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The Questions I Ask And What I Believe


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Just a summary for my own clarity of mind. I no longer ask "Is there a God?" The question has so many presuppositions and baggage that I can no longer see the wood for the trees. The loud voices of the over ardent drown me out.

 

For me I/we live in a Cosmos, not a chaos. There is significance to our lives.

 

I love books like "Gods Gravedigger" and other such anti theist tomes. They explain with great clarity exactly what cannot be. What is left after what cannot be, unsayable and beyond logic, must needs be lived.

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The question of God does have a lot of presuppositions and baggage. Perhaps it is the former teacher in me, but I enjoy the question and the need/challenge to present an alternative understanding to theism.

 

However, I do agree there is significance to our lives and we live not in chaos but in a Cosmos....but, for me, the cosmos and all live in 'God.' Properly understood :+}

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Cheers Mate,

 

That's no rubbish. Cosmos it is to me also. The question " Do you believe in God" is no longer a suitable question to me as it gets me knackered. To me it is similar to a non-question both in that it is as you say "full of presuppositions and baggage" and also by my own definition, the answer is self evident.

 

Excuse my Brit slang :)

Joseph

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but, for me, the cosmos and all live in 'God.' Properly understood :+}

"He's got the whole world in his hands" Perhaps more "the whole world IS his hands"? But then, why "his" hands? Why "hands" and not "beak" or "claws"? Properly understood? Or more "properly imagined"?

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Cheers Mate,

 

That's no rubbish. Cosmos it is to me also. The question " Do you believe in God" is no longer a suitable question to me as it gets me knackered. To me it is similar to a non-question both in that it is as you say "full of presuppositions and baggage" and also by my own definition, the answer is self evident.

 

Excuse my Brit slang :)

Joseph

"Knackered" is a bit near the mark for an English Gentleman like myself.

 

Laughing Face!

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"He's got the whole world in his hands" Perhaps more "the whole world IS his hands"? But then, why "his" hands? Why "hands" and not "beak" or "claws"? Properly understood? Or more "properly imagined"?

 

The Egyptians tried animals and it didn't work out so on to imagery that was closer to us. The dove for the Holy Ghost didn't do much for me either.

 

Perhaps one starts with imagining and moves to understanding.

Edited by thormas
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For me I/we live in a Cosmos, not a chaos. There is significance to our lives.

 

The cosmos is chaotic! It is the interesting bit.

 

Not say there is not order in it, but that order is very definitely overwritten in chaos.

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"Knackered" is a bit near the mark for an English Gentleman like myself.

 

Laughing Face!

 

And what about rubbish ... I liked that.

Though knackered has two broad slang meanings tired and damaged.

The latter meaning is epitomized in the knacker's yard ... slaughter house.

 

It was not clear to me which meaning George was pointing to when he asked do you believe in God?

Edited by romansh
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And what about rubbish ... I liked that.

Though knackered has two broad slang meanings tired and damaged.

The latter meaning is epitomized in the knacker's yard ... slaughter house.

 

It was not clear to me which meaning George was pointing to when he asked do you believe in God?

"Rubbish" I'm pretty attuned to. As far as the knacker's yard is concerned, I'll cope with that when the time comes.

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The cosmos is chaotic! It is the interesting bit.

 

Not say there is not order in it, but that order is very definitely overwritten in chaos.

As long as I remember I have had a love of trees. Part I think because of the sheer chaos of the branches within a deeper symmetry. I really do find them reassuring and healing to look at.

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I also find no confusion and balance at a deeper level in what many see as chaotic, turmoil or the seemingly randomness of life. Perhaps it is just a choice i have made as a result of my own experience? It does also, to me, seem to be reassuring and healing.

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I noticed dog is in the word God so why not serve animals as God if one is so inclined to do so maybe we will come closer to loving humans in the process. Americans at this point in general treat their dogs better than the sick, elderly and down and out.

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I noticed dog is in the word God so why not serve animals as God if one is so inclined to do so maybe we will come closer to loving humans in the process. Americans at this point in general treat their dogs better than the sick, elderly and down and out.

 

I was surprised by this comment from you. Of course you generalize although I do agree that western countries, or at least the USA, have a problem with what to do with those who are elderly and/or sick. Perhaps the aging of the boomers will help rewrite this....or not, one can hope.

 

As for dogs, if you truly love your dog, you're probably pretty good with people, including the elderly, after all, dogs are social animals. Now cats owners on the other hand..............

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I noticed dog is in the word God so why not serve animals as God if one is so inclined to do so maybe we will come closer to loving humans in the process.

 

Well in Genesis God did say he made plants for eating and animals for human companionship! Maybe Christians should stop eating the companions God made for them? (Just a little of the buried vegan in me coming out).

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I was being tongue in cheek thinking of the people who are cutting money for the elderly, sich and poor are willing to feed their dogs steak every night with their tax breaks. More money is spent hiding our problems then dealing with them head on, but the hope like you said thormas is if people get close to their dogs, they will get closer to everyone else. No one in the world should go hungry, but we don't have the will to feed everyone, we have the resources, but not the compassion.

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As long as I remember I have had a love of trees. Part I think because of the sheer chaos of the branches within a deeper symmetry. I really do find them reassuring and healing to look at.

 

Yep ... trees brought to you by the chaos in the universe.

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I was being tongue in cheek thinking of the people who are cutting money for the elderly, sich and poor are willing to feed their dogs steak every night with their tax breaks. More money is spent hiding our problems then dealing with them head on, but the hope like you said thormas is if people get close to their dogs, they will get closer to everyone else. No one in the world should go hungry, but we don't have the will to feed everyone, we have the resources, but not the compassion.

 

On this I agree completely.

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Isn't science about finding the order that sorts out the cause,sequence and structure that brings the tree to us?

 

It is more about finding descriptions of that order and understanding the causes underlying that order.

Here is an example of a chaotic/random process creating ordered shapes from one simple rule and a dice.

Edited by romansh
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That video is definitely amazing! For some reason it causes me to think of a question I've asked on numerous occasions outside of here to which no one has ever attempted an answer. That is what if evolution is intelligent design? I feel the need to confess that I believe it is.

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Hi Tom,

 

And by the way, welcome to the forum. When I was going to Catholic high school, I remember being taught a little evolutionary theory. The Church didn't seem to have a problem with it. I think your idea is similar to theistic evolutionism. Not unusual, just no scientific proof for it.

 

Steve

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That video is definitely amazing! For some reason it causes me to think of a question I've asked on numerous occasions outside of here to which no one has ever attempted an answer. That is what if evolution is intelligent design? I feel the need to confess that I believe it is.

 

Hi Tom, I see far too much sheer wastage and dead ends when looking at the evolutionary process to move directly to "ah! intelligent design". Something must have gone "awry" somewhere along the line - which opens the door to the "fall". But again, for me t seems indisputable that things were "awry" well before human beings of any description appeared on the scene. Myself, I get back to what is often discounted as the "mystical"..........Meister Eckhart's "Love has no why". Simply put it is faith, not sight.

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Hi Tom, I see far too much sheer wastage and dead ends when looking at the evolutionary process to move directly to "ah! intelligent design". Something must have gone "awry" somewhere along the line - which opens the door to the "fall". But again, for me t seems indisputable that things were "awry" well before human beings of any description appeared on the scene. Myself, I get back to what is often discounted as the "mystical"..........Meister Eckhart's "Love has no why". Simply put it is faith, not sight.

 

I feel we are the 5 blind men describing the elephant each describing a different part with the dead ends and the fall which I feel has different interpretations. To incorporate it in my Chritianity I fell on an interpretation of it that I can live with sorry if it is too abstract. Being metaphoric, the tree of life and the tree of knowledge are simply saying that we benefit by listening to the pure consciousness, the unity of the soul, and debilitated by going the way of the mind. These two trees are located in the middle of the Garden of Eden signifying two different expressions on one whole extensive unity. The whole is the pure consciousnesses that permeates everything and is never-ending that will never die and will live forever even in the objects that are temporary that are in eternity. The Bible says, “And out of the ground made the Lord God (Subtle Energy) to grow every tree that is pleasant to the sight, and good for food; the tree of life also in the midst of the garden, and the tree of knowledge of good and evil.” (Genesis 2:9) The Book of Genesis tells us in story form the basic concepts and the accepted wisdom about our relations on the physical plane and the spiritual plane. The fundamental message is that our expansion from the material into the spiritual realm and higher dimensions of consciousness reveals our dual nature when revealed in unity. Therefore; we have two trees located in the middle of the Garden of Eden representing our material and divine natures. The tree of knowledge of good and evil is a metaphor for the thinking mind or our capacity to form thoughts that classify, differentiate and can single out favoritism or prejudice. The tree of life signifies a spiritual plane of consciousness that flows from divine unity and is an inward encounter with the soul and not the outward experience of the mind.

 

Socrates said, “If you don’t get what you want you suffer; if you get what you don’t want, you suffer; even when you get exactly what you want, you still suffer because you can’t hold on to it forever. Your mind is your predicament. It wants to be free of change. Free of pain, free of the obligations of life and death. But change is law and no amount of pretending will alter that reality.” Pain carries information that we will enjoy life more if we would only do more of something or less of something and when we get the message and respond the pain goes away. Our identification with our mind creates boundaries, limits, separation and our suffering, but when we identify with the soul love flows without boundaries as it is made new every second of every moment. An amazing thing happens when we eat of the tree of life because we begin doing what we love and what makes us happy. In the soul we live each moment just being in it, content with what happens as we flow with love as our intuition is alive and clear guiding us to pure joy. The mind creates good and bad, limitations and boundaries, but our soul crosses and goes beyond them to reside in pure consciousness and ocean of love.

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