The Hereafter Handbook: The Universal Truth (Part 3)

Belief systems to which you may have subscribed while you had a pulse, whether secular or spiritual, are inconsequential in the Hereafter.

All of your world's great religions, as well as the not-so-great ones (they know who they are) – are the same here. Makes violent religious conflicts back on your planet seem even more tragic, doesn't it?

All religions created by Humanity are rooted in a need to explain the unknown. What were those twinkling lights that appeared in the sky after the sun made its mysterious daily disappearance? Why were crops sometimes bathed in nourishing sunshine and at other times swept away by floods? Why did so many people find the Three Stooges to be funny? As Human knowledge progressed, the answers to the first two of these questions were among those discovered. Failing to answer the third has led to the inexplicable production of a feature film.

Some things simply cannot be known.

With continued scientific advancement, established religions initially mounted stubborn, unreasoning resistance whenever confronted with such newfangled concepts as a spherical Earth orbiting the Sun. Great resources were expended to fight these ideas and to enforce established belief structures among both practitioners and non-practitioners alike.

Historically, these impositions, all too often, took decidedly nasty turns against those who held conflicting views. This invariably resulted in great loss of life, not to mention considerable residual ill-will in the Middle East. Not even the Holy See, it turns out, could envision the coming of the internal combustion engine.

Modern day religions have a relatively basic arrangement. True believers enjoy a social support structure of like-minded individuals and are promised eternal life, somewhat assuaging their fear of death. In exchange, religious organizations receive donations of time and money (mostly money) to maintain their infrastructures and to expand their market shares.

Consequences of these outreach efforts have included continent-wide populations practicing non-indigent religions, as well as vast numbers of home dwellers who have become highly skilled at feigning absence whenever the doorbell rings unexpectedly.