euthanatos93420
Well-Known Member
If you're familiar with these two staples of Christian theology then I must ask. How many of you caught that CSL used 'The Great Divorce' to basically say Dante had it backwards. That Dante's Inferno is actually Heaven.
If you're not familiar with The Great Divorce then I recommend it regardless of whatever religious affiliation or lack thereof you may have.in short, purgatory is where everyone goes, a grey facade resembling life and composed purely of mental projections or some such. Space is infinate and we can be as close or as far from anyone. Anything our mind generates can be 'real' and we can find almost anyone else in purgatory that isn't so far out that we get lost ourselves. Eventually our human failings and inability to forgive something causes social rifts and we find ourselves in varying degrees of loniness against the backdrop of eternity that reminds us that our imagination is limited and our lonilness an eternal suffering. By then we are too insane and lost to find our way back to the 'bus stop' that takes us to the gates of heaven.
Heaven is a city on the faraway hill. To begin traveling toward it is extremely painful. Quintessentially we must admit that things we thought we knew in life were wrong so that we may be taught the truth by God via our friends who comes back to the gates to help us understand the experience.
We must learn forgiveness for even the worst of sinners if we are to make it inside a functional community. Each level of 'Dante's Inferno' is yet another shocking revelation of how fucked up it is that we have to forgive murderers, rapists, pedos and Judas.
Because the likes of these sinners, thieves, whores, rapists, the 'sensualists' are the most apt to admit their own ignorance and receive revelation. Whereas the one who already knows the truth finds it mst difficult to let go of his preconcieved narcisxsitic notions about God and the nature of reality. Thus, the most fundamentalist Christian will have the most difficult time entering heaven.
This diametric opposition in theology has never been to my knowledge addressed and just recently hit me while I was tripping and watching Supernatural (I've been watching some reruns to be ready for Season 7). They follow Dante's model for hell and show that it obvious opposite was basically C.S. Lewis' hell and I shit brix.
Anyway, I'm not arguing for one or the other. I just laughed my ass off that Christian theology can't seem to make up its mind which side it's on and thought I'd share that 'revelation' with you and maybe see what you think.
If you're not familiar with The Great Divorce then I recommend it regardless of whatever religious affiliation or lack thereof you may have.in short, purgatory is where everyone goes, a grey facade resembling life and composed purely of mental projections or some such. Space is infinate and we can be as close or as far from anyone. Anything our mind generates can be 'real' and we can find almost anyone else in purgatory that isn't so far out that we get lost ourselves. Eventually our human failings and inability to forgive something causes social rifts and we find ourselves in varying degrees of loniness against the backdrop of eternity that reminds us that our imagination is limited and our lonilness an eternal suffering. By then we are too insane and lost to find our way back to the 'bus stop' that takes us to the gates of heaven.
Heaven is a city on the faraway hill. To begin traveling toward it is extremely painful. Quintessentially we must admit that things we thought we knew in life were wrong so that we may be taught the truth by God via our friends who comes back to the gates to help us understand the experience.
We must learn forgiveness for even the worst of sinners if we are to make it inside a functional community. Each level of 'Dante's Inferno' is yet another shocking revelation of how fucked up it is that we have to forgive murderers, rapists, pedos and Judas.
Because the likes of these sinners, thieves, whores, rapists, the 'sensualists' are the most apt to admit their own ignorance and receive revelation. Whereas the one who already knows the truth finds it mst difficult to let go of his preconcieved narcisxsitic notions about God and the nature of reality. Thus, the most fundamentalist Christian will have the most difficult time entering heaven.
This diametric opposition in theology has never been to my knowledge addressed and just recently hit me while I was tripping and watching Supernatural (I've been watching some reruns to be ready for Season 7). They follow Dante's model for hell and show that it obvious opposite was basically C.S. Lewis' hell and I shit brix.
Anyway, I'm not arguing for one or the other. I just laughed my ass off that Christian theology can't seem to make up its mind which side it's on and thought I'd share that 'revelation' with you and maybe see what you think.