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lately, i have been having an odd feeling. i am a third generation atheist. i was raised with no faith, and also no feelings about faith. it’s just sort of a blank space for me. but as i’ve been watching what’s happened in minnesota, i’ve had this stirring feeling: we are going to heaven.

i’ve watched empathy and compassion and fellowship and i have seen cruelty and injustice. and i just feel so certain that if there is some sort of afterlife, we are on the right side of things. and that the other side…that the need some sort of retribution that is bigger than this lifetime

i still don’t feel any kind of divinity except the sort of humanist idea of the divinity of us, collectively it’s feeling/seeing what i imagine community could look like, in a just world. a slight bend towards that world. a small shift. while also seeing the worst. the classic good and evil.

maybe “we are going to heaven” means “we are making heaven” or “finally this feels more right” but it is such a certainty this is the way. this is the path of the good and righteous. the other side is lost in the darkness. they have lost their humanity. given it away, maybe. had it taken?

One of the common beliefs in Judaism is that the Moshiach/Messiah will not show up into an unready world, but arrive in a world where we've fixed it already. Not a savior, really, just an indication that we've saved ourselves.

this is connected to tikkun olam, right? like the more mitzvot you do the sooner the messiah arrives?

Yeah, pretty much! Nobody us descending on a cloud to save us, we have to do the work, and fortunately, we have a list of some Very Good Ideas for what is likely to help.