Whatever happened to hell?

The following are some of the cults listed by John Ankerberg and John Weldon in Facts on Life after Death. Listed also is each group's divisive opinion about both heaven and hell along with its founder's quotations.

1. Christian Science, founded by spiritist Mary Baker Eddy, teaches that "there is no death." They believe that "heaven and hell are states of thought, not places. People experience their own heaven or hell right here on earth."

2. Edgar Cayce, a spiritist and New Age prophet, said that "the destiny of the soul, as of all creation, is to become One with the Creator" and that no soul is ever lost.

3. New Age cult leader Sun Myung Moon of The Unification Church believes that "God will not desert any person eternally. By some means...they will be restored."

4. Mormonism, founded by occultist Joseph Smith, argues, "The false doctrine that the punishment to be visited upon erring souls is endless...is but a dogma of unauthorized and erring sectaries, at once unscriptural, unreasonable, and revolting."

5. Jehovah's Witnesses, founded by Charles Taze Russell maintains that the wicked are forever annihilated because "the teaching about a fiery hell can rightly be designated as a &ls;teaching of demons.'"

6. The Church of the New Jerusalem (Swedenborgianism), founded by spiritist Emanuel Swedenborgh, emphasizes that God "does not condemn anyone to hell."

7. Eckankar, a New Age religion founded by Paul Twitchell and Darwin Gross, insists that "there is no death"...and that there is no eternal hell.

8. Lucis Trust and the Arcane School/Full Moon Meditation Groups, established by New Age spiritist Alice Bailey, argue that "the fear of death is based upon...old erroneous teaching as to heaven and hell."

9. The Love Family (The Children of God), founded by spiritist David Berg, views hell as a temporal purgatory: "The lake of fire is where the wicked go to get purged from their sins...to let them eventually come...out."

10. Rosicrucianism, an occult philosophy, declares that "the &ls;eternal damnation' of those who are not &ls;saved' does not mean destruction nor endless torture," and that "the Christian religion did not originally contain any dogmas about Hell."

11. Unitarian Universalism confesses the following: "It seems safe to say that no Unitarian Universalist believes in a resurrection of the body, a literal heaven or hell, or any kind of eternal punishment."

12. The Theosophical Society, founded by medium Helena P. Blavatsky, declares, "we positively refuse to accept the...belief in eternal reward or eternal punishment." Hence, "Death...is not...a cause for fear."

13. The spirits everywhere proclaim their allegiance to cultic teachings, declare Ankerberg and Weldon. "Ramtha," the spirit speaking through medium J. S. Knight, claims "God has never judged you or anyone" and "No, there is no hell and there is no devil." "Lilly" and other spirits channeled through medium Ruth Montgomery argue that there is no such thing as death" and that "God punishes no man."