A friend of mine has regular bible studies at his house. I’ve known this couple for a few years and they never struck me as the in-your-face-Christians that seem to be all the rage these days.
So, it kind of caught me off guard when he told me that he leads bible studies and was a youth pastor in their church and did I want to come by sometime for bible study.
He asked again tonight and I had something come up, so I couldn’t.
But if I didn’t….would I have gone?
I really don’t know.
I’m not necessarily an atheist. I do believe that there is energy…a force…a will, if you will, that is greater than what we normally tap in to as humans. Not sure if that makes me some kind of theist…agnostic…or what.
I think Jesus was a great teacher. I think he had some good ideas.
I think the same about Buddha. And Eckhart Tolle. And Wayne Dyer. And Richard Bachman.
I don’t have a problem with Christianity per se.
I have a big ass problem with organized religion. Organized religion has always been, at its core, a way to keep a large group of people in line. I don’t really feeling like stepping on any toes right now…I’m just clearing the cognitive cobwebs tonight. I know that churches and other religious groups do help people–sometimes. Almost as many people as they wind up hurting–sometimes. And if you go to a service and get the spiritual fuel you need, then cool. I wish you well.
My problem is…I’ve seen behind the curtain. There’s nothing quite like working on a media production team of a church to realize how finely choreographed the service actually is. It’s like when Dorothy actually sees the ‘Wizard’ behind the curtain. She can no longer believe in the Great and Powerful Oz.
Thing is…she didn’t go out and ruin it for the Lollipop Guild. They still believe in the Great and Powerful Oz. Dorothy just gained a different perspective. She had gone a different path, so to speak.
And I guess that’s what it’s really about, isn’t it? Paths.
I’m not quite prepared at this point in my life to say that there is no God.
However, I am prepared so say that there is no complete understanding of God and that most of what people know about ‘God’ has been by and largely influenced by the machinations of humankind.
To me there has to be a string theory for ‘the higher power.’ Physics has its M-theory. Is there a G-Theory for God?
I don’t know.
I think, though, in my heart of hearts that there has to be.
The other side of the coin is this. If there IS some kind of theory or proof of the true nature of God, will people be ready to accept it? If the neighbor you’ve secretly hated for years because he’s Hindi and all those heathen non-Christians are going to hell suddenly becomes your brother under this new theory and principle of God. Could you accept that?
The ‘system’ of religion thrives on divisiveness. Don’t like the Catholics? Come to the Methodists. Not enough structure for you? Come to the Lutherans.
It doesn’t make sense to me that this book, one single book, could spawn over 40,000 denominations of Christianity. How does that happen? Good question.
Clearly its written in such a way that interpretation has something to do with it.
It still boggles my mind. That’s just Christianity. That’s not even counting the different flavors and splinters of the other major religions.
That’s way too much of a variance for me to say ‘I’m right, and you’re wrong.’
Again…just clearing the mental dust bunnies. I know in my heart what the key is…the rosetta stone of this puzzle…but I don’t know that this forum is the best outlet for it. I think perhaps a book would be a better venu.
We shall see.
Right now, though, I’m a little too…meh….to continue with this train of thought. Not sure what’s flowing in the undercurrents below my consciousness, but something tells me I’ll be busy in my Dreamland workshop.
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Speaking of my workshop…(worst segue ever)
I’ve notice that since I don’t really have FB anymore to feed the links to people, the number of people that regularly read the posts has been declining to about the 10 people I expect.
It’s not enough of a reason for me to go back to FB…just an observation.
Alright. Time to sign off for now.
-A.T.
Todd Skaggs Writes 