Who is Minding the Store?

Human beings desire to have security in their lives. We pay millions of dollars annually to install various kinds of security systems to keep us safe. Who is it that we are afraid of? Ourselves, actually. Other human beings who want to steal from us, or worse. This is an intolerable situation. There is no reason why any human being, rich or poor, smart or dumb, socially capable or incapable, should attempt to take advantage of another human being. There is enough of everything to go around. So why do we do it? Did the Devil make us do it? If you are a fundamentalist of some kind, you may very well blame the Devil. The fact is that the root of evil is located in all of us. On TV it is easy to find shows that showcase the murders committed by those of us who simply do not care whether our neighbor lives or dies. If it suits his or her purpose, they will commit murder. Husbands killing their wives rather than go through a divorce is all too common. We might ask if God cares. I think he does, but I can't prove it. Too many people commit murder and get away with it. However, we have yet to establish what happens when we die. If you commit murder and fail to pay for it during your lifetime, are you subject to a penalty upon death? I suspect that you are. Why? In the Hermetic Code, the Greek God Hermes, known as Thoth in the Egyptian pantheon, says that "AS ABOVE SO BELOW." In short, the rules are the same in the after life as they are here on earth. You can run but you can't hide. People who think they are above the law should, in my opinion, think again. If you pass over to the next world upon death, so to does your victim, and even more importantly, so to does the Sheriff, the prosecutor, and the Judge. So who is minding the store? I believe that the answer is that we all do. We are not only responsible for our own lives, but those of our neighbor as well. THE GOLDEN RULE IS NOT OPTIONAL.

Waiting by the Window

The beginnings of Christianity were based on the return of Jesus to implement the Kingdom of God. His return was expected sooner not later. Two Thousand years have gone by since the time of Jesus. He has not returned and I personally think we have waited long enough. I believe that no matter how difficult the days ahead may be, and they will be difficult, the resolution of our problems will not be coming to us from the sky. The Greeks ended their plays with something called Deus Ex Machina. (God from the machine) At the end of the play, no matter how severe the problem, God would come in and make changes to the satisfaction of the play goer. Hollywood follows suit, and the good guy usually defeats the bad guy. History tells us another story. Very bad men led very bad armies into the land of the beautiful people and left rack and ruin in their wake. In my own lifetime, Germany and Japan owned half of the world. For three to four years. Then they lost it all. Not because Jesus came, but because the good guys got stirred up and put an end to this outrage. Now Germany and Japan are part of the good guys. Let's put it bluntly. Jesus is not coming back. Not today, not tomorrow, not ever. We are in up to our earlobes in trouble, but like always, we have to find our own way out of it. Like World War II, we have to make the sacrifices necessary to save ourselves. The universe that God created many billions of years ago is far more complex than our religion seems to realize. I suspect that there are gadzillions of sentient beings as smart as us, and many smarter than us, who face the same problems that we do. God is responsible for all of them. He has given them all the means to survive if they (and us) are willing to use them. Many, I suspect, have fallen and disappeared. We could do the same. Together we can get the job done. If we continue to fight over non-essentials like who has the best religion, we will certainly fail. We need to all get together and find a common set of rules to live by. We need to do it fast before all of the bad things that loom in our horizon come to pass. I'd like to make it easy for everybody. Whatever your religion may be, it is not the end all and be all of the universe. It may have good parts to it, and you may be proud of it, but ultimately it will not unite us all under one tent. We are too large and too diverse for that. I am not suggesting that we get rid of all religion. That is not a practical solution. Instead, I am suggesting that we ease up on the idea that we have all of the answers in our own basket. There is no reason why all of the people of the world, whatever their point of view might be, should not get along with each other. It does not diminish me if somebody disagrees with my view of God. None of us know the real answer to that one. Lets put aside our differences and get to work saving the world. We will all be better off for it. Those of you who are awaiting the return of Jesus, go ahead and wait. Just don't sit on your hands and do nothing about our problems while you are so doing. The end result of that strategy will be disaster.

We are One

The problems with Christianity stem from the philosophy of St. Augustine. He came up with the idea of "original sin." Original sin, the sin of Adam in eating the fruit of the tree of knowledge of good and evil, is not reality, it is a metaphor. Simply put, if we try to out-think God, we lose. From the concept of original sin, we are led naturally to the concept of salvation. The problem with salvation is one of exclusiveness. If my focus is on saving myself, I will be less motivated to saving others. This is why Christians are constantly telling other people that they must believe in the idea that Jesus saves us from original sin. To fail to do so, means either death or hellfire, or both. The Gnostic believes that the road to understanding God is a long and hard road. It may take many lifetimes, and a significant transformation for a soul to achieve union with God. It is not because we, through Adam, ate an apple. It is because we must both learn to approach God, and learn how to approach God at the same time. Once we learn that the responsibility to approach God rests with us individually, we must then learn how to do so collectively. This is inclusive as God is inclusive. No one ultimately will be left behind. We may arrive at the Kingdom of God at different times, but we will always get there. God will greet the last to arrive with the same passion as the first to arrive. Re-read the parable of the Prodigal Son with this in mind. It will tell you how you will be received by God when you get there, and you will get there. In God's world, we are all winners.

Our Relationship with God

Our relationship with God is personal. It is not dependent on third party intermediaries, such as theologians. Truth is the theologians know no more of the true nature of God than you do. Your knowledge is innate, and does not need embellishment. If you understand the need to use metaphor to see God, you may imagine God in any form you wish. It is not idolatry. God's true form is unknowable. As such, all you have to do is find the working hypothesis that fits your understanding. Prayer is the way to approach God. It should not be a selfish, please make me important, type of prayer. God is inclusive and loves all life forms. Pray for your friends, relatives, pets, and anyone else in need. For yourself, ask for wisdom, courage, and love for all of God's creation. God will respond. You are God's child and he loves you unconditionally. He will not let you down. No matter how rough life gets, God will always walk with you. Don't let a theologian tell you otherwise. God's love transcends church dogma.

Saving Humanity: Post Five

In the previous four posts, I have talked about some of the dangers that human beings face, both now and in the future. In this post, I want to discuss one of the things that we can do to save ourselves. The action that I have in mind is for us to become more "spiritual." By spiritual, I do not mean going to church. Church as its presently constituted is designed to assist you to save yourself personally. The spirituality that I am contemplating is that more akin to the ancient shaman, who worked to meld together his tribe and the world that the tribe lived in. ln that sense we live on three levels. One level is the micro world of the cell. This world works automatically, and it keeps us healthy and alive. When it goes awry, we get sick, and if its bad enough, we die. The second level is consciousness. We live in this world for the most part. We eat, sleep, work, and play in this level. It is this level that we take to church and work towards our own personal salvation. The third level is our planet earth. From this level, we get food, air, water, and warmth. All of these are necessary for life. It is this level that I have been talking about in the previous four post, because we have been neglecting this level to our detriment. It is the only level that can kill us all. It is the level in which we have to develop spirituality. Too many of us think that God will come from the sky and save us by instituting his own rule. I do not believe that this is a viable option. The universe that we live in, including our galaxy and our earth, willdie. Everything dies. Eternity if it exists, and I believe that it does, will have to be in our participation in subsequent entities, and our participation is clearly out of our hands. In my opinion it is in God's hands solely. In this context, spirituality is taking responsibility for all of creation as God would have us do; taking responsibility for our own bodies, for our own life, and for the world that we inhabit. Taking it seriously means taking it as it is, not as we wish it to be. That means we must learn what the body needs to be healthy, what we need to be sound in mind, and what the earth needs from us to be viable over the long term. This is spirituality, and we need to find it in ourselves. Some churches are attempting to deal with this issue. Unfortunately, too many are teaching only on the second level. It is not enough. It is time that we matured and took steps to save ourselves. Indeed, it is past time.

Saving Humanity: Post Four

The earth has had many extinction events. While some have been severe, none have resulted in the extinction of all forms of life. Single cell forms of life live in the depths of the ocean. They may also live in space. Evolution ultimately will result in the rebounding of the species after an extinction event. This does not mean, however, that individual forms of life can survive an extinction event. The history of life shows many forms dying off, the dinosaurs being the most discussed. Many things can result in extinctions. Volcanic activity is constant, and occasionally severely so. Asteroids and comets hit the earth from time to time, often with deadly effect. The occasional virus and microbe can be devastating. The black death of the middle ages was horrific. The only thing that we can say for certain is that all of the above problems will come again. In our lifetime? Probably not. If we create a heaven on earth, we can still be subject to one or all of the above problems. Most of us are familiar with the story of Atlantis. Fiction or fact? It doesn't really matter. We could be just as easily the victims of such an event. It doesn't have to be water. Noah's flood is probably the most recent of such events. I find it interesting that Stephen Hawking, one of our most intelligent scientists, has suggested recently that we must be able to move about the galaxy for no better reason then the earth may make it necessary that we do so for our own survival. This may be far off considering our short life span. However, we need to understand that by pulling together we make escape more probable when the time comes that escape becomes our only hope. Do we need a better reason to get together and learn to love and respect each other?

Saving Humanity: Post Three

Considering the fact that we as a species (homo sapiens sapiens) have only been around for about two to three hundred thousand years, a small amount of time compared to the more than 300 million years that life has existed on the earth, it should come as no surprise that we are not yet civilized. Why do I say this? I am seventy five years old this year, and during my lifetime, more than 100 million people have been killed by war, crime, genocide, and the like. This is enough people to form a large nation state. I am being conservative about the figure I just gave you. It is probably much larger. The ability to kill one's own kind is rife in nature. Two males fighting for the right to inherit the female herd will often fight to the death. Notice that I did not identify the species, since there are so many that employ this method. Our closest cousins, Chimpanzees, will go to war with neighboring groups and will kill each other in the process. In a civilization, the right to kill is abridged. The penalty for murder of a human being is generally severe, except where governments do it, or where the government is weak and ineffectual. In order for civilization to succeed, it must be found everywhere in the world, and the rules must be similar and rigorously enforced. Penalties for crime which are too weak or too harsh must be eliminated. In America today, mention of world government is taboo. Its a non starter for anyone running for office. However, anyone who thinks through the options that are there for us has to conclude that the rules cannot be the same without some form of world government to back them up. We are not free in this country when there are countries all around the world where the citizens are enslaved by their governments. Anyone following the news knows that many of these totalitarian states are either in possession of the atomic bomb or are seeking to have it in their arsenal. This is an intolerable situation that cannot be allowed to go on in a world rapidly becoming connected and possessed of a single economy. If civilization does not become viable for every nation state, and if the economy does not equalize for all peoples, we will continue to live in a dangerous world. If anything, it will get worse unless we take steps to make it better. Roosevelt, Churchill, and Stalin created the United Nations because they had just experienced a war that left more than fifty million people dead, and the cities of Europe in ruins. The United Nations in its present form will not be able to do much to foster civilization. We must agree to do more and to do it soon. If you think that warfare was bad in the twentieth century, think again. The wars of the twenty first century will make it seem like paradise. Civilization itself is at stake. We need to do more, much more, to make it work. Our lives depend upon it.