Heaven and Hell

Today I'm thinking on the concepts of heaven and hell. I have been doing some research on these alleged places and I have also been combining that with what I had been taught about these places, growing up. I have to be honest, the more I learn about heaven and hell and the more I think about these places as if they do exist, the more ridiculous they seem.

First off, let me bring up the fact that not all religions believe in heaven or hell and even those that do, CANNOT agree on how this all works. However, we are supposed to have faith and believe that some version of this is correct. Of course there is always that chance we assumed the wrong version was correct which would, by all accounts, keep us out of heaven just for that. 

I grew up a Christian so I am going to speak to THAT version of heaven and hell because it is the only one I know much about. There are a lot of different ideas within Christianity when it comes to the idea of heaven and how/when you get there. Some denominations will tell you that as soon as you die, your spirit goes to heaven (or hell) to dwell with him forever (or be tortured for all eternity). Then there are the denominations that teach that nobody goes to heaven until Jesus returns. THAT'S when everybody joins him and sky daddy in heaven. Actually, I think if you read the Bible very closely, the latter is what you would find when concerning heaven.  

The same can be illustrated about hell. Some will tell you that if you don't repent before you die and accept Jesus as your lord and savior, your spirit will go straight to hell where you will be tortured for all of eternity. Others think this happens after Jesus returns and judgement day. If you read the parts of the Bible that talk about hell and/or the lake of fire it doesn't sound like a place where people have to hang out forever. It seems to suggest that while everyone who made the cut gets to enjoy eternal life, your spiritual life stops when you are destroyed forever in the lake of fire. Meaning, you would just cease to exist. And, I am also not quite sure how a spirit outside of a physical body could experience pain and torture? You need a brain and a body for that, wouldn't you? And if God made hell as a place for Satan and all his people, how is Satan still able to be on earth causing problems? So many things that contradict other things. But, I digress...   

But if heaven and hell are real places, I think everlasting life in a place where everything and everyone is perfect in a utopian paradise sounds boring as fuck. Think of the people that would be in heaven. A bunch of squares. A bunch of squares doing what, exactly? Nothing fun, that's for sure. Think about hell. I mean, so being tortured wouldn't be fun. But at least you would be in good company. I would think that you would get used to the torture after a while. But, think of the fun people you would be able to talk to. It would be one big gay party, so you KNOW that would be fun. No rules. No goody two shoes religious types. Maybe just a false prophet or so, but they'd be fun to mess with too! 

Heaven and hell are just myths like Valhalla and Hel or Paradise and Hell, or Mount Olympus and Hades. They are all made up places. If there is an after life at all, I would think that the more likely manifestation would be reincarnation, where a consciousness gets recycled. That seems at least somewhat more plausible than the other fairy tale endings. Personally, I'll take "ceases to exist" over some tyrannical God's heaven. That place sounds lame as fuck.  

The truth is, there is absolutely zero evidence that a heaven and hell exist. None. Any anecdotal evidence provided of near death experiences can be explained away by what happens when a brain is deprived of oxygen. I am not stating that I know for a fact, nothing happens when you die. At this point, evidence seems to suggest that nothing happens when you die. We have no way of investigating it. It just seems like the idea of nothing happening is far easier to accept than the fantastic afterlife we've been sold. I understand that the idea of heaven brings people comfort when facing their death or the idea of never seeing a loved one again. It brings them comfort to think about there being more. And if there isn't more (there likely isn't) they won't be hurt to find out that heaven isn't real. They won't feel anything. They'll be dead. So, allowing them that comfort is not harmful. It's helpful. What IS harmful is when these same people use hell to condemn people and to make them afraid of dying, thinking they are going to suffer for eternity for not measuring up. Now THAT'S gross. These people speak and act with such certainty as they condemn others to eternal damnation. An eternal existence that they have ZERO proof exists.