which these days tends to be the question of whether a free, rational agent, in order to be truly free, or truly capable of a relation of love with God, must have the power justly to condemn himself or herself to everlasting dereliction, and whether then God will allow him or her to do so out of regard for the high dignity of this absolutely indispensable autonomy.
We very rarely condemn ourselves. That is where the term self righteous comes from and if we are honest we are all self righteous out of a self interest at survival. To condemn ourselves is to admit that we are deserving of hell. If we are deserving of hell then we do not need to condemn ourselves and our condemnation isn’t the mechanism but rather the realization of our predicament. Where we really get into trouble is in our condemnation of others. Here we can both recognize that another is deserving of condemnation and simultaneously ignore our own justly deserved condemnation. We demand justice for the injustices committed against us while ignoring the justice required for the injustices we have committed.
