Early Christian WI: Universal Reconciliation Goes Mainstream?

The idea of universal reconciliation, or the idea that all will eventually be reconciled to Christ and that Hell is not an eternal torment, was a widely held belief amongst the early Christian communities, but it eventually fell to the side and regarded as heresy by the Church.

What would it take to have this idea come to be adopted as orthodox by the Church?
 
Three ideas;

1. Either make the punishments, while temporary, still seem terrible and relatively long.

2. Introduce the idea of something like Karma.

3. Introduce the concept of a 'Lower Heaven' in which you'd never suffer (IE be sick or starve), but in which you'd just exist and never be truly happy and never see your loved ones.
 

Deimos

Banned
I have four ideas.

1. The term for universal salvation is apocatastasis in English. In original Greek manuscripts of the New Testament this word (as a noun) is only to be found in Acts III, 21
Heaven must receive him until the time comes for God to restore everything (!), as he promised long ago through his holy prophets.
and is mostly thought to refer to the re-establishmnt of the Jewish kingdom. Change it, so it refers God restoring everything and cutting the part referring to the prophets.

2. Have Origen's writings be not judged heretical, I remember him being an advocate of universal salvation.

3. Keep on baptizing only adults. Familial piety will want to kow what happens to stillborns and children who could not be accepted into the church because they died before adulthood and the Church will be forced to concede that they might be saved to keep the surviving family members happy which would open theology to universal salvation much sooner than the late 19th century.

4. Maybe something like what the Mormons do could help. Make it widely acceptable to baptize your ancestors retroactively so they can get into heaven long after they have died as heathens/infidels/atheists which would be a softer form of universal salvation.
 

whitecrow

Banned
Sort of, but somewhat nicer/better, basically you'd never get sick, never starve and you could have earthly pleasures if you could get them, but you'd never have true, deep meaningful happiness and even if your loved ones were in purgatory to, you'd never see them.
Interestingly, from what I heard Dante's outermost Circle of Hell is just like the above description....
 
The thing is, it doesnt work well theologically.

If you have no choice but to accept God, it means accepting God is meaningless.

There's an image in CS Lewis, from the Great Divorce i think, where he proposes that Heaven and Hell could be the same place. Those who open themselves to God, bathe in his radiance, while those who cling to dark bits of sin are burned by the actinic radiance of the same light.

It's probably not accurate, but it is a hugely powerful idea for considering the concepts of Heaven and Hell, and how it fits with a loving God.

Some people simply wont accept God's love, no matter what, and, for them, breaking their will and forcing them into Heaven would be more wrong.

Do understand that while I believe in Heaven, and suspect Hell exists, I am absolutely sure that the 'classical' ideas of people with harps on clouds vs people in boiling pitch being stabbed by demons are wrong, wrong, wrong.
 

RavenMM

Banned
Some people simply wont accept God's love, no matter what,

So God is not almighty in talking them into it? ;)
That's one of the arguments for Universal Reconciliation, I heard... God's almighty and allloving and merciful, so he will have everybody in His Heaven and Hell (if it exits) will be empty.
Myself, I'm a roman catholic, and I believe strongly in the idependent and free will of people, so Universial Reconciliation is.. troublesome for me. But I know there are other christians, who still believe in it. There are arguments for both sides.
But for the What If, Catholic Theology would more closely resemble modern day calvinism, I think. I don't know if it would really change something... Maybe you get an earlier approach to proselytize with the Image of the loving God, and not by telling people about the horrors of hell.
 
If you get the Gospel of Nicodemus into the Christian canon that could lay the foundation for Universal Reconciliation. In it Jesus goes into Hell and busts out all the Jews, prophets, and patriarchs who lived in the time before his coming and leads them into Heaven. Aside from sounding like it would make a great action flick that could lay the foundation for broader acceptance of the idea that sooner or later all sinners will be forgiven.
 
If you get the Gospel of Nicodemus into the Christian canon that could lay the foundation for Universal Reconciliation. In it Jesus goes into Hell and busts out all the Jews, prophets, and patriarchs who lived in the time before his coming and leads them into Heaven. Aside from sounding like it would make a great action flick that could lay the foundation for broader acceptance of the idea that sooner or later all sinners will be forgiven.
That's the Harrowing of Hell, which was widely accepted during medieval times (and still is), due to one plausible interpretation of several vague passages in the Epistles. However, Jesus only saves the righteous men who died before His coming - or, even in the broadest interpretation, only the Jews who had at least a previous covenant with God. This doesn't support universal reconciliation because these people were saved in exactly the same way as people today; it's just that they needed to sit in the waiting room outside until Jesus came to open the door to Heaven. Accepting this passage wouldn't even lay a foundation because the Harrowing of Hell already was believed OTL.
 
That's the Harrowing of Hell, which was widely accepted during medieval times (and still is), due to one plausible interpretation of several vague passages in the Epistles. However, Jesus only saves the righteous men who died before His coming - or, even in the broadest interpretation, only the Jews who had at least a previous covenant with God. This doesn't support universal reconciliation because these people were saved in exactly the same way as people today; it's just that they needed to sit in the waiting room outside until Jesus came to open the door to Heaven. Accepting this passage wouldn't even lay a foundation because the Harrowing of Hell already was believed OTL.
You would be surprised how many Protestants I know haven't heard of that, and don't count it as a part of their theology, but I agree with the rest of the assessment.

As for changing the view, well, TBH it almost sounds like calling life a meaningless transitory stage with no reason for being at all, since human choice means nothing in the end, so it would probably totally change Christianity. In particular the ammount of authority given to preachers and priests would probably be far less without the belief that they hold the keys to saving souls, and this goes for the papacy ten times over. So, at the very least Christianity becomes far less hierarchical and organized. Also, without the idea that Paganism can lead to eternal damnation, Christianity may not become exclusivist, and may become syncretic with many other beliefs. As for whether this would help or hinder it, I would actually say it hinders it, because exclusivism often leads to stronger devotion and even fanaticism brought on by a belief in superiority, and I think that this superiority idea meshed well first with the Romans, and later with their successors. Even in modern times religious patriotism has been shown to be a powerful force, and I think that it even more true 2000 years ago.
 
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