Nirvana? Nevermind.

No hell below us, above us only sky? Maybe. I am on occasion worried about the hell part. Possibly being damned to burn in unbearable pain for eternity amidst the fires of hell is not a prospect I look forward to with relish. Not only can I not tolerate the heat as well as I once could, eternity is such a long time. As for heaven, no matter how clean and pleasant heaven may be, do I want to spend eternity fluttering about with wings on my back and a harp in my hands? Not unless it's a Harp Lager, no. But is the wings and harp thing only for angels, and not everyone in heaven is an angel? I'm not really sure how that all works. I must have missed that day in religion class at the Lutheran grammar school I attended.

And what about this Rapture thing? It was indeed one of Blondie's better songs, but I'm referring to that judgment day business alluded to in the what was apparently the first LSD inspired piece of literature, the book of Revelations. When the Rapture occurs Jesus Christ will return to separate the naughty from the nice, there will be lots of fire and brimstone (what the heck is brimstone anyway?), the naughty will descend into a fiery pit and the nice will ascend to the pearly gates and beyond.

But seriously folks, I don't think it's going to go down that way. I don't think it's going to go down at all. Earth is here forever, and all it's inhabitants as well, at least the ones that don't become extinct.

Earth is heaven and Earth is hell. Right now it is hell. It's hell because of the way we treat each other, with pettiness and ill-will, it's hell because we rape and rob and kill and assault and numb our souls with drugs and alcohol, it's hell because we're all going to the mall instead of going after Bin Laden.

There are flashes of heaven on Earth, flashes that transport us temporarily from our self-created hell. There is love and kindness, there are sunrises and sunsets and blue skies. But mostly we make Earth hell.

God, however, wants Earth to be heaven. His plan for us is that we humans become educated. God wants us to learn. He wants us to learn to love our fellow man, to learn not to kill and hurt and numb ourselves. God wants us all to coexist peacefully.

When peaceful coexistence occurs for generation after generation after generation then we will have heaven on Earth. We will have attained the nirvana God wants for us here on Earth.

Nirvana will only come when mankind truly learns to deal with it's problems, when every last human makes the effort to be good. There are many who try to make the world a better place yet it appears that nirvana keeps slipping farther and farther away. That's why I, pessimistically I'm afraid, feel that Earth will be here forever.