Describe if you will, your idea of Heaven.....

[peter]

...... for who knows, you may have to live there for eternity!

[and it might be as well to put your order in, in advance just in case. ]

Let's see: I'd wake up in the sun drenched rolling hills of Andelain with the ripe corn fields of Elysium in the distance. My much loved chestnut mare would be there to greet me, together with my ornery but loyal grey cat Quickie, who would be increased in size to that of a tiger, and would run by my side as I rode. I'd shortly find a gathering of people awaiting me - and would be reunited with my parents, my grandparents and all of my ascendants for as far back as I chose to go [today]. We'd eat and drink and make merry for as long as we felt doing so, and then I'd retire to sleep in the simple cabin that would be there for me and in which I'd find dozing my big female cat Cheeky, as fat round and shining as ever she was in my memory of childhood.

I'd meet with God the following morning and laughing, he'd restore to me the innocence I squandered in so cavalier a fashion by sweeping away my sins with a simple brush of his hand and a dismissive shake of his head. Then, introductions over I'd be given my formal tour as to how I could go anywhere in the Universe [this or any other] at any time [past or present] of my choosing, to observe all of the things that my brief life, 'surrounded by it's sleep' had denied me. Of art and literature I'd be able to drink my fill; of the majesty of swirling galaxies and exploding suns I'd be able to bear witness, and the mysteries of all possible and all impossible alternate realities I'd be able to experience at my leisure. Talk with who I would choose, when I chose - or indeed silent meditation and reflection - all these things would be mine. I'd never get bored, because boredom would not exist and I'd have the pleasure of seeing all of those who have suffered in life - be it animal or human - be brought to the realisation that it was but a brief and transitory thing - an experience that in and of itself is now a simple facet in the 'infinite diamond' of experience of what it is to be alive, and now too, Heaven is theirs as well. I'd meet the Angels and Demons of our imagination, and find them not so opposed after all, and it would be well, and all would be well, and all manner of things would be well.

[Mighara Sovmadhi]

An adventure that never ends, where you're never entirely certain the danger has passed, but you know it always can pass. (This is a Tranquilline-Halls kind of image (from Sanderson's Stormlight Archives series...).)

[peter]

An alternative take! Great! I had wondered if I had left any room, but now I wonder if each and every one of us would not have our own version.

[Avatar]

Of the nature of Death and the Dead, we may enumerate twelve types.

First are those who become new Gods, and for whom New Universes are Born.

Second those who Praise.

Third, those who Fight as Soldiers in the War with Evil.

Fourth, those who Amuse themselves among Flowers and Sweet Streams with sports.

Fifth, those who dwell in Gardens of Bliss, or are Tortured.

Sixth, those who Continue as in Life.

Seventh, those who Turn the Wheel of the Universe.

Eighth, those who find in their Graves their Mothers wombs, and in one Life Circle Forever.

Ninth, Ghosts.

Tenth, those Born Again as Men in their Grandsons time.

Eleventh, those who Return as Beasts or Tree's.

And Last, those who Sleep.

Gene Wolfe -The Book of Days

--A

[peter]

I like that Av!

[Linna Heartbooger]

peter- the day before I came back home from my dad's house, I asked my dad if I could talk to him about how to get to heaven.
As you can imagine, it did not go over very well!
But heaven is so often on my mind.

Also, no fear of having used up all the ideas peter - I have this sense that there is "more" of heaven than there is of earth... and even earth is a pretty big subject.

I'm gonna do like Av and quote someone... one of the ideas I've heard about Heaven that has most sparked my imagination.

...Such will be the union in their society that they will be partakers of each other's happiness. Then will be fulfilled in its perfection that which is declared in 1 Cor. 12:26, "If one of the members be honoured all the members rejoice with it."
Jonathan Edwards, Sermon VII on Romans ii.10., circa 1740

Other thoughts:

Heaven is like sex, only better.
...as my pastor once said!

Heaven is security.
Sometimes living without anxiety for a whole day or even a whole hour becomes fairly unimaginable for me.
But when my anxiety is gone for awhile, it is... wow, wonderful.
I am convinced that we will KNOW deep within ourselves that we are safe; know it in every fibre of our bodies, every part of our minds.

Heaven is harmony.
The thing in this life that tastes most like heaven to me is successful peacemaking.
I have done this a few times, and the process can be quite painful... but I remember at least one incident of walking home afterwards - much too late at night - utterly exultant.
At that moment, God was real.

Heaven is one city.
Nothing provincial or parochial about it.
No people looking askance at different worship styles.
No Catholic/Protestant divide anymore. (thought I'd slip that in there!)
Just one giant throng of affectionate worshippers gathered from many tribes and tongues - tongues human and angelic.

Mighara- that reminds me of something!
When it occurred to me that I was taught that "all good stories need a conflict to make them interesting," I worried: "Wouldn't heaven be boring, then?"

[wayfriend]

Sometimes living without anxiety for a whole day or even a whole hour becomes fairly unimaginable for me.
But when my anxiety is gone for awhile, it is... wow, wonderful.

I often say, with a bit of humor, that I'm not worried about the end of the world coming - I would finally be able to relax. But it's a wry humor.

So when you mention this above, you make me realize that, to me, heaven and the end of the world (zombie apocalypse or whatever) are a bit alike in my mind.

[aTOMiC]

Heaven for me is a state in which I expect to experience an alien and familiar reality that defies the description of mortal beings. I need not try to paint on a canvas that is presently out of reach and will in the fullness of time be rendered by a future I am unable to fathom. For no living creature can assuredly describe an existence that lies beyond its knowledge and experience and any wondering, though entertaining, is ultimately futile.

[Zarathustra]

The universe is enough for me. I'd settle for this world, with its limits overcome through knowledge, understanding, and power. Anything else just sounds boring.

[peter]

That's why for me Z, heaven includes a complete and absolute knowledge of this and every other universe! I want to be able to turn every single atom over in my hands. Why place me in the middle of the biggest show in town and then deny me the opportunity to see it? (shakes metaphorical fist at sky )

[Avatar]

Yeah, I'll take the new universe myself, but that might be my ego talking...

--A

[Vraith]

I'd like to say that heaven would be the state/place/whatever where I both know/understand the reasons for everything AND agree that the reasons are good reasons.

What I actually think is any and all of us are wrong about even our own ideas of what heaven should be.
I mean: peter thinks heaven includes [for him] complete knowledge of all the universes. If/when he gets to heaven, he'll find that a ridiculous thought/idea.
But don't worry, peter...you'll never have to face that. Not cuz you're unworthy of heaven, but because there's no[any[one[where]]] there "there."

[Avatar]

Well, I'd say because there is no heaven.

--A

[Wosbald]

+JMJ+

Heaven for me is a state in which I expect to experience an alien and familiar reality that defies the description of mortal beings. I need not try to paint on a canvas that is presently out of reach and will in the fullness of time be rendered by a future I am unable to fathom. For no living creature can assuredly describe an existence that lies beyond its knowledge and experience and any wondering, though entertaining, is ultimately futile.

That pretty much sums up the Catholic parameters for speculation. Both "alien" and "familiar". Not a reductive either/or.

Though I take slight issue (perhaps just a semantic issue) with the term "futile", since wondering and speculating isn't futile. Not any more than cleaning the house is futile, since it's just gonna get dirty again. It's not futile. It's food for the road.

[peter]

Wos - I have just noticed for the first time you have designated yourself as Bloodguard. If it is not to intrusive, can I ask what aspects of that particular group you hold in high esteem, such that you choose them as a name upon which to anchor yourself [badly put, but I hope you know what I mean]? I'm a huge fan myself [and never much liked to see them forced into change as they were], but what is it about them that does it for you? Their rectitude, their inflexibility? I'm curious.

[There would be Blood guard in my heaven - they deserve incorporation!]

[Wosbald]

+JMJ+

Wos - I have just noticed for the first time you have designated yourself as Bloodguard.

I haven't designated myself as anything. Not TTBOMK, anyway.

Unless I haplessly tripped some setting, must be a mod.

EDIT: A mod, or else auto-ranking. Maybe something will happen if/when I get to 1000 posts.

[peter]

Fair do's.

[Avatar]

Automatically changes based on your post count, up to 1,000 posts. (At which point your title becomes "The Gap Into Spam" )

You can change the title to a custom one in your profile settings. (Hitting 1,000 posts also gives you entry to the mile high club. (Which gives you nothing though.) )

--A

[peter]

Ah - The Mile High Club! The days of my youth ............

............(not!)

[Linna Heartbooger]

I often say, with a bit of humor, that I'm not worried about the end of the world coming - I would finally be able to relax. But it's a wry humor.

So when you mention this above, you make me realize that, to me, heaven and the end of the world (zombie apocalypse or whatever) are a bit alike in my mind.

Right?

In the Bible there's an intertwining of what it has that are the closest maps to those two things...
Thing 1. the Day of the Lord / day when what is "whispered in private rooms shall be proclaimed on the housetops"
Thing 2. the New Creation / the Kingdom of God being fully realized / the meek inheriting the earth*

There's the sense that they go together... this world and all its futile systems destroyed... new world remade without the decay, futility, and trouble.

One time, I was commenting to a friend about having seen a "SMOD 2016" sign or something...
...and his response was, "hey, there's this universal human awareness of the need for - somehow - justice to be done, on a huge scale"

Oh! Also, on stuff that has mucho Biblical resonance - peter-
The feasting, the great, lavish party... is such a major theme.
Of course, I bet it's huge in most cosmologies' versions of heaven...
...but I think that in some ways, people's (false) expectation of Christianity's description of heaven is that it would be more anaemic, more "spiritual" in some wispy, non-eating, floating-like-a-cloud...
So they don't expect the big feast to be in it!

* Wouldn't it be cool if I could pull HLT over here with the potential to make a Monte Python reference?