I went to a funeral last week. A sweet lady who used to live downstairs from us. She was one of those rare people who never offended you. Never made you mad, annoyed or anti-social. As I sat through her wake, listening to a Portuguese priest invoke the Ave Maria, I got to thinking. I realized that I no longer believe in heaven.

How scary is that?

Nowadays, religion has found it's way into everything. You can't even watch a tv ad without being 'touched by an angel' in some way. And yet, this is the culture that believes that (g)od is dead. So, there I was, looking at the peaceful display before me and realizing that the older I get, the less I believe.

So, where is my grandfather? Better yet, what sort of place did George Carlin go to? He didn't much believe in god, but c'mon...he did one heck of a job keeping a majority of us laughing for decades. Doesn't he get some kind of reward? Some kind of heaven, or a limbo with hot strippers and tons of people to point and laugh at?

See, that's why I can't wrap my head around it anymore. It's a farce. We are told to do good and be good so that we can ascend to a good place, and it's just ... well, it's elitist to me.

Some people deserve heaven, just like that woman I sat there eyeing...waiting for her corpse to rise in some George Romero-like way; a zombie chasing after people in a funeral home. But that's just how my brain works. I can envision zombies, but I can't fathom heaven.

I don't think I have to believe in a heaven to believe in ghosts. I don't have to believe in a heaven to believe in demons, or aliens or multi-dimensions. Scientists (a vast majority of them) don't believe in God or Heaven, and yet they get along just fine hypothesizing about invisible shit.

So, do I, with an interest in the esoteric, have to believe in Heaven? Is it essential? I wonder if it going to save me to think, "Yeah, I'll go muck around in the woods, looking for Bigfoot and if I find him and he stomps me to death, at least I'll go to heaven." Or, "Yeah, aliens may exist, and they may take over and annihilate the human race. But screw it if I care. Cuz I'm going to heaven."

Which is worse: believing in extraterrestrials or believing in a place that no one's ever seen, but most of us seem to put all our faith in? Seriously, I think that something so trivial only serves to emphasize the focus we all have on the things we believe in and never question.

It's so easy to believe, but so much harder to explain why. So, if there's that one person who believes in the white clouds, pearly gates, winged angels with harps and horns vision ... fine. But, just don't take it upon yourself to call those of us who believe in little grey men in flying saucers crazy. Right now, as I see it ... we're all susceptible to blind faith.