That really isn't correct. The Catechism states clearly:
"This state of definitive self-exclusion from communion with God and the blessed is called 'hell.'" (Paragraph 1033)
You need to think through the logical consequences of what you are saying. Hell is a place only in the sense that bodies, being physical matter, must exist in some place (of course, this will not occur with the damned until the general resurrection at the end of time).
Hell is not a "place" however, in the sense of being some "where" that can be freely visited and left. Not only does such an idea make absolutely no sense, but it is quite anti-Biblical. When Lazarus and the Rich Man both die (St. luke 16.19-31), they are together in the same place and can see each other and converse, even though as Abraham says "between us and you, there is fixed a great chaos: so that they who would pass from hence to you, cannot, nor from thence come hither" (verse 26). In the Apocalypse of St. John it is revealed quite clearly that sinners "shall be tormented with fire and brimstone in the sight of the holy angels, and in the sight of the Lamb" (Apocalypse 14.10). The sinners are right there in the presence of God and the blessed, but they are in torment, and the blessed are in bliss. Making God the creator of a place called Hell also makes God into a monster, since He would be the Creator of a physical "place" of indescribible torture and suffering. And most certainly, the devil did not create hell, because he is not the Creator, much as he might want us to believe otherwise. Our salvation from damnation would be God saving us from His own monstrosity, rather than Him saving us from our sins. But to say such a thing is, I think, blasphemy! We need to seek the source of the torments of hell within us.
Christ tells us that hell is the "fire which was prepared for the devil and his angels" (St. Matthew 25.41). What hell actually is, is the state of an unredeemed sinner (and the devil and his angels are sinners too) existing in the presence of the Holiness and Love of God. After all, God is present in Hell too "if I descend into hell, thou art present." (Psalm 138(139).8) While God loves the sinner, the sinner hates God, hates himself, and hates all mankind. He wishes he never existed. When he dies he goes to hell, because he has seperated himself from the Source of life, and through his death and being brought into the presence of the Lord, he sees for all eternity precisely what he has thrown away through his love of self and hatred of God. That is "the worm [that] dieth not." (St. Mark 9.47). The burning fire is the presence of God Himself "for our God is a consuming fire." (Hebrews 12.29) This fire warms and enlightens the saints (Apocalypse 22.5), and it burns the sinners. The seperation from God is the sinner's eternal refusal of communion with Him - the eternal cry of "non serviam".
The topographical language of the Church, which affirms "after death the souls of those who die in a state of mortal sin descend into hell" (Catechism 1035) is intended not so much as to place hell in the center of the earth (although the physical bodies of the damned may very well end up there), but to use the image of the firey center of the earth as the firey furnace of hell, and the location of center of the earth as the furtherest point from God who is "up" above the empyrean heavens, so as to emphasize the vast distance of seperation the sinner is making from God by his life - he is placing himself at the point "furthest" from God.
Like most modern Catholics, (and of course non-Catholics), you are completely mistaken to think that a catechism is doctrinal. There have been literally hundreds of them over the centuries, many of them differing on teachings. The catechism is NOT an infallible document, and it is not intended to be an infallible document, it's just a general teaching instrument. Catechisms are never deferred to in any serious Catholic theological debate.
However, if you really want to defer to a catechism that is considered to be the most authoritative of them all, then pick up the "Catechism of the Council of Trent", (which was ordered by the "Council of Trent"). It is also known as "the Catechism of Saint Pius V", and "the Roman Catechism". This catechism was promulgated by a Sainted Pope, Pope St. Pius V, and was compiled and edited by another saint, Saint Charles Borromeo, one of the Church's greatest defenders of the faith ever. St. Charles' deep faith and love for the Church, along with his prodigious intellect enabled him to be an ArchBishop at only age 22. He recieved the tonsure at age 12. His catechism was compiled strictly from defide Church doctrine, not philosophical musings and novelty such as you read in the 1993 catechism. The Catechism of the Council of Trent was designed especially for Catholic priests to help them teach the ignorant faithful.
The Catechism of Trent refers to Hell as an "abode". It goes on to describe some punishements of Hell as being spirtual in nature, (the eternal loss of God), and physical in nature as well. It says:
"The next words, 'into everlasting fire', express another sort of punishment, which is called by theologians 'the pain of sense', because, like lashes, stripes or other more severe chastisements, among which fire, no doubt, produces the most intense pain, it is felt through the organs of sense. When, moreover, we reflect that this torment is to be eternal, we can see at once that the punishment of the damned includes every kind of suffering
So there you have it, the most authoritative catechsim ever written describes Hell as both a spiritual and physical PLACE of suffering. If the body is going to suffer there "through its senses", it must be a physical place as well as a spiritual place of suffering. But hey, what did those old fashioned, traditionalist Saints know anyway, right? They weren't as enlightened as john paul 'the great'.
IMHO, the 1993 catechism is a whimsical, new-age novelty, not to be trusted lest you fall into error. It departs too much from the better known catechsisms of tradition and history. When it says that: "Muslims worship the same 'one God' (of Abraham) that Catholics do", and that muslims are saved by their faith, it makes me long for the return of Tradition. Maybe when JP2 kissed the Satanic koran they put something in the leather cover that warped his thinking?
Hell is a REAL PLACE. The “state of mind” that is separation from God is because you are in hell.
I’ll skip the Catechism since it is not in agreement with the Bible. BTW, it is Christ that spoke repeadetly about hell as a PLACE.
WORD PICTURES OF HEAVEN
A beautiful city: Heb 11:16; 13:14; Rev 21
WORD PICTURE OF HELL
The garbage dump of City: Mk 9:43-48 (Hell=Gehenna=Valley of Hinnom=Dump)
WORD PICTURE OF HEAVEN
Eternal day: Rev 21:25 + 22:5
WORD PICTURE OF HELL
Eternal night, black darkness: Mt 22:13; 25:30; Jude 13; 2 Pet 2:17
WORD PICTURE OF HEAVEN
Sabbath rest: Heb 3:12-4:11; Rev 14:13
WORD PICTURE OF HELL
The second death: Rev 2:11; 20:6,14
WORD PICTURE OF HEAVEN
New heavens & earth: 2 Pet 3:3-13; Rev 21:1
WORD PICTURES OF HELL
Exiled & banished away from God’s new kingdom: 2 Thes 1:9; Mt 22:13; Rev 22:15
WORD PICTURE OF HEAVEN
A garden paradise: Rev 2:7; 22:2-3
WORD PICTURES OF HELL
Beaten & tortured while shackled in prison: Lk 12:47-48; Mt 22:13; 18:34; 24:51
WORD PICTURE OF HEAVEN
Holy place in Jewish tabernacle: Heb 9:11,24
WORD PICTURE OF HELL
Eternal fire: Mt 25:41; 13:42; Jude 7
C. Heaven and hell are of the same nature:
1. Not of this world, realm or creation: Jn 18:36; Heb 9:11,24; Rev 20:11=2 Pe 3:10
II. 9 WORD PICTURES OF HELL
A. Hell=Greek, “Gehenna”: “SENTENCE OF GEHENNA”: MT 23:33
1. Used 13x in NT: Mt 5:22,29,30; 10:28; 18:8,9; 23:15,33; Mk 9:43,45,47; Lk 12:5; Jas 3:6
2. Deep narrow valley outside Jerusalem: Valley of Hinnon, Josh 15:8, see MAP next page
3. Why did Jesus choose the valley of hinnon as the ultimate picture of hell?
a) Human sacrifices offered to Baal & Moleck: 2 Chr 28:3; 33:6; 2 Ki 23:10; Jer 7:31; 19:2-6; 32:35
b) Some have speculated it was the garbage dump of Jerusalem at the time of Christ:
(1) filth, dead animals and bodies of executed criminals
(2) Some suggest that fires were stoked to burn and sanitize
(3) Barnes, “...It was the place where to throw all the dead carcasses and filth of the city; and wan frequently the place of executions. The sight was horrible, the air was polluted and to preserve it in any manner of purity, it was necessary to keep fires continually burning there. The Jew’s extreme loathsomeness of the place, the filth and putrefaction, the corruption of the atmosphere, and the lurid fires blazing by day and night, made it one of the most appalling symbols with which a Jew was acquainted.”
4. Penalty for the sons of Gehenna: Mt 23:15,33
5. Purpose: Body and soul will be destroyed: Mt 10:28
6. Duration of Gehenna: Eternal: Mt 18:8,9 (Eternal fire = Gehenna fire)
a) Some think Gehenna depicts annihililation, yet the fire itself is described as eternal
7. Only two elements directly mentioned with Gehenna:
a) Unquenchable, eternal fire: Mk 9:43,45,47; Mt 5:22,29,30; 18:8,9; Jas 3:6
b) Eternal worms: Mk 9:48
B. Wicked cast into eternal fire: Mt 25:41 (3 FIGURES EXCLUDING GEHENNA FIRE)
1. Unquenchable fire of Gehenna: Mk 9:43,45,47; Mt 5:22,29,30; 18:8,9; Jas 3:6
2. Furnace of fire
a) Burn chaff with unquenchable fire Mt 3:12; Lk 3:17
b) Burn tares in furnace of fire: Mt 13:42,50
3. Rain of fire and brimstone:
a) Destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah: Gen 19:24,28; (antitype of hell: Jude 7)
4. Lake of fire which burns with brimstone (sulfur): Rev 19:20; 20:10; 21:8
a) “Once a brimstone (sulfur) deposit ignites, it would melt & run in burning streams down the ravines spreading everywhere suffocating fumes the ordinary match” ISBE
b) “Torrents of brimstone” (fast moving flows): Isa 30:33
c) “Lake of fire” could also be a reference to lava from a volcano
C. Exiled & banished from God’s kingdom:
1. “Away from God’s presence”: 2 Th 1:9; cast into outer darkness: Mt 22:13
D. Eternal night:
1. “outer darkness”: Mt 22:13; 25:30; black darkness, Jude 13; 2 Pe 2:17
2. Counterpart: Heaven likened unto eternal day: Rev 21:25; 22:5
E. The second death: Rev 2:11; 20:6,14
F. A scourging, shackled torturing in prison:
1. Scourge: “lashes, cut in pieces” Lk 12:47-48; Mt 24:51
2. Shackled: “bind hand & foot” Mt 22:13
3. Tortured: “handed over to torturer: Mt 18:34
G. Worse than drowned in sea with millstone hung around neck: Mt 18:6
III. FACTS ABOUT HELL
A. A place of everlasting destruction: 2 Th 1:9; Phil 3:19; Heb 10:39
B. A place of conscious punishment
1. Both the rich man and Lazarus were fully conscious: Lk 16:19-31
2. “away from the presence of God”: 2 Th 1:9
a) indicates conscious existence in exile not annihilation
3. A place of suffering, affliction and retribution: 2 Th 1:5-8
4. Weeping and gnashing of teeth: Mt 13:42,50; 25:30
C. Duration of punishment is forever, eternity
1. The same words that describe hell also describe God and duration of heaven
a) forever: Rev 14:11; 20:10
b) black darkness forever: Jude 13
c) Eternal: Mt 25:46 (heaven and hell alike)
2. Eternal day of Christians is same duration as eternal night of lost
3. The undying worm, everlastingly consuming an unconsumable body
4. No second chance:
a) Appointed to die once then comes judgement: Heb 9:27
b) Great gulf fixed between good and bad: Lk 16
5. Annihilation is a false doctrine:
Based fundamentally upon the false doctrine that rejects the dichotomous nature of man. Eternal punishment is likened unto setting fire to dry leaf. The leaf is destroyed forever, it ceases to exist and the fire goes out although nothing could extinguish the fire before the leaf was fully consumed. “Carnalists” believe the Bible teaches “eternal destruction” (destroyed forever) rather than “eternal punishment” (conscious pain forever). The Bible mentions a punishment worse than physical death: Heb 10:28-29 What is it if not hell?
D. Hell is a demonstration of God’s justice: 2 Th 1:5-10
1. The “carnalist” type groups who teach annihilation argue that God would not be just to punish a man forever.
2. Just as no one can actually understand the logic behind God’s mercy in saving us through Christ dying on the cross, we probably can’t understand God’s justice with hell.
E. Degrees of punishment in hell
1. Proof texts:
a) Many and few lashes: Lk 12:47-48
b) Both lost but one judgement more tolerable than other: Mt 11:24
c) Hypocrites will receive “greater condemnation”: Mk 12:40
d) Better for them if they had never been Christians: 2 Pe 2:20-21
2. The basis of the degree of punishment is not the frequency or magnitude of sin, but rather how accountable the individual was to God: (teachers- stricter judgement Jas 3:1)
a) The elder who runs off with another women will be punished more severely than any of the recent mass murder-rapists.
b) It is not a matter of how bad they sinned but the degree they knew it was sin.
3. Danger of those who reject degrees of punishment and reward:
a) It directly contradicts scripture: Lk 12:47-48; Mt 11:24; Mk 12:40; 2 Pe 2:20-21
b) It violates that there are in fact, as everyone recognizes, varying degrees of sin in a practical way.
c) It violates everything the Old Testament law taught about varying degrees of punishment for varying sins.
d) It violates the principle of every civil/criminal code in the world by punishing all crimes identically. (Remember that most civil codes were built upon Judeo-Christian principles, the rest upon common sense.)
e) It violates everything human parents understand in raising children, (just try disciplining children the identical way for varying sins.)
f) It is patterned after “communism”, where all get the same thing in spite of personal effort. It gives no incentive to excel. And no discouragement to sin the more!
g) It allows men to get the same reward for minimum effort. It condones, legislates and entrenches a mindset of mediocrity in the church. Statements like, “Hey what do we pay the preacher for!” is the fruit of this false doctrine! As one brother said, “This doctrine poisons the well-springs of zeal!”
h) It encourages Ketchersidism for if all men get the same reward, regardless of the extent of sin in each of their personal lives, then any one can see the close connection between, “We all get to heaven, regardless of our varying degrees of personal sin” AND “All the denominations get to heaven regardless of their varying degrees of doctrinal sin.” (No one believes we are saved by either moral or doctrinal perfection!)
10 Descriptions Are Symbolic
A. Physical garbage dump outside of Jerusalem
B. 4 Different figures of fire: (INCLUDING GEHENNA)
1. Fire of Gehenna
2. furnace of fire
3. rain storm of fire and brimstone
4. lake of fire and brimstone
a) huge furnace with lake of fire inside, raining fire located in valley of hinnon in Jerusalem?
b) Or 4 different figures to depict the spiritual counterpart
C. Exile and banishment
D. Eternal night
E. A bottomless pit (Hades)
F. Scourged, while shacked in a prison
G. Worse than drowned in sea with millstone hung around neck: Mt 18:6
CONCLUSION: Not A Pretty Place
A. Touch: pain from burning fire
B. Taste: dry mouth, extreme thirst, blood from gnashing teeth
C. Smell: rotting garbage-Gehenna; rotten eggs-brimstone
D. Sight: smoke-fire; corruption-Gehenna or black darkness
E. Sound: moaning, weeping, crying, screaming
Fact About Heaven
Duration is forever, eternity: Mt 25:46; Rev 22:11
Fact About Hell
Duration is forever, eternity: Mt 25:46; Rev 14:11; 20:10; Jude 13. No 2nd chance: Heb 9:27; Never to enter heaven: Lk 16:26
Fact about Heaven
Conscious reward: Mt 5:11. Comfort from sufferings: Rom 8:18; 2 Cor 4:17-18
Fact About Hell
Conscious punishment: Lk 16:19-31; 2 Th 1:5-8; Mt 13:42,50; 25:30
Fact about Heaven
Physical & emotional healing: Rev 7:16; 21:4
Fact about Hell
Destruction: 2 Th 1:9; Phil 3:19; Mt 10:28
Fact about Heaven
Reward for obeying: 2 Pe 1:10-11
Fact about Hell
Punishment for bad conduct: Rom 2:5-11
Fact about Heaven
Better than our wildest imagination: Eph 3:20
Fact about Hell
Worse than any known fear and horror
Again, I’ll pass on false doctrine.
Heaven and Hell are REAL PLACES.
Their are MAJOR DIFFERENCE between Heaven and Hell.
How do I know this?
The BIBLE tells me so - not some egotistical sinner with an agenda that doesn’t match what the Bible states. In fact this sinner propagates lies that disagree with the Bible. The choice is yours. Believe God or just another sinner? I gently suggest you get to know God and throw this Catechism in the trash where it belongs. Ever notice how this “Catechism” OFTEN lacks Bible verses to support teachings? Hmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm? It is because this “Catechism” is not in line with Scripture - blindly believing false teachings isn’t good ... .
For once, understand and see what God says and be saved.
There is nothing more to say or repsond to. It is the BIBLE that tells us what to believe and for good reason.
Jer.17:9
[9] The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked: who can know it?
This applies to all sinners and the desperate need to look to God, whose teachings are ALL in the Bible.