Johnny is a Bishop, Heretic, Prophet, Priest, Apostle and ASM (Ascended Spiritual Master). On his good days he is often also the one true almighty God incarnate. He enjoys writing theology and philosophy articles and spreading the Gospel promise of Universal Salvation
I don’t deny everlasting damnation. I deny irrevocable damnation. The idea that God would not or could not save souls who find themselves in Hell is the most outrageous blasphemy and unholy heresy of our age, regardless of what reasons are invoked to justify it. All those who insist on the irrevocability of damnation are possessed by dark and Satanic powers, and have fallen victim to the great apostasy of the Church, worshipping the god of this world rather than the one true Lord and King of the cosmos.
I will not hear you tell me that God respects a person’s freedom more than he desires the salvation of that person, giving up on trying to save them once they pass the threshold of death; I will not tolerate talk of God torturing a soul forever just so that he can show off his glory and justice; And I will not accept the irrational notion that our sovereign God desires the salvation of all but ultimately fails to achieve it.
Johnny is a Bishop, Heretic, Prophet, Priest, Apostle and ASM (Ascended Spiritual Master). On his good days he is often also the one true almighty God incarnate. He enjoys writing theology and philosophy articles and spreading the Gospel promise of Universal Salvation
Brotherton opens with a summary: Universalism implies predestination. Throughout the paper he meditates on the relationship between divine freedom and created freedom, and puts them in competition with each other. God wills everyone to be saved, but individuals will themselves to be damned; Rather than God “overriding” this individual will to be saved, he “respects” it and allows the creature to go off into eternal torment. Brotherton claims that human freedom, correctly understood, forbids anyone from confidently claiming that all will be saved. The ending of the story of creation has not been revealed to us and it is entirely possible (and highly likely) that many will be damned. God permits souls to be damned so as to manifest his divine glory more fully. It would be “improper” for mercy to defeat justice, and therefore in the final outcome of history there must be a balance between mercy and justice in the form of a plurality of souls in both heaven and hell. It would be more glorious for numerous souls to freely damn themselves than it would be for God to save everyone. The “reality of moral evil” should be the determining fact that undergirds all of our theological reflections, and it should lead us to think that “universal salvation appears to be an especially doubtful proposal.”
Academic Comment
The doctrine of Universalism is so obviously wrong and so completely heretical that I am shocked Brotherton felt the need to refute it with a paper of this length. The issue is quite simple: the God whom we Catholics worship is first and foremost a God of Justice1 and Wrath.2 He hates sin and must punish it.3 Every sin is an offence against God, and because the gravity of the sin is measured by the dignity of the one offended4, every sin – even something as ‘small’ as a white lie – merits infinite, endless, irrevocable, everlasting, inescapable, irredeemable, eternal torture in the flames of Hell.5 Furthermore God made humans free to either accept his love or reject it,6 and all who reject it are doomed to the aforementioned punishment of damnation. Finally, it is absolutely impossible for a person to know that they will ultimately be saved.7 All of this is the essence of the Gospel and Universalism denies all of it in every particular. Universalism claims that God is going to force us to go to heaven – even if we don’t want to – and is thus a heretical denial of human freedom. Universalism purports to permit people to be certain of their salvation, which is nothing but the sin of blasphemous presumption as identified and condemned at Trent. Universalism also claims that God doesn’t care about sin at all and is just going to ignore it and let everyone be saved regardless of whether they lived a good life or not; Universalism is thus an egregious denial of God’s Justice and Wrath against sin. Universalism also denies that there is a Hell; this is a blunt slander against the dogmas of the church and is therefore essentially a claim that the church is fallible. Universalism was once and for all condemned at the fifth ecumenical council:
If anyone advocates the mythical pre-existence of souls and the monstrous restoration that follows from this, let him be anathema.8
How can anyone continue to hold to a position of Universalism after reading such a clear and unambiguous condemnation of all possible formulations of Universalist theology?
All universalists without exception base their views purely on emotion and sentimentalism, and they all ignore the dogmas of the church and the countless clear scriptural verses which contradict their views. There is not a trace of logic or reasonable argument in any of their explanations. Universalism is a lazy theology which does not bother to notice all the many threats of eternal punishment found in the bible. Universalists construct a vision of God that appeals to a completely and utterly warped idea of love and mercy, rather than submitting themselves to the one true God of Justice who will righteously damn them to Hell if they do not repent and if they do not cease stubbornly spreading these ghastly heresies. This is no cause for alarm on the part of the saved, as it is a venerable Catholic opinion that witnessing the righteous torment of heretics is a crucial component of the beatific vision,9 and thus the damnation of Balthasar and other universalists like him has the providential purpose of contributing to the delight of the elect.
To hold to any variety of universalist theology today is to commit formal heresy and therefore to stand condemned along with Satan, Judas, Hitler, Arius, Pelagius, Luther and all of the heretics. Von Balthasar is therefore not only wrong, but a heretic doomed to hellfire, and it would be advisable to completely renounce his theology in all of its parts and it would be prudent to burn all of his writings, so as to prevent him from infecting the faithful with his heresies and dragging more souls into Hell. My only criticism of this paper is that it doesn’t go far enough: Brotherton should be calling for the blood of Von Balthasar and his followers, and the fact that he does not is incredibly suspicious, making one wonder whether he too is harbouring dangerous and satanic heresies which would merit his execution by fire.
Glossary
Freedom / Free Will
The great gift that God gives everyone so that they can damn themselves to everlasting damnation
Hell
The final destination of those who are Universalists, and other formal heretics like them. Infinitely painful, inescapable. God will harden a soul’s heart so that the souls stuck there have no possibility of escape
Grace
A gift that God gives us so that we can reject it and go to Hell
Heaven
A happy place where Mothers delight as they watch their children burn in Hell
Von Balthasar
A dangerous heretic. The Holy spirit providentially struck him down shortly before he was to become a cardinal and infect the entire church with his errors.
Salvation
Consists of enjoying a vision of the damned gnashing their teeth for all eternity (ie, the beatific vision)
Johnny is a Bishop, Heretic, Prophet, Priest, Apostle and ASM (Ascended Spiritual Master). On his good days he is often also the one true almighty God incarnate. He enjoys writing theology and philosophy articles and spreading the Gospel promise of Universal Salvation
The Muslims are right: Jesus was just a man. He wasn’t God. He was just a dude. He had a single nature and that nature was human. In fact, Jesus was peccable, which is to say he was able to sin. Adds a whole new dimension to the temptation in the wilderness story doesn’t it? Our saviour really could have failed, he really could have given in to the temptations!
However, at no point did he actually sin. If we conceive of sins as the bricks in a wall that stands between us and God and separate us from him, then consider what it means for Jesus to not have to contend with such a barrier. At all times, Jesus the man had full and direct access to God. There was no sin that stood in his way. In other words, from the moment of his conception all the way through his life and ministry, and even up to his death; Jesus experienced a profound unity with God and a full theosis.
Now, Jesus was fully man, which means that he inherited a fallen, imperfect human nature just like the rest of us. And this was why he needed to be baptised! Baptism removes the curse of original sin, which Jesus suffered from just like all of us, even if he never commit any actual moral fault.
But Jesus experienced full theosis, which is to say that even though he was merely a man by nature, it would be accurate to call him “fully God” by participation. And this would hold true for the duration of his entire life. So there is a sort of dyophysis at play: Jesus is fully man by nature, and fully God by participation, and there is a strict separation between the two natures. If at any time he had slipped up and sinned, he would have lost his full participation in divinity, as the bricks in the wall between him and God would have begun to stack up.
But no, Jesus was fully united to the divine λογος for his entire life. Never did he slip up. There have been many saints, Christian and otherwise who have also achieved a full unity with the λογος, for example Muhammad and Buddha, but what separates these saints and mystics from Jesus is that they begun their journey behind the wall of sin, and had to dismantle it brick by brick, whereas Jesus experienced theosis for the entire duration of his life.
Now, Jesus died. For the purposes of this discussion the details are not relevant, whether it was by murder or by old age does not matter. The crucial point is that this innocent man died; the only man who had ever lived his entire life without sinning once. But the wages of sin is death, so how could a man who had never sinned be subject to the penalty of death? And so the Justice of God becomes manifest as God raises Jesus from death to new life; a new life from which he will never die again.
But something funny happened as Jesus passed from death to new life. His nature changed. He took on an eschatalogical existence. No longer was he a dyophysis of created nature and divine participation. Instead he takes on the divine simplicity of a miaphysis; he becomes God! My thesis is therefore that the full incarnation did not occur at Christmas, but at Easter. Jesus was not born as God, he became God. Yes there was a sense in which he was fully God for his entire life and ministry, but this was merely by “participation”, not by “nature”. However the game changed after the resurrection. Jesus truly could be referred to as fully God in every respect. In fact, all of the imperfections and limitations of his human nature were swallowed up in the divine nature, like a drop in the ocean. Nevertheless he retained his created attributes.
This is why it is now appropriate to worship Jesus as the one true God. He has attained the divine perfections and exists already at the end of history, in the eschaton. This is why he says “no one comes to the father except through me”. God is eternally hidden, unmanifest, and there is valid no way to worship him, despite his being the only valid object of worship. But Jesus changes all that. He has broken the curtain that separates us from God in half and taken on a tangible form. Now we direct our worship towards this man Jesus, in the Eucharist, in the flesh. He became God, but by being God, he always was God. And so it will be with us. All of us will achieve theosis, and then all of us will achieve resurrection, and finally all of us will become the λογος incarnate. But while we are pilgrims here, on this side of the eschaton, waiting for that glorious resurrection, only Jesus is God, and only him do we worship.
Johnny is a Bishop, Heretic, Prophet, Priest, Apostle and ASM (Ascended Spiritual Master). On his good days he is often also the one true almighty God incarnate. He enjoys writing theology and philosophy articles and spreading the Gospel promise of Universal Salvation
All things are lawful to me – but not all are beneficial. All things are lawful to me – but I will not be overpowered by any of them.
All things are lawful – but not all are expedient; all things are lawful – but not all edify.
According to these quotes from St Paul, no action is inherently evil and nothing is to be considered a sin in and of itself. “Where there is no law, there is no sin”. And yet the Christian traditions are insistent on the reality of objectively sinful actions that are never permissible. How do we reconcile this?
Answer: Whether or not an action is evil is determined by the context surrounding the action. So for example, Sex, Killing, Theft, Lying, Self-Pleasure, Abstinence, and using contraceptive products are not inherently evil actions. The context surrounding the action determines whether or not these things are grave. When does killing become murder? When does sex become rape? Killing and murder are the same action, but with different contexts. Sex and rape are the same action, but with different contexts. Sex and killing are always lawful, but murder and rape are always unlawful. But the unlawfulness of murder and rape does not flow from the actions involved, it flows from the context surrounding those actions
Sex is not Inherently Sinful
Definition: Intercourse between two or more people Rape is sinful = Sex + anyone involved does not consent Adultery is sinful = Sex + everyone involved is consenting to the act + three conditions must hold:
It’s with someone you’re not married to
There is the possibility of pregnancy
You don’t intend to marry them in the event of pregnancy.
If any of those three conditions aren’t met, the sex is lawful.
(Commentary)
Having sex with someone you are not married to, whilst still being married to someone else, is not a sin under this schema, SO LONG AS there is no possibility of pregnancy.
However, having sex with someone you are not married to, whilst still being married to someone else, might lead to tensions and issues in the marriage such as jealousy and spurned emotions and it would therefore be unwise to engage in such behaviour if you are aiming to minimise pain for both yourself and your partner.
Homosexual sex comes up as lawful, because there is no possibility of pregnancy
Killing is not Inherently Sinful
Definition: To end a life Manslaughter is not sinful = killing + it’s unintentional. Execution/self-defence is not sinful = killing + it’s intentional + three conditions must hold:
The victim himself is guilty of murder
The victim must pose an ongoing, immanent mortal threat to someone
All other possible options have been exhausted
If those conditions aren’t met, then the action of killing becomes the sin of murder
(Commentary)
This is why in modern, stable societies, which have the luxury of prison systems, the death penalty is never appropriate. It is always possible to lock the prisoner away and attempt to reform them.
Whereas in a post-apocalyptic/anarchic society which doesn’t have the resources to hold the guilty indefinitely, execution may be necessary to prevent further harm to the weak and innocent.
Abortion remains a form of murder under this scheme, because even though the foetus may pose a threat to the mental or physical health of the mother, the foetus has not commit any actual crime deserving of death and there are always other possible options.
Killing of animals is always murder (unless there is some sense in which an animal can be “guilty”. An area for further enquiry)
Theft is not Inherently Sinful
Definition: Taking something that doesn’t belong to you Stealing is sinful = theft + you don’t intend to compensate Borrowing is not sinful = theft + you intend to compensate
Lying is not Inherently Sinful
Definition: Speaking a statement that is factually false, or withholding a relevant truth. Deception is sinful = Lying + the intent is personal gain at the expense of others Protection is not sinful = Lying + the intent is to shield the weak and vulnerable from harm
Self-Pleasure is not Inherently Sinful
Definition: Wanking or schlicking. Sexual self-stimulation Masturbation is sinful: Self-Pleasure + the arousal is connected to any other actually sinful act. If that condition does not hold, self-pleasure is not sinful.
(Commentary)
Any mental sexual fantasy is permissible.
Pornography is permissible, so long as the acts depicted are not sinful. (For example, rape fantasies are permissible, but no ACTUAL rape or adultery should be involved. Everyone should be enthusiastically consenting and there should be no danger of pregnancy)
Condoms, the pill and abstinence are not Inherently Sinful
Definition: Self explanatory Contraception is sinful: Using these things for selfish reasons such as “I don’t want to have kids” Birth control is not sinful: Using these things for practical reasons and in a temporary capacity. Such as avoiding pregnancy with someone you’re not married to, or avoiding pregnancy at a certain period of time where it would be in-optimal.
Worship is not Inherently Sinful
Definition: Giving awe, respect, reverence (technically latria) to something Idolatry is sinful: Worship + the object of worship is something other than God. If what you worship is not other than God, the worship is lawful.
Johnny is a Bishop, Heretic, Prophet, Priest, Apostle and ASM (Ascended Spiritual Master). On his good days he is often also the one true almighty God incarnate. He enjoys writing theology and philosophy articles and spreading the Gospel promise of Universal Salvation
Do you really expect that saying “Agree with me or go to Hell!” will convert your opponents heart? No! This is why every anathema is always just another schism.
So listen closely to the Origens, Ariuses, Pelagiuses, Nestoriuses, Luthers, Calvins and Robertses of the day: They have discovered something important and profound, and it is only by listening to them that we will avoid further schism and maintain the unity of the church.
Johnny is a Bishop, Heretic, Prophet, Priest, Apostle and ASM (Ascended Spiritual Master). On his good days he is often also the one true almighty God incarnate. He enjoys writing theology and philosophy articles and spreading the Gospel promise of Universal Salvation
![foxtrot-free-will1[1].jpg](https://antipodeanosmosis.files.wordpress.com/2019/02/foxtrot-free-will11.jpg?resize=191%2C180)
Just as it is a heresy to believe that you can freely save yourself, so too is it a heresy to claim that you can damn yourself. By claiming that man is “free” to choose whether or not to accept God’s love, the catholic ministers of the gospel of perdition elevate themselves above God and deny his sovereignty; their condemnation will be swift and just. Do not be so foolish as to think you can climb the ladder to heaven apart from grace, and do not be so presumptuous as to think that you have the “freedom” to hide from God in Hell forever. God loves you and intends your salvation; do you really think you can defeat his sovereign will by a stubborn refusal to submit and a childish denial of worship?
![rescue-the-perishing[1].jpg](https://antipodeanosmosis.files.wordpress.com/2019/02/rescue-the-perishing1.jpg?resize=676%2C386)
I don’t deny everlasting damnation. 
![20091210_thisissue_600-kindle-cover_w[1]](https://i0.wp.com/universalism-au.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/04/20091210_thisissue_600-kindle-cover_w1.jpg?resize=676%2C482)
The Muslims are right: Jesus was just a man. He wasn’t God. He was just a dude. He had a single nature and that nature was human. In fact, Jesus was peccable, which is to say he was able to sin. Adds a whole new dimension to the temptation in the wilderness story doesn’t it? Our saviour really could have failed, he really could have given in to the temptations!![free[1].jpg](https://antipodeanosmosis.files.wordpress.com/2019/03/free1.jpg?resize=640%2C344)
![heretic_happy_hour[1].png](https://i0.wp.com/universalism-au.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/04/heretic_happy_hour1.png?resize=361%2C361)