Here's my struggle with descriptions of the afterlife and eternity:

I have known people in my life who are so genuine, and so singular and incomparable in their humor and humanity, that I find the reports of what seems like an inevitable fading away of 'personality' extremely depressing.

I know you've written that people in the afterlife retain their individuality, their complexes, their inimitable 'self' hood - but other reports - particularly about the 'higher' spheres - seem to assert that personality is somehow anathema to being a pure channel for spiritual love.

Here's my issue: why would the creator make us so nuanced, subtle and full of different shades, if we're to just fall off into some undifferentiated bliss? My love for my father, who crossed over in August 2008, is greater than my love for my neighbor - I'm sorry.

I may help my neighbor, I may even save his life, I may be moved by his circumstances, I may relate to them, even. He may even remind me of my father in some small way - but I cannot love him like I love my father.

If that is evolution - count me out. And how can I look forward to an eternity when the objective, apparently, is to slowly break down and wash away what makes me 'myself'? I can't see God having such a limited imagination - the whole thing just sounds horrifically didactic.

I read Michael Tymn's blog, and he was quoting some spiritual thinker who ridiculed man for spendin time 'trying to put a little ball into a cup', because this idle activity apparently didn't provide enough spiritual frisson for him.

It had to be the tritest thing I have ever read. People play golf because they enjoy the elements, the existential battle against the self's limits - both physical and mental - and because the tactile sensation of hitting a golf ball into the air and onto the green is satisfying.

What kind of elitist and frankly, unspiritual BS that was to take in. So - there's no baseball in heaven, I take it. Well then, why did God invent it in the first place?