I am an odd outlier, in that I never made it back to the religion I grew up with. Some don’t, but so many do.I think about that feeling I get when I recognize a scent from my deep memory, and find myself flooded with the emotions of comfort and nostalgia. Those are always the best smells.

Part of my problem is the idea that anyone thinks their system is the only correct one. The first task of my sincere religious pursuit was to define God, and that proved to be impossible. I eventually settled on a series of loose analogies and abstract concepts that “point the way” as the Buddhists say, and they say it best! I’ve read pretty much all of them and there’s no better description for a concept that is indescribable but still attainable.

What I know is that God is infinite, boundless, and abides a very abstract definition of compassion that has only to do with an objectively definable morality, dictated by the advancement of living well.

With this in mind, I have come to view religion as a set of boundaries that humans have attempted to place on their God, which they all, ironically enough, agree to be boundless. The thing is, we need to define things in order to feel comfortable believing them. We need to believe that we understand the nature and will of god in order to commit to them. So, another irony, everything we believe we know about god is in reality, just an illusion we’ve emotionally committed to belief in order to trick ourselves into some neurotic sense of control.

Why would any religion *need* to be the only correct one? The answer to that question is ALWAYS control, and that control is never yours.

As a final question, I wonder whether or not God is actually compassionate and would espouse love and kindness for all, or if it’s simply a completely inert, indifferent consciousness, with far too great a perspective to consider our existence anymore than we consider the existence of the microscopic organisms that live around us.

Fortunately this question is easy to answer. If God is indifferent to our existence, then we must adopt a system of morality that suits the advancement of every living thing to live as well as possible. If God is not indifferent, then the descriptions of God as an infinitely compassionate being as espoused by every religion is likely a reliable assessment.

So, assuming the latter, (because the former is functionally irrelevant), I have to ask you, why would any loving god feel compelled to issue supreme disappointment to a loving, kind and generous Hindu, who lived a life of kind piety and faith in their belief that their reward is to be reincarnated as a higher being? Why would God feel the need to deprive a kind and gentle Muslim of their gardens, beneath which rivers flow?

I’m not asking you to abandon your faith, I’m just asking you to consider how violent and arrogant it is to claim that your small minority group has attained some monopoly on understanding the nature and will of the intangible. How cruel it is to tell everyone that is not in your minority group that they are doomed.

I feel this notion is the best definition I can find for “Taking God’s name in vain.” Growing up I was told that this just simply meant to not use God and Jesus’ name as a curse word, but that always felt far too trivial. No, I think it is a grave sin against man, an act of supreme violence to claim sovereign control over the definition of something that all agree to be undefinable.

On the contrary, I think it is an act of supreme love to approach people of other faiths and give their beliefs every credit of validation that you hold for your own. I can think of nothing more culturally equalizing and equality in action is always an act of love.

14Bethany Dawn Forest, Casey Wilkerson and 12 others19 CommentsLikeCommentShare