Shouldn't most religious people in theory be excited to die because then they get to experience the afterlife?
Shouldn't most religious people in theory be excited to die because then they get to experience the afterlife?
esp if you're one of the devout ones who think they've been really good
You're viewing a single thread.
Even in the back of their minds, the religious are unsure where they're going. Because nobody came back from the dead to tell anyone what to expect.
Mankind has constructed the idea of Heaven, Hell, Rainbow Bridge, Valhalla, River Styx, Hades .etc as places we all think we'll go when we die. But the truth of the matter is, is that we won't know until we do die, though we can't come back to tell anyone what's there and what to expect.
It is all as superfluous as trying to tell someone there's a being of omniscient and omnipotent design that controls the casualty of our actions.
I think heaven was a necessary evil. The point was to have a scary place with an omnipresent being that will send you there if you break the rules. For that to work, you need a good place to serve as the dangling carrot.
No, for that to work, you needed to be the only convincing, smart and devious conman that had influence on otherwise people with simple brains in ancient civilization. Ones who were too scared to even know what a sun eclipse was.
And look where we are now, it has done wonders.
You're agreeing with me, so I'm not sure why you're saying No.
The con man uses the carrot as part of the convincing. And people are just as susceptible to those strategies now as they were back then. Science is better now but the "floor" hasn't moved much, just the ceiling.
It is essential to Christianity that Jesus was raised from the dead. Without that, there is no message. Source: the Bible
"...if Christ has not been raised, your faith is futile and you are still in your sins. Then those also who have fallen asleep in Christ have perished. If in Christ we have hope in this life only, we are of all people most to be pitied."
1 Corinthians 15: 17-19