How do you envision Heaven?

[Rhea]

According to what the bible says, and also according to what the people who believe it say (even though the two don't match up), here's how I envision heaven:

Since it's defined as no worries, and no unhappiness, and since that is not possible to achieve when interacting with another independently thinking being, I envision the Christians' heaven as being a celestial Barcalounger in an IMAX theater with unlimited channels. And all the souls do in heaven is watch and THINK they are interacting with others when in fact they are merely interacting with constructs that do what that soul _wishes_ other people would do.

Forever.


Because one person's heaven may include another person who doesn't actually have the first person in their heaven.
Take remarried widows, for example. You get to heaven and you have two husbands that you loved? Whoops! Both of them may have a heaven that includes you full time. But you have a heaven that includes both of them part time, maybe or just doesn't even include one of them. Or you get to heaven thinking "oh, I can't wait to DANCE!" but there's your late husband who always hated dancing, and you love him, but, sorry, heaven includes dancing for you. Or you get there and your heaven definitely included being reunited with your children, except 3 of them turned out to be atheists and they're burning in hell, but you can't be allowed to know that or you'd be sad.

So there's no way around it. It must be just watching channels for eternity.

 

[Ford]

My impression - from the Christians I've talked to who are really looking forward to dying - is that all those things you mentioned are superfluous. Heaven is pretty much an eternity of sitting at the feet of Jesus and saying "wow...I'm sitting here at the feet of Jesus." Basking in his love, and what not. And the soundtrack is shitty Christian rock music...forever.

 

[steve_bank]

An endless supply of Hagan Daz ice cream and never gaining weight.

Biblically heaven was up there and hell down below in a general sort of way.

Mormons have a unique view of having family and pets reunited. In the original theology blacks got in only by being attached to a white Mormon family.

 

[Tom Sawyer]

Heaven would be best if it were like a massive VR game where you can be or do anything you like. Want to spend a couple of decades as a Viking raider? There you go. Want to then go on and live a life as an NBA all-star? Done.

It would also be nice to have a multiplayer mode where you and your great-great-great-great-great grandkid can mow down hordes of Nazi zombies with plasma rifles, but you don't want to deal with trolls in Heaven and I don't know how you'd set up a multiplayer option without some of them getting in. Then again, I'm not omniscient but the guy writing the source code is, so I'll assume the problem can be dealt with.

 

[funinspace]

According to what the bible says, and also according to what the people who believe it say (even though the two don't match up), here's how I envision heaven:

Since it's defined as no worries, and no unhappiness, and since that is not possible to achieve when interacting with another independently thinking being, I envision the Christians' heaven as being a celestial Barcalounger in an IMAX theater with unlimited channels. And all the souls do in heaven is watch and THINK they are interacting with others when in fact they are merely interacting with constructs that do what that soul _wishes_ other people would do.

Forever.


Because one person's heaven may include another person who doesn't actually have the first person in their heaven.
Take remarried widows, for example. You get to heaven and you have two husbands that you loved? Whoops! Both of them may have a heaven that includes you full time. But you have a heaven that includes both of them part time, maybe or just doesn't even include one of them. Or you get to heaven thinking "oh, I can't wait to DANCE!" but there's your late husband who always hated dancing, and you love him, but, sorry, heaven includes dancing for you. Or you get there and your heaven definitely included being reunited with your children, except 3 of them turned out to be atheists and they're burning in hell, but you can't be allowed to know that or you'd be sad.

So there's no way around it. It must be just watching channels for eternity.

Yeah, an IMAX entertainment private theater is probably as good as a description as any, except for the impression that one gets to join dinner parties at God's table; like with other lobotomized souls...

What I usually explain it as people will be effectively lobotomized, as one won't care about loved ones and you won't be married...

Some of the few things on the ToDo & NotToDo list...from the very limited Bible verses available. At least you will get to eat and drink wine...
Lk 22:18 “For I say to you, I will not drink of the fruit of the vine from now on until the kingdom of God comes."
Lk 22:28-30 “You are those who have stood by Me in My trials; and just as My Father has granted Me a kingdom, I grant you that you may eat and drink at My table in My kingdom…”
Revelation 21:4 “He will wipe away every tear from their eyes, and death shall be no more, neither shall there be mourning, nor crying, nor pain anymore, for the former things have passed away.”
Mt 22:30 “For in the resurrection they neither marry nor are given in marriage, but are like angels in heaven.”

 

[Rhea]

Hunh. Reminds me of a conversation with my daughter when her brother called home. She gets on the phone and he says (as he does,) , “Hi Poop!” And I tell her, “you do not have to put up with that. He should not call you poop.” And she sez, “it’s okay mom, it’s how I know he’s not an imposter.” Sometimes the “sadness and sorrow “ gives clues as to the falsehood of the Matrix.

 

[braces_for_impact]

I find it interesting that we seem to know about hell than heaven. It could be worse, it could be Muslim heaven...endless virgins and rivers of milk and honey everywhere...ugh.

 

[Tom Sawyer]

I find it interesting that we seem to know about hell than heaven. It could be worse, it could be Muslim heaven...endless virgins and rivers of milk and honey everywhere...ugh.

Do they also have endless dry cleaners for when you fall into those rivers and get honey all over your clothes?

 

[southernhybrid]

The heaven I was taught to believe as a child sounded really boring. Think of it like the following lines from the hymn "Amazing Grace".

When we've been there ten thousand years, bright shining as the sun
We've no less days to sing God's praise that when we first begun. ( Shit. That's not even good poetry )

So, in other words, heaven is a place where the Christians sit around all day singing to their egotistical god who never gets tired of being praised. Sort of like the current US president and his sycophants, but I digress.

Now, some more contemporary Christians have added the "Rainbow Bridge" to heaven. If you're not familiar with it, this is the bridge that your pets take as they make their way into heaven. Because let's face it, for a lot of us, heaven without pets would be hell.

Some Christians think heaven is a place with golden streets and all kinds of material stuff that they couldn't get when they were on earth. That seems awful materialistic to me. But then, prosperity gospel is pretty popular these days. So maybe that's it.

Maybe if you praise god enough in this life, you get to choose whatever you want your personal heaven to be.

 

[ideologyhunter]

Aren't the politicians 'spose to address some of this when they tell us how to stem the opioid crisis? "Almost heaven, West Virginia" -- was John Denver a prophet 'er what?

 

[rousseau]

The one thing that's the weirdest to me about heaven is that..

a) People think they're going to live for eternity
b) They don't consider what 'eternity' actually means

Living forever sounds more like hell, than heaven, to me.

 

[steve_bank]

I believe hell as never ending torments and punishment came late in the RCC. Dante and one o the clerics may have influenced the image of hell.

Generally the protestant haven seems to be sitting with god and the angels.

Not much to do it seems except sitting around god for eternity. Sounds worse than hell.

The inference has to be the continued existence of YOU, feelings, thoughts and the like.

 

[Tars Tarkus]

Growing up Fundamentalist Baptist we were taught that heaven was streets of gold, mansions, jeweled crowns, an opulent lifestyle. This appealed to my father who always loved to look at huge houses in affluent areas or go to the docks to look at yachts. When I was 9 years old I asked him what we did in heaven and he said "We sing praises to the Lord!" Now, the life of luxury sounded good to me but the singing sounded too much like church which I didn't care for and told him so(in a manner that would hopefully avoid a punishment). He just told me "Don't worry, you'll like it." I didn't know what a lobotomy was then, but that's what it would have taken for me to enjoy that.

 

[bilby]

Heaven is clearly designed to appeal to unimaginative and highly conservative medieval peons.

When your greatest wish in life is to be given a chance (perhaps once a year at Christmas) to eat at the same table as your betters (although of course you will be served last, and speak only if spoken to), the descriptions of heaven, where you get to do that every day (and the new boss, Jesus, is a kindly boss who asks little and grants much) sound pretty appealing.

When you live in the modern developed world, where your place in life is not necessarily set in stone at birth based on the station of your parents, and where being patronized has come to mean being demeaned and insulted (where previously it meant being given a leg up by your social superior), suddenly it's not so great.

Modern people in the developed world told 'You can have wonderful things' will tend not to think of 'being able to serve a better boss' as such a good deal. We have gotten used to the idea that we can BE the boss. Or at least not be beholden to one.

Being the slave with the kindest master is no longer a paradise to which people aspire.

 

[bilby]

The heaven I was taught to believe as a child sounded really boring. Think of it like the following lines from the hymn "Amazing Grace".

When we've been there ten thousand years, bright shining as the sun
We've no less days to sing God's praise that when we first begun.

An all powerful being who permits the use if the word 'less' when it should be 'fewer' is not worthy of the slightest praise.

 

[phands]

If heaven existed, it would be a place with no religion, and no pious, mealy-mouthed hypocritical posturing god-masturbators. I'm glad, though, that it doesn't exist.

 

[steve_bank]

I don't.

 

[Thomas II]

According to what the bible says, and also according to what the people who believe it say (even though the two don't match up), here's how I envision heaven:

Since it's defined as no worries, and no unhappiness, and since that is not possible to achieve when interacting with another independently thinking being, I envision the Christians' heaven as being a celestial Barcalounger in an IMAX theater with unlimited channels. And all the souls do in heaven is watch and THINK they are interacting with others when in fact they are merely interacting with constructs that do what that soul _wishes_ other people would do.

Forever.


Because one person's heaven may include another person who doesn't actually have the first person in their heaven.
Take remarried widows, for example. You get to heaven and you have two husbands that you loved? Whoops! Both of them may have a heaven that includes you full time. But you have a heaven that includes both of them part time, maybe or just doesn't even include one of them. Or you get to heaven thinking "oh, I can't wait to DANCE!" but there's your late husband who always hated dancing, and you love him, but, sorry, heaven includes dancing for you. Or you get there and your heaven definitely included being reunited with your children, except 3 of them turned out to be atheists and they're burning in hell, but you can't be allowed to know that or you'd be sad.

So there's no way around it. It must be just watching channels for eternity.

 

[James Brown]

I asked a Christian what he expected heaven to be like. He was smart enough to realize that "ten thousand years of singing God's praise" probably wouldn't appeal to me and frankly it didn't appeal to him either.

Finally he laid down his trump card: "I don't know what it will be like, but I trust Him that it will be perfect."

See, that's why I don't have enough faith to be a Christian. "I don't know, but I believe it will be great."

Would you take a vacation to a destination based on that? Would you buy a house with that little assurance?

Or, even more to the point, would you buy a house in a gated retirement community with no idea what it will be like inside other than what the salesperson told you? And with other salespeople telling you the others are lying? With no user testimonies to review for yourself?

 

[Tom Sawyer]

Also, I'm unclear about whether or not my pets get into Heaven. What's the latest on that?

If they are, what about other animals? If my dog is part of a litter of eight puppies but only four get adopted and the others are put down by the animal shelter, would my dog get to meet her unadopted litter mates in Heaven? What if one of the adopted dog's owners mistakenly joins up with the Third Reformation Baptist Church of West Philadelphia instead of the Fourth Ecclesiastical Baptist Church of Eastern Pennsylvania and has his soul cast into Hell for heresy as a result - does the dog get damned for eternity with him or does it get to go to Heaven anyways even though it pooped on the carpet that one time?