I write this through (slightly unexpected) tears as I just finished Whenever You’re Ready, the final episode ever of The Good Place. This show… well, when I began watching it, I expected what was basically funny nothings–Superstore in heaven, if you will. What I got (if you know anything of the show), was nothing like that. While it obviously did not ascribe to my views of heaven, it did fill my need to see people actually striving for the best for each other and for others. I was in a place in my life where I didn’t see much good in the world. The Good Place gave me a place to go to see the best in people, even people who might be bad. Heck, the whole judge storyline, and the idea of NOBODY being good enough to rack up enough “points” to make it to the Good Place–that one really rings true.
But, while it did hit good marks, it did give such a sad view of “after.” As soon as Phoebe–I mean, Hypatia of Alexandria–I mean, Patty?–started talking about how too much good turned people into mush, my heart broke a little. The “resolution” of that storyline? To give you an easy button to an eternal almost-suicide, that you can learn all you want and enjoy all you want but then choose to end your existence–forever. The idea of heaven, but heaven without a point, truly is heartbreaking, I think. To desire to just live, learn, and then blip off into oblivion… if that was the real afterlife, what does it all mean? Is the only real purpose of life to better ourselves? That can’t be all there is.
In all that was good in the show–Eleanor and Chidi constantly finding each other, Tahani finally reconciling with Kamilah and her parents after so, so many Bearimys, Jason and Janet’s unexpected love and (oh dip!) Jason even waiting around to give Janet the missing necklace–there was still this prevailing theme that life was only good if it had an end. Everything was given meaning by the existence of an end. And I just don’t think that’s true. I thought about this several days ago, too, as I finished Schitt’s Creek and watched the Best Wishes, Warmest Regards mini-documentary, and Dan Levy mentioned how much more meaningful the show was made by seeing it end. (A paraphrase to be sure.) I was already pondering this by the time I chose to finally finish The Good Place, which I had been putting off as I didn’t particularly want it to be done. I do think that this is somewhat true–the ending of a show on your own terms does give a little more meaning to the whole thing. But I don’t think human life can be so easily equated to the run of a series, no matter how beloved.
The idea that heaven needs an “out”–the Final Door–the door into oblivion, is a thought so sour in my mouth.
I am reminded of one of my favorite songs from back in middle school– “I Will Follow You Into The Dark” by Death Cab for Cutie.
Love of mine, one day you will die, and I’ll be close behind,
I’ll follow you into the dark
No blinding lights, or tunnels to gates of white,
Just our hands clasped so tight,
Waiting for the hint of a spark…
If Heaven and Hell decide that they both are satisfied,
Illuminate the NOs on their VACANCY signs
If there’s no one beside you when your soul embarks,
Then I’ll follow you into the dark.You and me have seen everything to see
“I will follow you into the dark”, Death cab for cutie
From Bangkok to Calgary,
And the soles of your shoes
Are all worn down
The time for sleep is now,
And it’s nothing to cry about,
‘Cause we’ll hold each other soon
In the blackest of rooms.
What I am hearing from all these is this: ending is the only thing that gives meaning. At some point we need to embrace the darkness. It is desirable to embark into an unknown dark. And that just feels so sad to me.
My faith in God gives me hope in a very different afterlife. We aren’t embracing darkness, we are embracing eternity in the light of God’s love for us. We aren’t embarking into the unknown, we are walking into a real paradise. However, I can see how heaven without God looks so bleak and dreary. If everything is unicorns and frozen yogurt and music you can eat, but there’s no purpose… what is there? God is what gives life, and afterlife, real purpose.
I look at embarking into the afterlife not as a lonely walk into darkness and the unknown, but as Bilbo at the Grey Havens:
Day is ended, dim my eyes,
But journey long before me lies.
Farewell, friends! I hear the call,
The ship’s beside the stony wall.
Foam is white and waves are grey;
beyond the sunset leads my way.
Foam is salt, the wind is free;
I hear the rising of the sea.Farewell, friends! The sails are set,
the wind is east, the moorings fret.
Shadows long before me lie,
beneath the ever-bending sky,
but islands lie behind the Sun,
that I shall raise ere all is done;
lands there are to west of West,
where night is quiet and sleep is rest.Guided by the Lonely Star,
“Bilbo’s last song”, J.r.R. Tolkien
beyond the utmost harbour-bar,
I’ll find the heavens fair and free,
and beaches of the Starlit Sea.
Ship my ship! I seek the West,
and fields and mountains ever blest.
Farewell to Middle-Earth at last.
I see the star above my mast!
Instead of looking into those shadows and only seeing darkness behind them, we should look forward to those islands where “night is quiet and sleep is rest”, where there are “fields and mountains ever blest.” I also think of Narnia.. I think of Reepicheep’s insistence on heading to Aslan’s Country (Matt Mikalatos, who I had the joy of hearing speak at several retreats in college, wrote a great piece on this) and I especially think of The Last Battle. The door in the forest, the Final Door, the door to oblivion, in The Good Place–that reminds me of an almost-perversion, a sadder version of that Door through which Aslan led the Narnians, from an old Narnia being torn apart by evil, by Dragons and Giant Lizards, “further up and further in” to a new and glorious Narnia, where everything is made whole. It is in that new Narnia–the new Heaven and the new Earth, which I have hope. I cannot hope in being vaporized into the universe through a door in the woods, but I do have hope in following happily through the door into wholeness.
So just like it wasn’t truly The Good Place for Eleanor without Chidi (or a sense of purpose), I would argue, it’s not Heaven without God.