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"And yet John Paul II, along with his favorite theologian Hans Urs Von Balthasar, said that it was not an unreasonable thing to hope and to pray that hell was empty."

With all due respect to +JPII, that's not reasonable at all, though it may be sensible and beneficial to pray that no more souls go there. The fact is, as +John Chrysostomos teaches, the floor of hell is paved with the skulls of bishops!

The fact is, as +John Chrysostomos teaches, the floor of hell is paved with the skulls of bishops!

With all due respect to John Chrysostom, that is something about which he could not have had any personal or supernatural knowledge.

With respect, sir, Chrysostom was not dogmatically insisting that he could prove who was in hell. He was making a point about the evil that corrupt bishops bring upon the Church. If they died unrepentant, they are in hell. But even Chrysostom was too wise a theologian to forget that none of us can say absolutely whether or not even the most vile sinner repented. To us all the evidence may point to unrepentance but even Chrysostom would say that judgment belongs to God, not to us.

And von Balthasar said exactly the same thing on that point. He did think we could hope and pray that everyone repented. Chrysostom would not say that but he also would not be so stupid as to say for sure that hell is full, only that all the evidence points toward that conclusion. Von Balthasar agrees that all the evidence points toward that conclusion so that it's reasonable to think that hell is full of sinners but despite that reasonable but qualified conclusion, von Balthasar then says, we can hope that the reasonable conclusion proves to be false. It's a very small difference, really--what Von B. was concerned with is the temptation to self-righteousness when one quickly, casually proclaims how full hell is or readily consigns this or that gross sinner to hell.

It's true that gross, public sinners deserve to have their sins denounced in the strongest terms, but von B. wants us to realize that we can easily send ourselves to hell if we do that without ourselves being full of humility and repentance. He didn't like the "us" versus "them" attitude, the attitude of the publican in the temple. So, fine, quote Chrysostom on this but do it with the humble attitude of the "have mercy on me a sinner."

Von B's strategy for guarding against self-righteous condemnation of others that risks hell for the condemner may not be the best strategy--Chrysostom's strategy may be better, but they actually agree on the main point: we can't be sure whether someone repented before death or not and it's best to be humble about it.

And John Paul II did not agree with von Balthasar on this point--he distances himself from his favorite theologian preciesly on that point in _Crossing the Threshold_. So let's take it easy in denouncing JPII, please.