Finally, Platonists taught that the human soul had the capacity to draw itself up to that higher transcendent level of reality through the practice of philosophy. Platonists believed in different versions of reincarnation, but the common goal was to be freed from repeated incarnations and to exist eternally in that perfect world. Thus, pagan Platonism might be said to have offered salvation through philosophy, and thereby took on aspects of what we would describe as a religion.

https://credomag.com/article/christian-platonism-a-history/

Well, there it is. The whole entirety of Christian soteriology, nicely wrapped up in one small sentence: salvation through philosophy. In other words, by coming to know the truth, you are saved. This is the foundation of every fundamentalist religion that exists, whether it be Orthodoxy, Roman Catholicism, Protestantism, Islam or whatever. When you believe our way, when your “truth” coincides with our truth, then God will save you. All the rest are on their way to eternal burnings from a God who is furious that you don’t believe correctly. Never mind that the human mind struggles in darkness to come to truth, never mind that false teachers, false miracles, and false prophets abound, YOU, sir, must come to know the truth and hold to it to the end or you are toast!! God will git you! Salvation is not a gift gratis. Work your ass off for it, 100% believe the right things, and maybe – MAYBE – you will get through the toll-houses on the other end and get to heaven. Maybe.

I was going to write a blog piece called TRUTH OR CONSEQUENCES. This one will do. It seems there are two modes of thinking in modern Christianity. One is sloppy sentimentality, where truth doesn’t matter as much as how one feels about a certain subject. Gay marriage? Awwwww . . . they luuuuuv each other, so we can ignore two millennia of Christian teaching and the prohibitions against homosexual behavior found in the Bible. Just go with your feelings.

On the other hand, there is the angry perfectionism of fundamentalists, where if you don’t have every single thought about God 100% correct, you are in deep kimchee, pal! I can’t tell you how many times I have been told I am going to hell because I don’t believe in a place called hell, I certainly don’t believe in the lurid Roman Catholic descriptions of such a place, and I believe that the fire is God’s love, which is designed to burn away our sins and make us pure. Yeah, what a horrible thing to believe in such a God!

Talk to any fundamentalist Orthodox (which is mostly found in Russian Orthodoxy), and they will assure you that Roman Catholics and Protestants will spend eternity screaming in hell. Talk to any “Extra Eclessia Nulla Salus” Roman Catholic “Latin Traddy” and they will say the same about Orthodox and Protestant believers. And in Protestantism you have the Bob Jones, Texe Marrs, Jack Hyles, and Jack Chick brand of Anabaptist fundamentalists who not only put all outside their camp in hell forever, but even each other if there is the slightest whiff of belief in something other than their brand of “pure fundamentalism,” whatever the hell that is. When I was (God forgive me) one of them, I watched them tear into each other with gusto.

So my question is this: of what importance is truth in our salvation? I am not suggesting we should be okay with a sloppy theology which wanders all over the intellectual and theological map, but on the other hand, I am questioning deeply the kind of salvation which is based on the need to have everything down pat 100%. I have watched two Baptists on a Christian forum board condemn each other to hell over the issue of how baptism is to be administered. I’ve listened to men like Peter Heers say that any baptism which does not follow the Orthodox prescription – threefold immersion in the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit – is invalid (which means, if you believe in baptismal regeneration, that the person being baptized is still unsaved!) Roman Catholic Traddies assure us that only they, in the perfection of their dogmas and practices (especially ONLY the Traditional Latin Mass) will obtain eternal life. In short, God’s mercy is truncated, if you believe in the necessity of absolute perfection in praxis and understanding, by our sinfulness and our lack of complete obedience.

I guess belief in Universal Restoration has ruined me. I can no longer easily wrap my head around the idea of a God who is love and who would, at the very same time, create sentient beings for the sole purpose of tormenting them forever. I expect to be chastised for my failures. I expect that this chastisement will be considerably painful. What I don’t expect from a God who is love is that He act like my earthly father, who had neither care for me nor any instruction or correction which would have made me a better person as I grew up.

I expect love to be better than that.