Can’t Christians Just Admit Anne Frank is in Hell?

Given that Hitler was a professed Christian, shouldn’t he be in heaven – in much the same way Anne Frank would be in hell?

I mean, if we follow their beliefs to their inevitable conclusions.

They must also acknowledge that Jeffrey Dahmer could very well be in heaven.

According to what I’ve read, he became a born-again christian and was forgiven just weeks before he was murdered in prison.

If Christians say she is in Heaven, that means it’s possible for us heathens to wind up in Heaven too, as long as we lead good lives.

I bet they won’t admit that, though.

i’ve heard christians say things like, “well, at least jewish people believe in the same god as us, that’s a plus”

stupid…just stupid

@Lxndr – Whether works get one into heaven, divine grace, or simply believing the right stuff is a point of much contention among Christians.

In other words, Christianity is vague as to whether Hitler is in heaven or hell, but Anne Frank is definitely, absolutely, positively in hell.

Hoorah for religion!

It’s not that simple. Many Christians believe in a concept called “Universal reconciliation”, which holds that everyone will eventually be redeemed and go to heaven, perhaps even Satan. One of my favorite Christian writers, C. S. Lewis, appears to have taken the notion that “Hell is separation from God” quite literally; he wrote a fascinating book called “The Great Divorce”, in which denizens of hell can take field trips to heaven, and are offered, even begged to stay, but generally most of them refuse to do so.

Of course, the whole idea’s rubbish, since neither heaven nor hell exist. But you ought to be fairer; not all Christians agree on the nature of hell, or whether the “damned” are eternally so.

@Chris Ho-Stuart – What Biblical passages indicate that Anne Frank might be in Heaven?

@Nick

A Catholic would not doubt that an innocent girl that was murdered is in Heaven, regardless of her belief system

Perhaps , but the point is that’s not a Catholic teaching. The Catholic then have to admit that some catholic teaching is wrong, some parts of the bible are wrong , the pope is fallible(in any matter , including doctrine) and why be a catholic if all the above hold.

I met a Christian in freshman year that insisted that Hitler is in heaven since he probably “accepted Christ” before he died.

Chris Ho-Stuart
You will find many Christians who state that just believing in Christ isnt enough , you must have good deeds too. However there are few people who hold that deeds are all that matter (and that an atheist or a polytheist idol worshipper will go to heaven if he performs good deeds). Its also non existent in the official positions of the churches.

@Julie – I haven’t read any passages that talk about universal salvation. Do you happen to know what they are off hand?

To all the Christians who have answered here to the effect that the criteria for hell aren’t defined or are ambiguous
Do you(you personally) believe that a belief in Jesus is necessary/needed/better for any of the goodies (if any) that might await us after we die?
If your answer is no then
Do you believe that a belief in Jesus helps you to be a better person or perform better deeds?
If the answer is no then Im confused why you are christian.

Rachel actually did a follow-up post today explaining why she (and others) believes in a more inclusive view of the Bible.

Either Anne Frank is in heaven or she is in hell. If the former, what’s the point in being a Christian, and what exactly did Jesus die for? If the latter, what kind of god are you people worshipping?

I really sympathize with Rachel when she says:

I don’t know how to interpret Christ’s teachings regarding hell. I’ve heard theologians make a good case for the impermanent “trash heap” and a good case for the traditional view of eternal torture. Still sorting it all out.

Because I felt similarly when I was a christian. What I think she is seeing here, is that a plain reading of the bible is, at best, ambiguous. If the christian’s god exists, and the bible is truly his inspired work, such a deity is ludicrously inept for crafting something that they KNEW would be misunderstood or constructed to support wildly different viewpoints on key issues.

There is, of course, a better explanation. The NT’s internal inconsistency betrays the writings of its original works by fallible men in bronze age palestine and its metaphysical claims, as with every other equally unsupported metaphysical claim, are not true.

There is no reason to think that a Bible believing Christian should believe Anne Frank is in hell.I do not think the New Testament really makes it all that clear what happens to non-Christians. I can see how an evangelical atheist, who has a vested interest in trying to make Christians look bad would not have it in her interest to give the Bible (or any other religious text) a fair reading, but that is another issue.

Even those who never heard of christ when they died, such as other parts of the world, would go to hell.

I brought this up with my minister nephew once (honestly one of my favorite people in the world). I said “What about them?”
His answer was “I don’t care about them.”

It seems any logical flaw, when brought to light, simply becomes irrelevant.

As to the Catholic discussion above, I once spoke to a conservative Catholic woman who told me that her Catholic education taught her that Jews would go to heaven because God had a convenant with them that was unbreakable. I then asked her if converting to Catholicism and converting to Judaism where equal and she waffled, but at least in that sense I did see some theological wiggle-room. Of course, none of that means a damn thing for Ghandi, who will be screaming for the pain to stop, according to both Catholics and Protestants.

The views on the afterlife have been studied by the Pew Forum. See here. Here they ask about “eternal life” and not heaven, but I think that’s what’s understood. Most people don’t want to believe that good people go to hell, even if they are theologically mistaken. 40% of people are even willing to say that us big-bad atheists can get eternal life.

I don’t see this as very different from Christian women who work outside the home, or from religious people who follow few of the more inconvenient rules about sex and diet etc. They are directly contradicting their holy books. Likewise with hell and heaven. Theist thought is not known for consistency or logic, so it’s no surprise that we’d get some pretty fuzzy bounderies and mental gymnastics when we try to force them to step outside the childish “good people go to heaven and bad people go to hell” mindset.

One often finds moderate religious people uncomfortable committing to the consequences if their dogmas are played out to their logical ends, especially with someone very likeable but not of the same faith. What does it say that their own religion squicks them out when generally applied to everyone, not just disliked “others?”

Yeah, basically universal salvation means that everyone gets saved. As I said, I would never claim that this should be comforting or “good news” to someone who doesn’t believe in God, because if you don’t believe in God, why would you want to be saved? But that may be an argument for another day.

And I’m Lutheran, so I would never say that salvation is based on deeds, even if I didn’t believe in universal salvation. And by the way, I’m still wrestling with this theological concept, but I’m probably 95% there, so that’s pretty much close enough to say that I believe in it, eh?

I didn’t think anyone from earth was in heaven (well, except for Enoch and Elijah). I thought everyone was just in suspension until the final “Day of Judgement” when Christ returns… or at least until the “rapture”, when the dead’s souls will rise to join the saved living that are carried aloft. So right now, Ann and Hitler are exactly where everyone else is… dust in the ground. Right?

“He will come again in glory to judge the living and the dead”. If the dead are already in heaven, seems like they get to enjoy it for a while, and then possibly not pass the test and be booted out on the judgement? Think of the backtalk: “Hey, J, you can’t hold that against me… that was thousands of years ago when I was alive. Think what a good believer I’ve been since getting here.”

I always thought that pretty stupid… God is such a procrastinator. Just think of the queue that’ll exist after all these centuries. Seems like that’s why many believe in the instant POD judgement, I guess.

to add to the catholic conversation, I was raised catholic and went to a Jesuit high school. We spent a long time learning catholic theology and philosophy, ie the stuff that’s been written by catholics to rationalize their belief systems into more practical matters.

Anyway, one tenant I was taught is that “no one goes to hell through no fault of their own”. (I still remember this verbatim b/c that double negative always pissed me off). What it means practically is that if you are never exposed to the catholic faith, or if you are exposed but your true conscience (another in-depth definition would be appropriate for that) does not permit you believe and have faith, then sort of it’s not your fault and you get a free pass to heaven (or more specifically, you get baptism by spirit).

as an aside, later on in life this moral relativism sort of blew religion out of the water for me, and I’ve been atheist ever since. But there it is.

I’ve never gone back to research the verity of that statement of theology because it’s irrelevant, but it’s what I was taught then.

I’m pretty sure a ton of christians (perhaps even a majority of them; certainly all that I know except one) don’t believe that you need to be a christian in order to go to heaven. No christian person reads the bible and believes everything in it literally (although some claim they do). Everybody allows *some* room for interpretation, and a lot of them believe that you’ll go to heaven if you lead a good life regardless of whether you believe in their god.

The idea of hell and what I’d been taught about it was the first nail in my theism coffin. As @Anna said, once I thought “omg, all those people who have grown up never hearing about Jesus are going to go to hell,” I couldn’t un-think it. It was paralyzing.

So the brand of Christianity I was raised with went straight out the window. I simply could not rationalize that a morally good god would be exclusive – especially based on things beyond the individual’s control.

So then I went with this freaky “spiritual” pan-theism crap. That didn’t last too long. It quickly became clear to me that I was just making it up as I went along based on my personal sensibilities. It seemed a bit presumptuous to project my own personal opinions onto some cosmic deity. So *ploof* went my religion.

All this discussion reminded me of something I recall from childhood. I was raised Catholic, and in the early 1960’s… the mass was in Latin, and it was a mortal sin to willfully eat meat on Friday. (yeah, I’m old). When they changed the rule where it was OK to eat meat on Friday, I remember asking my Mom: “What about those who went to hell for doing that. And now the rules have changed. Is that fair?” She said, you have to play by the rules you’re given at the time. So that moment was the start of my fall from grace into atheism. Well, that, and actually reading the Bible cover to cover several times. And all other ‘holy’ books I could get my hands on. Finally came to believe… it was all rubbish.

The Protestant evangelical doctrine of hell is not spelled out in any clear way anywhere in the Bible, and the verses pertaining to hell, or gehenna, are not consistent with one another. (It can’t be said often enough: The Bible does not have one clear, consistent viewpoint – it’s an anthology written by many hands, with many agendas, none of which would recognize modern evangelicalism.) But one thing that is really not in the Bible is the sinner’s prayer, or any version of the phrase “accept Jesus as your personal savior.”

All that aside, this is a great question for the fundie in your life! It’s kind of similar to a question I like to ask my friends who keep trying to sell me on The Secret or “new thought” jive. “Did six million Jews die because they just weren’t visualizing a better result for themselves?” It’s a real stunner, and I’ve seen it cause instant cognitive dissonance in several friends. (Alas, they all managed to compartmentalize and disregard it almost as quickly. But maybe this seed will grow.)

I might add to Hemant’s honest atheist answer (Anne Frank is neither in heaven nor in hell): Because there is no afterlife in which to right wrongs or sort out justice, we have to take this life seriously and pay real attention to the consequences of hateful ideologies.

@Julie
Getting out of the difference brands of Christianity mold:
OK, do good Muslims go to heaven? They deny the divinity of Jesus.
Do good Buddhist got to heaven? They do not think any gods are worth worshiping (emulating perhaps. They claim there is a difference).
Do good Wiccans go to heaven?
Do good atheists go to heaven?

Because the question becomes “If good people do not go to heaven, what is the point of heaven? If non-Christians go to heaven, why bother being a Christian?”
Depending on the interpretation you go with, Heaven could be full of some of the worst bastards ever born.

@Reginald Selkirk

Someone’s a fan of Twain’s antedeluvian diaries, I see. The Mad Prophet, I presume?

@Digitus Impudicus

Simply, yes. But universal salvation would not just limit it to people who are “good.” If I were to believe that only good people go to “heaven,” I would believe that there are a lot of atheists who would go and a lot of Christians who would not, and then salvation is still not universal. “Heaven” may very well be full of bastards, but that’s based on an idea that we are the same people in “heaven” that we are on earth, and my understanding of theology doesn’t support such a statement.

Again, that’s all just me and the issues I’m working through at the moment!

What one wants to say instead is that anyone who would hold it against atheists for not having the same dogma has to hold it against Anne Frank. “Damned atheists” is equivalent to “Anne Frank on a hot-dog cooker.” And if we get someone to recognize atheists don’t deserve to be tortured and that its okay to interpret the Bible loosely so it makes ethical sense then that is quite a victory.

Of course Hitler’s in hell. He’s a suicide.

I was raised Christian and some of my Sunday School teachers told me Jews go to hell, and some of them were completely sure Jews were the chosen people, so Jews and Christians both go to hell. I was also told two completely different beliefs on suicides. I was told one, that suicide is murder and you go to hell, and the other idea is that someone who kills him/herself most often is in misery and wants to die so they can be rid of this life’s suffering and god allows them into heaven if they believe in heaven.

So..yeah different version of Christianity and one reason I stopped believing. Being a sufferer of depression myself, one of the first things I couldn’t swallow was that god would allow depressed people to burn! There are more logical reasons for my disbelief now, but that was a small spark..aside from that fact that my value as a female human being was less than that of a male human being.

but that’s based on an idea that we are the same people in “heaven” that we are on earth

@Julie
If we are different people in heaven, then WE don’t go to heaven, something else does.

universal salvation would not just limit it to people who are “good.”

Of course, universal salvation would not be limited to just good people, that is what would be universal about it.

Actually, that is one of the theological debates I had with various [super-fundie] family members. God can’t be perfectly just and perfectly merciful. Mercy often requires that one withhold just punishment. If God gives Hitler or Pol Pot a pass after being mass murderers, and I get the same deal after being a fairly decent guy, I just got screwed. I could have (theoretically) murdered millions, with no problems. That would be perfectly merciful, however.

And the argument that I get a better mansion or something is flawed, since if Hitler were in any way still human in heaven, he would eventually resent living in heaven’s gutters while I lived in a modest ranch-style, especially since he claimed to be doing God’s work in fighting the Jews.

If we all got exactly what we deserved for failing to live perfectly, that would not be perfect mercy. It would however, be perfectly just. Unless, of course, God does not care about morality, which would make it hard to explain all the rules demanding certain moral behavior.

And “perfectly merciful and perfectly just” is how many Christians describe God, among other logically inconsistent other pairs.

It seems that deities are the only beings that can exist while being logically impossible.

disclaimer: the reason I don’t murder people is not a fear of hell, it is compassion and other good things, but I am sure you see my point.

And “perfectly merciful and perfectly just” is how many Christians describe God, among other logically inconsistent other pairs.

Indeed! Let’s not forget the litany of logically incoherent omni’s that get slapped on.

Christians get their social and moral values from their environment (their society) as they grow up like everybody else, then they adapt their religious beliefs to those values they already have by trying desperately to come up with rationalizations and ad hoc excuses to justify the blatant dislocation between their values and their bibles.

That’s why Anne Frank must be in Heaven and that’s why many young Christians will say gay people won’t go to Hell just for being gay.

They have been doing it for centuries.

@Darryl said:

when we are in heaven, we will have our natures changed to Christ’s perfect nature and spend eternity glorifying god. Isn’t this the same thing? Don’t we then become the mindless automatons we were just told would be meaningless to God?

Reminds me of: “Your individuality will merge into the unity of Good. And in your submergence into the common being of the Body, you will find contentment and fulfillment. You will experience the Absolute Good.” (PS: You will be absorbed. It is the will of Landru)

The bible itself does not, in fact, give a clear consistent answer to your question, and many Christians acknowledge that.

Ehh… kind of. It does give clear answers, such as in Romans 10:9-10.

If you declare with your mouth, “Jesus is Lord,” and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved. For it is with your heart that you believe and are justified, and it is with your mouth that you profess your faith and are saved.

Cherry-picking? Sure. You can easily find a more ambiguous answer. But even with the inconsistencies, I don’t think you’ll find a single verse (in the New Testament – the Christian-only bit) that suggests that you can be saved without faith in Jesus. If Christians believe otherwise, it’s probably because they find the idea of hell to be repellent (at least hell for people we consider good or innocent).

You should also, in my opinion!

I agree. It’s a human problem, really; we all tend to paint with a broad brush. See? I just did.

Also, quite a number of Christians don’t treat the bible as inerrant in any case, and are honest in that as well.

My parents, for example. They believe everyone goes to heaven. Yet they still hassle me about being an atheist…

Anna,

If empathy and compassion are important to her, then wouldn’t she think that a good and loving god would refrain from torturing anyone for eternity?

That is a great question.

I would follow it up with one of my own- Why would a loving and caring God make you choose to love him and want to be with him?

For atheists who believe that there is no afterlife the idea of eternity, either one in Heaven or Hell, seems unjust being based upon faith and belief instead of actions and good works. That is based upon man’s interpretation of justice

But for theists who believe in an afterlife, belief and faith take on a whole new significance and the idea of eternal destination based upon works alone seems capricious and arbitrary. The idea being, how would your salvation ever be assured? Where are you in the equation? Have you done enough?

The bottom line is that God doesn’t send anyone to Hell. Those that end up there who have heard and rejected the Gospel are there by their own free will and choice.

@Wes Weinhold,
“He suggests that salvation is an ongoing process, continuing through life and after death, that hell is literally a state of mind, i.e. rejection of the existence and salvation offered by God.”

He seems to like his god very much and can’t stand the idea of rejecting him, so doing so would feel real bad. Hence, hell. It’s like me saying Gawd I love chocolate so much. Those people who don’t like chocolate really must be having a hard time. Why won’t they embrace the utterly joy of chocolate?

Maybe separation from God means hell to him. Certainly it doesn’t to me.

When I was a christian, it was through clever use of compartmentalization. Deliberately not turning your critical thinking (or lying to yourself and saying you were when you really weren’t!) on your religious beliefs allow you to rationalize/compartmentalize all sorts of ridiculous things.

The bible itself does not, in fact, give a clear consistent answer to your question, and many Christians acknowledge that. You should also, in my opinion! Also, quite a number of Christians don’t treat the bible as inerrant in any case, and are honest in that as well.

Didn’t read through all 500 comments, so this may have already been said. BUT…
With all it’s ambiguities, and contradictions the Bible is VERY CLEAR about who goes to hell. Nowhere does it even suggest that non-believers will see anything other than hell in the afterlife. Jesus spoke of hell more than any other topic in the NT.

If I’m wrong, please show me chapter and verse and I will retract my statement.

Edit: OK, so I read some of the comments about universal salvation. I would wager that all but the Unitarians would disagree with the “universal salvation” interpretation of those verses.

lol WOOPS! I meant to say “heaven” in my post!

Was supposed to read:

“I was raised Christian and some of my Sunday School teachers told me Jews go to hell, and some of them were completely sure Jews were the chosen people, so Jews and Christians both go to heaven.

I apologize to anyone I offend with this statement, but the bible is a bunch of crap! There’s just no way I can possible believe that in 2000 odd years of it’s exsistance that people have changed what it said to better suit themself. There is no way. So of course it sends to hell whoever the “translator” was having a beef with at the time.

Anna,

Torture is wrong, regardless of your claim that people are given a “choice.” Of course, people cannot consciously choose what to believe (I defy you to start believing in Vishnu), and even if they could, torturing human beings for any reason (let alone for something as silly as an inconsequential, unchosen belief) is flat out immoral, not to mention absurd.

I do remember our discussion and your feelings that even though you think it is all make believe that the notion of Hell offends you.

But I disagree with your statement that your choice to believe or not to believe is inconsequential. Although our life span here on Earth is limited Christians clearly believe that this choice has eternal consequences. On both sides of the equation the results are eternal. One of the most consequential choices you will make.

I have heard from many atheists on this site that they can’t choose to not believe and I simply disagree. Quite a few of them were raised in Christian homes and believed at one time, then they decided that they would no longer believe. So they made a choice.

For what it’s worth, this Christian thinks that the whole disembodied afterlife thing with heaven for people who said the magic words and hell for those who didn’t is completely unbiblical. Hell doesn’t exist, and Christians look forward to the resurrection, not heaven, as their eschatological hope.

Mike,

I think you put a fine point on it.

Even though I’m an atheist for all my live I think the stance on this subject is rather clear from the biblical viewpoint. Jesus teaches in John 8:44 that jews are of the devil and thus burn in hell for all eternity. I don’t know if anybody posted this so far and if my interpretation of this verse is right as english is not my native language.
Greetings from Europe

@Julie: why bother being a Lutheran? This is a serious question. Actually, I suppose it’s a bit like Pascal’s Wager in reverse. If you’re going to get saved anyway, why muck around with all the irrelevant detail that ultimately has no effect?

I see that you and Julie have decided to take your conversation off the blog, but I found this interesting, and thought I’d comment in case you’re still reading. (I’d encourage you to come back, because I was lurking and enjoying your discussion.)

Fraser, I find your question a bit puzzling. Presumably, the reason to be Lutheran is that it’s true. (Possibly not the only true thing in the world, perhaps Islam is also true, in a different way, but a true thing nonetheless.) I would think the reasson to believe it a true thing is that it’s true, not because it comes with lots of benefits. I don’t believe in the principles of electricity because they helps me microwave my burritto, I believe them because they’re true. That would be my take on it, now Julie can come back and tell me I got it totally wrong. 🙂

Sorry but before you can discuss whether or not different people get sent to heaven or hell you first have to demonstrate that gods exist, that heaven and hell exist and that people somehow exist after they die.

Good luck with that.

The evidence suggests that we exist as material entities and when we die we cease to exist. The material breaks down. The brain decays and our consciousness is no longer maintained. The closest analogy I can think of is a perpetual, dreamless sleep. That doesn’t seem so bad to me. It is certainly better than spending eternity bowing and scraping to some tyrant god or having my delicate bits toasted by pitch fork wielding demons. Or whatever it is that different people believe.

For example, Mike the Infidel gives a passage that he claims gives a “clear answer” that there’s a hell here…

You’ll notice that I said it gives clear answers – not that they’re consistent. This particular answer, taken on its own, is very clear – verbally declare Jesus’ sovereignty and believe in his resurrection and you’re saved. You’ll also notice that the question I was providing a clear answer to had nothing to do with whether or not there’s a hell; rather, it was about whether or not the Bible clearly said how to be saved, so any objections to the answer based on your misconception aren’t really my problem.

All it says is that if you believe certain things, you will be “saved.” It doesn’t specify what “saved” means – are we to be resurrected in a new earthly body? given a spiritual body in a new world, which we could decide to call “heaven”? Given new planets to rule in the Celestial Kingdom? It doesn’t say whether there are other ways to be “saved,” whatever that means.

Am I actually going to have to pull the “read it in context” card? Do so. The entire book of Romans does go into great detail about these things.

Your description of Biblical teachings is way off. It seems like you’re only going with the theology of the Christians who shout the loudest. If you really check out the bible, it absolutely does not say that everyone who doesn’t accept Jesus will go to hell. It’s pretty ambigous honestly so I think it is intellectually honest of a Christian to say that they don’t know who will be in heaven or hell.

I’m not a Christian, but I grew up in a Chritian home and know a lot about what’s there in the Bible and what isn’t. Lots of times people say that certain things are Biblical, when they’re really just BSing and making things up as they go along. In addition, not all Christians believe that when you die you go straght to heaven or hell (or purgatory or some other state). There is debate on the subject of the state of the dead, with some believing that death is like a sleep and that they will only go a certain place after the second coming of Jesus. This is not so important for this discussion because it doesn’t really matter if you’re saying Anne Frank is in Hell or that she will go to Hell, but there are a lot of differences in Christian thought out there. If you’re unsure about which thought is Biblical, look it up. It’s pretty easy to do. In fact doing that can be a lot of fun. Try getting Chritians to show you where is says in the Bible that there’s fire in Hell.

I don’t want to get too sentimental here, but I will say this, in response to Hemant’s comment that Anne Frank is nowhere but the ground — she has also achieved literary immortality, with every new generation of youth who read her diary and learn a little more about her time, life, and the human condition.

Sometimes I wonder how people who believe in hell are even able to function in society. If they really think that everyone who doesn’t accept Jesus as their savior is burning eternally, how are they even able to have normal interactions with the damned? How are they able to read books or watch movies without thinking that the deceased authors or actors are being tortured? If they are normal, empathetic, compassionate people (as Rachel clearly is), wouldn’t that kind of thing drive them crazy?

Maybe that’s why so many conservative Christians live such insular lives, why they don’t get emotionally close to anyone outside their circle. If they believe the rest of us are damned, maybe that’s why they discourage emotional connections (unequally yoked and all that) with people who don’t believe the same things they do. It can’t be easy to maintain hell-belief if you actually care about (or even love) people you think are condemned.

I am a Christian and I wonder the same things. You make an excellent point about the insular lives. I think it’s one of the regrettable things about American Christianity, and it makes me wonder how many of us truly believe what we claim to believe.

As I understand from reading James and elsewhere, works are the natural outpouring of faith. If we don’t have works — if we don’t spread the gospel and help the poor and such — it’s a disturbing sign that our faith is dead.

Mike,

Here’s the problem. According to your theology:

1. God designed the mind of man, to the minutest details.
2. God knows the future.
3. God created a place of everlasting suffering for those who become separated from him (originally Lucifer and his angels, but eventually man as well).
4. It is not the will of God that any should suffer.
5. Everything that happens is in accordance with God’s plan.

All of what you list is true, but that doesn’t make the theology internally inconsistent. You are discussing God’s sovereignty. God created man with the ability to choose him or not. That is evidence of his sovereignty in that he sovereignly decreed that we would have the choice to decide our fate. The fact that he knew that some would use their free will to chose not to follow him is something he knew but couldn’t change if he was to give us that choice.

God’s plan was not which choice we would make but that we would have the ability to make it. If it is God’s plan to make that choice for us then the free choice goes away.

Does God want us to suffer? No, the Bible states that God is a God of love and that he cares for all of his children, even those that choose not to follow him for whom he grieves. But it doesn’t logically follow that he would then make the choice for us to avoid that suffering. That would be illogical considering he gave us the choice in the first place.

Oh, and if you think that becoming an atheist is “simply” deciding to disbelieve: I challenge you to choose to believe that the tooth fairy actually exists. Not just say it – actually believe it. Then you’ll see how much of a choice it is.

Choosing to believe in Jesus Christ is a choice that you make. You seek him. From there the Holy Spirit takes over and grows your faith. I’m sure that doesn’t happen to with the tooth fairy.

Mike it is obvious that you have studied the Bible and Christianity. Maybe that was because you grew up in a Christian home or maybe it was just to counter Christians in arguments, I don’t know but, I would take it that based upon your investigation you have decided that you don’t believe in God. You have studied the arguments for God, you have read parts of the Bible and you have read the books of prominent atheists who have espoused arguments against God and Christianity. To me that is a conscious choice.

I love how people pull out these BS analogies for hell when we all know one that really fits: “Stalin didn’t send anyone to the gulag, people chose to go to the gulag when they chose to not be loyal communists.”

Robert W, I hate to cut in to someone else’s discussion, but I had to reply to this:

Choosing to believe in Jesus Christ is a choice that you make. You seek him. From there the Holy Spirit takes over and grows your faith. I’m sure that doesn’t happen to with the tooth fairy.

Do you honestly think that some atheists haven’t tried to find god? In fact, given the amount of people who have painfully deconverted from Christianity, desperately trying to hold onto their faith every step of the way until they could do it no longer, are you honestly trying to tell me they weren’t trying to find Jesus? Seriously?

Many, many atheists have tried to find your god, and there has been absolutely no answer.

No offence, but that statement just shows your ignorance.

(Also, as an aside, if you exchange the words “tooth fairy”, and “Jesus Christ”, the sentence makes equally as much sense to anyone who doesn’t believe in your god.)

Jose,

The difference between you and me is that I don’t need to see the holes in Jesus’ hands before I will believe. But I do see evidence of God’s existence and I do believe that the Bible is true in what it says about Jesus Christ.

If you actually need to see Hell or Heaven before you believe that it is real, then that is your choice. But why blame God for that choice?

Its like saying I won’t get married before I see what that marriage will be like 50 years from now. You take faith and you make the decision to believe and you get married. If you have to see what that marriage will be like fifty years from now before you get married then you will never get married.

“If you actually need to see Hell or Heaven before you believe that it is real, then that is your choice. But why blame God for that choice?”

Easy, he created heaven and hell. He’s responsible for all that stuff. He could have created just heaven, but decided not to. Or he could have closed up hell. He could appear and show me the damn holes. He prefers watching people fall and die instead.

Assuming for the sake of the argument that your god and your beliefs are real, I think he is kind of an ass. I think most people are better than him, because most people would save their children from a certain death if they could. Wouldn’t you?

There’s this prayer we used to recite, it went sort of like this: I confess to God that I have sinned by thought and by word and by what I have done and by what I have failed to do. Mea culpa, mea culpa. Because of that I ask Mary ever virgin and all the angels and all the saints to pray for me before God. Kinda. Can’t remember exactly.

Important bit: “and by what I have failed to do”. Like, say, being able to do what was right, like saving a life, and doing nothing instead.

(Warning — what follows is just a random rambling directed to noone) The argument of free choice strikes me as very American conservative style. The mentality of free market and less regulation that results in selfish individualism: you’re on your own and we have equal opportunities. If you screw up, well, too bad about you. Good luck with that! Don’t blame me, it was you who made the bad decision. Yeah I could have saved you, but I was busy with my own stuff (and saving you would have meant big government regulations and less freedom!). The arguments applied in the case against god showing up and actively saving people can be equally applied to the case against the bailout. To me, it looks pretty much as Christianity adapted to a certain set of social and economic values.

Robert,

I do remember our discussion and your feelings that even though you think it is all make believe that the notion of Hell offends you.

Well, good. I really don’t feel like hashing it out all over again, and I’m tired of hearing justifications and excuses for torture. Maybe other people don’t find those statements as sickening as I do. If that’s the case, you’re welcome to discuss it with them, but I’ve had quite enough of people claiming that “kitten stomping” is fine and dandy, to borrow from our previous analogy.

But I disagree with your statement that your choice to believe or not to believe is inconsequential.

Yes, I know from your perspective that it matters a great deal, but I was explaining that it seems extremely inconsequential to me. I can’t think of anything more inconsequential than what people believe about deities, and the notion of punishing people for what they believe is absurd. Thoughts are private. There are no magical beings that can hear anyone’s thoughts, and people cannot choose what they believe is real and what isn’t.

I have heard from many atheists on this site that they can’t choose to not believe and I simply disagree. Quite a few of them were raised in Christian homes and believed at one time, then they decided that they would no longer believe. So they made a choice.

So you’re calling them liars. That’s nice. I’ll leave it to someone who actually went through that experience to refute you, but that’s not what happened to me. I was not raised in a Christian home, and I never believed in your deity or in any other deity. I never even heard about deities until I was in elementary school, and even then, it took me a really long time to understand that people took them seriously. So if you honestly think that I can choose to believe in your deity, you’re mistaken. I can no more choose to believe in your god than you can choose to believe in the gods of Hinduism.

jose wrote:

Easy, he created heaven and hell. He’s responsible for all that stuff. He could have created just heaven, but decided not to. Or he could have closed up hell. He could appear and show me the damn holes. He prefers watching people fall and die instead

Exactly. ‘He’ set up all the parameters of this game.

God’s immoral character

Fast forward to 3:30 in the video. As Tracie Harris so aptly says, “it’s the most messed up thing ever”

If these examples seem outlandish to you, it’s only because you’ve accepted 20th Century Christianity as the standard for “normal” afterlife behavior, and read it into these 1st century texts. But people in the 1st entury had much more diverse beliefs about the afterline.

The only way you get from that passage to a clear picture of “hell” is by already having a 20th century picture of heaven, hell, and redemption in your head, and (consciously or unconsciously) reading it back into a 1st century text.

Fascinating points. Atheists would take that even further and question the assumption of an afterlife at all, given that the only reason human beings believe in such things is because our cultures teach us that they are real. From the time we are tiny children, most of us are told that people are able to survive physical death.

I will also say: If there is no punishment and therefore no possibility of salvation from that punishment, then Jesus does not matter anymore than any other teacher.

Well, that’s certainly the atheist position. The reason that Jesus doesn’t matter is because the supernatural is not real, and there is no such thing as reward or punishment after death.

One does choose, however, to be open to the possibility of the existence of God, or to shut out any consideration of that possibility. Faith comes through grace, and grace builds upon nature. But if the nature of an individual is such that he or she concludes that God cannot and does not exist, then there is very little nature left upon which to build.

We don’t choose our nature, do we? I can’t accept things without evidence. That’s basically what it comes down to for me. If something is undetectable, I have absolutely no reason to believe it’s there. Is there a chance it might be there? Sure, anything’s possible. But I can’t start believing in something simply because someone tells me to. It’s like if I visited the Amazonian rainforest. The people there believe in spirits, but most visitors would not start believing that their spirits exist. Now, sure, they might be real, but people raised outside that culture would have no reason to assume that they are. We’d need to see some kind of evidence first.

It does seem curious that some atheists, of whom it may be said profess a sceptical nature, are decidedly unsceptical regarding the possibility of a metaphysical (i.e. supernatural) reality. On that point there often exists a decidedly nonsceptical view. A view that seems to be based upon the idea that a non-material reality must be proven with material evidence, and that the absence of evidence is evidence of absence.

I think absence of evidence is a pretty good indication. If there is absolutely no evidence of something, why on earth would you think that it exists? Anything might be real. The question is whether it’s plausible and probable. I don’t think the supernatural is either of those things. I’ve never seen even a shred of evidence that would make me doubt that we live in a purely material world. I find it, well, ridiculous to assume that people can survive their physical deaths. All the people who believe that only believe it because that’s what they were told from a very young age. But if they’re right, then why can’t they provide any evidence for their claim?

If something is undetectable, I have absolutely no reason to believe it’s there.

But that’s not the same thing as saying you know for a fact that it cannot be there. In other words, you did not say that you knew as a demonstrable fact that “God cannot and does not exist.”

All the people who believe that only believe it because that’s what they were told from a very young age.

That seems like both an overly broad assumption, and a type of profession of faith.

“A view that seems to be based upon the idea that a non-material reality must be proven with material evidence”

Religious people claim there is plenty of material evidence for Jesus and his resurrection. They’re always quoting historians that supposedly prove his existence and his sanctity. Also, we read in the bible that Jesus himself did quite a few material tricks to convince people, like, say, bringing dead people back to life. We also see him curing paralysis and leprosy and walking on water and turning water into wine and multiplying bread and fishes and letting some people kill him and then going back home alive and speaking with his friends for a while and then zooming all over the place and disappearing in the sky.

So yeah, having some material evidence instead of just stories would be nice.

“and that the absence of evidence is evidence of absence.”

It’s just that better explanations are preferable. I think religion as a human invention makes more sense than religion as a tool some deity with inferiority complex uses to tell people to worship it or else. By the way, nobody is arguing that they absolutely know for a fact that it cannot exist. I don’t know if we live in the Matrix either. May be. Show me the evidence.

I have to come down on the side that free-willed choices are largely an illusion. Our minds kind-of unconsciously self-organize around certain propositions that minimize internal dissonance. For some, that is God belief. For others that is being free of God belief. Any theology that has at its core rewards or punishments based on unconscious mental self-organizations is disingenuous at best and immoral at worst.

Religious people claim there is plenty of material evidence for Jesus and his resurrection. They’re always quoting historians that supposedly prove his existence and his sanctity.

Well, maybe you should take that up with them. I know of no such physical evidence.

In any event, my point (which you block quoted) was not addressing particular claims regarding the physical life of Jesus. Rather it was an observation of a much more general claim regarding the requirement of material evidence to prove the existence of an immaterial reality.

Some anthropological evidence points to humans having a natural propensity toward spirituality, or at least to creating explanations for what they find in life that seems otherwise inexplicable and to feel awe when seeing the universe.
As far as the afterlife is concerned, I think that most humans tend to that belief as they cannot truly imagine an end to their own consciousness. Can you imagine not being? This doesn’t prove anything, but I do think many religious beliefs grow out of natural human tendencies.
It is actually materialism and atheism that is a later rationalist construct. For myself, I was raised Lutheran and then became a materialist; but I have no idea what to believe concerning gods, consequences and the afterlife.

Uh, when did I ever say that? I never stated that deities cannot exist.

I didn’t say you said that. I said you didn’t say that, and did so because I was pointing out that we were talking about two different things.

Robert,

I would imagine that Anna, once you heard about God, you explored the idea even a little bit, and decided there was no reason to believe and that those that do are wrong (for lack of a better term).

You’re awfully wrapped up in your culture box. It wasn’t just your god that I heard about. In fact, I really don’t know which god I heard about first. And I didn’t “explore the idea” and then decide “there was no reason to believe.” I had absolutely no idea people actually believed in deities at all, not for years after I first heard about them. I was always an atheist. I never made the choice not to believe. I simply never started to believe in the first place. It all seemed like mythology to me. I didn’t realize that people believed in things that were obviously made up, like heaven, when I could see no difference between that and Rainbow Land or Care-a-Lot. The idea that people might think any of those things were real was not even in my mind for a very long time. I just assumed it was all pretend, and that adults knew that.

How old were you when people taught you to believe in your god? How old were you when they taught you that heaven was a real place? How old were you when you were taught that Jesus was a real person? How old were you when you were taught to say prayers? You just seem so unable to comprehend that different people have different life experiences. I never experienced any of the things that you did. I can’t understand why you think I should have been in any position to think of your god as likely or reasonable. It’s just bizarre to me. Again, I was not raised in a Christian home, and I had absolutely no reason to consider the Christian deity as special or more likely to be true than any other deity.

The weighing of the evidence and the conclusion you have reached is a conscious decision.. ie a choice.

A conscious choice? I never weighed any evidence because I never saw any evidence. I didn’t have to find reasons not to believe. I never started, so I didn’t have doubts or questions and I didn’t lose faith at all. I never had it to begin with. If you’re so bent on believing that I weighed the evidence and made a conscious choice not to believe in your deity, when was the exact moment you made a conscious choice not to believe in the gods of Hinduism? You didn’t have one, because you never started believing in them to start with. And you could not choose to start believing in them, either, making the “choice” to believe a false one.

Anna,

Since we were in a discussion about the God of the Bible, that is why I referred to that God in my previous post.

A conscious choice? I never weighed any evidence because I never saw any evidence. I didn’t have to find reasons not to believe. I never started, so I didn’t have doubts or questions and I didn’t lose faith at all. I never had it to begin with.

As an adult, have you read the Bible? Even just parts of it? Do you think it is true? I assume you don’t.

The Bible is some evidence that Christians rely upon to believe. So if you have read the Bible and have reached the conclusion that what it says is not true then I would argue that you have made a choice as an adult not to believe.

As for my history, I was raised as a Christian then as an adult I questioned my faith and did independent study.

As for the gods of hinduism, the minute I decided that the God of the Bible was the one true God, then I knew that the gods of hinduism were not to be believed in.

Robert,

As an adult, have you read the Bible? Even just parts of it? Do you think it is true? I assume you don’t.

What has that got to do with the supernatural? I didn’t read the Bible until I was an adult, but I had heard about all sorts of gods and goddesses for years by that point. I was an atheist long before I ever heard of your holy book, let alone got around to reading it.

The Bible is some evidence that Christians rely upon to believe. So if you have read the Bible and have reached the conclusion that what it says is not true then I would argue that you have made a choice as an adult not to believe.

So I didn’t make the “choice” until I read the Bible? I was already an adult by then, and I was well aware that I was an atheist. Your definition of “conscious choice” strikes me as very strange. You somehow believe that I made the conscious choice not to believe in deities that a) I had never heard of, b) had no idea people thought were real, and c) never started believing in in the first place.

As for my history, I was raised as a Christian then as an adult I questioned my faith and did independent study.

So you were taught these things as a baby and toddler. Well, I figured that. It seems to me that you have absolutely no conception of how people can have different beliefs than you do. You seem to think that we’re all lying, dishonest, and stubborn, and you keep completely discounting our experiences and pretending that you know our thoughts and feelings better than we do. I suppose that goes hand in hand with your fundamentalism. You are so convinced of your deity that you simply can’t conceive of people who see no evidence for not just your deity, but for the supernatural in general.

As for the gods of hinduism, the minute I decided that the God of the Bible was the one true God, then I knew that the gods of hinduism were not to be believed in.

When was that? When you were a baby? Was there ever a time in your life when you didn’t believe in the god of the Bible? You said you were raised as a Christian. That means you already believed in your god at the time you encountered the gods of Hinduism. You didn’t encounter them as an unbiased outsider. You were taught they were false. I mean, if you were raised in the type of fundamentalism that you now espouse, you should at least be honest about the fact that you were taught that all other gods were false. You never had a chance of believing in them because they were a) outside your culture and b) dismissed by the people who taught you to believe in the supernatural.

Mike,

If God truly wished that none should suffer, he could’ve designed the human mind with the ability to make free choices that didn’t involve rebellion. We’re already limited in the choices we can make as it is – that your theology allows for a god that didn’t design us properly in line with his own desire is a little disappointing.

If God designed us with only one choice- the choice to accept and believe in him then there is no real choice. The only way the choice is a true choice is if it includes the choice to rebel. That way the choice to love is also a true choice.

It is not a choice. The evidence is only convincing if you begin with the assumption that some part of Christian theology is correct. Coming from any other position, it reads like fiction.

How does that explain all of those who grew up in Christian households and then later became Atheists? They believed it was true at one point and certainly assumed that some part of Christian theology was correct. They then changed their belief. Multiple people on this blog have explained that occurring to them.

And I have personally seen the opposite where people raised in African villages heard the gospel and believed, after being raised without learning that theology.

Anna,

It seems to me that you have absolutely no conception of how people can have different beliefs than you do. You seem to think that we’re all lying, dishonest, and stubborn, and you keep completely discounting our experiences and pretending that you know our thoughts and feelings better than we do. I suppose that goes hand in hand with your fundamentalism. You are so convinced of your deity that you simply can’t conceive of people who see no evidence for not just your deity, but for the supernatural in general.

If my comments come off that way I apologize. I readily admit I am convinced about God and find it hard to believe that others cannot see that. But that is nature of faith. And I can be closed minded about that I admit.

While I’m sure that’s true, I doubt it spontaneously occurred to those converts that the Bible was special. They didn’t just read a Bible and become convinced it was something other than mythology. In all those cases, Bibles were brought to those lands by foreign missionaries, who did their damndest to tell people that it was a a special holy book and that the god it talked about was real. It’s not like these people randomly stumbled across a Bible and all of a sudden began to think it talked about the One True God™. Missionaries don’t just drop off Bibles and leave. They invest considerable effort to get the people there to accept that what they are saying is true. Since those people already believe in the supernatural, it’s not a big leap for many of them to accept that missionaries know what they’re talking about.

Perhaps, but that’s a separate issue from the one Mike brought up and about which I was commenting.

Robert, could you specifically answer this question?

If you were on a jury and the prosecution didn’t present a case that convinced you of the accused’s guilt, how would you ‘decide’ to believe they’re guilty anyway?

How would you go about making yourself do that?

Axe Girl,

If you were on a jury and the prosecution didn’t present a case that convinced you of the accused’s guilt, how would you ‘decide’ to believe they’re guilty anyway?

How would you go about making yourself do that?

Assuming that that was all the evidence there was and three was only one way to look at it, I wouldn’t. I would decide that the accused was not guilty. That choice to believe in the innocence would be based upon what I perceived to be a lack of evidence.

On the other hand, others on the jury could look at that same evidence and chose to believe that the accused was guilty.

Further, i could be convinced to look at that same evidence in a different light or from a different perspective and change my beliefs.

Either way it would be a conscious choice.

Choice is defined in the dictionary as such:

choice (chois)
n.
1. The act of choosing; selection.
2. The power, right, or liberty to choose; option.
3. One that is chosen.
4. A number or variety from which to choose: a wide choice of styles and colors.
5. The best or most preferable part.
6. Care in choosing.
7. An alternative.

Chose choosing not to believe or to believe is an act. Something that is done. It is not just a passive lack of belief.

Ihope this answers your question

AxxGrrl,

I’ve only skimmed a few of the posts between you and Robert about “choice” so I’m not up to speed on all that’s been put forth.

Yet if my skimming is any indication, you are right on this matter.

If in considering any proposition one is honest with one’s self, the conclusions made (even if in error) are what they are. A person can only “choose” against that conclusion with some sort of self-dishonesty; maybe willfully, maybe not.

BTW, Nordog:

If in considering any proposition one is honest with one’s self, the conclusions made (even if in error) are what they are. A person can only “choose” against that conclusion with some sort of self-dishonesty; maybe willfully, maybe not.

Was about to say something like this myself before I saw you’d already said it. If you’ve decided to follow where the evidence leads, and the evidence doesn’t support a position, the choice would be to willfully ignore the lack of evidence and believe it anyways. If there’s no evidence, it doesn’t even really register as a choice to go ahead and disbelieve. To call it a choice is to say that every single thing we disbelieve in was a choice – even things we may not even know about yet, since we don’t believe in them.

At the age of 6 I chose to accept gifts from the Santa Clause in whom I no longer believed.

Mike,

You did it again. You didn’t explain, you just equated rebellion with not loving. You do understand that a child that rebels against its parents can still love them, right?

Please explain the bold bit. How is rebelling against God equivalent to not loving God?

By putting the two words in the proper context the connection is explained. So are you saying that you can rebel against God, ignore his existence, fail to follow his Word and still Love him?

A child can do that to a point with their parents in the sense that they can rebel against their teachings and still love them because they recognize their relationship that still exists between them. If you rebel against God in the sense that you ignore his existence then there isn’t any room for love.

That is the choice options I was talking about. We weren’t discussing the idea of two Christians, one who follows God’s word more then the other, but free will to decide if he exists or not.

That’s just it – we aren’t choosing not to believe. It is not a choice. Are you actively choosing not to believe in fairies? Dragons? Aliens? Tell me something you don’t believe in, and then tell me honestly whether or not you could choose to actually believe it exists. Not just whether you can say you believe it, but actually believe it.

In my opinion the decision that you made to decide that God doesn’t exist was a choice. You may never look at tit that way. But it was similar to choices you make everyday. For example, (not a perfect analogy but close) say you were going to fly somewhere. Based upon the evidence you have gathered, past history of flying, some knowledge of the safety of airlines, some evidence of the safety record of this particular airline, etc. you choose to get on the plane.

If on the other hand you had evidence that this airline wasn’t safe, that their could be a safety problem with this particular plane you would choose not to get on the plane. Your act of not getting on the plane is a choice based upon the evidence.

When it comes to faith and belief in God, I contend that you made that same sort of decision after thinking about it and being exposed to other ideas or doubts in your mind.

Say that I present you with overwhelming evidence of God’s existence. And you re thought your current position and came to the conclusion that God exists. Do you not agree that the decision to believe would be a choice?

As for something I don’t believe in, say unicorns to use a common example, if I was presented with the same evidence that I have for the existence of God then I would have to change my belief that they don’t exist.

If you have read the Bible with the Spirit guiding you you realize no one has ascended to Heaven except Jesus. Jesus tells the thief on the cross “I tell you today you will be with me in Paradise”. No commas in the Greek language when this was written. So stating I tell you today not stating it will happen just stating you will be with me in Paradise. And what about the Post trib rapture? If people are in Heaven now who will rise from the graves and meet Christ in the air? Paul states “we will not all sleep”. Please read and understand the Bible before commenting on things you have no knowledge about. May God call you unto repentance. Repent and be baptized.

I can not change to become one of them I can only tell them the truth. You will either accept it or you will not. Just as the parable of Lazarus and the rich man. Most know the law that God gave to Moses if they dont believe him they will not believe me. I am here to put people on the right path. I dont bring them into a relationship with Jesus only the Father can do that. That is my prayer people to read the Bible instead of following man made traditions. This is the reason Christians and I use that word loosely look uneducated to non believers. There are so many different beliefs how can one be sure. If you follow the Bible completely you will find the truth. I just wish I could have two hours time with those who think they are following God to show them there error from the Bible Gods words. Open your mind and you will find the truth. I use to laugh to myself as my Dad would talk about God. Now I realize as most things come to pass Dad was right.

Robert W wrote:

If on the other hand you had evidence that this airline wasn’t safe, that their could be a safety problem with this particular plane you would choose not to get on the plane. Your act of not getting on the plane is a choice based upon the evidence

Ok, this is a GREAT example to use Robert!

Yes, not getting on the plane would be the ‘choice’ in that scenario. But (and here’s the crucial part)……

Was your conclusion that the plane “wasn’t safe” a choice Robert? That’s the relevant part of the scenario you’ve just described, and you glossed right over it!

You mentioned evidence that the “plane wasn’t safe”. Given that evidence, could you, instead, have simply chosen to believe that the plane is completely safe? If coming to conclusions is simply a ‘choice’, then you’d have to say that you could have chosen to believe that the plane is safe…..in the face of evidence to the contrary.

And as Nordog has already pointed out, that would have to involve a certain degree of ‘self-dishonesty’.

(are you getting where we’re coming from yet, Robert?)

Nordog,

Perhaps, but that’s a separate issue from the one Mike brought up and about which I was commenting.

I didn’t mean to imply that’s what you were saying. It’s a related point, though, since it’s no surprise that religions with histories of aggressive proselytization tend to gain converts. Particularly since they also have a tendency to target uneducated, disenfranchised people who are in no position to question the claims of the missionaries or to do research on their own. People who already believe in the supernatural are prime candidates for conversion by missionaries who speak with authority, and an illiterate villager has no way of determining whether or not what the missionaries are saying is true.

You aren’t a very “friendly Atheist”… just saying. Jesus was Jewish, but Jesus even said that his own would be against him. Can’t we all just get along? I would gladly except your views IF you wouldn’t be mean about it. I’m a devout Christian and love Jesus, but I don’t go around saying “YOU ARE GOING TO HELL!!!!!” to nonbelievers.

Ok Anne Frank is not in Hell. She did nothing wrong and she loved the world. If anything she deserves to go to heaven more than alot of Christians do.

 What a joke.

If you are a Christian this is an easy question to answer. If Anne Frank did not give her life to Christ, than she is in hell (John 3:16). We don’t 100% know if she didn’t give her life to Christ but odds are that she didn’t. Anyway, whoever said God is fair and will give just punishment has no idea what they are saying. God is completely unfair. If He was fair, we would all be dead and in hell. That would be the only just punishment. To be honest all of us deserve hell. Odds are you are a liar, a cheater, an adulterer at heart, a thief, and a plain sinner. So you can’t say only people like Hitler deserve hell. Anyway to back to the point, it says in the Bible that only through Jesus you can get to heaven. So back to before, unless Anne accepted Jesus into her life, she is in hell, even as bad as that sounds. I like the point Robert W. made, God doesn’t send you to hell, you are there by your own free will and choice.