Chapter 20 – Official Statements

Arriving at your own view is important, but Christianity is not merely an individualistic faith. Official statements or creeds help us understand what major groups of believers have thought about many topics through the centuries. What do these public declarations reveal about final judgment?

• Originating in the 2^nd century, the Apostles’ Creed corresponds with what we noticed in the book of Acts: the reality of final judgment is affirmed but details are absent: Christ “will come to judge the quick (living) and the dead.”
• Likewise, the Nicene Creed (AD 325) is silent on details of the afterlife. Again, it affirms that Christ will come “to judge the quick (living) and the dead.”
• The Chalcedonian Creed (AD 451) focuses on the two natures of Christ so it does not comment on the destiny of humans.
• “None of the four great General Councils held in the first four centuries of the Christian era—those at Nicea, Constantinople, Ephesus, and Chalcedon—condemned the belief in ultimate restoration or even mentioned endless punishment as the consensus belief of the Church, although both doctrines were held by various key participants at the time.”[i]

Based on this evidence, J. W. Hanson concludes, “It is apparent that the early Christian church did not dogmatize on man’s final destiny.”[ii] Reticence on this topic makes sense because early creeds were not written to clarify details of the afterlife. They were written to express the Christian view of God. Consequently, we need to continue our search by focusing on official statements from Catholic, Eastern Orthodox, and Protestant sources.

Roman Catholicism

The Catechism of the Catholic Church (1992) states:

The teaching of the Church affirms the existence of hell and its eternity. Immediately after death the souls of those who die in a state of mortal sin descend into hell, where they suffer the punishments of hell, “eternal fire.” The chief punishment of hell is eternal separation from God, in whom alone man can possess the life and happiness for which he was created and for which he longs.[iii]

As we have noticed, eternal conscious torment has been the official perspective of the Catholic Church since Augustine. The statement above emphasizes hell as “eternal separation from God.” According to this view, hell is primarily a state rather than a place. It is a permanent break in the divine-human relationship. We all know that broken relationships make our lives miserable, but this one leads to “the punishments of hell, ‘eternal fire.’”

This doctrine, however, is tempered in the following ways. First, the punishments of hell are reserved for those “who die in a state of mortal sin.” This entails, for example, breaking one of the Ten Commandments with “full knowledge and deliberate consent” then dying without repentance.[iv] Second, as we have seen, the Catholic Church has never claimed to know the identity of individuals in hell. In fact, it has never even officially declared the final fate of Judas Iscariot. As a result, Richard John Neuhaus (1936–2009) concludes, “we do not know who, if any one, is in hell.”[v] Third, the Second Vatican Council (1962–1965) gives hope to those who have not heard the good news of Christ:

Those also can attain to salvation who through no fault of their own do not know the Gospel of Christ or His Church, yet sincerely seek God and moved by grace strive by their deeds to do His will as it is known to them through the dictates of conscience.[vi]

Fourth, by affirming Christ’s descent to Hades and offering prayers for the dead, the Catholic Church expresses faith in God’s mercy beyond the grave. Lastly, Catholics are permitted to hope for the salvation of all. And prominent Catholic thinkers, such as Hans Urs von Balthasar, have expressed this hope in writing.

I should add a comment about the Catholic doctrine of purgatory. According to this doctrine, purgatory is only for those who die as God’s friends. They were on the path to heaven before death and need cleansing before entering paradise.[vii] This is a similar idea to the afterlife purification expressed by Clement and Gregory, but they expand its application to everyone.

Eastern Orthodoxy

Embracing mystery is a fundamental feature of the Eastern Orthodox faith so it is not surprising that there is no official position on details of eternity. While some Orthodox writers have described the fate of the unrighteous as separation from God, many have described hell in opposite terms: God is present with the wicked.[viii] This has been called the “divine presence model” and it asserts that instead of actively torturing people, God simply reveals his light and love. And that revelation is painful to those who have rejected the truth.[ix] As Basil the Great (329–379) says:

Fire has two powers, the caustic and illuminating energies, and that is why it burns and sheds light. Thus those worthy of the fire will feel its caustic quality and those worthy of lighting will feel the illuminating property of the fire.[x]

Similarly, Isaac of Nineveh writes, “It is not right to say that the sinners in hell are deprived of the love of God . . . But love acts in two ways, as suffering of the reproved, and as joy in the blessed!”[xi]

Seeing hell as the lack of God’s presence and the reality of God’s presence is thought-provoking because both make sense. On the one hand, Jesus says to some, “Away from me, you evildoers” (Matt 7:23) and they will be thrown outside (22:13). And Paul writes, “They will be punished with everlasting destruction and shut out from the presence of the Lord” (2 Thess 1:9). On the other hand, if God is omnipresent, he is by definition everywhere. Additionally, we can call Paul’s statement back to the witness stand. Although most English versions convey the idea of separation from the Lord (i.e., “shut out,” “separated”), the ambiguity in Greek leads others to indicate that the destruction is the result of the Lord’s presence: “These will pay the penalty of eternal destruction from the Lord’s presence and from His glorious strength” (HCSB). In contrast with the previous translation, it is God’s presence, not his absence, that will cause destruction.

What else do we know about the Orthodox view of hell? Gregory MacDonald writes:

Currently, the Orthodox Churches allow belief in universalism as an acceptable personal opinion, though it may not be taught as dogma. To some extent this reflects the high regard that the Orthodox have for Gregory of Nyssa.[xii]

Protestantism

Since there are thousands of Protestant denominations, I will only highlight a few examples. The only reference to hell in the Church of England’s Thirty-Nine Articles of Religion (1571) relates to Christ’s descent: “As Christ died for us, and was buried, so also is it to be believed, that he went down into Hell.”

About two centuries later, John Wesley (1703–1791), the founder of Methodism, based his Articles of Religion (1784) on the Thirty-Nine Articles. Wesley’s Articles also do not give specific information on eternal damnation.

Article 37 of the Belgic Confession (1561), a primary source of doctrine for the Christian Reformed Church, says:

The evil ones will be convicted by the witness of their own consciences, and shall be made immortal—but only to be tormented in “the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels.”[xiii]

Likewise, the Westminster Larger Catechism (1648) used by Presbyterians affirms:

The punishments of sin in the world to come, are everlasting separation from the comfortable presence of God, and most grievous torments in soul and body, without intermission, in hell-fire forever.[xiv]

It continues by declaring that after the wicked are cast out from God’s favorable presence, they will be sent to hell “to be punished with unspeakable torments, both of body and soul, with the devil and his angels forever.”[xv] So far, the Belgic Confession and Westminster Larger Catechism are the most explicit in supporting eternal conscious torment.

Fast-forwarding to modern times, The Lausanne Covenant (1974), relied on by Evangelical churches and mission organizations, says: “those who reject Christ repudiate the joy of salvation and condemn themselves to eternal separation from God.”[xvi]

The Mystery of Salvation, written by the Church of England Doctrine Commission in 1995, defends annihilationism or conditionalism:

the reality of hell (and indeed of heaven) is the ultimate affirmation of the reality of human freedom. Hell is not eternal torment, but it is the final and irreversible choosing of that which is opposed to God so completely and so absolutely that the only end is total non-being.[xvii]

Moving to the United States, The Baptist Faith and Message, published in 2000 by the Southern Baptist Convention, the largest Protestant denomination, reads simply, “The unrighteous will be consigned to Hell, the place of everlasting punishment.”

Finally, returning to the United Kingdom, The Evangelical Alliance, also published a statement in 2000, called The Nature of Hell. This four-page document contains a list of conclusions and recommendations, including openness to the possibility of inclusive salvation, a recognition that Evangelicals disagree on whether hell is eternal in duration (ECT) or effect (annihilation), and a rejection of universalism, which is defined as “all will be saved regardless of their commitment to Christ.” Here is a selected portion:

God may save some who have not explicitly professed faith in Jesus Christ . . . e.g. the unevangelized, children who die in infancy, or those who have severe mental disabilities.” While such people may receive the mercy of God in salvation, we are not at liberty to presume that any specific individual will be saved apart from professing faith in Jesus Christ. In particular, we can find no convincing warrant in Scripture for ‘post-mortem’ or ‘second-chance’ repentance. We also reject the teaching of universalism, which holds that all will be saved regardless of their commitment to Christ.[xviii]

What does The Nature of Hell report affirm about ultimate judgment?

As separation from God, hell involves severe punishment. Scripture depicts this punishment in various ways, using both psychological and physical terminology. Although the terminology is often metaphorical and although we should be wary of inferring more detail about hell than Scripture itself affords, hell is a conscious experience of rejection and torment.[xix]

The report continues by acknowledging conditional immortality or annihilation as a “significant minority evangelical view” with “eternal conscious punishment” being “the most widely attested by the Church.”[xx]

The authors resist fully siding with one perspective because this disagreement does not affect core Christian teaching. Instead they conclude by urging both sides to “pursue agreement on the matter of hell.”[xxi]

Summary

What can we conclude from these official statements of faith? Since hell doesn’t appear in the creeds, and we know a diversity of views existed in the early centuries, it could not have been a major topic of concern. As a result, no particular view can appeal to a Christian consensus in the early centuries. The early church was concerned with something much more important—the nature of God as revealed in Christ.

If churches feel the need to dogmatize about the afterlife, it is wise to stick with the language of Scripture, such as Jesus’ words in John 5:

a time is coming when all who are in their graves will hear his voice and come out—those who have done what is good will rise to live, and those who have done what is evil will rise to be condemned. (vv. 28–29)

They will be condemned—convicted by the perfect Judge and Savior. And then what? According to Christian history, the answer to that question is up for debate. But listen closely to the words of the judge: “I did not come to judge the world, but to save the world” (Jn 12:47).

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[i] Sarris, 68.

[ii] Hanson, 26.

[iii] Catechism of the Catholic Church, Part 1, Sec. 2, Ch. 3, Art. 12, IV, 1035.

[iv] Catechism, Part 3, Sec. 1, Ch. 1, Art. 8, IV, 1857-1858.

[v] Neuhaus, “Will All Be Saved?”

[vi] “Dogmatic Constitution on the Church,” 1964, Lumen Gentium, chap. 2, sect. 16.

[vii] Jerry Walls argues that purgatory makes sense even for Protestants. See his book Heaven, Hell, and Purgatory: Rethinking the Things That Matter Most (Grand Rapids: Brazos, 2015).

[viii] Certain Catholics and Protestants have also expressed a divine presence model of hell.

[ix] R. Zachary Manis, Sinners in the Presence of a Loving God: An Essay on the Problem of Hell (New York: Oxford, 2019).

[x] Cited in Jersak, Her Gates Will Never Be Shut, 78.

[xi] Quoted in Orthodox Church in America, Volume IV: Spirituality, The Kingdom of Heaven, Heaven and Hell, oca.org, accessed May 22, 2020, www.oca.org/orthodoxy/the-orthodox-faith/spirituality/the-kingdom-of-heaven/heaven-and-hell.

[xii] MacDonald, Evangelical Universalist, chap. 7.

[xiii] Accessed May 23, 2020, www.crcna.org/welcome/beliefs/confessions/belgic-confession

[xiv] Answer to Question 29.

[xv] Answer to Question 89.

[xvi] Lausanne Covenant, accessed May 23, 2020, www.lausanne.org/content/covenant/lausanne-covenant.

[xvii] Quoted in Thiselton, 158.

[xviii] Point 4, accessed May 23, 2020, www.eauk.org/church/resources/theological-articles/upload/The-Nature-of-Hell-2.pdf.

[xix] Point 7, accessed May 23, 2020, www.eauk.org/church/resources/theological-articles/upload/The-Nature-of-Hell-2.pdf.

[xx] Points 18 and 19, accessed May 23, 2020, www.eauk.org/church/resources/theological-articles/upload/The-Nature-of-Hell-2.pdf.

[xxi] Point 22, accessed May 23, 2020, www.eauk.org/church/resources/theological-articles/upload/The-Nature-of-Hell-2.pdf.

Les Bridgeman

After graduating from Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary, I served as a high school Bible teacher in Asia. I enjoy traveling, writing, and playing the drums. For a deep dive into church history and the character of God, see my book Surprised by Hell.