Oct 5 - Yesterday I was invited to give a talk to religious leaders at a Conference on "Religion in the City", and one discussion stood out. I pointed out that until modern times, the heavenly city was the great afterlife destination, whereas now most people thought of a kind of paradisal nature as their idea of heaven. This got everyone talking about their idea of heaven, and, again, it turned out that no one considered the city to be their idea -- it was all some form of nature. The original idea was that the perfect city showed the perfection of humanity in community -- the Heavenly Jerusalem was one such -- and that the city had become so connected with darkness, that it was implausible to consider it as a heavenly home. Well, perhaps not a good sample -- we lacked any Parisians at the Conference, for whom a universe without Paris is like a meal without cheese. (p.t.)