{"id":59933,"date":"2011-06-02T23:55:04","date_gmt":"2011-06-02T23:55:04","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/thesmokingpriest\/?p=59933"},"modified":"2011-06-02T23:55:04","modified_gmt":"2011-06-02T23:55:04","slug":"go-to-heaven","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/thesmokingpriest\/2011\/06\/go-to-heaven.html","title":{"rendered":"Go to Heaven"},"content":{"rendered":"<p style=\"text-align: justify\"><span style=\"color: #000000\">What is Heaven?\u00a0 Without a doubt, Heaven is a place difficult to describe.\u00a0 We cannot begin to understand it because Heaven belongs to the mystery of faith.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify\"><span style=\"color: #000000\">In the Gospels, Jesus speaks of this mystery\u00a0through images.\u00a0 He calls it the kingdom, a place of life, light and peace.\u00a0 He refers to it as a wedding feast, the Father\u2019s house, the heavenly Jerusalem and paradise.\u00a0 St.   Paul tells us that <em>\u201cno eye has seen, nor ear has heard, nor the heart of man conceived what God has prepared for those who love him\u201d<\/em> (1 Corinthians 2: 9).\u00a0\u00a0 And St. John tells us that in Heaven <em>\u201cwe shall see him as he really is\u201d<\/em> (1 John 3: 2).<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify\"><span style=\"color: #000000\">St. Paul&#8217;s awe is echoed in the words of a child taking an evening walk with her father. Wonderingly, she looked up at the stars and exclaimed; &#8220;Oh, Daddy, if the wrong side of Heaven is so beautiful, what must the right side be!&#8221;<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify\"><span style=\"color: #000000\">Life confined to the boundaries of time and space without the promise of eternal life would be cruel and unbearable to live.\u00a0 Without the certainty of an eternal paradise, the trials and tribulations of this present life would have no meaning and purpose.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify\"><span style=\"color: #000000\">The judgments of time will be corrected by the judgments of eternity.\u00a0 The injustices of this world will be replaced by the justice of the world to come.\u00a0 The tears shed now, will be replaced by the joy lived forever in eternal life.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify\"><span style=\"color: #000000\">One day each of us will stand before God for judgment.\u00a0 We will stand before God without a lawyer and without family or friends to support us.\u00a0 We will stand alone before Almighty God.\u00a0 Each day could be our last day on earth.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify\"><span style=\"color: #000000\">We should ask ourselves each day, if I were to die today, how would God judge me?\u00a0 Is there any particular sin, attachment, or attitude that might keep me from getting to Heaven? \u00a0If we really want to get to Heaven, we can\u2019t be making excuses for our behavior.\u00a0 Life is not a dress rehearsal.\u00a0 Life is like a bus ride.\u00a0 We move forward with our bags packed, hoping that when the bus stops and the door opens, we\u00a0will be\u00a0at the right location.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify\"><span style=\"color: #000000\">By the way, my new book <strong><a href=\"http:\/\/fatherjames.org\/\" target=\"_blank\">Get Serious! A Survival Guide for Serious Catholics<\/a> <\/strong>gives you all of the steps that you need to take to live a happy life here on earth and the steps that you need to take now\u00a0 to get to Heaven.<br \/>\n<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify\">&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify\">&nbsp;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>What is Heaven?\u00a0 Without a doubt, Heaven is a place difficult to describe.\u00a0 We cannot begin to understand it because Heaven belongs to the mystery of faith. In the Gospels, Jesus speaks of this mystery\u00a0through images.\u00a0 He calls it the kingdom, a place of life, light and peace.\u00a0 He refers to it as a wedding&hellip;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":382,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[13,11,12,31,83],"tags":[26,82,27],"class_list":["post-59933","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-apologetics","category-catholic-spirituality","category-evangelization","category-heaven","category-jesus","tag-catholic-church","tag-heaven","tag-spirituality"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v23.9 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Go to Heaven - The Smoking Priest<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/thesmokingpriest\/2011\/06\/go-to-heaven.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Go to Heaven - The Smoking Priest\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"What is Heaven?\u00a0 Without a doubt, Heaven is a place difficult to describe.\u00a0 We cannot begin to understand it because Heaven belongs to the mystery of faith. In the Gospels, Jesus speaks of this mystery\u00a0through images.\u00a0 He calls it the kingdom, a place of life, light and peace.\u00a0 He refers to it as a wedding&hellip;\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/thesmokingpriest\/2011\/06\/go-to-heaven.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"The Smoking Priest\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2011-06-02T23:55:04+00:00\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Father James Farfaglia\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"Go to Heaven - The Smoking Priest","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/thesmokingpriest\/2011\/06\/go-to-heaven.html","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"Go to Heaven - The Smoking Priest","og_description":"What is Heaven?\u00a0 Without a doubt, Heaven is a place difficult to describe.\u00a0 We cannot begin to understand it because Heaven belongs to the mystery of faith. 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