Alternatively, why has Christian universalism never gone away?
My assumption is that people can't reconcile:
A Good God sending His creatures to eternal punishment / torment
...the interest in UR is increasing while mainstream church attendance is declining, certainly in the UK anyway.
Could you link that please?
...It seems to me that CF also shows this trend in that threads on UR have considerably more comments and, more significantly, views than those on any other subject.
Could it possibly be that the reason belief in universal reconciliation has never gone away is because it's the truth that scripture points to?
I think the primary reason UR hasn't gone away is that people can't make sense of a good God that tortures eternally.
I guess they think they have to choose. Either
1) God's not that good, or
2) Eternal torment is good (under the circumstances) or,
3) People have misunderstood the scriptures.
I guess loads of people go with No. 3. ????
Personally,
It's hard for me to seperate 1 & 2.
The following thoughts are hard for me to overcome...
If eternal torment is right and good - it immediately lowers my concept of "Good".
I think "If that's what you mean by "good", it's not
that good."
My idea of God would downgrade as well.
Some might say He is good, but I think "He's not
that good".
Maybe all-creative and all-powerful, but I wouldn't describe a diety like that as "good".
Also, it hardly makes you bothered about heaven either.
A God that sends people to eternal torment talks about "heaven", you wonder what that God means when they say "heaven". It's not much to look forward to haha