The Reason For Hell

“What you people do is child abuse! You should be ashamed of yourselves!” a woman screamed at me while I was engaged in evangelism at a college campus. 

I was genuinely confused so I asked her, “What exactly should I be ashamed of?” She fired back, “Hell! Telling little children they might go to hell traumatizes them!” 

I’ll admit this scares me! It’s almost too difficult to imagine the possibility of being in agony not just for a while, but forever, living in despair and pain without end. And yet we can’t reject hell just because we don’t like it. Just as it’s not child abuse to warn children about “stranger danger” or what will happen if they run into traffic, even if the truth is scary, it’s not child abuse to warn children (or adults) about the dangers of hell—provided that hell is real.  

In the New Testament, the word “hell” usually refers to the final, eternal dwelling place for the damned. According to the Catechism, “To die in mortal sin without repenting and accepting God’s merciful love means remaining separated from him forever by our own free choice. This state of definitive self-exclusion from communion with God and the blessed is called ‘hell’” (CCC 1033).  

Scripture uses a variety of images to describe the awfulness of hell. Christ said it was a place of fire (Matt. 5:22), undying worms (Mark 9:48), gnashing of teeth (Matt. 13:42), and an outer darkness (Matt. 22:13). Matthew even compared it to Gehenna (Matt. 23:33), which was a place where children were offered as fire sacrifices to pagan gods. Since Jesus walked out of his own tomb, he is a reliable source about the afterlife, and so we should believe what he taught about hell. 

While Christ used earthly images to convey spiritual truths, we must remember that none of these images, including those of unending fire, are necessarily literal descriptions of hell. But even if hell is not a place of literal fire, it is still the worst thing we can imagine. Those who think hell is fun because all the “cool sinners” will be there should think again.  

The sins that make life miserable, like selfishness, greed, hatred, and the vindictive desire to hurt others because we’ve been hurt, are just some of the evils that make hell so “hellish.” In hell, sinners will eternally receive the one thing they cared the most about in life—themselves. Pope St. John Paul II said,  

The images of hell that Sacred Scripture presents to us must be correctly interpreted. They show the complete frustration and emptiness of life without God. Rather than a place, hell indicates the state of those who freely and definitively separate themselves from God, the source of all life and joy.

The most terrifying aspect of hell is its permanence. According to the Catechism, “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” (CCC 1035). Jesus taught that hell is not temporary but lasts forever. He said that those who are damned “will go away into eternal punishment, but the righteous into eternal life” (Matt. 25:46).

Some argue that if God were fair, then hell would be temporary and someone could eventually “work themselves” out of it. But no one can ever work himself out of hell any more than he could work himself into heaven. Salvation is a gift from God that we “work out” in this life (Phil. 2:12) by persevering in faith that works through love (Gal. 5:6) until the end of our lives (Matt. 10:22). The only time we can accept this gift, or this free offer of grace from God, is during our earthly lives. Upon our death, our choices in this life forever seal what our destinies will be in the next life (Heb. 9:27).  

Moreover, if hell were temporary, it would be incredibly unjust. Since heaven includes eternal bliss and happiness with God, then no matter how long a person spends in hell it will seem like only a few seconds compared to the infinite happiness that awaits them in heaven. It would be like telling a child who purposefully breaks his sibling’s arm that they have to go to “time out” for thirty seconds before they can go to an amusement park for the rest of the day. 

Hell may also be eternal because the damned continue to sin and reject God after death. In this scenario, their punishment is everlasting because they make it that way and cannot do otherwise. If you’ve ever been around a self-centered person, you know they find it excruciating to be in the presence of a person everyone else admires more. The damned in hell may even love themselves and their sins so much that the selfless love of God may be unbearable to them. They may even choose to remain in hell, thinking it is better than heaven.