Wow! Yesterday's blog - 'Why Religion Doesn't Work For Me' - drew the biggest postbag I have ever received for any of my articles. Some were shocked by the picture, some liked the way I tried to show how religion can be anti-life, others disliked my criticisms of (some) religious people, others appreciated that, while I was not insulting Christ, Buddha or Mohammed, I was drawing attention to the mystery that surrounds what they actually taught. One reader said she would reserve judgment on my 'provocative' comments until she had read what I had to say about my suggested alternative to the religious life saying, ominously, that 'it had better be good...'
So here goes.
The divine would not exist if there were no human beings
Start with the assumption that whatever is holy, sacred or God-like needs human beings to make it so. In other words - we are the channels for the divine. Whatever God is (and I believe she is just energy) she needs human beings to work her magic. So it is human beings that have created great spiritual teachings, works of art, just and compassionate societies, the cultivation of nature, works of art, science, and so on. The divine cannot exist without the human. You could even argue that that is what we humans are for.
So we don't really need to think about God to become divine and we don't need religion for that purpose either.
All we need to do is follow our personal genius and make the most of the gifts we have. Living by the truth, contributing to the community, and nurturing others are also vital if we want to become truly human, and thus divine.
There is no ONE God or one way to God
Next it follows that, if we are to become all that we can be, we need to explore the often contradictory aspects of what it means to be human. That may mean engaging in practices that some religious people dismiss as 'evil' - experimenting with sex, creating wealth, fighting the Pharisees, exercising aggression, being a Good Samaritan, taking mind-expanding drugs (that does not mean misusing them), and making/enjoying art. Sometimes, too, we need to be 'selfish' in pursuing what is right for us when others try to stop us. It was partly for that reason that Buddha, Christ and Mohammed all went into exile for a time.
The body is sacred
The third observation I want to make is that spiritual people are passionate, emotional, often angry people. They work through Bodymind rather than trying to deny it. Many Buddhists, Christians and Muslims are ascetics who claim that God wants us to suppress our desires. I don't agree with that. If you read the sayings of the Buddha, the Gospels and the Koran, they all say that we need to channel the passions, not deny them. Without them we can do nothing god-like.
God is a tease
The last attitude I want to recommend works like this: there is no final perfection or salvation, there is only endless becoming. The divine energy expresses itself through change, surprise, creativity, playfulness and joy. The Bisexual Hindu Goddess Shiva is always shown dancing. S/he also has many arms - two are held in prayer, one conjoins silence, another encourages singing, one points upward (heaven), one downward (hell), and so on (the picture shows a dance to Shiva). The Hindu images of Shiva imply that God-in-Man (or Son of Man if you prefer the Hebrew version) is constantly expressing the dance of life - playfully, comically, teasingly, comically. Knowing that there is no final truth and finding it amusing when people think there is.
Shiva gives us some clues for deciding whether we are living in the divine or not:
- We accept that we are contradictory
- We express all contradictions
- We are playful
- We have a wonderful inner joy
- We know that there is no final truth
- We take nothing really seriously
- We toy with experiences, as does God
- We approach everything we do as a kind of game
- We dance, laugh, cry - often
In my next post I will provide the final - and most important - thing that we have do if we want to become god-like. And that is to practice Awareness.
"Jesus' ministry was clearly defined, and the alternatives to the illusion and temptations of the desert were spelled out. A choice was made - life abundant, full, and free for all. Make no mistake about it, the day that choice was made, Jesus became suspect. That day in the temple he sealed the fate already prepared for him. How was the world to understand one who rejected an offer of power and control?"
Joan Campbell
Image of Shiva dancing by sprungli
