On reincarnation and the "after life".

I don't know what happens after we die. I have no sense of that. The idea of a fairyland heaven with streets paved in gold doesn't really appeal to me, frankly. When people point up at the sky and talk about "going up" to heaven, I wonder if they've ever been in a planetarium..."up" doesn't make sense. Life is anything but simple, so I understand the appeal of a place where everything is simple, but again, it holds no appeal for me. Plus, I just don't find that to be very consistent with what I understand creation to be. If this world, with all it's beautiful complexity, is genuinely reflective of a creator, how could a simple, purely happy, gold-paved heaven also reflect that creator? "Heaven" is supposed to be a place everyone looks forward to living in and wants to be in, but again, the "heaven" that people talk about is not a place I want to go; so doesn't that challenge the very idea of it as a place everyone wants for their future?

Then there are so many people who have talked about experiencing some kind of presence of a loved one who has died. These aren't "hauntings" by a ghost - just an awareness of a presence, an impression of someone's being. Who am I to question this? This, too seems to challenge the idea of a heaven that is completely separate and other-worldly.

Then there are the many people who believe in reincarnation. Actually, from a scientific perspective, in many ways this makes the most sense to me: energy and matter get reconverted, changed, recycled repeatedly. Nothing in energy and matter "disappears". So why wouldn't it be the same with "souls" (whatever they are) - they may be changed, converted, but do they really disappear?

At the same time I have to admit that reincarnation is also not at all appealing to me. I have no desire to "return" here or to go through the struggles of life again and again. And frankly, I don't see humanity as "improving" on the whole. I am still shocked and amazed by how many people believe that killing others is a viable solution for anything. I am still intensely sorrowed by the fact that people are usually about getting the most for themselves and really don't know how or have any real desire to love their enemies as they love themselves. People don't want to pay taxes, don't want to be part of improving this place, but they do want the free resources of good education, at least for their own kids: etc, etc. Those who do well somehow believe they are better than others, that they have "deserved" what birth, privilege and opportunity has given them and that others who have nothing somehow deserve that. So short sighted, or "self" sighted. I don't see the point in repeating this over and over in the form of reincarnation.

There is another real problem that I see with those who talk about their past lives and who believe deeply in reincarnation. I think about the few people I personally know who subscribe to this belief. In the history of humanity, one article guesstimated that by 2002 there had been
106,456, 367, 700 people on this planet. In 2002, the population was estimated at about 6 1/4 billion people. And yet, every single one of the people I've met who believes in reincarnation was somebody famous in a past life. I'm sorry, but that is so much more than unlikely. It points, I believe, at a very basic level to the reason for the belief in reincarnation. These people feel small in their current life, but they deal with it by saying they were someone big and important in a different incarnation. Also, if we are supposed to be reincarnated into a completely new life, why do some "remember" past lives while others don't? None of this makes sense to me. And again, I really don't want any part of it.

I'm not saying that these things are somehow determined by what we like or what we hope will happen. But I think most philosophies/theologies about the afterlife do tend to stem from some kind of hope or need for comfort, or need to understand. And I'm also saying that so far none of the after-life theories that I have encountered serve that need or create that comfort for me. Not that I'm afraid of death. I'm not. I just don't know what happens after we die and I'm okay with that. I think we have to live this life to the best of our ability. I think we need to strive to make this world a place where everyone is given a chance to really live, an opportunity to thrive. I think we are called to love everyone now not because that will improve our chances of going to "heaven" but because "heaven" is something we are called to create - right here and now, and only through the continual, difficult, purposeful act of loving.