Pamphlet No. 3: “Will Heaven Be Boring?”

“Teacher: You might watch a movie to alleviate boredom, but what if the movie went on for ten hours?

Student: Anyone would tire of a movie that long.

Teacher: Yes, and so you would quit watching the movie to do something else, but that thing would eventually becomes boring, as well. So you do something else that you eventually tired of, then something else you tired of after that. Have you ever tasted something so good that you never wanted to eat it again?

Student: No. If something tastes really good, you want it all the more.

Teacher: Yes. We want to eat our favorite foods again and again. They’re good, but they don’t satisfy us for all that long. Have you ever seen a movie that was so good you never wanted to watch it again?

Student: Again, no. I generally watch good movies over and over again.

Teacher: But you don’t immediately rewatch them? You don’t rewatch a good film the second it’s over?

Student: Of course not. I might watch my favorite films once a year.

Teacher: Why don’t you rewatch them immediately?

Student: Because I don’t want to. I’ve had enough. 

Teacher: Yes. If you rewatched a good movie the second it was over, you wouldn’t enjoy it.

Student: It would be boring. Teacher: Yes. That’s how tenuous the things of this world are. We enjoy our favorite movies as long as we don’t have to watch them twice in a row. We enjoy our favorite meals as long as we don’t have to eat them three times in the same day, in which case we’d grow sick of them. And yet neither does the satisfaction which our favorite movies and favorite meals offer us last all that long. We tire of not having them, then we tire of having them. There’s nothing on earth—not even our favorite things—which isn’t beset on all sides by boredom. And consider just how many things you enjoyed last year or the year before which no longer interest you at all.”

-from “Will Heaven Be Boring? A Companion Piece To Love What Lasts“

My next pamphlet should be done by Christmas and will be available through Gibbs Classical. It’s a long conversation between a teacher and a student that revolves around the fear that heaven will be boring. Love What Lasts explores the connections between good taste and piety. “Will Heaven Be Boring?” explores those connections in a way that will prove compelling to high school students and adults alike.