I think religion can stop people from reaching a deeper spiritual experience. I don't know what the nature of god is, but I know what religion teaches us isn't right.

submitted by HibikiBlackCaudillo from self.conspiracy

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[–]StillLessons 2 insightful - 1 fun2 insightful - 0 fun3 insightful - 1 fun -  (2 children)

Start from the premise, "In the beginning, God created..."

Before God, there was nothing.

Everything that exists - everything we perceive - everything with which we interact - exists within God's creation. Each of us as well. Our connection to God is quite direct. Just as God created all things, God created each of us. That puts us neither superior nor inferior to all the rest of it. We are each another element of God's universe.

The problem with most organized religions is that they exist based on the premise of "we're better than those other people over there". But in order for God to be all-powerful (kind of the definition, no?), then God must have created "them", too.

This deep instinct of ours to divide God's creation into "what we like" and "what we don't like" is what makes it so difficult - perhaps impossible (though I'm not sure of this)... - to accurately perceive the universe around us. To achieve this "universal" perception is the true spiritual quest. That's why truly spiritual people have no desire for violence. No matter who or what you attack and destroy, you are by definition attacking and destroying part of God's creation. How can that be productive?

[–]Markimus 1 insightful - 1 fun1 insightful - 0 fun2 insightful - 1 fun -  (1 child)

No serious tradition has ever been built on liberal universalist egalitarianism, the premise itself denies the very existence of quality and hierarchy which are prerequisites for Truth, Beauty and Goodness to be possible. What a load of babble.

[–]StillLessons 1 insightful - 1 fun1 insightful - 0 fun2 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

As to "load of babble", I accept the charge. Talking about this subject never yields anything but babble, but it is a series of hopelessly off-the-mark words I happen to enjoy, so I engage.

What you address here - quite correctly - is the most paradoxical element of the spiritual path. How do we simultaneously promote beauty and goodness, while recognizing that one person's "good" is his enemy's "bad"? Violence results from taking ourselves and our individual perspectives too seriously. Interestingly, however, even violence is clearly part and parcel of reality (watch a cat with a mouse or colliding galaxies), so where's the problem? For me, I prefer peace and calm to violence and anger, so I promote acceptance, but even this is just a preference on my part. As you say: babble.

The third term you use is different, however. Truth needs no prerequisite. Truth is what is. Full stop. What is around us (and includes us as well as all we do, think, or perceive) is Truth. Truth has neither quality nor hierarchy. You may prefer parts of it and reject other parts, but that doesn't in any way diminish the reality of what you reject, which lies in its simple existence.

Lastly, regarding a serious tradition, I have been engaged for twenty-five years now in a tradition that traces its roots back to before Christ. While the words I use here are seemingly unrelated to the tradition to which I refer, I definitely was exposed to many of my concepts there and continue to find them reinforced in that tradition. Whether it is "serious" I have no idea. Those who sincerely follow it have never represented more than a handful.

Have fun with this stuff. What better is there for us to do with this wonderful - and ever changing, including that we die - life we've been granted?