Deleted
Deleted Member
Posts: 0
|
Post by Deleted on Jun 30, 2019 21:15:58 GMT -5
In terms of insight, what I've been referring to as faith would best be translated as a genuine, open not-knowing, along with the humility of acknowledging that one is seeking. It seems to me that faith and belief have been conflated (for well over a thousand years) in precisely the way you describe: "have faith that these beliefs are true". But despite the way it's been misused, the real meaning of faith hasn't been erased: it's a leap into the unknown despite evidence to the contrary. In Christian terms, it's the radical notion of making a sincere effort to love your enemy. I mean, who really does that, and why? You can't really love someone else just because you're told to, and the distinction between the two words, belief, and faith, remains despite the ages-old conflation. To the extent that a Christian can find some relative measure of inner-peace by their faith, as they live a world that can be dangerous and hostile, the dogma might seem important to them, the clergy, and anyone from the outside looking in. But anyone who's gained insight knows better. It's not the beliefs that led to the inner-peace, but the prayer. If they believe they have to pray to find that peace, they're no different from folks who meditate to relax or get in tune with their environment. Faith, in this sense, is a trust in God, and not the God of the devotee's imagination, but rather, trust in the degree they can sense of their own true nature. That this is directly in opposition to the dogma is why devotion and insight seem to be roads in directly opposite directions to the people on them. The devotee places his attention on the deity in an act of surrender, while the seeker of insight broadens their sense of awareness as the appearance of limitation falls away. To the extent that a Christian engages in a blind belief because they want to go to heaven, then this might serve the institutions that perpetuate the religion, but it seems to me there is more than one biblical parable that illustrates the "sin" of this. As examples: the workers all receiving the same pay regardless of when they started, and that good works can't get you into heaven. Whether those have survived despite the institutions is an interesting question that I have no answer to. I understand, but because I was raised in a fundamentalist church (Southern Baptist), my memories about faith and belief from that tradition make the two words almost synonymous. The entire message of that church is summed up in one verse--John 3:16--"For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only son that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life." In that tradition it was believed that "once saved always saved," so members of the church had to publicly proclaim their faith/belief in Jesus and "give their life to him," and no matter what they did afterwards they would still go to heaven. It's a rather incredible idea, but that entire tradition revolves around that idea. When one of my brothers died in a car wreck at the age of 30, my mother consoled herself with the fact that he had joined the church and professed his faith in Jesus at the age of about 11. For that reason, alone, she convinced herself that she would see him again in heaven! Maybe its the fact that advancing age cannot be ignored at a certain point, but Carol and I have been astonished at the number of my high school classmates who, over the last twenty years have gone from being in the category one our relatives cynically calls "Christian Lite" to becoming hard-core believers who now claim that the Bible is inerrant and is to be understood in a totally literal sense. It's like everyone is reverting to the rigid belief system they grew up with. We were recently having dinner with some good friends and I was discussing the past 5 major world extinction events. After telling them about the Permian Extinction that wiped out more than 90% of all life on earth 250 million years ago, my oldest friend from childhood, who has an engineering degree from Vanderbilt and is very successful in business, said, "Do you think that those higher sea levels at that time are evidence for the Flood?" I was so shocked at that level of ignorance that it took a moment before i could even respond and say, "No." You can't make this stuff up! Tool-making hominids date back to about 2.4 million years ago and true humans (homo sapiens) date back only about 40,000 years. I feel relatively sure, from reading the NT, the Gospel of Thomas, and dozens of books about the Bible, that JC discovered the Infinite, but in my whole life I've only met two or three living Christians who had attained any depth at all, and only one who seemed to understand that what JC called "the kingdom of God" is here and now. I can't remember ever personally meeting a single Christian who had attained SR. Carol told me that there's a Christian who was featured on BATGAP who had attained SR and that his interview is one of the most popular interviews in that series (which might be worth checking out for those who are curious). At one time Bernadette Roberts seems to have attained a state of no-self, but I've been told by ND friends that later she reverted to some sort of Christian interpretation of her experiences. What's been your experience in this regard? You're a kind man ZD. When I was in college they were drawn to me like flies. But I had great fun with it. Once at an all night revival they were going to lay hands on me and exorcise my demons. It was so much fun.
|
|
Deleted
Deleted Member
Posts: 0
|
Post by Deleted on Jul 1, 2019 2:05:15 GMT -5
Yeah.. and it seems that the very rich in your country have been making plans.. Not just in America. Wealthy people from all over the world are doing this. The writing is on the wall, and it's hard to see how global warming will reverse anytime soon. If I lived in a coastal area only a few feet above sea level, I'd be selling my home and moving to higher ground. Big changes are no longer in the distant future, and many of us are already dealing with the effects of significant climate change. 1000 year floods are occurring every few years in many places, and no one can predict what will happen as the permafrost melts. FWIW methane has a much greater effect upon global warming than CO2, and it is also increasing at a very fast rate. I don;t have much FAITH that humans will respond very intelligently to what climate scientists are forecasting. This may be why I find it so interesting when it's said that there are no humans. And that all of this, is the dream of a benevolent God. If humans are no more than a cosmic experiment in love, because they can love like no other species.. then to encourage them to care, to the degree that saving a planet demands is a mighty fine use of the term 'experiment'.
|
|
|
Post by lolly on Jul 1, 2019 6:18:15 GMT -5
Faith is important. For instance, Nisargadatta Maharaj had blind faith in what his guru told him, but then again so do fundamentalists. Yes, in this case the word "faith" is a synonym for "trust." Niz trusted his teacher, and therefore did what his teacher told him to do. As he said, "I was a simple man, and I trusted my guru totally." In contrast to Niz, some people never meet anyone that they can totally trust, so they have to find the truth without clear directions that they can trust. The Buddha had no guru, and there are hundreds of other people who have found the truth without a guru. Tolle, for example, was freed by one weird thought that stopped his mind. Same same with Ramana. My point was that faith or trust can be beneficial but it isn't absolutely necessary. In my spiritual background we were always told not to accept anything on faith, and we were required to look and see for ourselves if any 'teaching' might be true. Because of my background where faith was not looked upon favourably, I do not advocate having faith, but trust is another thing altogether. The whole integrity of the sangha and it's moral code is about trustworthiness so that the setting is truly worthy of 'refuge' (as we called it). This is certainly not accepting spiritual/religious teachings on authority, and as such, I point out the problem validating faith by merit of Nis having faith.
|
|
|
Post by laughter on Jul 1, 2019 6:23:18 GMT -5
In terms of insight, what I've been referring to as faith would best be translated as a genuine, open not-knowing, along with the humility of acknowledging that one is seeking. It seems to me that faith and belief have been conflated (for well over a thousand years) in precisely the way you describe: "have faith that these beliefs are true". But despite the way it's been misused, the real meaning of faith hasn't been erased: it's a leap into the unknown despite evidence to the contrary. In Christian terms, it's the radical notion of making a sincere effort to love your enemy. I mean, who really does that, and why? You can't really love someone else just because you're told to, and the distinction between the two words, belief, and faith, remains despite the ages-old conflation. To the extent that a Christian can find some relative measure of inner-peace by their faith, as they live a world that can be dangerous and hostile, the dogma might seem important to them, the clergy, and anyone from the outside looking in. But anyone who's gained insight knows better. It's not the beliefs that led to the inner-peace, but the prayer. If they believe they have to pray to find that peace, they're no different from folks who meditate to relax or get in tune with their environment. Faith, in this sense, is a trust in God, and not the God of the devotee's imagination, but rather, trust in the degree they can sense of their own true nature. That this is directly in opposition to the dogma is why devotion and insight seem to be roads in directly opposite directions to the people on them. The devotee places his attention on the deity in an act of surrender, while the seeker of insight broadens their sense of awareness as the appearance of limitation falls away. To the extent that a Christian engages in a blind belief because they want to go to heaven, then this might serve the institutions that perpetuate the religion, but it seems to me there is more than one biblical parable that illustrates the "sin" of this. As examples: the workers all receiving the same pay regardless of when they started, and that good works can't get you into heaven. Whether those have survived despite the institutions is an interesting question that I have no answer to. I understand, but because I was raised in a fundamentalist church (Southern Baptist), my memories about faith and belief from that tradition make the two words almost synonymous. The entire message of that church is summed up in one verse--John 3:16--"For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only son that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life." In that tradition it was believed that "once saved always saved," so members of the church had to publicly proclaim their faith/belief in Jesus and "give their life to him," and no matter what they did afterwards they would still go to heaven. It's a rather incredible idea, but that entire tradition revolves around that idea. When one of my brothers died in a car wreck at the age of 30, my mother consoled herself with the fact that he had joined the church and professed his faith in Jesus at the age of about 11. For that reason, alone, she convinced herself that she would see him again in heaven! Maybe its the fact that advancing age cannot be ignored at a certain point, but Carol and I have been astonished at the number of my high school classmates who, over the last twenty years have gone from being in the category one our relatives cynically calls "Christian Lite" to becoming hard-core believers who now claim that the Bible is inerrant and is to be understood in a totally literal sense. It's like everyone is reverting to the rigid belief system they grew up with. We were recently having dinner with some good friends and I was discussing the past 5 major world extinction events. After telling them about the Permian Extinction that wiped out more than 90% of all life on earth 250 million years ago, my oldest friend from childhood, who has an engineering degree from Vanderbilt and is very successful in business, said, "Do you think that those higher sea levels at that time are evidence for the Flood?" I was so shocked at that level of ignorance that it took a moment before i could even respond and say, "No." You can't make this stuff up! Tool-making hominids date back to about 2.4 million years ago and true humans (homo sapiens) date back only about 40,000 years. I feel relatively sure, from reading the NT, the Gospel of Thomas, and dozens of books about the Bible, that JC discovered the Infinite, but in my whole life I've only met two or three living Christians who had attained any depth at all, and only one who seemed to understand that what JC called "the kingdom of God" is here and now. I can't remember ever personally meeting a single Christian who had attained SR. Carol told me that there's a Christian who was featured on BATGAP who had attained SR and that his interview is one of the most popular interviews in that series (which might be worth checking out for those who are curious). At one time Bernadette Roberts seems to have attained a state of no-self, but I've been told by ND friends that later she reverted to some sort of Christian interpretation of her experiences. What's been your experience in this regard? Zd, a few things occurred to me this morning. One is that losing a child is about the worst agony this planet has to deal out to a woman, so it's no surprise your mother would seek some sort of comforting existential thought as she did. This actually exemplifies why the deck is stacked against insight, which is what I took robertk to be referring to. Also, from the outside looking in, the Southern Baptist faith is notable to me for it's passion and energy. People cluster in their groups, this is just the way it is. Community provides a sort of nonphysical shelter, and the White Southern experience is a unique one that seems to me is often unfairly maligned by the wider American culture, which only serves to reinforce the division.
|
|
|
Post by zendancer on Jul 1, 2019 7:40:21 GMT -5
I understand, but because I was raised in a fundamentalist church (Southern Baptist), my memories about faith and belief from that tradition make the two words almost synonymous. The entire message of that church is summed up in one verse--John 3:16--"For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only son that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life." In that tradition it was believed that "once saved always saved," so members of the church had to publicly proclaim their faith/belief in Jesus and "give their life to him," and no matter what they did afterwards they would still go to heaven. It's a rather incredible idea, but that entire tradition revolves around that idea. When one of my brothers died in a car wreck at the age of 30, my mother consoled herself with the fact that he had joined the church and professed his faith in Jesus at the age of about 11. For that reason, alone, she convinced herself that she would see him again in heaven! Maybe its the fact that advancing age cannot be ignored at a certain point, but Carol and I have been astonished at the number of my high school classmates who, over the last twenty years have gone from being in the category one our relatives cynically calls "Christian Lite" to becoming hard-core believers who now claim that the Bible is inerrant and is to be understood in a totally literal sense. It's like everyone is reverting to the rigid belief system they grew up with. We were recently having dinner with some good friends and I was discussing the past 5 major world extinction events. After telling them about the Permian Extinction that wiped out more than 90% of all life on earth 250 million years ago, my oldest friend from childhood, who has an engineering degree from Vanderbilt and is very successful in business, said, "Do you think that those higher sea levels at that time are evidence for the Flood?" I was so shocked at that level of ignorance that it took a moment before i could even respond and say, "No." You can't make this stuff up! Tool-making hominids date back to about 2.4 million years ago and true humans (homo sapiens) date back only about 40,000 years. I feel relatively sure, from reading the NT, the Gospel of Thomas, and dozens of books about the Bible, that JC discovered the Infinite, but in my whole life I've only met two or three living Christians who had attained any depth at all, and only one who seemed to understand that what JC called "the kingdom of God" is here and now. I can't remember ever personally meeting a single Christian who had attained SR. Carol told me that there's a Christian who was featured on BATGAP who had attained SR and that his interview is one of the most popular interviews in that series (which might be worth checking out for those who are curious). At one time Bernadette Roberts seems to have attained a state of no-self, but I've been told by ND friends that later she reverted to some sort of Christian interpretation of her experiences. What's been your experience in this regard? Zd, a few things occurred to me this morning. One is that losing a child is about the worst agony this planet has to deal out to a woman, so it's no surprise your mother would seek some sort of comforting existential thought as she did. This actually exemplifies why the deck is stacked against insight, which is what I took robertk to be referring to. Also, from the outside looking in, the Southern Baptist faith is notable to me for it's passion and energy. People cluster in their groups, this is just the way it is. Community provides a sort of nonphysical shelter, and the White Southern experience is a unique one that seems to me is often unfairly maligned by the wider American culture, which only serves to reinforce the division. No argument about that, but the force of conformity, judgmentalness, and the power of beliefs in such a community is amazing. Sometimes there is no openess at all. On the morning that we learned about my brother's death, we rushed to my parent's home, where many people from the church were already gathered in support. I attempted to hug my mother, but she was as cold as ice and as rigid as a statue, so much so that I was shocked (because both of my parents were very sentimental and often cried during sad movies). My father also appeared to be in a zombie state. I later learned that my mother had told my father not to show any sadness in order to show other people the power of their faith. IOW, they were exercising enormous willpower not to allow their emotions to show because of the crazy idea that any show of emotion might betray a weakness in their faith. You can't make this stuff up! Later, my mother actually had "friends" in the church who implied that my brother was not going to make it into heaven because of his wild lifestyle and departure from the church and its belief system. My mother defended her position by relying upon the "once saved always saved" idea. I fully understand why all of this went down in the way that it did, but it illustrates the idiocy of such ideas. If you can't allow yourself to feel ordinary human grief and sadness when a child dies, what does that say about the humanity of the belief system?
|
|
|
Post by laughter on Jul 1, 2019 7:53:09 GMT -5
Zd, a few things occurred to me this morning. One is that losing a child is about the worst agony this planet has to deal out to a woman, so it's no surprise your mother would seek some sort of comforting existential thought as she did. This actually exemplifies why the deck is stacked against insight, which is what I took robertk to be referring to. Also, from the outside looking in, the Southern Baptist faith is notable to me for it's passion and energy. People cluster in their groups, this is just the way it is. Community provides a sort of nonphysical shelter, and the White Southern experience is a unique one that seems to me is often unfairly maligned by the wider American culture, which only serves to reinforce the division. No argument about that, but the force of conformity, judgmentalness, and the power of beliefs in such a community is amazing. Sometimes there is no openess at all. On the morning that we learned about my brother's death, we rushed to my parent's home, where many people from the church were already gathered in support. I attempted to hug my mother, but she was as cold as ice and as rigid as a statue, so much so that I was shocked (because both of my parents were very sentimental and often cried during sad movies). My father also appeared to be in a zombie state. I later learned that my mother had told my father not to show any sadness in order to show other people the power of their faith. IOW, they were exercising enormous willpower not to allow their emotions to show because of the crazy idea that any show of emotion might betray a weakness in their faith. You can't make this stuff up! Later, my mother actually had "friends" in the church who implied that my brother was not going to make it into heaven because of his wild lifestyle and departure from the church and its belief system. My mother defended her position by relying upon the "once saved always saved" idea. I fully understand why all of this went down in the way that it did, but it illustrates the idiocy of such ideas. If you can't allow yourself to feel ordinary human grief and sadness when a child dies, what does that say about the humanity of the belief system? Sounds like maybe she was in a state of shock. Looking back, do you think that experiencing these weaknesses of the belief system might have helped open your mind to the notion of getting perspective on belief in general?
|
|
|
Post by zendancer on Jul 1, 2019 8:05:26 GMT -5
No argument about that, but the force of conformity, judgmentalness, and the power of beliefs in such a community is amazing. Sometimes there is no openess at all. On the morning that we learned about my brother's death, we rushed to my parent's home, where many people from the church were already gathered in support. I attempted to hug my mother, but she was as cold as ice and as rigid as a statue, so much so that I was shocked (because both of my parents were very sentimental and often cried during sad movies). My father also appeared to be in a zombie state. I later learned that my mother had told my father not to show any sadness in order to show other people the power of their faith. IOW, they were exercising enormous willpower not to allow their emotions to show because of the crazy idea that any show of emotion might betray a weakness in their faith. You can't make this stuff up! Later, my mother actually had "friends" in the church who implied that my brother was not going to make it into heaven because of his wild lifestyle and departure from the church and its belief system. My mother defended her position by relying upon the "once saved always saved" idea. I fully understand why all of this went down in the way that it did, but it illustrates the idiocy of such ideas. If you can't allow yourself to feel ordinary human grief and sadness when a child dies, what does that say about the humanity of the belief system? Sounds like maybe she was in a state of shock. Looking back, do you think that experiencing these weaknesses of the belief system might have helped open your mind to the notion of getting perspective on belief in general? 1. I'm sure that there was some shock, but my mother had the most powerful will I've ever seen, and this was just an example of that. 2. By the time this happened I was already reading Zen books, and I thought it was pitiful that she couldn't allow her true feelings to show. 3. I had left the church 15 years earlier, and I had already concluded that the belief system was nuts. 4. I didn;t fully appreciate the role of mind-talk and thinking in the formation of beliefs until kensho, which occurred 6 years later.
|
|
|
Post by laughter on Jul 1, 2019 8:10:17 GMT -5
Sounds like maybe she was in a state of shock. Looking back, do you think that experiencing these weaknesses of the belief system might have helped open your mind to the notion of getting perspective on belief in general? 1. I'm sure that there was some shock, but my mother had the most powerful will I've ever seen, and this was just an example of that. 2. By the time this happened I was already reading Zen books, and I thought it was pitiful that she couldn't allow her true feelings to show. 3. I had left the church 15 years earlier, and I had already concluded that the belief system was nuts. 4. I didn;t fully appreciate the role of mind-talk and thinking in the formation of beliefs until kensho, which occurred 6 years later. Ok, I see, thanks for sharing that. My father had come to a similar conclusion long before I was born - and he'd spent his teen years in the seminary on the path to the priesthood. He was a man of few words, in this case it was .. "yeah, it's just bullsh!t". I'm quite grateful to both of my parents for the space that created.
|
|
|
Post by zendancer on Jul 1, 2019 8:52:41 GMT -5
1. I'm sure that there was some shock, but my mother had the most powerful will I've ever seen, and this was just an example of that. 2. By the time this happened I was already reading Zen books, and I thought it was pitiful that she couldn't allow her true feelings to show. 3. I had left the church 15 years earlier, and I had already concluded that the belief system was nuts. 4. I didn;t fully appreciate the role of mind-talk and thinking in the formation of beliefs until kensho, which occurred 6 years later. Ok, I see, thanks for sharing that. My father had come to a similar conclusion long before I was born - and he'd spent his teen years in the seminary on the path to the priesthood. He was a man of few words, in this case it was .. "yeah, it's just bullsh!t". I'm quite grateful to both of my parents for the space that created. Exept for religion my parents gave me enormous freedom and support, and allowed me to think for myself. They were quite shocked when I left the church and began to disagree with them about many issues, but that's what you get for letting people think for themselves! It sounds like your parents even gave you freedom in the sphere of relgion, and that was a real gift. I've known countless people who got screwed up as a result of being forced to adopt rigid dogmas.
|
|
Deleted
Deleted Member
Posts: 0
|
Post by Deleted on Jul 1, 2019 8:57:00 GMT -5
I understand, but because I was raised in a fundamentalist church (Southern Baptist), my memories about faith and belief from that tradition make the two words almost synonymous. The entire message of that church is summed up in one verse--John 3:16--"For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only son that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life." In that tradition it was believed that "once saved always saved," so members of the church had to publicly proclaim their faith/belief in Jesus and "give their life to him," and no matter what they did afterwards they would still go to heaven. It's a rather incredible idea, but that entire tradition revolves around that idea. When one of my brothers died in a car wreck at the age of 30, my mother consoled herself with the fact that he had joined the church and professed his faith in Jesus at the age of about 11. For that reason, alone, she convinced herself that she would see him again in heaven! Maybe its the fact that advancing age cannot be ignored at a certain point, but Carol and I have been astonished at the number of my high school classmates who, over the last twenty years have gone from being in the category one our relatives cynically calls "Christian Lite" to becoming hard-core believers who now claim that the Bible is inerrant and is to be understood in a totally literal sense. It's like everyone is reverting to the rigid belief system they grew up with. We were recently having dinner with some good friends and I was discussing the past 5 major world extinction events. After telling them about the Permian Extinction that wiped out more than 90% of all life on earth 250 million years ago, my oldest friend from childhood, who has an engineering degree from Vanderbilt and is very successful in business, said, "Do you think that those higher sea levels at that time are evidence for the Flood?" I was so shocked at that level of ignorance that it took a moment before i could even respond and say, "No." You can't make this stuff up! Tool-making hominids date back to about 2.4 million years ago and true humans (homo sapiens) date back only about 40,000 years. I feel relatively sure, from reading the NT, the Gospel of Thomas, and dozens of books about the Bible, that JC discovered the Infinite, but in my whole life I've only met two or three living Christians who had attained any depth at all, and only one who seemed to understand that what JC called "the kingdom of God" is here and now. I can't remember ever personally meeting a single Christian who had attained SR. Carol told me that there's a Christian who was featured on BATGAP who had attained SR and that his interview is one of the most popular interviews in that series (which might be worth checking out for those who are curious). At one time Bernadette Roberts seems to have attained a state of no-self, but I've been told by ND friends that later she reverted to some sort of Christian interpretation of her experiences. What's been your experience in this regard? Zd, a few things occurred to me this morning. One is that losing a child is about the worst agony this planet has to deal out to a woman, so it's no surprise your mother would seek some sort of comforting existential thought as she did. This actually exemplifies why the deck is stacked against insight, which is what I took robertk to be referring to. Also, from the outside looking in, the Southern Baptist faith is notable to me for it's passion and energy. People cluster in their groups, this is just the way it is. Community provides a sort of nonphysical shelter, and the White Southern experience is a unique one that seems to me is often unfairly maligned by the wider American culture, which only serves to reinforce the division. This is what too much Lynyrd Synyrd does to you.
|
|
|
Post by laughter on Jul 1, 2019 9:49:17 GMT -5
but that's what you get for letting people think for themselves!
|
|
|
Post by laughter on Jul 1, 2019 10:13:21 GMT -5
Zd, a few things occurred to me this morning. One is that losing a child is about the worst agony this planet has to deal out to a woman, so it's no surprise your mother would seek some sort of comforting existential thought as she did. This actually exemplifies why the deck is stacked against insight, which is what I took robertk to be referring to. Also, from the outside looking in, the Southern Baptist faith is notable to me for it's passion and energy. People cluster in their groups, this is just the way it is. Community provides a sort of nonphysical shelter, and the White Southern experience is a unique one that seems to me is often unfairly maligned by the wider American culture, which only serves to reinforce the division. This is what too much Lynyrd Synyrd does to you. Hey! That's not fair!
|
|
|
Post by etolle on Jul 1, 2019 11:54:43 GMT -5
Zd, a few things occurred to me this morning. One is that losing a child is about the worst agony this planet has to deal out to a woman, so it's no surprise your mother would seek some sort of comforting existential thought as she did. This actually exemplifies why the deck is stacked against insight, which is what I took robertk to be referring to. Also, from the outside looking in, the Southern Baptist faith is notable to me for it's passion and energy. People cluster in their groups, this is just the way it is. Community provides a sort of nonphysical shelter, and the White Southern experience is a unique one that seems to me is often unfairly maligned by the wider American culture, which only serves to reinforce the division. No argument about that, but the force of conformity, judgmentalness, and the power of beliefs in such a community is amazing. Sometimes there is no openess at all. On the morning that we learned about my brother's death, we rushed to my parent's home, where many people from the church were already gathered in support. I attempted to hug my mother, but she was as cold as ice and as rigid as a statue, so much so that I was shocked (because both of my parents were very sentimental and often cried during sad movies). My father also appeared to be in a zombie state. I later learned that my mother had told my father not to show any sadness in order to show other people the power of their faith. IOW, they were exercising enormous willpower not to allow their emotions to show because of the crazy idea that any show of emotion might betray a weakness in their faith. You can't make this stuff up! Later, my mother actually had "friends" in the church who implied that my brother was not going to make it into heaven because of his wild lifestyle and departure from the church and its belief system. My mother defended her position by relying upon the "once saved always saved" idea. I fully understand why all of this went down in the way that it did, but it illustrates the idiocy of such ideas. If you can't allow yourself to feel ordinary human grief and sadness when a child dies, what does that say about the humanity of the belief system? zendancer,i was raised just like that and from my earliest memory I thought it was crazy..i wanted so to believe my mother but I just couldn't and I suffered for many years...if you did not believe that a man walked on water you better keep it to yourself...to me its like an addiction because they talked about this 24/7...total insanity...but,for many years I thought there was somethin wrong with me.lol...its funny now,but not then
|
|
|
Post by zendancer on Jul 1, 2019 12:18:09 GMT -5
No argument about that, but the force of conformity, judgmentalness, and the power of beliefs in such a community is amazing. Sometimes there is no openess at all. On the morning that we learned about my brother's death, we rushed to my parent's home, where many people from the church were already gathered in support. I attempted to hug my mother, but she was as cold as ice and as rigid as a statue, so much so that I was shocked (because both of my parents were very sentimental and often cried during sad movies). My father also appeared to be in a zombie state. I later learned that my mother had told my father not to show any sadness in order to show other people the power of their faith. IOW, they were exercising enormous willpower not to allow their emotions to show because of the crazy idea that any show of emotion might betray a weakness in their faith. You can't make this stuff up! Later, my mother actually had "friends" in the church who implied that my brother was not going to make it into heaven because of his wild lifestyle and departure from the church and its belief system. My mother defended her position by relying upon the "once saved always saved" idea. I fully understand why all of this went down in the way that it did, but it illustrates the idiocy of such ideas. If you can't allow yourself to feel ordinary human grief and sadness when a child dies, what does that say about the humanity of the belief system? zendancer,i was raised just like that and from my earliest memory I thought it was crazy..i wanted so to believe my mother but I just couldn't and I suffered for many years...if you did not believe that a man walked on water you better keep it to yourself...to me its like an addiction because they talked about this 24/7...total insanity...but,for many years I thought there was somethin wrong with me.lol...its funny now,but not then You were smarter than I was! I was very pious and bought into the whole story hook line and sinker. Only after going away to college and quit attending church did I start to question the belief system. I eventually became an agnostic, but certain aspects of the story were so compelling that I finally decided to simply put it out of my mind until I could gain some sort of contextual understanding that would make sense of it all. One of my many existential questions at that time was, "Could there be any scientific basis for the miracle stories that appear in many different religions?" Only after a cosmic consciousness experience two decades later did I realize that the Infinite is not bound by any limits, and I had experiences at that time that revealed anything is possible.
|
|
|
Post by stardustpilgrim on Jul 1, 2019 14:15:04 GMT -5
No argument about that, but the force of conformity, judgmentalness, and the power of beliefs in such a community is amazing. Sometimes there is no openess at all. On the morning that we learned about my brother's death, we rushed to my parent's home, where many people from the church were already gathered in support. I attempted to hug my mother, but she was as cold as ice and as rigid as a statue, so much so that I was shocked (because both of my parents were very sentimental and often cried during sad movies). My father also appeared to be in a zombie state. I later learned that my mother had told my father not to show any sadness in order to show other people the power of their faith. IOW, they were exercising enormous willpower not to allow their emotions to show because of the crazy idea that any show of emotion might betray a weakness in their faith. You can't make this stuff up! Later, my mother actually had "friends" in the church who implied that my brother was not going to make it into heaven because of his wild lifestyle and departure from the church and its belief system. My mother defended her position by relying upon the "once saved always saved" idea. I fully understand why all of this went down in the way that it did, but it illustrates the idiocy of such ideas. If you can't allow yourself to feel ordinary human grief and sadness when a child dies, what does that say about the humanity of the belief system? zendancer,i was raised just like that and from my earliest memory I thought it was crazy..i wanted so to believe my mother but I just couldn't and I suffered for many years...if you did not believe that a man walked on water you better keep it to yourself...to me its like an addiction because they talked about this 24/7...total insanity...but,for many years I thought there was somethin wrong with me.lol...its funny now,but not then I was raised Southern Baptist too. Starting about 14 I had questions nobody in the church could answer. About 17 I decided I had to do my own search, this led me to The Theosophical Society teachings via Astrology, and then to Eastern religions and Eastern philosophy, I especially liked Zen and Taoism. I almost totally ignored Christianity for some years. Then I read about where some Christian dudes who had become interested in Eastern stuff had discovered the Christian mystics. So I started reading Madame Guyon and Fenelon and then St John of the Cross/Dark Night of the Soul and St Theresa, and it made me almost angry that no Christian ever said, here, look at this, maybe you'll find some of your answers here... And then I discovered the Monasticism of the Eastern Orthodox Church and The Philokalia, which I have come to believe are closest in the organized church to what Jesus was all about. In the middle of all that I discovered the Esoteric Christianity of Gurdjieff. ....But ALL of my family is still *within* the Southern Baptist tradition (excepting my own kids). So...I'm always dealing with the undercurrent of that... But everybody gets conditioned into their own little niche...and it's hard to break out. It takes something internal to break out... This lady is pretty good, Cynthia Bourgeault www.amazon.com/gp/product/1590305809/ref=dbs_a_def_rwt_bibl_vppi_i1 When I was on Beliefnet I described myself as a Zen, Taoist, Kabbalist, Eastern Orthodox, Celtic Christian mystic.
|
|