That is some good reflection. To me it seems that you do infact believe in a great many of the things that you think you don't belive in.
The Catholic church is not a place of evil, I believe it has just evolved to a different place.
As I walked past a TV today I heard a reporter alluding to the fact that John Paul had been critticized for not moving in this direction or that in his tenure. The nature of the statement . . . I don't know.
The church is not supposed to change, evolve or devolve. In this way it is much like the Constitution (sans ammendments). The word of God is not to be interpreted. It requires no interpretation.
There is a lot more I can say on the topic, but the point is, I think you are OK.
An inability to reconcile the Catholic church is wholly irrelevent. If you have had a mano y mano w/ JC, then you don't need to listen to a priest to recieve the word of God. Jesus has enabled you to be your own savior and His doer.
You've got it made.
BTW, I am unbaptised, unconfirmed etc, but I am a man of faith none the less.
Great post. Lapsed Catholic here too (as is my better half). And it is surprising sometimes what Catholic residual pops up from time to time. With the passing of my father a couple years back, I was looking at the possibility of re-establishing ties with the church. And the current pontiff was (at least at the beginning of his reign).to be a new light, a new leader into the 21st century, for the church. Sadly, with the continued cases of sexual child abuse and the like, coupled with, what to me was a far less then satisfactory answer or solution to this, ended any attempt on my part to develop any sort of ties with the Church.
I like your three states of being and how it ties into mankind's search for what lies beyond the veil. And not being one to miss a chance to tie in RAH, I wonder what your views on "JOB; a comedy of manners" , would be.
Finally, doing my part to see you rise above the cold blooded beings, you are on my "roll" now.
Well thank you guy.
Im not sure what you mean by I believe in things I sayI dont believe in there Ian, I say I belive in god and christ but not in the literal word of the bible, especially as relates to imacculate conception and the physical ascension.
But you seem to believe in creation and heaven (unless I read you wrong), in which case both the conception and ascention are just an extension of them. I realize I am in no place to really tell a person what they believe (regularly reminded by my wife), but I guess to me it looks like you could believe those things, now or sometime later in life.
I understand the dificullty in believing the literal word. I do, but I couldn't for more than 20 years. I had a philos teacher explain how it was a fiction describing a set of facts. That was easy to latch on to, but now I just kind of take the bible at face value.
But, you've got spirit and that seems to really be what matters.
Not exactly no. I dont believe in the creation as the bible story, however I DO believe that there is a sentience that drives creation.
I believe in an afterlife, because I have seen departed souls with my own eyes, but I have no idea what form it takes. I very certainly believe in hell.
I, too am a lapsed Catholic, and a lot of what you said echoes in me as well. I really don't feel the presence of God in the new Cathedral we have, but I do feel Him in the old country church where I was raised. I guess if I do go to church, I try to get something out of the experience and not let the hyporcrisies of the Church adminstration bother me. I tend to be bothered more by some of the changes in Mass over the years - more singing that the priest used to vocalize. I have always justified the sins of the heirarchy as man's failings that you can find in any religion - that I don't expect perfection in them.
I really have to wonder about the continued viability of the Church if they don't allow women to say Mass, for instance. They just aren't getting enough new priests. The whole idea of priests not marrying was not the way it was originally, either. Just because the Catholic Church has done things a certain way for a couple hundred years is no reason to stay that way, particularly if there is a historical and biblical reference for a change.
I, too have heard a voice speak to me. I was upset at work over not getting something promised that was very very important to me. I distinctly heard a voice say "Be patient." That is all I heard. It sounded like my father. My dad died in the house where I live in a chair I still have, and I have never felt his presence since he passed. I do hear his voice in my head when certain things happen - what he would say floats up from the depths. but this was different. The voice sounded llike it came from behind, and I turned around to see if someone was there. I have always believed in the existence of spirits, ghosts and all, but have never actually seen one. I always figured I wasn't tuned for reception, as it were.
Anyway, the experience defused whatever reaction I probably had in mind, like just quitting and walking out. I did that anyway some years later, and am glad of it, but I think it wasn't my time for that to happen then.
So for me, religion isn't the force it was in childhood, and my ancestors are probably spinning in their graves. I think I get more from a beautiful sunset, or a breath of cool air that feels like one could drink it, or seeing something grow. Yeah, it sounds like some sort of naturalistic crap, but I feel closer to God in these moments than I do at the new Cathedral. I also talk to God, thanking him when something happens, the occasional prayer, and if someone I know needs a positive request to God from me. Will I end up in Hell? According to most Christian doctrine, yes. But in my heart, I know I honor God, just not in the institutionalized way organized religion demands for their survival.
I was raised Lutheran, which is like Catholic-lite. I took a path very similar to yours. I never really found god in the church, and had slowly left it. I have since settled on an agnostic sort of being. I feel like there may be that day where I get that sign, as you did, but I don't know what to believe without that.
But I have come close a few times. I've lived in the San Francisco and LA areas (Sodom and Gomorrah to some, I'm sure you can guess which is which). I never really found god there either. But I am a motorcyclist. That has allowed me to escape the hustle and bustle, up into the deserted mountains. When I see the wonder and beauty up there, I am filled with a sense of peace and awe, and that is when I've felt closest to anything I would call 'god'.
Brad, I know what you mean. Whether it is a deserted beach at midnight, or the deck of a Navy vessel as she is crossing the ocean, in the dark of night, looking a t the stars in the sky, so thick you can cut them with a knife. These moments tend to place one in their proper place. And yet give us a moment for peacefull contemplation on how all this seems to fit together.
Guy, are you familiar with the fishermans prayer:
Protect me oh Lord, for my boat is so small, and your ocean is so wide.
No-one who has been out of sight of land in rough weather can doubt the existence of a higher power long.
Oh and Guy, I love Job. I have the printing from the early eighties with the Alex in bemused expression, shrug, and leather jacket on the cover.
My favorite heaven and hell novel though is Stephen Brusts "To Reign in hell"
I sympathize with the disaffection with organized religion expresed here. I fell away from a protestant church in the late 80's as Punk Rock became more appealing to me and indeed conflicted with my fellow congregants' sensibilities.
In my early twenties, I began an independant study to determine if my departure was warranted. Long story short: I found that the Bible is more credible than most for whom it is sacred. Put simply, years of evolving tradition has created a chasm between modern dogma/doctrine and that which the text actually communicates.
The issue of faith is problematic for many in an age of scientific enlightenment. While certain aspects of the Bible are a matter of historical fact, the controversial elements are useless to an empiricist. My belief in it's veracity is qualified by the following: I don't expect anyone else (my kids included) to take my word for it. I often decribe it as a philosophical construct. The premise of an omniscient, omnipotent, sovereign deity is absolutely supported by the subsequent textual information. Said premise provides for each and every supernatural occurance.
The construct is quite sound; the question is whether one accepts the premise. I stand in support of any contrary view, but respect greatly a noncontradictory thesis.
Chris,
Where that leaves you is with an open mind to continue seeking the truth. Religion is not about God or gods, it is about population control. Way back when someone figured out that people were susceptable to superstition, and used that to influence them. Ever since the masses have been sold a fantasy and told how to think and act in order to achieve it. I like your concept of "Creativity, Entropy, and Chaos" but as someone who has drifted from agnosticism toward athiesm in the last several years, I have a hard time giving any power of cognition to these forces. I see creativity more as just the random shuffling of atoms on an extremely large scale, statistically resulting in cool things.
On a side note, RAH's book is called "Job: A Comedy of Justice". I read it as a teen, and it helped set the stage for my rejection of religion.
Lapsed Catholic here, too. I just couldn't accept that I was supposed to follow the Church blindly. Men alone of the animals were given reason, and it seems almost blasphemous to suborn that to anyone or anything. I respect the accumulated wisdom of tradition, but not when it is telling me to do what I know is wrong.
A few years ago I finally got around to reading the whole Bible, with _everybody's_ apocrypha and annotations by leading scholars. After a period of dissatisfaction with the Church, I think I was expecting to find God within the pages. At first I was disappointed, since I found only men and their voices. After awhile (somewhere around Ruth), I began to appreciate their voices. I'm an historian by trade, and I realized that each page gave me a incredible glimpse into the life of my ancestors. How they ate, how they contracted (I'm also a lawyer), how they fought, how they loved...it's all in those pages. ~1500 years of human history and philosophy, distilled into a single book.
I was disappointed when I read the Bible and tried to find insights into the nature of God. It never fails me when I read to find insights into the nature of Man, though, and it's now one of my favorite books.
One of the things that I reject about the catholic church, and about organized religion in generl, is dogma. I absolute cannot accept people telling me what or how to think, without reason, or inspection.
THANK YOU!! I have heard of that book but for the life of me couldnt remember the author or title! Now I can go 'round the corner and either pick it up straight away or do the inter-library loan thing. ( I was of course refering to "To Reign In Hell)
Interesting read. Thank you very much, Chris.
I love your belief system. Satan us the 2nd Law of Thermodynamics. Beautiful.
I knew you and I were much the same but fundamentally different somehow. I see it clearly now. You are "of" the spiritual even though you see thought the hypocrisy and falsehoods of religion. I do not have the spiritual connection, even though I did feel it as a young man. To me, it is only neurotransmitters.
A very evocative post. Thanks again.
G
PS: I'm assuming you have your own copy of "Good Will Hunting" 
Oh yeah. "Howdya like them apples"
Hi Chris,
Thanks for your moving and heartfelt post. I'm curious whether you've read anything about the Emerging or Postmodern Church? It might fit well with where you are at.
http://www.emergingchurch.org/
Hi, I read your testimony. When Jesus Christ spoke to you, he didn't say anything about going back to the catholic church.
So what is your hangup? Get on with it....put your hand to the plow and don't look back. Don't be double-minded, choose you this day whom you will serve...that's all the Bible I can think of that applies.
Smiles,
Sandra
It leaves you a Muslim my friend:D.
I think the church is like a tourist Bureaux, where you can look at pictures of places you can visit, and its very well signed so you can get to the bureaux dead easily.
But it wouldnt be a good holiday if you stayed in the bureaux looking at the brochures because you couldnt make up your mind.
Im having difficulty making up my mind.
It should leave you wherever you want to be. Churches, in my opinion, are merely pillars for the weak to hold themselves up on. I'm not saying that as an all-encompassing fact, only that the majority of church goers go because they are scared to believe alone. You know? My beliefs hold true because I want them to. Not because somebody is telling me that they will. Of course, by now you've probably got this one figured out... You seem rather similar to me in many ways, though we also seem vastly different. Have a good day, hope my other posts haven't confused you (I'm really getting tired at this point. Your blog is keeping me awake...) too much.
Let me stir the pot and say like another commenter above that I was raised Lutheran, which is probably about as close to Roman Catholic as you can get and still be allowed to call yourself a Protestant. My experience in the curch growing up was mostly benign. It wasn't until I found myself packed off to a fundamentalist private school by a naive but well-meaning mother that I began to see what was really behind the entire idea of Religion.
In my later years, I would say that, intellectually at least, I am a confirmed Atheist. Emotionally, of course, it's a bit more complicated. I truly believe that there is nothing of the so-called divine in this world. I believe that religion, at its core, is nothing more or less than a primitive attempt at instilling a moral code in humans. Unfortunately, without a rational basis for that moral code, it is ultimately doomed to failure.
And like still another commenter, it was Robert Heinlein that helped me begin on the path to finding a real philosophical base for my life, with his book Starship Troopers and his Scientific Theory of Morality.
On the other hand, the old fears are difficult to lay to rest, and I too can claim to have experienced something of a visitation or revelation in my life. I was walking down the street in NYC on day in my teenage years when I suddenly felt as if I knew that God Was A Woman, and exactly why. It was like a bolt of lightning out of a clear blue sky...and I promptly forgot the entire train of thought and cannot recall it to this day, and I probably never will. Still, I know it happened--I just really don't know what to make of it, because I've lost the line of reasoning.
A lack of a God scares the pants off many people who cannot imagine themselves facing a world in which they are ultimately responsible for the consequences of their own actions.
But if the Bible has anything important to say at all, it must begin with this little phrase:
"God is Love."
I thought you valued truth above all?
Well truth is there is no god(s)
I'd like to end there but of course human being being what they are we're not easily swayed by simple facts they have to fit into and be persuasive when related to our own personality and mental schema.
So I will go on albeit briefly to say, I like you was raised catholic, I like you saw the awful things done by the church or under cover of the church and yes these things are off putting; but I realised a more important thing.
Religion, like monarchy, (the queen is gods representative on earth after all (CofE) - sorry I mean the pope (Cath))! It's all about the power of the few over the many.
Look at catholicism, with such a history of genocide and oppression how can anyone ever claim to be catholic knowing all those millions murdered in the inquisition and witch hunts? paedophile priests and cover ups, taking money from the poor and living like kings, stopping birth control thereby causing poverty and starvation, crime and disease.
Think about it this way, who benefits from religion? some people do. Who suffers at the hands of religion, some other people do.
But that's religion, your post was about faith and god. I did try to read your post but frankly you lost me, not because I don't have the intelligence to understand it but simply because it is a collection of disparate ideas and words tied together in a semantically void bundle.
Now I don't mean to be offensive but what I will say is this, anything that is true, can be made fairly simple (not too simple though eh Einstein!) and that is what is the problem with most belief systems like your own they are the fruit of several years indoctrination, a basically predominantly christian society(by some definition we can argue all day what cristianity is but by definition of self identification most Americans are xians), and a certain biological inheritance that predisposes the human mind to superstitious explanations (according to a recent study) combined with much woolly thinking.
It struck me right away that while I was so impressed by the clarity of your thoughts expressed in your other blogs this one was so different and lacked that clarity, combining scientific sounding words in non science ways and religious words but without conviction.
Cultural relativism is an interesting thing, and it is so amazingly predictive of religious belief (or disbelief; that it is is amazing to wonder how people could assume whether or not there was a god based on their cultural norms.
So most of what you have said is entirely predicable given your life experiences, that must give you pause for thought I hope, if life experiences determine religious or faith belief then am I, or is anyone really objectively able or even attempting to come to the truth of such an important matter or are we merely good little behaviourists doing and behaving as we were programmed to do.
To anyone who believes in god I would ask these questions: what is a god? what does it look like? smell like? taste like? feel like? how do you know? through what sense do you know? do you have such a sense? would you believe in god if you didn't know what a god was? where is god? if the answer is all around how can I test for god? is there more than one god? if not why not? (doesn't that make you an atheist or isn't an atheist just someone who denies one more god than you?
What's with the jesus thing? what did he really do that was so great, a few parlour tricks that Derren Brown could easily replicate? what did he say that was so great? check the bible to see he ACTUALLY said what you think he said. Couldn't he have said so much more? better things? less ambiguous things? more enlightened things? why didn't he do more elaborate miracles? why isn't he still doing miracles? how can god be jesus and the holy spirit? how can jesus die when he was never mortal, or if he was mortal how could he have done miracles. How can jesus of died if he knew he would and did rise to heaven? is it such a sacrifice to "die" for a few days if you know you can never die? how can he have even been born if he is god? did the holy spirit rape mary or did she volunteer to commit adultery? did Joseph consent to her banging the holy spirit and having gods child? if god created man in his image and then slept with mary (which is a (unadulterated) descendent of god and thereby related) is that not incest? can a mortal even ethically consent to sleep with or be impregnated by a god? couldn't Joseph have knocked up mary as they were married and would this not be a simpler explanation for giving birth to jesus? why did jesus wait so long before becoming a prophet? why was jesus born a baby, not appear fully formed? why does the universe need a god? how does it help explain or understand anything? if there was a god what created it? if it always existed how can that be? if it can be then why cannot matter have always existed? how can an intelligent being just exist when we know that intelligence takes millions of years to evolve? do you know what parsimony means? most people don't understand it. If there is a god then science is useless because any natural law can be broken at any time so don't you worry about suddenly vanishing and ending up in a far away galaxy for no reason? If your version of god is right then are you happy and conceited enough to say other peoples contradictory versions are false.
How can we ever know which is true, DOES TRUTH MATTER? if god is real why cannot science support the hypothesis of god? how can you scientifically test your ideas about god?
BTW a word of caution; visitations from god and guns don't mix please choose to indulge one hobby or the other before someone (an actual tangible living being not a fictional construct) gets hurt :-(
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