Gabe the Angel

Hi

Many discussions have gone before us about one thing or the other, but has anyone really wondered about what it is that starts someone one the road to the big prize in the sky?

I was talking to a "Born Again" and all he was saying was that how happy he was that he would go to heaven and have eternal life. Then a thought struck me, it was his narcissistic tendency that had created this fantasy world around him, not his wanting to be a good decent human being, he had done the exam, passed out, and that was it. He really thought all he had to do was be able to read the Bible backwards and then go on to eternal life in the kingdom of heaven, his cognitive dissonance from his narcissistic tendency was set in stone.

Josh Adkins

I agree that in a sense it is narcissistic in that beliefs of an afterlife are created out of self-interest and self-preservation. Theists cannot comprehend a time when they will not not exist. All of us are alive and have consciousness and it is hard to imagine a time when we will not have consciousness. Even though I believe that when we die, that's it, we just die, I too find it hard to think that some day I won't wake up again. So that's it, out of the desire to preserve the self, theists create an afterlife.

Zeda

I agree one of the hardest things to leave behind when you leave religion is the belief in eternal life. Many times people will go from the heaven and hell type faith to a reincarnation type belief system in order to hold on to the idea that they matter.

When you grow up being taught that God has a special plan for your life and that you will be reunited in the end with your loved ones in the hereafter, it is a long long road to "dust to dust" and the fact that you will cease to exsist at the point in time when your loved ones also cease to exsist or forget you. (Barring the fact that you make some kind of historical, literary or artistic contribution that keeps you alive)

jdlongmire

I actually find it quite easy to imagine non-existance...what's the big deal? You're dead, it's over, who cares?... I think it is much cooler imagining eternity and the endless possibilities...