On St. Augustine’s criticism of the ‘intercessory universalist’ position

 

On St. Augustine’s criticism of the ‘intercessory universalist’ position

“In hope, the Church prays for "all men to be saved."” (for other quotes of the Catechism on ‘hell’ and ‘hope’, see: https://ancientafterlifebelifs.blogspot.com/2026/03/the-current-catholic-catechism-on-hell.html )

In the early 5^th century, St. Augustine of Hyppo (354-430) criticized certain Christians that believed on the salvation of all people due to the intercession of the saints. The main section of such a criticism is worthy to be quoted in some length (the first paragraph is actually addressed to a different kind of universalist who believed in a purgatorial hell but as he says, that paragraph can be addressed also to the ‘intercessory universalists’):

“And if this be so, how can it be believed that all men, or even some, shall be withdrawn from the endurance of punishment after some time has been spent in it? how can this be believed without enervating our faith in the eternal punishment of the devils?  For if all or some of those to whom it shall be said, “Depart from me, ye cursed, into everlasting fire, prepared for the devil and his angels,”¹⁵⁴⁴ are not to be always in that fire, then what reason is there for believing that the devil and his angels shall always be there?  Or is perhaps the sentence of God, which is to be pronounced on wicked men and angels alike, to be true in the case of the angels, false in that of men?  Plainly it will be so if the conjectures of men are to weigh more than the word of God.  But because this is absurd, they who desire to be rid of eternal punishment ought to abstain from arguing against God, and rather, while yet there is opportunity, obey the divine commands.  Then what a fond fancy is it to suppose that eternal punishment means long continued punishment, while eternal life means life without end, since Christ in the very same passage spoke of both in similar terms in one and the same sentence, “These shall go away into eternal punishment, but the righteous into life eternal!”¹⁵⁴⁵  If both destinies are “eternal,” then we must either understand both as long-continued but at last terminating, or both as endless.  For they are correlative,—on the one hand, punishment eternal, on the other hand, life eternal.  And to say in one and the same sense, life eternal shall be endless, punishment eternal shall come to an end, is the height of absurdity.  Wherefore, as the eternal life of the saints shall be endless, so too the eternal punishment of those who are doomed to it shall have no end.

…

And this reasoning is equally conclusive against those who, in their own interest, but under the guise of a greater tenderness of spirit, attempt to invalidate the words of God, and who assert that these words are true, not because men shall suffer those things which are threatened by God, but because they deserve to suffer them.  For God, they say, will yield them to the prayers of His saints, who will then the more earnestly pray for their enemies, as they shall be more perfect in holiness, and whose prayers will be the more efficacious and the more worthy of God’s ear, because now purged from all sin whatsoever.  Why, then, if in that perfected holiness their prayers be so pure and all-availing, will they not use them in behalf of the angels for whom eternal fire is prepared, that God may mitigate His sentence and alter it, and extricate them from that fire?  Or will there, perhaps, be some one hardy enough to affirm that even the holy angels will make common cause with holy men (then become the equals of God’s angels), and will intercede for the guilty, both men and angels, that mercy may spare them the punishment which truth has pronounced them to deserve?  But this has been asserted by no one sound in the faith; nor will be.  Otherwise there is no reason why the Church should not even now pray for the devil and his angels, since God her Master has ordered her to pray for her enemies.  The reason, then, which prevents the Church from now praying for the wicked angels, whom she knows to be her enemies, is the identical reason which shall prevent her, however perfected in holiness, from praying at the last judgment for those men who are to be punished in eternal fire.  At present she prays for her enemies among men, because they have yet opportunity for fruitful repentance.” (City of God, book 21, chapters 23:  https://ccel.org/ccel/schaff/npnf102/npnf102.iv.XXI.23.html and 24: https://ccel.org/ccel/schaff/npnf102/npnf102.iv.XXI.24.html)

Augustine’s argument seems to be based on the following premises:

1.       Matthew 25:41 suggests that the damned human beings and fallen angels will be condemned to the same ‘eternal fire’

2.       Matthew 25:46 with its parallelism between ‘eternal punishment’ and ‘eternal life’ excludes the possibility of an end to punishment

3.       The Church doesn’t pray for the fallen angels even if they are ‘enemies’

4.       The Church prays for human enemies because in this life there is chance of repentance

Hence, Augustine’s conclusion follows:

In the future life, the Church of the blessed will not pray on behalf of the damned because they are beyond hope. So, the prayers of the Church in the present do not imply that all human beings will be saved. And this implies that some will be lost forever.

Other than the Scriptural arguments, Augustine does indeed refer to a somewhat empirical fact: the Church doesn’t pray for the fallen angels. This has to mean something to Augustine and to Augustine, it means that the fallen angels can’t have benefit from prayers. It is a reasonable conclusion that, indeed, this implies that the fallen angels are in a state in which salvation and repentance is no more possible for them.

However, to be honest, I do think that even if we accept all premises of Augustine’s conclusion, it doesn’t necessarily follow that some human beings will be eternally lost.

Now, of course, such a conclusion is inevitable if, for instance, one is convinced that the participation in the sacramental life of the Church is a necessary condition to be saved. If this is the case, indeed, the unevangelized are doomed precisely because they never entered in the sacramental life of the Church. But even if one makes exceptions for those who were in a condition of clear ‘invincible ignorance’ (think of, say, a Chinese family in the third century BC who couldn’t have possibly heard of God of the Jews and clearly not of Jesus Christ), it seems nevertheless the case that this ‘sacramental exclusivism’ would imply that the usually Catholic observant John Smith who, say, skipped a mass to follow the football play of his nephew and died before confessing this deed, will be inevitably damned for eternity (I made the example of the Catholic Church because Augustine is quite a central figure there. But I could have chosen another particular denomination – the point is the same for all exclusivist positions, I believe.).

Nowadays, of course, few people would take at face value such a bleak conclusion. But, in order to avoid such a bleak conclusion, it is necessary to admit that the salvific grace of God isn’t limited to the visible sacraments of a particular religious tradition (something that the Catholic Church accepts, it should be noted). So, the ‘tender-hearted’ Christian might first reply to Augustine that, perhaps, the ‘visible participation’  in the sacramental life of the Church isn’t a good indicator about the ‘number of the saved (and unsaved)’. But if God’s salvific grace isn’t limited to what happens in the sacraments, it necessarily follows that anyone can be saved, irrespective of the religion they practice or even their being irreligious. And, if, indeed, the ‘Church’ prays for the human enemies because there is still hope for their ‘fruitful repentance’, it necessarily follows that such a change of heart is thought to be possible, otherwise the prayer can’t be sincere. So, the ‘tender-hearted’ Christian might reply to Augustine that it makes little sense to pray for ‘all’, including the ‘enemies’, if one is already convinced that some will be eternally lost (remember that, according to Augustine, the Church doesn’t pray for the fallen angels because they are beyond hope). So, contrary to what Augustine himself thought, the salvation of all humans is a possibility implied by the Church’s practice of praying even for the human enemies. This position, sometimes called ‘hopeful universalism’ was most famously advanced by the Catholic theologian Hans Urs Von Balthasar:  https://ancientafterlifebelifs.blogspot.com/2026/06/quotes-from-hans-von-balthasars-dare-we.html

However, I do believe that the ‘tender-hearted intercessory universalist’ might even use another card. If the Church prays that no one should be eternally lost and some will be lost, the prayers of the Church quite clearly will not come true. Now, suppose a devout member of the Catholic Church is convinced of the efficacy of the prayers of the Church. Quite clearly, if the Church prays for the ‘salvation of all’ and some will be lost, that particular prayer won’t come true. And this for them is quite a theological problem. While perhaps this isn’t a decisive argument, it nevertheless shows the problem of Augustine’s argument. He seems to have taken for granted that some (indeed, in his case, most – see chapter 12 of Book 21 of the City of God, just to make an example) will be lost. For the ‘intercessory universalist’, this is quite a problem: how can one pray for the salvation of all people, that no human being shall be lost, if he or she already knows that what is prayed for is an impossibility? This clearly implies, in my opinion, ‘hopeful universalism’: the salvation of all must be a possible outcome. But if one is completely convinced of the efficacy of prayers (at least, those that are ‘officially’ made by the Church), this might even lead to a more radical conclusion, i.e. that, indeed, none shall be eternally lost at the end.