I hope I’m not boring you by writing again, but I have been meditating some more on your insights, especially your statement, “We will make the same journey, but experience it according to our own beliefs. We will reach the same destination, and my impression of it will be different from, but just as valid as, my friend’s impression of it.”
Above I referred to the apparently mutually contradictory Christian views of (a) the soul leaving the body and going to heaven, as opposed to (be) the resurrection of the body. I never thought to include the view held by so many people of so many belief systems, that is (c) reincarnation, an impression which is “different from, but just as valid as” the two Christian views. And suppose that views (a), (b) and (c) are not merely “perceptions” or “impressions.” Suppose that the divine spirit is loving enough, and powerful enough, to allow each of these three views (and others as well?) to have its own “objective” reality, so that each of us will experience the afterlife in the way with which we feel comfortable, even after we have reached it. Some of us will be reincarnated in new bodies with new personalities, some will live as spirits and some will be resurrected. Could it be possible? If the divine is in each of us, can s/he not be manifested in a wide variety of ways?

That’s where my thought is right now, and I am still trying to work it out.

Peace and blessed be!!!

It makes me so happy to know that something I’ve written has helped someone else; particularly an article like this because writing it wasn’t easy and made me do a lot of thinking myself. I’m glad when people enjoy my more factual pages, like the encyclopedias, but a lot more of myself went into writing this one, and I’m beyond glad that you liked it. Thanks for taking the time to leave a comment – it really does motivate me to keep working on this site.

As a retired Christian pastor, I have a lot of free time now to meditate on some of the doctrines that I always accepted and I find that some of those beliefs really do conflict with others. For example, how do I reconcile the belief in the soul going to heaven after it leaves the body with the belief in the resurrection of the body? The first comes from a belief that the soul or spirit is better than the body, and that the body is really dross to be discarded. The other comes from the belief that a person is an indivisible unity of body and soul. How can the two be reconciled? Your explanation of “one destination with different but equally valid ways of understanding it while I am still in this life” is enlightening, inspirational and, most of all, exciting because it will give me a brand new way of thinking and reading and understanding what I read about such matters in the future. Thank You.

Roger