I heard an interview with author Maurice Sendak (b. 1928) today on PBS. He described his childhood as nearly unbearable but said that his brother "saved" him. He said he doesn't believe in God or the hearafter-when you die, you are dead, - nothingness. He said he "loves" life and people and is sad that it will end but death is final. And yet after making it very plain that he is an unflappable athiest, he choked up a little at the mention of his brother who died years ago and said, "I think I will see him again". Some very decent people are athiest but I suspect that it is the human condition that we long for life continuously.

I think I would reserve my harshest criticism for the so called Christian who pushes his dogama and yet hasn't a spark of humanity. I remember being told once by a young man who apparently thought I needed to be converted, "If I thought there was no afterlife and no heaven, I would sin and take advantage of people, cheat and kill because nothing would matter." When he left without my public confession to Jesus, I remember thinking what an awful person he was that the only thing keeping him from killing me was his fear of Hell and expectation of Heaven. The person to admire is the person who has no hope of a reward in the afterlife and yet acts decently in this life.


"Imagination is more important than knowledge." - Albert Einstein