A co-worker raised a thorny issue today. Assume that there is actually a heaven and that if you are good, you get to go there after you die. Assume, further, that your spouse dies first, and you thus get to be re-united with your spouse in heaven. Now that would be one hell of a joyous reunion, right? You both actually died and now you find each other up there! But not so fast . . .
What happens to widows and widowers who have remarried? If all of the relevant parties were good, we’re going to have this uncomfortable situation: Joe goes to heaven and he sees his first wife Edna asking him to join her on the cloud on the left, while Betty, his second wife, is asking him to join her on the cloud on the right. What should he do? I thought that the whole reason that you could re-married is because your first spouse was dead. But that tidy earthly situation would unravel in heaven.
It could get really complicated in heaven if there were sex in heaven, but there apparently isn’t. I once heard a Christian radio-show preacher having an extended conversation with an earnest caller about this exact topic (I wrote about this conversation in 2006–it was one of the first posts at DI). The radio-preacher assured that man that there was no such thing as sex in heaven, but don’t worry, because the joys of heaven would be “better than sex.” The caller was upset. He insisted that he wanted to have sex in heaven–even if there was also something “better than sex.”
If body-less people still have emotions and passions, I would expect considerable turmoil in heaven. Even couples who had been happily married for 50 years might have their patience tested after sitting together on the same cloud for several million years. What if she decides that she wants to go visit some other guy on some other cloud, legitimately claiming: “I know that it’s utterly perfect up here in heaven, but we’ve already discussed everything that we could possibly discuss. I know everything about you; you know everything about me. I’m tired of having that thing that’s better than sex, even though we have it 3 times per week, which is more than most couples in heaven.”
Is there marriage counseling in heaven? A heavenly divorce court? What about popcorn? Just because you don’t have a traditional human body up there, wouldn’t you still crave popcorn? Consider this case of dead Mary, who now lives in heaven:
Mary [speaking to her dead doctor, who works as a physician in heaven): “I crave popcorn”
Mary’s doctor: “You have phantom taste buds syndrome. You just think you crave popcorn. You don’t really crave it, and that’s a good thing, because popcorn would fall right through your ethereal hands. But don’t worry. We have things that are better than popcorn up here.
Assume, too, that the guy who wanted sex in heaven finally dies and makes it to heaven. After a few restless nights, though, he complains to the heaven doctor: “I’m horny.”
Heaven doctor: “No, you only think you are horny. You have phantom penis syndrome.
I’ll end with a quote by George Bernard Shaw:
Heaven: a place so inane, so dull, so useless, so miserable, that nobody has ever ventured to describe a whole day in heaven, though plenty of people have described a day at the seaside.
what if there is a heaven, and the rules to get in aren't as strict as many people think.. does one run the risk of having a heavenly conversation like this?
"Doctor, I don't believe in heaven, why am I here?"
"You only *think* you don't believe in heaven. You have phantom skeptic syndrome!"
"Heaven: a place so inane, so dull, so useless, so miserable, that nobody has ever ventured to describe a whole day in heaven, though plenty of people have described a day at the seaside."
OK, HERE GOES. THE FOLLOWING IS A DESCRIPTION OF A DAY IN HEAVEN:
.
If one assumes the stories are correct, then there are two phases—bodylessness in the first phase and then, at Judgment, the resurrection of all those bodies and then…
Well, it gets a bit vague…talk about a new heaven and a new earth, which kind of suggests that the whole thing will start over as is, only without "sin", whatever that means. But during the bodyless part, there would be no sex. How could there be? As for disembodied spirits having emotions—not with hormones and a limbic system, pal.
I suppose as to phase two, though, the discussion really ought to center on whether or not Sex is actually sin. If it is, then no, there won't be any, because we'll be without sin. But if it isn't…
Of course, if it isn't, then one wonders why we get so exercised about it in the here and now.
TMOL: Not even any backgammon? Not even a sigh? Are you suggesting that there isn't a heaven? Arrrgggg!
At least the Muslim version has sex because each guy gets a whole bunch of virgins to himself. But on the other hand, that probably would not be so good for the girls because they would have to share one guy with all the others.
Unless the reason they died as virgins was that they were extremely undesirable in the first place.
Yeah, but how good is it if you have to pace yourself to make 72 virgins last through eternity? They're only virgins once, after all. . .
The 72 virgins in heaven opportunity sounds like a pyramid scheme. Especially with China skewing the gender ratio in favor of men.
Unfortunately, this constitutes such a narrow-minded and callously amused view of what "Heaven" is really supposed to be. Many faiths believe in the reality of a perfect place of Unity, harmony, and Understanding. Oneness with the Universe. If we choose to use the Bible as our main source of inspiration, as many of you have chosen to do, then we can focus on the already mentioned scriptures concerning a "New Heaven" and a "New Earth."
It states that those who have been "judged worthy" will enter the "kingdom of Heaven" where they will be given new, celestial (spiritual) bodies. This place will be without sin because sin is of the flesh. This new body will be one better than flesh, more than skin and bones. Heaven will be a place where people are in constant contact with the Love of God (so the theory would say), and consequently the Love of the Neighbor. Sex is a human necessity for pleasure, procreation, and to express love. Sex can also be very sinful when not in the correct circumstances (ultimately, it SHOULD be in the constraints of LOVE…not marriage, mind you. That is the commitment that comes BECAUSE of LOVE). In Heaven, everybody loves everybody. Everybody lives forever. Sex becomes ultimately meaningless because it reduced to something trivial and unnecessary.
Gregory: Thanks for straightening this out about heaven. Sounds like you've been there yourself. Or, at least, that somebody you know has been there and reported back to you. You aren't just making this up or engaging in wishful thinking, are you? If you aren't reporting someone's first-hand knowledge of heaven, your description wouldn't be any more credible than mine, right?
As far as "callously amused," I assume that your saying that I have insulted dead people? Please relay to them that I'm sorry, because I don't actually know how to communicate with the dead. I was under the presumption that dead people were dead.
Gregory Bosch says:
"In Heaven, everybody loves everybody."
Great.
So Adolf Hitler, Jeffrey Dammer, Charles Manson, & Bernie Madoff will all love me?
And I have to love them back?
"So Adolf Hitler, Jeffrey Dammer, Charles Manson, & Bernie Madoff will all love me? And I have to love them back?"
TMOL – You're being presumptuous. There's no guarantee that you'll make it into heaven.
What a crock of nihilist sophistry!
"Sex in Heaven- Part II?"
I guess its OK for bored skeptics to create some Straw Man and knock it down (again!) with half-witted humor. So, some people have religious beliefs with which you do not agree, that means they're subject to ridicule, abuse, scorn and laughter? Good showing of Tolerance of Others Consciousness on your part.
As for me, I'll stick with my "imaginary friends" and forgive you for you know not what you do. I don't agree with many persons' religious beliefs (or lack of the same) but, sure as heck don't sit around doing a smack-down on them for what they believe. Try tolerance, you might like it!
Tim: I guess I'm going to be sent to hell for ridiculing heaven!
WHOA there Timmy boy.
Remember, you have to love me in Heaven.
tmol: Timmy is (as he is wont to remind us) a practicing Catholic. Therefore, he is not only going to love you in heaven, but he is under a duty to love you in this life, even if you had been his "enemy."
BTW: In his new book, "The Evolution of God," Robert Wright forcefully argues the following:
Just making a wish for some intellectual rigor here in a field of cow pies—boy ones, for sure!
I don't "have" to love you, I actively choose love and compassion over indifference. Compassion includes ruthless compassion which allows me the freedom, maybe obligates me, to call you on your male cow pies.
As ever, you are to call me on my own. Thank you for your love and compassion in these important matters.
Erich, if you don't go to heaven it will because you made fun of heaven poorly.
"Erich, if you don’t go to heaven it will because you made fun of heaven poorly."
Tim, is that based on the assumption that there is, in fact, an accurate picture of heaven somewhere that people must pay mind to when satirising it? Or did you just not like the joke and assume that God shares your sense of humour?
If it's the former, once again the question is begged as to which version of Heaven from which branch, sub-branch, clique, claque or clade of which particular faith is indeed the True Heaven, yada yada yada and once again here we are on familiar ground.
If it's the latter, then hey – you can't please everyone. Still seems a bit harsh to punish someone eternally for a joke that didn't light up the whole audience!
If there's a Heaven and if it's open to atheists (as it bloody well should be, as we're the ones who need the most convincing about such things), I hope I get to chat to Miles Davis. I know I could always ask Gerry Mulligan about who really did most of the writing on "Birth Of The Cool", but Gerry's still a living, breathing, baritone sax-blasting fallible human, possibly prone to exaggeration or embellishment. If what I've read about Heaven is correct, Miles's departed soul will be unfailingly honest in his answers and I'll finally have the truth 🙂
Hank: Barely related anecdote. Last week, I jammed with friend of mine, a jazz bass player named Derrick. Derick's dad was also a jazz bass player, and when Derick was a small boy of about 5 years old, his dad often had various musicians come over to the house to play (they lived in St. Louis)–Derrick remembered that one of those musicians was the jazz guitarist Grant Green. After Derick grew up, he dad reminded him that lots of jazz players used to come over and jam at their house while little Derrick used to sit on the floor and play. One of those musicians was none other than Miles Davis. Pretty cool, eh? You're a little boy playing on the floor and Miles Davis is playing the trumpet in the same room, but you're not old enough to appreciate it. Not till you grow up, but by then you can't really remember much about it. Is that heaven or hell?
Yup, ask for just the tiniest bit of intellectual rigor from anti-Bible thumping atheists and they circle the wagons like any other group of fundies!:~)
If one is true to what they believe, and that truth (perhaps) leads to a way of living which recognizes, promotes and respects the miracles of life, I think they should go to heaven (whatever it may be).
If St. Anselm can attempt to define God as: "That than which nothing greater may be conceived," how much less are we mortals able to describe being in the actual presence of God for all eternity?
One of the paradoxes of living as a believer is to not be able to conceive, much less describe, what God must be.
The only way I see it dimly is in what I feel for my children and try to imagine that God loves us more than I love them. I often watch the kids as they sleep at night, and it brings me to tears how truly, wonderfully beautiful they are!
I do nothing to deserve God's love, and that loving God has brought to me the possibility of being saved from sin and brought to me the possibility of eternal salvation in His presence. I have chosen to believe after being raised Catholic but, also after seeking other ways to know God.
Tim
St. Anselm was obviously suffering a logic fail.
Perhaps some reading on the mathematics of infinities would have been helpful. In any event, define me a God, I'll easily define a greater god that encompasses your definition.
After all – it not be 'true' it need only be 'conceived' and predicated.
I'm afraid that, when all is said and done, the biggest argument against god is that god is so pedestrian. WTF? Creates an entire universe, and an entire ecosystem on one little planet, induces evolution (according to latest Catholic doctrine) that results in a line of hominids who are finally endowed with souls so that they may join him in heaven.
Weak. Do other animals have souls? Did god just hang around waiting for this evolution thing to happen — 15 billion years from inception, just to then spend 'real time with humanity' for the past … what? tens of thousands? hundreds of thousands? million? years.
When was the first soul? It is obviously an important point. Animals do not have souls. Apes do not have souls. people have souls. So when was the first soul? And was it a gradual ensoulment, or did the first soul come about complete and ready made? Before the soul, pre-human. after the soul, real human.
I'd dearly love to know what the latest 'critical thinking' in scholarly seminaries would tell us.
Erich said "You’re a little boy playing on the floor and Miles Davis is playing the trumpet in the same room, but you’re not old enough to appreciate it. Not till you grow up, but by then you can’t really remember much about it. Is that heaven or hell?"
Hell. Some Christians say Hell is a separation from God, or the loss of a relationship of God, or God's ignorance of you. In this case, Hell would be a separation from one of the immortals 🙂
"If St. Anselm can attempt to define God as: “That than which nothing greater may be conceived,” how much less are we mortals able to describe being in the actual presence of God for all eternity?"
This is what passes for intellectual rigor? Good lord.
Precisely how intellectually rigorous is it to define God as "the most awesome thing ever – hey, no, wait, don't you even TRY to think of anything more awesome because you just can't because he's GOD." It seems, going by St Anselm's example, that intellectual rigor has no more place in theological discussions than fossil rabbits in the pre-Cambrian.
"One of the paradoxes of living as a believer is to not be able to conceive, much less describe, what God must be."
I appreciate the honesty…
"I do nothing to deserve God’s love, and that loving God has brought to me the possibility of being saved from sin and brought to me the possibility of eternal salvation in His presence. I have chosen to believe after being raised Catholic but, also after seeking other ways to know God."
…honesty which is followed up with the statement that although you can't actually comprehend God in the slightest, you have sufficient knowledge of his intent, desires, likes, dislikes, emotions & character to pledge to him your entire eternal existence. That, or you have implicit trust in those who claim to speak & write for him; mere mortals, just like the rest of us!
Believe what you like for whatever reasons make sense to you (as do we all), but don't chide others for lacking rigor if your reasons aren't reasonable.
Tony,
Weak is right, but for another reason. God creates beings capable of Godel's Theorem, Relativity, Quantum Mechanics, and String Theory; capable of the Sistine Chapel, the Mona Lisa, the Lily Pads; capable of Falling Water, the cathedral at Chartes, the Guggenhiem; capable of The Republic, Don Quixote, War & Peace, and To Kill A Mockingbird; capable of the Ninth Symphony, Kind of Blue, Layla, Mozart…
Capable of such heights of intellectual, artisitic, and spiritual achievement, and what does God do?
Goes all school-girl wall-flower, wanting people to see him, worship him, fawn over him, and not wanting to actually step out onto the dance floor and state unequivocally "I'm here!" (and no, he doesn't, however metaphorical one might get about creation as the manifestation of his existence—a simple "Hi, how are you, my name is God" would work infinitely better than in this regard than the Grand Canyon.) And then, when no one pays any attention–because he's like being shy—he gets miffed and goes all mass murderer serial killer on humanity.
And how does he want notice?
Flock into a big building, sing lyrically-challenges songs, and repeat the words "Yes, You're Great" with minor variations—and nothing else.
Weak is right.
p.s. Yeah, I know, I just don't get it.
What if someone were to tell you that heaven is not a physical place in the sense of a materialistic world, but rather a state of being where all of the facets of a person's existence are acceptable to themselves and also to others as well?
Many people here on DI think hell (if it exists) will be a wonderful place because it will still allow them to be their individual "twisted" selves.
Heaven will also allow people to be their individual selves, but the kicker is so many people can't imagine anyone wanting to have to accept the primary relationship of creator God to created being.
Imagine an atheist's heaven – no creationists being around to remind them that they might be wrong.
Heaven is a place where relatedness and existence are not in destructive tension one with the other, but rather they are in living relatedness that does not seek to harm others because it accepts one's self and others (including their creator) just as others accept and relate to them as well.
Sex in heaven is about the least of my concerns. Fallen angels that chose to leave heaven caused more perversion to people than we can ever imagine.
Mark, even when I got it I didn't really get it. So many aspects, not just of Christianity but of the whole damn she-bang, seemed unfair & unbalanced, even to my tiny child brain.
I had so many questions, even as a tadpole, and the big, multifaceted "WHY?" was and never has been answered satisfactorily. Why hide when you claim to require worship from us and apparently wish to claim credit for all of OUR good works? Why act as if you don't exist if you want people to know that you do? Why be so goddamned elusive when you know millions are happy to destroy each other because they disagree over your nature and desires – or when still other millions don't see any reason to think you're there at all? Why be inactive & invisible in the face of so much division and hatred and countless souls being consigned to Hell if what you really want is for everyone to be with you? Why the f*ck even create Hell – whatever form it takes, be it eternal torment or spiritual separation – in the first place? Why create such a horror and then give humanity only ONE chance to avoid it, but then allow muddying of the waters to the extent that noone can really tell, if they look with any objectivity outside the religion they were raised in, which alleged path to Heaven is the One True Path? Twenty years asking and not one answer that's made a lick of sense.
Some Christians say they choose to be Christians – fine. Be lucky enough to be born and raised in a free country and you have that choice – but what about the billions elsewhere (Iran, Saudi Arabia, Israel, India, the Bible Belt) that don't really get to "choose" their faith and are instead marinated in the faith of their fathers and/or their state for their entire lives? What if their faith is "wrong"? Hardly fair that those people should be hellbound. But what if theirs is right? Then everyone else gets reamed – but only because they were unfortunate enough to be born somewhere else.
But, again, what if God doesn't care what you believe as long as you're a decent person? OK, good. What if he doesn't care at all, doesn't punish and everyone gets to be reunited with him after death, no exceptions? Fine, also good. That was my old deist position – indeed, it was the only way the existence of a god ever made sense to me. But if that's so – whence religion? If everyone gets a free pass to the eternal love-in, religion is redundant – so I guess you may as well just stick with your father's faith or pick one that makes you feel good.
Yada, yada, yada, familiar ground again & I'm truly, madly, deeply boring the f*ck out of myself.
Karl writes:—"Heaven will also allow people to be their individual selves, but the kicker is so many people can’t imagine anyone wanting to have to accept the primary relationship of creator God to created being."
No, that's not it, Karl. The fact is no ever bothered to tell us anything about heaven other than we will have no "sin" there, which they then couldn't really define except by reminding us that just about everything that makes life fun is sinful. So under those circumstances, Mark Twain's argument in favor of hell is persuasive.
In point of fact, without physical bodies (as you posit) we won't want to do any of the things that make life here and now pleasant, including eating, drinking, listening to music, or having our backs scratched. You need nerve endings and a limbic system for that. So the fulfillment of heaven (as you posit it) would necessarily be significantly different.
But the torments of hell are likewise normally presented with respect to those same physical bodies and the unbearable pain those same nerves etc we won't have might convey.
So really, this whole contemplation is a mug's game, since none of the parameters are set. It's more about the reasons for wanting to go one place or the other, as it relates to our present apprehension of experiences that are good or bad.
Karl said (with a straight face, presumably):
"Many people here on DI think hell (if it exists) will be a wonderful place because it will still allow them to be their individual “twisted” selves."
Still with the thoughtless, baseless blanket statements then, Karl? Still ascribing to others positions they don't hold? Business as usual for you then. You're nothing if not consistent.
Anyway, you're going to need to back that statement up. Please provide anything written by any DI author or regular commenter which suggests either implicitly or explicitly that we'd like to go to Hell.
The thing is, my memory tells me than whenever a DI author has mentioned Hell – the biblical Hell, home of Satan, with all the torment and screaming, not some modern, noncommittal "separation from God" bullshit – it's usually in the context of how awful a doctrine it is, how disgusting it is to teach to children and how revolting the morality is that finds such a concept acceptable. So, make with the evidence that suggests we'd all like to go to Hell or kindly retract your comment.
Oh, and thanks for calling us _all_ twisted. Another sliver of support for my theory that your Christian morality is nothing more than cheap varnish over hatred and ignorance.
"Imagine an atheist’s heaven – no creationists around to harangue people with ghost stories, prejudice, ignorance or soft insults, but plenty of people who used to be creationists."
Fucking A.
See, circle wagons, attack theists!
I attempt to dimly percieve and describe beliefs which are unsupported by facts (that's faith) and I'm attacked for a lack of rigor when faith pre-supposes an absence of proof, and that is a universal definition accepted buy believers and skeptics.
You failed and refused and continue to fail and refuse to address the first criticism which alleged that the topic of "Sex in Heaven–II" was absurd, a Straw Man dredged up from the depths of sophistry to advance a preconcieved prejudice against believers and their beliefs. I don't give a rat's patootie whether you believe, just make sure your arguments are just that and not snarky sophistries of diatribes mascarading as argument.
If I have not been rigorous in my arguments, it is my belief that others are required, in good faith, to point such out. I wll become more effective, your contribution recognized, regardless of your beliefs.
God be with you!
Oh, and you'all are still wrasslin' pigs with Karl!
Accepting anything purely on faith – chucking all your eggs (presuming you have any eggs at all) in a basket you can neither properly imagine or even know is there (yet simultaneously claiming deep knowledge of that basket's nature, ie that it wants your eggs but only if you recognise the basket in the correct way) and being ok with that – gives nobody the right to have a crack at anyone else for a lack of intellectual rigor. Noone's personally attacking theists here, just their unsupported beliefs, their attempted justifications for them and their rank hypocrisy!
It isn't my job to respond to your first comment as it wasn't addressed to me, so sheath your claws. But I'll say this: wrangling about what Heaven's like is akin to asking a bunch of deaf men to put their heads together and describe jazz fusion. All they can do is speculate and work off the words of others. They can toil for years and they'll never actually know if they're perfectly right or dead wrong. In other words, it's utterly pointless – as pointless as another equally deaf man pointing out how flawed all their theories are and how he's got the right idea. And if one of the first group was to rise up and proclaim his unending love for jazz fusion because of his strong faith in how awesome it probably sounds, you'd be right to look at him with a raised eyebrow.
Now, as it's my keyboard and my boring work day, I'll wrassle pigs if I dang well please. Especially if the swines insist on rolling up and insulting everybody! We all want to go to Hell so we can continue being "twisted"? Where the f- does this clown get off? It's a perfect example of how faith can give some people a mistaken impression of their own importance.
I admit my cluelessness.
Faith is not based upon knowledge. However, to submit issues for false discussions solely to put down another's belief is sophistry and churlish.
I make no claims that my faith is superior to any other and admit that to non-believers it may seem to be less rational than others'.
I make no excuses for the fools which stake out their lives with the certainty which belies tolerance of anything other than adherence to a creed, any creed or the lack of the same.
I agree with your assessment of the discussion but, I didn't pose that there is any sex in heaven in the first place or bring the matter up again for another flogging.
As for the "twisted" comment and others;
"Judge not, lest ye too be judged!"