Catholicism's (imo dubious) teachings on hell were a major factor in my decision to leave it. Two books I always recommend (if you want a second opinion):
What does the COVID vaccine have to do with anything?
Also, I have a book recommendation on the subject of pornography that may soften your self-condemning attitude. Check out Samuel Perry's Addicted to Lust: Pornography in the Lives of Conservative Protestants. The book is written strictly from a sociological perspective (i.e., it's not a religious book), which I actually found insightful, revealing, and refreshing. The book includes non-judgmental interviews with many people struggling with your very situation and you may get some useful insight into what you're thinking and feeling and what to do about it. And DEFINITELY read it before you start getting into Christian anti-porn literature.
If you don't want to spring for the book, I can share my electronic copy, too. I highly recommend it.
I think you should read By Man Shall His Blood be Shed by Edward Feser and Joseph Bessette. Then read Fratelli Tutti. I don't know if Catholics have received extremely clear guidance either way, but at least you'll feel like you have the background for the current situation.
Hello! Former practicing Catholic here. The notion of eternal inescapable hell was a major sticking point in my faith that caused me to want to dig deeper to get at the truth. I had numerous discussions with other Catholics about it. And the more questions I asked, the more I realized they didn't actually have answers, just one-liners they'd rehearsed. Their answers to follow-up questions were all just impromptu guesses, and every Catholic gave a different one. I studied for months and months. I tried cross-referencing doctrines and things the Church had declared in the past with the things it declared now. Things didn't add up.
Ultimately, the book that made things about hell clearer was one by an Eastern Orthodox theologian, David Bently Hart, called That All Shall Be Saved. It made it abundantly clear to me that eternal inescapable hell is incompatible with Christianity. How could an all-loving God ever be okay with a plan that causes his children to be eternally separated from him? How could anyone be happy in heaven knowing their close friends and family could be suffering in hell forever? How could God's plan be called "good," if it ultimately results in a dualism of eternal heaven and hell, where evil would coexist with good forever?
My main suggestion is to listen to debates between Catholics and non-Catholics, and from there, maybe you'll get an idea of what topics to read more. For a long time, I felt that things in Catholicism did not add up. But I couldn't put my finger on exactly why, because I had been trained to not read books by non-Catholics (plus C.S. Lewis, haha), so I had never given "the other side" a chance to speak. Once I did, it was eye-opening, and things made so much more sense.
If you're interested in universal reconciliation, I recommend the book That All Shall Be Saved by David Bentley Hart, it makes an extremely strong case in my view.
I recommend the book, "Decision Making and the Will of God." https://www.amazon.com/Decision-Making-Will-God-Alternative-ebook/dp/B002RLBKEA
Roadblocks in and of themselves don't necessarily mean that God doesn't want you to do something. It could be Satan trying to hinder you. It could be trials that God is using in your life. It could be that God's timing is different than yours. You want to complete the program in a certain timeframe but God has something different in mind.
When deciding if something is God's will, you have to to look at your goal and measure that specifically against what scripture says. Is this goal honoring to God? Does it break any Biblical principles?
If the goal does not break any Biblical commands or principles, then you are free in Christ to pursue it. If God doesn't want this goal to happen, he will make sure that it doesn't.
This is where you need to pray about it and rely on the Holy Spirit to guide you. But I definitely recommend that book because he goes into much more detail.
I can recommend two books that helped me get over the fear of hell:
I truly believe the doctrine of hell crumbles under its own weight. Yet I understand and empathize with how hard it is to break the indoctrination of it. Hopefully these can help you. I wish you the best.
Two books really helped me to get over the fear of hell. Copy-pasted response below:
I highly recommend the book, "Decision Making and the Will of God: A Biblical Alternative to the Traditional View." It talks about this very thing. He even uses the college dilemma as an example. The basic gist is that if you have a morally neutral decision, you are free to choose what you want, and God's sovereignty works through that. He gives a lot more explanation with Biblical principles and how to know how to find God's will. https://www.amazon.com/Decision-Making-Will-God-Alternative-ebook/dp/B002RLBKEA
I highly recommend the book, "Decision Making and the Will of God: A Biblical Alternative to the Traditional View." It talks about this very thing. He even uses the college dilemma as an example. The basic gist is that if you have a morally neutral decision, you are free to choose what you want, and God's sovereignty works through that. He gives a lot more explanation with Biblical principles and how to know how to find God's will. https://www.amazon.com/Decision-Making-Will-God-Alternative-ebook/dp/B002RLBKEA
Hell is a nightmarish doctrine. Here's two books that helped me overcome fear of it, maybe they will help you:
Hopefully these can help you. I empathize with how hard it is to break the spell of hell. I wish you the best.
I'll post something that I've posted in the past on this issue:
>I got over my fear of eternal inescapable hell by realizing that it contradicts major tenets of traditional Christianity. In other words, even if Christianity were true, hell can't be. It is 100% a manmade idea.
>
>There's a book by David Bentley Hart, "That All Shall Be Saved," where he absolutely eviscerates the idea of eternal inescapable hell on logical grounds, even from a Christian perspective. I've read dozens of reviews of his book by Christians who preach eternal hell, and nearly all but ~two misrepresent his arguments or focus entirely on his tone. His arguments, in my opinion, are simply unassailable - they can't be answered. For this reason, the book is extremely popular in the r/ChristianUniversalism subreddit. If you want to see the idea of hell take a beating from a Christian perspective, I highly recommend it.
>
>I'm also currently reading a book by Bart Ehrman called "Heaven and Hell: A History of the Afterlife" which traces the ideas about hell through human history and shows that they developed organically over time, from pagan origins that started out very differently, rather than being some divine revelation.
>I still intensely fear Hell/purgatory
Regarding the fear of hell, I'll post something that I've posted in the past on this issue:
>I got over my fear of eternal inescapable hell by realizing that it contradicts major tenets of traditional Christianity. In other words, even if Christianity were true, hell can't be. It is 100% a manmade idea.
>
>There's a book by David Bentley Hart, "That All Shall Be Saved," where he absolutely eviscerates the idea of eternal inescapable hell on logical grounds, even from a Christian perspective. I've read dozens of reviews of his book by Christians who preach eternal hell, and nearly all but ~two misrepresent his arguments or focus entirely on his tone. His arguments, in my opinion, are simply unassailable - they can't be answered. For this reason, the book is extremely popular in the r/ChristianUniversalism subreddit. If you want to see the idea of hell take a beating from a Christian perspective, I highly recommend it.
I'm also currently reading a book by Bart Ehrman called "Heaven and Hell: A History of the Afterlife" which traces the ideas about hell through human history and shows that they developed organically over time, from pagan origins that started out very differently, rather than being some divine revelation.
It depends on how they talk about it.
Mark Laaser talked about his inclination to look at a gay website in a way that was incredibly honoring and instrumental to understanding how sexual brokenness distorts godly desire.
Unwanted: How Sexual Brokenness Reveals Our Way to Healing https://www.amazon.com/dp/B07B7RCM9B/ref=cm_sw_r_apan_glt_6BVQMNCM8ZHCMF3PQW7E
I got over my fear of hell by realizing that it contradicts major tenets of traditional Christianity. In other words, even if Christianity were true, hell can't be. It is 100% a manmade idea.
There's a book by David Bentley Hart, "That All Shall Be Saved," where he absolutely eviscerates the idea of eternal inescapable hell on logical grounds. I've read dozens of reviews of his book by Christians who preach eternal hell, and nearly all but ~two misrepresent his arguments or focus entirely on his tone. His arguments, in my opinion, are simply unassailable - they can't be answered. For this reason, the book is extremely popular in the r/ChristianUniversalism subreddit. If you want to see the idea of hell take a beating from a Christian perspective, I highly recommend it.
I highly recommend Samuel Perry’s Addicted to Lust.
In his (and my) opinion, the addiction paradigm of porn viewing and masturbation does more harm than good. It leads to greater compulsivity and pathology. And isn’t really an orthodox attitude. We aren’t sexual exceptionalists. Passions are passions. We fight them together as something common to man and woman.
Ugh. The old T2:11 trope is old hat and one addressed by finer minds than me. Basic Hermeneutics dispenses with it and several others. In short, context matters.
That said, there's a GREAT book that answers this question and many others like it that are kind of "back pocket" objections by many who haven't read the entirety of the bible:
https://www.amazon.com/How-Not-Read-Bible-Crazy-Sounding-ebook/dp/B085XNGKP3
One of my favorite recent quotes I came across is "Never read a bible verse." The fact is, the numbered verse were only introduced in the last 1000 years to aid references and citations. So taking things out of context is a recipe for misunderstanding. You need to understand the verse in the context of the sentence in the context of the book in the context of the author and to whom they are writing.
Try this, maybe?
While people sometimes cite the deuteronomy verse as being about transgenderness, that is a wildly anachronositic reading. The Bible says nothing about transgenderness specifically, because that is not a concept that people even had in their heads to be able to write about. Really the closest analogue is probably the mention of eunuchs, but even that isn't particularly close.
Additionally, it being part of the Law of Moses means that it is not (by itself) a good argument for how Christians today should behave.
Anyone who tells you that the Bible is clearly against being transgender, or transition if you are transgender, is overlaying their own beliefs onto what they read in it. There are some arguments that people make which are more reasonable, but in order to be reasonable they must acknowledge that they are taking general principles from the Bible and applying them to new situations.
Personally I don't think any of the arguments against transgenderness hold water, because they basically all boil down to "being transgender isn't actually a real thing, it's just a delusion that some people have". As the evidence continues to show that it is a real thing, that makes those arguments fall flat.
As for gay marriage and relationships, the Bible does speak more about that. I also think that the most correct view is that there is nothing specifically about the gender of the participants that makes a relationship sinful or not. But I recognize that it's a much more nuanced conversation. If you want a brief overview of one person's reason for supporting gay relationships, I highly recommend this post about it, or the book Torn by the same author (which is basically an better and more thorough version of the same arguments).
> what I should do as a follower of Jesus Christ who wants to do the will of God, where should I focus on in the Bible?
You can start by looking at the verses that are specifically about the will of God, many of them listed on this page.
The top three that I immediately thought of were:
1 Thessalonians 4:3: "For this is the will of God, your sanctification: that you abstain from sexual immorality"
1 Thessalonians 5:18: "Give thanks in all circumstances; for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus for you."
Micah 6:8: "He has told you, O man, what is good; and what does the Lord require of you but to do justice, and to love kindness, and to walk humbly with your God?"
So start thinking about how to do those in your daily and weekly life.
P.S. About how the will of God relates to an individual's choices during the path of his life, I recommend the book "Decision Making And The Will Of God" by Friesen and Maxson.
There are a few key components.
Now, that is all an argument for why we should look at it carefully, rather than decide it's a simple closed case, but it's not sufficient for deciding that gay relationships are fine. For that, we need to actually take the close look. For a relatively short example of that, I recommend this short essay. If you want a more detailed take, that author has an updated and expanded version of his view published: Torn.
You might want to take a look at this book, The Universal Christ, which helps ground Christianity in God's material world when you yourself might start to get unmoored.
There are what can look like mixed messages in the gospels about the nature of flesh. (Paul struggles with the flesh, but also says all things are lawful for him although not all are beneficial for him, just like Jesus says as long as the spirit is pure the body is pure -- why wash the outside of the cup when the one who made the inside also made the outside?)
Friar Rohr helps bring together the Bible's teachings in a way that will hopefully help you see God in matter rather than feel totally alienated from your body and from other people.
Honestly recognizing you have many issues will likely make it easier to deal with your pornography addiction. Just read this book https://www.amazon.com/Unwanted-Sexual-Brokenness-Reveals-Healing-ebook/dp/B07B7RCM9B/ref=tmm_kin_swatch_0?_encoding=UTF8&qid=&sr=
And it deals with how our issues need to be dealt with to deal with sexual addiction.
Roman Catholicism has consistently supported the moral legitimacy of the death penalty for two millennia, and there is nothing in even St. John Paul II's late-coming private theological views that did or ever could change that. You (or JPII, or Francis) might oppose it individually in principle, but Roman Catholicism does not.
If you're interested in a full exploration of the question, I'd recommend <em>By Man Shall His Blood Be Shed</em>, by Ed Feser and Joseph Bessette.
Have you done any online research into these verses? It might be worthwhile to seek out a theologian's view before making any snap judgements. Often we do not see the cultural context, nor do we understand the language. An excellent example of this is the laws on "slavery", which some use to claim the Bible endorses slavery as it was in the antebellum south. This is false, because what is called slavery in the OT is entirely different than what happened in more modern times. This is an excellent explanation if you are interested: http://christianthinktank.com/qnoslave.html
A book I am reading through now that may be useful to you: http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B004EPYPY4/ref=oh_aui_d_detailpage_o00_?ie=UTF8&psc=1
As for Lev. 26, it came true later on when the Israelites began to worship Canaanite gods, which involved child sacrifice. God then withdrew his protection and Israel was under siege from the Babylonians. The Israelites ate their own children rather than ask God for forgiveness and turn from their false gods.