Praying For What Won't Happen

A reader writes:

If your interpretation of Jesus’ statement about Judas is correct [here], then doesn’t that mean that certain parts of the Catechism should be changed, namely §1058 and §1821?

Wouldn’t it be illogical to pray “that no one should be lost” if we know that one person already is lost?

Wouldn’t it be illogical to pray that “all men” be saved, if we know, on the basis of your gloss, that one of them is damned?

This question has two aspects: One, taking the question at face value, has application specifically to praying that people won’t be damend. This, however, leads to a second aspect which is broader in scope.

Dealing with the first aspect first, I’d say the following:

1. Prayers of this sort can be taken either distributively or collectively. When taken distributively, they are made on behalf of each person as an individual–i.e., may this person not be damned. Taken collectively, they are made on behalf of all individuals as a whole–i.e., may nobody at all in the human race be damned.

The thing is, prayers can be made distributively for the human race that it would make no sense to take collectively. For example, we might pray distributively for each individual in the human race that he not get sick, though we know with certaintity that some people will in fact get sick. We can wish the good of health for each individual. Nevertheless, it is clear (from the fact that some people do get sick) that God does not choose to give this gift to everyone without exception, so it would make no sense for us to make the prayer in a collective sense.

2. Another axis along which questions of this nature have to be parsed is whether they have to do with the future or the past. We can pray that nobody in the future suffer from a particular evil without implying that we are asking the same for all the people who have lived (and suffered from it) in the past.

3. For the prayers you mention from the Catechism not to make sense, they would have to be taken (a) collectively and (b) for all people, past and present. This is one of only several possible combinations, so we already can see that the prayers can make sense on the thesis I’m advancing.

4. In fact, there are reasons to think that the Church does not intend the prayers in the sense described in point #3:

a. The passages both reference Paul’s statement in 1 Tim. 2:4 that God desires all men to be saved. They represent the Church’s appropriation of this desire of God’s in its own prayer life. Yet (i) we know that, though he doesn’t wish it, God is willing to let people choose hell, as Scripture and the Catechism both state, (ii) St. Paul certainly believed that some people end up in hell, as illustrated by numerous passages in his writings, and (iii) we still have Jesus’ statement that is most plausibly read as stating Judas’ damnation.

b. John Paul II, who approved the Catechism, is on record (e.g., in his book Crossing the Treshhold of Hope) stating that people are in hell, and

c. It certainly cannot be maintained that the world body of bishops, who collaborated on the Catechism, are all von Balthasarians with regard to this question.

Thus we have reason to read the prayers in question in another light, more consonant with Scripture and Tradition, that the Church is praying for the salvation of every human individually, not that hell to be empty.

The second and larger issue is one we have alluded to in dealing with the first: It is the question of praying for things that won’t happen. There are all kinds of prayers in the Church for things that simply aren’t going to happen–e.g., that there be an end to poverty, hunger, sickness, war, and any other evil you might want to name. To really imagine a world where all these are granted prior to the Second Coming would be to engage in unrealistic utopian hopes at best and to participate in the deception of the Antichrist at worst (see CCC 675-677). The world simply won’t be perfected in that way in this age, and the man who tells us that it can be will be the biggest, evilest snakeoil salesman of history.

Thus when prayers of this sort are made (and, personally, I find myself uncomfortable with this style of prayer), they always have to be made with the recognition that God is not going to banish all such evils from the world, and therefore they must be made with an unstated qualifier like “to the extent that it is Thy will, Lord.”

If they are not taken with some such qualifier then they constitute praying for something that one knows God will not grant, which is foolish or presumptuous, depending on the level of knowledge the person praying has.

Author: Jimmy Akin

Jimmy was born in Texas, grew up nominally Protestant, but at age 20 experienced a profound conversion to Christ. Planning on becoming a Protestant seminary professor, he started an intensive study of the Bible. But the more he immersed himself in Scripture the more he found to support the Catholic faith, and in 1992 he entered the Catholic Church. His conversion story, "A Triumph and a Tragedy," is published in Surprised by Truth. Besides being an author, Jimmy is the Senior Apologist at Catholic Answers, a contributing editor to Catholic Answers Magazine, and a weekly guest on "Catholic Answers Live."

5 thoughts on “Praying For What Won't Happen”

  1. Thanks for your reply, James. It’s a thoughtful post. It gives me much to chew on.

    In chapter twenty-eight of CTTOH (which you appeal to), JPII says:

    “Can God, who has loved man so much, permit the man who rejects Him to be condemned to eternal torment? And yet, the words of Christ are unequivocal. In Matthew’s Gospel He speaks clearly of those who will go to eternal punishment (cf. Mt 25:46). Who will these be? The Church has never made any pronouncement in this regard. This is a mystery, truly inscrutable, which embraces the holiness of God and the conscience of man. The silence of the Church is, therefore, the only appropriate position for Christian faith. Even when Jesus says of Judas, the traitor, “It would be better for that man if he had never been born” (Mt 26:24), His words do not allude for certain to eternal damnation.”

    Like you say, JPII affirms that there will be people in hell. But he says “The silence of the Church is, therefore, the only appropriate position for Christian faith.”

    Your position departs from that clear categorical statement affirming silence, even about Judas. That troubles me.

    I’d also not want to paint the Balthasarians too neatly as simple-minded universalists (not that you do, but I’ll still make the point). Dulles characterizes Balthasar and Neuhaus as follows:

    “It is unfair and incorrect to accuse either Balthasar or Neuhaus of teaching that no one goes to hell. They grant that it is probable that some or even many do go there, but they assert, on the ground that God is capable of bringing any sinner to repentance, that we have a right to hope and pray that all will be saved. The fact that something is highly improbable need not prevent us from hoping and praying that it will happen. According to the Catechism of the Catholic Church, “In hope, the Church prays for ‘all men to be saved’ (1 Timothy 2:4)” (CCC §1821). At another point the Catechism declares: “The Church prays that no one should be lost” (CCC §1058).”

    http://www.firstthings.com/ftissues/ft0305/articles/dulles.html

    I think their point is that it is not certain that hell is populated. It’s an epistemological claim, not an ontological one.

  2. I also find that quote from Dulles somewhat at odds with your interpretation of those prayers from the Catechism.

    Dulles seems to be using “all” in a univocal sense throughout the quote. He seems to be saying that the hope that Balthasar and Neuhaus emphasize is also emphasized in the Catechism.

    But if you’re correct in your interpretation of the prayers, the Balthasar/Neuhaus understanding of hope is not at all identical with the Catechism’s.

    Again, none of this entails that you’re wrong.

    But it does mean that your position asks us to dismiss the claims of some pretty weighty authorities.

  3. I found this too in Dulles’ responses to his First Things correspondents:

    “Let me take this occasion to clarify a further point. I reported that Pope John Paul II, according to the English text of one of his General Audience talks, said: “Eternal damnation remains a possibility, but we are not granted, without special divine revelation, the knowledge of whether or which human beings are effectively involved in it.” By now I have been able to get my hands on the official (Italian) version of the talk in the Insegnamenti di Giovanni Paolo II. It agrees with the English except that the words “whether or” are omitted. Thus the Pope cannot be cited as tending toward universalism. On the contrary, he teaches here as elsewhere that some have in fact said “no” to the divine invitation to everlasting life. I believe this to be the case, though the Church has never taught under pain of heresy that anyone is damned.” (my emphasis)

    http://www.firstthings.com/ftissues/ft0310/correspondence.html#hell

    I’m not sure what council or teaching that Dulles alludes to here. Got any ideas?

    What, exactly, would the heresy be in this context?

  4. Upon rereading that last passage from Dulles, I realize I misunderstood what he was saying.

    Please disregard my final two questions!

  5. Camping World Open Roads Forum: Search

    Your search for posts made by ‘Pull-Tab’ found 371 matches. … to save a mark then to edit it touch “edit/review favorits” next touch “location to edit” . …

Comments are closed.