The truth is that heaven is made up like the rest of the story.

This is a sermon about heaven you have just delivered Peter

It doesn't matter if heaven is real or not, does it? And we will never know about such things for sure.

But if umpteen million people feel so insecure as to create in their minds a nice safe place, then so be it. Maybe is has a useful sociological purpose. So long as they do no harm to others.

Problem is, so many religious devotees do do incredible harm. The most pertinent question ought to be "Is the invention of heaven a curse or a bain for society at large?"

Looking around me, I would argue the former, but I may be wrong.

Believers and unbelievers can live together in harmony. So let's let go of all that. The major danger to humankind comes not from belief but from fanatical belief - amongst hard core muslims and hard core christians.

That's where our fucus ought to be.

Heaven on Earth - Part 1

There will surely be a heaven on Earth when people learn to co-exist in a manner befitting sentient beings. We have plundered our brains just as we have plundered our other natural resources, and so denied ourselves the full measure of these blessings. We didn't have to deny ourselves anything - just take it easy, and not go at it like a bull at a gate - that's all.

We don't need no afterlife. There is time aplenty in a contented mind.

There seems to be two forces at play. Those that attract people together and those that repel. I sense that we live in some sort of equilibrium between the two.

If I were to make a ledger of attractive and repulsive influences, which column would politics, profit, love, power, go in to? Are some things neutral? Above all, which column would organised religious creeds go into?

I would have to say that on past and present performance, religion would go squarely into the repulsive column. What to do?

As they stand, religions reach a critical mass once they are filled with people with a common interest. Then they tend to become almost tribal and flip over into repulsion mode. Have we missed the point?

Take that hippie looking feller who turned up a couple of thou ago. He had a glimmer of an idea, saw something new out of the corner of his eye. But ever since his murder, the pious dance on his grave while reading from a piece of second-hand antiquarian tat, instead of using the common sense grace they were born with.

(watch this space - the robot might savage part 2)

Heaven on Earth - Part 2

Isn't about time we wrote some gospels of our own? MUST we have a messiah? Why should we be bounded by past performance? Can we do it collectively instead of waiting for some KING to come along?

Religions were the politics of their day, never forget that. We could write a constitution that would stand as a measure of our goodwill to each other, not only to serve this nation, but the world as a whole. It would have to do that, or fail as just another divisive piece of tat.

This is 2006. The sine qua non of religious reformation MUST be that religious leaders from all creeds must gather and stand together for all the world to see. They must embrace. They must check their "uniforms" at the door. They must leave their "handbooks" at home. A "clean break" (where have I heard that before?). A new day. A new start. A new gospel that includes everyone and everything.

It's doable. It really is.

I will be in Heaven, when I open the door and see all the good friends who have died before me, and we talk till eternity about our good times on this earth.
The path at the back door will open out to a ground where Melbourne Storm are beating a Sydney team and Carlton are thrashing Collingwood and in the distance Micheal Doohan and Alan Jones are both beating the field in a Live Grand Prix.
The Muslim,Christian,Jew style of God is a harsh father who will curse any wrong doing,by his children.
So all wrong doers are at the mercy of God,Allah,or whatever name we give HIM,for unlike the Christian Scientists who believe that GOD is a Mum,and she will put up with any wrong doing,and change the Bible to suit the day.