Before you become a christian …

Before you decide to “become a christian” there’s a few things you might like to think about:

There are lots of religions in the world – what makes you think christianity is the only right one?

There are lots of holy books in the world – what makes you think the bible is the only right one?

Your teachers tell you that God gives us free will – but what kind of free will is it when choosing one thing over another brings condemnation?

Your teachers tell you that Jesus prayed for unity, yet over the years there have been hundreds of different “denominations” that cannot agree on the most basic common ideas and – worse still – fight amongst themselves.

Your teachers use fear – the antithesis of all they say that God is – to gain your assent to their petty teachings. “Believe as we say or Perish!”

Over the ages, the christian church – both protestant and catholic – has been responsible for the murder of countless thousands of people (witch hunts, crusades, inquisitions, hugenots)

Believe what you like, but think it through!

Blessing that which I do not choose

During my years as a Christian I was very good at presenting my viewpoint (this was called evangelism) and also very good at attacking opposing viewpoints (this was called apologetics). I spent many hours studying the various religions, cults and other wrong world-views, and learnt ways to argue how wrong they were in light of the teaching of the bible.

From my reading of “Conversations with God”, I now see what unbridled judgementalism ruled my mind, and have now discovered (re-membered) a far better way of living:

“The job of the soul, of course, is to cause us to choose the grandeur-to select the best of Who You Are-without condemming that which you do not select.

This is a big task, taking many lifetimes, for you are wont to rush to judgement, to call a thing “wrong” or “bad” or “not enough” rather than bless what you do not choose.

You do worse than condemn-you actually seek to do harm to that which you do not choose. You seek to destroy it. If there is a person, place or thing with which you do not agree, you attack it. If there is a religion that goes against yours, you make it wrong. If there is a thought that contradicts yours, you riducule it. If there is an idea other than yours, you reject it.”

(quoted from CWG, Book 1, p78 )

Jessica’s question

My 14 year old daughter asked me “If you are gay or lesbian or bisexual, can you still be a christian?”

My response was to ask her what she meant by gay, and what she meant by christian. Although she seemed reasonably clear that gay meant “you were born liking other guys” she was fuzzy to say the least about this troublesome christian word, giving up after something like “someone who believes is God and tries to live the way the bible says you should.”

I then asked her to pretend she was a christian, and answer the question herself. She proceeded to ask me straight back what the bible said about homosexuality. From this, I asked her if that meant that her basis (as a christian) for determining whether something is right or wrong was “what the bible says”, which got met with a mumbling sort of yes. As for me telling her what the bible says about homosexuality, I pointed out that it isn’t all that clear, as christians from both sides of the fence argue their viewpoint by each quoting different verses at each other (as they do for many other issues). So then I suggested we just pretend that the bible was crystal clear that being gay was wrong – what would she think then? This was greeted with more grumbling as she clearly did not want to agree with this, but also did not want to disagree with the bible.

Finally I asked her how people of other cultures and religions would resolve the same question. So this left her with the questions of not only how do you determine the “correct” message of the bible, but also even if you do, what difference does that make as there are lots of other “bibles” out there. How can she know whether or not the bible can be trusted as divinely authoritative, or whether it is just another religious book devised by man.

After all this which was way more thinking than she was expecting, she decided to leave it at that.

What would you say to her?

It speaks

I have not posted anything new on this blog for 3 months now!

The main reason relates to why I ever started this blog at all, which was as a way of me venting first my frustrations with the church, then my exploration of “post-church” christianity, and finally moving to a “post christian” position following my discovery of the “Conversations with God” books. All of these processes gave me a lot to punch and kick about, hence this blog.

The fact that I have not posted anything recently is simply because I have finally found a new resting place now that the dust has settled, and I am no longer in a place of struggle and conflict. This process has taken about 1 year, and the process of deconversion from fundamentalist christianity has been one of the most difficult things I have ever done in my life.

To anyone who is struggling and battling with life, whatever your religion or creed, I encourage you to read “Conversations with God” Book 1 as it may be just the right thing for you to get out of the “rut of small thinking” that you are locked into, and open up whole new ways of thinking about your life that you do not even realise are available to you.

It worked for me. 

 

 

WWANAD?

During my christian days, one method of resolving moral/ethical conundrums was to apply the WWJD method. (For the dim and slow-witted amongst my readership, this stands for What Would Jesus Do). Or even better (but I digress), the classic variant “Who Would Jesus Bomb?”. Anyway, this leads me to wondering what answers we would come up with to similar questions with WWANAD. (What Would A New Ager Do?)

Thus here some questions I propose for our next discussion group (which will be Wednesday 27th at my house, 7:30pm)

“Is abortion OK? If not, why not?”

“Is watching porn OK?’ (you would simply not believe how many search hits this blog gets each day with poor christians tying themselves up in knots over porn and masturbation)

“Should marriage be abolished?” (Stats show that marriages are busting up faster than ever, and that many that are married are just going through the motions. Is there a better way of doing this?)

For these, and whatever similar questions arise out of the discussion, the underlying question of course is “on what basis do you make your answer?” For christians, the appeal is to the bible of course. But New Agers don’t have a bible, so who says which answer is right? How do we decide? How do we know? Hmmm.

Why is that I wonder?

On Thursdays I play soccer (or football if that makes you happier) and after the game I got chatting with a guy I sort of know about “all this New Age stuff” I’m currently into (a few years ago I would have had a similar conversation only I’d be going on about Christianity). This guy is just your average nice guy. Happy with life. Moseying along, enjoying stuff, just generally OK with his lot. I explained some of the key New Age ideas I’m learning about and he listened carefully, asked some good questions, and really tried to understand what I was on about. But at the end of the conversation he remarked that while he found religious and philosophical discussions of this type interesting, he saw no need to believe in any of this sort of thing for his daily life.

Hmmmm.

That got me thinking. How come he can just get on with his life and not think or worry about “all this stuff” and yet other people (like me) obsess and dwell and dissect and ponder about beliefs and doctrines and truths and wot-not for countless hours, days, months and years?

Why is that I wonder?

PS: Not poor genetic material, please God, not poor genetic material.

When you realise it doesn’t matter

I was chatting to a friend today who is a great sceptic and athiest, and also one of the smartest people I know. I asked him when he thought my constant thinking and struggling with/about God would ever come to an end, and he replied “When you realise that it doesn’t matter.”

Hmmmm. Maybe he’s right. Maybe I should just get off this endless merry-go-round of trying to sort out this or that doctrine of whatever, and just get on with the business of living my life here and now. Maybe that’s all that matters.

The problem with …

The problem with evangelical fundumentalists is they’re too narrow-minded

The problem with liberals is they’re too broad minded

The problem with a limited-atonement gospel is it is too exclusive

The problem with a full-atonement gospel is it is too inclusive

The problem with a literal bible interpretation is it is too objective

The problem with a symbolic bible interpretation is it is too subjective

Deconversion is like …

Deconversion is like a divorce. You hoped and prayed that it would work, that you could make it work, and yet somehow it slips through your fingers and the pain almost tears you apart.

Deconversion is like letting down your team – scoring a goal in your own net. So many disappointed. Such failure.

Deconversion is like getting out of jail. The rush of freedom. The terrible fear of no longer having the security of the walls.

Deconversion is like seeing your shares and stocks suddenly dive to zero. Worthless pieces of paper overnight.

Deconversion is like suddenly no longer being able to speak the same language as those you love.

Deconversion is like losing your sense of direction.

Deconversion is like being accused of a crime you didn’t commit.

Deconversion is like trying to tie a shoelace with only one hand.

Deconversion is like hanging over the edge of a cliff.

The man who says there is no god is a …

Watch and weep.