From: alvin@spot.Colorado.EDU (Kenneth Alvin)
Subject: Re: Assurance of Hell
Organization: University of Colorado, Boulder
Lines: 31

In article <Apr.20.03.01.19.1993.3755@geneva.rutgers.edu> REXLEX@fnal.fnal.gov writes:
>
>2)  If you haven't accepted Jesus are your Savior, you're taking an awful
>chance.  As I say to the Jehovah Witnesses (who no longer frequent my door), if
>you are right and I am wrong, then I will have lived a good life and will die
>and cease to exist, but if I am right and you are wrong, then you will die and
>suffer eternal damnation.  I don't mean to make fun at this point, but its like
>Dirty Harry said, "You've got to ask yourself, 'Do I feel lucky?'  Well do
>you?"  "A man's got to know his limitations."  Don't be one of the "whosoever
>wont's."  

This is a ridiculous argument for being a Christian.  So then, you might 
consider switching from Christianity to another religion if you were 
offered an even more frightening description of another hell?  How many
Christians do think there are who view it strictly as an insurance policy?
Not many I know; they believe in a message of love and compassion for 
others.  A faith based on fear of hell sounds like a dysfunctional 
relationship with God.  Like a child who cringes in fear of a parent's
physical violence.  

Many religions have concrete views of heaven and hell, with various
threats and persuasions regarding who will go where.  Competition over
who can envison the worst hell can hardly nurture the idea of loving
your neighbor as yourself.

>--Rex

-- 
comments, criticism welcome...
-Ken
alvin@ucsu.colorado.edu
