To religious people. Will atheists go to hell or heaven?

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What is there in Heaven that one seeks to attain? Describe it for me, that I may be convinced of such a place. Does it exist like we exist? I've never understood the popular description of heaven. Would I be born there, or be of a certain age? Would I remember my previous life or forget it altogether?

Hmm. I can understand Hell, but I am having a more difficult time understanding the Heaven people speak about.

First off I was being sarcastic, I don't believe in hell or heaven or happy fairy tale land. I also love how you people like to say 'I'm going to heaven and you're not', well that sounds exactly to me like this will sound to you: I'm going to the magical paradise land in the center of the moon and you're not because you sinned against the almighty octopus at the center of the universe. You don't take that comment seriously because you don't believe there could be an almighty octopus in the center of the universe or a paradise land in the center of the moon. Well saying there's a heaven or hell or god has the same exact probability level as that. And before you go off saying 'Atheists believe in a giant octopus in the center of the universe' we don't I was using it as a humorous example. All Atheism is, is a disbelief in a god or deity, that's all it doesn't mean you believe in evolution even it just means you don't believe in a deity or a god.

(sorry if I made that into a rant, it wasn't meant to be)

Though this wasn't directed at me, I found it interesting.

My feelings of scientific agnosticism were born not out of a hatred for religion of any kind, but it was merely the form that my logic took to help me approach the natural world. I try to be a kind person. If when I die I find out I was wrong, I will indeed argue with God. I will be reasonable and explain to Him that I used the mind given to me by Him to attempt to understand the world created by Him. I think that if He is all powerful, He would be able to see that I harbor no ill feelings towards Him, and see that I am just one small creature trying to make sense of an extremely complex world; I was wrong, but I did my best.

If God decides to send me to Hell anyway, then I will humbly accept his choice, after all, in a case such as that, heaven is not a place that I would like to be (and what an odd twist that is).

And I would be fully okay with it.

Rrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrring Rrrrrrrrrrrrrring..

Hello? Yes? uhuh. OK, I'll tell him.

Sir, that was God. He says we should let girls into Welton.

Dead Poets Society, 1991

No it doesnt.

Please read the Bible before you quote from it else all you do is perpetuate the God dishonouring lies of the Catholic Church and its daughter Islam that God would torture people horribly just because they didnt belive in him.

This is what the Bible says about Hell and the lake of fire

REV 20:14 And death and hell were cast into the lake of fire. This is the second death.

Did you read that, Hell was cast into the lake of fire.

So how can Hell BE the lake of fire?, how can it be cast into itself?

Hell is sheol or Hades, its just the grave, Jesus went to hell for 3 days before he was resurrected . There is no fire or pains or pitchforks there, its just a lie to make you become a Catholic or a muslim.

The lake of fire though, is an illustration to the Jews to help them understand permanant destruction, (not permanant torture), outside Jerusalem was a permantantly burning rubbish tip kept burning with sulpher into which even dead (not live) dead criminals would be hurled, it was called the Valley of Gehenna.

Did you also read death will be hurled into the lake of fire?, that means death itself will also be permantly destroyed.

And yes, we are dust, we are what we eat, which ultimately comes from the soil.

Funny how you should mention being 'you are what you eat' when you mention eating the body of Christ in church services (ALL Christians do it, not just Catholics). Going by that, by eating the 'body of Christ' (the bread), that makes YOU Christ or God. Does that then make you immortal? Or don't you practice that form of communion, so therefore aren't truly one with your god? But when you get right down to it, it's just another ritual Christians 'borrowed' from us pagans.

Yes indeed, heres why

6:48 I am that bread of life.
6:49 Your fathers did eat manna in the wilderness, and are dead.
6:50 This is the bread which cometh down from heaven, that a man may eat thereof, and not die.
6:51 I am the living bread which came down from heaven: if any man eat of this bread, he shall live for ever: and the bread that I will give is my flesh, which I will give for the life of the world.
6:52 The Jews therefore strove among themselves, saying, How can this man give us his flesh to eat?
6:53 Then Jesus said unto them, Verily, verily, I say unto you, Except ye eat the flesh of the Son of man, and drink his blood, ye have no life in you.
6:54 Whoso eateth my flesh, and drinketh my blood, hath eternal life; and I will raise him up at the last day.
6:55 For my flesh is meat indeed, and my blood is drink indeed.
6:56 He that eateth my flesh, and drinketh my blood, dwelleth in me, and I in him.

Also at the last supper Jesus identified himself as the Passover lamb.
The Jews had allways ate of the animal sacrifices they had offered to God in payment for thier sins, Jesus is the ultimate sacrifice, hence, "The Lamb of God", so just as the ancient Jews eat of thier sacrifices, Christians must eat of the ultimate sacrifice, and yes, it does make us part of the "body of Christ".

As for borrowing rituals from Pagans, dont forget that around 300AD Constantine started the Catholic Church by uniting christianity with all the pagan sun worshipping religions hence all the pagan rituals in Christendom such as the Trinity, Christmas, Easter, the Cross of Tammuz, etc etc etc , no wonder Jesus will say to most Christians, "get away from me, I never knew you", they are Pagans on which somebody has stuck a sticky label saying "Christians" on.

Nambo, I think you and Raggy are making a lot of assumptions here and do you know that when you assume you make an ass out of u and me?

You will have to point out said assumptions, I quote by scripture and history, whilst a quite full knowledge of both might be required to see the big overall picture, I do not think assumptions are used.

Didn't you know that much of what is written in the bible is very open to interpretation and not necessarily to be taken literally? I know plenty about the big picture as I have been to the movies.

The past is what happened, history is what people people chose to believe and committed to lore; scripture is history with an agenda. That you're expecting anyone to accept such fragmented and biased stories - however enduring - as factual basis for your argument is somewhat incredible to believe. It is your faith; why must you make it another's belief?


M.

Christopher Hitchens described Heaven as a "Celestial North Korea."

I don't see how Ragtime can be so sure he will go to heaven. That is very presumptuous. He might, he might not. None of us know for sure, especially not him.

Firstly to Nambo. Where is you proof apart from scripture? That is why you and Ragtime are so similar. All your documented evidence lies in the pages of your King James or Gideon. I do not need to have people point out to me lore that Judeo-Christians BELIEVE as fact because that is all it is - a BELIEF. Many church scholars ranging from Catholics to Jewish rabbis to preachers of many denominations don't just quote from the bible when they mention historical events, they research their studies and then voice their opinions concordantly. To just rely on one source, as you and Ragtime are doing shows a blinkered outlook to the bigger picture, and thus is very foolish in the extreme.

Makuranososhi: QFT. Unfortunately none of them seem to realise there is more to history than their beliefs and lore.

I guess what's rubbing me the wrong way, is that Heaven and Hell are typically presented in a way that seems so unlike God. People who do bad things are acting either out of short-sighted ignorance, personal weakness, mental defect, or simple lack of choice. I think as we mature and understand more of the nature of pain, we grow to pity these people, and to see our own suffering in them. It makes sense to me that a God who is older than mankind would be still MORE sympathetic.

The notion that Heaven will be my reward, and Hell your punishment, stinks like humanity at its worst. Schadenfreude. Who would want to be rewarded and see their fellow man - no matter how they acted in life - punished in such a horrible fashion? It's just people who were once victims turning around and victimizing their attackers when they're on their death bed. I don't care what book it's written in. It doesn't smell like God to me; and my "nose" has served me far better than any book.

No, I think heaven and hell are a natural product of our free will, extended into eternity. Over time, some of us learn to be decent to one another, and we prefer one another's company. Some people take a very long time to figure it out, and prefer to grapple at each other's throats until they grow up. The greatest mercy of God here is that He/She is willing to give us all of eternity to learn this lesson.

Hmm, I can only think of two things off the top of my head that I have personally read that create a reasonable heaven and hell concept. The closest to the traditional view is in the last book of the Narnia series. The next is the webcomic Jack; it focuses on hell, and is one of the most disturbing things I have ever read (consider yourself warned).