Sprawled out on the 2 steps that separated our living room from the front hallway, one of my brothers and a neighborhood friend discussed the existence of God. Though I can’t remember the specifics from conversations a week ago, the points my brother made this day, over 30 years ago, lodged deep into my psyche.
My brother was in junior high school (I was in elementary school) and was right on track developmentally. He was evolving into the rational stage of development. From this place, he argued his significant doubt in the existence of God, and postulated even if God did exist, why it shouldn’t matter to how we live. Our neighborhood friend was younger and was Catholic. He argued for the existence of God. Interestingly, I don’t remember a thing he said.
The 3 main arguments my brother made were:
1. Before science, God was used to explain so many of the mysteries of the universe, then science came along and explained them rationally. Where plagues were seen as God’s punishment of a people, science learned it was, in fact, germs and bacteria that spread plagues, not bad behavior. Science took the superstition out of life, it empowered us. For those mysteries that still exist, science simply hasn’t found the answer yet, but they will, and using God as the answer was ignorance and superstition.
2. The people who believed in God were the weak people of the world. They needed a crutch because they didn’t have the strength to handle life. Those who knew their intelligence and power didn’t need a God to lean on; they created their own destiny.
3. Even if there was a God, what mattered most how we lived our life, not whether we spent our time praying and worshipping God. If, at the end of our life, we had helped make the world a better place, but never prayed or thought of God, this was what matter more than if we led a life focused not on changing the world, but in praying and worshipping God every day. If, he argued, he was judged badly at the end of his life for not praying to God, rather than the good he had done, then this isn’t a God he’d want to pray to anyway.
I found these arguments very disturbing because they actually made sense. The one that worried me the most was the second, as I did feel very weak in life, compared to my brothers, and I worried that my love of God was only because I was weak and needed a crutch.
Upset by what my brother was saying, I ran out into the kitchen to tell my Mom that he was arguing that there might not be a God and she had to go tell him to stop. My Mom looked down at me and said, “Well maybe he’s right, maybe there isn’t, how do you know?” I was shocked. I thought I had only cared more about God than my family, but to suddenly realize that they doubted God’s existence at all was terrifying. I was suddenly alone in my belief, which shook me, especially because I loved and looked up to my family's strength and intelligence so much (I am the youngest of of 4 children and the only girl). Developmentally I was still at the mythic stage, and I no longer had the illusionary comfort of conformity among my primary group, my family.
Later on, I heard my Mom also talk about the irrelevance of praying to God, repeating my brother's third point. I still am not sure who actually came up with that theory, but I felt its influence in my life. The interior life did not matter, relationship with God did not matter, what mattered was the result in the exterior, the bottom line, did I improve life? Being of a more contemplative and devotional nature, this emphasis on doing, on external activity left me feeling a heightened sense of "not enoughness". I also found confusing my Mom’s requirement that we go to church every Sunday - a liberal, rational church yes (The United Church of Christ) - but church nonetheless. At church, however, the same values of service, changing the world were held, and the interior life went largely unnoticed, so I guess it wasn't really all that strange.
Though my brother's arguments upset me, in my heart I knew there was a God because of my mystical experience, and I knew that my brain had not made up that experience. I also knew I’d never be smart enough to intellectually prove to him, my Mom, or anyone else, that God was Real, beyond anything human, beyond synapses firing off in our brains. Thus, my life in God went even more underground than before.
After this day of witnessing the argument over God's existence, there was the added twist that my intellect now doubted what my heart knew. My brother's points haunted my mind, thus the split between my interior and exterior life now included a split between my heart and mind. My mind was not at all certain it trusted my heart, and thus I lived externally from my mind and ego, but interiorly, I still prayed, talked and loved God as much as ever, this is where I felt genuinely “me”.
The great gift that my brother gave me was he forced me to evolve my spirituality. With my naturally religious bent, if I had been raised in a religious family, my beliefs wouldn’t have been challenged as they were now…why was God relevant to living a good life? Could I be strong and still desire God in my life? Was God just a cop out from living in the mysteries of life? These questions pushed me into a life of inquiry, questions and doubts, that have made my spiritual life so much richer, deeper and wiser than had I never been provoked. These 3 questions, and many more, will be returned to as this blog continues to chronicle my spiritual evolution.
God’s gifts are not always easy, but when we stick with them, they reveal the pearls of great price.
Thursday, February 25, 2010
Monday, February 8, 2010
What's Love Got To Do With It?
It soon became apparent that what I learned about in Sunday School didn't seem to have much connection with what I learned in regular school or how my family, friends and I talked. God or Love were rarely mentioned. While I was inspired to be Love as a child, there was very little guidance or dialogue about what this actually meant in every day life.
Early in my elementary school life, my Mom taught me about "clicks". She pointed out how a group of children tend to be the popular kids and that so many of the other children want to be part of, or accepted by that popular group of children. Often, she pointed out, that the click could be mean or dismissive to those not in their group.
Though in our culture we typically think these popular groups begins in middle school and adolescence, in fact, they usually begin in elementary school. It's not as devastating in elementary school because children are not at the developmental stage yet where friends are their main focus.
Still, after my Mom pointed out this dynamic, I saw immediately in my class who the "in" people were, who the folks were who wanted to be in the"in" group (though often not consciously aware of it like they will be once they reach middle school) and who the folks were who just didn't care. Once I saw the dynamic, I felt nothing but harsh and judgmental criticism of the "in" group. Energetically I felt I should resist their power in our class, and so I built an inner wall of resistance and judgment against the "bad", "in" group.
By the way, my Mom pointed out the very common sense reason why "in" groups happen in elementary school. Some children develop socially faster than others, and since they are more advanced, they tend to find one another and be "in". Cruelty is not the reason these clicks were created, but genetics. [I think this is a big part of these groups initially, but doesn't explain the behavior later in middle school, where developmentally, rational thinking begins to emerge.]
For me, in elementary school however, the conflict went a little deeper. Though I felt I should for justice sake, stand for the "outsiders", at night time I was contrite. I'd be in bed talking to God, (I never was taught about praying on ones knees by the bedside, for which I'm grateful) about Jesus and His Love. I knew Jesus loved everybody, and there was never a reason not to love someone. I knew my judgment and harsh feelings towards the "in" crowd was wrong, yet I felt that often their behavior to those not in the "in" crowd was mean and unkind. I'd ask for forgiveness for all my judgmentalness, then I'd go to school the next morning, and continue judging, fighting inwardly their magnetic pull, and resenting even more their power. I don't ever remember even thinking about being unconditionally loving during the daytime, only at night time, safe and secure with my loving God did I remember I was supposed to love everyone.
Unconditionally Loving...seemed so sweet, so wonderful, the only way to live, yet even at such a young "innocent" stage, I found it so difficult. I also felt I had no one to talk with about this struggle. No one ever mentioned Love except at church. My family was not emotionally, religiously or spiritually oriented. God and Love were never the topics at the dinner table.
At school Love was never discussed or taught as a value. Sunday school teachers taught Christian values, but they themselves didn't feel at all accessible. Truthfully, I didn't think even they got it.
I was confused. Jesus was put on a pedestal on the one hand, yet nowhere did I feel safe enough to talk about the foundation of His teaching, Love. The message I got from this over the years was that in "real" life, God, Love was almost totally irrelevant. Thus, a split became solidified in my life. There was the outer life, family, school, activities and then there was this inner life, God, Jesus, Love that was more real to me than any of the outer world, but had no place in it. This split continued most of my life until I became a minister, where publicly I began to live what I had been living inwardly since childhood. Even now though, the split is still there, though more subtly. This is the primary reason for this blog, to be even more public about my interior world, so the separation is healed and the inner is the outer, and the outer is the inner.
Often we are guided in our spiritual life to keep our revelations secret, sacred and silent until they have time to gestate and grow strong enough that they won't be shut down by others ignorance, criticisms or judgments. These years of the split within me gave me the gift to continue to grow spiritually inwardly, explore, learn, question, doubt, struggle in the safety of God's Unconditional Love, and through that, develop a powerful inner core that lives spontaneously and freely in my heart.
Jesus said to lay our treasures in heaven where neither dust nor moth can corrupt. This is what my childhood gave me, it wasn't easy, in fact often extremely painful, and yet the treasure it has given me is beyond anything, anything humanly describable. For this, I am forever and ever grateful!
Early in my elementary school life, my Mom taught me about "clicks". She pointed out how a group of children tend to be the popular kids and that so many of the other children want to be part of, or accepted by that popular group of children. Often, she pointed out, that the click could be mean or dismissive to those not in their group.
Though in our culture we typically think these popular groups begins in middle school and adolescence, in fact, they usually begin in elementary school. It's not as devastating in elementary school because children are not at the developmental stage yet where friends are their main focus.
Still, after my Mom pointed out this dynamic, I saw immediately in my class who the "in" people were, who the folks were who wanted to be in the"in" group (though often not consciously aware of it like they will be once they reach middle school) and who the folks were who just didn't care. Once I saw the dynamic, I felt nothing but harsh and judgmental criticism of the "in" group. Energetically I felt I should resist their power in our class, and so I built an inner wall of resistance and judgment against the "bad", "in" group.
By the way, my Mom pointed out the very common sense reason why "in" groups happen in elementary school. Some children develop socially faster than others, and since they are more advanced, they tend to find one another and be "in". Cruelty is not the reason these clicks were created, but genetics. [I think this is a big part of these groups initially, but doesn't explain the behavior later in middle school, where developmentally, rational thinking begins to emerge.]
For me, in elementary school however, the conflict went a little deeper. Though I felt I should for justice sake, stand for the "outsiders", at night time I was contrite. I'd be in bed talking to God, (I never was taught about praying on ones knees by the bedside, for which I'm grateful) about Jesus and His Love. I knew Jesus loved everybody, and there was never a reason not to love someone. I knew my judgment and harsh feelings towards the "in" crowd was wrong, yet I felt that often their behavior to those not in the "in" crowd was mean and unkind. I'd ask for forgiveness for all my judgmentalness, then I'd go to school the next morning, and continue judging, fighting inwardly their magnetic pull, and resenting even more their power. I don't ever remember even thinking about being unconditionally loving during the daytime, only at night time, safe and secure with my loving God did I remember I was supposed to love everyone.
Unconditionally Loving...seemed so sweet, so wonderful, the only way to live, yet even at such a young "innocent" stage, I found it so difficult. I also felt I had no one to talk with about this struggle. No one ever mentioned Love except at church. My family was not emotionally, religiously or spiritually oriented. God and Love were never the topics at the dinner table.
At school Love was never discussed or taught as a value. Sunday school teachers taught Christian values, but they themselves didn't feel at all accessible. Truthfully, I didn't think even they got it.
I was confused. Jesus was put on a pedestal on the one hand, yet nowhere did I feel safe enough to talk about the foundation of His teaching, Love. The message I got from this over the years was that in "real" life, God, Love was almost totally irrelevant. Thus, a split became solidified in my life. There was the outer life, family, school, activities and then there was this inner life, God, Jesus, Love that was more real to me than any of the outer world, but had no place in it. This split continued most of my life until I became a minister, where publicly I began to live what I had been living inwardly since childhood. Even now though, the split is still there, though more subtly. This is the primary reason for this blog, to be even more public about my interior world, so the separation is healed and the inner is the outer, and the outer is the inner.
Often we are guided in our spiritual life to keep our revelations secret, sacred and silent until they have time to gestate and grow strong enough that they won't be shut down by others ignorance, criticisms or judgments. These years of the split within me gave me the gift to continue to grow spiritually inwardly, explore, learn, question, doubt, struggle in the safety of God's Unconditional Love, and through that, develop a powerful inner core that lives spontaneously and freely in my heart.
Jesus said to lay our treasures in heaven where neither dust nor moth can corrupt. This is what my childhood gave me, it wasn't easy, in fact often extremely painful, and yet the treasure it has given me is beyond anything, anything humanly describable. For this, I am forever and ever grateful!
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