Universal Salvation and Free Will: A Response to Fr James Dominic Rooney

by Jeremiah Carey, Ph.D.

Fr. James Dominic Rooney’s recent attack on universalism, and David Bentley Hart’s version of it in particular, contains so many claims and takes a stand on so many contentious fundamental issues in philosophy and theology that it’s hard to know where to start in evaluation or response. Thankfully, he summarizes his main argument with what seems admirable clarity:

If it is a necessary truth that all will be saved, something makes it so. The only way it would be impossible for anyone to go to hell is,

1. that God could not do otherwise than cause human beings to love him or

2. that human beings could not do otherwise than love God.

3. There is no third option.

Both of these options, however, entail heresy.

On the face of it, this allows us a sensible method to see whether his argument is a good one or not. In particular, we can ask the following questions: Does universalism require for its truth that (1) or (2) or both be true? Is it true that there are no other options for explaining the truth of universalism than (1) or (2)? Do (1) and (2) both entail heresy?  If the answer to any of these questions is “no,” then the argument doesn’t go through. And, as it happens, I think “no” is the correct answer to every one of those questions.

But, then again, I worry the apparent clarity of the argument summary turns out to be a mere appearance. Take the first claim, for example, that, supposedly, according to universalism God could not do otherwise than cause human beings to love him.  How are we to understand the word “cause” here? There are many different ways someone can rightfully be said to cause something. I can cause you to eat a piece of moldy cheese, for example, by shoving it down your throat. Or I can cause you to eat it by telling you (falsely) that it’s actually a perfectly inoffensive piece of Gouda. I can cause you to eat it by offering you $20 to do so. Or I can cause you to eat it simply by handing it to you, knowing that for some reason you enjoy the taste of blue cheese.

Carefully distinguishing between the different senses of “cause” that might be at play isn’t just a tedious game enjoyed by analytic philosophers. It’s absolutely central to under­stand­ing whether the causing at issue violates free will or leads to heretical views about God or man. If the universalist claims that God causes human beings to love him by deceiving or coercing them, then we have a problem. If he causes human beings to love him simply by being what he is, i.e., the Good and thus the ultimate object of their deepest longings, then we don’t.  

Or so it seems. I can’t see how any orthodox Christian could deny the claim that God is the Good and the ultimate object of our deepest longings. So the problem Fr. Rooney has must be about how exactly it is that God’s being the Good and our natural longing for the good combine to cause our loving of him. Thus, the crux of the issue is his (2), or something like it. The real problem is not with divine freedom, but human freedom.  No universalist thinks God causes us to love him by coercion or manipulation or deception. Rather, God causes us to love him just by being God. God doesn’t change as we come to love him.  We do. So the primary question is: What is the nature of that change, and can we understand it in a way that doesn’t undermine human freedom?

This is important to point out because much of the discussion following Fr. Rooney’s article has instead focused on the first claim, and has been aimed at alternatively accusing or excusing Hart for his allegedly heretical views on “the necessity” of creation. Hart himself has said that his views on this question are irrelevant to his arguments for universalism, so I can only conclude that the furor has more to do with many Christians’ penchant for heresy hunting than much else.

I’m not going to say much about this ongoing debate; in part because it is beyond my ken, and in part because it seems, as I’ve said, mostly irrelevant to the main debate about universalism. Still, I think the discussion so far illuminates what seems to me the main problem with Fr. Rooney’s side in the debate: a surprising lack of attention to the different ways words can be used. Fr. Rooney has amassed quite a few conciliar statements and patristic quotations insisting that God does not create necessarily. Hart has denied that he uses this word to describe God’s creative activity. But even if he had, that would only be a problem if it could be shown that the sense in which he might think creation is “necessary” is the same as the sense in which earlier authorities insisted it is not. For those of a libertarian bent (and I confess to having some inclinations that way myself), it is very easy to read all claims about lack of necessity, choice, decision, freedom, as if those very terms implied by their use a commitment to a libertarian conception of free will or ability to do otherwise. But, of course, they don’t.

Returning, then, to what I take to be the main issue, I suggest we start by restating the two possible claims upon which Fr. Rooney suspects universalism depends. The first strikes me as too vague, for reasons already discussed. The second also seems too vague.  On the face of it, it is obviously false, since we have all of us been led astray, and it is simply a matter of experience that not everyone loves God. Still, I think he is right that the fundamental support for universalism lies in two claims, one about God, and one about man. Here are those two claims as I would put them:

1. God is Goodness/Truth/Beauty.

2. Rational nature just is a teleological orientation towards goodness, truth, and beauty (and, thus, ultimate fulfillment in God).

The first is simply part of the traditional Christian view of God. The second is also over­whelmingly accepted in the tradition. In the case of action, it implies the claim that anything we do, insofar as it is to be seen as an intentional action—as something we do rather than something that merely happens to us, as something we can be held morally responsible for—must be done for a reason, i.e., in the light of some end which at least seems to us to be good.

Note that these two claims on their own do not get us to universalism, though. Even if we all pursue some good in all our actions, that doesn’t mean that we pursue the Good. Even worse, we are all ignorant, ambivalent, confused, and self-deceived in all sorts of ways about our actions and their aims. Sometimes we pursue lesser goods at the expense of higher goods. Sometimes we pursue ends that are only apparently good. Just because we are teleologically directed towards something doesn’t mean we will obtain it. Teleologically speaking, an acorn is meant to become an oak. But that doesn’t mean that it will. It might be eaten by a squirrel.

This means that if we are to get to universalism, we need to add in more premises. I suggest two more will get us to our conclusion:

3. God wills for all human beings that they reach the fulfillment of their nature in union with him.

4. This willing can be made effective in a way that doesn’t undermine freely chosen human acceptance of this union.

5. Therefore, God will bring about the free union of all human beings with himself.

Claim three seems to follow from any morally sane understanding of what it means for God to be a good and loving creator, and is something for which, at any rate, we have good scriptural evidence (see, e.g., Ezekiel 33:11 and 1 Timothy 2:4). The conclusion, claim five, follows from (3) and (4), so long as we suppose God’s will is always brought about unless it is impossible in the circumstances or would conflict with some greater good willed.

So the key premise is really (4). It is this that most critics of universalism are really worried about. Is it true? I’m going to argue that it is. But first, we need to know a bit more about what human freedom consists in. This is no easy thing to settle and is a central area of disagreement between Hart and Fr. Rooney.  Hart upholds a conception of freedom as the ability to unimpededly know and do the good, in accordance with one’s nature. On this approach, the highest freedom involves a real inability to do otherwise:

To see the good and know it truly is to desire it insatiably and to obey it unconditionally, while not to desire it is not to have known it truly.
(That All Shall Be Saved, 79-80)  

Fr. Rooney, on the other hand, seems to defend a libertarian conception of freedom in which an inability to do otherwise than one does in the circumstances is nearly the definition of lack of freedom.

On the one hand, I don’t think a Christian can really be a full-blown incompatibilist of this sort (and I’m not sure Fr. Rooney is, though it is hard to tell from the article). For we know that God is perfectly free and yet unable to do evil, and that perfected human beings will be unable to sin. It would be very odd, if not incoherent, given the supposed value and impor­tance of freedom, if the more perfect something is, the less freedom it has. We see this even in our imperfect state. As I said above, our imperfection means that even if we always pursue some apparent good, we may not always do what is actually good or what is best. Still, our rational nature means that there are some things we cannot freely do. You could not freely decide right now to stick a needle into your eye, or the eye of a child or loved one, for absolutely no reason. Yet that lack of ability does not in any way hinder or reduce your freedom. Rather, having that ability would likely show that you don’t count as the sort of rational agent to whom we can ascribe the relevant sort of freedom at all.

On the other hand, we often do seem to have the ability to do otherwise than we do, and this seems an important and valuable fact. After all, it seems to secure the possibility for moral responsibility and the ability to significantly form ourselves in different ways on the basis of our choices. 

We needn’t necessarily choose between these two conceptions of freedom. We can see them as two types of freedom, a lower and a higher. As the inability to refuse the known good represents the perfection of our nature, surely it is the higher type of freedom, and the other is valuable insofar as, lacking the higher freedom, we can through our choices attain to it. This seems more or less the approach of St. Augustine:

Neither are we to suppose that because sin shall have no power to delight [perfected humans], free will must be withdrawn.  It will, on the contrary, be all the more truly free, because set free from delight in sinning to take unfailing delight in not sinning.  For the first freedom of will which man received when he was created upright consisted in an ability not to sin, but also in an ability to sin; whereas this last freedom of will shall be superior, inasmuch as it shall not be able to sin. (City of God 22.30.3.)

With that in mind, let me proceed to my argument. It takes the form of a double dilemma:

1. For those in hell, it is either possible for them to repent and move toward union with God, or not.

2. If it is not, they are either not in hell freely, or no longer count as persons.

3. If it is, then it must be possible for God to bring it about that they move toward union with him.  

4. God can bring this movement about in a way that either violates their free will or doesn’t.

5. If he does it without in any way violating their free will, there is no problem, and as a loving God, he would do so.

6. But even if he does violate their free will initially to bring about their movement towards him, this need not undermine their free acceptance of union with him, so he would do so.

7. Thus, either one must deny that those in hell are there freely, or accept that God will bring all into freely accepted union with him.

The first premise is a logical truth, so let’s move to the second.  Why think that those in hell must be able to repent and move toward the good? Well, if they can’t, then they surely lack alternative possibilities–the ability to do otherwise–which is the hallmark of libertarian accounts of freedom. So they aren’t free in that sense. 

But, one might object, they are there as a result of their previous free choices, so they still have a type of “derivative freedom.” The problem with this claim has to do with the way that it goes against the fundamental nature of what it is to be a rational creature, i.e., a person. To be a person, remember, just is to have a teleological orientation towards goodness and truth. This orientation can fail to manifest properly through confusion, stubbornness, self-deception, and the like. But it must always be there. Any creature that is free in even a minimal sense must pursue at least an apparent good. But if those in hell are there because they are following an apparent good, then it must always be possible for them to come to learn that the good they are pursuing is not actually good, or that they are pursuing it in a wrong way. If they are totally immune in every way to being turned towards truth and goodness, then they could not genuinely think or act at all. They would be non-persons. This would result in a type of annihilationism, not the traditional view of hell.

So let’s say it’s at least possible that those in hell can move towards union with God, i.e., out of their self-imposed hell. Then it seems to follow that God could bring this about somehow or other. After all, omnipotence means being able to do anything it is possible to do. And there are reasons to think that his doing so need not in any case undermine free human acceptance of this union.

For example, it seems that he could do so by some sort of revelation or experience, so far as possible for us, of either his absolute goodness, or of the absolute badness of hell, or both.  William Lane Craig has said that even such a revelation would not have an effect, and thinking that it would simply shows that we don’t understand how deeply those in hell hate God. On the contrary, I think this sort of reply shows that we simply don’t understand the perfect goodness of God or the terrible badness of hell. Think back to the person who is literally unable to freely decide to stick a needle in his or his child’s eye “just because.”Surely, as awful and incomprehensible as doing such a thing would be, providing no reason that could motivate any sane person to act, choosing hell after seeing what it truly is and rejecting God after seeing who he truly is could furnish even less reason. The person who could make such a choice is either totally unable to see the truth or totally unable to be motivated by goodness. In either case, as I’ve said, he should then fail to be a person at all.

Ah, but then wouldn’t such a revelation undermine his free will? On the one hand, it’s hard to see why it would. After all, a Christian must believe that deep down everyone is made for union for God, that in it consists their greatest happiness.  Even if a person doesn’t realize this, and even if their blindness to the truth is a result of their own doing, how could revealing the truth about their own greatest happiness be a limitation of their freedom? It secures for them the possibility of obtaining what they’ve really been searching for all along. Isn’t that an increase in freedom?

But suppose, on the other hand, that such a revelation would itself constitute a violation of the person’s free will. Would that be so bad? It surely isn’t true that God is somehow obligated never to tamper with or violate human freedom. He is said in Scripture and tradition to have done so in all sorts of ways. (Didn’t he interfere with St Paul’s freedom to persecute the Christians in Damascus by striking him blind?) What is true, and what seems required by orthodox tradition, is that God wants our union with him to be freely accept­ed. But even if the revelation of the truth about God, ourselves, and our situation were itself to constitute a violation of our freedom (as it did at least to some degree for St. Paul), it doesn’t follow that what we did after and in the light of that revelation would be unfree.  Union with God, after all, is not something that happens all at once simply through a glimpse of the truth or a first turn in the right direction.

A little story by way of analogy may help, even if it is a bit silly and forced. Suppose there were someone whose entire happiness depended in the end on their finding some object.  Finding it was their life’s purpose, and failure to find it would mean unimaginable suffering. And suppose the main way they would be able to recognize such an object would be by color. Suppose, though, that through their own negligence and a life spent poorly, something were to happen to their color vision, such that even if they were to have the object right in front of them, they would be unable to recognize it. Suppose you love this person deeply—suppose it were your child. You know deep down they want to find the object, but their quest is about to fail, leading to an eternity of suffering. Now suppose you were able to do something to fix their vision. It might be temporarily painful for them, but thereafter they would see the object for what it is and gladly take hold of it and their eternal happiness. You are able and willing to do this, but they do not believe their vision is flawed. You know that if you do not, they will be consigned to certain misery.

Would you be obligated in such a case, knowing the stakes, to respect this resistance and simply let them live in agony for the rest of their life? Could a loving father or mother do such a thing? If you were to decide as a last resort to do it anyway, would you have done some unforgivable wrong and made their finding of the object meaningless and their happiness empty? I think not. Rather, you would have done them the greatest possible benefit. They would finally see clearly the object that they had been searching for all along, they would take it gladly and freely, repent of their obstinacy, and you would joyfully share in their happiness.

The story is perhaps too on the nose not to see its connection to the issue at hand. The biggest difference, I suppose, is that the protagonist in the story is supposed to know from the beginning the object of his quest. But failure to know that is just one more bit of ignorance to be overcome, for we are all on a quest anyhow. The Christian believes that union with God is the life purpose of every human being, the thing each of us is really seeking in every pursuit of every apparent good. One who sees and knows what this truly means could not fail to pursue such an end. And pursuing with open eyes this Goodness that is the perfection of our own nature is necessarily the highest possible freedom.

* * *

Jeremiah Carey has a PhD in philosophy from U.C. Berkeley, and taught for three years at Siena College. He has had articles published in the European Journal of Philosophy, the British Journal for the History of Philosophy, and the International Journal for Philosophy of Religion. He is currently working on a book which is a theological and philosophical defense of Christian vegetarianism.