Conference hydra::dejavu

    I may believe in a God equivalent, but its the associated organizations
    I don't believe in. For some reason this seems to be interpreted
    by many as "not believing in God".
    
    Thom

    RE:1
    
     It depends on what you mean by "God Equivalent"; Please explain.
    
    LORENZO
    

I feel very strongly that there is an energy which is incomprehensible to
us that makes the universe "move" the way it does.  I don't like to use
the word God because it is attached to the idea of a wise old man (in my
mind anyway).  Since I lean towards Buddhism, I prefer the word Myoho which
means mystic law.  I feel much more comfortable with the idea of a mystic
law than a wise old man.

I think there are alot of people who claim not to believe in God, when actually
they don't believe in what the word means to them.

		Dave

    People believe in God for one or more of the following reasons:
    
    1.  They were indoctrinated when quite young.
    
    2.  They are impatient in finding answers to life's mysteries such
    
                a.  Why are we here?
                b.  Why do we die?
                c.  How should we treat one another?
                d.  What happens after death?
                
        and choose a religion because it hands answers to them on a
        silver platter.
    
    3.  A terrible misfortune (addiction, death of loved one, disease,
        etc.) befell them and religion gives them a sense of worth and
        hope.
    
    4.  They experience thoughts or happenings they do not understand and
        attribute the thoughts or happenings to supernatural causes.
    
    

                                          
    I believe in God, a monothesistic God who is the Creator of all 
    things, and from which Love flows in many different forms, through
    many different religions and belief structures (Christianity being
    one of the many).
    
    Using the Bible (KJV), I John 4 sums it up rather well.
    
    Why do I believe in God?  Because I am alive today to see the grace,
    the mysteries and the wonders of the universe.  It is all quite
    elegant.  God can be found everywhere if one just takes the time
    to look.  There is good in everything.
                
    Cindy

    
    	I believe in God, as an axiom.   I think belief structures
    are based on assumptions that may not be provable, but which
    may make sense anyway.
    
    	The word "God" must refer to something common in human
    experience, being such a common word.   So "God" is what 
    people are referring to when they use that word.   
    The trinity, I believe refers to human perceptions of God, 
    perhaps not referring to "he" "himself".
    
	Here are what I understand to be the three possible
    referents of the word "God", depending on the context in
    which the word is used;
    
    	God the father; is God concieved of as the creator of
    		the universe, who existed before the universe.
                (the transcendant God)
    	God the Holy Spirit; the feminine aspect of God that
    		exists in all things.  (the immanent God, the God
    		of pantheisim and Taoism)
    	God the Son; refers to the seed of God consciousness in
    		each of us, as it was exemplified by Jesus the Christ.
    		That which is awakened by "The Imitation of Christ",
    		or by "accepting Christ into one's heart".  (The evidence
    		of this awakening is not in the mouthing of dogmatic
    		phrases, or group membership, but *only* requires demonstrating
    		Christlike love for others.)

	I believe all three of these possible referents are useful
    concepts, and all three seem to involve realities that are
    somehow beyond complete comprehension.   

    I believe in God, because the universe makes more sense to me
    when I reason from the axiom; "God exists", than it does if I
    were to reason from the axiom; "God does not exist."   "God"
    as a concept, is useful and even necessary.        I recognize
    that my understanding of the referent (the reality that the word
    refers to) is incomplete, and will probably always be so.   I
    believe that God *exists*, as a being greater than our concepts
    of him, but all I can talk about is the concept.   The reality
    will remain beyond the power of words to express.
    
	Alan.

    re: .2
    see: .3
    
    Thanks Dave.  I could not have said it better myself.(Although I
    am currently leaning a bit more Taoist).
    
    We better be careful though.  If enough people admit this "open"
    viewpoint someones going to start a religion to organize this. 
    Oh no!!! ;-)
    
    Thom
    
    

    
    
    
    I see God as my Mother and Father, as the Creator of all things in the
    universe I live in.  I also believe that God loves all of His/Her
    creations totally and unendingly, with no conditions.  I believe that
    God is there for each of us, that He is a living and loving God, and
    that all we have to do is reach to Her for that connection to be made
    real for us.  It's always there, we just have to take the action to
    bring it alive in our lives.

    A couple of years' ago, I attended a Christmas retreat at my church with
    a number of people.  One of the pastors was inspired to do a little
    exercise with us which consisted of each person being given an envelope
    containing cut up pieces of paper.  At the appropriate time, we were all
    brought together and told that these were all pieces to a puzzle, and that
    we were to put it together.  The process showed us that every single piece
    was important, otherwise we would not have a complete answer to the puzzle;
    there would always be something missing.  The completed puzzle contained a
    message that will stay in my heart always:



    "I know what love you have for Me.  I see it in the struggle of your
     search, where it cannot be hidden."





    Carole
 
    

    I believe in God (and as a Christian) because I've experienced God's
    presence as the result of prayers.  The responses of .4 imply a
    certain negativeness; particularly the catch-all reason 4:
    
    >4.  They experience thoughts or happenings they do not understand and
    >    attribute the thoughts or happenings to supernatural causes.
     
    ...which assumed that anyone with a religious experience "doesn't
    understand" what's _really_ going on.  [A no-win situation: no matter
    what the believer thinks, he or she is wrong from a faulty
    interpretation.]
    
    I was _not_ indoctrinated young; I did not take Belief as an easy
    way to explain the Meaning of Life, nor did "religion" come to me
    as the result of a terrible misfortune.
    
    These are the dark answers.  The light answers are the structure,
    the beauty, and the wonder of the cosmos.  Awe and reverence, love
    and compassion, all these are part of the equation.
    
    However, belief or non-belief are personal things.  No matter how
    grand or slight my personal experiences are, I cannot conver anything
    subjective in objective terms.                              
    
    But believe me, I Believe, and with just cause.
    
    Steve Kallis, Jr.   

    I also believe in what you are all calling God.  I too feel that
    the force we are calling God is the myoho.  In my opinion, science 
    is leading us closer and closer to proving God's existence.

    I think Richard Bach kind of summed it up in "Illusions" - by calling
    God the "Infinite Radiant Is".  My god is both genders, and does
    not demand sacrifice or struggle and no proof of faith further than
    my quiet belief and trust.  I'm a Unitarian but I stopped going
    to church a long time ago - I figure if god is everywhere, then
    my thoughts can be heard by the seashore, watching a sunset, in
    the kitchen, wherever...
    
    I asked myself why I believe and what I believe when my sister became
    a born again Christian (Church of Christ, to be exact).  And I realized
    that I am comforted by the belief that there is someone looking
    out for those who believe, and that doing good will bring good to
    me, and that I was giving myself ulcers worrying about everything
    and evolving a comfortable and stable belief system would reduce
    my worrying a great deal by helping me to be more optimistic and
    trust that everything would work out all right if only I worked
    to the best of my ability.  I don't think everyone who doesn't believe
    my way will be cast into the pit of hell.  I also think that those
    who do good things in this life will have a good afterlife, wherever
    and whatever that is - that is the only kind of justice my deity
    requires...what goes around, comes around.
    
    As for Jesus, as I was taught by my parents and our religion, he
    was not the son of God, but rather he was a really wonderful person
    who tried to help people and did good to the best of his ability
    to bring about a better world.  If I try to be the best I can, I
    may just be as good as Jesus was, and by following his teachings
    (to the spirit more often than to the letter, I am not a scripture
    quoter) I can bring about positive change in the world.
    
    -Jody
    

    I think God is another name for the sum total of all natural laws,
    whether we understand them fully or not. If there is a seperate God,
    even S/He is bound by the laws.

    So, I beleive in God, because I beleive the universe is governed by
    the laws of nature.

    There is a story in Hinduism, which goes like this.

    A monk, after meditating on the origin of God himself and finding no
    answer, asked one of the gods (Hindus have many gods!); "Where did
    you come from? Who created you?". The god replied, "I don't know. I
    think I have always been here."

    -- Rav Karwan

re: .11

Very well put.

		Dave

    I don't know why I believe in God -- but I do; though the God I believe
    in may not be recognizable to you.  I do not believe that God created
    the Universe, since there are temporal implications to that word
    which I do not accept.  It is as true, and as false, to say that
    God is creating the Universe right now, or that God has yet to create
    the Universe, as to say that God created the Universe, at some time in
    the past.
    
    While I don't know why I believe in God, I *do* know why I don't
    *not* believe in God.  Nothing in the Universe provides proof or
    even real evidence that God exists or that God does not exist. 
    To think otherwise, I feel, is to belittle God's power -- how could
    we possibly be aware of anything so absolutely all pervasive as
    God (personal belief here folks -- I understand that others don't
    see it that way).  So logic is indifferent to whether I believe
    God exists or not or whether I leave it undecided.  So I am honest
    with my feelings -- whatever their source -- and I do not reject
    my belief.
    
    					Topher

Sometimes I think that God *is* the universe.. and everything thats in it.
Hence the NA beliefs that "we" are God..  perhaps we are the path God has
chosen for It's evolution.

As to whether God created the universe, created suggests a beginning
and a beginning implies "time".  We don't understand time very well,.. 
time may be the illusion... perhaps there is only the eternal Now and our
memories are markers of events in a sea of all possible events.

Existence itself is far too complex to be accidental.. and to spring into 
existence "suddenly" out of a void as the Big Bang seems to suggest seems 
too incredibly simplistic.  Our only conception of something springing
into being from nothing is what some of us call God... the ability
to "will" oneself to exist is a "Godlike" characteristic.

I don't doubt that our conception of what we call God is flawed but ... there 
is at least *one* thing we do know about the nature of God.  God is creative.  

Nothing has really changed since the universe was created... there
are just variations on the original patterns.  Perhaps the original patterns
are what God really is and we are all a manifestation of It's personality,... 
evil reflecting It's dark side and good reflecting It's light side.  Perhaps 
It is choosing what It wants to be right now... as we speak.  

Perhaps we must come to terms with ourselves in order for God to come to
terms with Itself.  Is the creation a reflection of the artist?

Mary

    I believe in God as an all-encompassing being.  It is everywhere,
    and I have experienced It's presence through prayer and meditation.
    I also believe that God can be divided up in order for humans (or
    others I guess) to understand It.  It can be viewed as multiple
    gods, much as the way Jung defines his archetypes.  I also believe
    that God (big G) cares for It's creation, and wants us to learn
    and grow, and ask questions, and find answers, much as small children
    do.  God also realizes that It's creatures don't always do the right
    thing, mostly out of ignorance.  God wants us to learn, and is very
    patient with us.  I don't believe in any sort of eternal punishment
    - the God I believe in is not evil enough to punish It's children
    because of their ignorance and fallibility.  It will teach them
    though, possibly over a period of several lifetimes.
    
    I was also not indoctrinated when quite young, went through a period
    of questioning God's existence, and explored a multitude of religions.
    I have borrowed the best parts of all these religions, and certainly
    included the threads of similarity that go with all of them.
    No terrible catastrophe happened to me to cause my belief in God,
    I just know It's there.
    
    Elizabeth

    RE.0 
    
    Lorenzo,
    
    As you can see, the opinions and beliefs of many people in this
    conference are quite diverse, yet we all seem to manage to get along
    in harmony and even laugh together and enjoy each other's company
    just the same.
    
    It is my hope for the world that this kind of respect and consideration
    can be taken from small communities such as this and serve as a model
    for the rest of the world, because there would never really be any
    need to go to war and have people die for reasons which in the long
    run go against that which God would want for the world and the way
    that Jesus taught the world to resolve conflicts - via peaceful
    means.            
    
    It is also my belief that we hold the power to bring this kind of
    peace to the world on our own.  If when Jesus comes back the the
    world again wouldn't it be nice if he looked around at a world where
    we would all be truly loving and celebrating the joy of living with 
    our neighbors as opposed to fighting with them and killing them. 
                                                  
    "You may say I'm a dreamer, but I'm not the only one.  I hope someday
    you'll join us, and the world will be as one."
    
    God bless,
    
    Cindy

    So many  good  replies.    While  reading most of them I found myself
saying 'yeah, yeah!, you said it.'.

    I don't think I can describe  my  God, except to say what was said in
my reply in the topic 'Inspirational Lyrics':    I've found that, for me,
'He's not the kind you have to wind up on Sundays'.  
    
    I believe because I want to believe. 

    Jay

So, LORENZO, why do *you* believe?

    I believe in God and I think He is very like the picture of him
    painted by classical theology -- one, holy, omnipotent, omniscient,
    omnipresent, transcending the universe while still immanent in it,
    transcending the limits of personality or any other mode of finite
    being, perfect in love, righteousness and beauty.
    
    It occurs to me that responses to this note have often said WHAT
    the authors believe but have less often said WHY, as .0 asks.
    
    Summarizing briefly, I think the Ontological Argument is valid,
    or can be put in a valid form.  I do not think the Argument from
    Design can give definitive proof, but that it gives strong evidence
    for a Designer.  I also think the Argument for a First Cause is
    valid, but not much use since it says so little about the nature
    of that first cause.
    
    I think the human capacities for conscience, awe, and mystical
    experience provide inward evidence (though not proof) for God and
    His nature.
    
    Earl Wajenberg

    Re: .15

    > Existence itself is far too complex to be accidental.. and to spring into 
    > existence "suddenly" out of a void as the Big Bang seems to suggest seems 
    > too incredibly simplistic.

    I think matter itself can spring from nothing: two fundamental particles,
    if they have opposite quantum numbers, can come into being from nothing
    without violating any known laws. It's the law itself springing up from
    nothing that is intriguing.

    -- Rav Karwan

    each time I recall my "holier than thou" grandfather beating my
    then 5 year old sister with a fire poker i believe a little less
     
    I believe in God.
    I do not believe in idealists shoving God down our throats.

    Re .22:
    
    >each time I recall my "holier than thou" grandfather beating my
    >then 5 year old sister with a fire poker i believe a little less
     
    That shouldn't make you believe less (as indeed your next sentence
    states), but it should make you grieve for them both: she for being
    unjustly "punished"; he for his attitude and arrogance.
    
    Steve Kallis, Jr.

    re .21  Then perhaps the Mystic Law is God, eh?
    
    re .22  How sad Kerry.  We've all had so many difficult and painfull
    experiences in our collective lifetimes.  They seem to have made some
    of us very strong while distroying others of us.  
    
    I don't know the reasons why things are the way they are.  Karmic
    law makes sense to me though.  Lets hope that there are no more
    beatings in our collective futures... and lets do what we can to
    prevent any more five year olds from learning about the dark side
    the hard way.

    i forgot to mention
    
    my grandfather was a minister.

    
    RE.25
    
    Kerry,
    
    I, too, know about beatings and other equally unpleasant experiences,
    ....and in the name of God.  For the longest time, I didn't understand 
    why and therefore could not forgive.
    
    Reading Peck's works helped me to understand, and then forgive.
    
    Fortunately, my first introduction to God was when I was about 4
    years old and it was through my kind and loving grandfather who 
    lived with us.  I didn't realize that until very recently - how
    I never once questioned or doubted the existance of God through all 
    of the pain that I (and others) were subjected to.  Then I realized that
    my view of God is a kind and loving God and that it was as a direct
    result of my grandfather and other people/neighbors in the congregation
    at the time.
    
    I also realize now that the problem with 'idealists' spouting words
    with good intentions also probably had a loving introduction to
    God somewhere in their early life, and the problem comes into play
    when they try to 'badger' others who may be in pain that they should
    'get God'.  It's just not that simple.  God is not a 'pain pill'.
    It is through other people that God works to show love.  I know.
    I saw that love in the eyes of my grandfather, and more recently
    in the eyes of a very dear friend who gave me a reason to believe
    in humanity again.                                               
    
    The real problem is that the 'sins of the father' really do get
    passed from generation to generation.  There is a reason why your
    grandfather acted as he did, and perhaps some day you will understand
    just what that reason was.  It doesn't make the pain any easier
    to be sure, but at least you will understand, perhaps eventually
    forgive and break the pattern of violence (and help your sister
    to understand and forgive as well) so that future generations will
    never know such pain and agony.
    
    There is also a book that I highly recommend and that is "Why Bad
    Things Happen To Good People".  It has helped me a great deal and
    has also helped others.
    
    May God bless you and your sister always.
    
    Cindy

    Re .23:
    
    >That shouldn't make you believe less (as indeed your next sentence
    >states), but it should make you grieve for them both: she for being
    >unjustly "punished"; he for his attitude and arrogance.
     
    Somebody brought to my attention off-line that this observation
    could be taken to mean I was telling another person how to act.
    I did not nor do not mean it that way.  The "should" in, "Stand
    closer to the fire; you should feel warmer," is the kind of "should"
    I had in mind.
    
    Steve Kallis, Jr.

    A number of years ago, I was a religion teacher in a Catholic grammar
    school.  I was teaching 6th graders who went to public school. 
    I got a call from the mother of one of my better students.  It seems
    that she was not a Catholic, but her husband was.  On his death
    bed, the mother had promised her husband that she would be sure
    that their daughter, Peggy (not her real name) would be raised a
    good Catholic.  The mother was very upset.  She told me that little
    Peggy insisted that she did not believe in God.  I told the mother
    that I would speak with Peggy and get back to her.  When I spoke
    with Peggy I told her that her mother had called me and I indicated
    that she was worried.  I asked her if she had told her mother that
    she did not believe in God.  Peggy said that she had.  I asked her
    if it was true that she did not believe in God.  She told me that
    she used to, but that she no longer did.  I asked her what changed
    her mind.  She told me that she had been doing a lot of reading
    about the subject (this from a sixth grader!) and that she currently
    felt that it was very hard for her to believe in an "all powerfull"
    God.  She said that she felt more comfortable with a concept similar
    to that of the Romans.  She could see, perhaps, that there might
    be several gods that were powerfull in their own way.  She said
    that she figured the Catholic Church somehow had at one time started
    to feel the same way as she did because there was God the Father,
    the Son, and the Holy Spirit, but she said that the idea of god
    was too big for just three.  She supposed that there must be many
    more than three.  I asked her a few more questions to be sure I
    understood how she really felt and found that she had put a good
    deal of time and effort inot her evolving belief system.  Peggy
    was a very good, kind, thoughtful girl who was very sweet and
    Christian in nature.  I admired her curiosity about God, and found
    that her belief system did not conflict with that of the Catholic
    Church save her concept of the "form" of God.  I called her mother
    and told her what I had found.  I told her that she had a very special
    little girl to be actively studying the nature of the almighty at
    her age.  I also suggested that what Peggy was expressing is the
    very real fact that we, as finite beings, *cannot* truely understand
    the full extent of God.  I told her mother that I didn't feel that
    any further intervention would be required at the time.  I felt
    that she was fulfilling her promise to her husband.  It seems that
    Peggy's mother was not totally satisfied with my oppinion.  She
    called the Mother Superior.  To make the rest of the story short,
    Peggy was pulled from my Religion class because Mother Superior
    judged that I was not strong enough to deal with this "Pagan little
    girl" (yes, exact works).  
    
    It was suggested in the next school year that I not return as a
    religion teacher.  I was not surprised, nor was I angry.  The school
    had lost a good teacher, and I wouldn't doubt that little Peggy
    was lost to them as well.  I have faith that Peggy went on with
    her studies and is to this day well "within the grace of God". 
    I feel sorry for the Mother Superior, and I often wonder if she
    ever had even the slightest knowledge of what she had done.  I sure
    do not blame the church.  I guess I just blame human nature - that
    is Peggy's, Mother Superior's, and mine.
                                            
    
    Marion

    
    RE:19
    
       WELL, It started (MY BELIEF) when I was very young: I was't brought
    up in a church, but we went to church every easter. Up until about
    2 1/2 years ago I couldn't even begin to tell why I believed in
    God: All I know is that, when I was child I use to find mysef praying,
    and there was times that I would vocally hear "myself" answering
    myself (strange huh!), at the time I was doing all of this, I didn't
    think that anyone heard me, but when I had gotten older, my mother
    told me how her and my father was laughing at me because they thought
    that I was talking to myself. At that I didn't know who God was;
    I didn't know that there was a Jesus ever existing. Well, to make
    a looong story short; there were a lot of things happening in my
    life that I didn't understand. I started seeing things at night,
    and having differant kinds if dreams and visions; One vision that
    I had was: I was standing on the edge of the earth, and there was
    nothing out in front of me, but, darkness and stars, just like you
    would see a night; there was a little girl kneeling on my left hand
    side, faceing the opposit direction praying; she was wearing a white
    robe, and the only light there was, was a light shinning out of
    heaven upon her: then a huge bible appeared in space which had written
    on it "Holy Bible" with the praying hands on it. Then I started
    tapping the little girl, trying to get her to look at the bible,
    but she kept on praying. Then all of a suddon those praying hands
    that were on the bible, came out, and pulled me up into the bible;
    going up in the bible was like a tunnel, and as I had gotten further
    into the bible, I felt my physical body began to fad away, the same
    feeling I had in that vision, is the same feeling I have when the
    spirit of Godcome upon me: I didn't understand what was happening
    to me, so I started screeming and crying, praying that the lord
    would forgive me and give me another chance to live; Then I woke-up.
    That was just one of the visions that I had: The reason I believe
    in god, is because God has proven himself to me SO many times; and
    because he placed his Love, Joy, and Peace inside my soul; and most
    importantally HE SAVED MY SOUL. Even if I want to not believe in
    him, I believe: because HE IS REAL IN MY LIFE!!
    
    LORENZO
    

.29

Thanks, LORENZO, sounds like it was an experience! I don't think it's
unlike many others I've heard of, here and other places. An experience
which turns out to be a strong pull towards something. Then a feeling of,
what some term, 'unconditional love' and/or a striving for that feeling
to live on in us. I know of a lot of people who are actively working
towards that in many ways. I think there are many paths to get there, and
I believe they all lead to Him eventually.

Jay

    Re.29
    
    Lorenzo, that was beautiful!
    
    There is a book entitled "Unconditional Love, by John Powell, S.J.
    which helped to put words around what happened to me last May, which,
    along with his other works I would highly recommend (and have already
    given quite a few of them as gifts to friends).
    
    Cindy

    Mystics refer to the "God of my Heart". Because of the diversity
    of Earth cultures and the complexities of human personalities,
    ALL of us have a different conception of "God".
    
    By studying our physical universe and attuning to our "inner universe",
    the consciousness of God, our "still small voice within", will prompt
    us and urge us on to greater understanding.
    
    Our scientists may clone, but they'll never make a flower. It is
    said that the secret to animal reproduction is so simple that it
    will never be truly understood, nor replicated.
    
    Many of us have had transcendental experiences, which have perhaps
    convinced us that a God exists. None of us, however, can
    perceive the Infinite in all His Glory. We are but allowed rare
    glimpses into the Cosmic scheme.
    
    We humans contain the spark of God within. It is our responsibility
    to nurture it. By studying the macrocosm and microcosm, we find
    true the ancient principle, "As above, so below". The complexities
    of the universe are so vast, it's laws work in such perfect harmony,
    it seems to me, at least, that this was no accident. Scientific
    law states that matter and energy can be neither created or
    destroyed.  I ask, then, where did it come from ?  We are able to
    generate electricity, we DO NOT CREATE IT ! Where did this electricity
    come from ?
    
    Examine the functioning of the human body. Billions of cells working
    TOGETHER in harmony. We are a very efficient plumbing, electrical, healing
    and reproductive system, in the least ! Not to mention that we are
    mostly water !
    
    We are ALL unique and special children of the Grand Architect. Our
    experiences in life and our thoughts have made us so. And this is the
    way that it is supposed to be, so that perhaps, we too, will one
    day reach to the stars and create our own worlds as we learn to
    take our rightful place in the universe of Light, Life and Love.
    
    

    I feel God, therefore I believe in God.  The God that I believe
    in is Love -- no punishments or guilt unless I impose them on
    myself (something I'm trying not to do anymore).  I feel closest 
    to my God-Self during quiet evenings at home during the week.
    
    "I'm gonna have what I can't see..."
    
    					Peace to you all,
    
    					Carla

I just want to say that I'm proud to be apart of a conference where people
can share their intimate feelings and beliefs however different they may be
without arguments or negativity.  We have a very special place here.

		Dave

.34>............................  We have a very special place here.
Hear Hear! 

A fun little juxtaposition of words... Jay

---
.15>Sometimes I think that God *is* the universe.. and everything thats in it.

.32>ALL of us have a different conception of "God".
    
.32>By studying our physical universe and attuning to our "inner universe",
.32>the consciousness of God, our "still small voice within", will prompt
.32>us and urge us on to greater understanding.
---
---
.15>Existence itself is far too complex to be accidental.. and to spring into 
.15>existence "suddenly" out of a void as the Big Bang seems to suggest seems 
.15>too incredibly simplistic.

.32>................................................. The complexities
.32>of the universe are so vast, it's laws work in such perfect harmony,
.32>it seems to me, at least, that this was no accident. 

.32>Our scientists may clone, but they'll never make a flower. It is
.32>said that the secret to animal reproduction is so simple that it
.32>will never be truly understood, nor replicated.
---
---
.15>..........................  Our only conception of something springing
.15>into being from nothing is what some of us call God... the ability
.15>to "will" oneself to exist is a "Godlike" characteristic.

.32>We humans contain the spark of God within. It is our responsibility
.32>to nurture it.
---
---
.15>Perhaps we must come to terms with ourselves in order for God to come to
.15>terms with Itself.

.32>We are ALL unique and special children of the Grand Architect.
---
---
.15>...................Is the creation a reflection of the artist?

.32>Examine the functioning of the human body.

.32>Our experiences in life and our thoughts have made us so. And this is
.32>the way that it is supposed to be, so that perhaps, we too, will one
.32>day reach to the stars and create our own worlds as we learn to take
.32>our rightful place in the universe of Light, Life and Love.
---

Hi.
     I do all kinds of fence sitting on this one.
     I was raised Roman Catholic.  I became an atheist in about the fourth
grade.  I thought God was propaganda or something.  It was very liberating
for me.  I was glad there wasn't any proof.  To me it was all more people
telling me I was bad, that God is the biggest, baddest dude that ever existed,
who was going to send me to hell if I committed such sins as putting my hands
in my pockets, or any other thing the nuns didn't happen to like us doing.
I hated having to memorize all the catechism, having to go to church and 
Sunday school.  I have never once in my life had any actual experience of
God.  I hated all my early associations with God.
     Later on I graduated to agnosticism.  I thought maybe there was actually
a God, but I hoped like hell that all the stuff I'd heard about God was
wrong.  I was beginning to differentiate between the message and the messengers.
I got interested in other religions; Hinduism, Buddhism, and Zen Buddhism in
particular.  Some of the things they had to say shed a new light on Christianity
for me.  One thing I realized lately, while talking to a Jewish raised "Jesus
freak" ( no insult intended by this phrase.  There are some people who are very
much into Jesus and God, who are very open, up front, and verbal about their
beliefs.  In the seventies, they were termed "Jesus freaks".)  is that I don't
believe God sends any sinner to hell for all eternity.  Virtue is knowledge.
That would be like torturing a two-year old forever because he voted for
Bush in the upcoming election.  He doesn't know all the facts.
     These days I believe in God, but I pick and choose, and lean very much
towards The Far East in my religious orientation (!).  I still can't handle
Christianity very well, and I can still get very negative about it when the
right buttons get pushed for me.
     I believe because what I see of the Universe is outrageous.  I believe
because the American Indians believed in a Great Spirit, having never heard
of Roman %$#@*&^ Catholicism!  I believe because every once in a while I feel
love, and that says "God" to me somehow.  I have this feeling, intuition,
hunch that all existence isn't about some disconnected, unfeeling accident.
I believe because I have faith in the integrity of people who've experienced
things that very much say "God".  It doesn't make sense to me that they're
all lying or deluded.  I don't have a LOT of faith; I'm still from Missouri.  
Still, my beliefs do shape my life in many ways.
     I also believe because it's comforting, because it makes death easier
to bear, and because it promises unlimited possibilities.  In fact, one of
the reasons that I have doubts about the existence of God, is because I
would very much like for there to be one. "If God didn't exist, it would
be necessary to invent him."  It also annoys me that something so fundamentally
important must be merely BELIEVED in for so many of us.  That should be like
believing in air!  It may be the way it is, but on my level, it just doesn't 
make sense, if you see what I mean.  People give all kinds of reasons for that,
but generally the reasons for having faith depend on more faith.  So it goes.
There aren't any real answers to "Why...?".
     So, I do believe--but the extent and shape of my belief waxes and wanes 
with time.  Really, God answers and asks about the same amount of questions,
when looked at logically--yet another reason why analysis and reason alone
don't do justice to existence!

                                              Mike

    -.1 (God as propaganda, 1st paragraph) touched off a humorous 
    recollection.  A woman I know has a grandson who at the tender age
    of 7 found out there was no Santa Claus.  Well it was right before
    Christmas, and as he stormed upstairs in frustration he said, "You
    know what, since I found out there's no Santa I've got some thinking
    to do...and right after Christmas I'm going to look into this Jesus
    thing."
    
    -Jody
    
    

    

re: .37 -  Thanks for your reply. Though I started out at a 
different place, I've gone through much the same as you, 
and it's nice not to feel alone.  I believe because I want to believe.  
But just knowing how much I want to makes me distrust it a 
little.

re: .23,.27 -

Steve, I've always had a problem with the Christian idea that 
we should have as much compassion for the child-beater as for
the child.  For one thing, I'm not sure that Christ himself
would act that way.  I know Christ forgave a lot of the more 
traditional type sinners but he also got tremendously angry, 
even violent I seem to remember, at some hypocrites who 
professed to love God while hurting man. (Sorry I'm not more
exact. I don't believe the Bible is the word of God and I 
haven't read it much since I was a child.)  I know that a 
child beater is distancing himself from all that is holy, I 
know that he is most likely a very disturbed individual, and I
know that the chances are great that he himself was beaten as
a child. But still I have tremendous anger at him.  The only 
way around such anger is either to distance myself emotionally
from humanity or to lie to myself and deny it. Surely God 
doesn't want us to do either.

    I believe that the Jesus portrayed in the Bible would judge the
    child beater depending on the circumstances.
    
    In any case, I think it is better for *us* (non child-beaters) to
    not judge others too harshly.
    
    Elizabeth
    

The following information can be found at the beginning of the 
"Religions and World Peace" topic in this conference, however I've 
condensed it somewhat because it seems like some people participating 
in this topic might benefit from this information.

----------------------------------------------------------------------

{From: The Different Drum, by M.Scott Peck, M.D.}

In any case, this book will start small.  The first section will focus 
entirely upon my personal experience of community.  For there I 
discovered its extreme importance in my own life and in the lives of 
thousands of my fellow humans as we struggled together to communicate 
without superficiality or distortion or animosity.

The key to community is the acceptance - in fact, the celebration - of 
our individual and cultural differences.  Such acceptance and 
celebration - which resolves the problem of pluralism and which can 
occur only after we learn to become empty (of intolerances) - is also 
the key to world peace.  

THE STAGES OF SPIRITUAL GROWTH

...Over the course of a decade of practicing psychotherapy a strange 
pattern began to emerge.  If people who were religious came to me in 
pain and trouble, and if they became engaged in the therapeutic 
process so as to go the whole route, they frequently left therapy as 
atheists, agnostics, or at least skeptics.  On the other hand, if 
atheists, agnostics, or skeptics came to me in pain or difficulty and 
became fully engaged, they frequently left therapy as deeply religious 
people.  

"Same therapy, same therapist, successful but utterly different
outcomes from a religious point of view.  ...It didn't compute until I
realized that 'we are not all in the same place spiritually'. 
           
With that realization came another: there is a pattern of progression 
through identifiable stages in human spiritual life. .....But here I will 
talk about those stages only in general, for individuals are unique and do 
not always fit neatly into any psychological or spiritual pigeonhole.

With that caveat, let me list my own understanding of these stages and the 
names I have chosen to give them:

STAGE I   - Chaotic, antisocial (people who lie and live by their own rules)
STAGE II  - Formal, institutional (rigid, fundamentalists)
STAGE III - Skeptic, individual (those questioning/rejecting past ideas)
STAGE IV  - Mystic, communal

Most all young children and perhaps one in five adults fall into Stage 
I.  It is essentially a stage of undeveloped spirituality.  I call it 
antisocial because those adults who are in it (People Of The Lie - 
book by same name) seem generally incapable of loving others.  
Although they may pretend to be loving (and think of themselves that 
way), their relationships with their fellow human beings are all 
essentially manipulative and self-serving.  ...Being unprincipled, 
there is nothing that governs them except their own will.  And since 
that will from moment to moment can go this way or that, there is a 
lack of integrity in their being.  

From time to time people in Stage I get in touch with the chaos of 
their own being, and when they do, I think it is the most painful 
experience a human can have.  A few, I suspect, may kill themselves, 
unable to envision change.  And some, occasionally, convert to Stage 
II.  Such conversions are usually sudden and dramatic and, I believe, 
God-given.  It is as if God had reached down and grabbed their soul 
and yanked it up a quantum leap.  The process also seems to be an 
unconscious one  It just seems to happen.

There are several things that characterize the behavior of men and 
women in Stage II of their spiritual development, which is the stage 
of the majority of churchgoers and believers (as well as that of most 
emotionally healthy "latency"-period children).  One is their 
attachment to the forms (as opposed to the essence) of their religion, 
which is why I call this stage "formal" as well as "institutional". 
They are in fact sometimes so attached to the canons and the liturgy 
that they become very upset if changes are made in the words or the 
music or in the traditional order of things.  ...Since it is precisely 
these forms that are responsible for their liberation from chaos, it 
is no wonder that people at this stage become so threatened when 
someone seems to be playing footloose and fancy-free with the rules.

Another thing characterizing the religious behavior of Stage II people 
is that their vision of God is almost entirely that of an external., 
transcendent Being.  They have very little understanding of the 
immanent, indwelling God - the God of the Holy Spirit, or what Quakers 
call the Inner Light.  and although they often consider Him loving, 
they also generally feel He possesses - and will use - punitive power. 
 But once again, it is no accident that their vision of God is that of 
a giant benevolent Cop in the Sky, because that is precisely the kind 
of God they need - just as they need a legalistic religion for their 
governance.

What happens to children when they are raised in a Stage II home 
environment?  They are treated with importance and dignity (and taken 
to Sunday school as well) and that they absorb the principles of 
Christianity as if with their mother's milk - or the principles of 
Buddhism if raised in a Buddhist home, or of Islam if raised in a 
Muslim home, and so on.  The principles of their parents' religion are 
literally engraved on their hearts, or come to be what 
psychotherapists call "internalized".

But once these principles become internalized, such children, now 
usually late-adolescents, have become self-governing human beings.  As 
such they are no longer dependent on an institution for their 
governance.  Consequently they begin to say to themselves, "Who needs 
this fuddy-duddy old Church with its silly superstitions?"  At this 
point they begin to convert to Stage III - skeptic, individual.  And 
to their parents' great but unnecessary chagrin, they often become 
atheists or agnostics.

Although frequently "nonbelievers," people in Stage III are generally 
more spiritually developed than many content to remain in Stage II.  
Although individualistic, they are not the least bit antisocial.  To 
the contrary, they are often deeply involved in and committed to 
social causes.  They make up their own minds and are no more likely to 
believe everything they read in the papers than to believe it 
necessary to acknowledge Jesus as Lord and Savior (as opposed to 
Buddha or Mao or Socrates) in order to be saved.  They make loving, 
intensely dedicated parents.  As skeptics they are often scientists, 
and as such they are again highly submitted to principle.  Indeed, 
what we call the scientific method is a collection of conventions and 
procedures that have been designed to combat our extraordinary 
capacity to deceive ourselves in the interest of submission to 
something higher than our own immediate emotional or intellectual 
comfort - namely, truth.  Advanced Stage III men and women are active 
truth seekers.

"Seek and you shall find," it has been said.  If people in Stage III 
seek the truth deeply and widely enough, they find what they are 
looking for - enough pieces to begin to fit them together but never 
enough to complete the whole puzzle.  In fact, the more pieces they 
find, the larger and more magnificent the puzzle becomes.  Yet they 
are able to get glimpses of the "big picture" and to see that it is 
very beautiful indeed - and that it strangely resembles those 
"primitive myths and superstitions" their Stage II parents and 
grandparents believe in .  At this point they begin conversion to 
Stage IV, which is the mystic communal stage of spiritual development.

...Mysticism also obviously has to do with mystery.  Mystics 
acknowledge the enormity of the unknown, but rather than being 
frightened by it, they seek to penetrate even deeper into it that they 
may understand more - even with the realization that the more they 
understand, the greater the mystery will become.  They love mystery, 
in dramatic contrast to those in Stage II, who need simple, clear-cut 
dogmatic structures and have little taste for the unknown and the 
unknowable.  While Stage IV men and women will enter religion in order 
to approach mystery, people in Stage II, to a considerable extent, 
enter religion in order to escape from it.

"Finally, mystics throughout the ages have not only spoken of emptiness 
but extolled its virtues.  I have labeled STAGE IV communal as well as 
mystical not because all mystic or even a majority of them live in communes 
but because among human beings they are the ones most aware that the whole 
world is a community and realize what divides us into warring camps is 
precisely the 'lack' of this awareness.   Having become practiced at 
emptying themselves of preconceived notions and prejudices and able to 
perceive the invisible underlying fabric that connects everything, they do 
not think in terms of factions or blocs or even national boundaries; they 
'know' this to be one world.

...Perhaps, predictably, there exists a sense of threat among people 
in the different stages of religious development.  Mostly we are 
threatened by people in the stages above us.

...STAGE I people are threatened by just about everything and everybody.  
STAGE II people are not threatened by STAGE I people, the "sinners".  They 
are commanded to love sinners.  But they are very threatened by the 
individuals and skeptics of STAGE III and even more by the mystics of STAGE 
IV, who seem to believe in the same sorts of things they do but believe in 
them with a freedom they find absolutely terrifying.  STAGE III people, on 
the other hand, are neither threatened by STAGE I people nor by STAGE II 
people (whom they simply regard as superstitious) but are cowed by STAGE IV 
people, who seem to be scientific-minded like themselves and know how to 
write good footnotes, yet somehow believe in this crazy God business."

...Much of the art of being a good teacher, healer, or minister 
consists largely in staying just one step ahead of your patients, 
clients, or pupils.  If you are not ahead, it is unlikely that you 
will be able to lead them anywhere.  But if you are two steps ahead, it 
is likely that you will lose them.  If people are one step ahead, we 
usually admire them.  If they are two steps ahead of us, we usually 
think they are evil.  That's why Socrates and Jesus were killed; they 
were thought to be evil.

...An understanding of the stages of spiritual development is 
important for community building.  A group of only Stage IV people or 
only Stage II people is, of course, not so much a community as a 
clique.  A true community will likely include people of all stages.  
With this understanding, it is possible for people in different stages 
to transcend the sense of threat that divides them and to become a 
true community, still recognizing that everyone was in their own stage 
of spiritual development and that it was ** literally all right **.

My experience suggests that this progression of spiritual development 
holds true in all cultures and for all religions.  Indeed, one of the 
things that seems to characterize all the great religions - 
Christianity, Buddhism, Taoism, Islam, Judaism, Hinduism - is their 
capacity to speak to people in both Stage II and Stage IV.  In fact, I 
suspect this is why they are great religions.  It is as if the words 
of each had two different translations.  Let us take a Christian 
example: "Jesus is my savior."  At Stage II this is often translated 
into a Jesus who is a kind of fairy godmother who will rescue me 
whenever I get in trouble as long as I remember to call upon his name. 
And that's true.  He will do just that.  At Stage IV "Jesus is my 
savior" is translated as "Jesus, through his life and death, taught me 
the way I must follow for my salvation."  Which is also true.  Two 
totally different translations, two totally different meanings, but 
both of them true.

"It is also important to remember that no matter how far we develop 
spiritually, we retain in ourselves vestiges of the previous stages 
through which we have come...   

"...Conversions from STAGE I and STAGE II are usually sudden and 
dramatic.  Conversions from STAGE III to STAGE IV are generally 
gradual."

....It is during the process of conversion from STAGE III to STAGE IV 
that people generally first become conscious that there is such a 
thing as spiritual growth.  There is a potential pitfall in this 
consciousness, however, and that is the notion some have at this point 
that they can they themselves 'direct' the process.  ...I believe that 
we cannot get to God under our own steam.  We must allow God to do the 
directing.

In any case, whether sudden or gradual, no matter how different in 
other respects, Stages I to II and Stages III to IV conversions do 
have one thing in common: a sense on the part of the persons converted 
that their own conversions were not something they themselves achieved 
but rather gifts from God.

As a part of the process of spiritual growth, the transition from 
Stage II to Stage III is also conversion.  We can be converted to 
atheism or agnosticism or, at least, skepticism!  Indeed I have every 
reason to believe that God has a hand in this part of the conversion 
process as well.  One of the greatest challenges, in fact, facing the 
Church is how to facility the conversion of its members from Stage II 
to Stage IV without them having to spend a whole adult lifetime in 
Stage III.  It is a challenge that the Church has historically avoided 
rather than begun to face.  As far as I'm concerned, one of the 
greatest sins of our sinful Christian Church has been its 
discouragement, through the ages, of doubt.  In so doing, it has 
consistently driven growing people out of its potential community, 
often fixating them thereby in a perpetual resistance to spiritual 
insights.  Conversely, the Church is not going to meet this challenge 
until doubt is properly considered a Christian virtue - indeed, a 
Christian responsibility.  We neither can nor should skip over 
questioning in our development.

In fact, it is only through the process of questioning that we begin 
to become even dimly aware that the whole point of life is the 
development of souls.  As I said, the notion that we can totally 
direct this development is a pitfall of such awareness.  But the 
beauty of the consciousness that we are all on an ongoing spiritual 
journey and that there is no end to our conversion far outshines that 
one pitfall.  For once we become aware that we are on a journey - that 
we are all pilgrims - for the first time we can actually begin to 
cooperate consciously with God in the process.

That is why Paul Vitz, at a symposium with me, correctly told the audience: 
"I think Scott's stages have a good deal of validity, and I suspect 
that I shall be using them in my practice, but I want you to remember 
that what Scotty calls STAGE IV is the beginning."

More of my story (condensed) - I became a Christian about the age of 
7 or so.  Somewhere in my early teens, I quit going to church because 
it didn't really seem to make a whole lot of sense to me, and 
consequently progressed very quickly into agnosticism.  I believed 
very deeply in God, however I didn't believe a lot of what other 
people were telling me, and in God's name at that.  

The last time I recall opening my Bible was back in my early teens 
around 15 years ago, and that was only because of a 'Bible as
Literature' class in school, and hence put religion on a back burner
...until last May. 

Then this person came into my life and helped me to understand why 
things happened the way they did (in a few problem situations that I 
had lived through a couple years before that).  I was taken aback by 
his kindness and caring, especially since I didn't really know him all 
that well, and yet he went out of his way to help me.  We talked about 
religion one evening and came to the conclusion that there is a 
'higher power' but that we weren't really all that enthused with the 
dogma, the 'thou shalt not's' and all the negative connotations 
associated with organized and fundamentalist-type religion, and the 
doom and gloom scenarios they presented.

For some reason, his kindness triggered some early memories about this 
fellow named Jesus who really didn't know people all that well, but 
went out of his way to help them, to be kind to them, and to love 
them, regardless of what they had done, or had been done to them.

I picked up my Bible again, and opened it to I John 4, and started to 
read it.  There were the words: 

	"Beloved, let us love one another: for love is of God; and
	every one that loveth is born of God, and knoweth God.
	"No man hath seen God at any time.  If we love one another,
	God dwelleth in us, and his love is perfected in us."

And then there were the two New Testament commandments which summed up 
the original 10:

	"Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, with
	all thy soul and with all thy mind.  And the second is like
	unto it, thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself.

It's that simple.  It's all about love.  And it was that night that I
truly understood for the first time what the Bible was really saying. 
There is no 'hellfire and damnation', as some would lead you to
believe.  There is a description of God who loves beyond comprehension
and (depending upon your belief system) sent someone from 'above' to
show us how we could live our lives and evolve into truly loving
beings. 

I did not come to that realization without God in the process - indeed 
C.S. Lewis wrote once that God appears in many different forms and 
through people that love, even without them knowing it, and believe I 
caught a glimpse of the power and intensity of God's love through my 
friend that night.  

Basically, I was propelled by this friend out of skepticism (Stage 3)
and managed to latch onto the bottom rung of Stage 4 (mysticism).  It
was about that same time that I took another look at organized
religion and saw the Jerry Falwells and the Bakkars and other
fundamentalist-types who insisted that you be 'just like they were'
before they would accept you as 'one of their own - a true
Bible-believing Christian' and decided that this sort of thing still
wasn't for me, but then I no longer felt so alone, especially after
reading Peck's books and KNEW that there had to be others like me in
the same position. 

A week later, I managed to stumble into DEJAVU and found a lot of other 
travelers seeking their own understanding of life....just like me, 
but the interesting thing was that they weren't 'just like me'.  They 
were ALL different, and that was literally alright.  I was accepted 
just the same as everyone else was.

I now have the eyes to see the grace and the goodness in the world.  I 
found my way through my friend and through Peck's works.  Other people 
have found their own ways through many different means, but I have to 
believe that it is all the same place that we are trying to get to, 
and that is 'home'.

I hope that by sharing this that others of you will be helped along 
your own paths a little.  It isn't a path of conformity, but a path of 
freedom - the freedom to be yourself and believe in what you can
accept as your own.  It isn't possible to love your neighbor, or God 
without loving yourself first, and you can't love yourself it you have 
someone else telling you how you 'should be', thus denying yourself 
the possibility of knowing yourself and what you are all about.  You
must find your own way - one step at a time.   And it is possible to 
dance along the way and smile and be happy, for that is the way I 
believe God would like us to be.

I don't believe that God has anything to do with the pain and 
suffering that people inflict upon one another in this world.  We all 
have choices.  We can use our hands to hit another, or we can use them 
to shake hands.  When people choose the former, I believe that God 
weeps for the person who is suffering from the pain and that 
miraculously God somehow manages to help that person find the strength 
to cope with the pain, and get on with life.  In the middle of WWII when 
people were being murdered at the hands of others, there were also 
those people who risked their own lives to help shelter those people 
who would otherwise have been killed.  It sometimes takes extreme 
darkness before it is possible to see the intensity of the bright 
light.

In the words of Jesus when he was being crucified, "Forgive them, 
Father, for they know not what they do."  People who inflict pain on 
others, I believe, really do not understand the consequences of their 
actions.  It is all the more important that there be other people 
around to counterbalance this negative energy and show love and
compassion to victims everywhere to stop the cycle of violence and
hatred....and pain, so that they may be able to get on with their own 
lives.

The most amazing thing I've come to realize over these last 6 months
is that love doesn't have to hurt.  It really doesn't.  Love can 
conquer all.

Peace, love and light,

Cindy

    re: .42
    
    	Thank you, Cindy, I agree completely.  In fact, as I was
    	reading your entry I kept thinking that somehow I had
    	typed it and didn't remember doing so!!
    
					Carla

    For further reference, please see "The Idea of the Holy" topic in
    DSSDEV::PHILOSOPHY, which seems to walk a fine line bewteen theism and
    atheism. 

    My father (which is a Southern Baptist minister) told us when we
    where children that we will be christians.  We had no say in the
    matter.  He thought that it was allowable to beat the devil out
    of us.  When I didn't learn my bedtime prayers right (at the age
    of 5), he beat me.  Even after I left home and went into the Air
    Force, he would call my commander to check if I was going to church
    (I had quit).  I got tired of hearing about the God who would punish
    us if we even missed one service at church.  I didn't want to hear
    about how we are born evil and that the devil needs to be beat out
    of us.  After all, we needed correction and It was our dad's
    resposibility to beat out the devil.
    
    Yes, I know there is a god and SHE is a loving Goddess.  She does
    not encourge child abuse.  It has taken me many years for my mental
    scars to heal and I still have a ways to go but with the help of
    my Goddess and my wife, I WILL OVERCOME.
    
    Blessed Be,
    
    PAT

    re .45

    I've also had problems with the concept of a Heavenly Father since
    I was alternately terrified of and angry with my earthy father.  I
    feel a lot more comfortable with a female or even a sexless God.
    I don't believe in a God that hits people with lightning bolts when 
    they make mistakes.

    Mike

First off, I'd like to thank everyone who has posted so far, and also like
to thank Lorenzo for asking the question.  On Friday, I tried to catch up
with the Dejavu notes and stumbled across this topic (with 40 replies at
that point).  I read into the .20's before I had to leave.  I was
overwhelmed with what I read and amazed with the consistency in the beliefs
of everyone, and the similarity to my own.  This is a beautiful topic with 
incredible replies.

What seems to be the common opinion between everyone who has posted regards
the question "What is God".  Our Global society is based on Polytheism, or
the beliefs of many Gods.  You have Catholics, Christians, Jews, Buddhists,
Moslems, etc.  who have different descriptions of God.  There are common
threads to all these beliefs, but there are differences between them as
well.  We are the first generation that can acquire significant knowledge of
all these beliefs.  In doing so, we are questioning all beliefs of God
throughout history, and our own beliefs.

Many of us still believe in a God, for whatever reason we have come up
with.  The belief in God is a personal choice, it can't be forced by
another (or shouldn't be).  But also part of that choice is your answer to
"What is God".  Maybe you believe in a Religion-based God (Christian,
Buddhism, etc.), maybe you believe in a personal definition of a God.
Maybe you believe that you can't describe God the same way you can't
describe love, or life or tranquillity, but can only experience God.

It seems that a common thread in the New Age Belief of God is that
no religion can adequately describe God.  No religion has a monopoly
of truth in regards to God, even though most religions claim they do.  A
relationship with God will vary from person to person and can't be taught
by a religion, or a book, or a ritual.  It has to be learned from the
heart.  Therefore, you may not agree with someone else's description of God,
but you still respect his opinion since his description is just as valid as
yours.  Of course there's one exception to this rule, if someone's belief
in their God allows any form of hatred, violence, or oppression of a fellow
man, _for whatever reason_, then he should be punished for his offensive
acts, *NOT HIS RELIGIOUS BELIEFS*.  I think that is where you draw the line
in the practice of religions.

I do believe in God.  Why?  I donno.  I feel in my heart that he exists and
that's all the reason I need.  I believe that God is an integral part of
the universe and is the ultimate conscious being.  We are a part of him the
same way that cells and organs are part of our body.  (Can you imagine two
cells in your forearm discussing if you exist or not.)  We are made in his
image in a spiritual sense, not a physical one.

    Hi again.
    
         About child beaters, I think it makes total sense to get extremely
    angry, and to do what is necessary to STOP it.  I don't think it's
    bad to judge the beater.  I also don't see what good it does.  What
    I'm getting at is that the emotional response is natural, and makes
    a lot of sense.  It's useful in that it gives us energy to try to
    stop what's going on.  I think that getting righteous about the
    judgement, about getting into the attitude, the stand that the beater
    is WORSE THAN US, that we have a right and a duty to be into judging
    that person, winds up as a way of emotionally profiting from that 
    situation.  Personally, I find it gratifying to find people whom
    I can safely say are worse than me.  That doesn't help the child,
    the child-beater, who really is in misery, or me, when it comes
    right down to it.  I feel a little soap boxish, saying this.  I
    have to admit that I am into emotional profit.
         God isn't male or female, to the exclusion of the other. Both
    of those are limiting concepts that allow our minds to grasp the
    conceptually ungraspable.  That's the limiting concept that I use
    to grasp the conceptually ungraspable.
    Mike
    

If, by mentioning my anger at child abuse in a previous note, I 
introduced a rat-hole here, I'm sorry.  I was using child 
abuse (specifically Kerry's story about his minister 
grandfather beating a five year-old with a poker) as an example of 
something I've always found extremely hard to understand and 
accept in the Christian religion - the idea that we should try 
to love and pray for people who do evil.  On one hand, I know 
that this makes sense - the only way to stop a spiralling 
cycle of hate is to stop hating.  On the other hand, I find 
conscious cruelty so upsetting that I cannot sincerely pray 
for certain people.

I don't think all child abusers are evil people - I'd assume 
most are people who are overwhelmed by having to take care 
of someone else when they don't feel they can even take care 
of themselves, people who strike out at their children without 
much thought.  I don't feel morally superior to such people, 
only an awful lot more fortunate. Those people I have no trouble 
praying for.  But people who self-righteously beat (or in any 
other way are cruel to) those who are helpless are a different 
story.  They both scare me and make me very angry.  And the 
fact that too many do it in Christ's name, makes it worse. 

It seems to me that Christianity today is often 180 degrees
away from the things that Christ really cared about.  
Christianity today seems so concerned with people's sex 
lives, drinking or drug habits (things that don't appear to 
have bothered Christ a whole lot), and not enough concerned 
with trying to stop cruelty.  I know that just getting angry doesn't
do any good, but if more of the churchs would get angry about it and
    make child protection (rather than recruiting new members) their
    priority, that might do some good.
    

    ref. -1.
    
    I think it is not fair to attack Christian religion in one particular
    case.  Although it is true that there are so many bad apple in one
    big basket, it does not mean all apple are bad (sounds like a rat
    hole here).  What you are saying is true that the church lost the
    true teaching of Christ.  How easy everyone forget that in order
    to love people the way Christ love us is to forgive first.
    
    Pointing one's finger is so easier than forgiving what they have
    done.
    
    What I am trying to say is - stop hating is not enough.  To be on
    the positive move, we have to start forgiving.
    

                <<< DMATE2::DUA0:[NOTES$LIBRARY]DEJAVU.NOTE;1 >>>
                             -< Psychic Phenomena >-
================================================================================
Note 553.52                 BELIEVE OR NOT BELIEVE!!                    52 of 52
BUMBLE::KALLAS                                        8 lines  10-NOV-1987 13:20
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
re: .50

    Of course I don't think all Christians are bad and I don't think
    I said that anywhere.  As for forgiveness, I can only forgive
    those who hurt me personally - it's not in my power to forgive anyone
    else for his sins, it is in God's.  I am not really interested in
    punishing or judging anyone - if I point a finger at cruelty to
    children and others who are helpless, it is to call attention to
    the child, not the abuser.  
    

    
    Reading Peck's "People Of The Lie" helped me to understand the evil
    and how it is a vicious cycle which is passed down through the 
    generations.
    
    In the book, he states that "the most difficult thing to come to
    terms with is evil in ones parentage" (or for a few other cases
    mentioned here - grandparentage).
    
    The book also helped me develop a 'model' of a trustworthy personality 
    which helps me to now identify with very little difficulty people I can 
    trust and people I can't trust. 
    
    Cindy 

    Again, again.
         "Spare the rod and spoil the child."  I've always been told
    that's in the bible, 'though I've never looked for it.  Was it Abraham
    who was ready to kill his child because God was testing him?  I
    did start, at one point, to read the bible.  I got the impression
    that God was a being I wouldn't want to meet in a dark alley.  This
    was the being that just destroyed Sodom and the other one that I
    can't spell.  "A wrathful God" is the idea.  More to the point,
    from the old testament, I didn't get the idea that God was good,
    by our current standards.  I got the idea that God was powerful,
    and that he did and caused cruel and nasty things to people that
    ticked him off.  What I'm getting carried away with here is the
    fact that I personally have to just ignore the Old Testament, beacause
    I can't worship a God who's no more than the biggest bully on the
    block.  Part of the message there is that God used violent retribution
    to get God's way.
         The original thing that I started out with here is that we
    have lately defined corporal punishment as evil.  I think I was
    an abused child, if being hit with a belt is wrongful abuse.  Back
    then, I didn't get the impression that being spanked was some horrible
    thing.  It was culturally acceptable, as far as I can remember. Since
    the maxim about the rod is in the bible, I'm reasonably sure that
    it was culturally acceptable at some point in the past.  To make
    this rathole bigger, I'd like to assume that the corporal punishment
    under discussion here is not flagrant abuse--a spanking over the
    knee, let's assume.  Is that evil, to be stamped out of society
    at all cost?  Let's also assume the child is old enough to clearly
    understand why he/she is being punished. Let's also assume that
    other methods have been unsuccessful.
         I know spanking is generally held to be poor parenting these
    days.  Has it gone further than that, that it's now seen as a major
    wrong in society?  I would also like to find out how many 
    people were spanked as children, if people are willing to say.
     (I won't be having any kids, so don't anybody worry about a cycle
    of abuse going on.)
                     Mike

    This "rathole" has gotten so far removed from DEJAVU that it is
    quite impossible to find any correlation to psychic issues.  Would
    it be appropriate to move it to Human_Relations, Soap, or Religion?
    No offense intended... just trying to get things back on track.
    Mary

    
    	I think child abuse has a direct effect on the psychic abilities
    and beliefs of the victims, and so does have somewhat of a place
    within a Dejavu discussion.    Particularly when we are speaking
    of trauma related to religious upbringing.   I believe we see
    some of the effects of such trauma in the anger that occasionally
    sparks in some of these topics.
    
    	Spanking can do good when the child can understand the
    justification for it.    When the justification is lacking
    the child resents it more, and is more psychically damaged.
    The worst type of punishment is where the child is punished
    for beliefs or opinions that would be found acceptable in the
    larger community but which are disapproved of by that particular
    parent.   For example, a child might be justly spanked for hitting a
    playmate or for behaving dangerously near automotive traffic.
    There is *never* (in my opinion) any justification for punishing
    a child for his/her beliefs or opinions.

	I believe that religion and beliefs about God *are* valid
    topics for discussion here.   So many "psychic" events have
    something to do with spirits or events that seem to have an 
    element of divine intervention, that there is an inevitable
    link between the religious realm and the psychic realm.

    	Alan.

    
    	One more note on the connection between beliefs in God,
    child abuse, and psychic phenomena;
    
    	There is an interesting book, "Soul Murder", I can't remember
    the author.  (Peter Schrag?)  The book recounts the history of 
    one of Freud's patients.   He was a man in an insane asylum who 
    suffered from constant visions of "God", whose life seemed a 
    constant torture.    He seemed to believe that "God" was torturing
    him.    Freud's analysis of this man was somewhat superficial, and 
    he missed mentioning one crucial fact, that the author of "Soul
    Murder" brought out, about the man's father.
    
    	The man's father had been an expert on child rearing, and had
    written books on the "proper" training of children.   Many of his
    cruelest methods he had tested on his children.    I seems that
    this man's hallucinations and visions of "God" were actually a
    reliving of tortures his own father had put him through as a very
    young child.    He had repressed the memory of this torture, and
    was experiencing past events as if they were psychic visions
    which were happening to him as an adult.   He hallucinated the
    actions of his own father, believing that these were visions from
    "God".

	Now, I hope you can see why I think this discussion, within
    this one topic, of God, and abusive upbringing, does in fact
    fit within the psychic realm addressed by the Dejavu discussions.
    There are powerful links between what we believe about God, and
    how we were raised.   Our expectations about the universe as a
    whole are probably formed in early childhood, and this effects
    both beliefs in God, as well as the development of psychic abilities.

    	Alan.

Re: .51 .52.

It is very sad "Not One Person Stopped to Help the Horrible Situation".
I am just like all of you, my blood get boiled over such kind of senseless
indifference.  This type of thing seems happened most often in a big city
like New York.  I heard that in such place people kept walking by while
some one crying for help from been mugged, stabbed or raped.  Yea, child
abuse, child beating is another thing showing the cruety of certain
human being ( beast).  What happened to the Jewish people during WWII?
Yesterday, I heard a man buried his dog alive (the dog, a K9, was ordered
to sit in the pit obediently). The dog was in shock when they rescued the dog.
I don't think there will be a solution to all above mentioned human behavior 
until the dooms day.

Meanwhile, what should we do?  Condemn the church organization for not
intervening?  I would not hold my breath to see such thing happen, as I
no longer believe God need people to organize for him. I remember reading 
about the karmic effect in this world that some one is deaf because his 
past life had heard the distressed call and did not give a hand.  Someone 
was born blind because his parents have sin?  No, it was because he saw 
something he could have done to save another life but he kept walking.  
Sorry I brought up the karmic theory and the reincarnation concept again, 
it is the only way the holy script can be explained.  As you said, we can
not punish or judge the child beater with our own hand. Neither we are in
the position of granting forgiveness for what he have done unto the others.  
I will not waste my time trying to preach him the words of compassion.
To get out of this rat hole, back to the topic, I believe all of us in this
world have a special mission of each own.  We have a life time to learn
how to live, to love...with each other.  

All in all, we have to forgive in order to love. This has to be done beginning
from each individual.  That is, before we shovel the other people's driveway,
we have to shovel our own driveway first. :-).

Now, where was I in the rat hole...still in my own driveway (snowed last
night).  Do we have to discuss psychic issue here? Did I mention "psychic"? 
								   |8-)...	

    Of course you mentioned a psychic issue... dejavu... you will
    experience it when you go to shovel your driveway tonight_:-)

    > This type of thing seems happened most often in a big city like
    > New York.
    
    I think that the key word here is "seemed".  Public indifference
    to others, particularly strangers, is, I'm afraid, ubiquitous. 
    It is more likely to happen in places like NY because,
    
    	1) There are simply more people there. (There are 8 million
    	   stories in the Naked City, here's one of them).
    
    	2) The conditions for this to happen -- violence in a crowd
    	   of strangers -- is more likely to occur (mostly the crowd
    	   of strangers part).
    
    We are also more likely to hear about it, since it fits with
    stereotypes of cities in general and New York especially, because
    it makes people from elsewhere feel superior (sure that they would
    have done something) and because New Yorker's themselves like the
    image of being tough "veterans" for simply having lived in the city.
    
    The reason I'm making a point of this (besides having been born
    in NY and raised just outside it) is that this kind of "labeling"
    allow people to dismiss this as not likely to be a part of their
    lives (the same point for Nazi attrocities).  Any of us could be
    the victim in a case like this *anywhere*, and any of us, unless
    we've experienced could suddenly discover that *we* are one of the
    stunned bystanders to conflicted to act (I wish to God I *knew*
    how I would act, and I hope to God that I never have the opportunity
    to find out -- at least in a really serious situation).
    
    					Topher

    I share the same feelings as worded in 553.5
    
    There has GOT to be a God....the proof is all around you.
    

    
    Re.62
    
    Can't believe I wrote .5 almost 9 years ago now.  Thanks for pointing
    it out.  (;^)
    
    Cindy

    Re: the last couple...   These notes conferences are interesting. 
    Maybe we think we have evolved in the last 8 or 10 years and that stuff
    written back then is no longer valid.  If you were in the conference
    back then, I think you (we) knew a lot and had good basis in life
    experience to have valuable contributions.  
    
    I don't find a lot of love and compassion in teachings or doctrines
    which say one's status within a given religion is improved by beliefs
    or actions which are detrimental to others.  I can't subscribe to blind
    faith and am suspect of an all loving god who requires it.   I guess I
    do have blind faith in the fact that our known universe has laws and
    structure that work.  
    
    During this time of the year, public TV stations are back on the fund
    raising trail and playing some specials.  Makes me want to ask: 
    Anybody want to argue about Depak Chopra again?
    
    Grins,
    Bob

    
    Re.64
    
    About stuff I wrote earlier not applying - actually not, at least in
    this case.  What I wrote in .5 still very much applies. 
    
    Cindy

    Cindy, I think almost all of your notes I've read are very good.

    
    Why thank you.  (;^)
    
    Cindy