Heaven

[Discordant Resonance]

As St Paul exhorted, the minds of the faithful should concern matters spiritual, rather than temporal, yet if the heavenly reward for earthly sacrifice is solely the eternal praising and glorifying of the Supreme Deity, does the end justify the means, even when Purgatory is merely Hell with the prospect of redemption? Of course, one of the carrots is reunion with deceased family members, but if some of them are denied eternity due to their sexuality or religion, is this due to personal choice, as Catholicism would claim, or predestination, as Protestantism would aver?

[Nefertiti2]

yes.

or possibly

no

[ursus arctos]

No one can do these like DR

Not that anyone would want to, of course

[Plodder]

I met a girl at a party in New York one night whose name was Heaven. Or so she said.

[S. aureus]

They say in heaven, love comes first.

[Rogin the Armchair fan]

Is everyone in heaven who you remember them to be, or who they'd want to be? I mean I'd love to see my Nan again, but to be honest when she died aged 94 she was suffering horribly from dementia and thought I was her son Brian. I'm sure in her heaven she'd be a giddy, skipping 21 year old again, before WW2 had even taken away what should have been her happiest years. Similarly with children who die young, are you going to be reunited with the happy toddler you tragically lost aged 3, or find out he grew up and turned into Laurence Fox? I really don't think the bible-clutchers have thought this through.

[Benjm]

Decent live venue, although the bar set up is a bit shit. A big plus is that shows always finish by 10pm so they can turn the venue around for the club nights, allowing concert goers to grab a debrief drink or two elsewhere.

[elguapo4]

When I started school there was heaven, hell, purgatory and limbo. Even as a young kid I thought that the latter was unfair. To the uninitiated, limbo was where babies went who died without being baptised, so while they did not sin, so couldn't go to hell or purgatory, they had the original sin of Adam and Eve on their souls so couldn't get to heaven. So limbo was where they were basically dumped forever, theologically speaking. You may laugh and roll your eyes at this absurdity, but it was taken deadly seriously. When my brother was born very sickly, the first thing the nurses did was ask my mother what his name was,before he was whisked away for an emergency baptism. Therefore, while his name was Peter Anthony, he was accidentally christened Anthony Peter. Limbo was abolished as a concept sometimes in the last 40 years.

[pebblethefish]

I've long imagined it as a sort of celestial Davina McCall, interviewing the latest contestant to be voted out of the Big Brother Earth. When she gets to say "Let's have a look at some of your Best Bits!" I already have a list of the top ten goals I've scored, my top ten cricket shots I'd like to see again, and the top ten girls I've dated.

Anything else would be a disappointment.

[Rogin the Armchair fan]

I've long imagined it as a sort of celestial Davina McCall, interviewing the latest contestant to be voted out of the Big Brother Earth. When she gets to say "Let's have a look at some of your Best Bits!" I already have a list of the top ten goals I've scored, my top ten cricket shots I'd like to see again, and the top ten girls I've dated.

Anything else would be a disappointment.

If I even met Davina McCall I'd know I was already in the other place.

[WOM]

Is everyone in heaven who you remember them to be, or who they'd want to be?.

I think the science suggests a multiverse sort of deal. Your nan gets her ideal heaven / age setup, and just a space-micron away you get yours, with your ideal-age nan making you scones. I’m not sure if you get to be multi-age, so that one day you get to see your kids again or your nan gets to meet the great granddaughters she never knew she had. But I’m sure someone has a good answer.

Or it’s all pre-enlightenment bumph to keep the faithful compliant and pacified. I’ve no opinion…

[delicatemoth]

Everyone is trying to get to the bar
The name of the bar, the bar is called Heaven
The band in Heaven, they play my favorite song
They play it once again, they play it all night long

Heaven (Heaven) is a place
A place where nothing
Nothing ever happens
Heaven (Heaven)
Heaven is a place
A place where nothing
Nothing ever happens

There is a party, everyone is there
Everyone will leave at exactly the same time
It's hard to imagine that nothing at all
Could be so exciting, could be so much fun

Yeah, Heaven
Heaven is a place
A place where nothing
Nothing ever happens
Yeah, Heaven
Heaven is a place
A place where nothing
Nothing ever happens

When this kiss is over, it will start again
It will not be any different, it will be exactly the same
It's hard to imagine that nothing at all
Could be so exciting, could be this much fun

Heaven (Heaven) is a place
A place where nothing
Nothing ever happens
Heaven
Heaven is a place
A place where nothing
Nothing ever happens

[ad hoc]

Presumably anyone who actually believes this stuff thinks that once we are enheavened we shed our earthly forms and get plunged into some kind of soul soup with all the other ingredients. The whole hanging around on clouds with wings on bit was always, I assumed, made up by priests in order to make heaven sound a bit more appealing to the average mild sinner.

I may need to consult Hot Pepsi to see if I've been barking up the wrong tree

[Rogin the Armchair fan]

I think the science suggests

The what where, now?

[Amor de Cosmos]

I played the Archangel Raphael in a school play once. If the gig's still available when I join the choir invisible I could be persuaded.

[The Awesome Berbaslug!!!]

I think a major component in the "pie in the sky when you die" (so do what we say and give generously) scam is that you allow everyone to choose their flavour of pie. Though the Catholic version of there being no pie in the sky unless you tell us your darkest secrets is a bit l ron hubbardish I've always thought

[Slightly Brown]

I really hope there isn’t a heaven. I can barely put up with myself as is. Infinite time? Man. That’s too much. Plus, I’d have to watch Jimmy Hendrix hitting on my wife and slagging off my demo tape.

[Plodder]

Is your demo tape going to Heaven?

[Nefertiti2]

When I started school there was heaven, hell, purgatory and limbo. Even as a young kid I thought that the latter was unfair. To the uninitiated, limbo was where babies went who died without being baptised, so while they did not sin, so couldn't go to hell or purgatory, they had the original sin of Adam and Eve on their souls so couldn't get to heaven. So limbo was where they were basically dumped forever, theologically speaking. You may laugh and roll your eyes at this absurdity, but it was taken deadly seriously. When my brother was born very sickly, the first thing the nurses did was ask my mother what his name was,before he was whisked away for an emergency baptism. Therefore, while his name was Peter Anthony, he was accidentally christened Anthony Peter. Limbo was abolished as a concept sometimes in the last 40 years.

Not religious but was always attracted to the
doctrine of The Harrowing of Hell in which Jesus went down to Hell on his own devices whilst himself in limbo between crucifixion and resurrection and freed everyone

[ursus arctos]

Same here

In part due to this Fra Angelico in The Covent of San Marco in Firenze

[scratchmonkey]

My horribly scattered thoughts, that I have probably too often:

If there is some actual "heaven" which is to say, some extension of consciousness beyond our earthly form, I don't think it would exist in any form that's comprehensible to us. More likely that we would be returned to some kind of collective consciousness, we would no longer be "us", let alone Uncle Phil, let alone harps.

I have read some neurologists hypothesize that as the brain dies, that the perception of time slows down, and that brain death then turns into a stretching to infinity of some combinations of memories and dreams, which would mean that there is some kind of eternal afterlife; only it consists entirely of our earthly experiences, that we would essentially be trapped in the back corridors of our brains forever, which I can imagine would be hell to many and heaven to some.

[Patrick Thistle]

There's plenty of descriptions of heaven in the book of Revelations. It sounds totes boring.

[Patrick Thistle]

On the abolition of Limbo, my friend from Derry was very upset when that got abolished and asked the nuns who taught in her school where all the babies were now. Because she'd been told dead babies went to Limbo. And now there was no Limbo. She was genuinely concerned about the dead babies but her question was treated as gross insubordination and she was thrown out of class and made to stand in the corridor all day.

Needless to say she was done with Catholicism not long after that.

[hobbes]

have read some neurologists hypothesize that as the brain dies, that the perception of time slows down, and that brain death then turns into a stretching to infinity of some combinations of memories and dreams, which would mean that there is some kind of eternal afterlife; only it consists entirely of our earthly experiences,

Were any of these neurologists called Belinda, by any chance?

[Jah Womble]

Maybe I’m wrong, but I have sod-all recollection or indeed consciousness of anything that happened before I was born, so I’m rather anticipatIng a similar outcome at this end. Like I said, maybe I’m wrong.

If there is a heaven - and I somehow get in - then I hope it has better (and better-stocked) bars than any of the dives around these parts.

If, on the other hand, it’s the other place - then I know it will.