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Many Christians talk about non-believers being tortured for all eternity in Hell by their all-loving deity. This is when I like to ask them if non-believing children go to Hell to be tortured for all eternity. I get a variety of answers on this one and they are all comically funny for atheists.<\/p>\n
First I get the extreme answer: \u201cYes, children who don\u2019t believe in God go to Hell to be tortured for all eternity and that is why it is so important to spread the message of Christ to everyone.\u201d I actually don\u2019t have a problem with this answer logically, but let\u2019s face facts here. That is not a moral answer. Those who hold this opinion are saying in no uncertain terms that children should be tortured\u2026 for all eternity no less. This answer shows just how morally corrupting religion can be because these people who express this opinion believe they are good moral people and yet they believe that children should be tortured!<\/p>\n
The second answer I get from Christians is the non-committal answer: \u201cI don\u2019t know; that is for God to decide.\u201d But just a moment ago this same Christian was telling me that non-believers are going to be tortured for all eternity in Hell and now they don\u2019t know if children go to Hell or not? Here we have a case of conscience meeting dogma. Christians like this have no problem telling non-believing adults that they will go to Hell, but even they realize that torturing non-believing children for all eternity is wrong. But they don\u2019t want to take a side. \u201cChildren might go to Hell and that might be okay, but that is for God to decide.\u201d Let\u2019s put it in another context. \u201cNorth Korea might be torturing children and that might be okay, that is up to Kim Jong-un to decide.\u201d<\/p>\n
Finally, we have the third answer from the more apologetic camp: \u201cNo, children don\u2019t go to Hell. The Bible lists multiple passages which can be vaguely interpreted to tell us that God will not torture children, ever!\u201d Here we have people of conscience and intellect who realize that torturing children is wrong and that morality is not just God\u2019s will (although they won\u2019t admit the latter). So because they know torturing children is wrong, they will re-interpret any verse they can find that vaguely mentions children to show that God wouldn\u2019t torture children. But the fact is that it doesn\u2019t really matter what the Bible actually says, it is the answer of their conscience that tells them that torturing children is wrong.<\/p>\n
So how does our conscience know that it is wrong? Because we empathize with a person being tortured and we empathize with children who are defenseless. Based on our empathy, our compassion as human beings tells us that torture is wrong and torturing defenseless children is that much more wrong. Doing it for all eternity is just extra special wrong. It isn\u2019t some vague Bible verse which needs to be understood in the light of some other vague Bible verse that tells them that children shouldn\u2019t tortured for all eternity in Hell, it is a sense of human decency.<\/p>\n
The Bible could flat out state that non-believing children go to Hell and it wouldn\u2019t make a bit of difference to these apologeticists. \u201cThat verse must be interpreted in the light of verse X and only applied to person Y in the special case because of situation Z.\u201d The apologeticist can turn any verse completely on its head if it doesn\u2019t fit with their view.<\/p>\n