Elen1107

Joe, I'm saying that I think I should be more compassionate and understanding that a good number of people have not had an opportunity to address and if they so chose, change the ideas that are part of their "conditioning". I see from your post that you have found this kind of understanding, and I'm thinking that I could use more of it. Thanks Elen

Hi and welcome, I'm a pretty new member here myself, I signed up just two weeks ago. Being from Bangladesh sounds fascinating. I hope that this board offers you something positive and good. Namaste Elen

I’m hoping that anyone who might read my post above can take it with a sense of humor and a grain of salt. I’m also hoping that the way people dress, all people, not just women, can come from a sense of freedom, intelligence and choice. That it can even be a statement about Freedom and Peace, which will always go hand in hand. That it can be like this for whoever wants to be seen that way, for themselves, as well as for everyone who wants to be noticed and understood in this light.

Hi Mike, Apologies again that I’ve not had more time to write and post. from one of your earlier posts: “I believe when they have a love of persuing knowledge and the truth, and they are working hard toward them, and with a person to walk with them through the process, they will come up with the best answer for themselves. “ I think that you really have the right idea here. You’re doing the right thing and your children will turn out well and do well because of it. “I felt amazed when some of the parents boasted that their young ones who were only about 5 to 7 were able to memorize the verses from the bible; I did not approve of that kind of teaching but what can I say? that's their children.” I think that here I would tell people to take one verse at a time. To pick and choose and pick and choose carefully. There can be some great ideas and insights in the bible, there can also be some so-so ones and some rather ugly ones also. “Another thing that I learn through experience is that don't believe 100% when the something is quoted to support the sermon.” I would say that I don’t believe 100% of what anyone is saying. No book, no bible, no poet, no president, no preacher, no pope, no parent, no prophet, no principal, no one – and that includes myself too. I try to tune into Christ and God through personal experience and not through a book/bible or church services. I can’t say I’m always perfect at this, or that I’m the best example to follow,… but the more I keep trying the better it seems to go. I’m starting to see that it’s more about love (as God means love), then having an intellectual approach or something like that. I like your paragraph about Einstein and Newton and think that you’re right on there. I’ve seen similar ideas like yours here on this website. I think that science can sometimes be a great reflection of God and even a kind of proof of Es/His/Her existence. I like you have as you say “no problem with people who consider themselves atheists.” As far as revolution is concerned, to me that is a big subject so I won’t go into it here, but as you say people were doing the best they could with what they had to go with. I wouldn’t legislate people not being able to have religion though, but I can also understand how they got there in the first place,… the way that religion used to be so mandatory and absolutely required no matter what and so forth. I’m out of time, maybe I can get back to you about the rest of your posts contents at another time. I hope you and yours are doing well E.

Hi Joseph, From your post #97 addressed to me: “I was not able to have compassion because of my understanding that they could and should have choose otherwise. When i later saw and understood that, for the most part, we are slaves to our conditioning (genetics, environment and our own unique experiences)” I guess I can kind of understand this, though the word “slave” seems a bit strong. My experiences have been a bit different. When I was eighteen I was exposed to a bunch of artist-philosopher types, but up until then I was perty much a product of my conditioning. I thought of myself what my parents thought of me, and I dealt with things in the way they dealt with things. There was enough dysfunction there to make me a bit uncomfortable with what I had been given to face the world and life with. These artist-philosophers let me know that I didn’t have to buy into this, or deal with things, or relate to the world with the same dysfunctions that I had learned while growing up. They tended to come from the “hey buddy get your act together” camp or the “you don’t have a right not to care” angle of looking at things. Maybe I have had too much of this attitude, and not as you say, enough understanding or compassion regarding a person’s or people’s “conditioning”. I guess I’ve figured that more people have had an opportunity or experience like this, where they felt they could change everything about themselves that wasn’t working for them or that they didn’t want to carry around anymore. I’m a little surprised that I haven’t encountered more people that haven’t had the same type of experiences and opportunity. The only place I have really seen it is in the 12 steps, which requires that a person make a “fearless personal moral inventory”. And of course there are things in the bible like this also. I guess I’ve been going about life like just about everyone has had this kind of opportunity when they haven’t, and as you say should be more compassionate and understanding in this regard. Sorry it can take me a day or two or sometimes more to get back to a person when they address a post to me. I have certain time limitations and also I sometimes like to think things out before writing, and this takes real time. Peace and Freedom E.

Hi soma, I’ve been looking at this last post of yours for the past ten days since you posted it, and can’t think of anything to say. Other than minor descriptive points I think I agree with the entire content. I feel good about the idea that we are able to have or develop a certain degree of independence and personal where with all and still be in touch with God both within ourselves as well as all around us. I sometimes also think that it would be easier to just give all my responsibility to God / the Creator / the Source and then I wouldn’t have to do all this extra leg work. Just trust in God and skip the whole rest of it, and be just happy. Maybe both paths lead to the same place or state of independence while still being with in and filled with God.

I like the part of the article that reads: “…progressive Christians do believe in the reality of a supernatural world, or are at the very least open to it… But they don’t view the Christian faith as fixed, unchangeable, but as constantly evolving as new data come in to correct and improve our beliefs.” I feel like this is a part of what Christianity should be. A growing living experience, not a fixed, boxed-in - booked-in experience.

I’ve had a number of thoughts and qualms about this style of dress, and dress in a more general sense, since it’s been in the public awareness. I guess mostly since 2001. I don’t think my thoughts listed here are necessarily listed in the order of importance or that well organized, but my time limits being what they are,… I don’t see why this style of dress necessarily has to denote or be a supporting statement the Muslim or Islamic religions. Why can’t a Christian, or a Buddhist, or a Hindu, or a Wicken, and so on and so forth… wear this kind of clothing without having to or being forced to be making a statement that they are Muslim or Islamic? Why should a person have to have any religious beliefs at all, or have to know what they think about everything in this context, to dress the way they choose to dress? Freedom of dress should be and is a form of freedom of speech and expression. The American Indians, and the women in particular, used dress as an art form that was meant to show their true character and their ideas about things. This kind of clothing could facilitate protection from prejudice and racism. You can’t tell what race, color or national origin a person is in a burka, or gender necessarily for that matter. Nuns of many religions where dress similar to this. The women and the “Marys” in religious art at painted wearing this sort of clothing. What would happen if for Halloween someone put on a burka with all kinds of pagan religious symbols, or Christian or Buddhist or what have you symbols on it? Would anyone get it, or what? From a security point of view: It’s not just about identification, or being able to look a person in the eyes, it’s about a person being able to carry a piece or a weapon also. I’ve been in stores here in the US where there are signs right on the front door stating you cannot where a hoodie or baggies specifically for this reason. During Vietnam there was a tendency for the men to wear their hair longer and dress a bit more colorfully. This in a sense gave the women some cover and protection,… someone couldn’t always tell if a person was a woman or a man mostly from behind or from a distance. What does the burka do in this respect? Unless a person is particularly large, one doesn’t necessarily know if that person is a woman or a man, or any variety of the two. My feeling is that unless you are my spouse or my truly committed partner, what concern is it of yours what gender I am or what I’m about. This again would give some responsibility for thinking to the men. My being there, my being alive and existing in time and space on this planet, (the only alternative to which is suicide), does not give a person a license to move in on me, corner me, pressure and intimidate me, or perpetuate to violate my rights. This kind of treatment starts at about age 13 if not at birth and is constant and continuous throughout all of our lifetimes. Even in the churches I might add. I’ve been intimidated and practically forced into dressing like a man, and walk like one too, or walk like I’m looking to get in a fight just to get down the street with a gallon of milk or get to work, which duh I need to do in order to eat and have shelter, (that is survive, again the only alternative again being suicide). This forces me to shift my natural center of gravity to my shoulders where a man’s center of gravity is, and creates extreme stress on the legs, feet and back. I’m not the only woman who’s felt they’ve had to do this by the way. Why do women have to go to such a degree to defend themselves simply because the male won’t pay any attention or concern to any self-management what so ever? Everything, all the pressure, all the stress, all the human need for self-management is put directly and intensely, all on the women. That is to say that the responsibility of self-management for both genders is put directly and intensely on just one gender, the women. That they tend to be smaller in terms of size and stature more than doubles this stress and anxiety. Of course men can’t care about women, it’s not in their programming and since they are preprogramed robots, they can’t step out of this kind of pack mentality. It’s not part of the mindless pack mentality that is their most rooted religion. But is there any way in three decades or less that they could care about the offspring. What kind of prenatal stress do you think this causes??????????????? Certain wild animals, cats in particular kill off the existing young, the living cubs, that they think might be of a different lineage than their own. “Humans” it seems do this before the infants are even born. A woman cannot just shut off all this stress that adds up to and leads to this kind of prenatal stress after a lifetime of living in this / these cultures on the day she meets a guy and therefor it won’t affect his children. What goes around comes around, but then who cares. These are just little helpless infants and if they want a voice, the “big” people can just take it away from them; so they can “loo-o-ok” like they’re all that, even though they are actually and really the complete opposite of what they so desperately wanna loo-o-ok like. Having to where a symbol and sign of one’s own oppression must be spirit breaking and mind shattering both at the same time. Or of a religion they are forced into, same results, same effect, same lifelessness… There have been several studies about how the fact that women legally have to cover their upper bodies’ effects the babies’ milk. A good deal of natural vitamins comes from the sun and this is important for an infant’s health and nutrition. Inadequate nourishment can stunt their growth, weaken the bones, muscles and ligaments. Sweden is the only country in the northern hemisphere where females are allowed to go to the beach without covering the parts of their bodies that particularly pertains to infant’s milk. There are tribes, in the southern hemisphere, where the men think that it is insane and ludicrous that an adult man would go after and be sexually attracted to what God and nature has clearly intended to be for babies. But then this isn’t about people / men it’s only about babies, so who will care. I’ve heard a few months back from two medical professionals that rickets is back. Rickets is a bone disease caused by lack of sunlight and was very prevalent in the 1600’s and the Victorian era. It starts in the womb and develops during early childhood. It deforms the bones and can be crippling. It can develop in adulthood too, particularly in women. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rickets#Diet_and_sunlight But this again isn’t about people / men it’s just about infants, children and women, so who’s gonna care. Osteoporosis is another disease that is very prevalent and particular to women. Again it’s about lack of sunlight, being kept indoors too often and having to cover the upper body in the sun. It is very painful, crippling and can even lead to an early death. These conditions in effect make it a form of “passive murder”. But this again isn’t about people / men it’s only about women, so who would care. I’ve been told, by both women and men, both by their words, behaviors and actions, that you have to dress “bimbo” to get / command any kind of respect. Like respect needs to be commanded instead of inspired. Intimidated is more like it. The only time I have ever gotten any respect from any men in my fifty-something years of life here on this planet earth, including from relatives and family members, is when I had them convinced that I had a gun. Then all of a sudden I was dealing with a group of perfect gentlemen acting exactly the way they’re supposed to act and as if they had any common sense what so ever. Thing is it had to be forced and frightened out of them; none of it came from them of their own impetus or accord. We can choose what to respect instead of going along with some mindless snake pack In Gulliver’s Travels, Ted Danson as Gulliver speaks about how people should be able to go about without any clothing “like people couldn’t possibly manage themselves if they didn’t have clothes on,” he says. There are tribes, living on this earth today, who think it is ridiculous that people, in particular men, are attracted to a person simply by looking at them or looking at their bodies. What? Are they actually attracted by having some kind of a relationship? Do they actually recognize that other people might have some kind or character or personality? Do they actually get to know one another or something ridiculous like that? What, is their actually more going on here than just going to breed? Could something actually go on in a person’s mind, or spirit or body, than an acute case of the ya-yas? Five Emmy awards and more nominations were given to this Gulliver’s Travels production: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0115195/awards?ref_=tt_awd http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gulliver%27s_Travels_(miniseries) Is this about protecting the men or protecting the women? Or which gender is protecting which gender more? If the women have to go around protecting the men so much more than the men protect women, like they are always and forever little tiny baby three year olds or something, and so much tinyer than we are... Then I say "men" can go hang themselves,… they’ve already gotten and taken for themselves; way too much rope. Every society it seems has legal limits as to how little a person is allowed to wear, one essentially has to keep their breaks on so to speak. As for it being the law as to how one gender or another has to dress, and if one is going to legislate this sort of thing like they do in some countreis: If men or people can’t manage themselves, then put a leash / a tie on them and enforce the leash laws. Or dress them all up like the Michelin tire man, the Stay-Puff marshmallow man or a bunch of Disney characters. In these outfits a person can only do so much damage and they are particularly difficult to get oneself in and out of. All this because men can’t twigger out how to manage themselves,… thank you very much anyways, but, No Thank you. People should be able to dress any way they want, from a full burka to the legal limit of near nothingness. Boo Happy Halloween E.

After looking at this opening post and Paul’s reply for the past three days, I thought I’d post the part from Burklo’s post that Paul is referring to and also that portion of the Sermon on the Mount that it relates to: From Jim Burklo’s post: Any reference to homosexuality and abortion. The “pelvic issues” Jesus raised in the Sermon on the Mount were limited to male lust for women, heterosexual adultery, and heterosexual divorce and remarriage – all of which he lumped into the same category of sinfulness. Find a heterosexual male who has never lusted for a woman! All heterosexual males are “busted” by this passage, so those in this category would do well to refrain from throwing stones at anybody for perceived lapses in morality. From the Sermon on the Mount: https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Matthew+5-7&version=NIV 27 “You have heard that it was said, ‘You shall not commit adultery.’[e]28 But I tell you that anyone who looks at a woman lustfully has already committed adultery with her in his heart. 29 If your right eye causes you to stumble, gouge it out and throw it away. It is better for you to lose one part of your body than for your whole body to be thrown into hell. 30 And if your right hand causes you to stumble, cut it off and throw it away. It is better for you to lose one part of your body than for your whole body to go into hell. 31 “It has been said, ‘Anyone who divorces his wife must give her a certificate of divorce.’[f]32 But I tell you that anyone who divorces his wife, except for sexual immorality, makes her the victim of adultery, and anyone who marries a divorced woman commits adultery. One thing I’ve gotta say about Christianity is that it actually gives the male gender some of the responsibility for their own “health” and conduct. A line from My Fair Lady goes as follows: “Being a lady is not about,… (this that and the other thing)… being a lady is about how she (women) is treated.” Paul, I’m thinking what maybe JC is saying that it’s only ok to look at or think about one’s spouse that way,… that way procreation can still exist. Does looking at others in a certain way cause them harm, or harm the spirit and/or soul of the one doing this looking? Maybe that’s another post thread / topic. To get off the serious side of this subject I thought I’d post a link to Mr. Burklo’s Sermon on Mount Hollywood: http://tcpc.blogs.com/musings/2014/10/the-sermon-on-mount-hollywood.html Cheers – Good Day – Freedom and Peace and don't do anything your true self wouldn't do

Hi soma, I’ve decided that I wanted to change the last part of my last post to you to: …and through generations and generations and generations and then through your own more particular generations they created your parents and that your parents in combining their DNA and the fabric of their lives then created you. Is this the “dust” that you feel you “came from” or do you think it’s some other kind of dust? And if so, can I ask what kind? Thanks, and I hope this is ok Cheers and Good Day and Freedom and Peace E. PS – I know that there are one or two other post that you’ve addressed to me that I haven’t got back to you concerning. I’ve got some real time constraints concerning how much time I can spend on this web board, right now. I am hoping to get back to you and reply to them sometime soon. Thanks

Hi Azvanna, Welcome to this site. I’m new here too; I’ve just been a member for 12 days. Congratulations on your new baby. I’m sure he is beautiful, …as all babies are. I’m a Spong fan too, and was a bit of a “follower” for the first two years or so after I first read his Rescuing the Bible from Fundamentalism somewhere back in the 1900’s. Today I find that I disagree with some of his outlooks, but I still think the world and more of the man. I write some lyrics too, some spiritual and some not as much. I’m sure with your background you could make some wonderful contributions to this site. I hope that it works out well for you. Cheers and Good Day Elen PS – there is another Aussie here on this site

Hi and welcome, I'm perty new here myself, I've just been a member for 12 days. I hope that it's a site and a "place" that works out well for you. Elen

Hi Paul I just have to keep arguing this/these point(s) with you, it’s become kind of a stickler with me and I just have to keep trying and going at it. I’m glad that we are doing it in the spirit of, as you’ve said to me: happy dialog and debate. Also apologies for taking a three or four days to reply to your post #85, I don’t have nearly as much time as I’d like to have for this. Also this is a tough or tricky subject for me so it takes some real time for me to make a reply that makes even some sort of sense. First the expressions “real to me” and “not real to me” are in many ways just expressions. For instance a bunch of people may get into a fight up the street, maybe outside a drinking place or something. Now a person may get home after seeing this and say that, “that is just not real to me.” They’re not saying that the fight wasn’t real, or that it didn’t happen. What they are saying is that they don’t understand the mind sets or the circumstances that created these things and probably that they want to forget about it. Similarly someone could say that what goes on in a fundamentalist religious assembly just isn’t real to them. They are not saying what goes on there didn’t happen, they are saying that what the people there were saying and thinking makes no sense to them, that it’s nonsense. At the same time one could say that some small part of it, some inner seed in there somewhere, there could be something real and have real truth to it. It’s just so covered over by so much of this other really strange stuff that one can’t see what one really is looking at, or what truth really exists there, in all these layers of hyper-fundamentalism. From your post #85 Me: I’m thinking that the color purple still exists whether I, or anyone else for that matter, can see it or not. It may not be part of my experience, but that doesn’t mean it doesn’t exist. It may not be “real to me” as you put it, but that doesn’t mean it isn’t real or a real phenomenon. Just because something “isn’t real to me”, doesn’t make it unreal or nonexistent. You: However, if it doesn't exist for you, then you are relying on somebody else's interpretation that it exists as they say it does. What if they're wrong? By the same token, what if they are right? Then I’m missing something, and something quite beautiful and inspirational too, the color of purple. It’s been proven with a good deal of scientific equipment that the wavelengths of color and light are a real phenomenon, and that they do exist, but regardless, these wavelengths exist and have existed whether they’ve been proven or anyone has seen them or not. It doesn’t matter if they are part of someone’s “reality” or not, they still exist. Again from your post #85 Me: I agree that no one can know everything, with the possible exception of JC, (and maybe a few others in or near that kind of echelon). But we can know the truth or truths that we do know. We can know some truth, or a piece of the truth, even if we don’t know everything, You: At best I think we can think we know the truth, but that has proved untrustworthy in the past (e.g. people used to 'know' that the earth was flat - they even killed people who questioned this). I would say here that people thought they knew the truth. Since then we’ve gone around the earth in ships, then in planes and have seen pictures of the earth from the moon and from space that clearly prove that the earth is round. The truth is that the earth is round, it’s not just the truth for you and me and a whole bunch of other people. It is the truth in its own right. The earth is round. Before there was any life on earth the earth was still round, even if there was no one or nothing around to perceive it as such, or say so. This changes nothing. The truth is that the earth is round, spherical in shape and form and that’s all there is to it, that’s just the way it is and the truth of the matter, regardless if anyone sees it or not. Again from your post #85 Me: I guess I go with real experience. If I feel or experience the presence of God, or JC, and perceive, encounter or experience enough of this/them, then I start understanding that this is real, this isn’t just me, and that there’s (a) real positive spiritual power(s) behind, in and around everything. For me this has very little to do with books or the bible or what a group of people up the street in a building with a steeple on it are saying. (it has nothing to do with what my parents think either, which wasn't that much). I just experience it, sometimes I do have to struggle or work to tune into it, and then other times I don’t, but in either case it’s a real experience of a real “entity” or “entities”, if you will, that I am experiencing. You: Again, what is a 'real' experience for you may not be such for another. At best, one can say that an experience to them is real, but it might not be for another, or anyone else for that matter. Well no, if they are not experiencing it so it can’t be a real experience for them, because they are not experiencing it. But that doesn’t mean it’s not real, or what these people are experiencing is not real. And they can’t say that someone’s else’s experience isn’t real or is real, or that it’s only “real to them” because they themselves are not experiencing it,… they can only say that they don’t know if it’s real or not, for the same reason, that is, because they haven’t experienced it. . Me: Also, this in no way makes me all that, or any more than just my own little regular, ordinary level of special, as a person. And this happens to lots of people. All of them may or may not talk about it or know how to put it into words, or be too shy to put it into words, but it’s still their real experiences. And for my time and understanding on this earth I feel that they are experiencing something real. They are not just experiencing something that is “real to them”, they are experiencing real and true and existing -somethings. If these somethings are God and/or Christ and/or the Holy Spirit, and if some book(s) that were once written about them don’t quite work too well, that doesn’t mean they aren’t real, that doesn't mean they don't exist. That just means some people wrote a/some mixed-up book(s) about them. You: I agree these may be peoples' very real experiences, but it is just 'their' very real experiences and not necessarily universal truths. I can't agree with you that they are experiencing something that is real and true and existing, other than to the point that it is 'for them'. You certainly have every right and then some to your outlook concerning these things, but that doesn’t mean they aren’t real and true experiences of real and true phenomenon. You state here that you believe in something called universal truths. Where do you get that from? Where do you get that concept? It’s a perty amazing and beautiful concept, and the fact that you are using those words mean that you might believe in something; otherwise would you have chosen those words? (unless you’re just using the words flippantly, in which case never mind, what I’m saying doesn’t pertain here). A statement or phrase like “universal truth” is God. God is in, about and surrounding an idea like “universal truth”. It’s hard to explain but He/She/E’s there and E’s in there. Haven’t you ever had an experience where something really rang true for you? Where something was said or an idea was expressed and something inside you just told you it was true? When you feel happy, you are actually experiencing happiness. It’s not just you or just “real for you”. You are actually experiencing something real, and in this case that something is happiness. You may not be able to take it out and put it on a table and say look at this, isn’t it real. But it’s still real. Even if it just happened to a person a few times, it’s still happiness and it’s still real happiness. When you’ve experienced love, whether it was for someone or something or just the experience of the feeling it’s self with no object that it was about or no object connected to it. (One doesn’t need an object or a thing to love in order to feel love; one can just experience the feeling of love in and of itself, with no object or without having the love necessarily directed at or being about anyone or anything.) When you’ve felt this, when you have felt love, you have felt something real. Again you can’t take it out and put it on the table, but it’s still there and it’s still a very real emotion. It’s not just real for you and there’s nothing real really there. It is real, it’s real love, and there’s no ifs ands or buts about it. Concerning your last sentence in the last quote by you above. The truth is that you can’t know if what they are experiencing is “real and true and existing” or not, because you have not experienced it, so in this sense you can’t argue that it is real, and likewise you can’t argue that it’s not real. I don’t think that anyone can unless they have experienced it or some of it for themselves. Just like a person can’t know lemon juice is sour unless they taste it. A lot of people might tell them that it’s sour and a person might believe them and take their word for it. But until they actually taste lemon juice they don’t know what it tastes like. They don’t know that lemon juice is sour. However lemon juice is still sour whether they know that or that’s “the reality for them” or not. Maybe here is another way to show what I am trying to communicate, and since we are on a PC website and God is a good piece of what we are conversing about anyways, let me use God as part of the following set of ideas: Now either God exists or God doesn’t exist. It’s either one way or another, both statements can’t be true, right? Now if God exists, then this is true whether you, or I, or a whole bunch of people, or everyone, and or including even if no one what so ever believe it or not. God would still exist / be in existence, right? By the same token or logic, if God doesn’t exist, then this is true whether everyone, a whole bunch of people, a few people, or no one believe E exists too. So a whole bunch of people, or just a few people, or everyone, or no one could believe God exists or doesn’t exist. This still has no bearing on whether God exists or not. God exists or doesn’t exist whether people believe it or not. The thing is to find out whether God exists or not, not whether it’s this persons reality or another person’s reality or no one’s reality or every ones reality and so on and so forth. And then of course if God does exist, find out what or who God is like. If God doesn’t exist then there’s no reason to find out what e’s like because that would become irrelevant or inapplicable. You can’t just look to other peoples testimonies for this you have to look for and find your own. Now, you feel that your own personal understanding of this was wrong, or made to be wrong, once before. But maybe it was the understanding or part(s) of the understanding that you were given, or that was given to you, that was wrong. Not the actual factor of whether God and or JC exist or not, but how they were presented and described to you. This has happened to me. Concerning the understanding of god that I was given growing up, it was so dark and damning that I finally re nicknamed hem blog and wanted nothing to do with em/him what so ever. (this was way before anything like the word “blog” existed on the internet and way before the internet even existed either) (also this “blog” was very much a him, and any thinking even the slightest bit different was not allowed, that’s why I use him as well as em in the previous sentence). It was fifteen or twenty years later, maybe more, when I finally started to understand that this “blog” is not God. That God was and is not this dark ogre in the sky looking down and trying to make a mess of everyone, and being really mean about it too. So I finally began to be able believe in something spiritual, possibly for the first time in a way, instead of just the material, tactile world that we see, touch, feel and hear and that’s all around us, or in this “blog” thing that made no any sense anyways. Well, maybe I can’t make what I’m trying to say totally and completely clear. Probably because of my lack of ability with words and being able to find the right words to explain complex or spiritual concepts, and also my lack of knowledge about these things too. Maybe someday I can try again, when I know more about it, have had more time to think and contemplate this stuff, and better know how to express it. Thanks for reading all this, I hope it hasn’t taken up too much of your time, and apologies if the ideas aren’t that clear or as clear as they could be. Cheers and Good Day E. PS – Thanks for your Dilbert cartoon – I’ve got to say I think there is a difference between “blaming someone” and holding them accountable and also letting them know they could do things differently and that this might even be better for them.

Hi Joe, Thanks for your statement that PC does not hold a specific tenet regarding ideas about free will. I think I’ve already sensed or know this, but it’s good and reassuring to have it stated out right and in a real sentence or set of ideas all the same. Also thanks for making a positive statement about compassion,… sometimes I feel like compassion and kindness get regarded as a weakness and/or just something to take advantage of. Instead of something to be respected and thought highly of and be responded to in kind. From your post #93: “Free will has been debated for thousands of years and is still debated today” What I understand from this is that no real conclusions or final realizations have come about from all of this “debate”. My sense of things is that doesn’t mean that we can’t come to them or find them now,.. in this day and age and turn in the course of human where-with-all, learning and understanding. (This would be very much like me, by the way, and the way that I approach or understand ‘unconcluded’ concepts or ideas like this. Just because people couldn’t or didn’t understand or realize certain things in the past,… doesn’t mean that we, or some of us, or someone somewhere can’t now. Maybe this comes from my being a child of the space age, or maybe it is pride on my part or about humanity in general. Or maybe it’s about my feeling that we can know the truth, and have a straight insight, or “see the light” as it is said, concerning ideas and about a good number or at least a few truly important things. And also have a better understanding of both ourselves and the Creation that we find ourselves in, and which we are a part of. As well as our relationship to Creation and Creations relationship to us.) Again from your post: “For me, believing our will is not truly 'free' makes compassion for others rise within me” What I’m asking here is, couldn’t a person still have this compassion for others, and still have free will, and a sense or understanding of their own “free will” at the same time? (I’m not trying to get on you here or just challenging you just for challenges sake, or trying to negate what you are saying for some other reason. Of course I think that compassion for others is a good thing, and that what goes around, comes around, so in a certain sense it is also compassion and understanding for one’s self. I think I’m honestly asking you this as a question. I’m also trying to throw the light of a different perspective on to this/these circumstances). Where you quote Steve in the same post: "So, for those of you who reject "free will", the question is this: Do you think it is possible for humans to liberate themselves from conditioned existence? Would this constitute "free will"? Asked another way, what would a human who possessed "free will" look like?" I guess I don’t really understand what you folks mean by “conditioned” existence. If one of you or anyone could clarify what that means it could be helpful. Thanks From the last part of that post: Speaking for myself , I think the natural order of things will insure over the course of time that people will be liberated from 'self'' .Also it seems to me it will be as a result of their conditioning and the evolutionary process” As I believe I’ve told you before, I think that there can be a healthy sense of self or a sense of self that lives in harmony with Creation. Where Paul of T. says he dies to self, I’m thinking that what he might mean is that he dies to selfishness, or an arrogant sense of self. When Jesus is depicted as saying, “Love your good neighbor as yourself”, I think that he means a real self here, and that that’s ok and that we should even love this “self” that we each are. Also from the last paragraph of that post: “For the last question, i can't say for it is doubtful to me that such a state could be accurately described as human.or in labels used by humans.” I’m not able to figure out what part of my post this sentence applies to or is replying to. If you could let me know what it pertains to, thanks and maybe I could clear it up. I’ve been thinking just a bit about the difference between free will and absolute free will, since we’ve been writing and discussing this subject. I don’t think I’ll go into it now because of my time constraints and also because I need to think about it some more. Thanks for reading – again Freedom Peace and Cheers E.

Hi Joseph, I guess in the case of the dishes my want or desire to have the dishes done and have something to eat off of the next day out weighs my not wanting to do the dishes, or my wanting to be doing something besides dishes. So in this sense it is a balance between two wants. I could do something like use paper plates and disposable utensils, cups and bake ware, but this is more expensive and more than that I don’t want to put a negative “footprint” on my environment by using disposables. Or I should say rather that I want to create a positive footprint, or as much of a positive footprint as I can and this definitely out weighs wanting to do something besides dishes. So here again there’s a balance between two wants. In the case of going to work, I have met people who have lived in a camper or even a tent in order to have more free time to do things that they would rather do. I’ve also met people who have lived in unsafe areas, in sometimes substandard and unsafe housing, eaten an unhealthy yet inexpensive diet and driven unsafe vehicles in order to have more free time to do what they want to do. Is this a balance of wants? I don’t know, but on a certain level it still is a choice. Of course what might be unsafe for one person might be just fine for another depending on their size and appearance as well as some other real factors. Maybe I look at free will more as a matter of: yeah I have or need to do these dishes, but it’s my choice if I do a good job or not. Or it’s my choice to make it as pleasant as possible by tuning into the bubbles and the swishing and running water and the shiny cups and plates and so forth. In terms of work or the any number of things we do in a day, we do seem to make many choices and free will choices in the course of a day. We can drive safely and enjoy the scenery to the extent that we are still keeping our eyes on the road, we can be decent to the people we encounter, and be decent to those who are decent to us, we can focus on what ever activities we are engaged in and get what we can out of them. Even if a person is just sweeping a floor, one can tune into the colors or patterns on that floor and even the sound of a broom can be kind of nice or interesting. I guess in terms of free choice, I’ve wished that people could have more opportunity to work fewer hours, that is “part time”. I’m thinking that once children are a certain age two people ought to be able to live at a safe and healthy standard on less than eighty hours. I do feel like there is some free will infringement here. (also there would be more jobs to go around). I could elaborate on this but I want to try and keep my posts shorter, and also I can get kind of short on free time. Thanks Elen PS – Sometimes I have eaten fish out of a can and vegetables out of the package just to avoid making dishes, but not that often, but here is another choice so to speak that a person chose can make.

Thanks Steve, Similarly, I don't think that the people in the 1st century who actually saw or met Jesus, needed to know that this earth is round in order to have real faith or to have a real "Christ experience" or to have the gifts that they received through their experience. Freedom and Peace E.

Hi Soma, From your post #20 on this thread: “My body is changing as it has been from a baby to adolescents to teen to young adult to elderly. It will become dirt and that is alright because it came from dust.” Can I ask you, do you think that the “dust” that you came from is star dust, and that it somehow combined to form amino acids and that somehow transformed into proteins back in this earths primordial sea, and that that somehow evolved into a fuzzy little fur ball running around the jungle floor, and then that evolved into a two legged mammals and that they evolved into what are physically humans, and through generations and generations and generations and then through your own more personal generations they created your parents and that your parents in combining their DNA and the fabric of their lives then created you, or do you think something else? I hope that this post is taken in the friendly spirit in which it is meant. Thanks – E.

Hello romansh, Please excuse me that I haven’t been able to get online much in the past two days, I like to reply to most posts addressed to me in good time, but it’s not always possible From your post #84 Quote me: Yeah, but I can choose to do what I don't want to do, even if I don't want to, just like most people can. Quote you: So what you are saying here Elen is that you have some wants that are stronger than others, are you not? No that’s not what I was saying. What I was saying is more like: I don’t want to do the dishes, but I do them anyways, or I don’t always want to get up or go to work, but I do. What you were asking is if I could put my mind set into that of an atheist, and I was saying I probably could do that, but that I didn’t want to and fact is that it would probably be an uncomfortable experience. But just because I don’t want to do it, doesn’t mean I couldn’t. For some reason your statement above reminds me of someone I met a few years back. He didn’t understand that people could prioritize their priorities or that a person could have more than one priority. He was kind of a comical character and a fun person, but I think what he made his one and only and first priority might get some real laughs. I figure by putting God first and my good neighbor on par with myself second , that I can’t be that far off the track To me your next two statements seem to contradict each other to me: Quote you: Whether we take on responsibility or not is really not the issue when discussing free will. Quote me: I think that a part of free will is choosing to take up responsibility Quote you: While this is valid a definition of free will as any other... Regardless, to answer your question there were a number of factors that got me to take up responsibility, but at about age nineteen I decided that it was something I wanted to do and could feel good about, instead of it just being a burden. I think that my greater challenge been understanding what is my responsibility and what is not, and not taking responsibility for other people, or taking on more responsibility than is truly and rightly mine, which can be very painful and over burdening experience. To answer your second two questions, I think that both body chemistry and mental chemistry can influence what we think, and that at the same time the opposite is also true. What we think or choose to think about can influence our mental and/or physical chemistry. To address your next post on this thread post #86 Quote you: If we apply our understanding of how we perceive colour, we can be very skeptical about whether the colour purple exists or any colour for that matter I guess I see things quite a bit differently. To me color is an actual phenomenon of light and pigment, the pigment being that of an object reflecting the light off its surface. What happens is that light comes from a source, natural or artificial, and then bounces off the objects around us. The pigments of these objects absorb certain wavelengths of light and reflect others. It is the light reflected off these objects that reaches the cells in the back of our eyeballs and these in turn communicate with our brains and this is how we see colors. It is my understanding that the light being reflected off of the objects in our world is there, whether anyone is around to see it being reflected or not. Therefore if someone for some reason can’t see a certain color or colors, the light and the wave lengths are still there, (that is the phenomenon that creates the color(s) is still there). It’s just that this particular person can’t see them, (usually because of the cells in the back of their eyes). So if someone for some reason can’t see a particular color, whether it is red or green or in this case purple, it doesn’t mean that the phenomenon of light and color isn’t there, it just means that for some reason they can’t perceive it. In the case of colorblindness it’s because of the cells in their eyeballs. In the case of the color purple it’s either because of their eye sight, or they’re just not looking at it for some reason. Romansh, I hope that you and I are on okay terms on this post board and on this post thread. I've felt that you were kind of coming at me a bit in your last few posts, and here in this post of mine I have disagreed with you. I know that this is the section on the site entitled “Debate and Dialogue”, but still I’m wondering if there’s something that we might need to straighten or clear up. Regardless I hope you have as Joseph says a “safe” trip. E.

Thanks Paul, I'm short on time and energy so I'm just going to say thanks. Cheers E.

Hi Steve, Thanks for being supportive or at least not being derogatory. I was really wondering if I totally blew it with that last post. Still, with all that’s said about Christ being Gods son, I was thinking that the parent child relationship might have something to tell us in this regard. I’m going to play with the idea(s) for a while and then see how I feel. Sometimes I think that the simpler a concept can be put, the more divine it could be. Like Jesus is quoted as saying that God has made these things clear to little children and hidden them from the wise. To me Jesus or Christ is more than just a person or just a man, though he may have been very much a regular person and regular guy at one time. I think he has evolved beyond and in ways that a lot of us can’t see or can’t quite understand. However I don’t think they are paths that we can’t follow in, though in our own time. Sometimes I’ve thought that how Christ actually was begetted, so to speak, may well be none of my business, or anyone else’s at the same time. And then there's the question, do I need to know, to have my faith, and for Him to be Him or Jesus to be Jesus or Christ to be Christ, for me or in a more general sense. Freedom and Peace E.

Hi Mike, I've been meaning to get back to you but I've been so busy. Try expressing and sharing some of your ideas on one of the post threads here on the site. Get to know people a bit and see if this message board is really what you're looking for and if it will fill the need you have to be the kind of Christian you are and be able to express yourself concerning it. Apologies that I can only write a short note. I hope everything is going well for you and yours E.

I might think differently, but I'm not 100% or 110% sure.

Hi Steve, I find the last part of your post (#21) a lot easier for me to think about. Quoted from your post: “So, there is this pretty well known Zen koan which goes: "If everything returns to the "one", where does the "one" return?" “ Someone could say that the “one” could return to es self. Then again, maybe the “one” doesn’t need to return to anywhere, the “one” just is. Or maybe the “one” moves on to new and greater things. Or maybe it’s a combination of these things, or these things at different times. The first part of your post is quite difficult for me to see the structure of the ideas. I’m pasting it just below in the interest of making this exchange clearer: “I think it's our reliance on classical logic that makes these things so hard to understand. In the case of Christ/God, is this one or two? Is God one or two? God cannot be both, because logically, we run right up against something called the "Law of the Excluded Middle", which comes from Aristotle's logic. Generally, it means that if two statements are contradictory, one must be affirmed, and the other denied. Put a different way, if one statement is affirmed, the other must be denied.” I kind of have two ways of resolving or coming to terms with this, one of which I’ve just thought up since I read your post about an hour ago. I have heard of this conundrum before though, and am aware that it comes up often. This is completely off the cuff and may or may not be a good set of ideas, and please excuse if I’m not using the best words or way to try to explain it: Ok, say you are a parent rising a child, and you’ve done perty well in your life so you try to raise em up to be just like you. Now I think most human parents kind of want their children to do better than them, and build on what they know and understand and in their own generation take things to the next level and so on. But with God this is not possible. God can’t actually expect Es child, in this case a son, to be more intelligent, enlightened, all knowing or loving. That’s because God’s God and there’s no limit to these kinds of things in God, so how can God actually expect more of Es child? It doesn’t matter whether this child of yours actually looks like you, has your hair or is your gender, what’s important is that this child turns out to be like you as a person, on the inside and also in the way e spends es time and how e relates to people and places and even politics. What’s important is that this child has and shares your ideas, is as enlightened, is as loving (as God means loving) and caring, has possibly as much energy or near as much energy, has as much insight and understanding and so on and so forth. So this is the way this child grows up and really wants to grow up, and e accomplishes this very, very well. Now at a certain age you give or enable this child certain powers or things (which of course e completely earns in some sensible way or another), your car or a car just like yours, your plane, or a plane just like yours, your finesse in communicating, your understanding of geo-physics and the way the universe works, and a whole bunch of things, (one can use their imagination and just fill in a lot of stuff here). I guess that this child turns out to be perty amazing. Now, at a certain age this child is all grown up, and is perty amazing, and you can essentially say that you’ve created another you. Es hair might be a little different and e might be a bit younger but essentially e’s another you. Ta-da Ok, I myself, don’t believe in an anatomical God so like your child might not have your hair or something this child does have some differences. I don’t think that God has hands and feet and arms and legs and a nose and ears and so on and so forth. However this child that God evolved out of the primordial sea and human evolution does. He also happens to be a boy, and this is good or important cause the people that he’s gonna be communicating listen to boys a bit better and there were also thieves going around beating up people sometimes that someone like a Samaritan might find and help out, so it might be a bit easier on the person if he was a boy. So anyways God raises up this child and teaches and finds ways to teach him everything E knows and eventually gives him all Es powers and gifts and abilities and things about God that I can’t even think about or put into words; but it could be things like time travel, and the ability to walk through walls, and the ability to be in many places and/or times at once and still be whole; and perfect understanding and judgment and Love beyond the ability of most of us to possibly even contain. And a lot more too, like I say, I myself can’t put it into words or understand all of it. So at a certain point, just as you could say you have created or raised another you, with in and about the child you have raised. And people could say that in effect, you’ve created or raised another Steve. Maybe people could say that God has in a certain sense of the words, created or raised another Him or ‘God’. I don’t know if I’d say that Jesus is just as big as God in anatomical or structural senses of the matter, but in the ways that people will and do say “are important”, this is another ‘God’, so to speak, just as one might say of your child, that this is another ‘Steve’. And even if e looks a little different, or has a different hair or something (e’s also inherited all your talents and aptitudes too by the way). Or in a sense that this is another 'God' or 'God' cause he’s got so many of the qualities that count that there’s a really strong parallel and uniformity and similarities all going on here. I really don’t know if this makes any sense at all or what kind of partial sense or senses it does make. Like I’ve said this is entirely off the cuff for me. And if it does make any sense I’m sure it could be put a lot more articulately and brilliantly and be reworked a few times at that. And maybe someone could add somethings to it, that would make more sense of it too. Thanks for reading all this, and if you think it’s all pocket philosophy and even a bit of creative or vivid imagination there, that’s ok, cause that’s what it is. Take the idea(s), if you will, and play with it in your head for a while maybe add things or switch things around a bit and/or try to put it all in another way and see if you come up with something - anything that makes sense to you. And if not that’s ok, I don’t even know if I think this way myself, the concepts are perty new to me too. Like I say I’ve just come up with them today and can’t really know what I think of it myself at this point. I could go on but this post is already way too long as it is. Thanks for Reading Cheers E PS - just another funny thought: If you’d named or called this child of yours Steve or Stevey then people might be even more likely to say that this is another Steve. If Gods real name could be sometimes thought of as I Am and Jesus’s nonwestern name is pronounced something like YesYouAre then people might find a certain parallel here too. Just a thought, and I don’t know if it quite fits in or if there’s really anything to it, it’s just a thought or an idea. It’s just that YesYouAre could be thought of as another form of I Am, though somewhat more subjective or objective way I suppose.

I don’t know if this has anything to do with what people are writing about, but I’m sure if Christ and God choose to be independent of each other for a while, I’m sure it’s up to them, and that they’re not messing things up by choosing to do this for a while. I just figure that it’s not my call and if they so choose then it’s not my business, whether or how much time they spend together or apart and to what degree or at what distances. I figure they can both be trusted not to mess anything up when and if they are independent and certainly can be trusted to be doing the same if not more when they are together. I guess it’s a matter of degree. I don’t think anyone is totally independent of God’s energy and light, (even if we don’t realize it, it’s still there). But I think Jesus could act independently because He’s so full of light and energy and Love in His own right. But of course God could still see Him and would still be conscious of him.

I believe completely and implicitly in: No book No bible No president No pope No priest No preacher No parent No person No celebrity No song No one Except Christ and God And them I could still get to know better (I also don’t know very much at all about the Holy Spirit, so I’m just kind of leaving Em of my little list for right now) I’m thinking that it’s a little humorous that this little “poem” or spiel of mine, which is about Christ and God, was inspired, by what looks like a profound, informative, long standing and deeply rooted set of Buddhist teachings; - them that’s found in the OP (Opening Post) of this discussion thread.