Mapping out religious beliefs and learning to think
I drew this up flowchart / map of religious beliefs about three years ago. I agree with this quote in part. Thinking can be terrifying. At the time I drew up this map I was at the beginning of an emotional process of learning to think – discovering where the worldview of my upbringing fit with the worldview of other people’s upbringing.
Can you see where your beliefs fit?
There seems to be an endless list of ism’s. Have I missed yours? If I’ve missed any to do with key categories of beliefs about the universe then please let me know so I can add it.
It was during this process of surfing wikipedia and exploring different ism’s that I first came across “Panentheism” (from Greek πᾶν (pân) “all“; ἐν (en) “in“; and θεός (theós) “God“; “all-in-God”) – the idea that everything is in that which we call “God” is different from “Pantheism” (πᾶν (pân) “all“; θεός (theós) “God“; “all-is-God”) which equates The Universe or Nature to “God”.
I like the idea of Panentheism so much that I’m now writing a thesis on it.
I like of pantheism too but seeing as we will never know what lies beyond what we know (until we know it) I cannot see a reason to keep the doors of our imagination open for what might exist beyond our universe. For example, the energies/macrososm we call “God” could encompass a universe of universes, or even a universe of universes of universes… we will never know. Ok, now I’ve lost myself.
I guess this is flowchart is the basis of a number of entries that I will post as I research Panentheism and Process Theology (the idea that everything is a process, an event, that nothing (even “you”) is ever a static “thing”). And by combining these ideas with what I told you about the other day – Narratology (the study of narratives) – I hope to see where and how these different ism’s may actually meet, differing mainly in the historical context that the words, images and stories that describe their beliefs developed.
“ISM” means adherence to an ideology.
Ideology refers to ideas that constitute a person’s goals, expectations and actions – what makes up a person’s view of the world.
My hypothesis is that all the above ideologies might actually meet each other in the idea of Panentheism.
That is, I think that everyone – atheists, agnostics, Christians, Hindus, Buddhists, Muslims, Jews, new-age people, etc. etc. – are panentheists, they just don’t know it yet.
What would this mean? Well, maybe if we see that our ideologies are talking about the same thing, it will be harder for our identities to get caught up in them. And seeing as misuse of identity-driven ideologies is a major cause of violence, from terrorism to intolerance, maybe some forms of violence will discover a peaceful resolution.
Of course a lot of people will disagree – which is the fun of having a hypothesis and exploring it.
Maybe I will like my conclusions, maybe I won’t, but it is in the process of thinking and exploring that I expect I will learn and grow and get even just a little bit closer to “truth”.
So somewhere in the intersection of philosophy, religion, and science, I have over the last few blog entries, attempted to introduce the narrative-oriented research project that I suppose will (after many years, if not my entire life), be my magnum opus.
Anyway, I’ve spent enough entries telling you what I want to do… now I have to figure out how I’m going to do it.
Any research project (at least any academic research project), starts with a “literature review”. The objective is to learn who has had similar thoughts in the past, what influenced their ideas, how their ideas evolved, how their ideas influenced other people’s ideas, (and so on and so on), and observing what practical actions have come from it.
As a friend said to me the other day, “There are no new ideas… just new applications of old ones. It’s how ideas are used that matters.” Hopefully whether or not we like the conclusions of our thinking, our ideas will be used in ways we can be proud of.
Picture:
Taken at a cafe I often walk past on my way to work – it always has these cool little quotes so sometimes I stand there feeling a little silly taking a photo of it with my phone.
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What makes more sense?
What makes more sense?
1. That God selected ONE species to be his “chosen” species, abandoning all His other creations to nothingness.
OR
2. That God values ALL of his creations. The idea that humans are the only creations with souls, is a narrative created by humans not God.
What makes more sense?
1. That God selected ONE group of people to be His “chosen people, to help them conquer other groups of people (as long as they obeyed Him) and to punish all other people in the world who strive to discover Him and His will.
OR
2. That this group of people crowned themselves God’s chosen people, and that in times where these people won battles they believed it was because of their obedience to God, while in times of trouble their scapegoat was to disobedience to God.
What makes more sense?
1. That the world was created in 6 days, 6,000 years ago, by a God who is an entity separate from the world, that watches the world from afar. And yet is omniscient, omnipotent, and omnipresent?
OR
2. That some component of the universe has always existed, and this has be personified as God. That the universe is, like the breath of God, currently expanding, and one day it will compress back to a single quantum atom at which time the process of expansion will start again. That the process of creation, destruction and recreation never ends, hence presenting the beautiful process and nature of “God”. A never-ending process of yin and yang, good and evil, diametrical opposites that allow us, (and God) to know the other.
What makes more sense?
1. That carbon and other dating methods are inaccurate by millions/billions of years, that evolution is incorrect, and that the 30,000-year history of the aborigines is a complete fabrication.
OR
2. That the biblical account of Genesis is, like many other (very similar) creation stories about human beings that lived between 5-2000 years ago, a mythological symbolic account that explained the origins of life in a non-literal sense.
What makes more sense?
1. That God selected one point in time, that is, 2000 years ago, to impregnate a human woman to bare His one son, who is also an incarnation of Himself, in order to save humanity and provide an opportunity for people born lucky enough to hear this story, to have a relationship with Him. That this path to heaven does not come through how people live their lives, but they come from His “grace” that allows “anyone who believes in Him” – and the biblically narratated account of His divine Son dying on a cross and physically rising again for my, or your, sin, can have a relationship with God and go to heaven when they die.
OR
2. That God would love ALL the human (and non-human) beings He created and continues and will always continue to create over billions and zillions of years – before our universe’s beginning, and after it will end. That each group of people, through myriad circumstances, have developed a unique relationship with “Him” (referring to a personification of what is not human nor of any gender), discovering different aspects of the macrocosmic, omnipotent, omnipresent entity to which we are all a part of.
What makes more sense?
1. That all the Mayans and Incas in South America, the Aborigines in Australia, the Chinese, Japanese, Indians – all the people that were born into other cultures and see the world through a different lens that they have been brought up in, people who believe they have a relashionship with God – are actually wrong and are worshiping false gods, and hence will go to hell unless they repent and abandon the beliefs of their ancestors, and believe in the Christian God and Jesus Christ His son.
OR
2. That none of these religions have discovered the whole of who (or what) “God” is?
Is it possible that by exploring each tradition in it’s historical context, alongside the ongoing scientific and astronomical discoveries, that we can together continue to uncover more about the nature of the powers driving the universe?
What makes more sense?
1. That one simple story behind every incredible complexity that this world has to offer, was magically captured in One Holy Book, which was gathered, translated and interpreted without any human political motivations entering the decision process.
OR
2. That all Holy Books contain historical complexities surrounding the “truth”, “myth”, “Midrash”, myriad political intentions, and mis-translations, and that they as much as one strives to discover the “Truth” in it, there will always be different interpretations, and mis-interpretations of passages when taken outside their original language and context.
What makes more sense?
1. That God created such a narrative of the battle of good vs evil, of creation 6000 years ago, of one saviour in one part of the world 2000 years ago – all so that He can still continue to choose who He wants to hear this narrative, who He will reveal Himself to and have a relationship with…
OR
2. That man made up this narrative over thousands of years of a developing human consciousness, evolving moralities, political motivations, desires to know where we came from, to feel special, to deal with the inequalities and injustices in life, to provide hope of justice and eternal life, and to provide a grand-narrative of purpose and rid sense of emptiness and meaningless.
What makes more sense?
1. That Jesus is a “liar, lunatic, or Lord.”
OR
2. That the Bible contains some flaws.
There are many alternative scenarios than Jesus being a liar, a lunatic, or Lord. This manipulative argument is based on the presumption that everything in the Bible is literally true – a presumption to which any thinking person can see is an biased argument. Even if you allow for evidence from within this paradigm, does the bible claim not to contain mythos? Does it claim to contain no error? Even if God inspired the words, through translations and interpretations you can be guaranteed there are errors (and in other writings I have listed but a few of the many).
Think about it – couldn’t the virgin birth and rising from dead have a deep symbolic meaning without literally being true. Could these parts have been added when, after Jesus’ death his teachings were being transformed into a Jewish social revolution and then a religion taken to the Roman pagans? The fact that many pagan gods were born of a virgin died and rose from the dead, for example Ishtar from who Easter is based upon, infers that this scenario is a highly reasonable one to consider. Could Jesus be a prophet, a fantastic example of how we can know God? Could he be a mythical legend inspired by a number of heroic social and spiritual revolutionaries at the time? Maybe.
…
What makes more sense?
1. That God used various men to write, edit, collate, translate and interpret the Bible – exactly the way that He wanted it to be done – bridging the language and cultural barriers as if everyone understands everything the way he intended.
OR
2. That men wrote the books of the Bible, feeling inspired by God but remaining human and hence fallible. In the version of events and “facts” that they had access to, open to political interference, additions and manipulation, open to errors in translation and open to much debate over various ways to interpret the words in different circumstances that the rader finds themselves?
Debates over the divinity of Jesus, the Trinity… and existence of so many contradicting divisions of Christianity demonstrates the openness for such a human filtering process.
Jesus was an incarnation of God himself, and simultameously God’s one and only Son, and that a belief in this God-Man’s special birth, life’s teachings, humiliating and horrifying death, miraculous resurrection and incomprehensible ascension in to the earth’s atmosphere (to where-ver Heaven supposedly is located in the sky)
What makes more sense?
1. That one groups are the rare lucky people that God has chosen to be provided with the particular circumstances that lead us to the “right’ religion – the “right’ relationship with God through the belief in the “right” interpretation of history and historical writings.
OR
2. That humans of a particular culture and particular period made up the exclusiveness side of this story, that writings were manipulated so that the powerful could control the masses.
Might all religions record the experiences of various people with the great divine power, not with “other fake gods”? Is it possible that we do not know everything there is to know about God? Doesn’t God have a right to interact with different people however he wants to? Is it possible that by saying that God chose us and not people in Australia 500-years ago, that we are the ones playing God? Who are we to say what God is thinking, planning and choosing? Who are we to interpret a book out of their written context, and applying it to different cultures within this globalised society where such an attitude can have a rippling violent effect? Might it be better to let God be God, and us humans be humans? Might we be better to keep open toward all the humans of the world and seek to discover everything we can about the historical relationships between non-Western humans and God?
Does it really make sense that people in other cultures, whose circumstances have led them to belief Jesus was a human and not a God-incarnate – are sent to hell by no fault of their own? Why – if there is one God, and people in other cultures, and people who have lived for thousands of years seeking God within these cultures -would God reject them and accord that only one culture of people in one period of time, will have the correct story.
What makes more sense?
1. That life is a battle between good and evil, that people who choose to do evil will be punished in hell – an afterlife of eternal suffering.
OR
2. That those who do good in the world largely to so due to their life experiences, and that whots who do “evil” do so as a consequence of theirs?
Those who steal do so because they can’t afford to eat, or maybe because of an addiction to a drug they have developed due to a parent dying when they are young, or maybe just because they have been brought up with the overtly materialistic dreams that they hence believe will make them happy, even if it means harming other sto get there. Those who murder often do so because their psychy is completely fucked up by whatever circumstances they have withstood in their lifetime. Our definition of good, bad, and justice, and our knowledge about how to move toward peace, is an ever-evolving process. As our knowledge grows it may not mean wemove toward it however could it be structural circumstances that lead this to be?
…
In summary, think about these questions:
- Why would God create populations of people for thousands of years before Jesus, on unreachable areas of the world, eg the Australian Aborigines, only to send them to hell?
- Is it more likely that God chose one group of people, or that they crowned this title to themselves?
- Don’t you think that God would be powerful enough to love us without having to come to earth in human form so that he could forgive us? If you are all powerful, can’t you just forgive without people pleading for that forgiveness? Can’t you be happy with your achievements without needing someone else’s applaud?
- What is more likely: God incarnated Himself as a human ONCE in the whole history of the universe, or that God incarnates Himself in each and every one of us, and in every life orm, every cell and every quantum atom that makes up our universe?
- What is more likely: Jesus was a God-incarnation who three days after laying dead, rose back to life, and ascended into the earth’s atmosphere to wherever heaven exists up there; or that the supernatural parts of this story are reflections of the Roman pagan influence, additions to the story of Jesus that occurred in between Jesus’ death and the writings of the gospels?
Think about the complexities that surround us: the nature of life, humanity, consciousness, the connections between us and the micro and macro world that surrounds us… how can we uncover more about how we got to where we are, why, and where we are going from here?
Via a collective exploration it would seem that we might be able to get closer to knowing “God”, discovering more about “His” nature (taking “him” as a personification for the laws of nature), learning about how He created us, what He wants for us to do with this understanding and with our live (which I think is the same as Him discovering these things about Himself).
…
If not an absolute and elitist Christian God, then what???
To answer this question I think it is useful to return to the question: Who, or what is “God”??? Click here for some blog entries on this topic.
This process of questioning isn’t easy. It not only takes a lot of time. It can involve a roller coaster of emotions. It can cause conflict within yourself, as you question the roots of how you understand the world. It can cause conflict within social groups, even between you and family members. For me it was all these things. And so here, in hope of easing the pain of anyone else that might be facing the same dilemma, I documented my question and answers, and I offer it to you in this book I wrote in 2007-8: Journey of an Intuitive Christian
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Can Buddha help us deal with the elephant?
I am starting to understand what Buddha meant when he said all life is suffering. No matter which financial situation you are born into, we always want more. It is very rare we reach a stage where we happily say “enough”. The more chocolate I have, the more chocolate I want. The more countries I go to, the more countries I want to go to. The more money I have the bigger apartment I can get, the better the car, the more vintage the scooter, the more designer the clothes, the better quality the beauty products, the more fancy dinners etc etc. Sorry Ecclesiastes quotes are in my head at the moment – 6:7 says “A man’s efforts are for his mouth, yet his appetite is never satisfied.” I think you could say that is pretty much on the money – things haven’t changed much in the last 2-3000 years.
When it comes to dealing with the elephant in the room (the world population), it would seem it is largely due to an inability for humans to say enough (be it enough children or enough consumption of products that harm our environment), that means that eradicating poverty will eradicate humanity, if we are still the billions we are today.
As I see it we have few options. Either:
1. we accept that billions of people will always live in poverty and allow them to continue creating more and more billions of people to live in poverty (given that those people living in poverty don’t have much of an ecological footprint so while they stay in poverty there isn’t really a problem). Or,
2. we somehow get rid of a few billion people (I’m not inferring not overnight, but thinking some kind of population control with a 100 year plan would be a good start). Or,
3. we suicide of our species (seeing as it doesn’t seem possible for 7 billion people we grow to to live the American lifestyle without destroying our habitat, let alone 10 or 50 or whatever ridiculous number of billion people we allow ourselves to grow to).
I really don’t like any of these options, not one bit.
Surely there are alternatives??? I wonder if Buddha can help?
Buddha observed that greed, anger and hatred were the root causes of the world’s problems. He thought that these three evils were rooted in ignorance about what will make us happy, and that solutions come from non-attachment, from meditating into a state of inner peace, and changing the attitudes that were causing the violence in the first place.
Does this help with the population problem?
I suppose monks don’t have sex so if we all became Buddhist monks that might help – but that’s no more appealing than the first three options.
I guess Buddha’s suggestions do seem to be pointing us toward a less materialistic lifestyle, which means less consumption and less planetary damage, so maybe there is something practical we can learn from it.
The problem with a solution the comes from decreasing consumption, is that for our economy this equates to a dead economy, no jobs, and a downward spiral into depression... I heard from my Opa about depressions, eating rosebuds to stay alive. Nope, don’t like that option either…
One of the best solutions I have come across is the suggestion that GOOD DESIGN can solve all the worlds problems. We need to find ways to consume in ways that don’t harm our environment: designing products and housing that don’t do any damage, setting up more efficient agriculture and trade systems, and consuming more equally around the world. Maybe we don’t have to cut our consumption – we can just learn to consume in different ways?
The exciting thing about this is that a few days ago, while doing a little lingerie shopping, I discovered it is already happening!!! Check out this Simone Perele biodegradable bag. I bought underwear from three shops and put it all in this little bag.
How good is that!!! With a little ingenuity maybe humans change the world. I’m definitely liking the sound of this option…
BUT do more efficient, non-polluting systems and more ecological product designs actually address the elephant in the room?
Will these systems remain ecologically sustainably when 7 billion become 70 billion? And what about 700 billion? Where do you draw the line? And if you don’t draw a line and implement some kind of population control, what will ever cause people to stop having so many babies?
I know there are predictions that the population will stop at 10 billion – but I don’t understand the logic behind it. Just because western countries have bought into the “have less children because children are too expensive” idea, doesn’t mean that other civilisations, as they develop, will culturally adapt in the same way. If a culture values having ten children, why will having enough food to feed them not make them have twenty? Maybe it will, but I’m not convinced.
“Earth provides enough to satisfy every man’s need, but not every man’s greed” – said Gandhi.
I think this is true but I wonder: is greed something that will ever disappear? I’m not so sure. To be continued…
Note on the picture:
I am not actually sure if this is Buddha – I think it’s a Hindu god – if anyone knows, please let me know. I took this in Kathmandu, Nepal and am too lazy to find a better pic to suit this entry.
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IS LIFE MEANINGLESS?
“Meaningless! Meaningless!” says the Teacher. “Utterly meaningless! Everything is meaningless.”
What does man gain from all his labor at which he toils under the sun? Generations come and generations go, but the earth remains forever. The sun rises and the sun sets, and hurries back to where it rises. The wind blows to the south and turns to the north; round and round it goes, ever returning on its course. All streams flow into the sea, yet the sea is never full. To the place the streams come from, there they return again.
All things are wearisome, more than one can say. The eye never has enough of seeing, nor the ear its fill of hearing. What has been will be again, what has done will be done again; there is nothing new under the sun…. There is no remembrance of men of old, and even those who are yet to come will not be remembered by those who follow…
I thought in my heart, “Come now, I will test you with pleasure to find out what is good.” But that also proved to be meaningless. “Laughter,” I said, “is foolish. And what does pleasure accomplish?” I tried cheering myself with wine, and embracing folly – my mind was still guiding me with wisdom. I wanted to see what was worthwhile for men to do under heaven during the few days of their lives.
I undertook great projects: I built houses for myself and planted vineyards. I made gardens and parks and planted all kinds of fruit trees in them. I made reservoirs to water groves of flourishing trees… I amassed silver and gold for myself, and the treasure of kings and provinces… I denied myself nothing my eyes desired; I refused my heart no pleasure. My heart took delight in all my work, and this was the reward for all my labor. Yet when I surveyed all that my hands had done and what I had toiled to achieve, everything was meaningless, a chasing after the wind; nothing was gained under the sun.
Then I turned my thoughts to consider wisdom, and also madness and folly… I saw that wisdom is better than folly, just as light is better than darkness… but I came to realize that the same fate overtakes them both… For the wise man, like the fool, will not be long remembered; in the days to come both will be forgotten. Like the fool, the wise man too must die!
So I hated life… I hated all the things I had toiled for under the sun, because I must leave them to the one who comes after me. And who knows whether he will be a wise man or a fool? Yet he will have control over all the work into which I have poured my effort and skill under the sun. This too is meaningless. So my heart began to despair over all my toilsome labor under the sun. For a man may do his work with wisdom, knowledge and skill, and then he must leave all he owns to someone who has not worked for it. This too is meaningless and a great misfortune… a chasing after the wind.
I also thought, “As for men, God tests them so that they may see that they are like the animals. Man’s fate is like that of the animals; the same fate awaits them both. As one dies, so dies the other. All have the same breath; man has no advantage over the animal. Everything is meaningless. All go to the same place; all come form dust, and to dust all return. Who knows if the spirit of man rises upward and if the spirit of the animal goes down into the earth?” So I saw that there is nothing better for a man than to enjoy his work, because that is his lot. For who can bring him to see what will happen after him?
Again I looked and saw all the oppression that was taking place under the sun: I saw the tears of the oppressed – and they have no comforter; power was on the side of their oppressors – and they (too) have no comforter. And I declared that the dead, who had already died , are happier than the living, who are still alive. But better than both is he who has not yet been, who has not seen the evil that is done under the sun.
If you see the poor oppressed in a district, and justice and rights denied, do not be surprised at such things; for one official is eyed by a higher one, and over them both are others higher still. The increase from the land is taken by all; the king himself profits from the fields. Whoever loves money never has money enough; whoever loves wealth is never satisfied with his income. This too is meaningless.
As goods increase, so do those who consume them. And what benefit are they to the owner except to feast his eyes on them? The sleep of a laborer is sweet, whether he eats little or much, but the abundance of a rich man permits him no sleep... Naked a man comes from his mother’s womb, and as he comes so he departs. He takes nothing from his labor that he can carry in his hand. This too is a grievous evil…
So I reflected on all this and concluded that the righteous and the wise and what they do are in God’s hands, but no man knows whether love or hate awaits him. All share a common destiny – the righteous and the wicked, the good and the bad, the clean and the unclean, those who offer sacrifices and those who do not… This is the evil under the sun: The same destiny overtakes all.
Go, eat your food with gladness, and drink your wine with a joyful heart, for it is now that God favor what you do… Whatever your hand finds to do, do it with all your might, for in the grave, where you are going, there is neither working nor planning nor knowledge nor wisdom.
“Meaningless! Meaningless!” says the Teacher. “Everything is meaningless!”
The above could quite easily be my words, but they are not. Believe it or not they come from the OLD TESTAMENT of the Christian Bible!!! They come from the BOOK OF ECCLESIASTES, by paragraph: Ecclesiastes 1:2-11; Ecclesiastes 2:1-3; Ecclesiastes 2:4-11; Ecclesiastes 2: 13-26; Ecclesiastes 3:18-22; Ecclesiastes 4:1-3; Ecclesiastes 5:8-16; Ecclesiastes 9:1-3; Ecclesiastes 9:7-11; Ecclesiastes 11:5; Ecclesiastes 12:8.
In times that I feel a little down about life, times where I’m exhausted, times that I see myself using chocolate, coffee or alcohol to give me little highs, times when I feel confused, lacking motivation, or fed-up with the projects I’m working on… Ecclesiastes captures the thoughts I am thinking: WHAT IS THE POINT OF IT ALL? Maybe I am a reincarnate of this old depressed soul…
While they don’t know when or by who the book of Ecclesiastes was written, (their wild guess is King Solomon, which could very well be true but no one really knows), it is pretty clear that it was written by a man who had everything yet felt empty, a man who is bitter about life, who is has been hurt by a woman (or women), and who doesn’t want to get old and die but knows this time is approaching. I guess maybe we can or will all relate, at one stage or another, to the lack of satisfaction that comes from consumption, materialism, love, and the unavoidable death that awaits us.
Ecclesiastes is not a long book – all of ten pages long – and I think it’s a worthwhile read. If you do, then maybe you will notice what I did – a few out-of-place passages that more or less say, that this meaningless life is made meaningful by obedience to God: “Now all has been heard; here is the conclusion of the matter: Fear God and keep his commandments, for this is the whole duty of man. For God will bring every deed into judgment, including every hidden thing, whether it is good or evil.” (Ecclesiastes 12:13-14)
I don’t blame the editors for adding that – actually I’m more surprised the rest of the book made it in the published version at all. I suppose the publishers of the book wanted readers to confront these philosophical ideas with the conclusion to obey whatever they told them God wanted them to do. I think it’s funny the way in which it was done – with sloppily placed paragraphs that don’t interfere with what appears (to me) to be the key messages of the original writer.
Still I guess a note of something is a little more or a positive finishing point than the depressing note my summary above leaves it…
IS LIFE REALLY SO MEANINGLESS?
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Capitalistic karma: reinterpreting reincarnation
Walking up in the mountains outside Kathmandu I contemplated the connection between the world’s inequalities today, the actions of one’s ancestors, and the idea of karma and reincarnation that I had been reading about in some books on the Eastern Religions.
Be they the ancestors who split from the group to discover new worlds fifty thousand years ago, or be they the innovators of new technologies that won them last century’s battles, the connection is pretty clear… and I wondered, is this what the yogis are talking about when they talk about karma? Are the people of today the reincarnations of ancestors, manifested through the processes of material, genetic and education inheritance? The closer we get to a person, the more the other embodies our ideas. If we, say, write a book and disperse our ideas, are we, on some level, reincarnating ourselves through the people that these ideas influence? Are our children simply more direct reincarnations of ourselves as they gain more of our energy through our genes and through the time we spend with them?
At the end of the day we are all responsible for the consequences of our own actions, be they consequences experienced our own lifetime, or in that of our children and childrens’ childrens’ childrens’ lifetimes. If we do bad to another person, animal, or to our environment, be it in our lifetime or in sometime in the distant future, the universe eventually balances itself out… Is this, in a wider sense, our “karma”? Could the cycle of birth-death-rebirth that the yogis talk about be less about a separate soul reincarnating (for example, that if you kill a bee in this life you will come back as an bee in your next life), and actually be describing the process of evolution (for example, if many people kill many bees, humanity will have to adapt to a world with less flowers and foods)?
When the caste system tells people that they have been born into their caste as a consequence of their actions in a past life I typically respond (in my head) with “what a load of bullocks!” But, when viewed from this understanding of karma and reincarnation, this idea starts to make sense… Could poverty actually be the karmic result of the decisions of one’s ancestors?
When I compare the capitalist system to the caste system I can’t help but appreciate the open opportunities capitalism provides. Sure it’s not a perfect system with the opportunities it provides not exactly equal (for example, children in wealthy families are sure to have more opportunities than less wealthy families) but on the other side I also think that if a person dedicates their life to provide such opportunities for their children, isn’t it fair that this child benefits from their parent’s hard work? Is such their good fortune, their parent or grandparent’s karma?
Or is maybe this just my wishful thinking, in hope of justifying the unjustifiable, I’m not quite sure. Karma and reincarnation aside, as I consider the advantages and disadvantages of capitalism and I wonder: if you take away the ability to transfer wealth to your children, will people still be motivated to innovate and work hard? At least in this system, children in the less wealthy family still get a decent education and decent amount of opportunity. While life may not be as easy as it is for the child born in the wealthy family, the challenges this presents can actually an opportunity for even more growth for that individual, and at least no one is completely left out of the system and being condemned to be an untouchable for all their future generations.
It is starting to seem to me that as we reincarnate ourselves, from generation to generation of cell to plant to animal to self-aware human, our creativity is growing, our sense of morality and ethics is deepening, and our capability to consider the future of the whole planet is expanding. And so I wonder, if we continue collective learn from each other and from the past, what incredible species will the reincarnates of humanity be like in the future?
Picture notes
Photographer: Edwina Hughes.
Taken at my sister’s wedding at Craigiburn in Bowral on the weekend, this photo doesn’t really have anything to do with this blog entry although I guess in a way it represents the passing on of traditions and possibly the beginning of a new generation of Bennetts. And it’s nice to share considering it was such an incredible wedding, very fun, my sister looked GORGEOUS, and my new brother-in-law spunky… Congratulations guys!
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Free Documentaries: The Truth Is Free
Bored? Never! Check out this website: http://freedocumentaries.org/index.php
In particular I recommend:
Manufacturing Consent – Noam Chomsky … if you haven’t seen this one you better watch it NOW!
The War on Democracy – The US manipulates politics of South America
The Power of Nightmares – The rise of the Religious Right in America, and Islamic Fundamentalists.
Jesus Camp – SCARY!
The Story of God – explores the history of humanity’s search for our creator.
Zeitgeist – as I mentioned yesterday – a must see.
The Corporation – Damn corporations.
The 11th Hour – Leonardo Dicaprio carries on from “inconvenient” message Al Gore shared with us.
And I’m sure heaps more are great. Check it out!!!
Photo credit:
I sneakily snapped this photo in a museum in Peru or Ecuador (no cameras allowed) – they are little Inca statues in erotic positions… You can actually buy packs of cards that each have a picture of a different statue in a different tantric-sex-like pose. I bought some as a gift, now wish I had them to show hehehe funny stuff. How fun is exploring different cultures! I wonder what India has in store for me next month…. okay, I gotta stop yabbering. Enjoy your weekend!
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The Spirit of the Times (Zeitgeist)
In the hidden-away tranquility beneath the branches of large shadowy trees, in the Secret Garden hostel in a mysterious little town called Vilcabamba, in Ecuador December 2008, I met a man with white hair and a white beard. It was from this man that I first learned of the Zeitgeist…
The word “Zeitgeist” comes from the German word Zeit, which means time, and Geist, which means spirit.
So basically Zeitgeist means the “spirit of the times” and according to wikipedia this means the “general cultural, intellectual, ethical, spiritual, and/or political climate within a nation or even specific groups, along with the general ambience, morals, and sociocultural direction or mood of an era (similar to the English word mainstream or trend).”
The first part of the first movie (entitled The Greatest Story Ever Told) looks at religion, describes the worship of the Sun, the anthropomorphism of astrological constellations, of an ancient and ongoing battle between Horus and Set, or Light and Darkness, with each morning Horus winning and providing us warmth and vision, and Set conquering as our nights set in. The celebration of the birth of the Sun would occur on the Winter equinox (the 25th of December), where from then on the days would get longer.
The second part (entitled All The World’s a Stage) looks at the theory that September 11 attacks on the World Trade Center were an inside job.
Part 3 (entitled Don’t Mind the Men Behind the Curtain) looks at the waging of war for the economic gain of international bankers.
The sequel to the movie is called Zeitgeist: Addendum explains “fractional reserve banking”, shows how debt makes us economic slaves that must submit to employment in order to live. How’s this for a quote:
“Physical slavery requires people to be housed and fed. Economic slavery requires people to feed and house themselves.”
A confronting lens from which to interpret reality, isn’t it.
The second part of the sequel is mainly interviews with John Perkins, the ex-CIA economic hit man and the author of “Confessions of an Economic Hit Man”, a New York Times best seller that is now also a film). Perkins writes:
Economic hit men (EHMs) are highly-paid professionals who cheat countries around the globe out of trillions of dollars. They funnel money from the World Bank, the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID), and other foreign “aid” organizations into the coffers of huge corporations and the pockets of a few wealthy families who control the planet’s natural resources.
The final part of the Zeitgeist sequel leaves some points of hope, with futurist Jacque Fresco providing a vision of a “resource-based economy” based on abundance rather than the current monetary-based economy based on scarcity. The vision is known as The Venus Project, and it involves the use of magnetic and geotechnologies that have allegedly been suppressed for political and monetary gains that could help us adapt to environmentally friendly and sustainable lifestyles. These technologies sound fantastic, but they need more research and development and hence more funding, which the capitalist system prevents them getting as it gives preference to policies like carbon tax which bandaid a solution rather than looking to solve the actual cause. I don’t know if all that is said is possible, but it’s refreshing and powerful to visualise and imagine.
The last part of this movie turns to our society’s values, oppressive laws, and irrelevant superstitions, and points to a collective ignorance that leads it.
The films have been criticised for containing material that is partially true, and some that is complete bogus, used mainly to ‘maximize an emotional response at the expense of reasoned argument’ which as a result undermines ‘legitimate questions about what happened on 9/11, and about corruption in religious and financial organizations.’[1]
Still even if some details are added for emotional oomph, it seems to me that the core issues they discuss are real issues. They may not have referenced all of their sources but finding sources to support the gist of what they talk about is not hard to find. This documentary is available for free online and is absolutely worth watching, as long as all it’s details are not taken as gospel.
http://www.zeitgeistmovie.com/
The core messages in the film are strong, I think it does a good job to capture the spirit of our times, and provide at least some direction and vision as to where we are going. It is for sure that humanity together must seek the emergent and the symbiotic. Throughout history people have desired to fit and uphold the norm, otherwise they are ostracized by their society. But the perpetuation of a closed worldview is not positive for society. It is destructive. Fundamentalist religions are psychologically distorting the idea of faith. The new is ignored in favor of outdated beliefs. We misinterpret myths as literal events. Consider the paradigm shifts of the last two millennia: heliocentric to geocentric and beyond. What we know today was unimaginable 2000 years ago. To be proven wrong should be celebrated. Fluid perpetual change must be embraced. There is no such thing as static knowledge. Nothing is ever static.
We have to stay open to new information at all times; even if challenges our present beliefs.
When the pupil is ready, a teacher will show up. Read a Zen proverb on a gift card in a little art shop in a small Vilcamamban street. It is overwhelming to consider the problems of our worldwide system and their deep historic roots. But what matters is not how we can change the world, but how we can change ourselves. It starts with being ready to learn. I am ready.
And on that note, guess what teacher is showing up in town (my town, ie Sydney)???… JACQUE FRESCO!!! Next Friday the 23rd April 2010, for the Venus Project World Lecture Tour. He’s speaking at my uni – Sydney University - and tickets are open, just under $30, and available here … I hope to see you there!
[1] ^ Chapman, Jane (2009). Documentary in Practice: Filmmakers and Production Choices. Polity Press. p. 171–173.
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Happy Ishtar!
Easter is celebrated at Spring equinox, a time that for thousands of years was a celebration of the goddess Ishtar resurrecting the Babylonian/Sumerian god Tammuz/Dumuzid – the god of food and vegetation.
Ohhhh, it makes so much sense!
The burgeoning of spring: a time of fertility, when rabbits lay eggs, flowers come out, seeds sprout and our food grows. Easter is a wonderful celebration of the sun’s warmth returning to us, a celebration of new life, and best of all – CHOCOLATE EGGS!!!
Springtime means summer is on it’s way – the SUN has been resurrected!
I love the sun. I worship the sun. So do Brazilians – sitting on the beach clapping and cheering it as it retires for the day. Without the sun, there would be no life on earth, so it does deserve a little appreciation. And besides that, without the sun I would have to a solarium to get my tan. Heaven forbid!
DID I MENTION I LOVE THE SUN?
Now that’s a pretty important resurrection! But not a literal one. Just like Christmas, early Christians adopted and adapted this pagan tradition to be their own. NO WHERE in the bible does it talk about Easter. Just like NO WHERE in the bible does Jesus ask to be worshiped.
Interesting to mention is that the Bible, in Ezekiel 8:13-14, does refer to the Easter tradition. A woman weeping for Tammuz is seen as an “abomination”!
It’s funny how Easter has been adopted – in both dates and traditions (ie spring equinox and with exchange of Easter eggs) – by religious followers of the same holy book that describes the tradition as an abomination!
So rather than celebrating the resurrection of the sun, Easter is now a celebration of the resurrection of the Son, Jesus the Christ.
Tell me, what makes more sense:
a) that Jesus was sent by God to die on the cross and “save you from your sins” and then physically rise back to being human and 40-days later ascend into heaven;
or
b) that Jesus Christ heard the Buddhist philosophies of love and non-violence, and dedicated his life to a movement toward find peace on earth (the “kingdom of heaven”), and that after a few years of teaching Jesus was killed by the religious/political leaders of the day who saw the growing movement as a threat.
Is it possible that after the horrific death the early Christians felt Jesus energy come to them and tell them to continue with the peace movement? After my Opa died I felt his energy outside the hospital, I could see his energy around me, in the trees, in the air, everywhere – I suppose that is a form of resurrection.
Is it possible that the idea of Christ’s resurrection being physical, with a missing body, was added to the Christan gospels in order to synthesize Judaism with Paganism and gain momentum for this movement? Maybe even when it was added it was more mythical and mysterious than supposed to be something physical?
Scholars, both Christian and secular, agree that the part about the resurrection in the gospel of Mark was added a few hundred years after the writer of Mark finished documenting the story. Hmmm… I wonder where else has been added?
Enough enough enough – today is a celebration.
I do have one final question: now that we have re-established the real meaning of Easter, can someone please explain to me why here – in the Southern Hemisphere as the sun is retiring earlier and his intensity slowly dying – am I eating this chocolate Ishtar bunny??? I’m not complaining, I happen to love chocolate maybe even more than I love the sun. But still, shouldn’t it be spring?
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How to create a world war
Among my Internet surfing I came across a “creationist” website – the belief that the world is around 6000 years old – a figure derived from tracing back the genealogy in the bible from Jesus to Adam, and the seven-day creation. This belief is growing so much that more than 40% of Americans believe this and do not believe in evolution!
Obviously this creation story clashes with the Story of the Universe I am presenting in my Big History Blog Series. I think it is always important to read other views with the most open mind you can possibly have, and I have tried, but serious – this is pretty destructive stuff…
This website was advertising a book called:
WAR OF THE WORLDVIEWS
“What do aliens, dinosaurs and gay marriage have in common?
They are all part of the culture war—a war between two worldviews…
How are we to respond when we hear of the latest “argument” for evolution? How can we prepare our children to face the evolutionary indoctrination of our public schools and universities? What are we to make of “Christian” organizations who teach the big bang and millions of years? How can we build a truly biblical worldview?
In this powerful book, you will find ammunition for the war: answers to some of the most common arguments for evolution, analyses of Christian compromise and a call for a return to true biblical authority.”
This is a quote from a corresponding article:
“This story of origins is entirely fiction. But sadly, many people claim to believe the big bang model. It is particularly distressing that many professing Christians have been taken in by the big bang, perhaps without realizing its atheistic underpinnings. They have chosen to reinterpret the plain teachings of Scripture in an attempt to make it mesh with secular beliefs about origins.
There are several reasons why we cannot just add the big bang to the Bible. Ultimately, the big bang is a secular story of origins. When first proposed, it was an attempt to explain how the universe could have been created without God. Really, it is an alternative to the Bible; so it makes no sense to try to “add” it to the Bible. Let us examine some of the profound differences between the Bible and the secular big bang view of origins.
The Bible teaches that God created the universe in six days ( Genesis 1; Exodus 20:11). It is clear from the context in Genesis that these were days in the ordinary sense (i.e., 24-hour days) since they are bounded by evening and morning and occur in an ordered list (second day, third day, etc.). Conversely, the big bang teaches the universe has evolved over billions of years.
The Bible says that Earth was created before the stars and that trees were created before the sun.1 However, the big bang view teaches the exact opposite. The Bible tells us that the earth was created as a paradise; the secular model teaches it was created as a molten blob. The big bang and the Bible certainly do not agree about the past.
Many people don’t realize that the big bang is a story not only about the past but also about the future. The most popular version of the big bang teaches that the universe will expand forever and eventually run out of usable energy. According to the story, it will remain that way forever in a state that astronomers call “heat death.”2 But the Bible teaches that the world will be judged and remade. Paradise will be restored. The big bang denies this crucial biblical teaching.
See the full article here: http://www.answersingenesis.org/articles/wow/does-the-big-bang-fit
Some thoughts:
First of all I have to ask: wasn’t the book of Genesis written by Jews? And don’t Jews believe the Genesis story is MYTH? So what are these Christians thinking when they decide to interpret is as LITERAL???
Secondly, referring to the parts of the quote I have highlighted in red, this article appears to be highly manipulative propaganda. It appeals to people’s fear of death and offers a reward of eternal life – you have a choice: be a part of a universe that might one day, in billions of years, cease to exist; or be a Christian and live forever. But what of this choice is based on anything real?
If we are part of a universe that might one day cease to exist, maybe we should accept it and stop fearing it. Maybe it’s a good thing? Life is pretty good, but to live forever in the same consciousness would get pretty mundane. Especially if there this eternal life was somewhere that everything was perfect… urgh! Nope – I think “God” made a pretty good world with this play of opposing forces – it’ keeps life interesting. Change is great! Maybe we should enjoy the billions years this universe has left to offer. Now we are in a stage of expansion, one day the universe may contract and billions of years later start to expand again… who knows! It’s a pretty exciting idea, and at least it’s a real possibility as opposed to a fairytale told to make us feel good and turn our consciousness from creative and peaceful to one that is conforming and destructive …
Thirdly, this article polarizes non-believers and falsifies who they are and their motives. Maybe Christians who believe in evolution and not creationism are NOT “compromising” their religion – isn’t it possible that they are THINKING FOR THEMSELVES? Isn’t it possible that they are READING THE BIBLE IN THE CONTEXT THAT IT WAS WRITTEN? Isn’t it possible that “GOD” WANTED THE BIBLE TO CONTAIN MYTH, WHICH IS WHY GENESIS IS A MYTH???
I really cannot understand how people can abuse a historical book, cherry pick and take parts out of context, and use it to hate certain groups of society, to deny the dinosaurs, polarize worldview rather than look for the lessons that can be learned from each other, increasing tensions, and calling for war. Yep – that’s a great way to create a world war. Good one guys.
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How Religion Spread
You MUST check out this awesome animated map of history. It shows when each religion starts and how each one spreads across the globe – all in less than two minutes.
http://www.mapsofwar.com/images/Religion.swf
It’s been a busy week so I will start the Big History series, beginning with the Big Bang, very soon.
Have a good weekend!
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Richard Dawkins and WHAT is God?
Interesting interview on SBS with Richard Dawkins last night. Stream it at this address:
http://www.sbs.com.au/dateline/story/watch/id/600352/n/Interview-with-Richard-Dawkins
I left this comment and thought I’d share it with you:
There is a God VS there is no God.. haven’t we forgotten to define WHAT is it we refer to as “GOD”???
I was a fundamentalist Christian for 20 years but now having rejected it I am getting closer to “God”.
In evolution I see “God”. In intuition I hear “God”. God is not a man in the sky (I think even fundamentalists agree with this) “He” is the personification of creative energy behind life. Atheists prefer not to personify it.
Can we please just expose the manipulative dogmas and seek truth?
I would love to hear YOUR thoughts on this stuff…
Below are personal reflections written a couple of years ago when I was searching for answers.
Monotheisms
All monotheistic religions believe there is only one God. One transcendent being that is omnipotent (all powerful), omniscient (all knowing), and omnipresent (present everywhere.)
God, most of us acknowledge, is of a complexity beyond our mind’s capacity to ever fully understand. “He” or it, is a power beyond words our language offers us, a mystery that will always surround us but which until death we will never fully solve.
God’s name
In Spanish the word for God is Dios. In French it is Dieu. In Greek Theos. In Hebrew, Elohim. In Japanese it is Goezur, in Italian Dio, Malay Alla, Latin Deus, Peruvian Puchecammae, Persian Sire, Russian Bojh, In Syriac, Turkish and Arabic, it is Allah. Just as we say cold, the Spanish sayfrio, and Japanese samui, all refer to the same thing. When Muslims call out to Allah, they are calling out to God, but in their language. If they were to pray in English, they could call Allah God, and if we were to pray in Turkish, we would call God Allah. Different words for God doesn’t mean we pray to different gods.
God is on my side
The words Allah and God cognate two very different images of God in our minds, but why? It is due to the fact that most people in Turkey, Syria and Arabia, have been brought up Muslim, and most people in England, America and Australia, brought up to be Christian, that Allah is thought to be the god of Islam, and God, the god of Christianity. But this is wrong, both words mean God. I’m not saying that the Muslim God and the Christian God are one and the same God. No. They are two different civilizations attempts to know the same mysterious power behind life, of which both there is only one.
Islam and Christianity are based on different interpretations of someone else’s God-inspired teachings. The discrepancy between the two religions comes down to the credibility Mohammed and Jesus, the credibility of the writers who documented their stories, the credibility of their followers that continued to spread their words, and the credibility and accuracy of theologians who have interpreted these narratives into the creeds many people so strongly believe today.
Different interpretations of God’s will for different people at different times has led to each religions’ different beliefs about how to communicate with God, our life’s purpose, ideologies about how society should be run, what constitutes good morals etc, and God’s eternal plan for who goes to heaven and who goes to hell. Aren’t these differences simply reflecting different civilizations in different times focusing on this one transcendent power behind our existence: worshiping it, praising it, praying to it, being inspired by it, wanting to please it and gain protection and direction from it? Surely if we can just recognize this common goal, and humbly admit our own nature as fallible humans who cannot fully comprehend this power, we have a stronger base to think through our own conceptions and ideas about God, and learn from each other’s?
Dear Christians
Does it really make sense that your God would only reveal himself to the Israelites, one small group of people who exited Egypt around 3000 years ago? What about all the people that lived before the Israelites? What about the Sumerians and Egyptians, the Indian and Chinese, the Indigenous peoples of Americas and Australia? Does God not care to have a relationship with these people too? Why would he bother creating them then?
Does it make sense that the only way to have a relationship directly with God, is by believing in Jesus? Does it really make sense that God would make the condition of entering a relationship with him be based on accepting a number of statements only available to a small percentage of the population? Is God not powerful enough to forgive without creating aformula of sacrifice and forgiveness? Wouldn’t “he” want to have a relationship with all “his” creations?
When you think of God, what image come to mind? A king? A judge? A man or woman sitting on a throne in a golden castle? This is an image but is this what you really believe God is? Does God experience days, and time? Time on earth only exists because of earth’s rotation around the sun and on its axis, so how is it in heaven? Is there a past, present and future in Heaven? Does God sit on his throne reminiscing the past – those good ol’days when Lucifer was his right-hand angel? Does God think back fondly to the times when his creation was perfect, the times when we were his obedient human creations that had not yet sinned?
Does he think about what went wrong, and wonder how he could have allowed himself to be so betrayed? Does he wish he’d used his omniscience and omnipotence to stop it? If he is omnipotent then can’t he do that now? I know we explain this by saying he wanted it to happen, because he wanted us to have choice, does that mean he is disappointed in our choice? But, can you imagine God of most power, actually feeling disappointed and sad? If you were all powerful, would you really take things so personally? Or would your ego be quite ok without needing other’s praise and acceptance?
What would the point be for God to set up such a grand narrative: throwing Satan out of heaven, planning a battle between good and evil whereby we, his special human creations, must choose which side we want to be on? All this bother when he is already “all-knowing” and knows that in the end he will win – and those that chose good will be saved and live for eternity with him. Why did he do it? Why would he bother? Just so that he could have friends? Weren’t the angels his friends? Is it because he was bored?
I guess eternal life of peace might get boring. In a place free of conflict – a place of pure peace and tranquility where every day you feel safe and happy – I think I too would eventually pick a fight with someone, fire things up, just make life interesting again… Could the narrative of a battle between Satan and God be a mythological representation of this ongoing conflict between yin and yang? Did “God” “create” each of these opposites simply in order to write a more exciting story fo the world? The universe is constructed with protons and electrons, which combine together in different combinations to create different elements which combine to create different forms of matter. + and -. It’s like binary code of a computer 0s and 1s. Necessary opposites. It is the balance of opposites that make up for me the wonder of life.
“God” created this myriad of experiences available to us, so that life can be experienced to the full, in whichever way we want. God is more creative, clever and powerful than we give him credit for. In my mind “He” is not some ego maniac king demanding praise and creating hard-to-belief formulas with the requirement for us to believe it, so that when we die, we can meet him and become his servants in heaven. This image sounds like something people living in these type of conditions on earth would have imagined. Think about it, does it really make sense?
How can we believe God is omnipotent if we believe Satan to be a serious threat to our salvation? How can we believe God is omniscient, knowing already who will be in heaven, yet simultaneously believe we have free choice? The only way this can make sense to me is through the omnipresence of “God” when freed from human-constructed conceptions of “His” form.
How I imagine “God”
If God is present everywhere then isn’t “he” in every cell of our body and every spec of matter in our universe?And hence if we are in God and God is in us, can we not derive that the universe IS God. God may be bigger than the universe too, we can never know what’s outside our universe, but we can know that God is everythingin this universe.
I see “God” in the middle of “His” process of self-creative evolution. We humans might even be God in his most creative and dynamic expression to date. More recent developments in this creation process have led to an individualistic self-awareness, whereby we have developed complex minds that construct and deconstruct the realities around us. This is a magnificent part of God’s creative expression, yet in the process we have taken an interesting turn. We are born into a world that teaches us we are separate: separate from each other, separate from nature, and most important, separate from God. This separateness has led to creation of an ego. Our ego has positives and negatives. It allows a greater breadth of feelings, yet is also the cause of loneliness, fear, and confusion. Through self-analysis we have lost sight of what we are and what is our purpose. Our separateness feels like an eternal separateness, and most of all we fear what will happen when we die.
Our purpose in life, as an expression of God, is to continue our collective godly process of creation. To do this we must reconnect with our true self, this means listening to the voice deep within each of us and taking comfort in the fact that all of us are separate yet one. We are all expressions of God, and together we are God. God is you, me, humanity, all life, and the entire universe and beyond – we are all God.
When we realize this, we will realise that peace is possible. This paradigm shift is consistent with all religions, and sciences. Ultimately we are all matter, and in a reality that mind-body-spirit between man, animal and plant, all connect in ways we do not yet understand. Developments in quantum physics, in discovering your intuition, connect to Buddhism, connect to mysticism, connect to the teachings of Jesus, Mohammad, Abraham, Buddha and all the other spiritual gurus of the past and of today.
If we open our minds to an image of God that is not the symbolic one we have grown up with, if we recognise our interpretations are fallible, if we accept that “God” is an incredible entity of which we are a part of even if “He” is not a person and exists in a form that no words can describe – then I think we can truly discover a relationship with God/Our Universe, that so many wise teachers have described.
If we wish to forego our egos, we can return to the oneness of God – just as Buddhists do when they meditate into blissful enlightenment. But egos are also a source of pleasure and competition which spurs creativity. Maybe egos are also good, as long as it’s kept in perspective of the oneness which we are more deeply a part of. I don’t know – what do you think??? (comments??)
Ego or no ego I believe we are simultaneously God’s creation and God’s creators, and we have a purpose: to create! This means we can transform this world and universe to the one we want it to be. How? Well we can start by reconnecting with each other, increasing awareness of our egos, and designing a vision, a blueprint, of the reality we want to create.
Oh, and if you are interested in the comment from Pat Robertson (a leading evangelical in the US) that said Haiti experienced the quake because of their “pact with the devil”, I found the snippet from his interview on youtube:
Arghhhhhhhhh!!!!!!!
And when it comes to Atheists – don’t you think they have a right NOT to personify this power if they don’t want to? What difference should it make to anyone else if some people personify it while others talk about it in the scientific terms they decide to delegate to it? Richard Dawkins may be a little derogatory in his approach but he makes a good point – at least he is going about his pursuit of truth through words not war.
When it comes to the crunch we are all incredibly complex beings inside an incredibly complex universe constructed by an incredibly powerful creative energy – personified as God or described as a series of Supernovas – aren’t we all just using different words and conceptions to describe the same thing?
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A time for everything
Time is the most valuable asset we have. We count as weeks and years go by, as we get older and our borrowed energy starts to dwindle. There’s not enough time in our day. Not enough time in our weeks. Not enough time in our lives. And yet there is, we just have to accept that there is a time for everything:
A time to be born, and a time to die;
a time to plant, and a time to pluck up that which is planted;
A time to kill, and a time to heal;
a time to break down, and a time to build up;
A time to weep, and a time to laugh;
a time to mourn, and a time to dance;
A time to cast away stones, and a time to gather stones together;
a time to embrace, and a time to refrain from embracing;
A time to get, and a time to lose;
a time to keep, and a time to cast away;
A time to rend, and a time to sew;
a time to keep silence, and a time to speak;
A time to love, and a time to hate;
a time of war, and a time of peace.
…
You wouldn’t expect this to come out of the bible hey! So Taoist!!! And so true. Ecclesiastes 3:1-8.
A photographic interpretation:
A time for icecream
A time for dropping it
A time for five-second rules? (and pouting)
And I’ll always have time for huskies.
Photo credits:
Bernie de Belles http://debellesimages.com
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Resolution Theory
So I (finally) finished reading Shantaram!!! It is a very long book, but well worth the time.
My favourite parts, besides Gregory David Robert’s incredible use of adjectives, is the philosophy of life that Khader Bhai, the Mafia don, shares with Lin. Khader Bhai calls it Resolution Theory, and I think it’s pretty similar to my own philosophy that I, for fun, labeled “Creativism”. While Resolution Theory relates good and evil to the tendency toward or away from complexity, I like to think of it (which is for sure inspired by books I’ve read even if I can’t remember which exact ones), as the tendency to be Creative or Destructive. (Click here to check out the post: creativism-a-philosophy-for-life)
“The whole universe is moving toward some ultimate complexity. This has been going on since the universe began, and physicists call it the tendency toward complexity. And… anything that kicks this along and helps it is good, and anything that hinders it is evil… And this final complexity… it can be called God or the Universal Spirit, or the Ultimate Complexity, as you please. For myself, there is no problem in calling it God. The whole universe is moving toward God, in a tendency toward the ultimate complexity that God is… In order to know about any act or intention or consequence, we must first ask two questions. One, what would happen if everyone did this thing? Two, would this help or hinder the movement toward complexity?’ p. 550-551.
And I think he makes a very good point when relating such philosophies to the various religious traditions:
“Every guru you meet and every teacher, every prophet and every philosopher should answer these two questions for you: What is an objective, universally acceptable definition of good and evil? And What is the relationship between consciousness and matter?... This is a test that you should apply to every man who tells you that he knows the meaning of life.” p. 708.
How do your beliefs perform in this test???
Photo Credits:
The creative fusion of photos and art is by: Gustavo Tomas Moreno. Check out more of his work on: www.yacophotographer.blogspot.com
More on Resolution Theory: http://www.julietbennett.com/2010/10/22/a-deeper-exploration-of-resolution-theory/
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The Religion Debate
1. “Is there or isn’t there a God?”
2. “Is my god the True God or is yours?”
These debates are entirely based on one’s definition of the word “God.” So, shouldn’t we be a little more focused on the question as to what is God???
People define God in different ways, and then we call those different definitions “different gods”… but they are not. They are different definitions of God. Different interpretations of God. Different personifications of God – or a decision not to personify the force behind evolution.
That’s why religious debates don’t get anywhere – they have become identity battles that disregard the linguistics they are based on.
Why do religions still claim to know the “real God” and that everyone else has been deceived into believing in “fake gods”? Why do atheists debate that “there is no God” rather than explaining to theists that they are simply choosing not to personify the force behind evolution while accepting that some people prefers a more personal construct? Does not a rose by any other name still smell as sweet?
I don’t think any religions still believe God is a super human-like man sitting above the clouds. We know how big the universe is. We know the mountains don’t hold up the sky and we know that angels aren’t moving our sun, moon and stars into their place at night. Religions imagine God as a transcendent being that is omnipotent (all powerful), omniscient (all knowing), and omnipresent (present everywhere) – so might we consider the physics of such a claim… is it not a cause to consider quantum physics and what that might be telling us about the “mind of God”???
Sure, we are not useless consequences of some set random manifestations reacting to other random manifestations of a single particle of matter, which appeared from nowhere. But nor are we hand designed by a super-human who lives above us reading our every thought and watching our every move, awaiting the day he or she wishes to bring us into his realm or cut the rope, destroy life on earth and reward “His” chosen people with eternal life in heaven – simply based on the background of the family one was born into. This concept no longer makes sense in my mind anyway.
Something greater than us exists. There is something more than what we see. We are a tiny little component of a fantastical, expanding, creative universe. The ultimate unexplainable creative force behind the evolution of life; the energetic force that caused the first cell to split into two; the power behind and inside everything that exists, and everything that doesn’t… the power we can label The Universe, or as has been done throughout history we can personify as God, Allah, Dios, YHWH, the great “I Am”, Krishna, Bhagwan, Zeus etc. etc… is quite an incredible power, and almost just as incredible is our ability to be conscious of this force, to be aware of it, to be in awe of it. I don’t see anything wrong with personifying this force differently depending on our understanding of ourselves in a culture and at different points history, but essentially (and quite obviously no?) we are personifying the same force. The Jewish name YHWH, which means I AM, makes a lot more sense than most definitions. There is what there is, and that is God, that is The Universe.
I speak of “God” and I speak of “The Universe”, depending on my mood. I still pray. I still speak to “God” and I understand that the “person” I speak to is my personification of an abstract unknowable force, and I’m ok with that. In fact I even see some value in it, a personal interface to an abstract energy.
“My religion has done some good, so can’t we just forget the murderous bad it’s done these last couple of millennia?” Forgiveness is one thing but I’m not so sure the Inquisitions, the Crusades and the myriad “missions” imposed on indigenous peoples around the world are not exactly easy to forget.
But what is most important is the future: is a religion causing good today, or is it still a source of violence? If a religion can see itself in its historical perspective, and not make exclusivist claims over their particular personification of God or about their particular interpretations of physical and spiritual realms; and if they can avoid using their connection with people’s identity as a cause for destruction – they can be a cause for good. But if this perspective can’t be found then maybe the atheists are right… maybe it is better for religion to end. It all comes down to the clarity from which a religion can bring, to one’s creative purpose in life. Can religion be a force for good? Maybe.
Coming back to those debates:
1. “Is there or isn’t there a God?” Yes AND No. Yes if you personify the energy behind life, and no if you prefer to refer to it in a scientific, abstract form.
2. “My God or your god?” Mine AND Yours. Surely we can accept the cultural roots of different personifications developed throughout history, and understand that they were “right” and “true” in their day, and that there is something to learn from all of them.
Can someone please explain to me why, when the human mind is capable of thinking through these questions logically and we know these debates are based on a loaded word that is not properly understood, are we still debating them?
Isn’t it time to look for the meaning of our evolution, the meaning of our place in this universe, the meaning of our connection to “God”, our connection to What Is? To look at how this impacts on our lives today, and how it can provide a positive impact on our lives in the future?
I think these are more important questions that would be much more beneficial to society than illogical ego-driven debates over identity… but what do I know 
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Consumerised misinterpreted pagan traditions
Surrounded by the mayhem of people spending money in desperation to tick the boxes and announce that those glorious words: “I have finished all my Christmas shopping”, when something dawned on me. It is not the nicest thing to day one day before the holiday many people have looked forward to all year but to be brutally honest I realised I like Christmas about as much as I like loosing my ipod.
I looked down at my own list, cursing myself for not getting organised earlier, chewed down hard and repetitively on the gum in my mouth to prevent me from punching a big stand of useless shit. What the heck was I doing there???
It’s not that I don’t like giving presents. I do. I love giving presents. I love the smile and sparkle in the eyes of someone who likes something you have chosen for them. But I don’t like having to buy this present by a certain deadline. It turns a pleasure into a chore.
I feel like I have this big assessment due on the 25th of December. And until I have ticked all my boxes I am afraid that I’ll be up at the midnight mall on Christmas Eve doing a rush job to get it in on time. Am I missing something here?
Sure I could buy gifts throughout the year in preparation. I often do. But the lack-of-patience leads me to give my gift straight away. Then I get to see the smile sooner. And they can enjoy it now. Can someone please explain why I should have to hold onto that present until the anniversary of a consumerised mis-interpreted pagan tradition???
For a second let’s just consider the real meaning of Christmas, the reason our ancestors had a big party on the 25th of December each year, that is: the celebration of the winter solstice. The celebration of the last short day and rebirth of the sun.
I celebrate that too – in JUNE! Here in Australia, the middle of January is our summer solstice – the last of our long days and beginning of shorter ones. If we are going to celebrate Christmas shouldn’t we at least do it at the appropriate time?
When you think about it, Christmas is just another overbearing example of continuing colonialism, Western hypocrisy and chronic consumerist Capitalism on steroids.
“But it’s tradition.”
And now that all my boxes have been ticked I am actually looking forward to it. I am looking forward to dinner at Mums tonight. Amongst the move and my Opa’s death it has been weeks if not months since we have sat down for a relaxed meal together. Now that I think about it I really really really am looking forward to it, and the wonderful fruit-filled breakfast we will have Christmas morning as we laugh and play games and exchange gifts by the tree.
I am looking forward to checking out the Sydney to Hobart boats getting ready down their big race, a burgeoning tradition I do with my sisters, Dad and Stepmom, that nicely breaks up the wonderful food and wine we will enjoy that night with my cousins and grandma and my sister’s fiancee’s family. Those are some pretty special moments – I guess I shouldn’t write-off Christmas altogether.
I wonder, is it possible to enjoy these moments without the chaotic consumerist prelude???
What if next Christmas I buy each of my loved ones a tree to be planted in the Amazon – something that will provide oxygen for them and the generations to come. My friend’s family put their gift money together to sponsor a child for a year. That’s a good one too!
The years come and go so fast I think I’m happy for Christmas to come every 4 years like the Olympics. Last Christmas I was at the top of Machu Picchu and I’m already dreaming of next Christmas – in India. Or China. Or Africa. Somewhere away from the shopping malls and plastic wrapping. I don’t need a pagan tradition to bring me to see my family, nor to give them presents. I do that throughout the year and prefer it that way.
But Christmas is here and I can relax. I too can happily announce “I have finished all my Christmas shopping”! I am ready to enjoy the food and festivities keeping my fingers crossed that when the time comes for plastic wrapping to be unveiled, my gifts deliver a smile.
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Potentialism: a philosophy for life
Potentialism: a philosophy for life
Discovering your ultimate creative potential: you as your individual conscious, you as your society and you as the universe – playing your role in the creation of a future reality you desire.
Syncretic paradigms:
1. The purpose of life is to discover and fulfill your creative potential in a way that brings the most benefit to others.
This is the purpose of all life
This is “living God’s will”
This is expressing Who You Truly Are and Who You Want To Be
This is discovering your inner being, your intuition, and listening to it
As Shakespeare said, “Above all things, to thyself be true”
2. We are defined not only by our separate identity, but are in fact a collective identity of humanity, of living organisms and of the universe.
In the same way that our body is not separate from the living micro atoms that make it up
In the same way that science describes all matter, us included, as made of the same substance: atoms, which at quantum levels flash in and out of physical existence
In the same way the Buddhists imagine God to be everything
In the same way Christians describe God, as three forms: the father, the son and the Holy Spirit, yet one God; simultaneously omniscient, omnipotent, and omnipresent ie all-knowing, all-powerful and present everywhere.
These ideas do not contradict – they complement. They are each other’s missing link – the way such abstract concepts maybe by physically actualised.
3. Peace is a state of harmony, when the body, mind and spirit are united
Key principles:
4. Listen to “God”/ The Universe / Your Intuition
Thoughts – ideas, images, and words that come into your mind
Intuition – the deep feeling inside that says ‘yes’ or ‘no’
Omens/signs – notice the things in the world around you that you are conscious of at each particular point in time
Words of other people – be it in conversation, a religious, fiction or nonfiction text, or a song on the radio, everything that enters your world is God communicating with you
5. Minimize fear and maximize love
Fear leads to insecurity, hate, and greed
Love leads to security, generosity, and kindness
6. Commit to the process not the result –
Creative potential is infinite and there is no end. An end means a beginning, and the circle of life continues.
Living in the present – it’s a present, a gift from God, pre-sent to you as an accumulation of all your life experiences and thoughts.
7. Realise that all problems can be solved with:
Will – desire to solve the problem
Honesty – about everything
Empathy – understanding where the other is coming from
Creativity – finding solutions
Transform and transcend:
8. Equal care for self and others
When we understand the inseparable connectedness between ourselves and others, we realise our happiness depends on the happiness of everyone else.
Hence our goal: to maximise our collaborative creative potential – expressing our own creativity, and encouraging others to express theirs
9. Consequences of this paradigm:
Selfishness transforms into selflessness – I want the best for me, and since you are me, I want the best for you.
Greed becomes generosity – I want everyone else to have as much as they can, because everyone else is me.
Jealousy and envy becomes pride and happiness for one another – others achievements are achievements of other expressions of myself
The concept of hate disappears – we cannot hate what is you
Self confidence increases, as we feel other’s trying to bring us up, not put us down
We truly put into action Jesus teaching to “do unto others as you’d have them do to yourself” (check wording + add equivilant teaching from other religions)
10. Self-reflection and self-transcendence
Breaking down defensiveness, building up confidence to critically evaluate one’s self and acknowledge our wrongs or harms we have done to others – allow us to repent and allow them to forgive
Rid yourself of your own grievances and any desire for vengeance for injuries inflicted by others – through empathy with the Other, we learn to forgive and move on
11. Create your own happiness
Make the decision to be happy – it is the biggest decision you will ever make in your life.
Begin with gratefulness, for what you have, even if it is little
Study the past, analyse different perspectives, take lessons from it and use it to expand your creative potential
Don’t cultivate feelings of regrets, everything has happened for a reason, figure out what that reason is, and how the past can help you in your quest for creative potential.
Bad decisions do not exist, that is judgement you make yet instead you can realise that this results may have led you to challenging times, from which you can now learn. These consequences were a small sacrifice, part of the process of discovering your creative potential.
Do not cultivate feelings of guilt. Guilt is of no benefit for you nor for those around you. Forgive yourself and let it go. Learn from the past, but keep your mind in the present, and an eye on the future
12. Cultivating wisdom
Facts are never static, but are the closest statement of the truth, at a particular point in time. If the data changes, facts also change. We must remain open to new data, ready to evaluate it in order to constantly progress towards a more truthful truth.
Taoists belief “what is impossible today may become possible tomorrow, and what is good today may become evil tomorrow; what seems right from one point of view may from another view seem completely wrong.”
13. The pleasure of extremes, and joys of balance
Life and death, hot and cold, love and hate, good and bad – you can’t have one without the other. This is the dualistic nature of life, and I wouldn’t have it any other way. I’d prefer a passionate love, even if it sometimes slips over to hate, than a mediocre love all the time. The extremes are much more fun. Ups and downs are what make life interesting. It’s the challenges that bring the most satisfaction.
Happiness when pushed to the extreme becomes sickly and dull. Beauty overdone becomes ugly. Even too much chocolate makes feel sick…
14. Rid your life of fear
In the same way that millions of skin cells die every day, and yet our human body continues to live
Our consciousness is already connected, and will continue to be connected even when the separateness of our present memory no longer functions, our consciousness will continue to live on through others – that are ourselves
15. Cultivate faith
Faith is about cultivating a state in your heart and mind whereby you give yourself to God* – not about conforming to a set of “beliefs”
Don’t worry, don’t struggle, allow the will of God/ the Universe to be done
Is not about belief in hocus pocus or confession to any kind of autocratic dogma – faith is about a state of heart and mind
Even things that seem to have no reason whatsoever, in time, you will see how it expanded your, or another’s, creative potential
16. Get in-touch with your creative side
We ALL have one, you just have to give it a go
Try everything, don’t be afraid of anything
Know that time and effort are what give results; if you are prepared to invest yourself in something, you can do whatever you want to do.
In order to maximise happiness in life:
17. Right investment
(a) Of your time
Spend it with people who motivate and encourage
In an occupation that allows you to learn and express your creativity
Feelings of daily happiness are essential to stimulate your creative potential
Expanding other’s creative potential, and the creative potential of other forms of life, including the planet
In ways that will provide maximum benefit to the most people
Spend some time in silence, connecting to your conscious and giving it room to create; meditation, walking, driving, prayer
(b) Of your money
Money should be a reflection of the amount of time and effort that you have expended, and can henceforth use in exchange for others’ time and effort.
In your purchases, buying what is good for yourself and good for others
In your financial investments, in businesses that are helping life move toward it’s creative potential
18. Not no conflict but no violence
No circumstance ever substantiates violence
The ideology of Potentialism must never be fought for – this is against the nature of creative potential. Fighting for an ideology destroys creativity, which may be trying to morph into new forms, in which case, this is it’s achievement of creative potential.
Fighting against nature is fighting against the will of God, that is, fighting against the deepest drive of each of us,
Potentialism seeks organic expansion through love, it is never forced or forged, but is the result of a synergy between selfish and selfless – working together for the good of all-life itself, all which is God.
19. The power of the mind
The universe operates through spontaneous creativity, and through patterned phenomena – your role may be to contribute to either
Thoughts are powerful in ways we don’t yet understand. We do know they are measurable on wavelengths, like radio waves, but have not tapped in to harness them yet. Experiments have shown the incredible impact of positive thoughts on plants, water molecules, and even the nature of atoms.
Harness this power. Dream, make goals, pray, meditate, make them reality.
20. The power for world peace lies with you
Each of us have, together, the power to change the world
All it takes is a vision: what do we want the world to look like?
And then in each of us the will to reconnect with our life’s purpose and play out our roles in this transformation.
It begins with finding the peace within ourselves.
Anything is possible!
Some notes on terminology and origins:
What is a Creativist?
A Creativist is someone who sees Creativity as the expression of the Divine Creator present in all life and the universe. Creativity is humanity’s source of greatest pleasure, satisfaction, and act of generosity. Creativity expresses your individual consciousness and shares it with others, simultaneously expressing the collective conscious and providing avenues for your individual conscious to learn.
Creativism or Creationism?
Just to clarify – this is NOT to be confused with “Creationism” which refers to a belief in a 6-day creation 6000 years ago. NO. Creativism is about CREATIVITY and the role WE play in the ONGOING CREATION PROCESS of our universe. These ideas are a work-in-progress (that I wrote one year ago and haven’t touched since) hence I thought I’d put out there. Everything in life always seems to be a work-in-progress, so carpe diem…
Expressions of Creativity:
Creativity is not only for those left-brainers; creativity is for everyone. Analyse the sources of pleasure in your life, you will probably find they involve some form of creation that you contribute to. For example:
- art of any kind: photography, draw, write,
- in numbers, in science, in business: look for creative solutions to problems
- food and wine: play with life’s little pleasures
- breathe: take pleasure in every breath, it feeds your cells and contributes to the production of new ones
- look for improvement: in every aspect of your life, each little bit of creative expression adds value
- in interior and exterior of your house, fashion, self expression
- make babies: the most amazing creation a human can make
Did I make this up?
I think you’ll find there’s nothing really new about what you’re read above … we are all so connected that I have this feeling when you finish reading this, you’ll feel like I’ve just typed out a transcript of your own mind. I may be wrong – all of the following may make no sense to anyone other than myself…
The writings above are a summation of my beliefs around July 2008. They outpoured form my brain as a stream of consciousness and are most likely inspired by all the books I’ve read and all the experiences I’ve incurred, so I don’t take credit for any of it. That’s how ideas grow and form – a culmination of the past, remoulded/stated a little differently, into something that can be used for the future.
I’m not sure how the term “creativism” first came into my head, probably on one of my long walks, where all my other ideas come from, and when I googled it I discovered it was a term being used by a few people to describe a similar concept of what I wanted to use it to describe.
There is even a definition in the Urban Dictionary: Creativism = ‘The theory or practice of creation as a way to live and understand life’ and a Creativist = ‘someone who is attuned creatively to their surroundings; a person who understands and expresses their life through creative works or motifs.’
I came across the term “Potentialist” in an article inside a flight magazine. See: http://www.julietbennett.com/2010/04/26/potentialism/
I couldn’t find a definition of “potentialist” so I made up my own: A “potentialist” is an alchemist of potential – someone who strives to achieve their mental, physical and spiritual potential.
The end and the beginning
Anyway if you have got through this essay then I have to say I’m extremely impressed. Six pages worth of babble… anyway I would really really really love to know what you think. And do you like the title Creativism or Potentialism, or can you think of something better???
Thank you!!!
Juliet xxx
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The memoirs of Willem Van Leeuwen… and the magic of life.
Yesterday at 5pm my Opa (that’s dutch for grandfather), passed away at the ripe old age of 93. Born 20th February 1916 in Amsterdam, The Netherlands, Willem Frederik Van Leeuwen lived a long and inspiring life. He was a wonderful, caring father and grand-father. Me and my Opa were “house-mates” (as he used to say), and he was my very good friend.
My Opa changed my life. My Masters degree is his Masters degree. My book to soon be published is his book as much as mine. I couldn’t have done either if it were not for him. The peace I shall share with the world I shall share because of my Opa. Living with him was a pivotal chapter of my life. He have opened my mind to new perspectives; he have opened my life to new opportunities. I left Vienna after I dreamt of my Opa – of me spending time at his home as he taught me to paint. Six months later I moved in, and he did just that: I learned to paint a new reality. Opa gave me a new perspective of space and time. He taught me to look beyond society’s facades, to see things for what they are. Through Opa I have come to truly appreciate the temporality of life. Life is short. Very short. We must take hold of it. Live it. Make the most of every moment. And not look back.
One hundred years is not a long time. Go back twenty of such lifetimes it was the year zero, the time where Jesus lived and died. Jesus spoke up against the Jewish dogma and Roman oppression of his time. Almost seventy years ago my Opa too protested against status quo, issuing fake identities to save lives of Jews. This took courage. This makes me proud.
When I was in my teens two thousand years seemed an ancient and irrelevant past, but from my Opa’s eyes, two thousand years is like the blink of an eye. Only fifty of his lifetimes have past since the Egyptian pyramids were built. In the big scheme of things our temporal state in the shells we currently embody, mean nothing.
My Opa used to look out at the stars, in awe of God’s universe, and appreciating the miracle of life. He wondered what other fantastical creatures exist beyond our vision but he didn’t think about it too hard. He didn’t worry about that which we cannot know. “Why think about it?” he said to me, shrugging his shoulders. Opa felt no need to define life’s magic, to humanise it, or to tell himself he knew everything about it. He didn’t question it, he didn’t judge others; he just felt it, embraced it, and played out his role in it. Opa was a man of simple faith.
Opa took pleasure in the little things: a homemade cup of coffee, a black tea, a small glass of port; a smile and a kiss on the cheek; a soccer game, a newspaper or an interesting session of Lateline. I now realise how little we need in order to live. Opa lived through wars eating rosebuds to fill his stomach. Opa left his country in order to create the best life he could for our family in Australia.
Opa has taught me to be grateful for all I have; to live for today; to live in the moment; to accept my limitations, acknowledge my weaknesses, to not let my mind or body cause me too much pain. I have learned from him that luxury is over-rated and unnecessary. He taught me to need little, and want less. Observing Opa I have come to understand that no person or thing can make us happy: happiness comes from within. Happiness begins with being content with what we have. Opa was happy with the life he lived. He was happy with the love he received. He did not want more than he was given. He accepted the jobs that came his way, he didn’t strive to have more or care about how he compared to others. He loved his children, and his grandchildren, and his wife; and he were grateful for all the love he received from us in return.
And now as he has left the physical body I knew him to be, I am reminded that there is more to life than that our individual consciousness of today. I have seen through my Opa’s death that the breathe behind life never dies; it just morphs, transforms, like caterpillars into butterflies.
Our lives are but temporal expressions of divinity. I believe, as many religions do, that our souls leave their human homes to be ”reunited with God”, to be reunited with everyone they have ever loved or known, reunited through the re-absorbing of our soul into the collective soul of the universe – as we return to the oneness from which we came. No more ups and downs; no more fear, no more greed, no more suffering – a heavenly state of harmonic bliss. We are no longer separate, we become one with God; we are one with the past, present and future; we are one with the magical wonder behind our universe, the magic that is our universe and the magic beyond the universe from which we exist within.
Now I type, I can feel my Opa’s energy surrounding me. I can see my Opa’s energy in the trees, I can feel him in the wind, I can hear his heart beat in mine. I know he is with me. He will always be with me.
Opa, I want to say to you: THANK YOU.
Thank you for your part in bringing me into the world. Thank you for taking me into your home. Thank you for making me laugh. Thank you for enjoying my food. Thank you for making me interested in politics. Thank you for putting up with my mess. Thank you for sharing your views on life. Thank you for changing my life. I will cherish my memories of our time together. I will love you forever.
I will miss your bright blue eyes and your wide happy smile.
May you rest in peace, may you live for eternity.
A few years back he wrote his memoirs which some two years ago now we typed up together. I wish to share his words and his story with you today:
…
Reading about all the new findings in the digital world arriving in the market in the near future. So I thought it a good idea to put on paper how life was when I was born half way through the First World War in 1916.
Since that time, so many things have been invented which changed the way of life in many ways and I think you would be interested to know about that.
To start with my birth. As far ass I know that happened at home going into the hospital was an exception in those days and as far as my mother was concerned I must have caused her quite a bit of trouble because I have always heard her say “That was once but never again”. So that was it. I was confined to be an ‘only child.’
To start with my growing up. This happens to be in Amsterdam. I still remember the address: 20 Wetering Dwars Street in the CBD, close to the National Museum.
This is a narrow street, with 3 story home units, like terraces, on both sides. Those units were rented as owning your own place was an exception.
Actually, there were four living quarters because there was a basement half way the bottom part. To enter the more sophisticated part of the building you encountered the so called ‘stoep’ this is a concrete stag of steps to reach the front door for the three units above. To make your arrival known you had to pull the bell cord. One time for the first floor, two times for the second and so on. Then a climb up a steep timber staircase with an ‘overloop’, sort of a landing between floors
The inside of the unit consisted of a kitchen, a ‘back’ or living room, and a front room with windows. In between the two rooms was an ‘alcoof’ – a simple bedroom with inbuilt double bed on one side and my bed on the other side. There were no windows so the ventilation must have been very restricted. The front room was the so called ‘mooie kamer’ and was only used for special occasions. Further there was a ‘waranda’ balcony with an ‘ice box’. In those years there was no gas, electricity, washing machines, dryers, radio, television. Bathrooms with shower recess came many years later.
The body washing procedure was once a week on Saturday in a tub in the kitchen. The heating of water etc occurred on kerosene heater and in winter time also on a big coal and peat theater in the living room. The lighting of the unit was also by kerosene lamps. The washing of linen underwear etc was done by hand in a tub. Food was kept in the so called ice box on the balcony. Bars of ice were delivered once a week in the Summer months.
Although life was primitive in comparison with today’s, we were still satisfied.
I started my education in the elementary school close by, but as there was a small canal at the end of our street, my mother always took me to school as she was afraid I would fall in the ‘dirty’ water.
Schools in those days did not have play grounds so all my ‘playing’ was done in the street.
Most of my school years were very uneventful. Reading books etc. was my main way of life.
I remember my parents having card evenings with a Jewish family from across the street. They had a daughter of my age and we were confined to the alcoof. This was quite fun. The family disappeared out of my life and I never found out what happened.
There were also friends who had a tobacco shop and a private library. I spent many hours reading over there.
I must have been about 8 years old when we moved to a better environment.
Again a unit on the third floor with a ‘view’! Over looking a canal with a lot of ship movements. Barges pulled by tugs and at the other side on industrial area of mainly timber yards. The school was close by but again no playgrounds so life was mainly spent at home and occasional staying with my grandparents in Haarlem.
This brings me to tell about my parents.
My father was born in Amsterdam as far as I can remember, in 1894. He was a builder by trade. He must have been a pretty good one as I remember him building a large school complex later on he built houses on his own accord which had to be sold in time to be able to finance the next project. Often there were financial difficulties which affected the atmosphere at home.
He came from a fairly large family of several brothers and sisters with kids. There was however a little contact so I don’t remember much of it.
His father, I never met my grandmother, lived on his own in the Huidenkoper street in Amsterdam. He was retired from a function in the Royal Palace in Amsterdam.
His living quarters were filled with beautiful antiques, which would have been worth a fortune if they had stayed in the family. Still he was not very family friendly and I believe he preferred to see us going than coming. Consequently I did not see much of him.
It was a different matter with my mother’s parents. They lived in Haarlem in Amsterdam street near the Amsterdam Gate. The family name was ‘Van Vreeden’. My grandfather was a retired carriage painter with the Dutch railways. My mother had one brother ‘Oom (uncle) Cor’ who being a bank manager, was the family’s ‘financial pillar’.
In my younger years for some reason or another I often stayed with my grandparents and I remember making long walks with my Opa. I think because Oma got fed up with us and kicked us out.
My mother was, I think, a seamstress, because I saw her sitting behind a treadle sewing machine for long hours. When my grandmother past away, there was great emotion in the family of the question “What to do with Opa…?”
Fortunately my father was building two houses in Haarlem in the Kemp Straat, and he had difficulty in selling one of them (most probably because they were built next to a large cooperative bakery.) The solution of the above question was solved, with the financial influences of Oom Cor, that we moved to Haarlem and Opa was living with us. In comparison with the home units in Amsterdam, this was a considerable improvement. It was a two story house with plenty of rooms, a small back yard with a shed, and even a bathroom. I must have been about 12 years old because I went straight to High school. After leaving school in 1934, my first employment was with Hotel Royal in Haarlem as a receptionist and in the administration.
In 1936 I went for my number in the army with the horse driven field artillery in Utrecht.
After discharge in 1937, I worked with Travel Bureau Lissone Lindeman.
For August 1939 I was called up again for military service in Socstduinen near Utrechet.
This lasted till May 14 when Holland surrendered to the Germans. Luckily we did not fire one shot because we would not have stood a chance with material dated back from before the First World War. The whole exercise lasted a couple of days and ended promptly with the air raids of Rotterdam.
We were discharged and from July 1940 I worked with the Rationing Service in Haarlem. I started a chief in the National Registration Certificate Department. Because of the many Rassias it was important that next to your ‘Stamcard’ you could prove that your work was too important to be missed, preventing you from being sent to labour camps in Germany. So apart from the administration of the registry, we were also occupied with creating of fake Declaration of Requirements for the underground and Jews.
It may be of interest for you to give sort of a survey of life during the German occupation. The first two years we were living with coupons etc. Life did not change too much. We were able to organize Balls, Theatre performances, Youth Clubs etc.
However when the Germans started to persecute the Jews, things became ugly.
We had a group of about thirty boys and girls, with whom we managed to organise bicycle holidays or house evenings. However we had to become more and more careful. You always had to watch your back to prevent from being picked up from the street and sent to Germany.
Life with coupons became gradually more and more difficult as in many occasions the goods in the coupons were simply not available. Especially the last half year became very hard. We had a curfew from 8pm to 7am. The southern part of Holland beneath the big rivers was liberated but the part above the rivers was left to keep on its own. As there was practically no import of food and the Germans confiscated anything edible. Hunger started to lift its nasty head. People went to barter valuables for edibles. Walking with improvised carts to farmers in order to be able to live.
Many did not survive those journeys or got their valuable food confiscated when they returned to their house in the city. On many occasions we hat to resort to eat grounded tulip bulbs as so called cookies. All in all the last year was very nasty.
It was only after the Allies managed to defeat the Germans near Arnhem that life became gradually better. After 1946 I worked in different positions in the Ministry for Economic Control.
My last position was an inspector with an Economist fund for the small goods trade.
After the war the detail trade was practically at bottom level. Stocks had disappeared and ‘new starts’ had not occurred for at least three years.
The retail trade needed an urgent lift and the government was prepared to guarantee loans with the bank for people to finance a new business. For this purpose an organization was created to investigate the viability of the business concerned. I became and inspector with this organization and travelled all over Holland to report about the applicants’ capability and family – determining whether the business could be expected to be viable to pay off the loan within a certain time limit. This report went to a board within this organization and the decision of the application was granted or refused. As a side line I was a manager with an association called Infantex, of about 50 specialist shopkeepers of articles in baby goods. I organized about three market days in Krasnapolsky in Amsterdam and at the Royal Hotel in Urtrecht. There would be about thirty stalls in where the manufacturers would show their newest creations. All this lasted until May 1961 when we departed to Australia.
Coming back to my life in Haarlem. I met your mother on Saturday 29th July 1944, in a swimming pool called Stoop. As she had no ‘transport’, I took her home on the back of my bike and from there on we stayed together.
Her father Jacob Bas had his trade as a plumber and a shop in the Atjeh Street in Haarlem.
Her mother’s family name was Platenga and both came from farmer’s families in West Friesland. Your mothers family name was Agatha Jacoba Bas, born 19th January 1920. She could not get along very well with her father and her mother was always the protective part.
Anyway, we got engaged on 24th December 1944, and on 14th June 1945 we married in Haarlem as one of the first after the war.
The wedding day started very curious as there were no hire cars available. We had to hire horse drawn carriages. They also were very sparse. Anyway we managed to hire two. One would collect the parents from their homes, and one for us.
On the big day, however, only one turned up. The other had been in an accident. You can imagine the consternation to get us all to the Civic Centre. It was decided that the parents were collected first and we last. So we waited in the Atjeh street home. Because of the distances of the addresses, it took quite a while. Finally the carriage turned up. Very late, and to make up time we went in gallop to the City Centrum. The carriage swayed from left to right, and the public looked in amazement to the race. I must say it did not bother us in the least and we had great fun. We still made barely on time.
I had managed to rent a whole house in the Pegasus street in Haarlem, which in those days must have been the envy of many in the neighborhood. Later we moved to the Jan Gyzen-kade in Haarlem Noord, and from there we bought with the help of Opa Bas, a house in Velzen Wustelaan and after a few years we sold the house and bought a house in Ede Arthur Van Schendelaan. This was more central in Holland and more suitable for my work with the financial institution.
This was the last house in Holland till our departure to Australia.
Although I had a very interesting job, we decided that in view of the increases in population in Holland, being new about the size of Tasmania, with a population the same as Australia, the future for the children was better in Australia.
14 May 1961. We boarded the Orange, and 19 June 1961, we arrived in Sydney. We were sponsored by Fien an Piet Voorderhake. They had rented a house on Pittwater road in Collaroy, for 10 pound a week. At that time there was a sort-of economic depression.
Although I had studied English correspondence in Holland, it was not easy to understand Australian English.
Fortunately I met Jan Van Beest, who was chief clerk in Prince Alfred Hospital. He introduced me to the accountant and I was appointed as a clerk in the Administration.
In 1963, Jan Van Beest became an accountant in the new built Mona Vale Hospital. He asked me to come with him. I accepted and became chief clerk and accountant when Jan Van Beest departed to New Zealand.
In January 1974, I transferred to the budget department of Royal North Shore Hospital, where I stayed to my retirement in January 1982.
…
This is where they finish. It is crazy to imagine all of this happening before I was even born. My Opa had enjoyed twenty-seven years of retirement, twenty-seven years of a simple peaceful life in his modest home in Frenchs Forest.
With age comes wisdom. I learned a lot from my wise old Opa, I hope you have been able to learn something too. God bless.
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Journey of an Inquisitive Christian
It is up to us individually to question everything we are told, everything we read and even those things we see and feel. We must always consider the source of our information, and what were those sources are influenced and motivated by.
When we read the Bible, we must consider the author, the author’s sources and the author’s sources’ sources. What were these people’s motivations and influences? In what context were they written, and what did the author’s original words and sentences mean to him.
We must consider various theological and historical perspectives of translations and adaptations through the passage of time, how and why we interpret these passages in the way we do, and are there alternative interpretations which may be more accurate to the intentions of the writer, or to the way God may intend us to be inspired by these words today.
This process of questioning isn’t easy. It not only takes a lot of time. It can involve a roller coaster of emotions. It can cause conflict within yourself, as you question the roots of how you understand the world. It can cause conflict within social groups, even between you and family members. For me it was all these things. And so here, in hope of easing the pain of anyone else that might be facing the same dilemma, I offer my story:
Chapter 1 – Introduction Click here
Chapter 2 – Is the Bible the “Word of God”? Click here
Chapter 3 – Is Jesus Christ the “Son of God?” Click here
Chapter 4 – Discussing the contradictions Click here
Chapter 5 – What does this mean for my life today? Click here
Chapter 6 – My conclusions Click here
Please excuse the quality of my writing – these were written between 2007-2008 and my writing skills have improved a lot in more recent years…
Extras:
From a diary in 2000 Click here
This is a script copied from a piece of paper I found that considering what it talks about I date it back to some time in 2000. It provides an interesting insight into just how much a person’s mind can change in a matter of 10 years…
My Thunderbolt Moment Click here
This is an account of my journey that might be more coherent check out this one I wrote as an appendix to my masters thesis which was entitled An Ethical Dilemma: Childhood Conversion in Christian Fundamentalism.
Link to a PBS documentary Click here
This documentary presents what seems to be a non-biased scholarly exploration of early Christianity – I particularly recommend the first few chapters of Part Two which looks at the writers of the gospels, their sources and their motives.
Over to you…
Being a Christian seems comes down to two key things:
1. Loving God – which means loving the universe, our planet, all life
2. Loving our Neighbours - who for all intensive purposes are no different from another version of yourself.
That is the WAY Jesus envisaged. That is the TRUTH Jesus preached. That is the LIFE Jesus offers.
This is not supernatural, not elitist, and not discriminatory; it is completely natural, allows for constant questioning, and the only hell it refers to is the hell-on-earth that results from not loving each other and not loving our planet.
That concludes my journey so far. I wish you all the best in your religious journeys, and if you care to share some of it with me – I’d love to about it!
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Introduction
Christianity has played a significant and dynamic role in my life. I was born into a Christian family and had a strong “Christian faith” until I was 20-years old and learned about the Crusades, the Inquisition, the pagan traditions it copied and the political powers that edited and produced the Holy Bible I had cherished and trusted so much.
This was a confronting moment. Traumatic to say the least – my entire world-view fell apart. I felt betrayed. I felt lost. Very soon after this I left Australia to see the world.
Although I had rejected the religion I continued to feel a relationship, a strong connection, with the divine magic behind life – which I continued to personify as “God”. When I returned to Australia I struggled to relate to my family and friends, who continued to see the world through the Christian lens. If I talked about other cultures, religions and the possibility of pre-historic civilisations, it was like talking to a blank wall – as if anything outside the reality the Bible paints, was a reality that could not be seen, heard or contemplated.
I found myself in a unique position. I completely understood how they were feeling – I had felt that before. I understood what they were thinking – I had thought that way before. And I was still open to what they were saying. I doubted I would ever return to being an exclusivist Christian – believing my truth is the ONLY truth and that everyone else was going to hell – but my heart was open to revisit Christianity. I wanted to evaluate it from a critical intellectual big picture perspective. It seemed that everyone in the world was trying to convince me to believe what they believe. From militant Atheists trying to convince me there is no God through to militant Christians trying to convince me their God was different from everyone else’s. Was evolution a fact, or a theory? Everyone was convinced one way or the other, but what was the evidence for each perspective?
I felt I owed it to my Dad to give the beliefs he so passionately follows one last really good try – investigate the “facts” and critically analyse whether they stood up to the “facts” that surrounded them. “SHOW ME THE EVIDENCE” I screamed out to the world.
Time is the greatest barrier to searching for our own answers to our questions. We lead busy lives and we can’t learn and do everything we want to – so we just accept what other people tell us, and move on. But moving in with my Opa I had been given this gift: the gift of time. Time to seek answers. I wanted to share this gift with others. So I made a decision: I would document all my questions and all the answers. I had no agenda – I didn’t want to convince anyone of anything – all I wanted was to distinguish what was true from what was false.
Never in my life have I ever stopped praying. Even at the point in my life where I was completely skeptical about God and had deemed my prayer an ignorant practice of indoctrinated fools – I continued to pray. It made me feel good. It comforted me. And it seemed more than coincidence that my prayers SO often were answered.
I prayed to God that “He” would direct my search: bring me the books, the websites, the people, that “He” wanted me to talk to. Something deep inside me told me this was my mission – that God had placed me in this unique position for a reason, and that “He” wanted me to undertake this search and document everything in an unbiased, non-misleading, completely honest way.
I wondered about God’s plan for my life. As an ugly schoolgirl with braces, pimples, glasses, a puppy-dog fringe and fundamentalist Christian beliefs, I clearly remember standing there in my room and saying to God:
“Please make me a model. Then I will do anything you want. Imagine if I was famous and beautiful, just imagine what we could do together – how many people we could bring to you. God my life is yours to do with what you please. But PLEASE make me a model.”
God had fulfilled his end of the deal and now it was my turn. Achieving my modeling dreams did change my life – mainly because it made me realise that absolutely ANYTHING IS POSSIBLE. As you have probably noticed by reading any of my writings this realisation and motto has remained with me throughout my life.
‘There are some things you just can’t know.’ ‘If you could actually prove something then everyone would believe – it all comes down to faith.’ ‘I wish you would hurry up and finish searching – you just never know when you might die – I worry about where you will end up.’ ‘Does it really matter?’
I appreciated my family’s loving concern for my eternal life but I can’t abandon my quest for real answers, my quest for TRUTH. It is important. If there is an eternal life then I want to be there but I don’t want to dedicate my entire life to something that is man’s creation not Gods. Questioning is a scary idea – not only because of what might happen in the interim, but I think also because of the fear we might discover an answer we don’t wish to discover. There is also an accumulated fear embedded in the history of Christianity, where questioners were declared ‘heretics’ and expelled from the congregation, or worse. At least now I was able to question without having my head chopped off.
I know I will never learn everything there is to know, or have all my questions answered, but I also knew I could get nearer to the truth than where I was. If I was going to have faith, it was not going to be a blind faith, it was going to be a defined faith, with awareness of which writers, politicians and theologians I was putting my trust in. I needed to get serious.
Beginning my search I was faced with information overload, with one question leading to ten and every website or book directing me to myriad more perspectives. I did the Alpha course and asked questions there. I did John Dickson’s Simply Christianity course with a very knowledgeable family friend, developed more questions and contemplated the varying answers. Returning to university I made friends with theologians, religious professors and philosophers.
After now two and a half years of searching and reflecting, I reduced this mass of questions and answers to two questions:
1. Is the Bible the “Word of God”? Click here
2. Is Jesus Christ the “Son of God?” Click here
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A scrap of paper from 2000
It was the year 2000, my first year out of school and first year of university. I would have been 17 or 18 years old.
My strength at this time came from my strong faith in God.
I went to church on Sunday nights, taught children’s Sunday school on Sunday mornings. Friday nights were youth group at church and once a week on the evening i went to a bible study group at someone from the church’s house. On top of all of this I had daily private times where I would read the bible or a biblical book and I would pray. I was told how I should live my life. I also did my best to obey all the commandments and teachings from the bible, including giving about 10% of the money I earned. I believed and obeyed everything I was told.
A scrap of paper I found and dated to sometime in 2000 reads:
“I love my Mum and I love my Dad. I love my sisters as well as my relatives and every one of my friends. I love God. God loves me. God loves every person so much that he sent his son to suffer, living hell after dying on a cross, just so that I may live eternally. this is the key to becoming a Christian, accepting God’s grace, through faith, so that when I die I know that I will live eternally in heaven.
This gives me feelings of peace as it shows that the eighty so years on earth, in perspective are so small and eternity so long, that we must always remember what is important is to love God and love others.
God loves me and has blessed me a thousand billion times and with my life I want to strive to please him.
I thank God every day for my blessings, for everyone that I know, for the fact that I can know them, love them and I thank him so much that they love me in return. I have said this to God every morning when I wake up for as long as I can remember and I will always as nothing can change this.
When I die I wish that everyone that knows me can know how much I love them and how much God loves them.
I hope that through my death, others can come to know Christ. If I could die tomorrow and my friends would come to know the love of God, I would without a second thought. When i die I hope everyone can rejoice over the life I lived and thank God for my life, as I do.
Everyone should rejoice in knowing that I will be eternally living with my God and will be waiting for them to join me.
What I want out of life
1. To please God and do his will. he has a plan for my life and he knows the best way (He created me so he must know!)
I know that without God I can achieve nothing, so why try to control my life without him? All it leads to is dissatisfaction. Look at Mariah Carey, for example, you would think she would be satisfied as she has everything materialistically you could ask for: money, guys, fame, talent… yet she tried to kill herself. She was unsatisfied. Materialism can only satisfy you to a point. There will always be a huge hole without God. Thus I wish to follow him and let Him do what he can. i trust that he has a plan and will lead me to a satisfying life.
2. Friends and family
I hope that my friends and family can be happy, healthy and also live satisfying lives on all levels. Especially that they will come to know God.
3. Materialistically and selfishly
I’d like what everyone wants: money, fame, love, nice house etc! No seriously… I want a job that I enjoy – working with great people and being able to support myself with a good income. I want to meet a guy, love him with all my heart and marry and have a happy marriage with God in the centre. We will live in a nice house, possibly with a couple of kids (eventually), have great holidays etc. Our kids will grow up to be also strong Christians. I will put my family before”
It finishes there and I can’t find the next page.
In fact, this is the only piece of writing that I have from this time in my life. It does a good job in summarising my mind at that time. I read this and I smile, laugh at the Mariah Carey commend, then cringe and feel my stomach turn. My innocent mind: pure, kind and loving – but so naive, indoctrinated and, excuse my language, fucked up.
This year brings tears to my eyes to think about – I gave every part of myself to everyone around me, and everyone around me took and took, like vampires on their prey. Noone realised the pain they put me through. At the time, not even I was aware.
To read about my journey from the very conformist fundamentalist Christian worldview above, into the questioning Christian / spiritually Buddhist / peace-loving Atheist I might classify myself today, check out:
My Thunderbolt Moment Click Here
And for Christians who haven’t had the time to question, I documented my questions, answers and my contemplation of the contradictions, which you can read here:
Further Reading:
Chapter 1 – Introduction Click here
Chapter 2 – Is the Bible the “Word of God”? Click here
Chapter 3 – Is Jesus Christ the “Son of God?” Click here
Chapter 4 – Discussing the contradictions Click here
Chapter 5 – What does this mean for my life today? Click here
Chapter 6 – My conclusions Click here
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God and fundamentalisms
This may sound strange but I LOVE our universe. I love that we are conscious of our selves, that we understand so much about our location in space and time, and I love that there is so much we don’t know – the mystery and intrigue keeps life exciting. It reminds you of the importance of the process, not the result. Dreaming and working to achieve your dreams so that when you make it you can dream a new dream. There’s always more to learn. There’s always new ways to create. The universe has infinite creative potential. This is God.
I love capturing beauty with my camera. I love thinking about the beautiful things I can see, hear, smell, taste – thinking about why I can see, hear, smell and taste them, and what gives me the ability to think about these things. The language that allows me to put feelings into thoughts and into words.
I love contemplating what this process of creation tells us about the nature “God”, about the nature of our expanding universe and the nature of ourselves and our role in this ongoing evolution. I love learning about religions and I try to keep an open and empathetic attitude to ideas and perspectives different to my own. Each perspective has come from somewhere, every person has a story, and every idea has its purpose and its place. Like people, perspectives and ideas, and like our universe and our understanding of God – CONSTANTLY CHANGE. We constantly know more. We will never know everything. And that in itself is what makes life so fantastic.
Today I went to St Matthews Church in Manly to listen to Ken Duncan, the famous landscape photographer, speak about Life’s Adventure, and the process of capturing the beauty and glory of God in these landscapes. I enjoyed this very much, until the end.
What I enjoyed was hearing the story behind the amazing panoramas. Each photo took patience and intuition – listening to that voice inside of you that Ken attributed to God. I do that too. And I find that listening to this voice is how I get my shots. It’s how I find the words. It’s how I live my life. Connecting myself with the all-power energy that surrounds us and connects all of life. To say no
Confronted with images from Mel Gibson’s movie The Passion – with the blood and guts of an Anglo-Saxon Jesus suffering “for me” on the cross – juxtaposed with his amazingly beautiful panoramas. I felt sick to the stomach.
“The only way to God is through Jesus Christ”
I’m sorry. I do not agree. I can not.
Why not?
a) People of other religions also connect with “God” (even if they speak another language and call this great force by another name like Allah or Jehovah – all the same MONOTHEISTIC god…) Who the heck would I be to say they are all deceived while the Western religion has magically got it right?
b) The power behind life I call “God” is more powerful than what this simple narrative makes out. What kind of God would REQUIRE a human incarnation of itself to suffer and die in order to have a relationship with me? Couldn’t an all-powerful God conquer death without requiring a death?
I’m still searching for answers. I’ll share more of my Christian journey when I get time to read through the writings I have done over the past few years. But there are just some times I have to speak up. This was one of those times, and I had to communicate these few points with Ken Duncan… so I wrote the above little essay on a feedback form and hope he gets in touch with me to discuss. If you are going to go out and tell everyone about Jesus, then maybe he has some answers. Those with exclusive perspectives of their own religion have a lot to answer for – not least the Clash of Civilisations predicted as a consequence of identities mixed up in such opposing exclusive views.
I do have to say though I was really impressed with Ken’s talk and I absolutely LOVE his work. And i loved his wonderful example of faith and listening to “God”. I relate to that. But when I see something that seems to me to be at the roots of world violence I can’t just sit back and watch. I have to say something.
Yes, a Jewish revolutionary was crucified 2000 years ago. Yes, this man changed the lives of many people – telling them to forget the church’s bureaucratic rules and instead follow his example and discover a personal direct relationship the divine power behind creation. He told them to be pacifists – to let your enemy slap the other cheek. The earliest Christians did this. Shame we don’t do it anymore, instead ignoring the Sermon on the Mount and focusing on the human theological interpretations of a narrative, mis-interpreting premodern writings in our modern paradigms. Focusing on rules, on separation, and on literal interpretations of myths.
Jesus said to forget the bullshit – life is not about obedience to autocratic rules. It’s about two things:
1. Love “God”.
2. Love your neighbour as yourself.
I find myself seeking the divine power behind our existence, connecting with it and allowing that connection to guide my life and help me pursue my unique role in the unveiling of the universe’s expansion. I am still debating whether or not I want to personify this power – it seems to have benefits of comfort and communication, but at the danger of tricking the mind to really think this power is actually a person. I don’t think anybody really believes God is a person, which is why I find the THEIST / ATHEIST debate so strange.
It seems to me it’s not a question of “is there a God?” but is actually question of “what is this power we call God?” and how can we best understand and connect with this power? Should we seek it through a deeper understanding quantum physics? Through looking at the major religions and identifying common elements – separating human-designed theologies from the original messages of the prophets? Or through seeking a deeper understanding of ourselves and our own potential to have a prophetic-like relationship with the divine.
Sometimes I find myself truly seeing other people and other forms of life as other expressions of myself. If i was born into their situation, I would be living and responding just as they do. This is why the concept of “sin” seems so foreign – most of the time these actions are derived from their life’s experience, and when you seek the cause of destructive behaviour, it is not something that the person had control over.
I love those moments where my separate identity disappears and I feel at one with the universe. Floating in the ocean allowing waves to carry your body up and down is one of the most meditative states that make me realise my separateness is a temporary condition – one I must enjoy each moment without fear of it’s inevitable end.
“But what do I know, I’m just a model”
And it’s late, I’m running on 5 hours sleep, my eyes are heavy so I’m going to post this, have a shower and go to bed.
The picture I used for this post is a meditation poster called Supreme Light from the Brahma Kumaris, a spiritual university – www.bkwsu.org
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Meaning of life
Something sure to come up a lot on this blog is the question of meaning – why the f**k are we here on this planet??? It is something I contemplate regularly.
The human condition is a strange one - born no different from other animals we are educated into languages, enculturated into structures of thinking, sets of values, morals, dreams. We grow up and play out our roles in society, dedicating our life to our relationships, our religions, our jobs, the building up materialistic goods, searching for our identity, trying to achieve the world’s ideals, create a family, pay off our mortgages or work for whatever other causes we see as valuable. But WHY??? Only to blink and find ourselves retired then old and dying. We may travel, meet people, enjoy food, beautiful sites, other cultures… still what’s the purpose of it all?
I have come across a fantastic fantastic website that contains interviews with some of the most amazing minds in our world today. www.meaningoflife.tv.
So far I’ve watched Karen Armstrong (a scholar of religion) and John Polkinghorne (a Cambridge scholar of physics and Anglican priest), and I definitely recommend both. Each interview is long but well worthwhile
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“A Little Inspiration for a Big Idea”
The Art Tree Exhibition – my series is called “A Little Inspiration for a Big Idea”…
The little inspiration
The Theory of Evolution is a HUGE idea. But like all ideas, it starts with one thing: a little inspiration. Something happens to you: a feeling, a thought, divine inspiration? Over time this develops, culminating in an idea which if it’s a good one, can change the world forever.
Darwin took over twenty years to transform his thoughts into the massive idea unleashed into the world in The Origin of Species. The year 2009 is The Year of Darwin, the 150-year anniversary of his theory’s publication. This series explores the origins of Darwin’s idea to explore his greatest inspiration: The Galapagos Islands.
1JB – “My little friend” on Isabela.
I flew to this island in the front seat of a tiny seaplane and roamed the island for what felt like days but was only a few hours. Alone with nature. This island is heaven. Marine Iguanas were everywhere – but it was this little Lava Lizard, so colourful and curious, that won my heart.
2JB – “Anything is possible” on Isla Bartolome.
I was standing with the tour group at the top of a volcano when Rachel pointed and mouthed “LOOK B E H I N D YOU”. I turned, and there it was, sitting on the rail. I stood and stared. This Galapagos Eagle was BEAUTIFUL. I took one photo, ten, and as it flew away I caught this shot. Freedom.
3JB – “Family life” on San Cristobal.
We spent three days and nights hanging out with the locals – Ecuadorian boys, English teachers, and Galapagos Sea Lions. At the local beach they welcome you to join their family of countless females and babies and one token attention-seeking male boss. Just watching their family relationships you realize we really are not so different after all. 3000 people live on this San Cristobal. You can too if you marry a local… and people do!
4JB – “Cancerian decor” on Plazas Sur.
There nothing little about these Sally Lightfoot Crabs – at least relative to their body… just look at their giant claws and bulging eyes!!! These bright coloured creatures, also known as ‘Red Rock Crabs’ are scattered all over the seaside rocks like Christmas lights on a tree. Sometimes animated and full of life, and seemingly playing dead – much like the Cancers I know (I’m one of them.)
5JB – “Kiss and cuddles” on Santa Fe.
I used to think if I had to be a different animal I would be a dog, or maybe a bird. But now I know what I want to come back as in my next life. These Galapagos Sea Lions are the most affectionate creatures on this planet. Sure the have their family domestics, but they always make up with kisses and cuddles.
6JB – “Old souls” on Santa Cruz.
The Galapagos Giant Tortoise has the aura of a very old very wise man. These beautiful ancient reptiles move very slowly, eat slowly, sleep 16 hours a day, and live like this for more than 100 years (the oldest recorded age is 152 years.) These majestic creatures have a ‘mutual symbiotic relationship’ with the finch –stretching out their necks for the bird to eat off ticks – an easy meal for the bird and no more parasites for them.
8JB – “Happy as Larry” on Santa Fe.
Feeling like Alice in Wonderland I wandered down a little path to have lunch with Larry the Land Iguana. He was hungry. Just one, I said to myself, unable to resist. I “accidentally” plucked a flower and put it on the step in front of Larry. As if in slow motion first his eyes motioned to the yellow petals. His head followed, then one foot and then the next. He scooped down, his tongue popped out and LICK… the flower was gone. Then he lifted his head and smiled at me. I got this shot, and hurried along in a vain attempt to catch up to my group.
7JB – “Curiosity killed the cat” on Santa Fe.
I got in trouble for taking this photo. I was crouched in the bushes observing this little Darwin Finch hopping here and there, engaging with me curiously. Finally I stood only to find my friends and tour group were nowhere to be seen. Still able to see our boat I didn’t panic, instead wandered up a pathway. The search party found me… eventually.
9JB – “Contemplating life” on San Cristobal.
I relate to this baby Galapagos Sea Lion. He is tired. Who isn’t? Life can be tough. Learning to walk. Learning to think. Learning to eat. Leraning to do this, do that, but why? All this “stuff” that requires energy and effort. Sometimes we all have follow this baby’s example: pause, rest our chins on a rock and think, “what is this life really all about?”
So… Why Galapagos?
Galapagos formed 5million years ago by underwater volcanoes that rose to the surface creating 20 or so rocky islands and over 40 tiny islets. These islands are in Ecuador, located 1000km from the mainland (about a 1.5 hour flight). There are over 300 plant and animal species that are unique to the islands, and evidence of evolution can be seen everywhere with each island inhabited by plant and animal life different from the rest. Plants and animals began to evolve there 2-million years ago after seeds, insects and plant spores were carried over in the wind and with birds, while larger animals such as the iguanas are suspected to have arrived on floating vegetation. Because they have sent this time with no predators around them, the animals have no fear toward humans and they go about their day as if you were one of them.
Our connection to the animals
As I took these photographs, and at times when I sat on a beach simply observing their family life, eating habits and the ways they communicate with each other, I felt a sense of unity with them. I could understand why these animals would challenge any belief in human superiority above other forms of life. I found myself contemplating my relationship to the other creatures of this planet: are they just there for the benefit of humans – to admire and eat? Or is there something more?
Darwin’s finches
It was the variety of finches collected from the various islands that demonstrated natural selection in action. Darwin discovered that the bird’s beaks would evolve to be longer or shorter, weaker or stronger, thinner or thicker, depending on the food sources available on the island for example large hard seeds led to nature preferring birds with a long strong beak while small soft seeds gave preference to small more flexible beaks. Darwin analysed his specimens and noticed differences between different islands, asking himself: did God create these in 6 days, or had something else occurred?
Controversy
In the last 150 years, people in western societies have faced a confronting dilemma: do I believe in creation or do I believe in evolution? It’s often presented as if we have to make a choice: religion or science. Either: an all-powerful “God” created us, or we evolved from an empty void of nothing and there is no God.
This polarized debate distorts the real issue. If we were “created in God’s image” but also evolved from animals, then might we simply have to broaden our idea of what “God” actually looks like? Could science and religion be talking about the same energy behind life, but in different languages? Could the two in essence believe in the same thing, but be talking about it in different ways – some choosing to personify the energy, and others preferring to scientify it? Might “God” be a personification of the quantum energies that create themselves out of nothing? If this is so, then what part do we now have to play in the ongoing evolution of our species, our planet and our universe?
Check out the other twenty artists collaborating for this exhibition at: www.thearttree.com.au
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My Thunderbolt Moment
Written as an appendix to my masters thesis “An Ethical Dilemma: Childhood Conversion in Christian Fundamentalism” in June 2009.
My ‘Thunderbolt’ Moment
This brief account of my personal case is provided to make known the perspective from which this paper was written, to demonstrate how some of the concepts discussed in this discourse apply in practice, and to help correct the misconception that a rejection of fundamentalism is a rejection of God.
The mind-explosion I have experienced is hard to describe. It was not until I began the academic research for this paper that I realised my Christian beliefs and those of my friends and family were classified as “fundamentalist.” I had still thought these beliefs were that of the average Christian, and that my school, being a “non-denominational” school, must have been one of the more open and accepting schools. I was very surprised as my investigations revealed that my school was part of a recent “new independent Christian school movement” that arrived with the Dutch in the 1950s, particularly given that my mother was one of those immigrants. I was even more surprised to learn that our fundamental beliefs were part of a movement that began in the 20th century, and of the change in definition of faith. As I learned I shared my discoveries with my family and friends, which has challenged them to question too. Looking back I can see myself experiencing each of Fowler’s Stages of Faith, up to Stage 5 anyway!
As I mentioned in the introduction, for the first 20 years of my life I was a passionate evangelical Christian. I was born into a Christian family (who are wonderful and I love very much) with Christian parents, grandparents, aunts, uncles and cousins. I was christened at birth, and I “asked God into my heart” every time the Sunday school teacher said aloud “the prayer” at the Sydney Anglican Sunday school of my childhood. At 4 years old I began my schooling at Covenant Christian School (CCS), a new independent Christian school mentioned in chapter 6, where I spent the next 13 years of my life. During my childhood I experienced the Intuitive-Projective stage of faith, with the lasting fear of hell’s eternal damnation a feeling that, although I do not believe hell is a real place, is still a fear deeply buried in my subconscious. It pops up on occasion when some Christians I am close to worry that I could end up in hell’s fires if I do not “return to my faith in Jesus”. During my years at CCS I moved on to a Mythic-Literal faith, my entire concept of Christianity based on a one-dimensional interpretation of the Bible and the fundamentalist narrative that my teachers, my parents and my church shared.
During my first two years at university I moved onto the Synthetic-Conventional stage. I lived what I thought was a typical Christian life: daily “private-times” where I would read a chapter of a Christian book and pray. I would go to a “Bible study” group on Wednesday nights, church “youth group” at a Baptist church on Friday nights. I taught Sunday school on Sunday mornings, and attended the evening service on Sunday nights. By my own choice I was baptised and “confirmed” at 19 years old. I had completely dedicated my life to God and believed it was through Jesus I could have this relationship. I openly shared my faith with new friends, who were always a little shocked when I told them about my commitment. I had a coherent orientation in my outlook to life and I felt secure in my Christian identity. I was not afraid of stating what I believed. In my mind life seemed clear although, as Fowler points out, at this stage I had not yet stepped outside the paradigm to reflect on it and I was unaware that I even had it. Although I had not stepped outside the Christian paradigm, I was always interested in learning about other people’s beliefs: if someone was not a Christian I wanted to know why. Yet I struggled to get any answers from my new non-Christian friends at university. They just “didn’t believe Christianity was the truth” but they had no real reason for this choice. They did not want to think about it. The church’s explanation that these “non-believers” wanted to live by their own rules rather than God’s rules (in other words they reject God because they want to have sex, drink alcohol and not go to church) seemed to make sense in my fundamentalist mind. But what I couldn’t understand was how people could care so much about such fickle desires and ruling their own lives for the short 80 years or so we have on earth. This did not compare to the ever-lasting life Christianity had on offer from my point of view.
The transition point for me was like Fowler suggests, caused by ‘a serious clash or contradiction between valued authority sources’. It came in the form of a boyfriend’s father, who had been brought up Catholic and had spent much time in his youth researching the facts and the frauds of religion. It was at this time, at the age of 20, that I first learned about the Crusades and the Inquisition, about Pagan nature of Easter and Christmas, and I realised for the first time that the whole world does not base concept of time on Jesus’ birth (BC/AD), but that other civilisations have their own measurements of history. This ‘thunderbolt moment’ transitioned me into an Individuative-Reflective stage of faith. Following an emotional battle, with everything I based my life seemingly falling apart, I abandoned religion and escaped from the narrow-minded world that surrounded me in Sydney. I travelled and lived overseas for three years, exposing myself to the world-views people in Thailand, Japan and all over Europe.
Although I had rejected Christianity, I had not rejected “God”. Prayer was deeply embedded in my mental processes and whether it was my own deluded mind or was truly a connection with ‘God,’ I could see my prayers being answered, and I felt the comfort and security of a fatherly omni-present force protecting me and guiding me in my daily life. For the first time in my life I began to claim my own identity, with my own boundaries and connections with the divine. On return to Sydney I was once again surrounded by fundamentalism and now feeling at an emotional-distance from it, I decided to do some research for myself. My 92 year old Opa had a fall, I moved in as his carer and was rewarded with the most valuable thing in the world: time. I taught myself the things I had missed out on in my education: the theory of evolution, and a big perspective of the history of humanity in comparison to the history of the universe. I tried to comprehend how humans had evolved so rapidly in such a short space of time. I was slowly becoming more and more reflective, increasing my capacity for critical reflection and dealing with the images still with me from my fundamentalist past. At first I was studying by reading library books, watching documentaries and overloading my Internet browser with hundreds of links. I discovered a new love of learning and soon arrived back at university, but unlike my first degree (in Business), this time I was studying Arts. I wanted to know about the world, about history, about philosophy, psychology, politics and other religions. I chose to study in the interdisciplinary field of Peace and Conflict Studies, which allowed me to pursue such knowledge and piece together the missing pieces of the puzzle in my mind. The very nature of Peace and Conflict Studies, initiated a further transition, now into a Conjunctive faith. Simultaneous to learning about philosophies of peace, and the relationship between religion and war, I was continuing to research and document the history and theology of Christianity. My purpose in this search was driven by a desire to share my knowledge and the freedom of thought, with my younger sisters and cousins, who had also attended CCS and I saw as earlier versions of myself still stuck at stage 2 and stage 3. They had not been exposed to the wider perspectives I had been exposed to through my ex-boyfriend, my travels and my research. Through my inner voice God was leading me to do this research, and faithfully I followed.
I particularly focussed my search on the evidence that supports the two fundamental exegeses: the divinity of Jesus and the holy inerrant Word of God. I considered the “Jesus: liar, lunatic or lord” argument, which presents three mutually exclusive options for who Jesus was, and concludes that unless you are going to call Jesus a liar or a lunatic, then you had better call him Lord.[1] I discovered there were many alternative scenarios which this argument leaves out. I considered the possibility that Jesus was a great teacher whose story, following his death, grew more dramatic as it was transmitted over time. This proposition seemed a whole lot more likely to me than a physical ascension into the heavens above. Where would he go? Heaven, if it is anywhere, is not above us among the stars and other planets! I may have believed this idea had I still thought the earth was flat, however things have changed since the time of Jesus. Discovering that the supernatural elements such as the virgin birth and resurrection were also elements of pagan religions, gives credence to the alternative view that Jesus was a great teacher but not divine. It seemed that these elements of pagan myth were added to the story to fit in the context of Roman pagan religion. The fact that Christmas and Easter were pagan traditions adopted by Christianity,[2] made it seem highly likely that the stories of Jesus are contextually shaped.[3]
Similarly, the Bible is justified as the inerrant “Word of God” simply because the church makes this claim. The church gives no consideration to the inadequacy of such an internal circular logic, or to the fact that the verses used support this claim were written before the the books of the Canon had been selected.[4] Similarly no mention is that Paul and other New Testament authors did not even infer that their writings were being divinely inspired.[5] I looked for errors in the Bible, and I found they were numerous. From inevitable translation errors that come from the fact that Ancient Hebrew did not contain punctuation[6] to discrepancies over event details,[7] all of which were soon “harmonized” away in my discussions with Christians; either with far-fetched explanations, or with the backup harmonization “you just have to have faith”.[8] In my Christian education the willingness of the early Christians to die for their beliefs was glorified, and yet there was no mention of the Inquisitional killing of anyone who would not believe.[9] The Christian narrative was taught just as Spong states, as if it ‘dropped out of heaven in a fully developed form’.[10] There was no mention of the controversial theological debates that moulded it along the way. The research for this paper was the crux of my journey, and it is my hope that along with providing insights for academic readers, that it may provide some points for self-reflection for fundamentalists and that it may help assist them on the emotionally challenging process of questioning one’s faith and beliefs.
Transitioning from a Literal faith to a Conjunctive faith is not an easy process. Taking responsibility for one’s own faith, and ensuring it is a faith that you have chosen for yourself rather than a consequence of your upbringing, is a worthwhile pursuit. It gives generous rewards both during the process and at the end when you feel your relationship with God deepen in understanding and integrity. Breaking from institutionalised intermediaries, you move from a world that appears black and white to unveil an exciting reality of a God and Universe of many colours and many forms with whom you may live your life in accordance with “His” will, which in a strange way is entirely connected to your own will. It is my understanding that God is not a separate super-human consciousness, sitting up in the clouds with a magic wand. Instead “He” is an all-encompassing presence that we humans personify in order to comprehend and communicate with. However “He” is not a he, “He” is the powerful presence behind life, encompassing the tiniest quantum molecule inside a single grain of sand, and extending out to the most faraway planets in galaxies trillions of light years away. “He” is in the air, in the water, in our food, and in our mind. An omni-presence that allows “Him” to know everything, to know how many hairs are on our heads, and to know each and every one of our thoughts. I believe it is through this knowing of our thoughts, that prayers are answered. Our thoughts are transmitted and in themselves have consequences. “Ask and you will receive, knock and the door will open.” I have realised you can talk to God in your mind, and listen to “Him” through the many ways “He” communicates, not only through historical Holy Books, but through nature, through other humans, through your deepest intuitions, through art, books, music – through everything.
I have noticed in my life that by asking God and listening to “Him”, your past, present and future self combine in a way that allows your will to align with God’s will. It seems that the most unlikely desires, if they will lead to a positive result in the long run for the collective conscious of life, may be fulfilled if only you ask. I think that the most satisfying thing you can do in your life is find your purpose and live it out. Ask how you can provide the most benefit for the most people. Listen to your intuition as this is God communicating with you. Understand your place in the universe and your unique role in fulfilling God’s purpose: to create. God created us and is continuing to create. We are still evolving and this process will never stop. Why does God do this? So that He can know Himself. We have God inside us and we are made in His image. We are God’s expression of himself. As we express ourselves, we express God. How do we love God? By loving all people. Loving our planet. Being grateful for all we have. By having faith, listening to the God’s communication, following His signs and our deepest intuitions, and thereby living out our individual and collective roles in the universe. Fulfilling our potential.
When Jesus said ‘I’ve not come to call the righteous but to call sinners to repent,’ He was calling for an improvement of behaviour. By following His example we will see a change in the hearts and minds of people, that will lead to a state of peace within individual conscious and collective conscious. Jesus was a teacher, a healer and eventually executed for his ideas and for the radical stands he stood against the religious leaders and status quo, against the structural violence of his world 2000-years ago, the cultural-societal prescribed path that he faced, and leading a revolution of heart and mind. It is now in the 21st century, that it is our turn to follow Jesus, and do the same.
But how do we do this? Our identity is caught up in our religion. We don’t know who we are without it. How would we define ourselves? How would we decipher what is right from what is wrong without the Bible as our guidebook? We share with our friends and family a wonderful blanket of security. We are warm, comfortable, and happy to think that our place in the afterlife is assured. Questioning this brings a fear of the future, and the uncertainty it holds. We feel we have no time to research these matters for ourselves, and we do not feel the need. We are satisfied with the simple explanation our church provides us of good versus evil, it makes sense and the outside world seems so confusing. Most of all we confront our fear of punishment, punishment for questioning, eternal punishment in hell’s fires should the fundamentalism be right, and the new path we choose for ourselves be wrong. What will happen to me after I die? These fears will soon be met with God’s love and assurance once again.
For the last 6000-years, humankind has become more conscious of our consciousness, ever since we, in mythological terms, “ate the fruit from the tree of knowledge.” As a side effect we have seen ourselves become more separate from other life forms and from God. However, this does not need to be the case. Our expanded consciousness is an amazing gift that allows us to express God in new ways. However we can expand our consciousness, express ourselves as creative individuals, and remain aware of the underlying connectedness of all life. When we disconnect from God, either through disfigurations of religion or by abandoning religion altogether, our separateness makes us feel alone and afraid, of what will happen to our consciousness when our human bodies die. But we are not separate from our environment or from each other. Our existence is interconnected. We cannot survive without our air, food, water and relationships. Plants transform our carbon to oxygen and provide us our food. God can be seen in every process, every cell, every animal, and inside us. Our existence is not comprised of the separateness we feel in our human defined identities, the separate consciousness of ‘me,’ but our existence is interdependent on everything. We are together, there is no ‘me’ there is only ‘us’.
The separate conscious we experience is a temporary illusion, allowing God to express his creativity and experience different realities. One day we will return to God, we will no longer separate, no longer experiencing the highs and lows – we will return to blissful peace of oneness. This is a place that we can meditate into, experiencing a temporary reuniting with God. This is what Buddhists find as they are enlightened. Even atheists must imagine the feeling of death, when our separate consciousness ceases to be conscious. We are returning to the state we were in before we were conscious – a return to nothing and a return to everything. Realise your connectedness, realise that you are not separate from God now nor will you ever be – then you can never feel alone. If you can see yourself in all things, you understand that death is not death, for you can never die. Even when our planet dies, we will continue to exist, beginning the wonderful evolutionary creative process once again in some alternate universe in some alternate time.
There is much to explore and learn and it is overwhelming at first. But we soon realise that we are all in this together, manifesting our individual and collective purposes in life and so the questioning and evaluation process becomes easy. Family and friends will see the joys of experiencing the deeper levels of reality you are experiencing. There is no need to fear anything – instead focus your mind and emotions on love. On loving God and loving others, for in the synchronicity of life, God, other humans and the Universe, are all you.
My faith today is stronger than ever. ‘How?’ asks my Dad, ‘Based upon what?’ My faith and understanding of God is not based on an authoritatively prescribed absolute, so there is no stock-standard simplistic answer as my Dad is able to place on the “historical evidence” as presented in the Christian Bible. My faith is based on deductions drawn from my own analytical evaluation of all the knowledge I have been exposed to and all the experiences I have had. As I am exposed to new knowledge and more experiences, the basis for my faith grows stronger and closer to the Truth, which I believe is a universal objective, even if humans will never fully discover it. This includes deductions drawn from what I see, hear, smell, taste, touch and feel; from my current understanding of language, history, science, religion, spirituality; and from the growing personal experiences I have with the unknown force driving the unfolding creation and evolution of our universe. I don’t claim that all these philosophies I describe are the one and only truth! They are simply the evolving results of my journey of faith.
I have gone from the very narrow perspective of my fundamentalist upbringing, blocking out much of the world in fear of loosing my assured place in heaven to a perspective that sees the unknown and embraces it, that rejoices over the uncertainty of life, and enjoys the ongoing process which learning allows for developing a deeper understanding of the purpose of my life in His continuous process of creation. I now have a closer relationship and much deeper understanding of God than could ever have been possible in the fundamentalist paradigm of my past. To take responsibility for your own mind and soul is scary at first, but then it is liberating. Your mind and soul are free to think for yourself.
While we can never know what new discoveries lay just outside our present knowledge, we can appreciate what we do know and enjoy the process of seeking to know more. When you have a question I recommend that you research it and draw your own conclusions, so that you are actively pursuing a deeper understanding of Truth, a deeper understanding of the Universe that God has created and which you and “He” are still continuing to create. Whether or not we ever achieve our goal of understanding the Truth is not important. When we realise that all people in all cultures and in all religions, are connected, and that we all seek this same common goal, we realise that joining together we can create a most wonderful synergy: sharing knowledge, sharing experiences, and sharing our understanding of the divine powers at play. Then we can, together, work for the common good of every form of life in our Universe. Continuing as part of God’s creative process, expressing “Him” in new ways, maximising our individual and collective creative potentials, advancing the collective conscious of the Universe to higher levels of understanding and spirituality. We are all a wondrous part of this exciting process and incredibly, if we set our sights on Shalom, the Kingdom of God, Peace on Earth, it will come. All we have to do is ask.
[1] The ‘Trilemma’ argument first put forth by C.S.Lewis, but as restated for Christian youth by Josh McDowell, More Than a Carpenter(New York: Tyndale House Publishers, 1977, 2004).
[2] Christmas was on the winter equinox (25th December in those days) – was a celebration of the birth of the sun-god. Easter was on the spring equinox – for thousands of years had been a celebration of the death and resurrection of Ishtar, the goddess of new-life.
[3] See Spong, A New Christianity for a New World. On page titled: Jesus.
[4] For example, 2 Timothy 3:16, “All Scripture is God-breathed”. See the opening of each Bible book.
[5] For example, Luke makes it particular clear he is attempting to put together a cohesive historical account of what people are talking about; he is clearly not claiming to be writing words inspired by God. See: Luke 1:1-4.
[6] Gerald L. Schroeder, The Hidden Face of God : How Science Reveals the Ultimate Truth (New York ; London: Free Press, 2001).
[7] For example, the conflicting genealogies of Matthew and Luke identify different fathers for Joseph’s father (Jesus’ grandfather).
Another example, is that each of the gospels state that Mary Magdalene visited Jesus tomb with a different person (Mathew states she was with one other woman while Mark states she was with two, Luke states three, and John states she went alone).
[8] For example the Joseph’s father might be harmonized by stating that ‘Joseph’s father might have changed his name sometime during his life from Jacob to Heli’.
Similarly the discrepancy between the women at the tomb can be harmonized by stating that ‘Mary Magdalene could have made one trip to the tomb alone. She could have followed this up with repetitive returns to the city and trips with various combinations of other women’ – this is ‘a very improbable story, but one that allows the Bible to be free of error.’
See: B. A. Robinson, ‘Harmonizing Apparent Conflicts & Errors in the Bible’. (Ontario: Ontario Consultants on Religious Tolerance, April 2009). <www.religioustolerance.org/ine_none4.htm>.
[9] Popular readings among fundamentalist youth include: Josh McDowell and Bob Hostetler, Don’t Check Your Brains at the Door (New York: Word Publishing, 1992). and Lee Strobel, The Case for Christ (Michigan: Zondervan, 1988). These books provide one-sided arguments that were very convincing to me while my mind was looking inside the Christian paradigm. Once I learned how to critically analyse and was able to think through these arguments for myself, I realised just how biased the facts presented are, and how mislead the format of the argument is.
For a liberal Christian opinion see: John Shelby Spong, The Sins of Scripture : Exposing the Bible’s Texts of Hate to Reveal the God of Love (Pymble, N.S.W.: HarperCollins, 2005).
[10] Spong, A New Christianity for a New World. On page titled: Jesus. op. cit.
Further Reading
This is a short book that I wrote in 2007-8, documenting my questions, the answers I found and thought processes involved in weighing up different factors involved in dedicating oneself to Christianity:
Chapter 1 – Introduction Click here
Chapter 2 – Is the Bible the “Word of God”? Click here
Chapter 3 – Is Jesus Christ the “Son of God?” Click here
Chapter 4 – Discussing the contradictions Click here
Chapter 5 – What does this mean for my life today? Click here
Chapter 6 – My conclusions Click here