Mitch Albom has written about the possibility of reuniting with choice people in heaven. I love the idea, but I’m not sure it’s going to happen. My mind entertains the possibility that Richard Dawkins, a vocal atheist, is right and there is no heaven. Or, that if heaven does exist, only the elect or the righteous will gain admittance. For those reasons, I’ve decided I’d better spend time with friends and loved ones while we’re still here.
A phone call last week announcing the death of a friend I’d been meaning to call jolted me with the consequences of procrastination. And while it’s nice to think I might get a second chance to tell her how much I care about her in heaven, that event is less than certain. What is certain is that I could have called her a couple of weeks earlier—and I didn’t.
George and I each lost aunts whom we didn’t take the time to visit when they were hospitalized. Of course, we’d have made the time if we’d known for sure this was their last illness—but we didn’t. An opportunity in heaven to make up for failure to visit, console, and express love to a person before they’ve left this life appeals to me. And don’t you think apologizing will be easier in heaven? Surely nobody’s going to hold a grudge beyond the pearly gates. Maybe the key to admittance to heaven is the realization of the long list of people to whom we should make amends. Maybe hell is finding out there is no opportunity to make amends beyond this life.
I think it’s time I went on People Finder to locate some long-lost friends. I’d like to meet them in heaven, but it’s risky to wait .And, assuming there is a heaven, the person I’d most like to meet there is Richard Dawkins—just to see the shock on his face.
Course Correction 
Comments on: "See You in Heaven" (5)
Do you suppose that after-death fantasies of meeting loved ones in heaven is part of a faith-based fairy tale, one that we know may never be true but it’s fun to believe in anyway?
Yup! Kind of like living happily ever after once you meet your prince!
This was a wake up call post! You’re so right. Not only with people but with all the “goals” and such we want to accomplish in life. All we have is this second we’re breathing in…we cannot know what’s next.
My daughter-in-law, who has terminal cancer, is an atheist. In January as we were talking about her death I asked her to let my son, her husband- who tends to agree with her and not me of course, know there is an after life after she is gone. I told her I didn’t care how she did it as long as she did. She didn’t have to let me know since I believe in an after life but if there wasn’t one she wouldn’t be able to let me know anyway. We had a good laugh about that.
We might as well laugh about what we can’t change.