Inevitably, when discussing my spiritual beliefs, the nature of the god that I believe in becomes important for a number of reasons. Firstly, the word itself has a range of implicit connotations to most people, particularly those who have been raised within one of the monotheistic traditions that form the bulwark of Western religious tradition.Even atheists who have been raised in atheist households and have never actually believed in god, have imbibed a particular concept of god from a range of cultural activities and the numerous religious references that litter the modern landscape.
The second reason that it is important to define what I mean when I use the word, “god”, is related to be found within the Spiritual Principle, which states that “it is impossible to ever fully communicate any genuinely spiritual experience, or understanding to another”. This principle tells us that any person with a spiritual, as opposed to dogmatic understanding of god, will not have the same understanding as others, but will instead have subtly different views from the rest, even if, as per the Spiritual Principle, they are not able to adequately articulate them.
For example, the deity worshiped by the more spiritually focused Catholics will often have very little resemblance to the legalistic, paternalistic lawgiver commonly found within the Papal tradition. For a mystic, such as myself, who has on many occasions experienced what I call “touching the Divine Mind”, this understanding and individualisation of the concept of god is taken to another level, as it is personal experience and the application of both intuition and reason, rather than preconceived dogma that forms the core of my understanding of god; anything not in harmony with these is rejected.
I have a very different view of the nature of god than nearly everyone I talk to. It is often the case that a failure to appreciate these differences prevents adequate communication from taking place. In extreme cases, people will tell me that I can’t believe something about the nature of god, because “by definition God is X”. For example, most people hold that the term “God” is by definition synonymous with “Creator God”, in that everything in existence owes its existence to the creative powers of “God”. As I will detail shortly, I do not hold to this view, but unless I explain this, most people will frame everything I say in terms of “Creator God” and subsequently misidentify a range of “contradictions” that don’t actually reflect my position.
Please read on and enjoy! As always, comment is appreciated.
