenting in the face of death, and leaves open to them the choice to choose love over death in the instant before they die.
A faith in which most are doomed frightens me. Would I not rather go to hell voluntarily then, so I can comfort all those who thought it wasn't real?

There is 0 comfort in hell because hell was not made for men but for the fallen angels. The only comfort men in hell feel is to look upon the face of the Devil and think at least I am not as cursed as him.

God does not send men to hell men send themselves to hell by rejecting God. By rejecting God, the soul once separated from the body is sucked into hell bacause the Soul has no where else to go if it can not be with God.

The soul is predisposed to wanting to be with God. You have every second up until your death to embrace God and he offers you countless chances often you don’t realize it.

DOOM soon fellow Church Militant!

In Revelations, after the Judgement, those who believe in Christ live, and those who don't are cast into the fires. Not to suffer forever, but to die. They disappear. Why? How can that be? Ultimately, God is life. Every part of you that's not dedicated to God and that bows to mundane things will get burned. That's just the nature of mundane things, their natural cycle. Only that which is divine can live eternally. It's not the punishment of an angry God, it's the consequence of what we choose.

Ultimately, it's hard to say how much of Revelations is literal or how much is allegorical. It's a vision the Lord gave to St John, and I have no doubt that what's written is exactly what he saw. We, however, must be aware that the Lord will not give us a cooking book with recipes and instructions. The Word of God cannot be contained with human language, and human words written with physical ink on physical paper. I'd say it's not so much allegorical as "meta-literal", that is, act as if the text was 100% literal and deeper truths will be revealed.

Attached: 3b9d6321380d5f9f469e5921c9dcb57b6c552f8d75d346931daaef14921494a8.jpg (1024x661, 182.88K)

Thank you. This is comforting to me.
God is supposed to be love, not hatred. Burning away our imperfections is just, as is giving 'hell' (whatever that might in reality mean) to those who ask for it explicitly.

You're welcome, user. I'm glad to be of help. The part I'm talking about is Revelations 20: 11-14
" Next I saw a large white throne and the one who was sitting on it. The earth and the sky fled from his presence and there was no place for them. 12 I saw the dead, the great and the lowly, standing before the throne, and scrolls were opened. Then another scroll was opened, the book of life. The dead were judged according to their deeds, by what was written in the scrolls. 13 The sea gave up its dead; then Death and Hades[k] gave up their dead. All the dead were judged according to their deeds. 14 Then Death and Hades were thrown into the pool of fire. (This pool of fire is the second death.) 15 Anyone whose name was not found written in the book of life was thrown into the pool of fire."

The Dragon (Satan) and the two beasts get thrown into the fire and suffer eternally, but it never says the sinners suffer eternally too. They suffer a "second death". If you can, pick up a Bible and read it yourself, then search for priests and theologians explaining it.

I think I have grace( i surrendered to the Lord). Does that mean I go to heaven easily?

what happens to the other lesser demons after judgement day? do they turn to nothing? burn in the lake of fire? Or something else?

Jude
{1:7} As Sodom and Gomorrha and the neighbouring cities, in like manner, having given themselves to fornication and going after other flesh, were made an example, suffering the punishment of eternal fire.
Hell is very much real. Your soul suffers for all eternity. There is no *poof* and you are non exsistant. You suffer for all eternity. Anyone that says otherwise is a literal heretic.

if i have grace to i have a much better chance of going to heaven?

*do I

Lake of fire. It’s stated to be reserved for the devil, his angels, and the wicked.

You get into heaven by dying in a state of grace and with no sin at all.

If you die with small sins on your soul the Lord purifies you for a bit it is painful but once it is done you enter into heaven with the Lord.

Dying with major sins on your soul. Anything that breaks the laws the 10 Commandments of God and damages your bond with him can send you to hell. This is incredibly subjective since a sin that might send one person to hell may not send another person to hell. For example a starving person stealing one apple from a tree full of apples is not the same as someone stealing all the apples so they can profit on them.

It is complicated and you can never know for sure what sins you commit are breaking your connection with God. So the best practice is to regularly beg forgiveness from God.

The is called imperfect contrition. God will forgive you but it is imperfect because God know you are only doing it because you fear the fires of hell and wish to go to heaven so you do not go to hell.

Perfect Contrition is more rare but can be done. When a person sincerely feels remorse for their sins and begs forgiveness for love of God and a desire to be with God. This will totally remove your mortal sins.

Your best bet is to go to the sacrament of Reconciliation.