Nope, I haven't left the building...I've just been recovering from surgery.
You guys display the hopes and pride many people feel, whether religious or not. Also, I'm not appealing to authority, but to logic.
If this life has meaning, it can only come from God. If we have a beginning, we also have an end. And if we are fully mortal, completely subject to death and a cessation of being, then how in the world can we find any meaning in anything we do.
Latter-day Saints believe in an eternal scheme of things. This life has meaning, not to be fulfilled here, but to develop us for the future. Do I believe Ecclesiastes is part of the Bible? Obviously, but I don't necessarily view it as scripture. Not all scripture is equal, and Solomon (like many others) reviewed his life in his last days and found himself wanting. He wasn't a prophet or priest, but a king. In his earlier days, before his transgressions and, some believe, his senility, his outlooks were quite different. It's the same with all of us. I read Ecclesiastes and think, here's a guy who had some serious issues. Could he possibly be happy? In his younger days, he most likely was impressed by the wisdom and intelligence of men, and about the accumulation of wealth. I don't believe for an instant that he was writing about what happens to us at death; rather, he was writing about how the wisdom of men is foolishness with God. Regardless how lofty man's thoughts are, in the end they perish with us. This doesn't mean we cease to exist. It means that from man's standpoint, nothing man does is lasting.
Now as far as early Christianity (and Mormonism) is concerned, one's purpose ceases when he no longer is able to progress. Origen, an early Christian theologian, writes: "After death, I think the saints go to Paradise, a place of teaching, a school of the spirits in which everything they saw on earth will be made clear to them. Those who were pure in heart will progress more rapidly, reaching the kingdom of heaven by definite steps or degrees." What does anything we do matter if our existence is to be cut off? Once the sun burns out and man's legacy is long forgotten, who will care about the sufferings, learning, wisdom, progress, civilizations and works of man? Unless another civilization masters space travel and records these things for others, it's all doomed to perish. You come to Earth and learn all your life and acquire wisdom, then you die. To me that's not a meaningful existence. We will be dead, our children and parents will be dust. At that time it won't make any difference whether you eased the sufferings of others or raised armies and committed genocide. There will be no memory or judgment; anything you learned will be lost.
Also, it's stated that no one can know what comes after death? That's like saying no one can possibly know if there's a Los Angeles. There are many accounts of people who say they visited Paradise (some were atheists). If they're being truthful, then it's possible that they know. Hallucinations are completely different from the accounts such people record. In hallucinations, details are vague and there's little intelligence in what is conveyed. Colors, clothing and such are foggy and the details are flighty, changing as quickly as the mind changes. Memory of hallucinations also are muted, but many near death experiences are vivid and as easy to remember as a conversation with your neighbor.
So again, what value are the things we're learning if everything is to be cut short? That's my question. And it's not meant to be insulting. Philosophers over the ages have been debating this as long as man has had language and the ability to communicate.
