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Tuesday, 13 June 2006 20:00 |
 | Marc Mullinax
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?®Imagine there??s no heaven, it??s easy if you try. No hell below us. Above us only sky.?∆ ?± John Lennon
?ÿ
MARS HILL ?? When I really want to bend my students?? minds, I ask, ?®If you knew for certain that there would not be a heaven or hell after you die, would that change the way you live??∆
Without hope of heaven, or threat of hell, how might our choices for life and living alter? Would there be radical change, or nothing new whatsoever? How would this world look or feel any different?
Most
faith-professions come with a ?®carrot?∆ of heaven, and a ?®stick?∆ of
hell. Remove the stick and the carrot for faith-motivation, and what is
left?
It sounds
like a hard essay question. But it??s a good one to examine
periodically. It??s a ?®spinach?∆ question: it may not taste good at
first, but we know it??s good for us. The question focuses upon the
question of why profess faith in the first place. Drop the goal; will
the journey be better or worse?
It doesn??t help that our mainline faiths do not set us up for this kind
of conversation. They do not issue invitations to dialogue on this
question. They offer us conclusions, not premises or hypotheses.
Refusals to consider life without the possibility of an afterlife may
cheapen this life. Is this pro-life?
So, in the safety of this column, join me in an illicit consideration.
Imagine that the scientists are largely correct, that life is without
design or purpose. All thought, effort and concern regarding any
afterlife is wishful thinking at worst, a compliment to an unhearing
universe at best, and potential tedium and waste of energy to those
alive.
How might
this change us? First of all, it might humanize us. Religions, when
wrongly read, interpreted and presented, can be idolized prejudices. In
the words of Pascal, ?®Men never do evil so completely and cheerfully as
when they do it from a religious conviction.?∆ So if we do not regard an
afterlife as a ?®Final Solution?∆ for enemies or ourselves, we might well
rise more to our potential as human beings.
Second, there??s something incomplete about a life dedicated to escaping
this one. There??s nothing more frustrating than speaking with someone
who is distracted, who keeps looking at a watch, or scans passersby for
potential dates. If this person is driving, it??s downright dangerous!
Likewise, a person with one eye on heaven and one eye on earth may seem
balanced, but it??s splitting the person from being fully present in
either. A person with divided loyalties makes no sense in love, armies,
or teamwork.
Third,
we??d stop being triumphalist and certain. In last week??s Planet, the
Rev. T. Threadwell??s last comment (?®I??ve read the end of the book ?± and
we??re the winners?∆) sounds good only in intramural, closed-off places
where circular reasoning reigns. One can have ?®blessed assurance,?∆ but
it certainly sounds arrogant.
Fourth,
this life is wonderful. Post-life speculations kill curiosity about
this life. Persons who lack curiosity about life, who find minimal joy
in existence, are all too willing, subconsciously, to cooperate with ?±
and attract ?± disease, accident and violence.
Life is
not something to transcend, but to transform. There is, in this life,
enough God, heaven and hell awaiting us. Our mission statement is to
assist God in making this world the kind of place where God would be
ever-born, grow up and live in. Dare we settle for bankrupting this
richness with speculative hooey about the future?
This
world is a very wonderful and strange place. The dice are always
rolling. You??ll find enough God, heaven and hell to last an infinity of
lifetimes, here and now. Get in the game; you??ll see.
?ÿ
Dr. Marc S.
Mullinax, chairman of the philosophy and religion departments at Mars
Hill College, can be reached at mmullinax-at-mhc.edu.
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