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Culture War Roundup for the week of May 11, 2026

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Don't you find it a little odd that an organisation that is extremely sure about the existence of God, creation, the resurrection and about how the church is the only source for salvation suddenly starts admitting its own fallability on a topic that might offend modern audiences?

That doesn't even make sense as an argument. The Catholic Church is quite willing to hold firm on things that offend modern audiences a great deal more than hell. People aren't really that offended by hell, but they certainly are offended by the idea that no, gay people cannot legitimately marry, and no, a man cannot become a woman or vice versa, both of which the church stands firm on. Then there's the doctrine that women can't be priests, or the ban on contraception, which also offend modern audiences, though not nearly to the extent as the first two. Say what you will about the Catholic Church, but it isn't afraid to say "no, this is true" even if it's unpopular to do so.

If hell was real in the same way that the earth's molten core is real, people would look for evidence, run tests and experiments, apply lessons learned from similar fields. There would be a real answer. Instead we get an understanding of existence that is based purely on written and spoken words, and people can come to basically any conclusion they want.

I'm not sure what you mean by this, exactly. What do you want people to do here? The spiritual is not, as a rule, something we can explore empirically via physical measurements. Nobody denies this. It sounds like you're saying "people don't do experiments to prove hell is real, so that proves they don't believe in hell", but that's silly. If that's not what you mean, then I don't follow you at all.