The Road To Hell Is Paved With Good Intentions
From the YouTube Platform…
Great video. It’s a hard concept to grasp sometimes. I’m not sure if I agree that all of these people have good intentions, but I get his point. There are some people who want chaos and destruction because they are evil, but I get his point.
Editor writes…
I suppose a very charitable soul could argue that the Fathers at the Second Vatican Council, had good intentions? Pope John Paul II when he organised the first Assisi event? Pope Benedict, with Summorum Pontificum, reinstating the importance of the Traditional Latin Mass (TLM) and even Pope Francis’s attempts to curtail the TLM via Traditionis Custodes?
Your thoughts…
Comments (11)
That’s a really great video. I suppose it’s true, according to the lights of individuals, that their intentions are good, and that they’ve not thought about the danger of unintended consequences. So, when Pope John XXIII decided to have a Council to let fresh air into the Church, or whatever it was he said like that, he would have had no idea of the way the modernists could (and did) take advantage of it to wreak havoc in the liturgy and later on, the moral law.
Same with the other examples, Pope John Paul II maybe thought he was helping to bring non-Catholics, including non-Christians closer to Jesus when he organised the ecumenical and inter-faith event at Assisi, whereas what actually happened was that indifference set in the Catholics got the message that one religion was as good as another.
It’s also obvious that Pope Francis thinks allowing the TLM to continue is dividing the Church, whereas it is him and his modernist and pagan ideas that is dividing us.
I’m unwilling to say that any of these prelates deliberately set us on the road to Hell with their good intentions but I think the result is the same. The law of unintended consequences has brought chaos into the Church and it won’t change until Russia has been consecrated to the Immaculate Heart of Mary, as she asked at Fatima. The good news about that is that I think most people now realise that the March consecration was not “as requested” – with the exception of Bishop Schneider who still thinks that was the one, as far as I know, which is a pity. I would have thought he’d have realised that Ukraine/Russia was not what Our Lady asked for. Again, though, we have to assume his good intentions. As Dennis Prager says, though, good intentions are not enough. Wisdom is paramount and I’d have thought Bishop Schneider has enough wisdom to see through the Ukraine/Russia consecration ceremony.
I meant to mention Summorum Pontificum – I do believe Pope Benedict had good intentions when releasing the old Mass but he lacked wisdom, too, because he did not make it a watertight document.
What this has made me think more about is, are good intentions enough to help those popes (and us all ) at judgment. People do keep saying, well, you meant well, if we do something that turns out to be wrong, even seriously wrong, so are good intentions enough to keep us out of Hell, or is the saying about the road to Hell being paved with good intentions a literally true warning? I sincerely hope not, LOL!
Michaela,
I agree that is a great Prager video but I don’t think the people you name can get off scot-free by saying they had good intentions. A kid might have the intention of doing his homework and then forget about it, but the outcome is the same, he damages his intellect and future life chances. The damage the popes of the past 60 years have done has caused souls to leave the Church and perhaps lose their souls, so their good intentions are irrelevant, IMHO.
Margaret Mary,
Exactly right – having twisted good intentions is no excuse for the evil that came into the Church 60 years ago. Introducing changes, e.g. to the Mass, that were intended to please Protestants, cannot be excused on the grounds that those responsible had “good intentions”.
A friend of mine recently defended ecumenical meetings by saying their intention was to bring us all closer together as Christians. I didn’t think of saying when did you ever hear of an ecumenical meeting that began with a Hail Mary?
It is very true that their good intentions don’t matter one bit – here’s a report about the latest Scottish scandal, a Glasgow priest up in court for sexual abuse of children. Is this one of the unintended consequences of lowering the standards in seminaries, e.g. accepting men into the priesthood who are unsuitable and even banned from being accepted into seminaries? Those responsible, as well as Fr McGarrity, will be punished for their part in the damage done to the priesthood out of Vatican II. https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-glasgow-west-62421306
I think there have been a lot of useful idiots in the hierarchy, since Vatican II, with good intentions, but the creators of the revolution’s agenda certainly did not have good intentions, being declared enemies of the Church through their Masonic affiliation.
I have to wonder, as an aside, what Judas’ intentions were….
RCA Victor,
I agree with Bernie – that’s a great question, what were Judas’s intentions. In the Gospels, greed seems to have been the reason, although he was given just 30 pieces of silver which I read once was the price paid for a slave at that time. How sad is that. But other writers have said Judas was disappointed that Jesus was not going to fight politically against the Romans, so maybe he was ambitious for a place in politics/government?
Whatever his intentions were, he committed the greatest betrayal in history and that is what he is remembered for.
Archbishop Fulton Sheen’s conference on Judas is worth pondering. The article – with video of his talk embedded – is found here…
RCA Victor,
What a great point about Judas’ intentions! It can’t just have been to make a few coins, as he threw them away soon after his betrayal. We’ll never know.
I was thinking about this idea of good intentions and the law of unintended consequences when I saw this report about the possibly future Pope (Tagle) addressing an Anglican conference at which he doesn’t seem to have mentioned the Faith at all.
https://www.churchtimes.co.uk/articles/2022/12-august/news/world/lambeth-2022-the-way-ahead-guided-by-scripture
Good intentions, the likes of Archbishop Bugnini who set out to change the Mass to make it pleasing to Protestants? I don’t think so.
There is some truth in the “good intentions pave the road to Hell” saying because sometimes people use good intentions as an excuse to do the wrong thing. Even if Bugnini thought it would have a good outcome to change the Mass, he is still accountable for the damage caused. If something isn’t within the authority or power of the individual, then the intentions don’t matter. If I drive through a red light with the intention of not offending someone who invited me to a dinner party by arriving late, and the result is I cause an accident and hurt other people, then my good intention is neither here nor there. The outcome matters more than the intention, I’m sure.
We live in an age when rules and laws don’t matter and all too often the excuse of good intentions is given to side-step responsibility for bad outcomes.
I always find the Prager-U videos helpful. This one is great.
Laura,
Well said! People do use the excuse of “good intentions” to justify evil-doing of one kind or another. That’s why they say that the road to Hell is pave with them – good intentions! If the objective behaviour is sinful, then all the good intentions in the world won’t keep us out of Hell. Genuine ignorance might, but not culpable ignorance or “good intentions”. We are supposed to inform our consciences, not rely on emotional “good intentions” when making religious and moral decisions that will affect our eternal salvation.