Shining Thru

Heaven…interesting word…I think it means something different to every person on the planet.  Some people don’t believe that such a place exists…some people believe that they can find heaven on earth.  Some people envision fluffy clouds and angels with harps…while others imagine a paradise customized to them.

One of the things that got me to thinking about what Heaven really is, is the movie What Dreams May Come, with Robin Williams.  A very interesting movie that has a different interpretation of heaven and hell…or at least different to what I had grown up hearing for most of my life.  The movie is kind of the same idea as The Lovely Bones as far as Heaven goes…meaning that each person can create their own heaven or they can travel and go to the shared part of heaven and see other people that share a vision of the same things of pleasure and peace.  In both movies, the people have to figure out how heaven operates and they have a guide…I have to wonder if a guardian angel’s (if you believe in such things) job doesn’t end when you die, but rather is just beginning as they have to then guide you through the steps of existence in heaven….

I think that there is a mystery that intrigues a lot of people associated with anything that we can’t see or isn’t found in this life time.  Heaven is one of those things that makes people wonder simply because it is something that wont have an answer until after you die…and even then you might not get to find out, depending on who ends up being right in the long run….Since there is no way to find out until we are indeed dead. Although some people believe that there are “near-death” experiences that reveal at least a slice of heaven or what lies on the way to heaven.  There was even a gospel written by someone who claimed that they went to heaven and were able to see all that lies there, but it was decided that it was not worthy of the Bible.

Heaven can inspire so many thoughts, death, dying, hell, angels, God or gods…..

Does God exist or simply created in the minds of those who do exist?  Like a dream that feels so real when you wake up you need to check the facts of the day before to make sure that it didn’t really happen?  Is God created out of habit, need for something to be in control, need for something bigger, need for someone to blame???  Or does God exist rather people want to admit it or not?

There are many interesting short stories about if God exists or not….Some proving that God does exist, some trying to encourage faith, and some trying to prove just the opposite and leave people without any confidence in their faith….

None of these stories can actually answer the question of if God exists or not….Can anyone or anything prove the existence of God?  On the other hand, can anyone or anything prove that there is no existence of something higher than what we can see?

What creates faith?  What creates God?  Does the existence of God really matter if people have faith in something, isn’t it the faith that gives that thing the power?  Or does that thing reign with power even when there is no faith?  Does faith give God power, or does God strengthen faith?  Is there a God or not?  Does it matter as long as people believe in a God?

At what point do you cross from a simple coincidence to …that can’t possibly be some random act that coincided?  When does it become too much to just accept as coincidence, no greater force, no god, no push of fate?  How long can you believe that things just happen and that there isn’t a greater force, that there is nothing in control, things just roll on?

I’m not talking about religion, but something greater than humans…something more powerful, or with a wider range of power at least….

Why is it that you can go months or sometimes years without speaking to someone and then call them when they need you the most just because you felt like calling them?  How is it that it seems like the perfect line of impossible events lined up in such a way that something happened with a million to one odds against it….

Granted maybe some things just simply happen…no mater plan behind them, no plot of fate…just simply the way the dice fall with life as the play board.

Do we question why or simply accept?  Does it matter if there is a controlling force or if it’s coincidence?  Or does it simply matter that it did in fact happen and needs to be dealt with from now on?

How do you decide what matters in life and what should simply pass on by?

I never realized that there could be so many different interpretations of the same text…namely the Bible, more specifically the story of Adam and Eve…I was watching the history channel tonight and it had a very interesting story on it about the Adam and Eve…and how there is a story that is very similar that comes about a thousand years before the Bible was written….what does this mean?

What really makes a religion?  Is it that you can prove your point of view…that you fight with all other religions in a race to prove that you know what you are talking about and somehow they are wrong?  Or is it simply in believing?  Is it the traditions that give people faith?  Or is it believing?  What makes a religion worth while?  Since no religion can really be proven…I have to wonder why people spend so much time trying.  Why not just be ok with believing what you want to believe.  And accept that not everyone is going to believe exactly what you’re going to believe.  What is so wrong with having different beliefs alive and well in the world?  If you are ok believing and really have faith that you are right, why can’t that be enough?

I have to wonder why many people need to find ways of proving themselves, their personal beliefs, especially their religious views (even though it does happen in other areas, like raising children, etc.)  If you truly believe that you are right, and you’re secure in that belief, why is it so important to win everyone else over to your beliefs and religion?  I never understood the point of shoving your own beliefs down the throats of others.  What good does it do…it doesn’t seem to have done any good for any world leader who has ever tried it…maybe belief by force worked for them at first while the fear held out…but you can’t make people believe things by force or fear….maybe by logical arguments, but if people don’t like you they probably wont listen to you.  Which is why any great leader has been charismatic have been able to work a crowd, rather you agree with what they may have done or not done is irrelevant, what matter was that they got people on their side at the time. 

So the last thought, what is the difference between a belief, faith, and religion?

People’s different impression of God is so vastly different…some different cultures have multiple gods…some people believe in more a guiding force like fate or something similar….even all of the people who believe in the one all knowing…all seeing God..have incredibly different opinions of the personality (for lack of a better word) of that God….some people believe that he is all fire and brimstone..just waiting to throw you into hell…while others believe that is all loving and ever forgiving….some people believe that there is simply a higher life form such as aliens that live as we do, but are much more advanced and therefore have god like qualities. 

People’s beliefs are really interesting to learn about.  Especially believes on things that have no proof one way or the other.  At the very least, sometimes people can surprise you and give you something to think about that never would have crossed your mind otherwise…that is if you’re open to hearing other people’s beliefs and opinions. 

What is also very interesting is how our society pushes certain impressions of things like God and aliens….I once heard someone say that if a giant monster landed in a round or square space ship and came out with eight arms some people still wouldn’t believe that it was an alien…because we “know” what aliens look like…I am willing to bet that if we took a poll we would get just about the same answer from at least 90% of the population when asked to describe an alien.  They have been depicted for years and even generations now in movies and on TV, much less in books and comic books. 

How much influence does Society have on our beliefs?  What opportunities have we all missed because we refuse to see what is right in front of us or listen to something that seems off the wall just because we haven’t heard it before?

I’m sure life is out there. We need only look harder. Considering how vast the universe is, we’ve only breached a billionth of a percent of a billionth.

Religious wackos refuse to believe in Alien life because it goes directly against their vanity at being created in God’s image. I can’t take them serious because they subscribe to notions passed word-of-mouth for the better part of 10,000 years. When the story was finally written down, it was written wrong. Then right before it hit official print, a group of people – who thought that God’s universe revolved around THEM – decided to leave out any part of His word they deemed unimportant. The bible is the original Wikipedia with fewer citations. Whatever your religion is, your creation theory is stupid and illogical.

I believe that in God’s multi-verse there must be another species that’s made it out of the primordial soup and sought to reach the sky. So here’s another theory:

I believe in aliens. We were created by aliens and left here.

That is why we constantly look to the sky for our God. It’s genetic memory of something we had and lost, even if we don’t know what it was. We have a natural imperative to worship the sky. Maybe that’s why we spend every day on our knees begging to be let back into heaven, or Eden or whatever you want to call it.

Religion seems to be the universal search for a God, or gods. Those that abandoned us here, they probably left us here because we were fucking pests… We are a failed experiment. We got too damn smart, too damn fast. Like rats out of their cages – or the Flood from Halo – we developed the need  and ability to consume but never developed the ability to control it. Greed is our most natural trait, and it consumes us as we consume everything else – over and over and over. Anonymous said ‘those who don’t study history are doomed to repeat it.” We know this and still manage to repeat it….

Maybe we’re a virus spread out of control. Maybe we’ve been put here in this purgatory to find enlightenment – this could be our Universal Time Out. Maybe we’re here until God figures out a humane way to deal with us. If we behave ourselves, if we get our shit together, maybe God will come back for us one day. If not, he’ll just leave us here abandoned in this dark wing of the galaxy like an experiment in some dark chasm in some archive somewhere. We’re so far from the next possibility of civilization that we’ll either bomb ourselves back into the bronze age or not make it off this blue rock before our star explodes.

Maybe this is God’s plan.