Jesus the Christ, in plain English, is Joshua the Chosen. There are two Books of Joshua one from Tribe of Ephraim and one from Tribe of Judah. Joshua Son of Nun was from Tribe of Ephraim. Born in Egypt. Everyone agrees the Tribe of Judah's Book of Joshua is not Jesus the Christ (Joshua the Chosen). Anyone read the Tribe of Ephraim's Book of Joshua? It's called the Samaritan Chronicle. Extra: did you know Joshua Son of Nun was originally named Hoshea Son of Nun? Moses changed his name with the implied meaning "May God save you from the conspiracy of the scouts".
It's actually counter-intuitive. People think you need to beleive in God in order to be moral, but so much immoral behavior is done under the umbrella of relgion and a beleif in god.
That's not true at all. God is the father of morality, we do nothing and think of nothing but evil, God is love and justice. You don't believe in God, then you don't believe what love actually is. For your last point, there was a news story about two gay guys who adopted two autistic kids.... to molest them. Using your logic, since evil is done under some christian beliefs, therefore all Christians are evil, this news story means all gays are child molesters and/or pedophiles.
The Twilight Zone (original series) absolutely NAILS this conversation. In the episode "A Nice Place to Visit", this gangster is shot by the police while attempting to rob a pawn shop. He is then escorted to the afterlife by what he perceives as his guardian angel. He is taken to a large palace with all the possible things you could want: He is surrounded by beautiful women, he always wins when he goes to gamble at the casinos, he has an unlimited supply of delicious food, alcohol, cigars, and material objects. He's having the time of his life but after a while, he grows increasingly bored of the repetitious nature of the afterlife. He eventually seeks his "guardian angel" and tells him that he misses living a life of sin and vice with the earthly thrill of unpredictability and mystery. He would even go as far as beg to be taken to the "other place". The angel reveals himself as who he really is and replies, "Technically, this is the 'other place'. What makes you think this is heaven?".
honestly that's a rly good depiction of hell...... no lasting goodness can be found apart from God. A "heaven" with everything we desired - food/sex/pretty things/entertainment - but without God would end up feeling like hell. Our souls were made by God to enjoy a relationship with Him.
Thanks for bringing that one up. I grew up watching the Twilight Zone. That is one of my favorite episodes, though I haven't seen it in a while. Your post brought it all back.
This hits so hard! I had a conversation with my Christian mother recently and I was honest and told her I felt like she had checked out of this life. Almost like I didn’t have my mother anymore, and she responded “I have checked out”. The degradation of our once close relationship has been so incredibly sad to me.
When it comes to truth, God is the Lord of glory, the glory we clearly see in this reality is a small portion of the glory in heaven. Gold is a element with small glory but it is a beautiful element as there will be other glorious designs. We will have the same freedom apart from sin in this world like designing technology that we can possibly even fathom like people couldn't fathom a cellphone a few hundred years ago. With God all things are possible and he will give every good gift with the possibility of infinite good. God made creation in wisdom and I believe the reason we started in a world we can rebel against God's good design is because creation has to know that a choice outside of God's will is corruption and evil, because there is only one that is good and that is God. I chose good and if God is good and made creation then creation is good, we are not as wise as God and would be a fool to trust our own reasoning over God's. Jesus is the way truth and life, choose good and avoid corruption so we can be with Christ. God bless you all.
Sad. My mom wanted to check out, but we wouldn’t let her. She lived 50 years with a family of atheists (husband & 4 children), so she was used to us. She died at 92-yrs. Dad is 94 and enjoying life.
Most Christians simply gloss over these logical problems with heaven with the phrase that our imperfect minds cannot conceive of heaven. This is of course a monumental cop out.
If you don't want to go to heaven, or, you wish to choose the kind of Heaven you believe you would prefer, it will be hell. Why? Because no human actually knows what would satisfy them for eternity.
Of course our minds cannot conceive heaven. Can you actually think of something that would satisfy you forever? No, you can't. But you know who does? According the the religion which talks about the heaven, God knows everything about you, therefore you can be most certain that heaven will be satisfying. The logic here is flawless
How is it a cop out? There's things God will understand that we can't even begin to comprehend. 1 CORINTHIANS 2:9 KJ21 But as it is written: “Eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, neither have entered into the heart of man the things which God hath prepared for them that love Him.”
I’m a teenager that’s going through a dilemma of faith. My father is a pastor and my mom is just as devoted. I’ve had some of these realizations of heaven for some years now like how eternal worship doesn’t sound fun at all, or how free will just wouldn’t exist in a place like heaven. I’ve come to realize that I have to make compromises in my questioning just so I can keep my relationship with my family. I’ve recently moved to a different city a few hours away from them for school and it drives me insane how they use up the only free hour I have at night to call me and use it for bible study, when all I really want is to just have a conversation with them.
Thats a tough spot, friend. All i can say is keep digging. Be sure of what you can be. Understand where they are coming from and find a balance best you can till you get a bit older
You're assuming you're going to keep your twisted and inherently bad traits of being human. All atheists do is argue and try to fit an infinitely immeasurable being into a small box. This guy is narcissistic himself. Listen to his arguments, it's just strawman. I recommend listening to near death experiences. They provide a deeper view on the afterlife.
I completely agree. My biggest fear as a child was not Hell, it was spending an eternity doing all the things I love for all time. How long will it take to try everything? Once done, does one do them again? How long will it take for this to become stale? How long will it take for me to hate doing what I once loved? An eternity of repeating everything. Maybe seeing my grandchildren being born will give me joy? But then I will have to see them die and meet them. And again with their grandchildren. And will humankind be around in another 200,000 years. What happens when humans go extinct? No new entrants? A finite number of friends for eternity? Once the earth has been consumed by the inevitable Red Giant, that was once our sun, what then? Spend my time watching the slow heat death of the universe? And when the last Black Hole evaporates away and there is only darkness... do I really continue with an eternity still ahead of me? Eventually, I will have met everyone who has made it into paradise an infinite number of times already. I will have done everything an infinite number of times already... And I still have an eternity ahead of me doing everything an infinite number of times again... This sounds a lot like hell. To do all this without my brother, without friends, without loved ones who were condemned by the church because they took their own lives... Without my pets, without animals... Without alcohol, Without S*x, without porn, without my wives, Knowing that the guy who r@ped my sister is in heaven... This is hell from the get go. And the alternative is hell? No wonder god's Angels rebelled.
Thank you for your videos. I deconverted from Christianity, twice, because of its endless problems that I couldn’t ignore. The first time was as a teenager and the second time was as an adult. I’m the first in my family, that I’m aware of, to break this chain. It’s scary to be a trailblazer but so worth it when if you’re a person who values truth and logic.
@@mfetterellino way you're this literal when u read. The Bible and many books are filled with metaphors. When Jesus calls himself the "Bright Morning Star" he isn't saying he is a giant ball of gas in space lmaooo smh. He gives light to the world in spirit. Those that find him have his light, and I'm not talking about a ball of gas above their heads, I'm talking about spiritually enlightened. My goodness, I can't believe people are this dense, I could understand this when I was just a teenager.
As an atheist since childhood, I tried fairly recently to explain this to my dad, because I didn’t want him to ever worry about “my salvation”. I said that “even if I pretend heaven, as it’s described, is real and entirely accurate, it’s not somewhere I would want to go after I die” for many of these reasons you’re touching on here. From what I recall, he had no response and the entire conversation was just him changing the subject whenever I made any logical points. At one point he even made a comment about how I wasn’t taught about this stuff properly while growing up, which felt like he proved my point that, without indoctrination, most of it sounds pretty ridiculous.
@@20july1944 Is your lack of belief in the tooth fairy, leprechauns, unicorns... (assuming you don't believe in some of those) based on science or is it just your opinion? There are an infinity of things that are logically possible, but a finite number of things that actually do palpably exist. That is why rational people look for empirical evidence to believe and at some stage in their life question their early indoctrination... And the existence of rainbows does not imply that there must be leprechauns.
This is the VERY thing that scared the crap out of me as a kid. My parents told me about how amazing heaven would be but it honestly scared me more than hell. The eternal monotony. It was the start of my journey away from these archaic religions of talking snakes and mythologies we would otherwise giggle at if we had no cultural connection with them. Once you leave Christianity, it becomes as daft, nonsensical and ancient as the Viking or Roman religions.
@@antoniopratt1893 no it's actually wasn't. 1. It's a ridiculous idea to begin with. Burning for an eternity is such a ludicrous punishment for a TINY mortal human that is bound to screw up a few times, especially is given free will but still expected to follow the guys rules perfectly, is just completely absurd, especially if so many people have never even heard of the gospel around the world. And if they did, it would just be another religion trying to win patrons for their shrine and they'll just laugh at it. How are they supposed to know that Christianity is the one true religion if all they grew up with was Buddhism. And they deserve to burn forever? Really?. If hell is real then god is a malicious tyrant that does not deserve worship. 2. If the burning of hell won't kill you, that means you'll get used to it. If you ever served in the military you'll know the deal. Plus all the cool people will be in hell. Hell would end up being more fun, when you get used to the pain. But that last point is more just for laughs because hell doesn't exist... at least the Christian one. It's a ridiculous and evil concept designed purely to get people to conform to the church.
@@dudemantype You're not expected to do anything, If you live your whole life neglecting God than at the end of it all he will neglect you. The difference between me and you is that you simply feel the need to justify your sin. Live however you want, do you see God standing in front of you telling you what to do? Just don't be upset about the outcome of your choices.
Saaame. I grew up Jehovah's Witness and our options were non-existence, paradise or, if you were extra special, heaven. I preferred non-existence or paradise, and if paradise, I always just pictured myself alone playing with animals. I had no interest in hanging out with JWs in the present or in the afterlife. Heaven seemed boring, and not in a good way.
Imagine being punished with Hell because you don't get along with everybody. It's one thing to be obligated to worship God forever, but even more-so alongside those you despise. Maybe that is Satan's real reason why he was banished from Heaven. It happened once, it can happen again.
This hits me so very hard. I have one child who is a Christian and one who is not. It was this very issue that caused me to deconvert last year. Thank you for being the voice of reason in this crazy conversation.
2 things 1) One of the things that began my deconstruction of faith and the Bible is when I had a Bible study with my then 12 year old daughter. She asked, "What if Gods idea of eternal heaven and happiness isn't exactly mine?" I immediately thought of my dad who for example bought us a living room set without talking to us that we did not like at all. She then asked if it would be either God changing our mindset to enjoy it, but doesn't that do away with free will, or will it be like the matrix where everyone will see what they want, but how would that work? #2 Do Christians even believe in a heaven? They say that they do but in reality do they? How is the only way we can get there? Death, but they call call on the prayer warriors. A person who must live in pain or paralyzed is told to be thankful that they are still be alive. So that's better than heaven? Again, do they in reality even believe in a heaven?
I have a firm believe that deep down, in the subconscious, everyone knows that heaven is bullshit, that's why everyone avoids it like it's the worst thing that can happen.
People are far more likely to be irrational than non-genuine. Even criminals only lie to get money, not for fun. But you'll never find someone completely rational in every way.
The end of your second point is why I believe in medically-assisted suicide. If I'm dying of cancer and I would rather just enjoy my remaining healthy days with my family before going to a doctor to end my life instead of playing the waiting game in a great amount of pain, I should have that choice. I think anyone should have that choice, and I believe that if God really existed, he would make an exception since, ultimately, it's a partly selfless act so your family can save money in the end and won't have to see their loved one in pain.
One of the best arguments against heaven I’ve heard is: if you lined up all 7 billion people on earth from morally best to morally worst, where do you cut the line to send one side to heaven and one side to hell? No matter what split you decide 50:50, 70:30 etc you will always have 2 people on either side of the line who are almost morally identical and yet one is condemned forever and one is saved. The difference could be a single good deed or a single thought. Imagine you go to hell over a single intrusive thought. Imagine the fear going to heaven knowing the guy before you was condemned for a single intrusive thought. It is absolutely insane.
Good/bad deeds have nothing to do with it. According to the BIble none of us are good enough to deserve "heaven". But Jesus Christ has paid the penalty for our sin by his sacrifical death . If you acknowledge your failures and just put your trust in Him, you will certainly get to heaven
@ChrisSmith-xh9wb "If you acknowledge your failures and just put your trust in him, you will certainly get to heaven" So you have to DO something to go to heaven? You have to acknowledge and put your trust in him. What happens to you if you don't?
@@przemeksledziewski1973if you lack faith then you dont get to heaven. That’s why people hate christians. The bible states that if people dont have faith on jesus or worship another god then that means they are completely blacklisted from heaven and some christians would ride and die with that statement.
@@przemeksledziewski1973 well to put it bluntly, God accepts that you don’t want him and you’re eternally separated from God. That’s what Hell is by its basic definition, according to Christianity. If heaven in this case is good, and all good things come from God, then it would be easy to suggest that the “apart from god” would include no good.
BEST case scenario is that for me heaven is literally my own imagination. Nothing more nothing less. My own mind where my thoughts are my power and i can create what ever the hell i want just by thinking it. I can destroy for fun, Create and see what happens, go down different paths, Relive my life and do things differently to see what happens. I mean it really can't get better than that. Your minds your own universe.
I think that is exactly what is happening. It is impossible to just live once, also if you create by thoughts you know results after but this may scare you and then next thought is unpredictable. Probably the worst thing is fear and other is ignorance. We constantly learning and after life there is something carried over..one life doesn't make sense
As a child, I always assumed that Heaven meant that after death, we'd have anything we wanted, whatever that was. For me, Heaven would involve an infinite library of every book ever written... and every time a new book was written on earth, this book would immediately appear in this library. This meant that I never considered boredom in Heaven could possibly a problem. I also never considered that there'd be anyone in Heaven who'd be miffed that their Heaven wasn't any nicer than anyone else's. My mind didn't work that way, and to be honest it still doesn't. By fifteen, I'd completely rejected the concept of Hell, so I assumed that evil people would either suffer annihilation or be reincarnated so they'd have another chance to get it right. Or maybe just as people would be healed of their physical ailments, their psychological disorders would automatically disappear as well, and they'd thus be good then. As I grew older, I began speculating that this physical life was just a step in a longer journey of self-development which would continue ever onward. Or maybe if Paradise ever palled, you'd have the option of volunteering for reincarnation. But since then after becoming acquainted with fundagelical ideas of Heaven... yeah, an eternity of doing nothing but praising God over and over 24/7 without any break does sound pretty hellish, doesn't it?
I'm sure that you've grown out of this sort of mindset by now, but your comment about people who are evil naturally having psychological disorders stood out to me. Is this something that had been taught as part of your religious upbringing? I have seen this idea circulate in other religious spaces, especially in groups that believe demons cause mental illness. I'd love to talk more about it!
I like most of what you said, but the thought still remains of eternity. The Earth isn't going to last for all of eternity that means that books aren't going to be written for all of eternity. At some point the Earth will end the people will stop existing and the books will stop being written and then you still have all of eternity without new books. Eventually you're going to read them all eventually you're going to get bored.
@@BecomePneuma11235The thing is boredom is caused by neurochemistry. You see your brain works to maintain a balance of chemicals that cause happiness and sadness. It's why you feel depressed after a week long vacation of fun for no reason. Boredom is your brain making things that were fun for you release less and less dopamine to maintain that balance I imagine the afterlife, if it exists, to be a place of genuinely true free will. Where you can "will" yourself to be eternally happy and entertained, or eternally miserable
Thank you Brandon!! As a deconstructing Christian I was scared of hell. That has been kind of dissipating but I was still really scared of dying. I have been starting to appreciate that 80 odd years of consciousness is probably enough and actually maybe I don’t want to live for ever. This video has helped tremendously, and I will focus on every single moment of this life with all it’s beauty and terror!
You're not alone... in fact it's staggering to think how many humans thru history have lived their lives in fear of hell. We are lucky to live in an internet age where people can talk and support each other, and hopefully humans will enter a new era where that fear disappears.
First off death concerns us all and scares most of us. It's hard to shake the feeling that an intelligent life that can end is a kind of torture. Once our eyes are open, once we are alive everything that means anything to us seems to need to last (even if it's just in our memories). So your concern/fear about death and the afterlife (Hell) are normal, "stock" even. Fear of Hell dissipates with maturity, both natural and spiritual. It's one of the reasons you never see terrified or angry elderly in church. As we get older we understand how little control we have over our ultimate fates and we come to acquiesce to that which we cannot control. With wisdom comes comfort, so to speak. My question for you is this: If you were afraid of Hell, and that was a bad thing for you, why is life being "terrifying" a good thing?
Yea, I'm a strong atheist.. but my instincts and meditations lead me to believe death is not the end.. and if I'm wrong.. I won't care cos I'll be dead.. so it's a win-win to assume i just get another new and improved life like the hindus say. I think that's why we all deep down want to make the world better because we know we're stuck here and will probably be back. In another form. There.. your terror is destroyed
This is spoilers, but The Good Place tackled the idea of heaven being monotonous. All the residents had been there for thousands of years and were miserable because the "highs" of eternal happiness were no longer effective. The end solution the characters came up with was actually to give all the residents a chance to leave existence, like a second death. It was truly beautiful.
And I still think the Good Place system Chidi created is the best way to go about it because not only is there room to improve, there is room for it to end.
my argument with this is that there’s a possibility we won’t have a concept of time in the afterlife, nor would we care enough because all that our soul would know is the joy of being united with god, aka its purpose. we would transcend the concept of time, and the care for it. pure peace and love forever with a heavenly family and with god/jesus ( im not exactly sure how the trinity works ) is what christians look forward to ( haven’t read the bible, just looked into religion a bit, and went to church as a kid, and youth group in high school. so again, won’t know 100% about this )
Did you ever watch The Good Place? This is what I like about how it ended: the main protagonist gave people the option to leave the Good Place after they were done having fun, and learning, and exploring, and improving themselves, because everyone had turned into these stupid happiness zombies, unable to do more with their afterlives. Having the option to leave is what inevitably gave the experience meaning, because humans are meaning-makers by nature.
The good place .. is not heaven, in fact it's a depiction of hell, 'eternal stasis' is not the Christian heaven, that's a hinduist/Buddhist idea of heaven and not of Christianity. Christian heaven is supposed to be ever growing, people work to make new things, it's not eternal stasis.
@@iprobablyhaveapoint, other way around. The Bible even says that all the residents of Heaven circle God and sing "his" praises for eternity, while the Buddhist and Hindu ideas of Heaven and Hell are not only very varied, but also, they do eventually end. If you're a god and you burn off all your good karma, you at once reincarnate into the Narakas (Hells) for a sense of contrast, and other way around if you burn off all your bad karma in the Narakas: you get reborn in a better place, again for contrast's sake.
My mother very much clings to the idea of heaven because she needs to believe she's going to be reunited with my father... and all of her beloved dead relatives. A big family reunion. But in this life, she cries because her two beloved children are atheists and won't be in heaven with her. She's 85. I don't press the issue. 😔 Thanks again for another great video. Brandon ❤️
During my deconstruction and ultimate deconversion, the concept of a heaven where all things are good is one where we lose our being. We would lose all memories of the very stuff that shaped us which includes family. We wouldn’t recognize the ones who are there unless we cruelly forgot the ones who are not so that we couldn’t be saddened by their absence. We would be automatons with a single programming to ONLY understand infinite worship. But my parents are aging, as well, and I don’t push it.
@@BessieRiggs I was always struck by the very human constructs that the heaven supposedly consisted of. Things that are important to humans. Very current ones. Mansions, streets of gold? No tears, no pain, no sorrow... All of those are human things. If it's not a physical body then, how would any of those things be relevant at all? As a kid I got the endless church service kind of vibe. Which I thought was a fate worse than death. So even a very early age, the whole concept of heaven made zero sense. And the injustice of eternal punishment for finite petty crimes like telling a lie or stealing when you were a child etc.. the opposite of just or merciful. 😔
Do you have evidence God doesn't exist? YOU'RE not going to heaven, but your parents can be happy together. If you know something relevant that I don't know -- convince me!
@@20july1944 If my mother cries in this life because her children are going to hell, why would she not cry even harder in heaven when her children are in hell? Is she suddenly going to start being happy? Her children are in hell because she's in heaven with my father? Will she suddenly stop feeling grief and sadness about her children who are in hell for eternity while she's in heaven? How exactly does that work? But she stopped being who she was in life? Does she stop caring about all the people that she cared about in life? Her own father being one of them. He wasn't a Christian either. She's going to be a happy if this family reunion where her beloved father isn't there nor her beloved children? But she's going to be happy? Did you even listen to the video? Brandon answered this question in the video directly. Or are you just trolling the comments?
As a child, this is my first real fear that I can remember. My family tried to comfort me and explain all the same things you did, but it never was enough. That was the crack. From there, I started looking for other flaws and had serious doubts about the whole thing soon after.
Speaking on denying themselves. I came clean about my Asexuality, Aromanticism, Atheism, and Politics to my parents. They handled it pretty well, but I was...disturbed to learn my Dad was priding himself on the not acting on his attraction to men. He said he has forced himself to focus on being with women. He's been married twice, including my mom. I still really don't know how to think of it.
same but instead it's my mom who has denied her true self. i semi recently have learned that it's possible she might be bi but she has forced herself to be only with men, im not saying she's unhappy with making that choice, I'm simply saying that denying yourself of who you truly are can become a deep hidden hurt, if humans do have a soul I'd imagine this kind of hurt is highkey sinful to said soul.
@@poxie2637 I think it mostly disturbed me, because my mom's reaction indicated she didn't know that either. Even if she practices what she preaches, then that has to be in the back of her head. I also know that my dad is vehemently LGBTIA+-phobic. It's just a really sad situation all around and I really can't do anything about it.
@@demodiums7216 I was trying to explain what Asexuality actually was, and my dad was all, "oh yeah, that's normal! You really have to work at getting into real relationships. Attraction has nothing to do with it! It'sa choice." And I got a rather disturbing description that my dad thought sexual attraction was not how relationships are initiated because his sexual attractions were all the sinful kind.
This is absolutely amazing. I can’t believe how extreme some of my Christian friends seemed after I left the religion. They don’t even ask why I left after 39 years of life. They don’t even think about these things at all. Everyone just imagines their own personal heaven, which isn’t even biblical. They are so obsessed with their religion; it takes so much time out of their daily lives. Just the fact that there are so many different heavens and hells across all of the different religions just makes it total nonsense to me. It’s so obvious the idea of heaven is simply for the people in mourning to cope with the loss. I realized everybody (religious and non-religious) mourns in a similar way to a certain point: they talk about their happy memories of the person that passed away. I don’t need the idea of heaven. I talk about all of the fond memories of the person to keep their memory alive. That’s all I need.
The idea of heaven isn't a coping mechanism. I mean it can be of course. But heaven is the amazing opportunity of being with Jesus Christ the One who died for you and for me. The One who serve Him and have relationship with Him. Heaven is a reward for us Christians who lived a life pleasing Him. Jesus still loves you and He hasn't abandoned you. It's not too late to build relationship with Him. He would love you to be apart of His Kingdom.
@@MalkosIzel I would have to disagree. We do care. In fact we care so much that we are persecuted for sharing the gospel of Jesus Christ. Now those that don't care with suffer the consequences for knowing the truth and not sharing or only caring about themselves. Jesus loves you. And remember a lot of ppl claim to be Christians and aren't and simply may go to church or may just believe in Jesus but not necessarily FOLLOW Him. Jesus loves you. And He wants you to be His friend. He wants you to confide in Him as your Father. Someone whom you can talk about all your problems too. He listens and the best listener at that. The times I've hit rock bottom and yet He listens and helps me and I see the help and how He blows my mind is just astounding and knowing Jesus is literally like the best person you can know how will have your back when you turn to Him
We Christians choose to accept the evidence that God exists and He raised Jesus from the dead. You offer no contrary evidence, and you're blandly and passively self-destructive. Shrug.
How about instead of repeating the same braindead Christian tagline bullshit, you actually refute or discuss in any way any of the concepts and points that the video creator posited? Oh wait, you won't.. you're engagijng in fingers-in-the-ear "la la la!", head in the sand techniques so that you don't have to engage critical thinking for the first time since you abandoned reason and became Christians. Because, that might mean you have to face your existential fears about life and death, and might have to wrap your head around uncomfortable concepts like the adults in the room have had to do their entire adult lives. Grow up, Christian sheeple.
I lost a son at the age of 20 in a car crash. When he was 8 he asked me where do we go when we die. I didn't know what to tell him since I am an agnostic but not to scare him I told him that we sing and pray to god, and he asked me what else do we do, I told him we sing and listen to music while worshiping god, his answer was, I don't want to go because I'll get bored-
It's wrong to think it would be boring. The God who has created the whole universe with the infinite knowledge we can gather in it, surely is not running out of things to do.
(spoiler alert) I loved the ending of "the good place" because you could leave Heaven when YOU chose. Just pass thru the door and, you no longer exist, no pain, no punishment, just the equivalent of thoughtless sleep.
THIS. Christian here, questioning the morals of religion. This is the most perfect concept of the afterlife imo. I swear if it's not like this I will cry-- Jokes aside, this is leagues better than the "heaven" we were told about in Religion class. I'm pretty sure the afterlife is a simulation you can control, where you can sleep for eternity if you'd want, you can experience the old nostalgic days of your childhood once again, you can finally find out small things you were always wondering about (why do we cook bacon and bake cookies), yadda yadda. All in your own personal bubble, with no one interfering. You can just cease to exist if you choose to, or if you don't need to exist anymore. Now THAT'S a heaven I'd prefer. Any thoughts though? I feel like something's missing, or there are a few flaws. Correct me on some things I may have missed.
I was a lead singer in a very popular LOCAL band. So I got a lot of praise and signed autographs even though I thought it was silly and I'm pretty modest. I couldn't imagine being worshipped for an hour let alone eternity!! Why would anyone need or want that?
This video is so good. I’ve saved it to send it to my mom when I carefully determine that the time seems right. My mom spends hours and hours praying every day, goes to church twice a week, and deprioritizes spending time with her family and living her life, fixing her actually crazy sleep schedule because during virtually the entire night she “has to pray” without her family “bothering” her, causing her to be asleep during most of the day when the rest of the family is awake and could be spending time with her and going out and doing things. It’s also the main thing keeping her from pursuing her passion in art (she loves it, is extremely talented but never does it because “she doesn’t have time” even though she is retired). And she’s doing this all because of her fear of hell (which she has outwardly admitted to me at times), her fear that I will go to hell (she knows I’m an atheist), her fear that her family is in danger because everyone else “isn’t praying enough,” her fear of an apocalypse that could come at any moment, the promise of an afterlife… It is quite literally robbing her of her life! I’ve never heard anyone describe this as the “inverse of Pascal’s Wager” but you are absolutely right. Thank you so much for talking about this.
I made a reverse pascal wager video years ago. Of course that didn't change my religious views or anything. I believe there's plenty of things to enjoy in this life and the next.
'wasting your One Garaunteed life!' That one has really been bothering me. It's so weird that they don't see that *they* are the ones taking a gamble, not me. It's so frustrating.
@@liabowden8526 Exactly! Properly understood pascal's wager makes less sense and is FAR dumber than selling literally everything you own and buying lottery tickets with every cent. 1) in pascals' you can NEVER get back anything you lost (ie you can earn more $$ but once spent time is gone and destroyed relationships are infinitely harder to repair) 2) there is infinitely more reason to believe (or more important KNOW) the 'payout' from the lottery exists over any and every proposed concept of 'heaven' 3) Also what is 'heaven' REALLY offering, an incredibly vague, totally incomprehensible, not even poorly defined 'infinite niceness' (which in practice amounts to less than a cool breeze on a hot day), or an eternity of 'meh'. At the cost of REAL tangible enjoyment now and often the chance to make this ONE life we know we get BETTER for EVERYONE. Which not only trades MASSIVE benefits for essentially NO REWARD it is also ridiculously, infinitely selfish.
No amount of praying will save you from facing the music. She will be held to account for the things she has done. Follow the commandments. Make the world a better place. Do not fritter away the time you have here. Strengthen your relationship with your family and friends. If you have hurt people, apologize and make it right.
The afterlife concept has been a hot button topic for me for a long time. When I was younger and din church the concept of hell would keep me up at night. The paralyzing fear of death it gave me made it worse. Every little burn was 1000's of times more terrifying, imagining it as an eternal feeling almost unconsciously. Heaven never felt like paradise as much as it felt like a deserted island surrounded by fire. I can't stand the idea of dying then becoming a slave. My father passed away when I was wrong and I kept close to the church because I wanted to see him in heaven. 10 years. For ten damn years, I lived in a futile hope that took away my ability to grieve. I, to this day, still blame the church. When I finally came to the crushing realization that I'll never see my father again, despite my best efforts, I fell into the worst depression of my life and almost my last. Because I was lied to. Because my pastors were too cowardly to tell me the truth. I can sleep peacefully now having accepted that my father would rather see me work hard than to cry. That I'll get to rest at the end of my life. That it's me who is caring for myself and making the effort to better everything around me. I get to hurt, feel love, feel regret, learn lessons, practice, make friends, and all of this is all I ever want. To live a life that I'll be proud of. Heaven is a spit to the face of everything I value and hold dear.
Heaven has all good in this world and more, most importantly good friends, but we have to repent (that's it, we have to let sin go), God is good we just have to trust him. When it comes to truth regarding the video. God is the Lord of glory, the glory we clearly see in this reality is a small portion of the glory in heaven. Gold is a element with small glory but it is a beautiful element as there will be other glorious designs. We will have the same freedom apart from sin in this world like designing technology that we can possibly even fathom like people couldn't fathom a cellphone a few hundred years ago. With God all things are possible and he will give every good gift with the possibility of infinite good. God made creation in wisdom and I believe the reason we started in a world we can rebel against God's good design is because creation has to know that a choice outside of God's will is corruption and evil, because there is only one that is good and that is God. I chose good and if God is good and made creation then creation is good, we are not as wise as God and would be a fool to trust our own reasoning over God's. Jesus is the way truth and life, choose good and avoid corruption so we can be with Christ. God bless you all.
@@deebz2626 Don't desire to challenge the holy and good world God created. If you do you it cause pain to God because he is holy and incorruptible, and disrupt the order for creation. Apart from paradise and all that is good is hell. We have the free will to choose obedience to a good holy God or disobedience. God loves us so much he sent his only son to tell us the truth and repent, we killed him and God used that action to pay for our sins. We just have to follow Jesus to inherit eternal life with him. I don't know who would deny such a gift of grace.
@@specilegg You bark like a wonderfully indoctrinated little lapdog. You prop up this dictator because you cannot fathom the idea that there is nothing after you die. You can't handle the idea that bad deeds go unpunished, or that bad people don't get what they deserve. Guess what, that's what happens, daily. Instead of actually making effort to better the world you already gave up on, you prattle on about a land of make believe for everyone else you get to drown in the pool of apathy you call religion. This is the only life you get and you're perfectly content in giving it up in hopes you don't have to make any effort to be a good person now. Because who cares about each other or the planet when you're going to paradise when you eventually kick the bucket. I couldn't imagine being subservient to an authoritarian man child.
When I was still a Christian, soon before deconversion, I used to think about it a lot. I thought about death, heaven and hell a lot, partially because of my depression and suicidal thoughts. Afterlife made little sense to me, but I still believed as best I could. And I prayed to God, asking and wondering if he could just let me stop existing instead of making me live forever with no way out. It was such a relief to finally allow myself to believe that there is likely nothing after death.
Speaking of walking into oblivion, there was a show I used to watch on Netflix called The Good Place. It was basically about the afterlife. The very last episode actually resonated with me. They had finally made it to the good place and when they got there, everyone had turned to mush brains because they kept doing the same things for like thousands if not millions of years. By the way, there was really no god in this heaven. It was just a bunch of good people (no evil people) who had the ability to do whatever they want....go to other planets, relive their favorite moments when they were alive....etc. And just like you said, they got bored and their brains turned to mush. So they came up with a new concept to help alleviate their extreme boredom. They created a doorway that they could walk through whenever they no longer wish to exist. They literally walked into oblivion. One of the characters said something really profound. Once he made his mind up it was time to no longer exist, he spent one last night with his partner who was also in the good place with him. He said (paraphrasing) "A wave comes to the shore but the wave always returns to the ocean". When people walk through this doorway, their physical form just evaporates and all of their atoms and molecules are scattered back into the universe. Choosing non-existence was something even more intriguing to me than the concept of heaven or hell. I think as an atheist, choosing non-existence would be preferable than spending eternity in heaven as a mush brain.
Watched it too. And like you, I resonated with the ending. As a non christian though, one gets the sense about how the system is so warped, there's mistakes in souls being allocated wrong destinations. One big fraud.
Having gone to Catholic school for K-8 with attending mass every week, the conception I remember having of heaven was essentially like a solipsistic void that you could shape to your will... which of course 7-9 year old me just used to play all the games that my parents didn't buy for me, haha. When I see what Christians think of heaven, I can't help but see all the ideas brought about by human experience. People having physical bodies, distinct physical places, physical objects and things that are valued as they are on Earth, worship done through song and aural praise, class hierarchies of the strong above the weak with the strong being the "goodest" and the weak being the "ungoodest", physical warehouses of natural phenomena that God sends to Earth. These ideas are just so utterly human.
@@jp22344It's so strange that this omnipotent and infinite god can't help his beloved children keep his one true word straight. He had it written originally in some obscure script used by desert people that almost nobody else knew and which would be nearly lost and forgotten a couple thousand years later, allowed it to be translated poorly to Roman, Greek, and English, allowed it to be distributed badly, misrepresented. You'd really think he could atleast help us in this one way. By making his word, the thing saving us from eternal flaying and burning and torture, easy to understand. If not that, then atleast clearly understandable
Sidebar: I despise comfort. My idea of enjoyment is testing my limits. Hiking in the cold rain. Falling down a hill but reaching the top. If suffering with achievement doesn’t exist in either Heaven OR Hell, where does that leave me?
Cant you just do that in heaven as well? Just turn yourself into your former human form and test your limits hiking mountains, riding the seas etc. I thought the idea of heaven means you can do anything you want. You can just choose to do more hard stuff by limiting yourself.
@@XEROXAYUKI like the Holodeck with the safety protocols turned off. I love this idea of Heaven. But is it a place where suffering doesn’t exist? Or CAN’T exist? CAN you turn the safety protocols off in Heaven? Fascinating questions.
I’m a Christian (16) right now, but after watching this video (and some others from this channel) that is very subject to change. I’ve seen several videos from other atheists (mainly Gen. Mod. Skeptic) and I was able to rationalize it as them not being taught the real Christianity, and instead being raised in some hypocritical version of it. You, however, actually dug into the core foundations of the faith and logically analyzed them more thoroughly than any theology teacher, family member, or priest has. I’m still extremely torn, but I’m starting to lean away from Christianity and tbh I’m running out of questions. Regardless of where I end up, I will be stronger and more confident because of you. Thank you 🙏
What I think is disturbing is the common assumption that if Christianity and Islam aren't true- and there are ample logical reasons to come to those conclusions- then the default option is to be an atheist. While the concept of an active, benevolent God is impossible to reconcile with our recognizable observed reality- with babies born with missing organs or sick and incapable of surviving, sex trafficking of children and every other unholy money making scheme humanity indulges in recreationally- there are many questions atheism has no answer for. One such is the existence of consciousness, and how- if this reality is just dead material space with nothing to connect us- an unconscious reality- then how are we conscious? There are circumstances where logic and reason break down and can't be relied upon. So any attempt at a holistic comprehension of all reality would be fundamentally beyond the parameters of our minds to conceive. To what degree do we create our own realities? The cognitive sciences are revealing what shaman and speculative philosophers have long contended. "We humans don't believe what we see. We see what we believe."
I think you’re incredibly strong and courageous to face these truths so early in your life, fortunate really… don’t be afraid Xavier, you’re growing and it’s painful sometimes but many throughout the course of human history have discovered the value of experiencing pain. You are growing in awareness, it’s a powerful process and we all experience a wide range of emotions and sensations, it’s natural to feel what you feel. If you haven’t already, perhaps try to find some people who are exploring similar themes in their lives, that can be a game changer for you. I wish you the best, take care my friend.
I spent my first 18 years in a Christian home and never once doubted my faith. Now that I’m in college I’m taking a deep look into what I believe and there more I listen to opposing views the less I believe in Christianity
Man, I love how you're taking all the questions that echoed through my mind for decades, that I strived to ignore, and actually asking them. I remember thinking almost ALL of this throughout my time as a believer. I was more excited about avoiding Hell than I was going to Heaven, which I later figured HAS to be different than pastors described it. But the thing that really sold me that Heaven would be a horrible place was the day that my dad and I were discussing the death of Betty White. I was already a non-believer at the time but I can't recall if I had told him yet (I think I had not). I told him a story about how White's husband had died years ago and she was quoted as saying she looks forward to going to Heaven so that she can be reunited with him. My father said "well, that's sweet but in Heaven all earthly ties will be dissolved. She won't be married to him anymore." I had heard him say stuff like that before but hearing it as a middle-aged man it seemed to really sink in. My wife miscarried early in our marriage (twice actually, but the first time was within the first month so we were barely even acknowledging it was real while the second time was four months in, she was showing, and we were buying baby stuff). Going through that second miscarriage was a traumatic event that I managed to get through only because I consoled myself that one day I would be reunited with that child. Not to mention that at around the same time, my grandmother passed away, so I enjoyed the image of my unborn child and their great-grandmother meeting for the first time in Heaven and being able to know each other. For that matter, I had a cousin who experienced about the worst possible thing a new parent can experience; hours after the birth of his son, he and his wife were told that their new baby had a serious heart defect that had somehow been missed on all prenatal tests. At six weeks old, this precious little one passed away. Even my father quoted King David, saying "he cannot come back to me, but I can go to him", and I took some solace that one day my cousin would meet his son again and they would be reunited. And here was my dad telling me that none of this is even going to happen. When I get to Heaven, my unborn child, and everyone else I know, will be part of the faceless throng of worshippers. My cousin will never see his son again to a point of acknowledging him as his long-lost son. And my father was LOOKING FORWARD TO THIS?? He was calling this PARADISE? His life goal was to attain THAT? That didn't sound like Paradise to me, that sounded like a nightmare!
I would agree with you that would be sad if that's how it is. Personally I'm confident we will have families in heaven because, as you say, we would be a faceless and sexless hive of drones otherwise. A good King or Father would want EVERY person in heaven to have a happy family -- why not?
@@20july1944 Imagine that, you have a completely unbiblical and made-up view of what heaven will be like because the description in the bible sounds too mundane and insanely boring to you.
As an atheist who was formerly a Christian, you've discussed here a lot of things I've thought about regarding the Christian heaven, but you've also made some good points I hadn't considered. It pains me a little to think of my Christian family members who believe in this version of heaven, and who can't see just how messed up it would actually be if it were real.
It pains me to see how focused we are over another realm when we aren't even good on earth look harsh truth is if you're having these thoughts then you won't have to worry about heaven if you know what I mean please take a deep breath and focus down on love and family let the Bible be just that once you get your life in order then try looking at it again.
@ton042005 Exactly. If we have faith we don't need every single question answered. Evidence that God exists in this world based on what we see with your eyes is faith enough. Jesus didn't die for us just so we would die ourselves. He saves us from eternal torment.
One of THE most POWERFUL videos I've ever seen! This was the original set of issues I ran into as a teen that began my process of deconverting. Man this is good stuff!
This arguments are elementary at best. He's trying to fit infinity into a box. I've listened to every single point and he's just pissed because Heaven sounds too good to be true. What if we're here to learn and choose to be here? What if we do indeed keep learning and growing in the Afterlife?
Here’s my deconstruction. Heaven is not a place of winners or temporarily. It’s eternally good, filled with environments, people, creatures, sounds, and colors schemes of any scope and flavor.
OMG this video is like coming home in terms of my interpretation of God and the Bible. Lucifer literally got kicked out of heaven for questioning whether there could be 2 kings and 2 kingdoms. God even throws all the gold and jewels that he gave him in his face. It's such a narcissistic idea of a supposedly perfect being who should be above all this. We need more videos like this
That whole concept/conversation between God and Lucifer never made any sense to me in the first place. IIRC, God says something like, "Lucifer, I created you perfect until iniquity was found in you." It can't be both: if Lucifer was created perfect, then no evil could be found in him ever; if Lucifer wasn't created perfect, then God is fallible.
It's not a matter of 2 kings and 2 kingdoms as much as it is: God created everything (including Lucifer), Lucifer created nothing, so who is superior? You do not understand who God is if you think that you can be His equal.
Thank you so much for addressing this! The fear of heaven was one of my biggest factors that led to my deconstruction. When ever I brought it up with my fellow Christians at the time, they always seemed shocked as if they hadn't thought that heaven could ever have a down side. Thank you Brandon, for helping me know I'm not alone in finding how disturbing the concept of heaven really is.
The problem is that children are fed a sugar-coated description of heaven - one that makes it sound like a never-ending Disneyland. Then they read the Bible and learn that heaven is more accurately described as a state of endless enthrallment to God. So, per those descriptions, heaven will be more like school. Or worse than school: the military.
@@underoakss I prefer to think that God will be able to tailor Heaven to each individual's sensibilities, so that even if we ARE enslaved, we'll never be the wiser and won't care. I also think our memories will be erased an infinite number of times so that eternity will not become boring for us - but we'll still somehow be able to remember all our friends and loved ones there with us.
Brandon, you really are the smartest guy in the room…another great one. I’ll never forget trying to wrap my imagination around why a never ending church service would even sound like a place you wanted to spend more than a day in…until they fed you the concept of hell 😂
@@20july1944maybe you should rewatch this whole video, there's plenty reasons why no one should want to go to heaven. The only real difference between heaven and hell, is one smells worse.
@@XRamenmaX No, you're wrong and I think you should spare us the headache of having you in heaven. Critiquing heaven is pointless when the question of God's existence is the key question and I'd love to chat about that with you based only on science and history.
When I was a young child, I remember having panic attacks in the middle of the night whenever I got caught in the feedback loop of trying of conceive of eternity and how my life will never end.
I was in tears because I'm passionate about this area also. Thinking how those who care for me and love me would be ok with me going to hell because I'm not a believer. I, of course, don't believe this. There's no way that I could. It's a horrible thing. Thank you for putting words to this that I can relate to. I appreciate it.
I'm just going to simplify it the secret to life is finding your Adam or your Eve that's when your real journey starts if you want to be real look at the start of the Bible you can't move forward without your soulmate I wish I was lying to you but trust me that's the key to this life find your damn soulmate I'm not lying to you
@Ton042005 did you not see the video? I swear you Christians look for videos that try to debunk Christianity in order to find people to convert. BTW it is highly likely Adam and Eve didn't even exist. Now, you're in title to your own beliefs, but please don't force said beliefs onto people. Especially on a non Christian video
@@zoeyanslow664 well I never spoke my religion and Adam and Eve was just an example sorry I didn't say spouse I also was just saying instead of worrying about heaven as if you are going to die today why not focus on love that has nothing to do with christians it's me saying live a full life with love and it will all make since but I appreciate your comment.
@@zoeyanslow664 and hahahaha convert lol I'm a gammer lol I was just trying to help but I understand but next time it would be nice if you asked me instead of assuming.
When I was a Christian I felt bad reading Revelation, because I felt for the 24 elders/ and beast that repeat the same phrase over and over, "Haleluyah Salvation and Glory", I was like do i have to sing tk god over and over, I would get tired. When I was a Christain I didn't wanted well in the later years, wanted to go heaven and live forever. Especially after watching the Good place, people just ran out of things to do and just wanted Anihilation
If I remember, there is a TV series(short stories) about people living in heaven and they got bored because they done everything. So, God(I think) create a portal but one of the resident of heaven said "What is other side in this portal", God reply " I don't know?". In the end, the people of heaven step into the portal without any hesitation, willing to step into the unknown. The only people that I recognize is Phoebe(Lisa Kudrow) from friends. Funny if she just sing smelly cat for all eternity.
@@lokisg3lol sin existed before man kind it started in heaven and God allowed it drop on earth and blame 2 beings that didn't know much while he knew what would be and didn't protect nor defend eden let the Devil stay there and then acted as if he didn't know he was there when he can see things before i5 happen
The Good Place did a great job of showing exactly the problems with heaven that you describe here; specifically, that people will eventually get bored and want to leave, but they can't. Highly recommend that show if you haven't seen it.
@@GhostzinZ just because it’s another plane doesn’t mean you don’t have your consciousness and emotions..I thought the whole point of the afterlife was to have some sense of self after death like wants,memories etc. imagine doing the same thing for 1 billion years idc what mental gymnastics you wanna use that would drive anyone insane dude
Imagine spending the remainder of your eternal existence soley praising someone that won't save a drowning family - even when they're begging and praying to him to save their lives - just to feed his inflated ego. And that's all you get to do.
@@andrewdowns3673 Imagine spending your whole life trying to prove you do not exist. We're not created, and believe when you die your entire life ends ...
What a great video. It's so wonderful to hear this expressed so well. I've been complaining about this for decades to any Christian who would listen. "If I end up in heaven because I believed, and my child ends up in eternal torment because they didn't, does this horrify me while I'm in heaven? If it does, in what sense is that heaven? And if it doesn't, in what sense is that me?"
I kinda hope the "afterlife" is more like a loading screen. Where you can review your stats of the last life you lived and you can either choose to create a new character or log off.
I hope that you become a deity and have meaningful interactions with other deities and humans....but also like have the ability to reincarnate or even stop existing.
This is why my idea of "heaven", as in the best case scenario for an afterlife, wouldn't be a biblical heaven of God's creation but an eternal lucid dream of my own design where I can just do whatever the hell I want, sins included
I'm a 51 year old atheist but was very religious in my 20's, obsessively so, and I basically read and thought my way out of it over many years, day after day reading and thinking. Rivers of ink and blood have been spent on these arguments and many 'sophisticated' theologians have had their say, but the arguments that a child can come up with are good enough. Your channel cuts away the bullshit and tells it like it really is. So thank you. I look forward to going through your videos
It's funny and I'm embarrassed to say this but I never really thought about the conceptual contradictions an eternal existence in heaven raises until watching this. You're absolutely right that it doesn't hold water for very simple extrapolations.
This reminds me of something my roommate in college, who grew up athiest, said about heaven one day "I've asked Christian friends and family members what they'd do in heaven and a lot of them say stuff like, 'eat a bunch,' 'have sex all the time,' or other similar things, and it baffles me because you can do that stuff now. What's the point of holding back now if you intend to do that stuff either way?"
@@B1-997I see this alot. You don't experience boredom in Heaven, you have to be alive for that because time is limited. Emotions don't have the flavor they do here. Bored, cold, tired. It's more of a scale between dread and euphoria.
This is of Course Not what Christians Actually believe about heaven and Atheists need to stop Lying. Christians do Not Think You "Eat a Bunch" In Heaven or "Have Sex Al the Time" In Heaven. What do You Really Hope by Lying? By the way I am well Aware hat thee are 48 Thousand Denominations of Christianity that Don't All Agree with wat My Denomination teaches and that I do not speak for All Christians. What You don't Understands is, You can't Show Any Christians Saying this.
I'm so glad you covered this. I could never reconcile with being s spirit in bliss but able to see the suffering of living beings and feeling no empathy. How could I watch my loved ones suffer in earth as i bask in eternal glory and sing praises all the live long day.
I often thought about the horrors of heaven as a believer... including the issues you raised. Others shamed me when i brought it up with them. When I believed in the fairytale i use to ask other believers "will there be no death in heaven?" .then id say "Im so glad we will all be vegetarian and no animals will die for meat." They were so shocked, not happy and had no response😅
There will be no human death God will provide the food not like we need to eat in heaven. Beside there is a difference between human death an animal death. It always baffles me when people try to put worldly attributes on God even though he is not of the world. Also if the no death rule also applies to animals we are taking about the all mighty one he can just create food for us to eat.
@@TomGraham-mk2wl Animals don't have a human soul so no it is not the same. We can kill animals for food but killing a human is different as we were made in God's image. We were created to rule over animals and animals were created to serve us.
@@zSteve1231 It amazes me that people think that animals don’t have emotions and don’t have a desire to live. Also it said no death. There is no prove that it only refer to humans.
My brother and i are both atheist and our mother always comes at us with the sad line "i just want to see you in heaven." It's hard to explain to her how little I care about a place as real to me as hogwarts. But you made a good point about the contradiction of "self" in heaven. My mother will either hate heaven because she will have to watch 2 of her children be tourtured for all eternity or she will have to comfort the reality that she, as our loving mother, will either forget us entirely or not love us enough to care once shes there lest she jeopardize the perfection of heaven.
@@stacie1595 I never said it was your job alone. The problem is how we view things. Do you know we can time travel? Yet we never use it when bringing people to Jesus Christ. Can you believe it. Also you know that whole gold mansion in heaven we always hear about? Why don't we take a small portion and use it as gold standard money? I mean it's just the way we see it. You know? Kind of the glass half full or half empty kind of thing. To me it's half full. More can be pour into it. Like all humans alive right now can become a Christian. I know for a fact. So.. . Working on that. Got any other solutions you can think of? Also for autistic kids did you know spirit cameras and time traveling trip like a field trip is all they really need? So they can object fully learm the truth of Christianity. It's not hard. We Christians just make it hard.
@@MindShift-Brandon I once saw someone online blame Isaac Newton for spending too much of his time on religion and not enough on science. That's like someone telling the world's strongest man he didn't spend enough time in the gym.
Bro you and Kristi Burke are straight killing it! It’s very refreshing watching something as destructive as Christianity get taken apart brick by brick
I just found Kristie Burk, and you’re right she is helping me deconstruct, and also the way she breaks things down is great! She is my favorite, then comes Viced Rhino, and dark matter 25! I don’t exactly know who does it, but it’s impressive! I’ve never been here before, I’m excited to listen! Being indoctrinated so young, and living in Arkansas we were spoon fed southern babtist religion! I remember after having my daughter I would cry when I was still a believer because I was told I had to love “god” more than my child! So I thought I wouldn’t get to see her in heaven!!! Religion is terribly emotionally abusive! If you count the children in church being told you’ were born a sinner, and if you don’t believe, or behave by Christian standards you’re going to burn in hell for eternity! That is what I consider emotional, and verbal child abuse! To me at least that is what religion feels like emotional abuse by people who get their morals from a violent terrible Book, and worship a morally bankrupt, selfish god! Since I have been deconstructing I’m so embarrassed I believed anything in the Bible, and I don’t know how I came to believe god was loving, and kind!Why would you worship a god that demands u love him over your family, and I can’t honestly find anything in the Bible that portrays him as kind,loving and patient! I didn’t start my deconstruction journey until 2016, and I’m 47 now! Honestly, it didn’t take too much to stop believing, it’s just getting all the programming out of my head that is hard! My grandfather was a southern babtist preacher so I was screwed from the very beginning! Now I’m embarrassed I believed such stupidity! Especially the Bible, and I didn’t even notice how anti woman it was until I started my deconstruction journey! If anyone hasn’t checked out Viced Rhino I highly recommend it! Dark Matter 25 too! So, I’m so excited to listen to someone I haven’t listened to yet!
One of the things I never understood is the "No Sin" in heaven. Can you imagine life with the 7 deadly sins not mentioning the lesser sins? There could be no feasts because that would be gluttony. You can be proud of your accomplishments because that would be pride. You can't sit around and relax because that would be sloth. Since you don't need food or drink, eating and drinking would be greed. You would be able to articulate this thought better than I, which I would love to hear.
As a child I had these same thoughts heaven and hell seemed horrible. By the time I was nine I realized men wrote unbelievable stories the others simply believed were literal without kicking the can down the road to any imagined outcome.
The word and the written word, I think we're just mind-shattering technologies that certainly seemed more magical in context than any other technology since. The "magic" of the written word was well used by those who knew how to wield it. This is reflected in scripture: In the beginning was the word, and the word was with God, and the word was God.
"The beauty of the finite" - this is a really really important statement. Thank you for it. One of my favourite activities is learning Spanish. It is the journey the I love. If someone with a click of their fingers made me fluent in Spanish - or even worse fluent in all languages I would be very upset and disappointed. This is why I think Cavafy's poem Ithaca is so important. Life is far more about the journey than the destination.
An absolutely amazing video. As a 16 year old with a very religious family i have to hear all of this all the time and its honestly comforting to find people on the internet and irl that share my sentiments, so thank you
Jesus Christ is alive and well and he loves you more than you know. So much so that he died and shed his blood for the forgiveness/pardon of all your sin/wrongdoing. If a man says he has never sinned/done wrong, he is a liar, and the truth is not in him. We are not sinners because we sin, we sin because we are sinners.
@paulgemme6056 the notion that a god was always there and made the universe out of nothing is not more rational than a big bang creating the universe out of nothing. Or a universe always being there, now is it
@@_xxClaudiaxx_ Everything has a design so everything needs a designer. Only Christ Jesus/God could design and create something as magnificent as the universe, the human body, a hummingbird. It takes a supernatural being. All Glory, honor and praise belongs to the Lord God Almighty for he has done great things.
GREAT THOUGHTS. One time during prayer meeting I went off praying about how I hope God gives me a great second body that is capable of horse riding and fighting in battle... the pastors wife came up to me later and chuckled saying something which I thought belittled the plan of heaven and thought how much pastors and their families are sometimes so ignorant to the texts that pay their bills.
I almost made a catastrophic mistake by being made to relocate to where I grew up and absolutely hated and was filled with negative ghosts from the past - thinking that I was doing the greater good and it was only for a few decades before I’d be in heaven anyway and it wouldn’t matter. I was that delusional, but mercifully my survival instinct kicked in and I rejected the very idea because all that I love is where I am currently. This video really spoke to that, especially toward the end, of wasting what we have now, or letting now be cast in gloom because we’re thinking what we should be doing to get up the tiers of bigger crowns. I really enjoyed this journey on my Sunday, I’m still surprised at how much fear there is under the rocks in my head, you’ll point something out an I suddenly realise it’s there … so please be assured that you are really helping folks like me to process stuff I’m not even conscious of, plus occasionally to have a good laugh about it.
To-do List Heaven, day one: Glorify god Heaven, day two: Glorify god Heaven, day three: sigh....go glorify again all day Heaven, day four: ffs..............
@@20july1944 You seem to get a real kick out of the idea of some people suffering for eternity. This is one of the terrible consequences of believing nonsense stories about gods, heavens, and hells. Or, perhaps religions simply attract sociopaths, rather than creating them.
@@YY4Me133 No, I didn't say that at all -- I'm a conditionalist/annihilationist and we don't believe hell is eternal punitive suffering. I would agree with you, and I often pray to God about this, that I don't support eternal punitive suffering even for Satan -- although I certainly don't seek his redemption either. However, IF there is eternal punitive suffering, I'm compelled to live with it based on my inference that God exists and my desire to have a happy afterlife if it is available.
I'm agnostic, but this is a great explanation of why I as a 9 year old started questioning Christianity, why I was a fully developed skeptic by age 11, why I was on my way out at 13, and why I had completely moved on from Christianity by 15. The more you think about it (truly think about it in depth) the more illogical any sort of after life becomes OTHER than reincarnation. Even reincarnation as we currently talk about it has issues. Just being gone once we are gone actually seems like the most just way we could go if a god does exist and the most likely option if a god does not exist.
When it comes to truth, God is the Lord of glory, the glory we clearly see in this reality is a small portion of the glory in heaven. Gold is a element with small glory but it is a beautiful element as there will be other glorious designs. We will have the same freedom apart from sin in this world like designing technology that we can possibly even fathom like people couldn't fathom a cellphone a few hundred years ago. With God all things are possible and he will give every good gift with the possibility of infinite good. God made creation in wisdom and I believe the reason we started in a world we can rebel against God's good design is because creation has to know that a choice outside of God's will is corruption and evil, because there is only one that is good and that is God. I chose good and if God is good and made creation then creation is good, we are not as wise as God and would be a fool to trust our own reasoning over God's. Jesus is the way truth and life, choose good and avoid corruption so we can be with Christ. God bless you all.
Reincarnation is at least more logical since it aligns with natural laws. Karma has it's flaws also, but it also makes some sense. The idea of a creator making everything, knowing we are going to rebel against him, in order to test us borders on psychopathy.
What you said at 5:25 brought me simultaneous comfort and dread. Dread because for about 20 years starting when I 1st started to really consider the implications of eternity there is like a 50% chance it leads to me having a panic attack of varying severity, there simply is no good option. The comfort just came from hearing another person deeply troubled by the topic.
The concept of eternity is maybe the scariest thing for me. Just, period. Because both options as I see it, either I live for eternity or do not live for eternity, are horrifying to me. I think heaven was devised to try and save this but I don’t think there is any way of saving it, UNLESS somehow there was an infinite number of things one could do in Heaven to satisfy themselves…because any finite number, *stretched over INFINITY,* will eventually become infinitely monotonous and unbearable.
I never understood why atheists wanted to deconvert people, until I became an atheist myself. There are people that I care for and love that are purposefully living lives that make them miserable. They live lifes of fear and delusion. I grew up in a conservative Christian community and it's filled with people that are in denial about their sadness. Queer people that decide to stay abstinent and will never know the ecstasy of connecting with someone on a sexual level, people who suffer from depression or anxiety that will never get help, people that don't make the art they want to or pursue careers they would excel in - all because of self repression and some misguided idea of morality. Honestly, it breaks my heart.
I remember being 10 years old and talking to my cousins about heaven. I couldn't understand how eternal life would be valuable. Even then I believed that life is only valuable because it is limited.
I asked someone about the thought of "living forever". She took it as a state of mind where one could choose to be the eternal. I perceived we were on two different wave lengths. I might have to chat again to find out where she is coming from. Communication is near impossible when each person has different definitions for words. This video was very thought provoking.
I always found the thought of being so changed that you no longer care about others that you did in life so wildly confusing. I'm an atheist, most of my family are atheists, but there are Christian people in my life that love me and care for me. And yet, like you said in this video, if Heaven is real, they will either forget about me and the impact I have had on them entirely or will rejoice that I'm burning in hell. Either of those options seem awful to me. The cognitive dissonance they must have, it's baffling.
This is the first video I've seen of yours, and I'm so glad to have found your channel! Thinking through the concept of heaven is actually what started my deconstruction, and I've never heard anyone else talk about it, but I agree that it is one of the biggest flaws in the whole religion! My first real "wait, why?" moment was the streets of gold and crowns and mansions thing. It just jumped out at me as utterly ridiculous one day, and then I couldn't stop thinking about the biblical descriptions of heaven. The final straw for me was, as you said: how am I me, or any version of me that is good, if I can have no sorrow for the people who I loved on earth, or even strangers honestly, that are now burning in hell? It became clear to me then that at least that part of the bible was not "divinely inspired," and you know once you don't trust that the bible is infallible, it's the beginning of the end.
Great video Brandon! The whole concept of heaven and hell are grossly immoral. Imagine having two children. One of the children obeys what you ask them to do. They are courteous and kind, always doing what is right. The other child is rebellious and full of hate. He is disrespectful to you and even disowns you. Would it be considered moral to lock up the rebellious child in your basement and torture him for the rest of his life? Of course not. Should you force the responsible child to spend the rest of his days thanking you that he is not being tortured like his brother. I don’t think so. Yet God is said to be our Heavenly Father and allegedly does these things in the extreme on an infinite scale. If god were an actual father on earth, child protective services would take his children and he would go to jail. It’s funny how we as mere mortals are more moral than a supposedly infinite god.
@@andrewferg8737 I have the same view of your god as I have for the antagonist present in most works of fiction. The main difference between your god and other fictional characters is that yours has a larger fan club and in I was a part of it for 3 decades.
the child doesn't even need to be courteous and kind too, they just need to worship the father, you can be a murder but along you accept him in y our heart then you can enter heaven. but if a child who did all the good deed in the world but as long they don't believe in the father, that child will be locked and torture forever...
Thanks for talking about this. I was raised Christian from the age of four and i never told people what my biggest fear was. It was Heaven and living forever, it always sounded terrible and I used to get panic attacks thinking about it.
What? 🤣🤣 well brother, our flesh will die but our souls will remain. I think you want to be in heaven with our loving and forgiving god. And we won’t mention the other option, where you do NOT want to go.
I think your biggest fear is living forever not in heaven. So you dismissed the idea of Heaven all together. But we are divine beings, much more than flesh and 4 dimensions. That voice you hear in your head is proof of the universe being more than energy and matter.
I'm so glad I found this channel. This is awesome! I love your tone, delivery, insight, research and...I just really love this channel. You have a new fan - an atheist from South Africa. Thank you for putting this out there. This issue is the most important issue of our time.
As a man with the double concoction nomenclatured Obsessive Compulsive Disorder and Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder, I can concur with your kneeslaping witticism 😁🤗😆
@@alisonbrowning9620 As a man with the double concoction nomenclatured Obsessive Compulsive Disorder and Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder, I can concur with your kneeslaping witticism 😁🤗😆
I'm an Atheist, I don't believe in heaven/hell, however I really hope that death doesn't feel like before birth. I want to have life again however who knows.
Well, it scares me, but you won’t really be able to be scared. You won’t be anything. Does a rock fear the tide? Do you remember the idea before birth? Do you have any memories of the 13 billion years before your birth? Then you will not need to experience the Google years that come after. You won’t exist anymore.
As a child sitting in 2+ hour Evangelical church services, all I could think of was that, if I a couple of hours of church made me just about die from, how was I going to get through an eternity in heaven? It would be like church forever without even coffee and cookies to look forward to afterward. That's a hard no from me. Some movies have shown versions of heaven in which people retain their own identities, build, create--even fall in love--but even that kind of idyllic existence would lose its charm after a few hundred years. Your last point hit me the hardest, I'm a member of the LGBTQ+ community and I accidentally came out to my mom at age 13 because I couldn't take anymore of the hateful, ignorant things she'd say. As a result, I was immediately sent to conversion "therapy" with a church elder who was a pedophile. Realizing that my only parent was happy to essentially destroy (and nearly cost me) my life in the name of "loving" god and longing for heaven was absolutely devastating. I was eventually able to love her again, n a guarded way but she was on her deathbed before she "forgave" me for my "sin" after giving me 37 years of o silent disapproval. Religion destroys families, lives, relationships, morality and human decency. I think of all the people whose entire purpose in life--all in the name of god--is to ruin the happiness and well-being of family, friends AND total strangers. What a waste.
quote: how was I going to get through an eternity in heaven? After the 3rd hour, you would start to sneeze. At the 4th hour you would silently piss under the bench. At the 5th hour you would create a new world. The world was created from something which could not hold his piss.
Well christians music is in all genres edm r&b rap rock whichever preference you need to look for it. Yes lgbt is demonic whether you like it or not. The common misconceptions is that the only thing you will do in heaven is worshipping?we will already have a very close relationship with God and there are Angels who do all the worshipping and never get tired. We will live in a golden city ,work according to the talents we were given by God,have feasts with jesus Christ, share our culture,talk to our ancestors and family members we never got to meet,a peaceful life ,play with animals even carnivores like lions since they won't even think of eating us,reunite with our pets that died,playing in garden which are way beautiful than we imagine,talk with angels....and so much more
I am so sorry about what happened to you. As a Christian who is planning on leaving religion (I still believe in God, but I don't believe in theists' cruel version of Him. I don't believe He is perfect, I don't think He wants people to worship Him for eternity, I don't believe that He is completely in control of everything), that is so sick. This bs paints a horrible picture of God. Man, religious people take it way too far. The things they do "in the name of God" are so sinful. I hope things have gotten better. I'm praying that they do. And then theists wonder why no one's joining their hypocritical, hateful, unnecessarily strict society anymore.
Heaven seems like a perfect solution to all our problems and sorrows until you think about it for 2 minutes. If there’s a heaven waiting for us, then everything about the current and only life we guaranteed to have becomes meaningless and just a waiting room until we enter paradise. What a terrible way to view existence.
Direct, that is a terrible way of thinking about existence. It’s a good thing that’s not what the Bible describes as the future of humans. The Evan and our earthly paradise will be one and the same which is the reason why people get mixed up so much in the Bible. So do you have a be looking forward to a future in a place that we have no experience in living would be scary. But once the Bible actually teaches, is that the heavens space of the spirit creatures in God in the physical space of all physical beings, will be home as if they are one.. therefore, making our earth like a heaven or paradise.
Even if Heaven if waiting for us, Life would be still meaningful because in Matthew 5:13-16 talks about letting your light shine so that others can see your good works. Also, Jesus said to his disciples in John 14:12 you will do greater works than I because i am going back to the father. This means that People are supposed to be productive and help others become the best version of themselves. What is point of life if not one person life's was made better by your existence? People hold on the concepts of Heaven and Hell for 2 main reasons, To reunite with loved ones who have died and to punish those who have done horrible things but is seems that they were not held accountable while they were alive on Earth. Carolyn Bryant Donham, the person who lied on and caused the lynching of Emmett Till is just one example. If the world was not so corrupt and full of suffering, maybe people would not seek "Heaven" so much as it would be more "Heaven" on Earth.
@@2l84me8 What does not make sense? I quoted the bible, which is being critiqued here, to make the point that people are suppose to create, learn, help their follow man whether there is Heaven in the Biblical sense or not. People are not suppose to live their life without leaving a positive mark on it.
There are two things that always got me about the idea of heaven. First is that if you always feel awesome and cool in heaven and there's no suffering, how do you know that it's awesome? There's nothing bad to compare it to. In life, you only know that you're happy because you know what it's felt like to feel sad. Good can't exist without bad, because otherwise it would just be neutral. The second is how can heaven be heaven for everyone? My idea of what would be heaven is completely different to someone elses. Having an endless supply of pickles would be awful for me since I can't stand them, but it would be amazing for someone else. Having tons of dogs that I can pet and love on would be amazing for me, but some people don't like dogs. How can heaven account for every single person in it? Or would we all get our own individual/specialised heavens? What if that isolationism would be hell for me?
I thought abt this too and again, if everyone experiences the same feeling of happiness in heaven, that means god manipulates our emotion, we wouldn't have free will. It rlly is stupid
When you stay a child and want all your dreams to be fulfilled later instead of living Today then you are fit to stay infantile forever and be a Christian. If not then you learn to live now.
Its 2am and I've been binging your videos for hours now. I have heard of ideas that never crossed my mind and my perception of religion has shifted completely.
Genuinely thought I was the only person who thought heaven sounded terrible as a child. I DID NOT want to go... but pushed it down and thought I would understand when I was there.
I’d want an afterlife that keeps people themselves, and allows freedom, and allows you to go back if you make a choice you normally couldn’t take back.
I would honestly like the "afterlife" if it behaved more like reincarnation or an ng+ in game terms. Being able to choose when to reincarnate and experience a new life as a different being while also getting to make contact with past lives
The logistics of Heaven are insane. Are we reunited with our parents in Heaven? But my parents had parents, so wouldn't my mom be with her parents and my dad be with his? But my grandparents had parents, and so on. Same with my kids, they may have spouses and children of their own. And this gets even more complicated with blended families, step children, orphans, etc.
Some great points here. I've used some of them, myself. The free will vs slavery is one I've been using a lot lately. If you go to heaven not having achieved perfection while alive, which no-one has, then if you do have free will, you're going to cause as many problems for yourself and everybody else as you did on earth, so there's no practical difference. And if no free will, then you're a slave. And I can't imagine anything much more intolerable than spending an eternity with a bunch of ass-kissing, goodie two shoes Jesus creepers, with nothing to do but feed into god's narcissism, listen to lyre music, and try to figure out which set of eyes to look into while talking to the angels. Things are only enjoyable because of contrast. Ice cream is best in hot weather. The best musical chords contain dissonance and tension. There is no such thing as a good story without conflict. If everything is nothing but good all day, every day, it becomes bland so quickly. And if it didn't, well, too much of a good thing is awful, too. I mean, how long could anyone tolerate an orgasm before it became painful, then debilitating, then torturous? People with that disorder that gives them constant orgasms will tell you exactly how much fun that is. And even if you could do everything you ever wanted, good or bad, eventually you'd run out of things to do, and you can only repeat them so many times before going insane. If god does exist and did create the universe, he did it because he was bored, not to benefit us in any way. And clearly he's psychotic, like an evil kid with an ant farm who, every once in awhile on a whim, decides that these ants in particular will be introduced to the magnifying glass today. I genuinely don't understand how anyone sees him as the good guy. I know lots of good, loving, moral people who are religious, and it blows my mind that they worship a character like this and think he's made of love and is omnibenevolent. I guess it's no different from anybody who keeps making justifications for staying with their narcissistic, sadistic, abusive partner: he only beats me because he loves me... It's enough of a tragedy that so many people waste their lives under this delusion-- although I'm sure plenty believers are happy enough-- but sometimes the results can be absolutely devastating. What follows is a short, true anecdote that happened recently and is truly heartbreaking. My ex- husband has an older cousin, a Mormon guy who has 3 biological kids and adopted 10 others. They're all from orphanages all around the world, from some of the most impoverished countries, such as Haiti and India, and he chose kids who had some sort of condition or issue that would make it unlikely that they would be adopted by someone else. Clearly trying to do a good thing. Less than 6 months ago, his youngest daughter unalived herself. She was 22. After the funeral, I believe actually while everyone was driving from the church to the cemetery for the graveside service, his oldest son, 23, stopped at a pawn shop to buy a gun, but instead decided to call his parents and tell them he wasn't okay. They took him to the hospital that same day, got him admitted as an inpatient. He said the reason he had wanted to buy the gun was so that he could go to heaven, where everything would be beautiful and he wouldn't have to suffer anymore. A day shy of 5 months after his sister died, he texted his parents goodbye. His dad drove to the location and, tragically, arrived just in time to hear the gunshot. I can't even fathom what they must all be feeling. And I'm pretty sure the Mormon doctrine, like other religions, says that you can't send yourself to heaven, although their rules are a bit more complicated and nuanced. I don't see how anyone could hold onto their faith after that, except for a sheer desperation that it might somehow comfort them. The dad and I were fairly close and would talk online quite a bit, and would frequently have friendly (and often frustrating, for both of us I'm sure) debates about, of all things, religion and gun control. In light of what happened, I'm at a loss as to what to say to him, as much as I'd like to reach out. This kind of thing just renews my anger and disgust at church leaders and people like Joseph Smith, who are clearly willing to do any awful thing to make themselves look good, or become rich, or marry as many young girls as they can successfully manipulate. It's people like that who make me wish there was a hell, because they deserve an eternity of torture. If there is a hell, it should be populated mostly with high level clergy and religious founders.
Wow... I wanted to watch this. I understand now that the concept of heaven is attractive to people who have lost family, especially the premature losses. After two very painful losses in the last six years in my family (my nephew in 2017 and my sister in 2023), I can see what heaven is for. It's so my sister could have imagined more time with her son, and so my Mom can now imagine more time with her daughter. Both woman, my mom and my sister, lost children to tragic road accidents. Neither one of them were ready to say goodbye to their first borns. I can understand in the valley of grief that heaven, or their limited understanding of heaven, would be a consolation for them. At least they got to, and get to imagine more time. But that is only possible if there is no thinking about it beyond that. Like you said... there is a lot that doesn't make any sense when it comes to imagining the idea of heaven as at all desirable. And yet... I get to say nothing to my mother of the ludicrousy of her belief. She is 86. She needs "heaven" even through it is a twisted imagination of one. The night my nephew died, my sister said this.."I am glad I believe in heaven, because I get to see my son again." He was 26-1/2 when he died. Now she is dead at the age of 57 and her pain is over. But my Mom's pain has just begun. Somehow I get to shake my head at it all in my own space... and not bring it up in conversation with her. It's her only solace now. In a letter she wrote that she sent me today, she writes... "She beat me to heaven, I should go first." I wish I could shout this message (about the "Problems with Paradise") from the rooftops, but because of the tragedies in my family... I get to keep it to myself for now. But thank you for sharing. Everything you said made so much sense and I totally get it. I'll keep listening... you have good stuff here!!! Time for Leviticus!!!
I can understand the appeal of heaven for the reasons you listed. Even though I'm not religious, some part of me hopes if there is something after we die then my loved ones are happy. It's just there to get us through the hard times. But it really becomes a problem when you're throwing your own life away to try and get to this other magical place you have zero control over. All I can do is be the best person I can personally be, with all my flaws and everything. If that's not good enough then there's nothing else I could have done. Another problem with the whole heaven concept, however, is there are people who literally NEVER had any chance of being a good person. The severely mentally disabled, for example. They wouldn't understand God or be able to do any actions that would get them into heaven. Some are even very violent but they have no control over that. Or people who are born narcissists or sociopaths. They are either born that way or made because of severe childhood abuse. Neither of which are likely to live a life of general well-being towards our neighbors. So are they going to go to hell for things they couldn't control? I'm sure people will argue the mentally disabled have a free pass to heaven. Would they be mentally disabled in heaven, too? The whole thing just kinda breaks down when you try to figure out the logistics of fairness in an inherently unfair system.
I lost my dad a couple of years ago. I feel kind of like you do, but I'm very vocal about my disbelief in an afterlife because I find the whole thing about a loving god now having him in his house as kind of insulting and evil. As if I'd even want to believe in the existence of a being who would kill someone and make those who know him suffer. Still, I also don't like hearing people say that their loved ones are no longer in pain after they're gone, because they also don't get to enjoy that relief. Worse, they don't know that they or anything else ever existed. At least with the concept of an afterlife you have people still knowing what happened in their life and lack of suffering, but in reality that doesn't happen. I get that some people need to believe it in order to get by, but I am just as free to express how I don't believe in it and why as they do to express their belief in it and their reason why. So I don't tell them it doesn't exist, but I make sure I don't lie to them about my own views.
When I was 16, instead of hanging out with friends, I was praying, instead of playing video games, I was praying, instead of eating, I was fasting... etc... I'm 18 and still scared god is real and I have to repent.
The Kingdom of Heaven is NOT eternally sitting on a cloud playing a harp, nor is it eternal church. There are homes in Heaven, and trees, horses, food, rivers, streets, and gates so there will most likely be exploring of God's vast creation. AND there is NO crying, NO sorrow, NO pain, and NO DEATH in Heaven. The Bible says, "No eye has seen, no ear has heard, neither has it entered the mind of man what God has prepared for those who love Him." This means we can't begin to imagine how great Heaven will be. Hell, at the very least, will be eternity without all that Heaven is. AND eventually God will bring the New Jerusalem (Heaven) down to a renovated earth and we will live for eternity in perfect Health, perfect Peace, perfect Happiness, on the earth the way it should have been BEFORE Adam and Eve sinned.
I've asked the question before of what do you do in heaven? Never get an answer. Your analysis was very thought provoking and all people should hear it. Thank you.
Majority of humans can't think for themselves and it's easier for them to just follow a crowd, it's truely unfortunate but it's the reality. Just found your channel bro, I liked and subscribed, we need more people like you! 🙂
@@evanthesquirrel 🙄 I'm perfectly capable of thinking for myself, I was just pointing out the obvious, if that offends you then you're probably one who can't think for himself.
given that i live when there are more humans on earth than at any time before or anytime soon, this is really ambarassing. How did i follow the crowd... Next time i will apply for a neanderthal career.
I’m very happy to say that I’ve realized most of these points and they were some of the first concerns I had with my faith. I have always described heaven as boring, I even described heaven as socialism or communism in like third grade(albeit very incorrectly as I still believed those to be authoritarian in nature, which couldn’t be less true). I never even bothered to use the Bible to back my arguments up, I just used what people said to me and I got a lot of discomfort and dodging.
You can't experience boredom in heaven. Just various states of euphoria, but you are correct it is objectively boring. I'm glad you can't see us. Present day Earth is the distillation of every creative thought we've had. To actually have a cat sit on your lap and purr is quite an experience. Make the most of your time here.
@@xandror bold of you to assume feeling good can’t become exhausting; when every day is the same the things that being pleasure become monotonous and the concept of inability to fail is incredibly boring. Heaven is boring
@@ToastUrbathI don't assume anything. You can't feel exhausted either. Yes it's boring but you can't experience the boredom so it really doesn't matter. It's like asking an asteroid if space is cold. I fail all the time.
@@ToastUrbath Well you don't have to believe me I suppose, another failure on my part. If I watched you take ecstacy, not knowing what it is, I could say taking ecstacy is boring, you swallow a little white pill. That's it? How boring. Do you understand now?
Hey Brandon, I'm totally with you on all of this, especially the part about supposedly not caring or being hurt about a loved one not getting to heaven if you yourself make it there. One of the absolute proofs that you will be stripped of any recognition that your loved one may not be there is actually stated in scripture. It states that there will be no marital unions recognized in heaven (you would not recognize your husband or wife), therefore it only stands to reason that you will not be able to recognize ANY person you created a relationship with - brother, sister, cousin, any other family member, friends, or acquaintances. I mean, if you won't recognize husband and wife relationships, WHY would you be permitted to recognize ANY past relationships you had with other people while living?
Appreciate this, (agnostic athiest here) And I have only heard the point of boredom and monotony of eternity. I heard it your interview with Trent. And you mentioned this is the weakest. When you understand neuro science of boredom this becomes very much weaker too. This has been a major interest of mine, the neuro science of how we get bored, feel unsafe feel pleasure and feel content etc. Even though I'm not on the camp of theism Let me tell you that boredom is optional, but most human beings don't feel like it is until they have a major experience that moves their primary brain function from dopamine and cortisol base, to see base. Dopamine-cortisol is the pleasure, fear, anger, boredom pathway. Serotonin is the contentment pathway. Under dopamine is about motivation, improvement, achievement, goals, good food good money. It's the doing pathway of our brain, it also what allows our brain to track time, to get bored over time. To have a sense of time. And we need it to survive. It's also designed/evolved to make us feel bored when you use it too much. To want something new. To not be content with what we have. To chase the next big thing. In itself it is unsustainable. It pleasure reduces on the same resistive thing. If it's didn't it brain circuits would fry and we would stop trying to improve our lives. So liked if you eat your favourite food all the time, you'll get bored of it. But if you have breaks three pleasure experience will build up again. True of everything pleasure. Sex, games, food, drugs like heroin etc etc. Not so with serotonin. Serotonin pathway if it primarily engaged over dopamine, you will not be bored no matter what. It does track time. It creates a feeling of contentment and safety. It never seeks improvement or growth in itself. It also makes one feel closer to spiritual realm or god etc. It's there pathway that is engaged under hallucinogenics, and near death experiences. People who go deep into these, describe the experience as being timeless. There is no idea of time or boredom. Things can feel like hundreds of years in these experiences or time can lose all it's meaning and so does boredom. These two pathways need to work in balance or we would die of starvation. If we just lived in a timeless state of contentment, our bodies would die. But if we just pleasure chase we become very unhappy. Think of unhappy rich people, there are lots of them. Then contest it with the happy or person. There are many examples of this as well. Of course there are also many happy rich people and a huge amount of unhappy poor people. You can experience a shift in this yourselfif you learn effe tive meditation. I can be really bored, sit down meditate, which litterally is a cessation of chasing what's pleasurable. At first I'll become more bored and irritated. But then as I go deeper into it, after about 10 minutes, I become less bored, by doing the most boring thing ever. I also start to lose the bed to track time. it feels good but it is not pleasure. It's contentment, acceptance, safety. There's nothing to do. I actually feel more excited about doing things that may have bored me previously, 20 mins earlier. I would hypothesise that if there is a heaven and we had the same physical neurological and psychological base that we do as humans, we would sit more in this timeless serotonin state. That never gets bored, makes boring things more interesting, and that teaches time not at all, or with far less importance. I've only really scratched the surface here. Happy to talk with you more about this. 😊
This is super interesting and nice to see at least one person provide some form of tangible example of how boredom could logically be a non-factor regarding eternity. I am obviously biased in saying as much, but I do think alot of these psychological 'problems' with hiw heaven works is truly born out of an inevitable lack of understanding anything outside of our current human/mortal experience in-life
Great video once again! I'm glad you started your UA-cam channel. You're gifted at articulating concepts that have always bugged people like me, who grew up in the church. When I was a kid, the concept of eternity always made me sick to my stomach
@@20july1944so by your logic if she wanted oblivion god would grant that wish..so your saying god would allow her to commit cosmic suicide 😐 isn’t suicide a sin in the bible..so god would allow an immoral act of taking one’s own eternal life in a place that’s meant to be holy and safe free from such traumas and tragedy but by your logic I guess not 😃..then that makes him a unjust god..if he really cared about the mental well being of this person then it would do everything to convince her not to commit cosmic suicide because supposedly god treats all life as scared we all his kids from what y’all Christian Extremist tell us..but he would allow suicide in this particular circumstance? That’s incredibly incoherent 🤨…Maybe it’s because existing for all eternity would drive anyone even god itself to madness..Absolute power corrupts absolutely there is no way the god you believe in is a just god
@@20july1944I’m not surprised though when god didn’t like the way we turned out EVEN THOUGH ITS FUCKING OMNISCIENT?!?! So the fact he got surprised by how “Sinful” we were should tell you something but it doesn’t for some reason 😐It decided to do the equivalent of dumping a bucket of water on a ant hill known as the flood…god sounds pretty damn violent and stupid to me how the hell did this being create everything else almost instantly but took this MF seven days to create this overheated,overpopulated,polluted Authoritarian shithole we call earth..
Your last point is the one I talk about almost every day. I have a customer that actually sits in his chair, in his bedroom, and watches Catholic crap on TV (and Faux News), waiting to die. He told me he wants to make sure he meets Jesus and he’s doing everything he can to make sure of it. It’s so sad. He’s wasting his one and only life for a fairy-tale. I hate religion so much.
When i was a child, I feared hell for the tormenting stuff and also feared heaven for the endless praises. "Imagine it's Sunday morning forever, and the service never ends..." whata boredom
Morning all, this is one of my favorite topics and one i dont see addressed nearly as much. Hope you enjoy.
Don't worry about heaven's "failures" -- you won't be there and we won't miss you.
Were you raised a Christian? I assume you were.
@@solomonessix6909 I'm unaware that God ejected Satan for not worshipping Adam, except in the Koran.
Does a similar story appear in the Bible?
Jesus the Christ, in plain English, is Joshua the Chosen.
There are two Books of Joshua one from Tribe of Ephraim and one from Tribe of Judah.
Joshua Son of Nun was from Tribe of Ephraim. Born in Egypt.
Everyone agrees the Tribe of Judah's Book of Joshua is not Jesus the Christ (Joshua the Chosen).
Anyone read the Tribe of Ephraim's Book of Joshua? It's called the Samaritan Chronicle.
Extra: did you know Joshua Son of Nun was originally named Hoshea Son of Nun? Moses changed his name with the implied meaning "May God save you from the conspiracy of the scouts".
There was no Moses.
@@ready1fire1aim1 What are the implications of that?
I don't know what your point is, assuming you're right.
It's actually counter-intuitive. People think you need to beleive in God in order to be moral, but so much immoral behavior is done under the umbrella of relgion and a beleif in god.
Exactly!
That's not true at all. God is the father of morality, we do nothing and think of nothing but evil, God is love and justice. You don't believe in God, then you don't believe what love actually is. For your last point, there was a news story about two gay guys who adopted two autistic kids.... to molest them. Using your logic, since evil is done under some christian beliefs, therefore all Christians are evil, this news story means all gays are child molesters and/or pedophiles.
you guys have def not thought this through LMAOO
@@txeazy Compelling. Color me saved - you’re good at this lol
@@txeazy I could never. My new found faith prohibits me from pursuing heretics such as yourself. So sayeth the lord.
I’m a fast reader.
The Twilight Zone (original series) absolutely NAILS this conversation. In the episode "A Nice Place to Visit", this gangster is shot by the police while attempting to rob a pawn shop. He is then escorted to the afterlife by what he perceives as his guardian angel. He is taken to a large palace with all the possible things you could want: He is surrounded by beautiful women, he always wins when he goes to gamble at the casinos, he has an unlimited supply of delicious food, alcohol, cigars, and material objects. He's having the time of his life but after a while, he grows increasingly bored of the repetitious nature of the afterlife. He eventually seeks his "guardian angel" and tells him that he misses living a life of sin and vice with the earthly thrill of unpredictability and mystery. He would even go as far as beg to be taken to the "other place". The angel reveals himself as who he really is and replies, "Technically, this is the 'other place'. What makes you think this is heaven?".
I just watched that episode a minute ago! That episode was wild!
Twilight Zone is so goated. The only black and white show I actually like. Andy Griffith is decent too.
honestly that's a rly good depiction of hell...... no lasting goodness can be found apart from God. A "heaven" with everything we desired - food/sex/pretty things/entertainment - but without God would end up feeling like hell. Our souls were made by God to enjoy a relationship with Him.
@@augustine.c8204technically, the truest form of hell in the Christian mythology, was non-existence before dante’s inferno
Thanks for bringing that one up. I grew up watching the Twilight Zone. That is one of my favorite episodes, though I haven't seen it in a while. Your post brought it all back.
This hits so hard! I had a conversation with my Christian mother recently and I was honest and told her I felt like she had checked out of this life. Almost like I didn’t have my mother anymore, and she responded “I have checked out”. The degradation of our once close relationship has been so incredibly sad to me.
Im so sorry to hear this!
When it comes to truth,
God is the Lord of glory, the glory we clearly see in this reality is a small portion of the glory in heaven. Gold is a element with small glory but it is a beautiful element as there will be other glorious designs. We will have the same freedom apart from sin in this world like designing technology that we can possibly even fathom like people couldn't fathom a cellphone a few hundred years ago. With God all things are possible and he will give every good gift with the possibility of infinite good. God made creation in wisdom and I believe the reason we started in a world we can rebel against God's good design is because creation has to know that a choice outside of God's will is corruption and evil, because there is only one that is good and that is God. I chose good and if God is good and made creation then creation is good, we are not as wise as God and would be a fool to trust our own reasoning over God's. Jesus is the way truth and life, choose good and avoid corruption so we can be with Christ. God bless you all.
I Really don't believe You but that Proves My Religious Indoctrinations. but when You call me a iar it Proves How Wise You are.
@@skwills1629he's talking about his mother...
Sad. My mom wanted to check out, but we wouldn’t let her. She lived 50 years with a family of atheists (husband & 4 children), so she was used to us. She died at 92-yrs. Dad is 94 and enjoying life.
Most Christians simply gloss over these logical problems with heaven with the phrase that our imperfect minds cannot conceive of heaven. This is of course a monumental cop out.
Try M. Scott Peck's book, "In Heaven, as on Earth." Plenty of wonderful work to be done, "up there."
If you don't want to go to heaven, or, you wish to choose the kind of Heaven you believe you would prefer, it will be hell.
Why?
Because no human actually knows what would satisfy them for eternity.
Yes, though it is of course, mostly true given our finute minds and heaven's infinity.
Of course our minds cannot conceive heaven. Can you actually think of something that would satisfy you forever? No, you can't. But you know who does? According the the religion which talks about the heaven, God knows everything about you, therefore you can be most certain that heaven will be satisfying. The logic here is flawless
How is it a cop out? There's things God will understand that we can't even begin to comprehend.
1 CORINTHIANS 2:9
KJ21
But as it is written: “Eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, neither have entered into the heart of man the things which God hath prepared for them that love Him.”
I’m a teenager that’s going through a dilemma of faith. My father is a pastor and my mom is just as devoted. I’ve had some of these realizations of heaven for some years now like how eternal worship doesn’t sound fun at all, or how free will just wouldn’t exist in a place like heaven. I’ve come to realize that I have to make compromises in my questioning just so I can keep my relationship with my family. I’ve recently moved to a different city a few hours away from them for school and it drives me insane how they use up the only free hour I have at night to call me and use it for bible study, when all I really want is to just have a conversation with them.
Been there done that kid. Life is unfair. It’ll get better eventually
Thats a tough spot, friend. All i can say is keep digging. Be sure of what you can be. Understand where they are coming from and find a balance best you can till you get a bit older
Good for you breaking away from the indoctrination!
You're assuming you're going to keep your twisted and inherently bad traits of being human. All atheists do is argue and try to fit an infinitely immeasurable being into a small box. This guy is narcissistic himself. Listen to his arguments, it's just strawman. I recommend listening to near death experiences. They provide a deeper view on the afterlife.
You must follow your own heart!
I completely agree. My biggest fear as a child was not Hell, it was spending an eternity doing all the things I love for all time.
How long will it take to try everything? Once done, does one do them again? How long will it take for this to become stale? How long will it take for me to hate doing what I once loved? An eternity of repeating everything. Maybe seeing my grandchildren being born will give me joy? But then I will have to see them die and meet them. And again with their grandchildren. And will humankind be around in another 200,000 years. What happens when humans go extinct? No new entrants? A finite number of friends for eternity? Once the earth has been consumed by the inevitable Red Giant, that was once our sun, what then? Spend my time watching the slow heat death of the universe? And when the last Black Hole evaporates away and there is only darkness... do I really continue with an eternity still ahead of me? Eventually, I will have met everyone who has made it into paradise an infinite number of times already. I will have done everything an infinite number of times already... And I still have an eternity ahead of me doing everything an infinite number of times again... This sounds a lot like hell.
To do all this without my brother, without friends, without loved ones who were condemned by the church because they took their own lives... Without my pets, without animals... Without alcohol, Without S*x, without porn, without my wives, Knowing that the guy who r@ped my sister is in heaven... This is hell from the get go.
And the alternative is hell?
No wonder god's Angels rebelled.
Love this, Tom! No wonder, indeed
@@MindShift-Brandonhello, if you deleted my comment, why? Did it offend you?
"No wonder god's Angels rebelled" sooo true wow
@@blueisacolor7639I haven't read your comment, but it was probably a skill issue on your part. Just post comments that don't get deleted lol
As i told you in your other comment, i dont delete comments. UA-cam might thiugh
I've always figured that heaven is just a psychological version of hell, but I could never explain it so eloquently.
Thanks for that and for being here!
Blah blah blah
How about Read the Bible dingo boy
Thank you for your videos. I deconverted from Christianity, twice, because of its endless problems that I couldn’t ignore. The first time was as a teenager and the second time was as an adult. I’m the first in my family, that I’m aware of, to break this chain. It’s scary to be a trailblazer but so worth it when if you’re a person who values truth and logic.
WELL SAID!!!
What have you found, that satisfies your need for truth and logic?
@@donnagelina8548certainly nothing from the Bible. Logic wouldn’t allow light to be created after a star. lol
@@mfetterellino way you're this literal when u read. The Bible and many books are filled with metaphors. When Jesus calls himself the "Bright Morning Star" he isn't saying he is a giant ball of gas in space lmaooo smh. He gives light to the world in spirit. Those that find him have his light, and I'm not talking about a ball of gas above their heads, I'm talking about spiritually enlightened. My goodness, I can't believe people are this dense, I could understand this when I was just a teenager.
@@mfetterellimy wife said she loved me, I said yea whatever get in the test tube woman.
As an atheist since childhood, I tried fairly recently to explain this to my dad, because I didn’t want him to ever worry about “my salvation”. I said that “even if I pretend heaven, as it’s described, is real and entirely accurate, it’s not somewhere I would want to go after I die” for many of these reasons you’re touching on here. From what I recall, he had no response and the entire conversation was just him changing the subject whenever I made any logical points. At one point he even made a comment about how I wasn’t taught about this stuff properly while growing up, which felt like he proved my point that, without indoctrination, most of it sounds pretty ridiculous.
Is you atheism based on anything like science, or is it just your opinion?
@@20july1944 I would say both
@@20july1944 Is your lack of belief in the tooth fairy, leprechauns, unicorns... (assuming you don't believe in some of those) based on science or is it just your opinion? There are an infinity of things that are logically possible, but a finite number of things that actually do palpably exist. That is why rational people look for empirical evidence to believe and at some stage in their life question their early indoctrination... And the existence of rainbows does not imply that there must be leprechauns.
@@Bry_bryyy04 OK, speaking scientifically, how did living organisms arise without guidance?
Right. It always come down to us not properly understanding. Terrible cop-outs
This is the VERY thing that scared the crap out of me as a kid. My parents told me about how amazing heaven would be but it honestly scared me more than hell. The eternal monotony. It was the start of my journey away from these archaic religions of talking snakes and mythologies we would otherwise giggle at if we had no cultural connection with them. Once you leave Christianity, it becomes as daft, nonsensical and ancient as the Viking or Roman religions.
Burning forever wasn't scary?
@@antoniopratt1893 no it's actually wasn't. 1. It's a ridiculous idea to begin with. Burning for an eternity is such a ludicrous punishment for a TINY mortal human that is bound to screw up a few times, especially is given free will but still expected to follow the guys rules perfectly, is just completely absurd, especially if so many people have never even heard of the gospel around the world. And if they did, it would just be another religion trying to win patrons for their shrine and they'll just laugh at it. How are they supposed to know that Christianity is the one true religion if all they grew up with was Buddhism. And they deserve to burn forever? Really?. If hell is real then god is a malicious tyrant that does not deserve worship. 2. If the burning of hell won't kill you, that means you'll get used to it. If you ever served in the military you'll know the deal. Plus all the cool people will be in hell. Hell would end up being more fun, when you get used to the pain. But that last point is more just for laughs because hell doesn't exist... at least the Christian one. It's a ridiculous and evil concept designed purely to get people to conform to the church.
@@dudemantype You're not expected to do anything, If you live your whole life neglecting God than at the end of it all he will neglect you. The difference between me and you is that you simply feel the need to justify your sin. Live however you want, do you see God standing in front of you telling you what to do? Just don't be upset about the outcome of your choices.
@@antoniopratt1893 how many hells might you end up burning in then? Christianity is not the only option out there friend 😉
heaven still feels better for me than hell as long as I'm with my love ones
As an introvert with ADHD, the thought of being somewhere surrounded by other inhabitants of the afterlife for eternity is actually my idea of hell
Diseases or naturally born ailments won’t exist in heaven so it doesn’t matter.
Saaame. I grew up Jehovah's Witness and our options were non-existence, paradise or, if you were extra special, heaven. I preferred non-existence or paradise, and if paradise, I always just pictured myself alone playing with animals. I had no interest in hanging out with JWs in the present or in the afterlife. Heaven seemed boring, and not in a good way.
Imagine being punished with Hell because you don't get along with everybody. It's one thing to be obligated to worship God forever, but even more-so alongside those you despise. Maybe that is Satan's real reason why he was banished from Heaven. It happened once, it can happen again.
If you don't want to be in heaven, I'm sure God will willingly annihilate you.
He didn't bring you to heaven to suffer.
@20july1944 sure because god wouldn't create a place where there's an overwhelming amount of human suffering right?
This hits me so very hard. I have one child who is a Christian and one who is not. It was this very issue that caused me to deconvert last year. Thank you for being the voice of reason in this crazy conversation.
So you will just burn in hell for eternity later with your one non christian child? Sounds like a great move 😑😣
2 things 1) One of the things that began my deconstruction of faith and the Bible is when I had a Bible study with my then 12 year old daughter. She asked, "What if Gods idea of eternal heaven and happiness isn't exactly mine?" I immediately thought of my dad who for example bought us a living room set without talking to us that we did not like at all. She then asked if it would be either God changing our mindset to enjoy it, but doesn't that do away with free will, or will it be like the matrix where everyone will see what they want, but how would that work?
#2 Do Christians even believe in a heaven? They say that they do but in reality do they? How is the only way we can get there? Death, but they call call on the prayer warriors. A person who must live in pain or paralyzed is told to be thankful that they are still be alive. So that's better than heaven? Again, do they in reality even believe in a heaven?
Yes the inconsistency of clinging to this life if one reallly believed in heaven is a major issue
I have a firm believe that deep down, in the subconscious, everyone knows that heaven is bullshit, that's why everyone avoids it like it's the worst thing that can happen.
People are far more likely to be irrational than non-genuine. Even criminals only lie to get money, not for fun. But you'll never find someone completely rational in every way.
The end of your second point is why I believe in medically-assisted suicide. If I'm dying of cancer and I would rather just enjoy my remaining healthy days with my family before going to a doctor to end my life instead of playing the waiting game in a great amount of pain, I should have that choice. I think anyone should have that choice, and I believe that if God really existed, he would make an exception since, ultimately, it's a partly selfless act so your family can save money in the end and won't have to see their loved one in pain.
You only want Heaven if you want God, that’s CS Lewis’s whole thing.
The thought of spending eternity in heaven gave me almost as much anxiety as hell when I was a kid.
what do you mean by eternity because heaven and god is outside of space-time (time doesn't exist)
How? 😂 you would prefer torture and torment over peace and love for eternity? Can you please explain?
@@rimrejectsit’d be like being in the most amazing place you could ever be, bu ur stuck there for eternity. Some souls wouldn’t like that I imagine
You won’t have those issues in heaven though
@@rimrejectsI have phobia with eternity and infinity. So, heaven and hell, always creep me out. 🤷🏻♀️
One of the best arguments against heaven I’ve heard is: if you lined up all 7 billion people on earth from morally best to morally worst, where do you cut the line to send one side to heaven and one side to hell? No matter what split you decide 50:50, 70:30 etc you will always have 2 people on either side of the line who are almost morally identical and yet one is condemned forever and one is saved. The difference could be a single good deed or a single thought. Imagine you go to hell over a single intrusive thought. Imagine the fear going to heaven knowing the guy before you was condemned for a single intrusive thought. It is absolutely insane.
Good/bad deeds have nothing to do with it. According to the BIble none of us are good enough to deserve "heaven". But Jesus Christ has paid the penalty for our sin by his sacrifical death . If you acknowledge your failures and just put your trust in Him, you will certainly get to heaven
@ChrisSmith-xh9wb
"If you acknowledge your failures and just put your trust in him, you will certainly get to heaven"
So you have to DO something to go to heaven? You have to acknowledge and put your trust in him.
What happens to you if you don't?
@@przemeksledziewski1973if you lack faith then you dont get to heaven. That’s why people hate christians. The bible states that if people dont have faith on jesus or worship another god then that means they are completely blacklisted from heaven and some christians would ride and die with that statement.
Then, appearantly, you go to Hell@@przemeksledziewski1973
@@przemeksledziewski1973 well to put it bluntly, God accepts that you don’t want him and you’re eternally separated from God. That’s what Hell is by its basic definition, according to Christianity. If heaven in this case is good, and all good things come from God, then it would be easy to suggest that the “apart from god” would include no good.
BEST case scenario is that for me heaven is literally my own imagination. Nothing more nothing less. My own mind where my thoughts are my power and i can create what ever the hell i want just by thinking it. I can destroy for fun, Create and see what happens, go down different paths, Relive my life and do things differently to see what happens. I mean it really can't get better than that. Your minds your own universe.
That sounds amazing lol .. I’m a Muslim but this sounds amazing 😂😂
I think that is exactly what is happening. It is impossible to just live once, also if you create by thoughts you know results after but this may scare you and then next thought is unpredictable. Probably the worst thing is fear and other is ignorance. We constantly learning and after life there is something carried over..one life doesn't make sense
Lmaooo trapped in my own human mind? Yeah no, unless I'm a child, as an adult my mind is full impurities.
so minecraft is heaven?
@@okamiexe1501 Minecraft is heaven tbf
As a child, I always assumed that Heaven meant that after death, we'd have anything we wanted, whatever that was. For me, Heaven would involve an infinite library of every book ever written... and every time a new book was written on earth, this book would immediately appear in this library. This meant that I never considered boredom in Heaven could possibly a problem. I also never considered that there'd be anyone in Heaven who'd be miffed that their Heaven wasn't any nicer than anyone else's. My mind didn't work that way, and to be honest it still doesn't.
By fifteen, I'd completely rejected the concept of Hell, so I assumed that evil people would either suffer annihilation or be reincarnated so they'd have another chance to get it right. Or maybe just as people would be healed of their physical ailments, their psychological disorders would automatically disappear as well, and they'd thus be good then.
As I grew older, I began speculating that this physical life was just a step in a longer journey of self-development which would continue ever onward. Or maybe if Paradise ever palled, you'd have the option of volunteering for reincarnation.
But since then after becoming acquainted with fundagelical ideas of Heaven... yeah, an eternity of doing nothing but praising God over and over 24/7 without any break does sound pretty hellish, doesn't it?
Exactly! Thanks for watching and for taking the time to share your thoughts
I'm sure that you've grown out of this sort of mindset by now, but your comment about people who are evil naturally having psychological disorders stood out to me. Is this something that had been taught as part of your religious upbringing? I have seen this idea circulate in other religious spaces, especially in groups that believe demons cause mental illness. I'd love to talk more about it!
@@FennecShardnah it's just obvious, self destruction even out of ignorance doesn't avail much of the self that you actually are
I like most of what you said, but the thought still remains of eternity. The Earth isn't going to last for all of eternity that means that books aren't going to be written for all of eternity. At some point the Earth will end the people will stop existing and the books will stop being written and then you still have all of eternity without new books. Eventually you're going to read them all eventually you're going to get bored.
@@BecomePneuma11235The thing is boredom is caused by neurochemistry. You see your brain works to maintain a balance of chemicals that cause happiness and sadness. It's why you feel depressed after a week long vacation of fun for no reason. Boredom is your brain making things that were fun for you release less and less dopamine to maintain that balance
I imagine the afterlife, if it exists, to be a place of genuinely true free will. Where you can "will" yourself to be eternally happy and entertained, or eternally miserable
Thank you Brandon!! As a deconstructing Christian I was scared of hell. That has been kind of dissipating but I was still really scared of dying. I have been starting to appreciate that 80 odd years of consciousness is probably enough and actually maybe I don’t want to live for ever. This video has helped tremendously, and I will focus on every single moment of this life with all it’s beauty and terror!
i am so pleased to hear that! thanks for letting me know.
_its_ beauty and terror, even
You're not alone... in fact it's staggering to think how many humans thru history have lived their lives in fear of hell. We are lucky to live in an internet age where people can talk and support each other, and hopefully humans will enter a new era where that fear disappears.
First off death concerns us all and scares most of us. It's hard to shake the feeling that an intelligent life that can end is a kind of torture. Once our eyes are open, once we are alive everything that means anything to us seems to need to last (even if it's just in our memories). So your concern/fear about death and the afterlife (Hell) are normal, "stock" even. Fear of Hell dissipates with maturity, both natural and spiritual. It's one of the reasons you never see terrified or angry elderly in church. As we get older we understand how little control we have over our ultimate fates and we come to acquiesce to that which we cannot control. With wisdom comes comfort, so to speak.
My question for you is this: If you were afraid of Hell, and that was a bad thing for you, why is life being "terrifying" a good thing?
Yea, I'm a strong atheist.. but my instincts and meditations lead me to believe death is not the end.. and if I'm wrong.. I won't care cos I'll be dead.. so it's a win-win to assume i just get another new and improved life like the hindus say. I think that's why we all deep down want to make the world better because we know we're stuck here and will probably be back. In another form. There.. your terror is destroyed
This is spoilers, but The Good Place tackled the idea of heaven being monotonous. All the residents had been there for thousands of years and were miserable because the "highs" of eternal happiness were no longer effective. The end solution the characters came up with was actually to give all the residents a chance to leave existence, like a second death. It was truly beautiful.
Like the SCI-fi classic Zardoz, starring Sean Connery and Charlotte Rampling!
And I still think the Good Place system Chidi created is the best way to go about it because not only is there room to improve, there is room for it to end.
Sounds like the movie Zardoz
my argument with this is that there’s a possibility we won’t have a concept of time in the afterlife, nor would we care enough because all that our soul would know is the joy of being united with god, aka its purpose. we would transcend the concept of time, and the care for it. pure peace and love forever with a heavenly family and with god/jesus ( im not exactly sure how the trinity works ) is what christians look forward to ( haven’t read the bible, just looked into religion a bit, and went to church as a kid, and youth group in high school. so again, won’t know 100% about this )
We wouldn’t have the dopaminergic pathways to get bored. It’s not an existence of flesh.
Found this video right after finishing “The good place” and YOU ARE MAKING SENSE
The comment above yours mentions the same thing.
Did you ever watch The Good Place? This is what I like about how it ended: the main protagonist gave people the option to leave the Good Place after they were done having fun, and learning, and exploring, and improving themselves, because everyone had turned into these stupid happiness zombies, unable to do more with their afterlives. Having the option to leave is what inevitably gave the experience meaning, because humans are meaning-makers by nature.
The good place .. is not heaven, in fact it's a depiction of hell, 'eternal stasis' is not the Christian heaven, that's a hinduist/Buddhist idea of heaven and not of Christianity. Christian heaven is supposed to be ever growing, people work to make new things, it's not eternal stasis.
@@iprobablyhaveapoint, other way around. The Bible even says that all the residents of Heaven circle God and sing "his" praises for eternity, while the Buddhist and Hindu ideas of Heaven and Hell are not only very varied, but also, they do eventually end. If you're a god and you burn off all your good karma, you at once reincarnate into the Narakas (Hells) for a sense of contrast, and other way around if you burn off all your bad karma in the Narakas: you get reborn in a better place, again for contrast's sake.
@@ActiveAdvocate1I don’t believe what you believe in completely, but this makes more sense than anyone can justify heaven to be
Even the sons of god seem to agree in Genesis 6. Kinda weird how angels would abandon heaven to make offspring on earth 🤔
My mother very much clings to the idea of heaven because she needs to believe she's going to be reunited with my father... and all of her beloved dead relatives.
A big family reunion.
But in this life, she cries because her two beloved children are atheists and won't be in heaven with her.
She's 85. I don't press the issue.
😔
Thanks again for another great video. Brandon ❤️
During my deconstruction and ultimate deconversion, the concept of a heaven where all things are good is one where we lose our being. We would lose all memories of the very stuff that shaped us which includes family. We wouldn’t recognize the ones who are there unless we cruelly forgot the ones who are not so that we couldn’t be saddened by their absence. We would be automatons with a single programming to ONLY understand infinite worship.
But my parents are aging, as well, and I don’t push it.
@@BessieRiggs
I was always struck by the very human constructs that the heaven supposedly consisted of.
Things that are important to humans. Very current ones. Mansions, streets of gold? No tears, no pain, no sorrow... All of those are human things.
If it's not a physical body then, how would any of those things be relevant at all?
As a kid I got the endless church service kind of vibe.
Which I thought was a fate worse than death.
So even a very early age, the whole concept of heaven made zero sense.
And the injustice of eternal punishment for finite petty crimes like telling a lie or stealing when you were a child etc.. the opposite of just or merciful.
😔
Glad you enjoyed it! Its just so sad to cling to this.
Do you have evidence God doesn't exist?
YOU'RE not going to heaven, but your parents can be happy together.
If you know something relevant that I don't know -- convince me!
@@20july1944
If my mother cries in this life because her children are going to hell, why would she not cry even harder in heaven when her children are in hell?
Is she suddenly going to start being happy? Her children are in hell because she's in heaven with my father?
Will she suddenly stop feeling grief and sadness about her children who are in hell for eternity while she's in heaven?
How exactly does that work?
But she stopped being who she was in life?
Does she stop caring about all the people that she cared about in life?
Her own father being one of them.
He wasn't a Christian either.
She's going to be a happy if this family reunion where her beloved father isn't there nor her beloved children?
But she's going to be happy?
Did you even listen to the video?
Brandon answered this question in the video directly.
Or are you just trolling the comments?
As a child, this is my first real fear that I can remember. My family tried to comfort me and explain all the same things you did, but it never was enough. That was the crack. From there, I started looking for other flaws and had serious doubts about the whole thing soon after.
Speaking on denying themselves. I came clean about my Asexuality, Aromanticism, Atheism, and Politics to my parents. They handled it pretty well, but I was...disturbed to learn my Dad was priding himself on the not acting on his attraction to men. He said he has forced himself to focus on being with women. He's been married twice, including my mom. I still really don't know how to think of it.
same but instead it's my mom who has denied her true self. i semi recently have learned that it's possible she might be bi but she has forced herself to be only with men, im not saying she's unhappy with making that choice, I'm simply saying that denying yourself of who you truly are can become a deep hidden hurt, if humans do have a soul I'd imagine this kind of hurt is highkey sinful to said soul.
@@poxie2637 I think it mostly disturbed me, because my mom's reaction indicated she didn't know that either. Even if she practices what she preaches, then that has to be in the back of her head.
I also know that my dad is vehemently LGBTIA+-phobic. It's just a really sad situation all around and I really can't do anything about it.
With all due respect....that is a very weird thing to tell your child lol
@@demodiums7216 I was trying to explain what Asexuality actually was, and my dad was all, "oh yeah, that's normal! You really have to work at getting into real relationships. Attraction has nothing to do with it! It'sa choice."
And I got a rather disturbing description that my dad thought sexual attraction was not how relationships are initiated because his sexual attractions were all the sinful kind.
@@poxie2637 NO. You read Genesis 6 and and the Sodom chapter. No.
This is absolutely amazing. I can’t believe how extreme some of my Christian friends seemed after I left the religion. They don’t even ask why I left after 39 years of life. They don’t even think about these things at all. Everyone just imagines their own personal heaven, which isn’t even biblical. They are so obsessed with their religion; it takes so much time out of their daily lives. Just the fact that there are so many different heavens and hells across all of the different religions just makes it total nonsense to me. It’s so obvious the idea of heaven is simply for the people in mourning to cope with the loss. I realized everybody (religious and non-religious) mourns in a similar way to a certain point: they talk about their happy memories of the person that passed away. I don’t need the idea of heaven. I talk about all of the fond memories of the person to keep their memory alive. That’s all I need.
Very well said. Thanks so much for sharing and for being here.
The idea of heaven isn't a coping mechanism. I mean it can be of course. But heaven is the amazing opportunity of being with Jesus Christ the One who died for you and for me. The One who serve Him and have relationship with Him. Heaven is a reward for us Christians who lived a life pleasing Him. Jesus still loves you and He hasn't abandoned you. It's not too late to build relationship with Him. He would love you to be apart of His Kingdom.
@@MalkosIzel I would have to disagree. We do care. In fact we care so much that we are persecuted for sharing the gospel of Jesus Christ. Now those that don't care with suffer the consequences for knowing the truth and not sharing or only caring about themselves. Jesus loves you. And remember a lot of ppl claim to be Christians and aren't and simply may go to church or may just believe in Jesus but not necessarily FOLLOW Him. Jesus loves you. And He wants you to be His friend. He wants you to confide in Him as your Father. Someone whom you can talk about all your problems too. He listens and the best listener at that. The times I've hit rock bottom and yet He listens and helps me and I see the help and how He blows my mind is just astounding and knowing Jesus is literally like the best person you can know how will have your back when you turn to Him
We Christians choose to accept the evidence that God exists and He raised Jesus from the dead.
You offer no contrary evidence, and you're blandly and passively self-destructive.
Shrug.
How about instead of repeating the same braindead Christian tagline bullshit, you actually refute or discuss in any way any of the concepts and points that the video creator posited? Oh wait, you won't.. you're engagijng in fingers-in-the-ear "la la la!", head in the sand techniques so that you don't have to engage critical thinking for the first time since you abandoned reason and became Christians. Because, that might mean you have to face your existential fears about life and death, and might have to wrap your head around uncomfortable concepts like the adults in the room have had to do their entire adult lives. Grow up, Christian sheeple.
I lost a son at the age of 20 in a car crash. When he was 8 he asked me where do we go when we die. I didn't know what to tell him since I am an agnostic but not to scare him I told him that we sing and pray to god, and he asked me what else do we do, I told him we sing and listen to music while worshiping god, his answer was, I don't want to go because I'll get bored-
That kid already knew
It's wrong to think it would be boring. The God who has created the whole universe with the infinite knowledge we can gather in it, surely is not running out of things to do.
Sorry for your loss.
I think this guy is a troll
Finally...sad...but HONESTY out of the mouth of babes! (Sorry about your son's death. But wish he could give us all some honest answers now.
(spoiler alert) I loved the ending of "the good place" because you could leave Heaven when YOU chose. Just pass thru the door and, you no longer exist, no pain, no punishment, just the equivalent of thoughtless sleep.
Like Nirvana
Im good with that i be in that
THIS. Christian here, questioning the morals of religion. This is the most perfect concept of the afterlife imo. I swear if it's not like this I will cry--
Jokes aside, this is leagues better than the "heaven" we were told about in Religion class. I'm pretty sure the afterlife is a simulation you can control, where you can sleep for eternity if you'd want, you can experience the old nostalgic days of your childhood once again, you can finally find out small things you were always wondering about (why do we cook bacon and bake cookies), yadda yadda. All in your own personal bubble, with no one interfering. You can just cease to exist if you choose to, or if you don't need to exist anymore. Now THAT'S a heaven I'd prefer. Any thoughts though? I feel like something's missing, or there are a few flaws. Correct me on some things I may have missed.
I'd prefer to just have my memory wiped and be able to enjoy everything all again
@@Voxelowo sounds like reincarnation
I was a lead singer in a very popular LOCAL band. So I got a lot of praise and signed autographs even though I thought it was silly and I'm pretty modest. I couldn't imagine being worshipped for an hour let alone eternity!! Why would anyone need or want that?
This video is so good. I’ve saved it to send it to my mom when I carefully determine that the time seems right. My mom spends hours and hours praying every day, goes to church twice a week, and deprioritizes spending time with her family and living her life, fixing her actually crazy sleep schedule because during virtually the entire night she “has to pray” without her family “bothering” her, causing her to be asleep during most of the day when the rest of the family is awake and could be spending time with her and going out and doing things. It’s also the main thing keeping her from pursuing her passion in art (she loves it, is extremely talented but never does it because “she doesn’t have time” even though she is retired). And she’s doing this all because of her fear of hell (which she has outwardly admitted to me at times), her fear that I will go to hell (she knows I’m an atheist), her fear that her family is in danger because everyone else “isn’t praying enough,” her fear of an apocalypse that could come at any moment, the promise of an afterlife… It is quite literally robbing her of her life! I’ve never heard anyone describe this as the “inverse of Pascal’s Wager” but you are absolutely right. Thank you so much for talking about this.
My pleasure! Thanks so much for the kind words and for sharing your situation. Its a tough one that i share in.
I made a reverse pascal wager video years ago. Of course that didn't change my religious views or anything. I believe there's plenty of things to enjoy in this life and the next.
'wasting your One Garaunteed life!' That one has really been bothering me. It's so weird that they don't see that *they* are the ones taking a gamble, not me. It's so frustrating.
@@liabowden8526 Exactly! Properly understood pascal's wager makes less sense and is FAR dumber than selling literally everything you own and buying lottery tickets with every cent.
1) in pascals' you can NEVER get back anything you lost (ie you can earn more $$ but once spent time is gone and destroyed relationships are infinitely harder to repair)
2) there is infinitely more reason to believe (or more important KNOW) the 'payout' from the lottery exists over any and every proposed concept of 'heaven'
3) Also what is 'heaven' REALLY offering, an incredibly vague, totally incomprehensible, not even poorly defined 'infinite niceness' (which in practice amounts to less than a cool breeze on a hot day), or an eternity of 'meh'. At the cost of REAL tangible enjoyment now and often the chance to make this ONE life we know we get BETTER for EVERYONE. Which not only trades MASSIVE benefits for essentially NO REWARD it is also ridiculously, infinitely selfish.
No amount of praying will save you from facing the music. She will be held to account for the things she has done. Follow the commandments. Make the world a better place. Do not fritter away the time you have here. Strengthen your relationship with your family and friends. If you have hurt people, apologize and make it right.
The afterlife concept has been a hot button topic for me for a long time. When I was younger and din church the concept of hell would keep me up at night. The paralyzing fear of death it gave me made it worse. Every little burn was 1000's of times more terrifying, imagining it as an eternal feeling almost unconsciously. Heaven never felt like paradise as much as it felt like a deserted island surrounded by fire. I can't stand the idea of dying then becoming a slave. My father passed away when I was wrong and I kept close to the church because I wanted to see him in heaven. 10 years. For ten damn years, I lived in a futile hope that took away my ability to grieve. I, to this day, still blame the church. When I finally came to the crushing realization that I'll never see my father again, despite my best efforts, I fell into the worst depression of my life and almost my last. Because I was lied to. Because my pastors were too cowardly to tell me the truth. I can sleep peacefully now having accepted that my father would rather see me work hard than to cry. That I'll get to rest at the end of my life. That it's me who is caring for myself and making the effort to better everything around me. I get to hurt, feel love, feel regret, learn lessons, practice, make friends, and all of this is all I ever want. To live a life that I'll be proud of. Heaven is a spit to the face of everything I value and hold dear.
The time you spent with loved ones will always be there. All you have now is the present moment. Life sucks sometimes but it's good for us.
Heaven has all good in this world and more, most importantly good friends, but we have to repent (that's it, we have to let sin go), God is good we just have to trust him. When it comes to truth regarding the video.
God is the Lord of glory, the glory we clearly see in this reality is a small portion of the glory in heaven. Gold is a element with small glory but it is a beautiful element as there will be other glorious designs. We will have the same freedom apart from sin in this world like designing technology that we can possibly even fathom like people couldn't fathom a cellphone a few hundred years ago. With God all things are possible and he will give every good gift with the possibility of infinite good. God made creation in wisdom and I believe the reason we started in a world we can rebel against God's good design is because creation has to know that a choice outside of God's will is corruption and evil, because there is only one that is good and that is God. I chose good and if God is good and made creation then creation is good, we are not as wise as God and would be a fool to trust our own reasoning over God's. Jesus is the way truth and life, choose good and avoid corruption so we can be with Christ. God bless you all.
@@specilegg So in simplification, Surrender your autonomy to an evil god so he doesn't send you to hell.
@@deebz2626 Don't desire to challenge the holy and good world God created. If you do you it cause pain to God because he is holy and incorruptible, and disrupt the order for creation. Apart from paradise and all that is good is hell. We have the free will to choose obedience to a good holy God or disobedience. God loves us so much he sent his only son to tell us the truth and repent, we killed him and God used that action to pay for our sins. We just have to follow Jesus to inherit eternal life with him. I don't know who would deny such a gift of grace.
@@specilegg You bark like a wonderfully indoctrinated little lapdog. You prop up this dictator because you cannot fathom the idea that there is nothing after you die. You can't handle the idea that bad deeds go unpunished, or that bad people don't get what they deserve. Guess what, that's what happens, daily. Instead of actually making effort to better the world you already gave up on, you prattle on about a land of make believe for everyone else you get to drown in the pool of apathy you call religion. This is the only life you get and you're perfectly content in giving it up in hopes you don't have to make any effort to be a good person now. Because who cares about each other or the planet when you're going to paradise when you eventually kick the bucket. I couldn't imagine being subservient to an authoritarian man child.
I'm very old, and totally content to know that death is the end. As it was in the beginning, before you were born. Nothingness.
Thank you, Brandon.
Love that. Thank you
Until you awake again and feel a sense of deja vu
@@ToniTruthArt You hope. 😊
When I was still a Christian, soon before deconversion, I used to think about it a lot. I thought about death, heaven and hell a lot, partially because of my depression and suicidal thoughts. Afterlife made little sense to me, but I still believed as best I could. And I prayed to God, asking and wondering if he could just let me stop existing instead of making me live forever with no way out. It was such a relief to finally allow myself to believe that there is likely nothing after death.
Speaking of walking into oblivion, there was a show I used to watch on Netflix called The Good Place. It was basically about the afterlife. The very last episode actually resonated with me. They had finally made it to the good place and when they got there, everyone had turned to mush brains because they kept doing the same things for like thousands if not millions of years. By the way, there was really no god in this heaven. It was just a bunch of good people (no evil people) who had the ability to do whatever they want....go to other planets, relive their favorite moments when they were alive....etc. And just like you said, they got bored and their brains turned to mush.
So they came up with a new concept to help alleviate their extreme boredom. They created a doorway that they could walk through whenever they no longer wish to exist. They literally walked into oblivion. One of the characters said something really profound. Once he made his mind up it was time to no longer exist, he spent one last night with his partner who was also in the good place with him. He said (paraphrasing) "A wave comes to the shore but the wave always returns to the ocean". When people walk through this doorway, their physical form just evaporates and all of their atoms and molecules are scattered back into the universe.
Choosing non-existence was something even more intriguing to me than the concept of heaven or hell. I think as an atheist, choosing non-existence would be preferable than spending eternity in heaven as a mush brain.
Watched it too. And like you, I resonated with the ending. As a non christian though, one gets the sense about how the system is so warped, there's mistakes in souls being allocated wrong destinations. One big fraud.
“One of the great joys of heaven will be seeing sinners suffer in Hell “ St Augustine
@@larryg6865just wow!!!! How this makes sense to them,...idk🤷🏽♀️
@@larryg6865 thank god I’m atheist
@@larryg6865I can’t find an actual source for that quote. Do you have one?
Having gone to Catholic school for K-8 with attending mass every week, the conception I remember having of heaven was essentially like a solipsistic void that you could shape to your will... which of course 7-9 year old me just used to play all the games that my parents didn't buy for me, haha. When I see what Christians think of heaven, I can't help but see all the ideas brought about by human experience. People having physical bodies, distinct physical places, physical objects and things that are valued as they are on Earth, worship done through song and aural praise, class hierarchies of the strong above the weak with the strong being the "goodest" and the weak being the "ungoodest", physical warehouses of natural phenomena that God sends to Earth. These ideas are just so utterly human.
I don't know about you, but the absolute worst part of Mass was the singing. Being forced to do that for all eternity sounds pretty hellish to me.
You are correct, you have been introduced to false doctrines of Heaven and not Biblical truth.
@@jp22344 Delightful. The "No True Christians Existed Prior to 1517" crowd has entered the discussion.
@@jp22344It's so strange that this omnipotent and infinite god can't help his beloved children keep his one true word straight. He had it written originally in some obscure script used by desert people that almost nobody else knew and which would be nearly lost and forgotten a couple thousand years later, allowed it to be translated poorly to Roman, Greek, and English, allowed it to be distributed badly, misrepresented.
You'd really think he could atleast help us in this one way. By making his word, the thing saving us from eternal flaying and burning and torture, easy to understand. If not that, then atleast clearly understandable
Sidebar: I despise comfort. My idea of enjoyment is testing my limits. Hiking in the cold rain. Falling down a hill but reaching the top. If suffering with achievement doesn’t exist in either Heaven OR Hell, where does that leave me?
Hell, because you always can try to challenge Satan himself
@@ambassadorofbadtaste better to rule in Hell than serve in Heaven
Cant you just do that in heaven as well? Just turn yourself into your former human form and test your limits hiking mountains, riding the seas etc.
I thought the idea of heaven means you can do anything you want. You can just choose to do more hard stuff by limiting yourself.
@@XEROXAYUKI like the Holodeck with the safety protocols turned off. I love this idea of Heaven. But is it a place where suffering doesn’t exist? Or CAN’T exist? CAN you turn the safety protocols off in Heaven? Fascinating questions.
Same here, I get uncomfortable when I'm too comfortable. Sooner or later, I have to try something new.
I’m a Christian (16) right now, but after watching this video (and some others from this channel) that is very subject to change. I’ve seen several videos from other atheists (mainly Gen. Mod. Skeptic) and I was able to rationalize it as them not being taught the real Christianity, and instead being raised in some hypocritical version of it. You, however, actually dug into the core foundations of the faith and logically analyzed them more thoroughly than any theology teacher, family member, or priest has. I’m still extremely torn, but I’m starting to lean away from Christianity and tbh I’m running out of questions. Regardless of where I end up, I will be stronger and more confident because of you. Thank you 🙏
What I think is disturbing is the common assumption that if Christianity and Islam aren't true- and there are ample logical reasons to come to those conclusions- then the default option is to be an atheist.
While the concept of an active, benevolent God is impossible to reconcile with our recognizable observed reality- with babies born with missing organs or sick and incapable of surviving, sex trafficking of children and every other unholy money making scheme humanity indulges in recreationally- there are many questions atheism has no answer for.
One such is the existence of consciousness, and how- if this reality is just dead material space with nothing to connect us- an unconscious reality- then how are we conscious?
There are circumstances where logic and reason break down and can't be relied upon. So any attempt at a holistic comprehension of all reality would be fundamentally beyond the parameters of our minds to conceive.
To what degree do we create our own realities?
The cognitive sciences are revealing what shaman and speculative philosophers have long contended.
"We humans don't believe what we see.
We see what we believe."
@iseeyou3352cliffe never won a debate, Aron ra owned him, so did Matt Dillahunty
@iseeyou3352Aron Ra owner cliffe, so did Matt dillahunty. Cliffe never won a debate ever.
I think you’re incredibly strong and courageous to face these truths so early in your life, fortunate really… don’t be afraid Xavier, you’re growing and it’s painful sometimes but many throughout the course of human history have discovered the value of experiencing pain. You are growing in awareness, it’s a powerful process and we all experience a wide range of emotions and sensations, it’s natural to feel what you feel. If you haven’t already, perhaps try to find some people who are exploring similar themes in their lives, that can be a game changer for you. I wish you the best, take care my friend.
I spent my first 18 years in a Christian home and never once doubted my faith. Now that I’m in college I’m taking a deep look into what I believe and there more I listen to opposing views the less I believe in Christianity
Man, I love how you're taking all the questions that echoed through my mind for decades, that I strived to ignore, and actually asking them. I remember thinking almost ALL of this throughout my time as a believer. I was more excited about avoiding Hell than I was going to Heaven, which I later figured HAS to be different than pastors described it.
But the thing that really sold me that Heaven would be a horrible place was the day that my dad and I were discussing the death of Betty White. I was already a non-believer at the time but I can't recall if I had told him yet (I think I had not). I told him a story about how White's husband had died years ago and she was quoted as saying she looks forward to going to Heaven so that she can be reunited with him. My father said "well, that's sweet but in Heaven all earthly ties will be dissolved. She won't be married to him anymore."
I had heard him say stuff like that before but hearing it as a middle-aged man it seemed to really sink in. My wife miscarried early in our marriage (twice actually, but the first time was within the first month so we were barely even acknowledging it was real while the second time was four months in, she was showing, and we were buying baby stuff). Going through that second miscarriage was a traumatic event that I managed to get through only because I consoled myself that one day I would be reunited with that child. Not to mention that at around the same time, my grandmother passed away, so I enjoyed the image of my unborn child and their great-grandmother meeting for the first time in Heaven and being able to know each other. For that matter, I had a cousin who experienced about the worst possible thing a new parent can experience; hours after the birth of his son, he and his wife were told that their new baby had a serious heart defect that had somehow been missed on all prenatal tests. At six weeks old, this precious little one passed away. Even my father quoted King David, saying "he cannot come back to me, but I can go to him", and I took some solace that one day my cousin would meet his son again and they would be reunited.
And here was my dad telling me that none of this is even going to happen. When I get to Heaven, my unborn child, and everyone else I know, will be part of the faceless throng of worshippers. My cousin will never see his son again to a point of acknowledging him as his long-lost son. And my father was LOOKING FORWARD TO THIS?? He was calling this PARADISE? His life goal was to attain THAT? That didn't sound like Paradise to me, that sounded like a nightmare!
Sounds like _Invasion of the Body Snatchers._
I would agree with you that would be sad if that's how it is.
Personally I'm confident we will have families in heaven because, as you say, we would be a faceless and sexless hive of drones otherwise.
A good King or Father would want EVERY person in heaven to have a happy family -- why not?
Thanks for sharing! Glad to help normalize all those thoughts. Just so sad how people hold to it.
@@MindShift-Brandon It's not sad they hold to it if it proves to be true.
You don't know, and are afraid to answer my question about your upbringing.
@@20july1944 Imagine that, you have a completely unbiblical and made-up view of what heaven will be like because the description in the bible sounds too mundane and insanely boring to you.
As an atheist who was formerly a Christian, you've discussed here a lot of things I've thought about regarding the Christian heaven, but you've also made some good points I hadn't considered. It pains me a little to think of my Christian family members who believe in this version of heaven, and who can't see just how messed up it would actually be if it were real.
I get that! Thanks for being here.
It pains me to see how focused we are over another realm when we aren't even good on earth look harsh truth is if you're having these thoughts then you won't have to worry about heaven if you know what I mean please take a deep breath and focus down on love and family let the Bible be just that once you get your life in order then try looking at it again.
Atheists have died and come back to life and became Christians when they returned. they said Hell was terrible
@ton042005 Exactly. If we have faith we don't need every single question answered. Evidence that God exists in this world based on what we see with your eyes is faith enough. Jesus didn't die for us just so we would die ourselves. He saves us from eternal torment.
@@Subremedy Faith is just the start. Salvation is a process
One of THE most POWERFUL videos I've ever seen! This was the original set of issues I ran into as a teen that began my process of deconverting. Man this is good stuff!
Appreciate that very much. Thanks so much for being here.
We won't have to put up with you in heaven, either -- making it a little more heavenly.
@@20july1944 wow dude, what a nice and respectful thing to say.
@@kingcactus5251 I didn't intend to be nice or respectful.
I'm here to discuss relevant science or history with someone here who knows some of either.
This arguments are elementary at best. He's trying to fit infinity into a box. I've listened to every single point and he's just pissed because Heaven sounds too good to be true. What if we're here to learn and choose to be here? What if we do indeed keep learning and growing in the Afterlife?
You are so clear, expressive, and articulate for those terrified of deconstructing with all the cracking walls collapsing. Thank you.
Appreciate that I very much!
Here’s my deconstruction. Heaven is not a place of winners or temporarily. It’s eternally good, filled with environments, people, creatures, sounds, and colors schemes of any scope and flavor.
OMG this video is like coming home in terms of my interpretation of God and the Bible. Lucifer literally got kicked out of heaven for questioning whether there could be 2 kings and 2 kingdoms. God even throws all the gold and jewels that he gave him in his face. It's such a narcissistic idea of a supposedly perfect being who should be above all this. We need more videos like this
That whole concept/conversation between God and Lucifer never made any sense to me in the first place. IIRC, God says something like, "Lucifer, I created you perfect until iniquity was found in you." It can't be both: if Lucifer was created perfect, then no evil could be found in him ever; if Lucifer wasn't created perfect, then God is fallible.
Wdym 2 kings and 2 kingdoms? Where does it say that?
It's not a matter of 2 kings and 2 kingdoms as much as it is: God created everything (including Lucifer), Lucifer created nothing, so who is superior? You do not understand who God is if you think that you can be His equal.
@@squizmeister2617 provide evidence for your god, oh wait, you can’t
@@squizmeister2617 your god didn’t create anything, you haven’t shown nor demonstrated in any shape or form that he exists.
Thank you so much for addressing this! The fear of heaven was one of my biggest factors that led to my deconstruction. When ever I brought it up with my fellow Christians at the time, they always seemed shocked as if they hadn't thought that heaven could ever have a down side.
Thank you Brandon, for helping me know I'm not alone in finding how disturbing the concept of heaven really is.
Got you!
The problem is that children are fed a sugar-coated description of heaven - one that makes it sound like a never-ending Disneyland. Then they read the Bible and learn that heaven is more accurately described as a state of endless enthrallment to God. So, per those descriptions, heaven will be more like school. Or worse than school: the military.
@@underoakss I prefer to think that God will be able to tailor Heaven to each individual's sensibilities, so that even if we ARE enslaved, we'll never be the wiser and won't care. I also think our memories will be erased an infinite number of times so that eternity will not become boring for us - but we'll still somehow be able to remember all our friends and loved ones there with us.
Brandon, you really are the smartest guy in the room…another great one. I’ll never forget trying to wrap my imagination around why a never ending church service would even sound like a place you wanted to spend more than a day in…until they fed you the concept of hell 😂
Too kind, my friend. But thank you very much. and yes hell will immediately make heaven sound palatable.
SouthernRedneck: if you don't even WANT to go to heaven, I don't think there's any chance God will take you there.
Always thought the same too…trapped in church worship eternally sounds a great deal like hell to me 😂😂😂
@@20july1944maybe you should rewatch this whole video, there's plenty reasons why no one should want to go to heaven. The only real difference between heaven and hell, is one smells worse.
@@XRamenmaX No, you're wrong and I think you should spare us the headache of having you in heaven.
Critiquing heaven is pointless when the question of God's existence is the key question and I'd love to chat about that with you based only on science and history.
When I was a young child, I remember having panic attacks in the middle of the night whenever I got caught in the feedback loop of trying of conceive of eternity and how my life will never end.
I was in tears because I'm passionate about this area also. Thinking how those who care for me and love me would be ok with me going to hell because I'm not a believer. I, of course, don't believe this. There's no way that I could. It's a horrible thing. Thank you for putting words to this that I can relate to. I appreciate it.
Thanks for this and for watching!
I'm just going to simplify it the secret to life is finding your Adam or your Eve that's when your real journey starts if you want to be real look at the start of the Bible you can't move forward without your soulmate I wish I was lying to you but trust me that's the key to this life find your damn soulmate I'm not lying to you
@Ton042005 did you not see the video? I swear you Christians look for videos that try to debunk Christianity in order to find people to convert. BTW it is highly likely Adam and Eve didn't even exist. Now, you're in title to your own beliefs, but please don't force said beliefs onto people. Especially on a non Christian video
@@zoeyanslow664 well I never spoke my religion and Adam and Eve was just an example sorry I didn't say spouse I also was just saying instead of worrying about heaven as if you are going to die today why not focus on love that has nothing to do with christians it's me saying live a full life with love and it will all make since but I appreciate your comment.
@@zoeyanslow664 and hahahaha convert lol I'm a gammer lol I was just trying to help but I understand but next time it would be nice if you asked me instead of assuming.
When I was a Christian I felt bad reading Revelation, because I felt for the 24 elders/ and beast that repeat the same phrase over and over, "Haleluyah Salvation and Glory", I was like do i have to sing tk god over and over, I would get tired. When I was a Christain I didn't wanted well in the later years, wanted to go heaven and live forever. Especially after watching the Good place, people just ran out of things to do and just wanted Anihilation
Yes i did too! And oh man the good place is soo good!
If I remember, there is a TV series(short stories) about people living in heaven and they got bored because they done everything. So, God(I think) create a portal but one of the resident of heaven said "What is other side in this portal", God reply " I don't know?".
In the end, the people of heaven step into the portal without any hesitation, willing to step into the unknown.
The only people that I recognize is Phoebe(Lisa Kudrow) from friends. Funny if she just sing smelly cat for all eternity.
@@lokisg3lol sin existed before man kind it started in heaven and God allowed it drop on earth and blame 2 beings that didn't know much while he knew what would be and didn't protect nor defend eden let the Devil stay there and then acted as if he didn't know he was there when he can see things before i5 happen
The Good Place did a great job of showing exactly the problems with heaven that you describe here; specifically, that people will eventually get bored and want to leave, but they can't. Highly recommend that show if you haven't seen it.
Bruh, heaven is another plane of existence, you won't feel boredom or any bad feelings
@@GhostzinZ just because it’s another plane doesn’t mean you don’t have your consciousness and emotions..I thought the whole point of the afterlife was to have some sense of self after death like wants,memories etc. imagine doing the same thing for 1 billion years idc what mental gymnastics you wanna use that would drive anyone insane dude
Imagine spending the remainder of your eternal existence soley praising someone that won't save a drowning family - even when they're begging and praying to him to save their lives - just to feed his inflated ego.
And that's all you get to do.
@@andrewdowns3673 Imagine spending your whole life trying to prove you do not exist. We're not created, and believe when you die your entire life ends ...
@@1888CHAD8881 ... cept I don't try to prove I don't exist. I do. I'm in fact writing this comment to you. 👋
@@andrewdowns3673 At least you follow logic and understand that the creation we live in was created by a Creator.
@@1888CHAD8881Who created your creator?
It's made up by people with inflated ego thats why!!
What a great video. It's so wonderful to hear this expressed so well. I've been complaining about this for decades to any Christian who would listen. "If I end up in heaven because I believed, and my child ends up in eternal torment because they didn't, does this horrify me while I'm in heaven? If it does, in what sense is that heaven? And if it doesn't, in what sense is that me?"
Thanks so much!
Wow... you hit the nail on the head with that one. 👏
I kinda hope the "afterlife" is more like a loading screen. Where you can review your stats of the last life you lived and you can either choose to create a new character or log off.
I hope that you become a deity and have meaningful interactions with other deities and humans....but also like have the ability to reincarnate or even stop existing.
This is the most exciting idea for a post death experience that I've ever heard
Sounds too much like actual choice, but this would be great
After you die a bunch of credits play with a "where are they now" end card for everyone on earth.
Fkn sick concept. Would be sick if you could see other reincarnations of your spirit too
This is why my idea of "heaven", as in the best case scenario for an afterlife, wouldn't be a biblical heaven of God's creation but an eternal lucid dream of my own design where I can just do whatever the hell I want, sins included
Sounds good.
Mormon heaven kinda?
I'm a 51 year old atheist but was very religious in my 20's, obsessively so, and I basically read and thought my way out of it over many years, day after day reading and thinking. Rivers of ink and blood have been spent on these arguments and many 'sophisticated' theologians have had their say, but the arguments that a child can come up with are good enough. Your channel cuts away the bullshit and tells it like it really is. So thank you. I look forward to going through your videos
It's funny and I'm embarrassed to say this but I never really thought about the conceptual contradictions an eternal existence in heaven raises until watching this. You're absolutely right that it doesn't hold water for very simple extrapolations.
Thank you. Glad it was useful!
This reminds me of something my roommate in college, who grew up athiest, said about heaven one day
"I've asked Christian friends and family members what they'd do in heaven and a lot of them say stuff like, 'eat a bunch,' 'have sex all the time,' or other similar things, and it baffles me because you can do that stuff now. What's the point of holding back now if you intend to do that stuff either way?"
plus wouldnt all that stuff get boring after the 1,000,000th time?
@@B1-997I see this alot. You don't experience boredom in Heaven, you have to be alive for that because time is limited. Emotions don't have the flavor they do here. Bored, cold, tired. It's more of a scale between dread and euphoria.
This is of Course Not what Christians Actually believe about heaven and Atheists need to stop Lying. Christians do Not Think You "Eat a Bunch" In Heaven or "Have Sex Al the Time" In Heaven. What do You Really Hope by Lying?
By the way I am well Aware hat thee are 48 Thousand Denominations of Christianity that Don't All Agree with wat My Denomination teaches and that I do not speak for All Christians. What You don't Understands is, You can't Show Any Christians Saying this.
@@xandror i feel like heaven would also effect your mind if your emotions are completley changed
For the record, there is no sex at all in
Heaven, Jesus said there isn't marriage
in Heaven but we will be like angels
I'm so glad you covered this. I could never reconcile with being s spirit in bliss but able to see the suffering of living beings and feeling no empathy. How could I watch my loved ones suffer in earth as i bask in eternal glory and sing praises all the live long day.
I often thought about the horrors of heaven as a believer... including the issues you raised. Others shamed me when i brought it up with them. When I believed in the fairytale i use to ask other believers "will there be no death in heaven?" .then id say "Im so glad we will all be vegetarian and no animals will die for meat." They were so shocked, not happy and had no response😅
Lol. Yup!
There will be no human death God will provide the food not like we need to eat in heaven. Beside there is a difference between human death an animal death. It always baffles me when people try to put worldly attributes on God even though he is not of the world. Also if the no death rule also applies to animals we are taking about the all mighty one he can just create food for us to eat.
@@TomGraham-mk2wl Animals don't have a human soul so no it is not the same. We can kill animals for food but killing a human is different as we were made in God's image. We were created to rule over animals and animals were created to serve us.
@@zSteve1231
It amazes me that people think that animals don’t have emotions and don’t have a desire to live. Also it said no death. There is no prove that it only refer to humans.
@@Bunni504 never said that animals don't have emotions and desire to live. The Bible never says that there will be animals in heaven either.
My brother and i are both atheist and our mother always comes at us with the sad line "i just want to see you in heaven." It's hard to explain to her how little I care about a place as real to me as hogwarts.
But you made a good point about the contradiction of "self" in heaven. My mother will either hate heaven because she will have to watch 2 of her children be tourtured for all eternity or she will have to comfort the reality that she, as our loving mother, will either forget us entirely or not love us enough to care once shes there lest she jeopardize the perfection of heaven.
Its just so hard all around. If only we could all just wake up at the same time to these myths. Glad to help a little. Thanks for being here.
Or you can stop whinning and come up with solutions. Stop blaming your poor mom or dad when you do nothing to solve the problem.
@cocococop6082 genuinely curious, what do you think the problem is? And even better, how is it my job alone to solve?
@@stacie1595 I never said it was your job alone. The problem is how we view things. Do you know we can time travel? Yet we never use it when bringing people to Jesus Christ. Can you believe it. Also you know that whole gold mansion in heaven we always hear about? Why don't we take a small portion and use it as gold standard money? I mean it's just the way we see it. You know? Kind of the glass half full or half empty kind of thing. To me it's half full. More can be pour into it. Like all humans alive right now can become a Christian. I know for a fact. So.. . Working on that. Got any other solutions you can think of? Also for autistic kids did you know spirit cameras and time traveling trip like a field trip is all they really need? So they can object fully learm the truth of Christianity. It's not hard. We Christians just make it hard.
@@MindShift-Brandon I once saw someone online blame Isaac Newton for spending too much of his time on religion and not enough on science. That's like someone telling the world's strongest man he didn't spend enough time in the gym.
Bro you and Kristi Burke are straight killing it! It’s very refreshing watching something as destructive as Christianity get taken apart brick by brick
Love her. Still waiting for our collab someday. Cant wait.
@@MindShift-Brandon In your videos I look at the booze. In her videos I stare at the eyes.
Keep going.
@@MindShift-Brandon likewise!
I just found Kristie Burk, and you’re right she is helping me deconstruct, and also the way she breaks things down is great! She is my favorite, then comes Viced Rhino, and dark matter 25! I don’t exactly know who does it, but it’s impressive! I’ve never been here before, I’m excited to listen! Being indoctrinated so young, and living in Arkansas we were spoon fed southern babtist religion! I remember after having my daughter I would cry when I was still a believer because I was told I had to love “god” more than my child! So I thought I wouldn’t get to see her in heaven!!! Religion is terribly emotionally abusive! If you count the children in church being told you’ were born a sinner, and if you don’t believe, or behave by Christian standards you’re going to burn in hell for eternity! That is what I consider emotional, and verbal child abuse! To me at least that is what religion feels like emotional abuse by people who get their morals from a violent terrible Book, and worship a morally bankrupt, selfish god! Since I have been deconstructing I’m so embarrassed I believed anything in the Bible, and I don’t know how I came to believe god was loving, and kind!Why would you worship a god that demands u love him over your family, and I can’t honestly find anything in the Bible that portrays him as kind,loving and patient! I didn’t start my deconstruction journey until 2016, and I’m 47 now! Honestly, it didn’t take too much to stop believing, it’s just getting all the programming out of my head that is hard! My grandfather was a southern babtist preacher so I was screwed from the very beginning! Now I’m embarrassed I believed such stupidity! Especially the Bible, and I didn’t even notice how anti woman it was until I started my deconstruction journey! If anyone hasn’t checked out Viced Rhino I highly recommend it! Dark Matter 25 too! So, I’m so excited to listen to someone I haven’t listened to yet!
I also recommend Viced Rhino!
One of the things I never understood is the "No Sin" in heaven. Can you imagine life with the 7 deadly sins not mentioning the lesser sins? There could be no feasts because that would be gluttony. You can be proud of your accomplishments because that would be pride. You can't sit around and relax because that would be sloth. Since you don't need food or drink, eating and drinking would be greed. You would be able to articulate this thought better than I, which I would love to hear.
I think you articulated it pretty darn well,!
In Heaven, I would no be the broken toy I was from birth. But you love your sins too much to realize how broken you are. All from two simping humans.
As a child I had these same thoughts heaven and hell seemed horrible. By the time I was nine I realized men wrote unbelievable stories the others simply believed were literal without kicking the can down the road to any imagined outcome.
The word and the written word, I think we're just mind-shattering technologies that certainly seemed more magical in context than any other technology since. The "magic" of the written word was well used by those who knew how to wield it. This is reflected in scripture:
In the beginning was the word, and the word was with God, and the word was God.
"The beauty of the finite" - this is a really really important statement. Thank you for it. One of my favourite activities is learning Spanish. It is the journey the I love. If someone with a click of their fingers made me fluent in Spanish - or even worse fluent in all languages I would be very upset and disappointed. This is why I think Cavafy's poem Ithaca is so important. Life is far more about the journey than the destination.
Thank you, have a good day. The Buscadero
An absolutely amazing video. As a 16 year old with a very religious family i have to hear all of this all the time and its honestly comforting to find people on the internet and irl that share my sentiments, so thank you
Jesus Christ is alive and well and he loves you more than you know. So much so that he died and shed his blood for the forgiveness/pardon of all your sin/wrongdoing. If a man says he has never sinned/done wrong, he is a liar, and the truth is not in him. We are not sinners because we sin, we sin because we are sinners.
@@paulgemme6056 show me proof. And don't say your little book because that's not proof
@@_xxClaudiaxx_ All creation screams: look at me, the proof is in the pudding. You think everything came about by some big bang. Absurd!
@paulgemme6056 the notion that a god was always there and made the universe out of nothing is not more rational than a big bang creating the universe out of nothing. Or a universe always being there, now is it
@@_xxClaudiaxx_ Everything has a design so everything needs a designer. Only Christ Jesus/God could design and create something as magnificent as the universe, the human body, a hummingbird. It takes a supernatural being. All Glory, honor and praise belongs to the Lord God Almighty for he has done great things.
GREAT THOUGHTS. One time during prayer meeting I went off praying about how I hope God gives me a great second body that is capable of horse riding and fighting in battle... the pastors wife came up to me later and chuckled saying something which I thought belittled the plan of heaven and thought how much pastors and their families are sometimes so ignorant to the texts that pay their bills.
I almost made a catastrophic mistake by being made to relocate to where I grew up and absolutely hated and was filled with negative ghosts from the past - thinking that I was doing the greater good and it was only for a few decades before I’d be in heaven anyway and it wouldn’t matter. I was that delusional, but mercifully my survival instinct kicked in and I rejected the very idea because all that I love is where I am currently.
This video really spoke to that, especially toward the end, of wasting what we have now, or letting now be cast in gloom because we’re thinking what we should be doing to get up the tiers of bigger crowns.
I really enjoyed this journey on my Sunday, I’m still surprised at how much fear there is under the rocks in my head, you’ll point something out an I suddenly realise it’s there … so please be assured that you are really helping folks like me to process stuff I’m not even conscious of, plus occasionally to have a good laugh about it.
To-do List
Heaven, day one: Glorify god
Heaven, day two: Glorify god
Heaven, day three: sigh....go glorify again all day
Heaven, day four: ffs..............
If you don't want to go to heaven, you're already all set!
Ha! Indeed.
@@MindShift-Brandon I assume you were raised a Christian. Is that correct?
@@20july1944
You seem to get a real kick out of the idea of some people suffering for eternity. This is one of the terrible consequences of believing nonsense stories about gods, heavens, and hells. Or, perhaps religions simply attract sociopaths, rather than creating them.
@@YY4Me133 No, I didn't say that at all -- I'm a conditionalist/annihilationist and we don't believe hell is eternal punitive suffering.
I would agree with you, and I often pray to God about this, that I don't support eternal punitive suffering even for Satan -- although I certainly don't seek his redemption either.
However, IF there is eternal punitive suffering, I'm compelled to live with it based on my inference that God exists and my desire to have a happy afterlife if it is available.
I'm agnostic, but this is a great explanation of why I as a 9 year old started questioning Christianity, why I was a fully developed skeptic by age 11, why I was on my way out at 13, and why I had completely moved on from Christianity by 15. The more you think about it (truly think about it in depth) the more illogical any sort of after life becomes OTHER than reincarnation. Even reincarnation as we currently talk about it has issues. Just being gone once we are gone actually seems like the most just way we could go if a god does exist and the most likely option if a god does not exist.
When it comes to truth,
God is the Lord of glory, the glory we clearly see in this reality is a small portion of the glory in heaven. Gold is a element with small glory but it is a beautiful element as there will be other glorious designs. We will have the same freedom apart from sin in this world like designing technology that we can possibly even fathom like people couldn't fathom a cellphone a few hundred years ago. With God all things are possible and he will give every good gift with the possibility of infinite good. God made creation in wisdom and I believe the reason we started in a world we can rebel against God's good design is because creation has to know that a choice outside of God's will is corruption and evil, because there is only one that is good and that is God. I chose good and if God is good and made creation then creation is good, we are not as wise as God and would be a fool to trust our own reasoning over God's. Jesus is the way truth and life, choose good and avoid corruption so we can be with Christ. God bless you all.
@@specileggeven mentioning the word freedom here means you clearly didn’t watch the video
@@quinxq323 apart from sin. God is good, sin is corruption and evil. Paradise can't exist with sin.
Reincarnation is at least more logical since it aligns with natural laws. Karma has it's flaws also, but it also makes some sense. The idea of a creator making everything, knowing we are going to rebel against him, in order to test us borders on psychopathy.
@@specileggyou say paradise can't exist with sin but good technically can't exist with evil. Evil can't exist unless God allows it to.
What you said at 5:25 brought me simultaneous comfort and dread. Dread because for about 20 years starting when I 1st started to really consider the implications of eternity there is like a 50% chance it leads to me having a panic attack of varying severity, there simply is no good option. The comfort just came from hearing another person deeply troubled by the topic.
The concept of eternity is maybe the scariest thing for me. Just, period. Because both options as I see it, either I live for eternity or do not live for eternity, are horrifying to me. I think heaven was devised to try and save this but I don’t think there is any way of saving it, UNLESS somehow there was an infinite number of things one could do in Heaven to satisfy themselves…because any finite number, *stretched over INFINITY,* will eventually become infinitely monotonous and unbearable.
I never understood why atheists wanted to deconvert people, until I became an atheist myself.
There are people that I care for and love that are purposefully living lives that make them miserable. They live lifes of fear and delusion. I grew up in a conservative Christian community and it's filled with people that are in denial about their sadness. Queer people that decide to stay abstinent and will never know the ecstasy of connecting with someone on a sexual level, people who suffer from depression or anxiety that will never get help, people that don't make the art they want to or pursue careers they would excel in - all because of self repression and some misguided idea of morality.
Honestly, it breaks my heart.
Exactly. It is just tragic
I remember being 10 years old and talking to my cousins about heaven. I couldn't understand how eternal life would be valuable. Even then I believed that life is only valuable because it is limited.
I asked someone about the thought of "living forever". She took it as a state of mind where one could choose to be the eternal. I perceived we were on two different wave lengths. I might have to chat again to find out where she is coming from. Communication is near impossible when each person has different definitions for words. This video was very thought provoking.
Thats a great point and thank you!
I always found the thought of being so changed that you no longer care about others that you did in life so wildly confusing. I'm an atheist, most of my family are atheists, but there are Christian people in my life that love me and care for me. And yet, like you said in this video, if Heaven is real, they will either forget about me and the impact I have had on them entirely or will rejoice that I'm burning in hell. Either of those options seem awful to me. The cognitive dissonance they must have, it's baffling.
This is the first video I've seen of yours, and I'm so glad to have found your channel! Thinking through the concept of heaven is actually what started my deconstruction, and I've never heard anyone else talk about it, but I agree that it is one of the biggest flaws in the whole religion! My first real "wait, why?" moment was the streets of gold and crowns and mansions thing. It just jumped out at me as utterly ridiculous one day, and then I couldn't stop thinking about the biblical descriptions of heaven. The final straw for me was, as you said: how am I me, or any version of me that is good, if I can have no sorrow for the people who I loved on earth, or even strangers honestly, that are now burning in hell? It became clear to me then that at least that part of the bible was not "divinely inspired," and you know once you don't trust that the bible is infallible, it's the beginning of the end.
Well said all around! Glad to have someone so likeminded. Thanks for being here!
Great video Brandon! The whole concept of heaven and hell are grossly immoral.
Imagine having two children. One of the children obeys what you ask them to do. They are courteous and kind, always doing what is right. The other child is rebellious and full of hate. He is disrespectful to you and even disowns you.
Would it be considered moral to lock up the rebellious child in your basement and torture him for the rest of his life? Of course not.
Should you force the responsible child to spend the rest of his days thanking you that he is not being tortured like his brother. I don’t think so.
Yet God is said to be our Heavenly Father and allegedly does these things in the extreme on an infinite scale.
If god were an actual father on earth, child protective services would take his children and he would go to jail. It’s funny how we as mere mortals are more moral than a supposedly infinite god.
God wouldn’t last on earth for one second, with his same character but no e of his powers. Just a mean psychopath!
@@MindShift-Brandon I think that was a scene in Lucifer. He almost got shot before his son stepped in.
"It’s funny how we as mere mortals are more moral than a supposedly infinite god" ----
Does that not also suggest that your view of God is flawed?
@@andrewferg8737 I have the same view of your god as I have for the antagonist present in most works of fiction. The main difference between your god and other fictional characters is that yours has a larger fan club and in I was a part of it for 3 decades.
the child doesn't even need to be courteous and kind too, they just need to worship the father, you can be a murder but along you accept him in y our heart then you can enter heaven.
but if a child who did all the good deed in the world but as long they don't believe in the father, that child will be locked and torture forever...
Thanks for talking about this. I was raised Christian from the age of four and i never told people what my biggest fear was. It was Heaven and living forever, it always sounded terrible and I used to get panic attacks thinking about it.
What? 🤣🤣 well brother, our flesh will die but our souls will remain. I think you want to be in heaven with our loving and forgiving god. And we won’t mention the other option, where you do NOT want to go.
I think your biggest fear is living forever not in heaven. So you dismissed the idea of Heaven all together. But we are divine beings, much more than flesh and 4 dimensions. That voice you hear in your head is proof of the universe being more than energy and matter.
You must have been taught evolution of molecules to man as a fact. It’s not brother.
The first reason this man gives is boredom… in heaven… that is pure bs and irony. What did he say that you liked?
I'm so glad I found this channel. This is awesome! I love your tone, delivery, insight, research and...I just really love this channel. You have a new fan - an atheist from South Africa. Thank you for putting this out there. This issue is the most important issue of our time.
Hey thanks so much for the kindness!
The freewill issue or question in heaven is what started me researching and questioning and eventually no longer accepting my faith from my youth.
It will do that! Thanks for watching
Everyone here should really watch "The Good Place". It's probably the best take on how the afterlife should be structured I've ever seen.
As a child, I could barely sit through a church service.....just imagine that for eternity.
my sister and i called the sermon the 'long chat'. oh gosh it was so boring it hurt
As a man with the double concoction nomenclatured Obsessive Compulsive Disorder and Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder, I can concur with your kneeslaping witticism 😁🤗😆
@@alisonbrowning9620 As a man with the double concoction nomenclatured Obsessive Compulsive Disorder and Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder, I can concur with your kneeslaping witticism 😁🤗😆
I'm an Atheist, I don't believe in heaven/hell, however I really hope that death doesn't feel like before birth. I want to have life again however who knows.
Well, it scares me, but you won’t really be able to be scared.
You won’t be anything.
Does a rock fear the tide?
Do you remember the idea before birth?
Do you have any memories of the 13 billion years before your birth?
Then you will not need to experience the Google years that come after. You won’t exist anymore.
As a child sitting in 2+ hour Evangelical church services, all I could think of was that, if I a couple of hours of church made me just about die from, how was I going to get through an eternity in heaven? It would be like church forever without even coffee and cookies to look forward to afterward. That's a hard no from me. Some movies have shown versions of heaven in which people retain their own identities, build, create--even fall in love--but even that kind of idyllic existence would lose its charm after a few hundred years.
Your last point hit me the hardest, I'm a member of the LGBTQ+ community and I accidentally came out to my mom at age 13 because I couldn't take anymore of the hateful, ignorant things she'd say. As a result, I was immediately sent to conversion "therapy" with a church elder who was a pedophile. Realizing that my only parent was happy to essentially destroy (and nearly cost me) my life in the name of "loving" god and longing for heaven was absolutely devastating. I was eventually able to love her again, n a guarded way but she was on her deathbed before she "forgave" me for my "sin" after giving me 37 years of o silent disapproval. Religion destroys families, lives, relationships, morality and human decency. I think of all the people whose entire purpose in life--all in the name of god--is to ruin the happiness and well-being of family, friends AND total strangers. What a waste.
quote: how was I going to get through an eternity in heaven?
After the 3rd hour, you would start to sneeze.
At the 4th hour you would silently piss under the bench.
At the 5th hour you would create a new world.
The world was created from something which could not hold his piss.
Well christians music is in all genres edm r&b rap rock whichever preference you need to look for it. Yes lgbt is demonic whether you like it or not. The common misconceptions is that the only thing you will do in heaven is worshipping?we will already have a very close relationship with God and there are Angels who do all the worshipping and never get tired. We will live in a golden city ,work according to the talents we were given by God,have feasts with jesus Christ, share our culture,talk to our ancestors and family members we never got to meet,a peaceful life ,play with animals even carnivores like lions since they won't even think of eating us,reunite with our pets that died,playing in garden which are way beautiful than we imagine,talk with angels....and so much more
@@joyirungu3592 Do you consider your supposed God to be perfect?
What she did to you is horrible no child of God deserves that
I am so sorry about what happened to you. As a Christian who is planning on leaving religion (I still believe in God, but I don't believe in theists' cruel version of Him. I don't believe He is perfect, I don't think He wants people to worship Him for eternity, I don't believe that He is completely in control of everything), that is so sick. This bs paints a horrible picture of God. Man, religious people take it way too far. The things they do "in the name of God" are so sinful. I hope things have gotten better. I'm praying that they do.
And then theists wonder why no one's joining their hypocritical, hateful, unnecessarily strict society anymore.
Heaven seems like a perfect solution to all our problems and sorrows until you think about it for 2 minutes.
If there’s a heaven waiting for us, then everything about the current and only life we guaranteed to have becomes meaningless and just a waiting room until we enter paradise.
What a terrible way to view existence.
Indeed! How very sad and unnecessary!
Direct, that is a terrible way of thinking about existence. It’s a good thing that’s not what the Bible describes as the future of humans. The Evan and our earthly paradise will be one and the same which is the reason why people get mixed up so much in the Bible. So do you have a be looking forward to a future in a place that we have no experience in living would be scary. But once the Bible actually teaches, is that the heavens space of the spirit creatures in God in the physical space of all physical beings, will be home as if they are one.. therefore, making our earth like a heaven or paradise.
Even if Heaven if waiting for us, Life would be still meaningful because in Matthew 5:13-16 talks about letting your light shine so that others can see your good works. Also, Jesus said to his disciples in John 14:12 you will do greater works than I because i am going back to the father. This means that People are supposed to be productive and help others become the best version of themselves. What is point of life if not one person life's was made better by your existence? People hold on the concepts of Heaven and Hell for 2 main reasons, To reunite with loved ones who have died and to punish those who have done horrible things but is seems that they were not held accountable while they were alive on Earth. Carolyn Bryant Donham, the person who lied on and caused the lynching of Emmett Till is just one example. If the world was not so corrupt and full of suffering, maybe people would not seek "Heaven" so much as it would be more "Heaven" on Earth.
@@Artisticexpression That doesn’t make sense and why should we care what the bible has to say?
@@2l84me8 What does not make sense? I quoted the bible, which is being critiqued here, to make the point that people are suppose to create, learn, help their follow man whether there is Heaven in the Biblical sense or not. People are not suppose to live their life without leaving a positive mark on it.
There are two things that always got me about the idea of heaven. First is that if you always feel awesome and cool in heaven and there's no suffering, how do you know that it's awesome? There's nothing bad to compare it to. In life, you only know that you're happy because you know what it's felt like to feel sad. Good can't exist without bad, because otherwise it would just be neutral.
The second is how can heaven be heaven for everyone? My idea of what would be heaven is completely different to someone elses. Having an endless supply of pickles would be awful for me since I can't stand them, but it would be amazing for someone else. Having tons of dogs that I can pet and love on would be amazing for me, but some people don't like dogs. How can heaven account for every single person in it? Or would we all get our own individual/specialised heavens? What if that isolationism would be hell for me?
I thought abt this too and again, if everyone experiences the same feeling of happiness in heaven, that means god manipulates our emotion, we wouldn't have free will. It rlly is stupid
Do you have to isolate ?
I suspect that you have to brainwash yourself to liking god or else you get kicked out, kinda like lucifer
When you stay a child and want all your dreams to be fulfilled later instead of living Today then you are fit to stay infantile forever and be a Christian. If not then you learn to live now.
@@TorianTammas what are you babling about ?
Its 2am and I've been binging your videos for hours now. I have heard of ideas that never crossed my mind and my perception of religion has shifted completely.
Fundamental Truth: Any being that demands worship is unworthy of worship, by virtue of demanding it.
Genuinely thought I was the only person who thought heaven sounded terrible as a child. I DID NOT want to go... but pushed it down and thought I would understand when I was there.
I’d want an afterlife that keeps people themselves, and allows freedom, and allows you to go back if you make a choice you normally couldn’t take back.
I would honestly like the "afterlife" if it behaved more like reincarnation or an ng+ in game terms. Being able to choose when to reincarnate and experience a new life as a different being while also getting to make contact with past lives
Oh man! My uncle, who I believe that's who it was, came to me in a dream and spoke on "heaven" and what or may not be up there. Blew my mind!
The logistics of Heaven are insane.
Are we reunited with our parents in Heaven? But my parents had parents, so wouldn't my mom be with her parents and my dad be with his? But my grandparents had parents, and so on.
Same with my kids, they may have spouses and children of their own. And this gets even more complicated with blended families, step children, orphans, etc.
Right. Unlimited issues!
I hate to think that my mother will still be annoying me 87 million years from now.
Some great points here. I've used some of them, myself. The free will vs slavery is one I've been using a lot lately. If you go to heaven not having achieved perfection while alive, which no-one has, then if you do have free will, you're going to cause as many problems for yourself and everybody else as you did on earth, so there's no practical difference. And if no free will, then you're a slave. And I can't imagine anything much more intolerable than spending an eternity with a bunch of ass-kissing, goodie two shoes Jesus creepers, with nothing to do but feed into god's narcissism, listen to lyre music, and try to figure out which set of eyes to look into while talking to the angels. Things are only enjoyable because of contrast. Ice cream is best in hot weather. The best musical chords contain dissonance and tension. There is no such thing as a good story without conflict. If everything is nothing but good all day, every day, it becomes bland so quickly. And if it didn't, well, too much of a good thing is awful, too. I mean, how long could anyone tolerate an orgasm before it became painful, then debilitating, then torturous? People with that disorder that gives them constant orgasms will tell you exactly how much fun that is.
And even if you could do everything you ever wanted, good or bad, eventually you'd run out of things to do, and you can only repeat them so many times before going insane. If god does exist and did create the universe, he did it because he was bored, not to benefit us in any way. And clearly he's psychotic, like an evil kid with an ant farm who, every once in awhile on a whim, decides that these ants in particular will be introduced to the magnifying glass today. I genuinely don't understand how anyone sees him as the good guy. I know lots of good, loving, moral people who are religious, and it blows my mind that they worship a character like this and think he's made of love and is omnibenevolent. I guess it's no different from anybody who keeps making justifications for staying with their narcissistic, sadistic, abusive partner: he only beats me because he loves me...
It's enough of a tragedy that so many people waste their lives under this delusion-- although I'm sure plenty believers are happy enough-- but sometimes the results can be absolutely devastating.
What follows is a short, true anecdote that happened recently and is truly heartbreaking.
My ex- husband has an older cousin, a Mormon guy who has 3 biological kids and adopted 10 others. They're all from orphanages all around the world, from some of the most impoverished countries, such as Haiti and India, and he chose kids who had some sort of condition or issue that would make it unlikely that they would be adopted by someone else. Clearly trying to do a good thing. Less than 6 months ago, his youngest daughter unalived herself. She was 22. After the funeral, I believe actually while everyone was driving from the church to the cemetery for the graveside service, his oldest son, 23, stopped at a pawn shop to buy a gun, but instead decided to call his parents and tell them he wasn't okay. They took him to the hospital that same day, got him admitted as an inpatient. He said the reason he had wanted to buy the gun was so that he could go to heaven, where everything would be beautiful and he wouldn't have to suffer anymore.
A day shy of 5 months after his sister died, he texted his parents goodbye. His dad drove to the location and, tragically, arrived just in time to hear the gunshot. I can't even fathom what they must all be feeling. And I'm pretty sure the Mormon doctrine, like other religions, says that you can't send yourself to heaven, although their rules are a bit more complicated and nuanced. I don't see how anyone could hold onto their faith after that, except for a sheer desperation that it might somehow comfort them. The dad and I were fairly close and would talk online quite a bit, and would frequently have friendly (and often frustrating, for both of us I'm sure) debates about, of all things, religion and gun control. In light of what happened, I'm at a loss as to what to say to him, as much as I'd like to reach out.
This kind of thing just renews my anger and disgust at church leaders and people like Joseph Smith, who are clearly willing to do any awful thing to make themselves look good, or become rich, or marry as many young girls as they can successfully manipulate. It's people like that who make me wish there was a hell, because they deserve an eternity of torture. If there is a hell, it should be populated mostly with high level clergy and religious founders.
Wow... I wanted to watch this. I understand now that the concept of heaven is attractive to people who have lost family, especially the premature losses. After two very painful losses in the last six years in my family (my nephew in 2017 and my sister in 2023), I can see what heaven is for. It's so my sister could have imagined more time with her son, and so my Mom can now imagine more time with her daughter. Both woman, my mom and my sister, lost children to tragic road accidents. Neither one of them were ready to say goodbye to their first borns. I can understand in the valley of grief that heaven, or their limited understanding of heaven, would be a consolation for them. At least they got to, and get to imagine more time. But that is only possible if there is no thinking about it beyond that. Like you said... there is a lot that doesn't make any sense when it comes to imagining the idea of heaven as at all desirable. And yet... I get to say nothing to my mother of the ludicrousy of her belief. She is 86. She needs "heaven" even through it is a twisted imagination of one. The night my nephew died, my sister said this.."I am glad I believe in heaven, because I get to see my son again." He was 26-1/2 when he died. Now she is dead at the age of 57 and her pain is over. But my Mom's pain has just begun. Somehow I get to shake my head at it all in my own space... and not bring it up in conversation with her. It's her only solace now. In a letter she wrote that she sent me today, she writes... "She beat me to heaven, I should go first." I wish I could shout this message (about the "Problems with Paradise") from the rooftops, but because of the tragedies in my family... I get to keep it to myself for now. But thank you for sharing. Everything you said made so much sense and I totally get it. I'll keep listening... you have good stuff here!!! Time for Leviticus!!!
I can understand the appeal of heaven for the reasons you listed. Even though I'm not religious, some part of me hopes if there is something after we die then my loved ones are happy. It's just there to get us through the hard times. But it really becomes a problem when you're throwing your own life away to try and get to this other magical place you have zero control over. All I can do is be the best person I can personally be, with all my flaws and everything. If that's not good enough then there's nothing else I could have done.
Another problem with the whole heaven concept, however, is there are people who literally NEVER had any chance of being a good person. The severely mentally disabled, for example. They wouldn't understand God or be able to do any actions that would get them into heaven. Some are even very violent but they have no control over that. Or people who are born narcissists or sociopaths. They are either born that way or made because of severe childhood abuse. Neither of which are likely to live a life of general well-being towards our neighbors. So are they going to go to hell for things they couldn't control? I'm sure people will argue the mentally disabled have a free pass to heaven. Would they be mentally disabled in heaven, too? The whole thing just kinda breaks down when you try to figure out the logistics of fairness in an inherently unfair system.
@@suicune2001 That is right... the whole thing breaks down when we actually think about it... Engage the brain and the magic train derails.
I lost my dad a couple of years ago. I feel kind of like you do, but I'm very vocal about my disbelief in an afterlife because I find the whole thing about a loving god now having him in his house as kind of insulting and evil. As if I'd even want to believe in the existence of a being who would kill someone and make those who know him suffer. Still, I also don't like hearing people say that their loved ones are no longer in pain after they're gone, because they also don't get to enjoy that relief. Worse, they don't know that they or anything else ever existed. At least with the concept of an afterlife you have people still knowing what happened in their life and lack of suffering, but in reality that doesn't happen. I get that some people need to believe it in order to get by, but I am just as free to express how I don't believe in it and why as they do to express their belief in it and their reason why. So I don't tell them it doesn't exist, but I make sure I don't lie to them about my own views.
When I was 16, instead of hanging out with friends, I was praying, instead of playing video games, I was praying, instead of eating, I was fasting... etc... I'm 18 and still scared god is real and I have to repent.
The Kingdom of Heaven is NOT eternally sitting on a cloud playing a harp, nor is it eternal church.
There are homes in Heaven, and trees, horses, food, rivers, streets, and gates so there will most likely be exploring of God's vast creation.
AND there is NO crying, NO sorrow, NO pain, and NO DEATH in Heaven.
The Bible says, "No eye has seen, no ear has heard, neither has it entered the mind of man what God has prepared for those who love Him." This means we can't begin to imagine how great Heaven will be.
Hell, at the very least, will be eternity without all that Heaven is.
AND eventually God will bring the New Jerusalem (Heaven) down to a renovated earth and we will live for eternity in perfect Health, perfect Peace, perfect Happiness, on the earth the way it should have been BEFORE Adam and Eve sinned.
All the gods are real. We made them all up. They are fairytales in books, just like Harry Potter. Why are you scared of fairytales? :-)
I've asked the question before of what do you do in heaven? Never get an answer. Your analysis was very thought provoking and all people should hear it. Thank you.
It's simple. We don't know.
Majority of humans can't think for themselves and it's easier for them to just follow a crowd, it's truely unfortunate but it's the reality. Just found your channel bro, I liked and subscribed, we need more people like you! 🙂
Too kind man, thanks for being here
"Other people can't think for themselves. Thank you for thinking for me. Please let me touch the hem of your garment."
That's what you sound like.
@@evanthesquirrel 🙄 I'm perfectly capable of thinking for myself, I was just pointing out the obvious, if that offends you then you're probably one who can't think for himself.
given that i live when there are more humans on earth than at any time before or anytime soon, this is really ambarassing. How did i follow the crowd... Next time i will apply for a neanderthal career.
@@evanthesquirrel Cope
I’m very happy to say that I’ve realized most of these points and they were some of the first concerns I had with my faith. I have always described heaven as boring, I even described heaven as socialism or communism in like third grade(albeit very incorrectly as I still believed those to be authoritarian in nature, which couldn’t be less true). I never even bothered to use the Bible to back my arguments up, I just used what people said to me and I got a lot of discomfort and dodging.
You can't experience boredom in heaven. Just various states of euphoria, but you are correct it is objectively boring. I'm glad you can't see us. Present day Earth is the distillation of every creative thought we've had. To actually have a cat sit on your lap and purr is quite an experience. Make the most of your time here.
@@xandror bold of you to assume feeling good can’t become exhausting; when every day is the same the things that being pleasure become monotonous and the concept of inability to fail is incredibly boring. Heaven is boring
@@ToastUrbathI don't assume anything. You can't feel exhausted either. Yes it's boring but you can't experience the boredom so it really doesn't matter. It's like asking an asteroid if space is cold. I fail all the time.
@@xandror well do unless you have any data to back up those claims.. We can only make assumptions about heaven.
@@ToastUrbath Well you don't have to believe me I suppose, another failure on my part. If I watched you take ecstacy, not knowing what it is, I could say taking ecstacy is boring, you swallow a little white pill. That's it? How boring. Do you understand now?
Hey Brandon, I'm totally with you on all of this, especially the part about supposedly not caring or being hurt about a loved one not getting to heaven if you yourself make it there. One of the absolute proofs that you will be stripped of any recognition that your loved one may not be there is actually stated in scripture. It states that there will be no marital unions recognized in heaven (you would not recognize your husband or wife), therefore it only stands to reason that you will not be able to recognize ANY person you created a relationship with - brother, sister, cousin, any other family member, friends, or acquaintances. I mean, if you won't recognize husband and wife relationships, WHY would you be permitted to recognize ANY past relationships you had with other people while living?
Appreciate this, (agnostic athiest here) And I have only heard the point of boredom and monotony of eternity. I heard it your interview with Trent. And you mentioned this is the weakest. When you understand neuro science of boredom this becomes very much weaker too. This has been a major interest of mine, the neuro science of how we get bored, feel unsafe feel pleasure and feel content etc. Even though I'm not on the camp of theism Let me tell you that boredom is optional, but most human beings don't feel like it is until they have a major experience that moves their primary brain function from dopamine and cortisol base, to see base. Dopamine-cortisol is the pleasure, fear, anger, boredom pathway. Serotonin is the contentment pathway. Under dopamine is about motivation, improvement, achievement, goals, good food good money. It's the doing pathway of our brain, it also what allows our brain to track time, to get bored over time. To have a sense of time. And we need it to survive. It's also designed/evolved to make us feel bored when you use it too much. To want something new. To not be content with what we have. To chase the next big thing. In itself it is unsustainable. It pleasure reduces on the same resistive thing. If it's didn't it brain circuits would fry and we would stop trying to improve our lives. So liked if you eat your favourite food all the time, you'll get bored of it. But if you have breaks three pleasure experience will build up again. True of everything pleasure. Sex, games, food, drugs like heroin etc etc.
Not so with serotonin. Serotonin pathway if it primarily engaged over dopamine, you will not be bored no matter what. It does track time. It creates a feeling of contentment and safety. It never seeks improvement or growth in itself. It also makes one feel closer to spiritual realm or god etc. It's there pathway that is engaged under hallucinogenics, and near death experiences. People who go deep into these, describe the experience as being timeless. There is no idea of time or boredom. Things can feel like hundreds of years in these experiences or time can lose all it's meaning and so does boredom.
These two pathways need to work in balance or we would die of starvation. If we just lived in a timeless state of contentment, our bodies would die. But if we just pleasure chase we become very unhappy. Think of unhappy rich people, there are lots of them. Then contest it with the happy or person. There are many examples of this as well. Of course there are also many happy rich people and a huge amount of unhappy poor people.
You can experience a shift in this yourselfif you learn effe tive meditation. I can be really bored, sit down meditate, which litterally is a cessation of chasing what's pleasurable. At first I'll become more bored and irritated. But then as I go deeper into it, after about 10 minutes, I become less bored, by doing the most boring thing ever. I also start to lose the bed to track time. it feels good but it is not pleasure. It's contentment, acceptance, safety. There's nothing to do. I actually feel more excited about doing things that may have bored me previously, 20 mins earlier.
I would hypothesise that if there is a heaven and we had the same physical neurological and psychological base that we do as humans, we would sit more in this timeless serotonin state. That never gets bored, makes boring things more interesting, and that teaches time not at all, or with far less importance.
I've only really scratched the surface here. Happy to talk with you more about this. 😊
Excellent analysis its strange that no one has responded to your comment
This is super interesting and nice to see at least one person provide some form of tangible example of how boredom could logically be a non-factor regarding eternity.
I am obviously biased in saying as much, but I do think alot of these psychological 'problems' with hiw heaven works is truly born out of an inevitable lack of understanding anything outside of our current human/mortal experience in-life
Great video once again! I'm glad you started your UA-cam channel. You're gifted at articulating concepts that have always bugged people like me, who grew up in the church. When I was a kid, the concept of eternity always made me sick to my stomach
I'm certain that if you really wanted to be annihilated once in heaven, God would grant it -- why have a whiney harpy if she doesn't want to be there?
Thank you very much! Same here! I couldnt fathom how it would be good and of course just felt so shameful for that
@@20july1944so by your logic if she wanted oblivion god would grant that wish..so your saying god would allow her to commit cosmic suicide 😐 isn’t suicide a sin in the bible..so god would allow an immoral act of taking one’s own eternal life in a place that’s meant to be holy and safe free from such traumas and tragedy but by your logic I guess not 😃..then that makes him a unjust god..if he really cared about the mental well being of this person then it would do everything to convince her not to commit cosmic suicide because supposedly god treats all life as scared we all his kids from what y’all Christian Extremist tell us..but he would allow suicide in this particular circumstance? That’s incredibly incoherent 🤨…Maybe it’s because existing for all eternity would drive anyone even god itself to madness..Absolute power corrupts absolutely there is no way the god you believe in is a just god
@@jazzatiff9460 If God allowed it, it wouldn't be a sin.
If she's unhappy in heaven, what is God's alternative to letting her cease to exist?
@@20july1944I’m not surprised though when god didn’t like the way we turned out EVEN THOUGH ITS FUCKING OMNISCIENT?!?! So the fact he got surprised by how “Sinful” we were should tell you something but it doesn’t for some reason 😐It decided to do the equivalent of dumping a bucket of water on a ant hill known as the flood…god sounds pretty damn violent and stupid to me how the hell did this being create everything else almost instantly but took this MF seven days to create this overheated,overpopulated,polluted Authoritarian shithole we call earth..
Your last point is the one I talk about almost every day. I have a customer that actually sits in his chair, in his bedroom, and watches Catholic crap on TV (and Faux News), waiting to die. He told me he wants to make sure he meets Jesus and he’s doing everything he can to make sure of it. It’s so sad. He’s wasting his one and only life for a fairy-tale. I hate religion so much.
oh man, it is so tragic. How many others are just like him too.
How is that worse than what my dad did, watch Rachel Maddow and wait for nothingness?
No one with a brain cares what you think.
Both are bad and a waste of your life. Hope this helps.
When i was a child, I feared hell for the tormenting stuff and also feared heaven for the endless praises. "Imagine it's Sunday morning forever, and the service never ends..." whata boredom