Will we not bored in heaven?

Please, let’s try to get past the concern of boredom in heaven to earth. Sometimes we get the idea that if all the people on earth were good and if none of us sinned, it would be monotonous, uninteresting, and boring. For evil, sin, and various imperfections – this view says, to bring variety to life, life is interesting and richer because of it. I am afraid that if someone says this, then either he does not know, or he judges by himself: he is inwardly empty and cannot imagine life without constantly seeking ways to break out of this emptiness.
For what is boredom? I can think of two answers to this question that are worthy of consideration. First, boredom is a sign of inner emptiness, a fragmented personality, of an uncrystallized identity. This is how he defines boredom and the constant attempts to escape it, among others, Arthur Schopenhauer. He writes about “inner emptiness whose traces are etched on countless faces and evidenced by the attention focused on all the most trivial events of the external world.

This emptiness, which is the main source of boredom, always requires external stimuli, just to set the mind and the emotions in motion. It is indiscriminate as to the means, as is evidenced by the miserable fun to which people resort, the nature of their mutual relations and manner of conversation, and also the many people who are constantly standing in open doors or looking out of windows. It is this inner emptiness that is the main reason for the pursuit of the company, for entertainment, for pleasure.”

The flight from boredom must of course be unsuccessful, for..it does not fill one up internally, but only drowns out the emptiness. It acts like a narcotic that intoxicates but does not change anything in a positive sense; on the contrary, it reinforces the state of emptiness and makes one less and less capable of change for the better. Meanwhile, boredom – and who among us is not subject to it? And we must not waste it. For it is truly God’s gift that emptiness disturbs man, disgusts him, and makes his action. Boredom is a disease of the soul. Just as the disease of the body alarms the organism, and announces a state of danger, so is boredom one of the alarm bells ringing that it is threatening the soul. It is not right to kill boredom because in doing so I remove the alarm bell and allow the inner destruction to continue already unhindered. The voice of the bell does not invite me to distract myself more and more, on the contrary, it calls me to focus, to seek my identity, and to become more and more myself.

The voice of this bell should be respected, and we should usually try to turn it off. Also, the second answer to the question of what is boredom is probably directed to the heart of the matter. Namely, boredom is evidence of a lack of love. A. Karpinski wrote about it: “Love is the opposite of boredom; boredom is the feeling that arises when we want to escape from some environment, but we can’t. Boredom tires because we are about to escape but are unable to realize it. One never gets bored with the person one loves, because love attracts, while boredom repels. The feeling of boredom is a sensitive indicator of our emotional relationship with our surroundings.” In the end, both concepts lead to essentially the same conclusion.

After all, the more we are ourselves, the more and more truly we love others; the more we distract ourselves and waste time with trivialities, the less we want to or can love. For to concentrate is not only to close our eyes sometimes (even though that is also very necessary) but above all, it means to open our eyes to our neighbor. On the other hand, it is possible to open your eyes and not see, look and not notice: the more truly I will see and love others, the richer I will be inward. My answer to your query is therefore directed as follows: We must look truthfully at the problem of boredom on earth, and then we shall see the whole absurdity of the fear that perhaps in heaven there will be boredom in heaven. After all, take a good look at all three of these
symbols of eternal life that you mentioned in your letter.

Constantly dwelling with the Lamb – heaven will therefore be an everlasting love. Where there is love, there is not and cannot be boredom. Love drives away boredom as light drives away the darkness. And yet it is love for someone infinite, someone infinitely rich; yet this love need not fear a lack of reciprocity, because he loved us first and his love is enduring. In eternal life, we shall be filled to the full with love, and therefore the happiness of eternal life is beyond the present possibilities of our imagination. In the beginning, however, we may experience this state already on this earth. And it is also interesting that people who are already here on earth are experiencing how much happier life with God and according to God, are not afraid of being bored in heaven.

You go on to mention the symbol of the banquet – and that is a symbol of fulfillment, a picture of a state in which one lacks nothing. This is not a matter of consumerism, of course. Eternal life, that is the state of full humanity, man will finally and forever be SOMEONE; for that is what love makes of us, union with God, the giver of love, union in God with all who are worthy of love, and with all that is worthy of love. Or the symbol of eternal reign or eternal freedom. Eternal life means freedom from all those external and inner bonds that now cripple our various good powers. Here on earth, we cannot even imagine what it means to be completely free from sin, what glorious landscapes of the spirit that opens up before man. Only those who can imagine those who have experienced the satisfaction it gives a man even that indefinite victory over sin which is possible on this earth. But the most important conclusion of these reflections should be this: Let us strive to respond to boredom in the right way – not to drown it out, but to triumph over it.