Biochemistry or Spiritual Experience

This was pulled from the “Are you evil” thread.

Don’t get hung up on the wording that’s used here, but I felt the “evil” thread was both the wrong place for my thought and too far past this comment to bring it back up.

Many hold this concept, or the other way around.
I have always wondered why they both aren’t the case.
One is a method (biochemistry), and the other is a result (spiritual experience).

As an example;

If I put copper wire to two batteries, the use of the copper does not negate that I wanted my race car to move forward.
If I put springs, cog wheels, and weights together with glass and metal, then I can make a clock; the use of springs, cog wheels, and weights does not negate that I wanted to be able to tell time.
If I put biochemical reactions into humans, the use of biochemistry does not negate spiritual authenticity.

Science can tell us “how”, “why”, something in nature is setup, as well as sometimes, “what for”, but that doesn’t negate a given reason or a given belief for a given setup’s existence and function.

Therefore, just because there are biochemical reactions in humans, does not mean that your personal belief in a spiritual connection is nullified, as biochemistry is not capable of negating a believed reason that we have the biochemistry.

It is only capable of telling us some Scientific reasons why we do have biochemical reactions.

You’re right, I don’t think the spiritual connection is nullified. I think where most of the nonreligious folks start having a problem is when additional assumptions are added on top.

For instance:

My brain has a chemical reaction, which induces a spiritual experience. Okay so far. The spiritual experience could be my connection to something beyond our understanding that cannot be measured by science. All good so far. That something is a God who loves me, will judge the wicked, designed the earth, co-authored a holy book, sent his son to earth, etc…wait, what? How does one reach such conclusions based on the spiritual experience?

I think that the initial jump from logical deduction from probability reliant on science into the realm of pure belief is the first and only point in belief that matters.

If you think about it, any belief after this jump point is simply a logical deduction with a given assumed that is the same as the jump point.

That is to say, that in the realm of logical deduction, whereby we are comparing a holder of a given belief system against a holder of no belief system, then it is aimless for the holder of no belief system to discuss logical deduction with the holder of a belief system if the conversation is about an extension of logic by the holder of a belief system that assumed the holder of the belief system’s jump point.

Those extended logical deductions, and their respective debates, make sense only if everyone involved assumes the same jump point.
Every logical deduction about an extension of logic that a holder of a belief system has that assumes a jump point will inevitably return to a conversation about the logical deduction of the jump from the logical deduction from probability on science into the realm of pure belief; caused by the introduction of the holder of no belief.

So while the logical deductions that lead to “a God who loves me, will judge the wicked, designed the earth, co-authored a holy book, sent his son to earth, etc…” seems incomprehensible to any among us that hold no belief, it is only because any among us that hold no belief are stopped by the original jump point.

We want to know how Hitler ever read Nietzsche to mean Hitler should kill all the Jews.

Jump point.

My guess is that’s because – and this applies only to true ‘believers’, not mindless followers – the ‘jump’ can only be inspired by subjective experience, something like a personal ‘revelation’ or otherwise unexplainable event. Nobody else is going to understand that particular experience, although there’s no shortage of such ‘experiencers’ who are persuasive in terms of getting others to believe it represents some supernatural reality revealed only through surrendering one’s disbelief in it in the first place.

Ugh. Exploring this sort of thing in much depth makes me crazy.

So wait, are you saying that you only need to take one leap of faith, and then the rest are logically deducted conclusions?

Sorry if I slaughtered the point you were trying to make.

It’s possible, yes.
But it’s also possible to make multiple jumps, but all further jumps rely on that initial jump.

The most important jump therefore, however, is that first one, as all other jumps or logical deductions fall back to that first jump.

(I refer to it as a jump, or jump point, rather than a leap of faith, because it is not always a move of faith, but it is always a gap in logic. Even if both sides of the jump gap are perfectly logical, the leap between the two logical sides is not.
The reason I do not count all jump point’s as leap’s of faith is because plenty of jump points are made in fear, which is not faith; it is fear.)

Pretty much.

However, I don’t exactly see it as an experience in the way of suggesting an event to cause the jump.

“Spiritual Intuition” seems to be the best way of describing these things.

A feeling by which a decision is made without any necessary due diligence.

When did you leap?
And in what kind of situation?
(What prompted you for the leap?)

And what is the core of your faith?

Probably when I was 11 years old.

I forgot my wallet at a youth basketball court and realized this after everyone had left and it was locked up; to which, in desperation I dropped down to a knee and prayed probably the purest prayer I’ve ever spoken for help from God that I could get my wallet to avoid being beaten when I went home.

No sooner than I had stood up than a truck pulled up, driven by the adult that had done the lock-up. They had forgotten their coat.

Fear of pain.
Mind you, we’re talking about a belt and swats by an always sober father. Not punches by a drunk or drug induced father.
However, to mind at 11, there was no difference.

The core of my personal faith is simple.

God exists.
I practice Christianity for no other reason than the fact that I was born in America.
Had I been born in Japan, there is a far greater chance I would practice both Buddhism and Shintoism.
I cannot practice something counter to Christianity because it would cause spiritual dissonance as I attempt to reason the unreasonable to counter my upbringing.

Since I place no weight in which religion I follow, I accept Christianity as my vessel of meditating on my spiritual self; the inner peace and communion.

For that reason, I do not place faith in sect theology, but only my theology based entirely on my intuition with an aim of spiritual peace and using the examples of great representations of living beyond the requirement of being human (Gandhi, Siddhartha, Jesus, and the Dali Lama, are among my highest examples to follow.)

I do not define God personally, nor do I have interest in doing so personally. By way of reason, if God exists, then God defines me; I do not define God.

I don’t bother to try to explain quandaries to myself about God, as I find the point is mute since the point of personally believing in something is ultimately to strive to become a better person in tune with the surroundings and with respect for them as they deserve.

And the point of doing this, is to find unity and sanity in mind where otherwise reason would cause insanity from shear over analytical deconstruction.

I see the relationship of faith and reason the same as sleep and awake.
You sleep so to refresh, among other things, your mind to be ready.
So to, for me, you have faith for meditation and peace to refresh your mind for reasoning.

It is far easier to hand over the job of determining the universe to God for a while so that I can refresh myself to go back and attempt to determine it once again.

Thank you for the detailed response.
I think I do understand some aspects of your faith and I can write if yoou are interested in seeing my perspectives.

However, I’m not writing it right away because it may touch your core belief and it can be uncomfortable for you (and your family if it affects you a lot).

If you still want to hear what I saw, please let me know. We can do it via private message as well, if you prefer. (I have personal experiences a bit similar to yours, but my interpretation has been different)
Otherwise, I’ll simply thank you again for providing another information that helped me to learn more about myself and others. I appreciate a lot your frank posting style.

Also, if you are relatively new to internet forum like this, you may want to note that it can be draining to participate in many threads, time wise and emotionally, as well.
I’m sure you know you can learn as much (if not more) by spending time with your kid(s) and loved one, compared to a forum discussion.

By all means, write away.

Your welcome, and thank you.

Oh-ho no. I’ve been around forums for a very long time. I even run a very small community, and have ran a few forums in the past.
I just happen to have extra time on my hands at the moment because I can’t work.
Instead of going crazy from doing nothing with my brain (I’m normally a tech support trouble-shooter, and I can’t shut my brain down as a regular pattern of life easily), that I would go looking for a forum on philosophy to spend time keeping my brain’s logic muscles in shape for when I go back to work. (“The little grey muscles are hard at work”, as Poirot would say.)
That said, I’ll probably be sticking around for a while after I go back to work, just probably less often.

A pretty close to accurate list of my other online existences is listed in my Wikipedia profile.

I love my kids and my wife. They teach me unparalleled amounts more than any other people on earth in my life.
And I don’t ever want them to stop teaching me.

OK. Here we go.

I think you were young. Were you well developed, as far as logical thinking goes?
It might be a factor in forming the faith.

I guess there was another factor for connecting the event to “God”, rather than sheer luck, angel, your dead ground father (or whoever) watching for you, a magic, a demon trying to entice you, and so on.

Personally, I simply take these as a luck. And I have been very lucky.
If I follow your way of seeing things, I am loved by your God very much. :slight_smile:

But also, I think these things happen because this world is fluid/plastic and anything can happen (within certain limitation) and things happen according to our desires to some degree.
In fact, most of my desires have been come true, including those I wasn’t aware.
Sometime, it came instantly, while some of them took many years.
I guess it depends on the purity and intensity of desire, on the conjuncture with environment and others.

So, I tend to see that you are attributing your luck (or simple mechanism of the world) to the God, which you are avoiding to define.

And your God is characterized by the protection, protecting your ass from your father.
I think it’s made up of your repulsion and fear against your father and yearning toward dependable protective figure (which is a partial mirror image of your father).
It’s a substitute (and idealized) image of father you wanted but you didn’t have.

Probably, “God” was something strongest, biggest thing that can possibly protect you, in your consciousness (or subconsciousness), that it was chosen to be the representation of your hope and as the dependable ground for the peace of your mind.

Maybe, it can be more natural for you to say “something is protecting/caring us” instead of bringing up “God”, since you don’t bother about the definition.

But we don’t need to seek protection when we feel safe without alone, and we are ready for the death/destruction.

Also, there is the problem of defining your God. Although you try to justify the lack of clarity, I would call your faith as a “blind faith” since you don’t know exactly what is your God.

Even though you try to avoid defining it, what it did was evident. And I guess you expect your God to save your ass under certain condition like if you are pure or if you can wish it honestly.
By the action you attribute to it and by your expectation, we can see the definition of your God.

Probably, it was more convenient to keep the definition vague because it means you had to become aware about the uncertain and blind nature of your faith and also loosing the comfort of (imaginary) protector.

What is the most important quality for being “better” ?

Well, I thought I might go insane or suicide a few times when I was a kid and soon after I became really aware of nothingness as my nature, but I got used to live without (imaginary) ground/figure I can depend on.

I think most of elements that might cause mental instability is coming from stupid common sense and religious/cultural imprints.

For example, in many societies, we see the tendency to think something useless SHOULD NOT exist.
And I guess many people did suicide precisely because of this, when they discovered that there is no objective value, aim, purpose of anything including ourselves, logically speaking.
Religious and many non-religious people cheat on the logical answer and stick on imaginary value/purpose, but we can be happy without any idea of self worth, too.

The tendency to seek the value and purpose of self is probably coming from the development of our brain. I think we developed our brain because we are relatively weak animal. And it developed by memorizing and comparing/conceptualizing different matters.
I guess it has innate tendency to seek effectiveness and efficiency in our action, and the evaluation is stored as “value”, while the typical use would be recognized as the “purpose”.

If we don’t stop it halfway, analytical deconstruction doesn’t cause insanity, IMO.
It may cause insanity or other symptoms including suicidal intentions and the actual act when it left basic imprints and tendencies of our mind (and the existence) intact.

Oh, I see.
I was a bit worried seeing your increased activity.

I am a specialist in trouble shooting, myself.
In the aviation industry, I learned trouble shooting of mechanical things, as well as our own thought and action (and that of colleagues and students).
I worked as a programmer and then support specialist in computer industry, too.
I also did none/half/fully paid administrator and moderator of different forums/sites.

And I apply debugging/troubleshooting skill on myself, mostly. :slight_smile:

No, I was pretty nieve in general. A very wide-eyed idealist.
That’s one of the big reasons I later hit bottom so hard.

At that time, sure.
Didn’t last long though.

Either or, everyone takes these things as they need to for their own stability.
Some need to believe something else was in control, that they were payed attention to.
Well, more appropriately, they need to feel the supernatural.
Supernatural is addicting, I will say that. It’s very similar to the toxicity of Love.

Evangelical Christianity and African Tribal religion’s are a good example of this addiction.

Others find more unrest in thinking that something else is in control.
In the sense that it causes more conflicts in their mind that it aids in resolving.
Or rather, it causes more disrupt than peace.

Some are not ready to be alone.
Some are not ready to be accompanied.

Either may never be ready for the other.

Absolutely.

Precisely.

They are the same thing in my book.
I don’t bother to figure out what to call it as a final determinant.
I don’t bother to thank God for a direct thing, or give God direct credit for something anymore.

I have no idea where God may or may not directly step in, if God even does so, which I also don’t know.
I simply thank God for experience and the life I live and learn from.

My concept of God at 11 was, but not now.
I have grown tremendous amounts since I was 11 years old, in brief and example: I rejected the existence of God at one point, then redefined God several, several times as I changed multiple religions after leaving the thought that God didn’t exist.

Point is, my faith today is no where near the same faith I had then.

It was, absolutely.
That’s one of the reasons that I later rejected everything; because I observed too many convenient needs by myself for what I was believing in such detail.
I had, more or less, chiseled out a divine father.

Probably was; I don’t think I looked at my early faith in that angle in retrospect.

Hmm…not quite.
I would say that you are right, I think it easier to say that for many people, however, that is not my reasoning.

I do not define God because I have done so many times in many ways.
Any time that I have done so has done nothing productive for my self other than provide a method by which I can discourage myself because I determine that I am still not correct in my assumptions.

I stirred about this in logical format for quite a few years trying to determine how it would be that I could possibly define God in a manner that I could not find logical fault in the construct of.
Eventually I determined that the concept is impossible for two reasons:

  1. God is a thing that is beyond my comprehension by which I only see the results of. I could not sooner define God than my Cat could define a Tuna factory.
  2. Any definition that I may construct would be to place God in my likeness, my biases, my shortcomings, and my approvals. If God caused a creation, then it would be highly unlikely that the result of God’s creation would be that which defines God by the creations construct of it’s comprehension.
    My wife did not have a child that will turn around and define what my Wife is and therefore cause my wife to be exactly that as an absolute. The definition will only be subjective. The complete character of my Wife is beyond our child.

Since I am not interested in my perspective of God, but God itself, then I have no interest in my subjective definition of God.

Therefore, I do not define God.
Rather to say, I personally attempt to define God very, very minimally and never share my concepts that I do define to any person as they are completely useless to any other person.

I do suppose and propose many definitions of God and construct many perspectives of God when talking to others as it pertains to the conversation in a method of showing an alternative vantage than may be taken, for consideration, to include my own.
I do the same with the Theology of God, namely in the Christian theology, but I have others that I can discuss, however no one really discusses God as a concept (or the divine spirit, insert whatever here, etc…) very much from a Wicca, Druid, Buddhist concept of things in the western culture.

I don’t think I’ll ever be ready for death.
And I mean that in this sense.

If God holds a heaven by which I am taken to after death, I would beg to come back.

Earth is far greater to me than any construct we have attempted to define as an alternative, and I will never be ready to leave this wonderful and surprising place.

I suppose, but I arrived at the lack of by my own logic of finding fault in defining.
I consider “Blind” to be the acceptance that all things are because of God without considering any other option and giving no credit to oneself, or others as deserved.

If I get over being sick, God healed me.
Maybe, but that’s just a bit extreme to assume.

If I suddenly win the lottery, God made it so.
No idea, but again, seems a bit difficult to reason out.

God watches over my every life changing moment.
Maybe, but do you really want that? That’s kind of limiting.

I don’t act on my belief because I believe in God.
I believe in God, and also aspire to live well as a human being in the eyes of fellow human beings.
The rest is completely guess work.

Absolutely not.
To assume so in my book is to assume that you have power over God, or that you have summoning conditions with God.

I don’t pray for anything like that.
I don’t actually pray like that, to be more specific.

I pray like some meditate. I strive to commune in spiritual tune with God.
That is my only ability of determining spiritual truth personally.
Listening to discord and tune; intuition.

My kids can do this with people. They can determine someone that isn’t healthy in mind; they tend to not like them. Their intuition causes them to fear the person.

Similarly, for whatever reason unknown to me, I have a type of intuition that I recognize is there that allows me to feel when I hear, see, or sense something as false in it’s presentation of pure commune to the spiritual harmony.

And I believe that this spiritual harmony is what is needed to find peace within oneself and be capable of tuning to the spiritual peace of God.
Buddhist’s consider this the attempt at listening to everything and nothing within the soul.

Probably not, by many of the reasons above described.

At one time, this did result, in part, to a very long and large break down of my spiritual belief system, so this used to be somewhat accurate.
Now, however, because I have rebuilt my spiritual belief system up from nearly nothing, it is far different than one would suppose from that account of an afraid 11 year old boy.

Regardless of religious taste, striving to be a more complete and self-aware human with the fullest respect you can gain for all that is around you has never struck me as a bad concept, and instead one that seems commonly valued to strive for.
This is what I call the “better person”.

I suppose I meant metaphorically.
Spirituality is a nice counterbalance to reason.

It’s like being a mathematician and a jazz musician.

Mental illness typically comes from trauma and genetic predispositions; commonly the mix of the two.

That doesn’t make sense to me, as anything that exists is useful; if you do not see a use, then you are not the one that needs it.

No idea, but depression usually plays a roll somewhere in suicide cases, either before or after a climax that leads up to the suicide.
And depression is the inability to place valued perspective on the exact, and only capable of seeing the overwhelming mass of the “everything” that cannot be examined and made sense of.

I would say in the concept of theological metaphysics, that even the concept of no self worth would be a value; as Buddhism strives for, to simply be.

Sounds pretty reasonable. I haven’t studied the anthropological studies of the evolution of the human brain, but that sounds reasonable.

Seems to be.

I know that a screw driver is valuable if I need to work with screws, and therefore the purpose of a screwdriver is to work with screws.

I don’t think it does exactly, but I feel that constant over examination without a rest will lead to some problems.

I agree, typically a mind is only capable of producing what it is capable of producing.
If it is capable of developing a notion of suicide, then it will be reviewed in those circumstances that produce the thought more prevalently.

Ditto.

Hope that helps.

Yeah, idealists are known to sink deeper.
Honest one and those with stronger sense of responsibility/moral may go even deeper. :smiley:

What’s the current factors in keeping a faith?
I don’t think you need it much, compared to many other people.

You listed your desire for community type acticity, for example.
But you can get it almost anywhere. It doesn’t have to be in religious community.

I find everything “natural”, including what people consider as “supernatural” or “miraculous”.
I think we have a strong tendency to make a story bigger than it is.
And making the God bigger is done with the same mechanism, most probably.
Probably Jewish God was just a middle-eastern local God. And then magnified, glorified, spoiled like a commercial for a hollywood movie. :slight_smile:

As long as the “separation”/“division” appears as real, we are alone accompanied by everything else.
Now, if your God can be cut into two or more pieces, you can be accompanied by it.
If God can’t be divided, then it’s impossible.

Well, in my case, since I don’t see the mechanism as “benefactor” nor “an entity/personality”, I don’t thank it.
I even think that it’s a kind of trap to maintain this reality type illusion.

And using the term God has subconscious influences in the way you see things, most probably.
And it can create blind spots.

I see. :slight_smile:
What is your concept of God, now?

Also, have you overpowered your dad, later?
I mean did you let your father know that he couldn’t terrorize you by force any more?

I think you are simply avoiding to making your definition clear.
I mean, you know what your God does and doesn’t (in your perspective).
Although you are choosing not to write it down, it’s there in your concept, thought, attitude, feeling, etc.

You didn’t come up with satisfactory definition in the past probably because your conscious and subconscious concepts of God had contradictory elements, just like the God in bible has many contradictions.

If you write down all elements of your God, or your idea/concepts of your God, you will see your desires.
Just like the desires for protection (or ideal father) at 11 years old, your God is amalgam of many desires/ideals, IMO.

Even if you think your God is beyond your comprehension, (mostly subconsciously) you are attaching different attributes to God when you talk.
It means (at least subconsciously) you are talking God as you comprehend, and thus it’s not true that you don’t/can’t comprehend your God.
If you want to be 100% honest with the unknowable nature of the God, all you can/should/would say is “I don’t know” and you don’t even name it “God” because it’s something simply “unknown”.

And the definition of your God is important for you because it shows what you want. By avoiding to define your God, you are actually avoiding (or missing the chance) to see what you termed as “my likeness, my biases, my shortcomings, and my approvals”.

I think you have constructed a compact armor that would allow you to defend your perspectives without the risk of showing the most touchy part (and possibly with full of contradiction).

It’s not a so bad, compared to other defense armor I’ve seen.
But just like any forceful justifications, It’s too weak for logical examinations.

“Wonderful” and “surprising” with all suffering that goes with?
Or wonderful and surprising when you don’t see suffering?

If it’s so wonderful, how do you feel about dying and the fear of death (in any sense)?

And it can mean that it was God who made you sick, unless you are ready to take responsibility of all negatives and give all credit to God.

Once, I won a lottery, not a big amount, just over 12,000$. And I knew I would win (my wife knew, too, as she is a bit sensitive, as well). So, we were not surprised, at all, even though my wife jumped from her seat with joy hearing the news.
It was my birthday. :smiley:

I was talking about the your faith when you were 11 years old, as you mentioned it was the “purest prayer”.

But I see your current attitude toward prayer.

In my case, what I sense is the “awareness” and “emptiness” (and fake logic, when I feel like).

I’m not so sure about the Buddhist part, since there are so many variations.

And since you are seeking harmony and peace, I guess you don’t have enough harmony nor peace, currently.
When we have enough and satisfied, we don’t need it anymore, unless both the need and the satisfaction are periodical/temporary.

Yeah. Now, I see the lack of clear definition as the design feature of your defense armor.

Why did you have to rebuild?
What was wrong with “nearly nothing”?

Then, you may want to be aware of why you need your God and your defense armor.

Oh, I see.

Here, I think I was talking about people without predisposition for mental illness such as you mentioned, but I didn’t specify. Sorry.

Anything can be seen as useful IF we take a perspective that evaluate usefulness.
Without certain arbitrary perspective, usefulness can’t be evaluated.

Also, you are contradicting by saying “anything that exists is useful”, first, and then talking about the case in which there is no use.

I was talking about the eventuality when we see the worthlessness (in the absolute sense, since any “worth” in relative).
If we see logic as relative, I think it’s a natural conclusion.

I guess you are talking about conscious (and subconscious) illusions of self-worth used as the decorative joint of our self defense mechanism.
They can’t stay around if we really understand relative nature of any evaluation.

Well, then I will adjust a bit. :slight_smile:
If we don’t stop it halfway (taking a rest, when needed), analytical deconstruction doesn’t cause insanity, IMO.

Thank you. I still don’t understand exactly why you need (or prefer) to buy religious package product, but I think it’s getting closer.

OK, this is getting extremely LONG.

So I’ll cut it up and we can try to keep going from a summary standpoint.

In short,

  1. you pose that my lack of definition of God is most probably a defense armor
  2. you don’t understand why I have an interest in practicing religion
  3. you wanted to know why I had to rebuild my faith
  4. you view all as inevitably worthless due to perspective

If there’s anything specific, just let me know and I’ll respond to that specific item.
I just feel that the quoting was getting really lengthy and causing too many fractions.

OK

  1. In a way, absolutely. It’s defense against myself. Even when I logic and reason a lack of probability in God, I still feel that there is, none-the-less, God.
    I can’t say that a bunch of text written and compiled in any given religion has the description that I can say has felt right.
    In fact, reading anything theological that describes God seems to bother the hell out of me outside of general theological conversation.
    That said, I still feel that God is.

I use the name God because it is a name that I know the concept by, and it is far more relatable to myself than “super uber thing of stuff I can’t explain but feel”.
I definitely feel that something in the Judaic-Christian concept of God seems to ring a chord with me, but I cannot identify exactly what.

However, the audacity that Christianity takes in the detailed lengths they go to define God while holding on to fully well known writing that is not directly from God, but claiming it to be, is really offensive to me.
Or the idea that it was preserved by some divine care is also b.s. when multiple translations have created completely different theological sects of the same belief.

That’s not preservation.

In the end, if you wanted a Pepsi commercial version of what I’m about, it would be this:
I have no idea what God is, but I feel that God is.
I am my worst destroyer of my thoughts on God, and since I can neither find anything that I agree on, or figure it out on my own, but still feel that God is, I choose to simply accept that God is and stop there.

In another way, you could say that I reasoned my self a fuckup.
I tried to reason God, and ended up finding that I couldn’t, which meant that I shouldn’t accept God.
That said, I found that I still felt God was real even without my ability to define God.
However, just because I did believe in God, I ended up reasoning (through much difficulty of searching) that I did not need to accept the theology of any creed.

So I stand alone quite often.
I believe in God.
I cannot define God myself.
I cannot accept any definition I have read.

God just is, and I choose to simply accept that and leave it alone.

This is why you will never see me defend why God must or must not be, but will see me engage in theological conversations about the nature of God all the way to the core concepts of God.

I have considered many, many concepts of God, but I can’t find any that seem fitting.

  1. I like to surround myself with people that are believing in a good force and concentrate on extending good by their belief. I look for the congregation that has the least discord within itself as a unit.
    At this point, the group that best fits this description is the LDS, and since I care little about theology, I don’t really care if I agree with their creed.

I’m a theological chameleon.

I only need religion because I need the surrounding.
I do not hold that religion contains the gateway to God.

  1. It’s probably obvious why I had to rebuild my faith at this point; I personally need faith because I cannot remove the intuition that God exists.
    I absolutely think that there is far too much confusion, manipulation, and misrepresentation to ever get an accurate picture of God on any scale, but I still believe that God exists.
    Since I do, I needed to compile my thoughts about God.

What I ended up with, instead, was re-evaluating the methodology by which we choose to define God and participate with God in our lives.
The only constant that I have found in all of my time, other than my feeling that God exists, is that religion is a great body to examine many ways to get in the way of your spiritual intuition by engaging your mind with mass amounts of justifications and religion is also a great body to examine many ways to shut down the mind and listen to your spiritual intuition (or listen to anything else that could be desired; sometimes this is dangerous feature of religion).

What I wanted, and sought, was a church (because of my social bias toward western Judaic-Christianity) where the “worship” was not a sermon.
I do know that I do not want to hear the words of a man or woman talking about how to interpret God, or how God is and is not, and what is sin and what is not, what is evil, and what is not, etc… when I am looking at being among other humans and worshiping.
I do know that when I want to go to theological study, that is easy, but when I want to go to worship my belief…that’s difficult, as everyone keeps talking.
I often wish that Christianity would contain a form whereby a temple existed that masses visited collectively for silent prayer and occasioned in hymn.

That, unfortunately, does not exist.
Again, the closest I have found is the LDS church.

And you would again, question why would I then choose to go.

A funeral is far more embracing in saturation by multitude.
A basketball game is more riled by the multitude.
So to, the religious experience is enhanced when among others.

In a way, I suppose it could be seen as religious leeching.
But we are pack animals by nature, and it appears that this fact is also evident in producing satisfying religious experiences.
Even if I do not agree with a shred of the theology, the mass seems to produce more satisfying levels of my experience than I will get as a worship alone.

Now, it should be explained that I divide things a bit personally.
Worship - This is my concept where we are attempting to praise in some fashion, or concentrate on the good force of our belief. To rid all thought and bask in our belief only.
Meditation - This is my concept of pondering what you feel morally or intrinsically about given aspects of your life with and without respect of your belief.
Listening - This is what most would probably call meditation, I call prayer and I call it listening (the two are the same word in my mind). It is the personal shut down of everything possible to listen to your focused belief. To listen to your God, not in words, but in feeling the you and the world around you.
Study - This is just simply the study of theology

I say these so that it can be understood what I mean when I talk about worshiping among others and alone.
I have found that I can pray/listen alone, but it is difficult to worship alone.

Therefore, what started as an attempt to define my theology so that I could find the theology I agreed with, ended with a theology regarding theology.

I am not done, by any means, but I have collected an interesting amount of information that I have found successful for myself.

  1. You are right in stating that everything ends up as perspective as far as we have concern to bother with. However, I cannot say that it’s meaningless as the experience is the meaning; the answer is often not the meaning.

For instance, you do not ride a roller-coaster to find out where it ends, or to find out what will happen when you get off of it.
You ride it to enjoy the ride.

In humans, an experience appears to be the most impactful thing we come in contact with in our lives, not answers and not thoughts.
Thoughts and answers can inspire experiences and be meaningful because of this, but with out that cause of an experience, they are fairly useless themselves.

That’s where I find meaning. In living the experience. I don’t really care about getting answers; I just find it enjoyable to look at puzzles.

[after note]
You asked about my relationship with my father.
He and I get along now.
It’s a very complicated mess, but we do get along now.

Stomps

You’re probably the most rational theist I have ever met…

What you call “religious experiece” I know by another name… “awestruck”… or something to that affect.

I don’t get these feelings in a church so much… but when staring at the stars in the sky and pondering the galaxies and massive scale of things, that leaves me “awestruck”… one might say I feel deeply satisfied and grateful for being here and experiencing this “universe”… you might call it connecting with “god” if you wish…

I find that I can relate to everything you’ve written… but calling it God seems like such a horrible tragedy… the bagage that goes with that name is vast and using that name is so misleading that it borders on deceptive… nearly no one knows God as what you describe. to most people he’s a character in their holy book to whom they attribute such experiences.

but you’re not talking about a character… you’re talking about some undefined thing that you feel connected with… and I see nothing wrong with being honest about this feeling you have and exploring the meaning this has for you personally.

When you start telling me your feelings must mean something to me or anyone else, however that’s when we generally have a conflict that cannot be resolved with reason because it isn’t born of reason.

Paging Herr R. Otto.

Thank you very much!
Really, I take that very appreciatively.

I have a saying:
In the magnificence of the heavens,
and the power of earth and storm.
In the peace of the stream,
and the sound of a dead forest.
In the feeling of wind on high,
and the fear of a moonless night.
In the whim of love,
and the passion of hate.
In the birth of a child,
and the death of a man.
In the shout of a killer and whore,
and the blood of a saint and king.

There you will find my God.

Yep, awestruck is generally a good term for the most impactful experiences that I claim for religion.
As seen above, there are many other environments that I call religious experiences…one could sum it up easily with, “life”, but to be exact, I would say any time that I am aware of life fully.

Yeah, I do have that problem.
However, I cannot call God anything but God in my mind.
I’ve tried; it doesn’t work.
And “God” isn’t copyright of any definition.
“God” is equally available to me as God is equally available to me.

I make sure to make the difference known when it matters.
Most of the time, if I’m talking to Christians, then I talk in their language and from their perspective.
I don’t care if they believe what I do, I only care that they are more connected to their spirituality.

Now if they are a nut job, then they are a nut job that also believes in something. I don’t have any interest in the extreme and ridiculous or encouraging it.
That said, I have helped quite a few traditional Protestant Christian’s either re-find their faith, or grow in their faith by only using their own theology.

To me, the only thing that matters is that people connect to a peace within themselves and enjoy their religious experience with respect for others.
How they choose to go about this…I don’t really care.

If they don’t want to go about this under the name of religion, cool by me. I speak that language as well. I can wax poetic about the wonders of nature and science.

I guess…if you wanted a cheap shot, you could just call me a “feel gooder”
shrug

I think we care too much about the crap that doesn’t matter and not enough about that which does.

Naah, I generally try to steer clear of telling people that because “I” feel “x”, that therefore “y” on mass scale.

Most of what I pose and discuss is strictly from the grounds of concept.

I hold discussion completely separate from personal belief.

My wife calls me, “the poster child of dualism”.

That said, you will find a common thought representing what I was talking about above, in all of my theological topics where appropriate: “trying to find ways for people to connect to a peace within themselves and enjoy their religious experience with respect for others.”

So what I tend to do allot is poke holes that cause questions, and patch holes that are tearing things down.

If religion is looked at negatively, then I will defend it on the grounds I see it’s benefits and sciences shortcomings.
If religion is after science, then I will defend science on the grounds of it’s benefits and religion’s shortcomings.
If logic is trying to link religion to science or science to religion as means of justification, then I’ll just rip it apart.
Such logic is false, a crutch, and weak.

That is actually one thing that I consider disgraceful.
The other is attempting to sound like anyone knows the absolute about God and that everyone else needs to see their errors.

Actually, the one thing that truly will send me over the edge faster than anything is seeing monetary good exchanged in any religious house.
I don’t care what the religion is, I simply lose control when I see profit directly in the house of religion.

I feel that I might as well have prostitutes dancing on poles inside. The distraction and disregard with respect for the purpose of the religious house is the absolute worst disgrace that I have experienced.

In the end, some people end up thinking that I’m a flip flopper without a stance.

However, I do have a stance, it’s just that most people talk about what I consider to be superfluous so it doesn’t matter which stance I take on the topic.

I don’t know this person.
Do you have some introduction I can look at?

Herr Rudolf Otto some info according to wiki… I’m sure that’s who Xun was refering to.

I’ll have to take a gander more in depth at some of his work the next chance I can, but from what I’m reading around (not just the wiki) of his work, I see it’s crude similarity to my thoughts, but he seems to be trying to categorize the experiences specifically and how they interact with people.
As if he were trying to accomplish the neuropsychoanalysis of spiritual experiences before it’s time.

For instance, I’m reading his descriptions of states that a creature would go through during different experiences, but now we can say that a given experience occurs in a given region of the brain, or that this class of people that have heightened experiences of this type have this in common in their brain.

So I’ll give it a read, but it seems pretty dated.

Thanks for the tip!