AN ATHEIST AGAINST AFTERLIFE

Life is brief. It is one third shorter than we think. We are completely awake for only two thirds of our life. The remaining third is spent in sleep. So, a person who lives 75 actually lives for fifty years. Worse, we get caught in a peculiar time paradox as we age. The days pass slowly but the years pass fast. And before we know it, we have joined our ancestors. But we are programmed to shut off thoughts of out mortality. Asked to name the greatest wonder of the world, a saint said, “Though you see people dying around you, you never think of your own death.

Our ego suppresses the awareness. Our fear of death is not the fear of the unknown. It’s the fear of what is known to all well: that when we die, we will never reappear. Deep inside we are devastated by this awareness. So we try to console ourselves by seeking the assurance of an afterlife that all religions promise. But we don’t believe these promises. As they say, everyone wants to go to heaven but no one wants to die. Rather unfairly, the atheist’s view of life is excluded from debates on spirituality. The truth is that like believers, the atheist looks for happiness too. But unlike believers, he does not depend on God to provide it. He considers God irrelevant to his existence. He believes this is the only time he’ll be alive. The king of horror writes, Stephen King, once said, he was always shaken “that almost nobody alive today will be alive a hundred years from now”. This awareness provides the zest for school and college reunions. Most enthusiastic about the reunions are ancient old boys whose time is running out.

A 60 years old man thinks he will be pretty happy if he lives till 80. Tell him his remaining 20 years mean just 7300 days, and he will panic. This awareness of mortality distinguishes human beings from all other species. The awareness is immensely saddening. Once we go, this is forever: nor have we any proof of Heaven.