posted
I would like to dedicate this thread to my grandfather, who passed away on Sunday 6/20/2010.
What are your beliefs on the afterlife?
I don't want to argue on what is wrong or right, but to just provide an opportunity to share what you guys personally believe. It would be very disappointing if this thread degenerated into attacks and insults, but I do encourage questions if ideas are unclear.
For me, I do not have a clear idea of whether there is an afterlife. I think that I think that people have souls, and after their bodies shut down, they go somewhere else. I don't know if it is to a set place like heaven or hell, or something similar, or if they become reincarnated. Perhaps their souls becomes part of ones memories and history, providing something to look back and rely on. I don't know, just kind of writing.
I am not really looking for sympathy, but just a comforting discussion on your guys' belief systems.
Thank you to all who participate.
Posts: 468 | Registered: Mar 2008
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I believe that we live after we die, that our natures aren't fundamentally changed by leaving our bodies behind, and that we receive the opportunity to continue learning and growing eternally. I also believe that it's possible for families to remain families eternally, but that it requires faith in Christ, a dedication to living His teachings, and obedience to the ordinances of His gospel.
In my life, all four of my grandparents have died. The first was my paternal grandfather when I was 12; I remember being very confused and just wishing he'd come back, and (for the first few days) believing that if I hoped enough he'd simply be there again. When I was 17 my paternal grandmother died; she had lived with us for years, and on New Year's morning my father called all of us who were at home to her room. She had died a few hours earlier, with my father holding her hand. I remember being a little shocked at being in the room with her dead body, but it was also a comforting family moment.
My maternal grandmother died when I was 25. I saw her a few weeks before and told her that my wife and I were expecting our first child; she was on life support at the time, and I don't know if she really understood, but it made me feel better to have told her. My maternal grandfather died a few years later just before my daughter turned two; the last years of his life were quite lonely and unhappy, and in the end he was more glad than sad, believing that he would soon be reunited with his wife.
All my grandparents believed, as I do, that they would be reunited with their loved ones once they died. I've often thought of the joy I will feel when I truly get to know my grandparents in a way that I couldn't in this life because of their age and infirmity. That brings me joy that tempers (to some degree) my feelings of loss and sorrow.
Posts: 2926 | Registered: Sep 2005
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posted
I'm sorry for your loss. I don't really believe in an afterlife, but I think there's still solace to be found.
My grandmother died last year and I still miss her. I have innumerable happy memories of her. I think she enjoyed her time on earth and did good things with it. She was good to others and had plenty of people who loved her in return. She left a mark that has meaning. To me, that is beautiful. I try to live life in such a way that all of those things will also be true of me. And if they are, I think that's enough.
Posts: 1947 | Registered: Aug 2002
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posted
Sorry you're having to go through this Rival, it sucks.
I don't believe in any organized afterlife, where we live eternally in a non-corporeal version of ourselves. But I leave open the possibility that the energy in our bodies goes somewhere and retains some of our essence. I don't know if that means we become ghosts, angels or what, but I'd like to think there's something, but it's not paradise.
Posts: 21898 | Registered: Nov 2004
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This topic pertains so strongly to my experiences- had I had a community such as Hatrack to discuss death with last year, my life now would be very different (perhaps easier?). In any case, I've done a lot of thinking on the subject. I believed in reincarnation for most of my childhood. Last year (the year I became very well acquainted with the process of grief) I became a bit of a Buddhist, believing that the ultimate afterlife (perhaps after multiple reincarnations) was a sort of one-ness with the universe, free from individual consciousness. I couldn't stand the idea of living forever, on earth or in heaven. After I read Xenocide and Stewart Edward White's The Unobstructed Universe, my ideas of an afterlife were much more formulated. We all know that the deceased live on in our minds. And, well, these are my thoughts after reading Card and Stewart Edward White together:
SEW suggested that when we die, our consciousnesses are elevated to a level that humans can’t see or feel, just like radio waves or x-rays. It’s all the same universe, but it’s like photography- our perception is black and white to their color. Matter just isn’t the same obstruction anymore. This is where I first became confused because if the dead are simply elevated to a higher frequency, they wouldn’t be able to see the things we do just like we can’t see the thing that they do. Of course, I was stubbornly trying to put things into what I consider physically possible and not, and that's not to say that there aren't new things to be discovered that break all the rules. And if the dead are really just more attuned to their philotic identities (which is to say, they’re less attached to their earthly persona), then it could be possible for them to control their philotic frequency so that they are able to see the things that we do. Would OSC say that they have philotic control?
Thinking about it that way helped me reason my way through grief. While it may have not been the best way to deal with my losses, it made me stronger eventually.
I was brought up in an agnostic, nearly secular household. It didn't work so much for me, as I discovered that I simply have a natural belief in a higher power. But because I couldn't talk about this with my family, I turned to the a friend that I knew would try to help me sort things out. She was Mormon, and shared a strong instinctive faith with me. It was very comforting to think about that, and she made me realize that what I really wanted was to get the dead back. Which can't happen. But it's so comforting to think that I might be reunited with them someday. In any case, I still don't think that we were meant to be conscious forever. Then what? It just seems unbearable to me. Thinking of heaven, though... Maybe, just maybe, that image of the deceased, how our philotes have twined together, is part of what heaven is. The dead certainly live on, but through memory.
Hope that helped. It's quite late so I'll probably think of a more well-thought out answer in the morning. I wish you only the best, Rival.
Posts: 47 | Registered: Mar 2010
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