Q&A: Will My Agnostic Husband Go to Heaven?

Question: I’m so glad I found you on your You Tube channel. Your program has been inspirational to me.
I have been a Christian my whole life and I do believe in Heaven. My husband doesn't really believe in God. He believes that there may be a God but he isn't sure. It honestly worries me that he doesn't have full faith in God, and that he may not make it into Heaven. I'm not really sure how that works, or what it will take to show him that God really does exist. Do you have any advice on this?
- W.M.

Answer: My first response to people of faith who want to convert their loved ones to a life of faith is: Would you appreciate your agnostic or atheist friends trying to take your faith away from you? People who don’t share our religious vocabulary still have values, and they cherish their values. They probably don’t appreciate having their values insulted anymore than we religious types do. So, in the spirit of the Golden Rule, if we wouldn’t want people to take our religion from us, then we might not want to take their contentment with a lack of religion from them.

Now, that being said, we certainly want to make our religious communities as relevant, as empowering, as optimistic, as loving, and as welcoming as possible. As we do that, people from all kinds of religious and philosophical backgrounds will find themselves attracted to us. And then if and when they embrace our kind of faith, it is a personal decision that was in no way coerced, and one that they can feel good about having made for themselves.

Finally, I have to admit my bias in all of this. I am a humanist and a universalist. By that I mean I have a high anthropology (I do not believe that people are innately depraved and can only be “saved” from their depravity by religious means) and I believe that the divine Spirit (“in which we live and move and have our being”) rejects no one for any reason. I can’t believe that anyone is eternally damned, especially for what their opinions in life happened to be!

My faith is in the universal power of divine Love which seeks to heal our loneliness, despair, and degradation (in this life) and which excludes none of us (in this life or beyond) for any reason. I’m sure your husband believes in beauty, in love, in hope, in compassion, in kindness, in justice, in joy…in all the Goodness that I believe God is. He may not call that Goodness God, but “what’s in a name? That which we call a rose by any other name would smell just as sweet” (Shakespeare). Whether or not your husband believes in God, I am certain that the infinite Love that I call God believes in your husband. And isn’t that enough?

--Rev. Durrell Watkins, MA, MDiv, DMin
Sunshine Cathedral

Thursday's Prayer

I am loveable.
I deserve love in my life.
I am loving.
I am loved.
I am love.
This truth brings me joy and all things are working together for my highest good.
Amen.

Wednesday's Prayer

Angels are holding me, watching over me, smiling on me, wishing me well, seeing the best in me, sharing my sorrows and celebrating my joys. Whether angels are the better parts of my human nature, my highest ideals, my fondest imaginings, the ancestors, spirit guides, loving friends, or kind strangers, I give thanks for their presence in my life. I depend on and am grateful for the ministry of angels. I know that I am never really alone. Amen.

Rev. Durrell Watkins, DMin

Tuesday's Prayer

God is my Source, and my Source is infinite and infinitely capable of meeting my every need. I am now asking my divine Source to comfort me, strengthen me, and fill me with wisdom and love. I am choosing to trust in this moment that blessings are flowing into my experience of life. In the name of Jesus and of all helpers of humanity, I declare that all is well in my life, and so it is. Amen.

Rev. Durrell Watkins, DMin

Monday's Prayer

This day has a gift for me.
Something good is mine to experience today.
I'm open to it.
I will recongnize it, receive it, and be grateful for it.
Nothing can keep my wonderful gift from me.
And so it is.

Rev. Durrell Watkins, DMin

Sunday's Prayer

The love I share is God’s love.
The love I give is healing love.
The love I offer is changing the world.
And the love I give is returned to me multiplied.
Amen.

Rev. Durrell Watkins, DMin

Saturday's Prayer

Mother-Father God,
You who are throughout the universe,
throughout the multiverse,
We ask you for blessings,
aware that to be blessed is to be happy.
Give us the courage to be happy!
Help us to love ourselves enough that we allow ourselves to be happy.
Give us the grace to wish all people lives of happiness and well-being.
Give us generosity so that we share freely of ourselves to help others be happy.
And as we sow seeds of joy, let us expect a bountiful harvest of the same;
it is in your many names that we pray.
Amen.

Rev. Durrell Watkins, DMin