Why do so many Millennials believe in heaven?

DESPITE scientific evidence against it, young Aussies are most likely to have faith in an afterlife. Maybe it’s because there are still so many taboos around death, writes Brian Morris.

THE promise of an afterlife — to meet departed family and friends — appeals to many,

especially younger Australians.

But why do they dismiss the evidence of physics?

Against all odds, it seems the concept of going to heaven holds far greater significance for the young than for those who are closer — numerically — to death. We need to confront “the d-word” itself, but let’s first get a handle on why the idea of paradise has gripped contemporary youth — more so than pensioners.

A recent national Essential poll shows 40 per cent of all Australians believe in heaven, but the crucial figure is that a staggering 51 per cent of those aged 18-34 hold such a belief. This compares to just 29 per cent of the public who are over 55 years old. The young are almost twice as fixated with an afterlife than those closer to pension age.

Why is that the case?

Is it insecurity or religiosity? One suggestion points to the fact that 40 per cent of secondary students now attend private religious schools — a rate far higher than all other Western nations. There has been an exponential growth in government funding for private Catholic and Anglican schools since the 1960s — from a base of almost zero.

Others suggest that a similar rise in Special Religious Instruction (SRI) and chaplains in public schools has led to the Christianisation of education across the nation. These government funded programs are run by evangelical Christian organisations in each state — with Catholic and Anglican private schools proselytising their own religions. And it’s also possible Millennials then stay living at home too long, with a childhood faith, instead of getting out into the real world as young adults.

Millennials have been found to be more likely than other age groups to believe in heaven. Picture: Getty

Since colonisation, Christianity instilled belief in an afterlife. It’s reflected on a daily basis in mainstream media, in film and on television — and in our obsession with sport. No game passes without players pointing skyward when scoring a goal, or honouring a deceased team or family member with hands reaching towards heaven.

But the biggest problem is that we don’t talk about death.

Society needs to get over this end-of-life taboo — to discuss and challenge the sugar-coated religious myth that claims we will all meet up with our loved ones (and pets) when we die and go to heaven.

Before confronting concrete scientific evidence — and how we can better handle the emotional aspects of death — just dwell on this thought for one moment.

Isn’t paradise already just a little crowded? Think about who those you would meet — not only the entire cohort of your departed relatives, your friends and ancestors — but all the people you have detested; and those who gave you so much grief during your lifetime.

Then there’s the rest — every human who died. Research shows that, by 2050, an estimated 113 billion people will have lived and died on planet Earth; so heaven is already a seething mass of “souls”. For eternity.

The average punter might have difficulty conceptualising “eternity”. The concept is starkly illustrated in Julian Barnes’ fascinating book, A History of the World in 10 1/2 Chapters.

Israel Folau of the Waratahs celebrates scoring a try by pointing skywards. Picture: Mark Metcalfe/Getty

While fictional, it focuses the mind on a serious problem with infinity. Chapter 10 sees our hero arrive in heaven, choosing to spend all his time eating luxurious food, having endless sex, and playing golf. After several thousand years he’s sick of food and sex, and on each heavenly golf course he hits holes-in-one on every par 3. He pleads to be released from this endless “perfect existence” and asks who yearns to finally be free, to actually “die”. With a short pause for effect, the answer was plain: “Everyone!”

Books on near-death experiences, and visits to heaven, are legion. A recent bestseller was 2012 book Proof of Heaven by Dr. Eben Alexander — a neurosurgeon, no less. Alexander sold more than 2 million copies of his tale of interacting with “divine” beings during a near-death experience before his claims were debunked.

Among those who contested his story was Professor Sean Carroll, a particle physicist. Carroll said there could only be two possibilities for Alexander’s supposed spiritual encounter:

“Option one is that some ill-defined metaphysical substance, not subject to the known laws of physics, interacted with the atoms of his brain in ways that have eluded every controlled experiment ever performed in the history of science.

“Option two is that people hallucinate when they are nearly dead.”

British author Julian Barnes satirised what heaven might actually be like in his book A History of the World in 10 1/2 Chapters. Picture: AP/Kirsty Wigglesworth

Carroll, who worked with the team that discovered the Higgs Boson at Geneva’s Large Hadron Collider, has also spelled out why an immaterial “soul” does not exist.

“Within quantum field theory, there can’t be a new collection of ‘spirit particles’ and ‘spirit forces’ that interact with our regular atoms, because we would have detected them in existing experiments …”

Science does not devalue the need for compassion and empathy in the face of raw emotions that come with our personal experiences of death. It is necessary to face up to reality — but there are alternatives to religion in coping with end of life crises. Discussing death openly and honestly — and encouraging public conversations — is a first step in helping to ease the extreme distress that many suffer with their own fear of death.

There are some options found in philosophy. The pre-Christian period known as the “Golden Age of Athens” (circa mid 400BC) led to a new period of philosophical thought, and some of these principles, such as stoicism, remain popular today.

It’s based on three central themes: “perception”, how we choose to view events; “action”, how we deal with events we can control (and those we can’t); and “will”, training ourselves to deal honestly and ethically with events in our own lives.

The stoic approach to dealing with death — of family, friends, or oneself — is particularly relevant. Initially, it may appear morbid to periodically remind ourselves of one’s mortality, but if this approach to death is considered deeply enough, there are clear benefits to being cognisant of this basic reality.

That’s because the stark alternative for most people is to ignore the inevitable, and to be completely consumed by grief when family or friends die unexpectedly. Religion holds its privileged status based on fear — fear of not believing in God, fear of the unknown, and especially the fear of death. It’s a cruel deception that society needs to overcome.

By sugar-coating mortality with the myth of everlasting heaven, religion simply deprives us all of the ways and means to better cope with the end of life. While stoicism may not be the complete solution for all, it is clear that the basic principles of “philosophical ethics” — honesty, reason, compassion, and love — would be a far better alternative than teaching schoolchildren obedience to God and religious ritual.

Future generations would also avoid the trap of today’s Millennials, who continue to shun science and instead cling to religious concepts of an afterlife. A “soul” that miraculously ascends to heaven, only to reunite with 113 billion other souls — for the whole of eternity.

Just like our golfing hero, that sounds more like purgatory.

Brian Morris is author of Sacred to Secular and director of Plain Reason which promotes science, reason and critical thinking.