Dear Susan:

We will certainly be in prayer for your friend.

Before I answer your question directly we need to review two things that we should never do:

1) presume upon the state of soul of another person. Only God knows for sure the state of a person's soul thus we can never judge that a person is going to hell no matter how much it may look to us that the person is doomed. We cannot even say for sure that Hitler went to hell. While it may be likely that he did, only God knows.

What we can say and judge is that a person's behavior, ideas, and beliefs may place them "on the road to hell." We can say that a person is "risking their soul to hell" if they do not repent of their ways. But we can never "declare" that a person is going to hell. Only God can know that.

2) presume a person lacks invincible ignorance. Again, only God can know for sure who is and who is not lacking invincible ignorance.

Invincible Ignorance involves the innocent, from no fault of their own, ignorance of the Truth of Jesus Christ or His Church. The mere intellectual ignorance of the existence of Christ or the existence of his Church is only one type of invincible ignorance.

In another type of invincible ignorance a person may live next door to a Catholic Church in the middle of Chicago and still be genuinely invincibly ignorant of the need for the Catholic Church for salvation.

St. Thomas Aquinas teaches us that a person may remain invincibly ignorant when the truth of a matter (such as the Truth of the Catholic Church as necessary for salvation) is deducible only by a process of laborious and sometimes intricate reasoning. Those who were raised Baptist or Hindu or agnostic may have to go through such laborious and intricate reasoning to eventually find the Truth about the Catholic Church (or Christianity in general for the non-Christian). This may mitigate their culpability and place them in invincible ignorance.

The difficulty in reasoning one's way to the truth, however, does not mitigate our responsibility to search for the truth. States of ignorance from inadvertence, forgetfulness, etc., which are obviously involuntary, are not imputable. On the other hand, ignorance is termed "vincible" if it can be dispelled by the use of "moral diligence". We are all obligated to employ moral diligence as is possible given a given circumstance. This certainly does not mean all possible extraordinary effort must be employed in the pursuit of that moral diligence. Rather, the energy of our diligence must be commensurate with the importance of the issue in hand, and with the capacity of the person's ability to reason, and with the at least the same amount of determination that any sensible and prudent person would use under the circumstances.

Invincible ignorance, however, may be present for reasons other than the lack of intellectual knowledge of the existence of Christ and his Church. It may be present for reasons other than the burden of laborious and intricate reasoning required to find Christ or His Church. Invincible ignorance may be present also due to the incapacity or impairment of the person to properly apply reason in these matters. Such persons may include those with psychiatric illnesses, psychological disorders, personality disorders, mental impairment, immaturity, prejudiced socialization by family and community, etc.

It must be noted at this point that one's culpability increases, instead of decreases, if ignorance is feigned or deliberate . In addition, pride, stubbornness, indifference, and unwillingness may also increase one's culpability.

But if one is truly invincibly ignorance then they may not be held accountable if they fail to find Christ or His Church. In such instances the Church officially teachings that such persons who, "through no fault of their own, do not know the Gospel of Christ or his Church, but who nevertheless seek God with a sincere heart, and, moved by grace, try in their actions to do his will as they know it through the dictates of their conscience -- those too may achieve eternal salvation" (Lumen Gentium, Vatican II, 16).

Although your friend intellectual knows about Christ, she may still be invincibly ignorant. Her attitude as you describe it sounds like it might be rather prideful and willful, but in the end we just cannot know her heart and thus CANNOT tell her "you are going to hell." Rather, you may properly say to her, "The direction you are going is placing your soul at risk for hell and here are the reasons way!"

Now as for the question:
 Can a Good Person Go to Hell?

Yes.

If we wish to live in God's House for eternity we must do more than mere be a good person -- we must be a holy and perfect person. How can we attain holiness and perfection?

Holiness and perfection are gained by the grace of God. No amount of effort on our part will bring us to full holiness and perfection. God tells us in the Bible that the righteousness (goodness) of man is like filthy rags to God (Isa. 64:6). God tells us that we all fall short of His glory (Rom. 3:23).

God also tells us that nothing unclean can enter heaven (Rev. 21:27) and thus we must strive for holiness for without it we cannot see God (Heb. 12:14). We must be perfect as our Father is perfect (Mt. 5:48).

This state of perfection can only be attained by God's sanctifying grace (Eph. 2:8), lived out in this life in love (Jam. 2:24, 26), and any unresolved failings of this life purge in purgatory (1 Cor. 3:15).

Just being a "good person" is not enough. A son may be a "good person" but if he no longer has a relationship with his parents he may lose his inheritance. In a similar way, we may be good people but if we do not maintain a relationship with God, we may lose our heavenly inheritance.

In addition there is a difference between "human good" and "divine good." Anyone can be a "good person" in the sense of ordinary human goodness (although even that is a gift from God). It is something else to be a "good person" inspired and empowered by the Holy Spirit to love.

One can be "good" for one's own purposes -- ego, pride, personal or financial gain, prestige, to impress the neighbors, etc.

No one can be "good" in the divine sense of perfect love without God. We must be a good person for love of God, not for ego or whatever. We cannot be or do anything for the love of God if we do not have a relationship with Him. That relationship with God comes to us through the Spirit and through the Church. If we avoid Church then we avoid the Spirit too and we do not have His love within us; and thus our "goodness" is vain because it lacks the love of God.

One cannot love God without acting upon that love. We cannot love God if we do not follow His teachings. Jesus said this himself: (John 14:15)  "If you love me, you will obey what I command."

If we do not receive Baptism, if we do not obey the Church, if we do not live according to the teachings of Christ, then WE DO NOT LOVE HIM no matter how much we say we do. Jesus said so!

Thus, we cannot get to heaven without Christ and His Church. Those in invincible ignorance will be judged by God according to their heart and His mercy and "may" find eternal life. Those who do not have invincible ignorance will be judged accordingly and find themselves in heaven or hell depending on whether they die in a state of grace which is impossible if one ignores Christ, his teachings, and his Church.

As for your friend, her attitude that she "will" go to heaven "if there is one" is dangerously presumptive and dangerously flippant.

Like the Fundamentalists who believe in the unbiblical and man-made notion of "once-saved-always-saved", your friend risks her soul by presuming what she cannot presume.

Our assurance of heaven is founded in the promises of God and a trust that He will fulfill His promises WHEN we fulfill ours. We can only know that for today. We cannot know what will happen to us in the future. We could deny Christ twenty years from now, we don't know.

The Bible, on the other hand, does not teach a "once-saved-always-saved" false assurance, but a "perseverance in the faith until the end." If we persevere in the faith to our death (die in a state of grace), then we finish and win the race and are rewarded with eternal life.

Since we cannot know the future we cannot presume to be "certainly" going to heaven when we die. We can be certain that if we die in a state of grace we will go to heaven.

Your friend's flippant attitude could speak to an indifference or unwillingness to find out the truth. If this is the case, and we really cannot know if it is, then she risks losing any invincible ignorance and thus risks her soul to hell.

What I advise is to not tell her she is going to hell or any language similar, but to charitably tell the truth -- she is "risking her soul to hell" by avoiding the truth of Christ and His Church -- and explain charitable why that is the case.

Share your faith with her, but do not argue, and pray for her.

We will be in certain prayer for her.

God Bless,
Bro. Ignatius Mary