You’ve probably heard of of Tod Burpo’s book, Heaven is For Real, and maybe you’ve even seen the movie. I’m sure I did at some point, but I really don’t remember it all that well. It is a beautiful story, but for skeptics, it’s just another seemingly-unrealistic Christian testimony that isn’t relatable or inclusive of “reliable evidence” for an outsider to evaluate. Nonetheless, from a variety of stories like these, most of us have this image of heaven as a place of peace, love, and happiness with pearly white gates and angels. Though when it comes to hell, a lot of people have a very different ideas about what exactly “eternal punishment” might look like. Is it filled with fire and demons with pitchforks? Are people in isolation or are they with other condemned souls? Can someone escape? Is it the Islam Jahannam? Or the Jewish Gehinom? I wish I could provide a specific answer. Unfortunately, someone has to die to enter hell (well duh). Even those who have claimed to witness what hell is like are unable to put the fullness of the experience into words. There tends to be something unique about the spiritual world that the physical mind can’t comprehend or accurately portray. However, I can provide some small glimpses that some of these people have recorded throughout time as well as the Church’s official doctrine of the certainties of hell through Divine Revelation.
As an empiricist myself, I don’t expect a single story to convince a nonbeliever of the existence of God, nor do I expect a single movie like Heaven is For Real or God’s Not Dead to make some fully-convicted of any form of revelation. As humans, we’re a lot more rational than that. We’re wired to be skeptical, and to a certain point, skepticism is very good. It can allow one adequate means to discern whether something is of divine or evil origin. It can help one to seek a fullness of truth and to avoid false testimonies in the scientific, academic, and religious worlds. Nevertheless, I want to emphasize that the more one knows, the more one is culpable.There will come a point when all of the “evidence” or years worth of revelation and doctrine is in favor a particular idea, and one must decide according to his own free-will whether to take a leap of faith or dismiss any possibility of a warranted belief.
Therefore, read on with caution. I advise a strong understanding of all theistic belief systems before proceeding, particularly Catholicism’s teachings on the roles of saints in order to reduce any initial biases or stereotypes that could hinder one’s perceptions of what I’d like to talk about: the Church’s understanding of hell. At this point, one can no longer plead ignorance after death about the revelations of hell’s existence. Take this as you may, but it is not intended to frighten or to compel belief in something against one’s free-will. Nevertheless, I think that hell’s existence is something that all should take into careful consideration and be made aware of in order to discern whether one is living a truly moral life.
Dante’s Inferno
You can skip this part of my post if you’d like because it really isn’t grounded in any form of Church doctrine, but I’ve always thought Dante’s portrayal of hell in his Divine Comedy was rather fascinating. He outlines 9 Circles of hell, based upon the greatest evils on one’s soul at the time of death. Multiple the visionaries in the Church claim to have witnessed similar segments of hell according to one’s sins, so it’s a very interesting concept to read up on.
Official Church Teaching
“We cannot be united with God unless we freely choose to love him. But we cannot love God if we sin gravely against him, against our neighbor or against ourselves… Our Lord warns us that we shall be separated from him if we fail to meet the serious needs of the poor and the little ones who are his brethren. To die in mortal sin without repenting and accepting God’s merciful love means remaining separated from him for ever by our own free choice. This state of definitive self-exclusion from communion with God and the blessed is called ‘hell.'”
The Catechism of the Catholic Church
In the Catholic Church, describing hell as a place isn’t really as much of a focus as recognizing that it is a permanent state, in which one’s immortal soul is separate from God. Regardless of what it will “look like” after the resurrection of the body at the end of time, hell is a merciful place for God to send those who willfully choose against Him. On Earth, the Church teaches that humans still have a connection to God. It can be weakened by sin, but it cannot be destroyed unless one dies in a state of grave sin without repentance. Existing in hell is viewed as a much better option than God allowing all lost souls to cease to exist. After all, the Church teaches that everything God creates is good in and of itself, and He isn’t about to destroy the beauty of his creations that He made out of agape love.
A common question asked is why would anyone choose hell? Well, if one looks at sacred Tradition, Satan and his angels were also beings with free-will who had full-knowledge of God’s intention to become incarnate (man) in the event that man exercises his free-will to choose against God on Earth so that their eternal souls may still be saved in the event that the consequences of sin, of which include a bodily death, is introduced. Satan and his angels were jealous of humanity, unable to cope with the idea that God could love such creatures so much, so they left. It was an exercise of free-will with full knowledge that they would no longer be able to live in God’s presence. It was rather petty in my opinion, but I guess jealousy is one of the vices we have in common with immortal beings. They preferred their own selfish lifestyles to Communion with God, and they aren’t going to ever “reconsider” their decision because their minds aren’t limited in understanding like human beings. The same goes for the humans on Earth who give into the temptations of these fallen angels with full knowledge of the gravity of their wrongdoings and with deliberate consent. The people who die in this state (Catholics refer to it as mortal sin) knowing full-well what they chose to do was wrong and who lack true contrition (sorrow) are very comparable to the original fallen angels. They won’t change their minds after death because they already had “full-knowledge” of their wrong doings when choosing to commit mortal sin. As a result, they are banished to hell for all eternity.
Click for more from the Catechism on hell
Documentation of Hell
As I mentioned briefly above, God has conveyed throughout history the reality of hell to many sinners who later became saints. These people realized that the messages they received were intended not only for their own salvation but also the salvation of countless other souls who would otherwise die in a state of mortal sin. So, they wrote down everything their human minds were able to describe or recall in the forms of journals or autobiographies, or they shared their testimonies with spiritual directors or lost souls, who carried out their messages.
St. Teresa of Avila’s visions of demons
Teresa (1515-1582) was born just before the Protestant Reformation. She was canonized in 1622 and named a Doctor of the Church in 1970. She was a Carmelite nun who suffered frequently throughout her life. She wrote during the Counter-Reformation to defend the Church, and she also detailed many of her spiritual experiences throughout her life in her writings.
“Once, while approaching to receive Communion, I saw with my soul’s eyes more clearly than with my bodily eyes two devils whose appearance was abominable. It seems to me their horns were wrapped around the poor priests’s throat…I understood that that soul was in mortal sin.
Another time something else happened to me that frightened me very much. I was at a place where a certain person died who for many years had lived a wicked life, from what I knew. But he had been sick for two years, and in some things it seems he had made amends. He died without confession, but nevertheless it didn’t seem to me he would be condemned. While the body was being wrapped in its shroud, I saw many devils take that body; and it seemed they were playing with it and punishing it.
Another time I was tormented for five hours with such terrible interior and exterior pains and disturbance that it didn’t seem to me I could suffer them any longer. The sisters who were with me were frightened and didn’t know what to do, nor did I know how to help myself. When bodily pains and sickness become intolerable I have the custom of making interior acts of supplication to the Lord as best I can… Well, since I was suffering so severely this time, I was helping myself through these acts and resolutions so as to be able to bear it. The Lord wanted me to understand it was the devil because I saw beside me a black, very abominable little creature, snarling like one in despair that where he had tried to gain he had lost. When I saw him I laughed to myself and was not afraid. There were some sisters there with me who were unable to help nor did they know of any remedy for so much torment; without being able to resist, I was striking myself hard on the body, head, and arms. What was worse was the interior disturbance, for I wasn’t able to feel calm of any sort. I didn’t dare ask for holy water lest I frighten them and they come to understand what the trouble was…
I shall only mention what happened to me on the night of All Souls: while I was in the oratory after having recited a nocturne and while saying some very devotional prayers that come at the end, a devil appeared on the book so that I couldn’t finish the prayer. I blessed myself, and he went away. When I began again to recite the prayers, he returned. I believe it was three times I began, and until I threw holy water at him I couldn’t finish. I saw that some souls left purgatory at that instant; little must have been lacking to their freedom, and I wondered if he had aimed at preventing this.
At other times I saw a large multitude of devils around me, and it seemed that a great brightness encircled me, and this prevented them from reaching me. I understood that God was watching over me so that they could not get to me in order to make me offend Him”
The Collected Works of St. Teresa of Avila
St. Veronica Giuliani
Veronica (1660-1727) was also a nun and a mystic of the Church. She received both the stigmata and Crown of Thorns in her lifetime. She also is one who received a mystical espousal. (It is a Church Doctrine that marital relationships are the best examples of God’s love on Earth, but they cease to exist after death. Likewise, God aspires to have a non-sexual marital relationship with all His people in heaven). Veronica was put in isolation by her bishop to test if her supernatural experiences were of God or of demonic origin, and she passed the bishop’s tests with flying colors. She viewed herself as a great sinner that God was leading to conversion. After her death, her body was among those of the incorruptibles until it was destroyed by a flood. She left behind a diary that her spiritual director advised her to write and share with the world despite the devil’s attempts to disrupt its completion.
“It seems that the tempter showed my soul hell being opened, and that in fact he had placed it (her soul) in it, and that only a small push was needed to cast it inside. It seemed then that I heard screams and voices of lamentation from the damned. I only saw infernal monsters, many serpents, many ferocious animals, and an infernal stench and extremely hot flames, which were so big that their height could not be measured. I could only compare it to the distance between heaven and earth. As far as the size of the place, one could not see the beginning or the end. You could hear many blasphemies and curses against God. How sad. What torment this caused my soul…
Il Diario by Edizioni Cantagalli (one volume abridgement of Veronica’s Diary by Maria Teresa Carloni)
She was shown hell once more: ‘At that moment I was once again shown hell opened; and it seemed many souls descended there, they were so ugly and black that they struck terror in me. They all dropped down in a rush, one after the other, and once they had entered those chasms there was nothing to be seen but fire and flames.’ This vision led Veronica to offer herself as a victim of Divine Justice: ‘My Lord, I offer myself to stand here as a doorway, so that no one may enter down there and lose You.’ Then she stretched out her arms and said, ‘As long as I stand in this doorway, no one shall enter. O souls, go back! My God, I ask nothing else of You but the salvation of sinners. Send me more pains, more torments, more crosses!’
The Blessed Virgin Mary speaking to Veronica about her trips to hell told her, ‘When you were going around hell, you came across torments and tormentors at every step; but that time when you went by the seat of Lucifer, you were terrified at seeing so many souls were on the seat of Lucifer himself. This is in the center of hell and is seen by all the damned, by all the devils, and this sight causes all of them great suffering. I also let you know that, in the same way that the sight of God in Paradise constitutes Paradise itself; down there in hell, the sight of Lucifer is what constitutes hell.’
The Blessed Virgin Mary also told her, ‘Many do not believe that hell exists, and I tell you yourself, who have been there, have understood nothing of what hell is.'”
John Bosco – Prophetic Dream of Hell
John Bosco (1815-1888) was an Italian saint and Roman Catholic priest who had many vivid dreams throughout his life that influenced him greatly. His entire depiction of hell from one of his dreams can be read through the link above. He was also known as a great educator.
“As soon as I crossed its threshold, I felt an indescribable terror and dared not take another step. Ahead of me I could see something like an immense cave which gradually disappeared into recesses sunk far into the bowels of the mountains. They were all ablaze, but theirs was not an earthly fire with leaping tongues of flames. The entire cave – walls, ceiling, floor, iron, stones, wood, and coal – everything was a glowing white at temperatures of thousands of degrees. Yet the fire did not incinerate, did not consume. I simply can’t find words to describe the cavern’s horror…
[My guide] seized my hand, forced it open, and pressed it against the first of the thousand walls. The sensation was so utterly excruciating that I leaped back with a scream and found myself sitting up in bed.
St. John Bosco “The Road to Hell”
My hand was stinging and I kept rubbing it to ease the pain. When I got up this morning I noticed that it was swollen. Having my hand pressed against the wall, though only in a dream, felt so real that, later, the skin of my palm peeled off.
Bear in mind that I have tried not to frighten you very much, and so I have not described these things in all their horror as I saw them and as they impressed me. We know that Our Lord always portrayed Hell in symbols because, had He described it as it really is, we would not have understood Him. No mortal can comprehend these things”
Sister Faustina Kowalska
Faustina Kowalska (1905-1938) also witnessed Dante-like special sections of hell reserved for specific agonies chosen in this fallen world through her visions of the Lord. She kept a detailed diary as recommended by her spiritual director. Her most well-known vision is that of Jesus requesting her to paint an image of His Divine Mercy (shown left), which helped re-emphasize a Catholic doctrine about the divine mercy of Christ.
“…I saw two roads. One was broad, covered with sand and flowers, full of joy, music and all sorts of pleasures. People were walking along it, dancing and enjoying themselves. They reached the end without realizing it. And at the end of the road there was a horrible precipice; that is, the abyss of hell. The souls fell blindly into it; as they walked, so they fell. And their number was so great that it was impossible to count them. And I saw the other road, or rather, a path, for it was narrow and strewn with thorns and rocks; and the people who walked along it had tears in their eyes, and all kinds of suffering befell them. Some fell down upon the rocks, but stood up immediately and went on. At the end of the road there was a magnificent garden filled with all sorts of happiness and all these souls entered there. At the very first instant they forgot all their sufferings”
The Diary of Sister Faustina (Diary, 153)
“..the devils were full of hatred for me, but they had to obey me at the command of God, What I have written is but a pale shadow of the things I saw. But I noticed one thing: That most of the souls there are those who disbelieved that there is a hell…
The First Torture that constitutes hell is:
The Diary of Sister Faustina, (Diary 741)
The loss of God.
The Second is:
Perpetual remorse of conscience.
The Third is
That one’s condition will never change.
The Fourth is:
The fire that will penetrate the soul without destroying it. A terrible suffering since it is a purely spiritual fire, lit by God’s anger.
The Fifth Torture is:
Continual darkness and a terrible suffocating smell, and despite the darkness, the devils and the souls of the damned see each other and all the evil, both of others and their own.
The Sixth Torture is:
The constant company of Satan.
The Seventh Torture is:
Horrible despair, hatred of God, vile words, curses and blasphemies.
These are the Tortures suffered by all the damned together, but that is not the end of the sufferings.
Indescribable Sufferings
There are special Tortures destined for particular souls. These are the torments of the senses. Each soul undergoes terrible and indescribable sufferings related to the manner in which it has sinned.
I would have died
There are caverns and pits of torture where one form of agony differs from another. I would have died at the very sight of these tortures if the omnipotence of God had not supported me.
No One Can Say There is No Hell
Let the sinner know that he will be tortured throughout all eternity, in those senses which he made use of to sin. I am writing this at the command of God, so that no soul may find an excuse by saying there is no hell, or that nobody has ever been there, and so no one can say what it is like…how terribly souls suffer there! Consequently, I pray even more fervently for the conversion of sinners. I incessantly plead God’s mercy upon them. O My Jesus, I would rather be in agony until the end of the world, amidst the greatest sufferings, than offend you by the least sin.”
Sister Lucia of Fatima
Lucia (1907-2005) was one of the children who witnessed the Church-approved Marian apparitions in Fatima in 1917. She received many messages, including those that predicted the end of WWI and the start of WWII by the time Pope Pius XI took reign. She also received the message to pray the rosary daily for peace and to end it each time with “O my Jesus, forgive us our sins, save us from the fire of hell. Take all souls to heaven, especially those who are most in need,” which has become a part of Catholic Tradition.
“[Mary] She once again opened her hands, as she had done the previous two months. The rays [of light] appeared to penetrate the earth and we saw it as a vast sea of fire and we saw the demons and souls [of the damned] immersed in it.. Then there were like burning embers transparent, all blackened and burned, with human form. They were floating in this great conflagration, now thrown into the air by the flames and then sucked again, along with large clouds of smoke. Sometimes they fell on each side like sparks on huge fires, without weight or balance, between shouts and lamentations of pain and despair, which terrified us and made us tremble with fear (it must have been this vision that made me cry, as people say she heard)…The demons were distinguished [from the souls of the damned] for their terrifying and repellent appearance similar to that of horrendous and unknown animals, black and transparent like burning embers. This vision lasted only a moment, thanks to our good Heavenly Mother, who in her first appearance promised to take us to Heaven. Without this promise, I believe we would have died of terror and fright.”
Memoirs of Sister Lucia of Fatima
LG❥
Pursuit of Truth 