If I’m not mistaken, this is the photo that was taken of the three Fatima children just after the vision of souls falling into hell like snowflakes shown to them by our Lady of the Rosary, as our Lady of Fatima called herself. The eyes tell the story, as does the clutching of the rosary beads. We know what happens to snowflakes when they get near fire, don’t we? We don’t want anyone going to hell, do we?
—–
UPDATE: Justin sends in this photo, which, after research, says is the photo taken on 13 July. They don’t look happy at all:
—–
Universal salvation is a heresy asserted by those who, apparently, have never even once read the Gospel. Cardinal Hans Urs von Balthasar (///Adrienne von Speyr) did not want people to assert this. But he is their hero for claiming there is no hell should one hope that all men be saved. We know that all are redeemed, and since we don’t know who will or will not be saved, we are in anguish that all men be saved, though we know that not all will, in fact, be saved.
I’m no follower of the extremely imprecise terminology used so very ambiguously by his Eminence. He gets the title, even if not the red hat.
Let’s use some clear terminology, shall we, my fellow priests and bishops, lest we lead our flock to hell, as if it were thought anyone could do anything, as if there were no hell? Let’s just take one chapter of Matthew:
- “Lord! Lord! Open up [the gates of heaven] for us!” But, having answered, He said, “Amen, amen, I say to you, I do not know you” (Matthew 25,11-12). [The most frightening words than one would ever hear.]
- “Throw this worthless slave out, into the outside-darkness. [Can't be more cast out and inescapably enveloped in eternal darkness than that, can one?] There will be weeping and gnashing of teeth” (Matthew 25,30). [This comes about with frustration, eternal frustration, no?]
- “And all the nations will be gathered together before Him, and He will separate them one from another, just as a shepherd separates the sheep from the goats” (Matthew 25,32). [No purgatory after that. Just heaven or hell.]
- “Amen I say to you, inasmuch as you did it not to one of these least ones, you did it not to me, and these will depart into eternal punishment” (Matthew 25,45-46). [And it all comes crashing home.]
All these are parables and therefore false, or just a warning, right? Wrong.
The first two are from parables, but parables reflect reality, don’t they? Our Lord is not an idiot, is He?
The last two are not from a parable, but from a description of how things will, in fact, be, at the last judgment. To say this is untrue or just a warning is to call our Lord a liar. But it is Satan who is the father of lies, no?
And so, why would a nice priest – a consensus builder, always prompt with the sacraments (at least Mass, at least on weekends), and always there for meetings, even for the committee arrangement of this or that spiritual or corporal work of mercy, just pack off and go to hell, condemned by our Lord, when all along he thought — and everyone else thought — he was just, well, such a nice priest?
He would go to hell most likely for being so very nice instead of being charitable in all truth. An exam of conscience is in order. One of these days I’ll have to publish a more comprehensive list.
- Did I lead people astray in the confessional or in answers to questions outside the confessional, telling them that such and such grave sin was no sin at all, just to be nice? Did I offer them “internal forum solutions” when these are not solutions at all, and only keep people in their sin? Did I absolve them even though they did not at all want to repent and try to change their lives with the grace of our Lord? Did I neglect offering the sacrament of reconciliation?
- Did I celebrate the sacraments just to draw attention to myself, so that when I protest to Christ that I prophesied in His name, that I absolved sin in His name, and that I even acted in His Person during Mass, all in His name, He will just reply: “Get away from me, you evildoer; I never knew you.”
- Did I use the priesthood as a power play, so that women got the idea that since it is all about power, and nothing more, then they can become priests too, just so as to get away from the male-oppressive-hierarchy? Did I neglect that I am to be a father to the family of faith, so that I was just an administrator of power, and not of true service, pointing the children of the family of faith to Jesus.
I’m sure we can all think of more reasons, but this is enough to get started, no? To aim at purgatory instead of hell would probably only get us as far as hell, so let’s aim at heaven, so that perhaps we might get to purgatory!
Next: Why would any priest go to purgatory?
Accompany me, Father George David Byers, S.S.L., S.T.D., as I begin life as a Catholic Priest-Hermit by choice. Holy Souls Hermitage is dedicated to the sanctification of my fellow priests, bishops, deacons & seminarians going through the purgatory of this life or the next. Prayer and sacrifice go up, of course, for both Benedict XVI and the next Successor of Saint Peter. 
Amen
With the utmost respect Father, I’m going to disagree not on the point itself, but on its presentation (which follows an established pattern). Feel free to axe the comment if you prefer that the site doesn’t become a forum for debate.
One thought always crosses my mind when I read topics like these (and especially the ones more strongly worded than this): Whether or not Hell is thickly populated or sparsely, is none of our business – it’s the Lord’s.
Just the probability – and I fail to see why it should even be likely, after all any nonzero chance is already quite bad enough – should be more than enough to ask some oneself hard questions. Conclusion: I think that often, we’re approaching this from the wrong angle by trying to ‘fill up Hell’* in order to grab the necessary attention, thereby decending into endless discussions about conditions for (non-)salvation, while simply recognizing that we will be judged is already quite sufficient.
* In fact, that’s pretty much fighting the battle on the ‘opponents’ terms – always a bad strategy – by giving much more prominence to the ‘all will be saved, regardless’ crowd than they deserve. Mention the likes of Hitler, Stalin or Pol Pot, and you’ll see that few people really hold on to the idea Hell will be empty.
Totally agree, Doc. Noli timere!
The pattern, however, in this case, is to be followed up with two more posts, on purgatory, already advertised, and then tying it all together with one on heaven and how to put the “Last Things” into perspective. Kind of a “Duc in altum”, starting from the bottom kind of a method.
Perhaps I started with the “Dare we think” crowd, for the reason that it seemed like everyone and their pet dog was doing a doctorate on von Balthasar throughout my latter years in Rome. Interesting that all of them would admit that he was impossibly ambiguous with his terminology.
Also interesting is that the post I had on Hitler, Stalin and Pol Pot is one of the most continuously popular.
But you’re right. It’s about Jesus: if we could get just a bit of an understanding of the weight of the glory of the Lord, and His majesty as judge of the living and the dead, in all His goodness and kindness, in all His mercy founded on justice, this should be way, way, way more than enough to grab out attention and put us on our knees before Him.
Just a correction with the photo – this is not the one taken of the children on July 13, 1917 (straight after the vision of hell), but was taken on September 13, 1917.
However, the actual July 13 photo, you will find, is much more disturbing.
In a quick search I found the correct photo at http://i942.photobucket.com/albums/ad269/frkevin48/Fatima/20081121173036_D0000100.jpg
Based on several published sources, I can vouch that this link is indeed the photo taken on July 13, 1917.
Thanks Justin. Yikes!
I spent a morose couple of weeks recently thanks to St. Leonard of Port Maurice– it is a very terrifying realization, this doctrine of the few. if dwelt upon it can become positively debilitating. What remedy then, other than camping out in the confessional and hoping all those indulgences count in the end.?
Hello Rebecca!
For Goodness sake! Don’t be morose! Dear Leo ( http://olrl.org/snt_docs/fewness.shtml ) was trying to shake up those who are intent on going to hell just because that was the fashion of the day, to be so consciously arrogant and yet politically correct enough to still hear a sermon such as that. Yikes!
Actually, I’ll go him one step more: All of us want to be damned except for the grace of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, who loved us while we were yet sinners, so as to drag us to Himself, with great mercy, though not forgetting the justice of Him having taken on all that we deserve, death, so as to have the right in justice to have mercy on us. He loves us! Enthusiastically! Tenderly! With the most solicitous attention to absolutely everything in our lives. Truly.
Any honest appraisal of philosophies and theologies (and any rationalizations on anyone’s part) that stray from the truth and charity which emanated from Mary’s Son will show that proponents of such rubbish are scared of free will and scared of a close friendship with Christ Jesus, right here, right now.
Why? Because we want to be in control of everything, even of the spiritual life, working our own way to heaven by way of complacent self-congratulations which rationalize away all sin, and because, in the same way, we think it terribly childISH to instead be drawn by the enthusiastic love of our Lord to Himself, to Him who provides us with eager childLIKE simplicity in all humble thanksgiving for all He does for us. We are all tempted to do the former, and sometimes fall into that hell (for which there is confession!), but we can all rejoice in the latter, being the Lord’s good children.
What scares us, and makes us frustrated, and then upset, and then morose, is that we take on too much responsibility for advancement in the spiritual life, failing to realize that it is not a matter of becoming oh so much more terribly intense, looking to ourselves for strength, but rather a matter of looking to Jesus in all simple and humble thanksgiving, which is so very easy, as it is He who is drawing us to do this, and with all enthusiasm. It’s a matter of love. And it is Jesus who loves us so much.
So, be shaken up by the words of the saint? Yes. Please do. But NOT so as to look to yourself and get depressed, but so as to rejoice in childLIKE simplicity before Mary’s dear Son. How much did He love us? Right do death, not with a hateful, spiteful attitude that we were not returning His love, but with the most tender forgiveness and invitation to great friendship: “See how much I love you?”
Father Leo says it well. But what he’s going after is actually a heresy that is rampant today — universal salvation (no one ever goes to hell) — which has been used as a rationalization of very many priests to arrogantly, purposely, consciously, calously and with all determination reject the doctrines and morality of the Church in a most frightening way, terribly brow-beating and marginalizing others who do not follow their lead, and I do mean terribly. I’ve seen it, and been subject to it. I really think that such priests, faced with the goodness and kindness of Jesus, would spit on Him and run straight to hell with the arrogance of their rationalizations. It is truly frightening. And I must say, Rebecca, seeing this up close and first hand, and being subject to such a hell by the heretic “nice” priests was the most trying time of my priesthood. I truly felt that I was in hell except for the consolation of a lively friendship with Mary’s Son, and of a filial devotion to His Mother. But I thank God for all that. It let me know more what He saw from the Cross. It let me know what His solidarity with us meant just a bit more. Yikes! A source of humble thanksgiving…
If Saint Leo’s sermon ripped out any last bit of self-reliance form your soul, thanks be to God! But don’t look to yourself in despair for ever having come near such bit of self-reliance. Instead, simply, in an eager childLIKE manner, let yourself be drawn into a bit of humble thanksgiving, looking to the Mary’s Son.
Also, thank the Lord for the likes of Father Leo. Know that he suffered like hell in his life to have had the capactity to give a sermon like that. Yikes!
Lastly: Don’t use the confessional or indulgences like superstitious tools of our own working our own way to heaven. That would be totally counterproductive and against everything that confession and indulgences are about.
Just participate in confession normally, and with humble thanksgiving for the great graces received, humble thanksgiving from one confession to the next. That keeps us away from sin, because we’re looking to Jesus, not to ourselves, and by His grace, not our ever so weak determination.
And a word on indulgences: Is it true that only, say, one in a million are worthy of an indulgence? Hah! I will go you one better: No one ever has been worthy of an indulgence, not even our Lady (who, with the grace of the Immaculate Conception, did not need an indulgence!). That’s why indulgences are “indulgences”. We cannot be perfectly open to such things, or we wouldn’t need them. That’s the point of Augustine’s remark. We only need to be adequately available: Confession, Communion, prayers for the Holy Father, the prayers or almsgiving, etc., indictated, with no arrogant attachment to sin. Are we weak? Yes. Can we and are we tempted to be attached to sin? Yes. Does that mean we are not available for the indulgences? Nope. That means we are candidates for the indulgence!
No being morose. Jesus loves us!!!
Your words are so reassuring. It all comes down to trusting in Jesus instead of ourselves. That’s so easy to say and understand but so difficult to practice and remember.
Of course, that’s the thing, isn’t it? It’s actually soooooooooooooooo easy, but we think it’s difficult! Harass your guardian angel into reminding you. Harass him all the time. Blame me!
Great idea!
What? To blame me?!
LOL, no no, to get my angel busy. And busy he will be I assure you!