Monday, October 27, 2003

Guardian Unlimited | Special reports | This is our heaven - or hell

Guardian Unlimited | Special reports | This is our heaven - or hell: "The Bishop of Durham has recently suggested that a belief in heaven or hell is not a core tenet of Christianity. This will be shocking news to those who imagine that the chief function of religion is to give us intimations of immortality. Human beings are the only animals who have to live with the knowledge of their inevitable demise. We are also meaning-seeking creatures, and as soon as we fell out of the trees and became recognisably human, we created religions at the same time as we began to produce works of art, in order to convince ourselves that, despite the crushing burden of our mortality, our lives had intrinsic meaning and value. What could be more consoling than the knowledge that death is not the end, and that we will enjoy a richer and fuller existence in the hereafter?

Yet, surprisingly perhaps, the panacea of eternal life has not been a feature of the religious quest, which has generally focused on living more intensely and humanely here on earth"

Some God reading for ya. And I agree, this place is the shiznit, not some other.

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