Sep 07, 2016

Five Fallacies About God (4)

2. God can fail to get what God needs (1)

 

Most of our religions use the logic that if, indeed, God needs something, then somehow, someway, God can fail to get what God needs. Now, it is not put it that way; but if God needs, say, our adoration, in some way or other, than that need must, by the expression of a “need”, must be somehow a lacking in God that only we can fulfill. It then becomes obvious, if it is something only we can fulfill, and we fail to fulfill that need, then God can fail to have something that God needs.

 

When expressed in that manner, that is, that God can fail to get something, most of us recoil in horror, saying ‘of course not, God can not need something’, or words to that effect, but yet, there it is: if God does not receive our adoration (t0 name only one thing), then God punishes us. Why would God punish us for not doing something that God does not need to have done? Would you punish a child for not wallpapering the entryway when the child does not know how to wallpaper anything, and besides, the entryway is perfect the way it is? But yet we claim that God will punish us for not adoring God in some specific manner, with that manner not really known.

 

It follows that if God needs our adoration, then it behooves us to find the manner of adoration that meets that need of God. Despite the overwhelming majority of humanity believing in a God, somehow humanity has failed to meet the need(s) of God. Just look at the state of the world: first, natural disasters abound, then this religion fights that religion, then this sect of a given religion fights that sect of a religion. (Not just Islam, but also Christianity: look at the animosity between the Protestants and the Catholics in Northern Ireland.) So somehow, humanity is obviously failing to meet the needs of God – or so we imply by our words and actions.

 

Ah yes; ‘We have made God in our image, in our image we have made God’. How we twist the words of God in our midst to satisfy our egos and put us on a par or above God: God is just like us, only bigger and stronger.

 

Our belief in the failure of God to receive what God wants/needs flows through most of our religious practices and understandings. We must go to church on Sunday – even though that is believed by fewer and fewer people each year. We are charged repeatedly to bow down and ask for forgiveness of countless “sins” that make us repugnant to God. Of course, giving money to this preacher or that one, this church or that one, will pave the way to forgiveness of these unspeakable crimes, whatever they are. We are told that we fail God in some way many times a day, and these failures dirty us so that God rejects us over and over.

 

Someway, somehow, the basic concept that Jesus and others taught is rejected: “Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do” (Luke 23:34, NIV). God forgive just because? No way! Oh how we judge others, despite “Judge not, that you be not judged.” Matt. 7:1 NIV.

Do not judge, and you will not be judged.

Do not condemn, and you will not be condemned.

Forgive, and you will be forgiven.

                     Luke 6:31 NIV

 

Meditation

 

My Divine Wisdom, I bow in gratitude for you wisdom and love You have shown humanity. Even though humanity, time and again, seems to want to make you into it’s most upsetting figure of judgment, You persist in refusing to be that fierce figure of doom and gloom that humanity puts forth, instead giving us love and gently reminding us through Your messengers that You are Love, and Love does not judge or condemn. You have understood humanity in the essence of humanity’s youth, for we ‘knew not what we do.’ Like children, we ignore your beauty and wonder, and refuse to see what You offer us – the peace and joy of Love eternal. I am grateful for the chance we have, day by day, to unveil the spell of what we are told, and to be able to see for ourselves the joy and bliss that are there for our delight, if we but open up to their presence.

 

 

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These five themes are taken from Conversation with God series of books, but the process discussed is a compilation of many sources and my processing of those sources.