In Romans 9:19-23 (RSV Catholic Edition), we can read:
You will say to me then, “Why does he [God] still find fault? For who can resist his will?” But who are you, a man, to answer back to God? Will what is molded say to its molder, “Why have you made me thus?” Has the potter no right over the clay, to make out of the same lump one vessel for beauty and another for menial use? What if God, desiring to show his wrath and to make known his power, has endured with much patience the vessels of wrath made for destruction, in order to make known the riches of his glory for the vessels of mercy, which he has prepared beforehand for glory, even us whom he has called, not from the Jews only but also from the Gentiles?
So, maybe we have those who have chosen to turn to God, however unfaithfully or cowardly, in this mortal realm and we have those who have turned away from God. But, some who choose, do so because of their own embodied self? Some have genetically determined characteristics which incline them strongly to turn away from God? Maybe to live the life of a virtuous human animal? Maybe to live a life of vice? Some are “vessels of mercy”? Some are “vessels of wrath”?
I think the above is a tad too simple, though I threw in a few complications. Along those lines, I would propose four populations of human beings as a better start to our understanding that St Paul’s “vessels of mercy” and “vessels of wrath”:
- Those who are friends with God or trying to be, who would be happy in Heaven sharing the life of Jesus Christ and, through Him, God.
- Those who have turned away from God for reasons understandable on the part of creatures—horrible death of a child or ???.
- Those who are enemies of God, who would hate sharing the life of Jesus Christ.
- Those totally uninterested in the question of God or that of the meaning of life.
I think those four types exist. There may be some overlap of those who can move in one direction or another—that is, we mortals aren’t of one mind or one heart or one set of hands.
I may have missed one or more possibilities, but the above list of `types’ of human beings is a good starting point.
I also think the speculation of some Medieval thinkers was right:
Who will be saved? Anyone who could enjoy life in Heaven, who could enjoy sharing the life of God.
Those Medieval thinkers were so to speak, following the somewhat speculative path of St Paul in asking the question: Is Heaven really a place which could be enjoyed by all human beings? Are there some human beings, creatures of God, who are made so that they would not be able to enjoy Heaven, perhaps because they are indifferent to issues beyond those of a human animal? Are there some human beings, creatures of God, who are made so that they would not be able to enjoy Heaven, perhaps because their brains and personality characteristics aren’t proper, perhaps causing them to turn away from God’s offer of friendship?
In any case, I would strongly say we presume wrongly when we presume that God made a Heaven which the most nonreligious human animal could enjoy alongside the great saints. We also presume wrongly when we presume that God will necessarily save those who could enjoy Heaven but turned away from God in this mortal realm. We don’t know, but we now know this: genetic analyses along with more general analyses of human being tell us there are some strong constraints on our individual human beings but also, sometimes, substantial freedom for development. There is such an entity as a genetically healthy human being—apparently inclined to “collective worship of moral gods”—and there are patterns of small mutations which are correlated with autism, atheism (of a deadening of mind and heart and not an intellectually active sort), homosexuality, and other complex problems. Such problems can be overcome by becoming a member of a community which gathers for the “collective worship of moral gods,” but preferably one which gathers to worship Christ and His Father and Their Holy Spirit, to worship and to learn their ways and their thoughts.
I’ll close with the speculation that the term free will is a dangerous one, implying some agent, independent of our embodied human being, and able to override all human desires and inclinations. It’s possible to override much that is bad or bad in a certain context, but possible only with a mind—perhaps more of a communal than individual mind—shaping the will and both guiding the hands.
We need to work from the concept of an embodied creature with limited but real freedom; we need educate and train young ones and our own selves by way of stories of moral import and by the development of habits of mind and heart and hands. We need to explicitly realize we have to find much that God wishes for us in our open responses to God the Creator, that is, in our open responses to Creation. Such a path will allow us to learn God’s ways and God’s thoughts and to make them our own.
[For background on some of my claims about genetic problems, see my earlier essays: Is Modern Atheism a Result of High Loads of Genetic Mutations? and What is Man? And All That?.]