Tuesday, November 20, 2018

The Term "god" is Not Necessary

A FRIEND'S COMMENT
            The word "god" represents so many different things to many different people. It's like the word "love" ... cannot be defined. Whatever heals your soul...

MY RESPONSE

          Unfortunately, you're right. God or gods always have been in the eye of the beholder ... which is not the solution but the problem. The god with which blameless children are brow-beaten into guilty submission, the god under which slavery was sanctioned, males kept ascendant, and women denied their reproductive rights, the god under which women are closeted away and beaten for any perceived infraction, the god by which genital mutilation is practiced, the god under which children are denied basic, and sometimes life-saving, medical attention, the god that calls for young men to strap bombs to themselves and murder innocents ... yes, may not be the god of love or cosmic spirituality. But where's the distinction?

          If you allow one person's "benign" beliefs - on the continuum from flower children to those who atrociously behead "infidels" - where do you draw the line? Who draws the line? Could not an almighty god - creator of the universe, keeper of naughty or nice lists, and grantor of eternal life - done a better job at defining exactly what's wanted of his/her/its creations? If a bee sipping a flower's nectar or the touch of a lover's fingertips or a blazing sunset or the smile of an infant "heels the soul," lovely, but why not just call it what it is? Nature or human nature. Why confuse these grand feelings by trying to make them grander than they already are? Neither the term nor the idea of a god is necessary.

          By the way, I wish I could agree with you, because I know you to be a warm and caring person, but the terms "god" and "love" most certainly can be defined. They're in the dictionary. The precise meanings of god and love (yes, in various forms) only become vague and subjective when it suits the agenda of the person speaking those words to be elusive, obfuscating, and expansive to the point of meaninglessness.

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