THE AFTERLIFE SALAD BAR IS OPEN!

All religions offer their believers an afterlife. Eternal life is one of the most compelling aspects of their sales pitch. These afterlives come in a variety of concepts based on what's important to that specific religion but everyone wants to live forever so let's look at a few of them.

Christianity offers either Heaven or Hell, that's it. There are no middle grounds anymore. When I was growing up as a Roman Catholic, there was also Purgatory and Limbo but apparently God has since closed those offices as they no longer apply. So now, if you're a Xian you either spend eternity worshiping at the feet of God or having your nuts chewed off by Imps while roasting forever in Hell. This same inflexible feast or famine idea is also featured in...

Islam where you either worship or burn just like in Xianity but Islam has doubled down on the idea of Heavenly reward by also promising that there will be pussy in Heaven as well. This makes good sense from a marketing perspective; if you're going to talk some Allah crazed zealot into strapping a bomb to his back there needs to be some serious practical reward involved beyond some nebulous promise of eternal bliss. Afterlife poontang seems to do the trick.

In general, neither Xianity nor Islam offers reincarnation as an option.

But Hindu does! So if you prefer to believe in the Transmigration of Souls and yearn to come back here again and again until you achieve divinity then the Hindu faith is for you. Reincarnation is an appealing notion because it conquers death with the promise of life over and again. It's like a soul recycling program. No Hell to fear but no Heaven either; just endless life although you do run the risk of not only coming back as a man or a woman but also as a goat or a barn owl or a dung beetle -- you don't get to choose.

But if you want a choice, the Pagans got you covered with Summerland. The Wiccan afterlife of Summerland is like an afterlife waiting room where you lounge for however long you need to reflect on your previous life and the lessons you learned then, when you're ready, you get to choose to come back at that time, and you get to choose what you come back as, and you even get some say in the circumstances of your reincarnation. What's not to like here? Its like you get to order all your favorite things off the menu of your favorite restaurant while sitting at your favorite table.

The Buddhists also offer reincarnation but there's no soul involved and it's not actually a good thing and...whatever, it's complicated.

But if you just want a simple afterlife with beautiful weather, rolling hills and plains of plenty, there's always the Native American afterlife of the Happy Hunting Ground. No gods, no demons, no complicated rules or reincarnations, just a beautiful spiritual plane of existence with plentiful game to hunt for eternity...because, I guess even souls need to eat for some reason.

So there's just a few of them for your consideration. Step up to the bar, look them over, find the one that appeals the most to your sensibilities and start believing in your favorite afterlife! Don't let the fact that none of them are actually real interfere with your enjoyment of having conquered death cuz no one likes a killjoy.

If you read all the way down this wall of text, you are a REAL MAN -- even if you're a woman.