Afterlife

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Afterlife

Belief in an afterlife is a feature of all the world's religions, although there are major differences among traditions, both historically and contemporaneously, in how the afterlife is construed. Whereas Western religions emphasize the break between earthly life and the afterworld of death and possible resurrection (eternal salvation), some Eastern traditions believe in the eternal cycle of successive lifetimes. Thus while Christianity has traditionally emphasized heaven and hell as opposing afterlife domains that reward or punish people for what they have "reaped on earth," the doctrine of karma in Hinduism and Buddhism states that a person's current existence is a direct result of one's past existences and a determinant of one's future existences. The Christian tradition does not accept the doctrine of reincarnation. Such differences in how the concept of "afterlife" is understood clearly have quite diverse implications for how adherents of particular traditions understand themselves, their place in the social world, and relations with their fellow human beings.

Within Christianity, some of the theological disagreements between Catholicism and Protestantism extend to include conceptions of the afterlife, particularly regarding the means of salvation. The notion of purification for sins committed is deeply grounded in New Testament accounts and in the writing of early church fathers such as St. Augustine. The doctrine of purgatory, however, was a cause of dissension during the Protestant Reformation. In particular, the Reformers rejected the practice of the church in encouraging the faithful to seek indulgences from church officials as a way of redeeming their own sins and those of the souls in purgatory. This practice contravened the Protestant belief in faith alone, and not prayers for the dead, as the means to salvation. The Council of Trent (1545–1563) reaffirmed the Catholic belief in purgatory as an intermediate state between death and possible salvation with Christ. In contemporary Catholicism, reflecting this theology of salvation, prayers for the dead are a routine dimension of the Mass liturgy, as the gathered community invoke God's mercy for any deceased family members and friends who may be in purgatory.

There is also doctrinal disagreement within Judaism as to what comprises belief in an afterlife. Orthodox Judaism adheres to the traditional rabbinic dogma of corporal resurrection and the immorality of the soul, whereas the Reform movement in America (following the Pittsburgh Platform, 1885), rejects both the idea of bodily resurrection and the notion of either eternal punishment or reward, while nonetheless embracing the more ambiguous concept of personal immortality. Notwithstanding the variety of ways in which different traditions envision the afterlife, it is noteworthy that death is recognized as an important life passage deserving of special rituals, whether evidenced by Christian funerals, the sanctity of shivah (period of mourning) and kaddish (prayer for the dead), for Jews, the emphasis on communal mourning in Islam, or the rites of ancestor-worship practiced in communities influenced by Confucianism.

No one, of course, can know whether there is an afterlife, and if there is, whether it approximates the scenes so vividly imagined in great literary works such as Dante's Inferno or James Joyce's Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man. The lack of plausible evidence has not dampened Americans' beliefs in an afterlife. National opinion polls indicate that almost three-quarters of Americans believe in life after death, a proportion that has remained relatively stable throughout the post–World War II period. Similarly, three of four Americans believe in heaven as a place of eternal reward, and although fewer, approximately 50 percent believe in hell. These beliefs do not vary significantly by either age or level of education. As Andrew Greeley points out, "in both 1944 and 1985 college-educated young people (under thirty) and non-college-educated older people (over sixty) were equally committed to the proposition that there is life after death" (Greeley, 1989: 15). It is also noteworthy that, reflecting Americans' comparatively higher levels of religious belief and involvement, they are significantly more likely than Europeans, for example, to believe in an afterlife.

The tenacity of Americans' beliefs in an afterlife is quite remarkable, especially given the tendency of Catholicism and mainline Protestantism to downplay the salience of concrete images of heaven, and especially hell, over the past three decades. The continuing appeal of such beliefs may be understood, in part, in terms of the broader search for personal meaning and purpose in life that seems to have become more public since the 1950s. The emphases on personal seeking and spiritual journeying prevalent in personal religious narratives and in mass media accounts point to the fact that for many people today material well-being is experienced as unfulfilling unless it is accompanied with some sense of a larger, transcendent meaning. It is also evident that while many contemporary Americans believe in an afterlife, the ways in which they construe it are quite diverse, and in many instances it is removed from traditional concepts of heaven and hell. The post–World War II trend toward the decoupling of personal spirituality from institutionalized religion means that people can envision an afterlife that is autonomous of the images of salvation that are enshrined in various faith traditions. For some, belief in an afterlife is nurtured by their strong experiential sense of an enduring personal spiritual connection with a loved one who has died. Whether people understand heaven and hell as actual afterlife domains, or more symbolically as representing the polarities of good and evil, for many, the belief in some form of continuity beyond one's present life serves to give purpose to life events and experiences that otherwise they would find difficult to integrate.

Concern with questions pertaining to the afterlife also helps to orient people to greater awareness of the finite nature of their own current existence and thus encourages them to set priorities with respect to personal relationships, community involvement, or in their attitudes toward nature and the environment. Although traditionally, therefore, the concept of afterlife denoted an emphasis on "last things" and the possible triumph of life over death, for some people today, the spiritual power of belief in an afterlife may help them focus on more immediate issues of personal salvation and growth in this world.

Notwithstanding Americans' embrace of the idea of an afterlife, it is striking that many people resist talking about issues of death and dying. In recent years, however, death has become a more salient part of public discourse. The aging of the American population has forced health practitioners and policymakers to openly discuss dilemmas of end-of-life care and has encouraged individuals and families to discuss practical matters relating to living wills. Beliefs about the afterlife are also tacitly present in current public debates with respect to physician-assisted death, and the assumption shared by some of its advocates that whatever the after-death experience, it will be preferable to the pain and suffering associated with terminal illness.