How To Talk To Your Children About Burning In Hell

Parents must, sometimes, have uncomfortable but necessary conversations with their kids. The birds and the bees come to mind. Often, the death of a family member can lead to a very real conversation about the d word: death. And its very discomforting corollary: burning in hell.

Thankfully, there are many, many resources out there to help you broach this topic with your children.

Youtuber and certain to burn in hell himself, Yves Gilvelvetstein has a series of instructional videos to help parents explain just what eternal damnation will be like. Yves is matter-of-fact, poignant, and even funny when it comes to covering the basics and more nuanced details of residence for the damned. With a following of over 12k and video views over 12 million, Yves has something to help most, if not all, parents.

Author and illustrator Brooke Bubez-Leeb has published a darling 3-book series, How Are You Hell? Nice To Meet Ya, aimed for early readers to tweeners that need the down-low on the down under (no offense Australia). Amazing illustrations of tortured souls in excruciating anguish alongside delightful, didactic prose will help even the most stunned children understand what hell has to offer. Parents rave about this series and many have commented that they feel very comfortable just giving these books to their offspring, knowing that the underworld won’t seem overwhelming.

Developmental psychologist Erlik Teufel has teamed up with theologian Luci Mephisto to offer a for credit online course entitled Hell: Everything We Need To Know. With videotaped lectures and weekly quizzes, parents can rest easy knowing that not only will they be prepped for explaining all aspects of hell to their children, they will also be earning college credit. And it is a complete boon knowing that it can all be done in just 5 weeks, asynchronously, from the living room sofa after the kids have gone to bed.

Last but certainly not least, there is Hell for Dummies from your local library.

Order Up! Modus Ponens. Over Easy.

I’m reading a book entitled The Self-Driven Child.

I got interested through this article and by being a parent.

The beginning of the book is about the brain and having taught Psych 101 much of this was review.

But then, suddenly, one little idea…

When someone is depressed, logic is impaired.

Logic? Impaired?

The logician in me will order the modus ponens this way:

If one is depressed, then one’s logic is impaired.

Not too surprising, right?

The brain is an organ and requires the right mixture of chemicals and elements to think logically or to do logic. Even logic like which way is right and which way is left, let alone something like advanced quantification calculus. Depression affects the balance of chemicals.

But…

Could we order the modus ponens the other way?

If logic is impaired, then one is depressed.

No.

There could be other factors (antecedents), conditions that necessitate depression and logic impairment isn’t one of them.

Now consider this question and logic:

How logical is it to believe in an afterlife?

That you will continue to be when the organ that organizes/synthesizes your thoughts and your personality (consider that I recently came to learn about a man who was struck by lightning, but lived to tell about it, and how his doctor’s warned him that he will see personality changes) will decompose like other material entities.

Can we say that any person x that believes in an afterlife has impaired logic?

Which goes first?

If one believes in an afterlife, then logic is impaired.

If logic is impaired, then one believes in an afterlife.

Why Didn’t I Merge Earlier?

There is hell, where souls burn for eternity and endure endless pain and agony exponentially greater than any earthly feeble pain like being caught in the gears of a combine harvester or having your feet sawed off at the ankles with a hacksaw and then there is the hell for 

Drivers who wait to the last second to merge when they saw the goddamn lane ends, merge right signs a fucking mile and half-mile ago!

Yes, these people will surely burn in a special section of hell reserved for the absolute, unequivocally worst of the worst. Murderers, rapists, torturers, and Patriots fans have a cakewalk in hell compared to these “people.” People is a misnomer. Because when you get down to it, these are monsters to the nth degree. One can imagine the havoc they would wreak on the globe if not for the good people like you and me who stop them from clubbing baby seals, destroying humanity and the universe as we know it. 

When these monsters get to the pearly gates to be judged by Peter, he is just going to show them video of them driving up as far as they can then BOTTLENECKING every decent person on their commute home. Peter will nod his head no in disgust and the floor will drop out from under the monster as she/he/monster falls naked down a chute of poison sumac as spritzes from skunk anal scent glands assail their bodies and olfactory senses while Yanni’s greatest hits blares through kmart speakers as they are hurled into the deepest, darkest, boiling layer of hell.

And for eternity, the pain, the anguish, the hell…will continue…while the only thought allowed is 

why didn’t I merge earlier?

Lightbulb!

Well the xmas holiday has come and gone and all I can say is, I may hate xmas. 

Now if I know anybody, I know you; and you my friend are one of the most centered, close-to-self-actuallized-as-anyone-I-know type of people. So this may not resonate with you because you are so goddamned self-aware and level headed so my apologies up front. 

I am not self-aware or level headed or keep an even keel of any kinds of sort. I have no idea what makes me tick or why I do what I do, while I’m doing it or after I’ve done it. Sort of.

But this particular xmas I may have become AWARE of a few things. 

Now I am aware that I grew up poor and that I bore much more sensitivity to this growing up than my younger brother. For example, I never in a million years would have brought a girl to my house due to the conditions, yet my brother dated the prom queen and mysteriously had no reservations about bringing her home. So I do know that I am sensitive to the poverty I grew up in. CHECK.

I am also aware that I am not exactly the world’s biggest fan of religion in general and catholicism specifically. A couple of philosophy degrees and a few history books can do that to a guy.

So now, (in Gru voice: “lightbulb”) take the holiday that uniquely celebrates materialism and christianity, wad it up into a big ole ball of bitterness and marginalization and judgment and stuff that down my piehole till I choke. 

So when I found myself tense enough to bounce dimes off of me about the gift exchanges and the xmas mass with the in-laws I think I had what some call, an epiphany. 

I may not like xmas. Now don’t get me wrong, I like giving gifts and seeing people smile, heck I love new socks, I like get togethers and breaking break…I’m not some misanthrope or Debbie Downer who pu pu’s anything that the masses love. Full disclosure, I bought that Paula Abdul album back in the day so there’s no arguing I hate anything popular.

I just don’t like it when I feel judged. And you, yes you, are judging me about my ability to provide gifts a la fiduciary gain and about my morality or lack thereof, especially on this holiday we call christmas. 

Tis tough for a poor kid from the rust belt who’s gonna burn in hell.

But, maybe the devil will throw me a bone and play some Paula Adbul down in the soul furnace. 

“Or I am I caught in a hit and run…”