fleetmouse wrote:I would say that the ground of being smells faintly of quality European chocolate and sounds like the distant tinkle of wind chines.
i have a perfect answer to that here:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0SKjRiPzIU8
Moderator:Metacrock
fleetmouse wrote:I would say that the ground of being smells faintly of quality European chocolate and sounds like the distant tinkle of wind chines.
lol!
I think the realization that I could not fit into my reality (as i perceive it) a god who DOES intervene and act, that it became easier for me to cross the line to atheism.
I had...lots of hope...but it is not something I see. In fact the absence of it was rather causing my heart to bleed, for the very hope for it's existence....
that was where all the pain, and emotional disturbance in my journey really was. Coming to the understanding that it was possible for us to exist without this "requirement"...and the realization that whether God existed or not, i do not see life (in the reality that i realize it) changing....was a huge step for me.
When I realized I could except deism, it was not a far step from atheism. I still could fathom a Deist sort of God ...just no longer see the necessity to do so.
my apologies, runamokmonk,runamokmonk wrote:
You said, "I had...lots of hope...but it is not something I see. In fact the absence of it was rather causing my heart to bleed, for the very hope for it's existence....that was where all the pain, and emotional disturbance in my journey really was. Coming to the understanding that it was possible for us to exist without this "requirement"...and the realization that whether God existed or not, i do not see life (in the reality that i realize it) changing....was a huge step for me."
What do you mean you do not see life changing? You started your post off saying you could not fit a god who does intervene and act in the reality in which you perceive.
If you mean, changing toward freedom, autonomy, fairness, or maybe "social justice" as the lefty's like to say, my life and mind has been on such tension. I'm someone who is not very able at "compartmentalizing" discomfort (I don't know how to explain that. Just how I understand what I have been told), so my theology reflects that tension. I would have this tension whether I knew God was there or not.
From what I understand the Christian, and I think, Jewish tradition, sees God as a God of promise. He comes to us as a promise.
I'm not sure if this is what you were writing but I read your post and I read that you gave up hope and the tension eased for you.
Sure, soms, i'll be humming that one all day long, really. . . . . . (but at least it was better than someone else's video response elsewhere: a link to "Imagine" by John Lennon - a near-perfect example of his post-beatles output of insipid, self-indulgent, syrupy pap - bleh. )
a couple of things Gwarlroge.Gwarlroge wrote:I'm not sure you can go into specifics here, soms, but ... why did you stop believing in God? God often has his own purposes in our suffering.
On the other hand: I can see something of what you mean. You talk about God intervening or working among us. Yet--hmm. Was the problem that God didn't seem to be there? I guess I don't know why you think that God (or God's action) isn't reality-based.
soms wrote:a couple of things Gwarlroge.Gwarlroge wrote:I'm not sure you can go into specifics here, soms, but ... why did you stop believing in God? God often has his own purposes in our suffering.
On the other hand: I can see something of what you mean. You talk about God intervening or working among us. Yet--hmm. Was the problem that God didn't seem to be there? I guess I don't know why you think that God (or God's action) isn't reality-based.
One being no evidence of the supernatural. I realize that meta disagrees with this.
the other being no difference between the life of the "believer" and the non believer....
the one who prays and the one who does not.
According to the bible, there should be....according to the stories...there was....
This is not what we see in reality.
(imho)
with love,
soms