This is the most incredible thread! Look at the directions it's taken, yet has remained coherent and cohesive.
I might have mentioned in an earlier post that my primary work is as a freelance Inter-Faith Pastoral Consultant working primarily with men and women who are in spiritual transition, confusion or crisis. The work is trans-religious/denominational, although I can speak Christianese, Protestantese, Roman Catholicese, some Buddhism, Taoism, Confucianism, Paganism (Wicca), Metaphysics, Shirley Maclaine, Wayne Dyer, Deepak, etc.
I employ a variety of methods in sessions (various psychological schools, philosophy (Ancient, Modern/Eastern, Western), metaphysics, semiotics, Western Astrology, Oracular Traditions (Tarot, Runes), to name a few). Mostly, I speak out of my own lived experiences as a SEEKER who has no wish to FIND nor expects to. The joy is in the journey. One of my dearest friends, a Franciscan sister 18 years my senior recently said to me, "Phenix, your are a Seeker; that is your Cross and your Crown." To those other Seekers out there, I'm sure this resonates deeply. I think the Universe led me to grad school so I could learn lingustic and philosophical structures in order to organize my experiences systematically so I could give them back to others who might find them helpful.
I work mostly by phone and/or email, although I do see clients one on one if they're in the vicinity. If anyone should want to talk, I'm available and my rates are reasonable (esp. for members of the "dick site"! LOL). Sessions are normally an hour +, once a week, twice if necessary at the beginning. I work with people where they are & never attempt to proselytize. Rather, to help people see different angles of vision, new and fresh perspectives; I'm an "Options Offerer" rather than an "Adviser". Jesus said, "The Kingdom is within you." That's my starting point, simply helping people remember they've had the "answer" all along and to trust this intuitive knowledge.
To use a well-known and loved American film as a metaphor, remember at the end of "The Wizard of OZ" when Prof. Marvel/the Wizard sails off in the balloon without Dorothy? It is at this point, that Dorothy all but completely gives up ("Oh now I'll never get home."). At which point the ubiquitous pink bubble appears and her companions say, "Look, here's someone who can help." Suddenly Glinda is standing beside her, and if you remember anything poignant about that scene, it's in Glinda's words: "She doesn't need to helped any longer. You've always had the power to back to Kansas." Dorothy replies, "I have? Then why didn't anybody tell me?" Glinda: "Because you wouldn't have believed it." The Scarecrow, Tin Man and Cowardly Lion all chime in saying they should have thought of it, felt it, etc. for her. Glinda replies: "No, she had to
learn it for herself ."
That's the kernel of truth brought to you by MGM in 1939. Glinda simply reminds her of something she's always known, but in the face of other worldly pressures (a Wizard, a new reality, a wicked witch threatening her life, poisonous poppies, Munchkins, Flying Monkeys, etc.), has temporarily forgotten. "If I ever go searching for my heart's desire, I won't look any further than my own backyard, because if it isn't there, then I never really lost it to begin with." (i.e., The Kingdom is within YOU).
A couple more random thoughts: GBO, you're an astute, intelligent, educated, soul and I identify with your philosophical proclivities. The safest place to be is deep within agnostic atheism. How utterly honest of you to be public about that. If you haven't read any 18th century "British Empiricists", here are two. George Berkeley, an Anglican cleric who argues empirically for the existence of God, and his contemporary, David Hume, who argues just as effectively that the existence of God cannot be proven empirically. Great reading. If you're interested, I'll give you exact references, so you're not poring over the sum total of each man's work!
Ditto Plato. I think you'd find his "Theory of the Forms", or better yet, the "Allegory of the Cave" fascinating as it might apply to your understanding (which I deem correct), that "Truth" doesn't exist. Or to use Platonic language, "Truth" exists, but we will never apprehend "Truth" as it is in itself because our finite minds cannot comprehend infinite "Truth" (i.e., "truth" vs. "Truth", the former a reflection (or FORM) of the latter). Each of us loosely defined as "seekers", either singly or communally, are on different paths to "it", but all have the same goal in mind. Nothing strikes me as more existentially arrogant than to say one possesses the "Truth" and moreover he/she/it knows the only way to get it. Anytime someone or an institution thinks its cornered the market on Truth, they've painted themselves into a very tight corner out of which lies one possibility of egress: To Admit Doubt. To this extent, Philosophy is more rigorously honest than Theology when Theology allows itself to slip into Orthodoxy. Orthodoxy gives birth to the false dichotomies of "us" vs. "them", "right" vs. "wrong", or to what I call "the need to be right". What is the need to be right based on? FEAR. Existential/Cosmic Insecurity. For this reason, it's impossible to argue with a fundamentalist (regardless of religion), because these souls are too frightened to deal with the fact that life is GRAY, life is UNCERTAIN. Hence, they must make things Black & White in order to cope with this FEAR. It's a coping strategy, albeit misguided and not the healthiest way of coping. My goal in counseling is to facillitate people's release from the bondage of fear, to remind them that they've "always had the power to go back to Kansas".
Another classic is Richard Swinburne's 1979 (revised 1991) book,
The Existence of God . Swinburne is Nolloth Professor of Philosophy of the Christian Religion at the University of Oxford (England).
Dear Madame Zora, in the spiritual life, we're always at the beginning. Remember that next time you feel you should be further along than you are. As Buddhism teaches, "This is only a dream; it shall soon pass." Without going into a Biblical Studies lecture, let me tell you this, the 4 canonical Gospels, are, first of all, anonymous. The names ascribed to each (Matthew, Mark, Luke, John) were added a century later based on oral tradition and to give them more authority over against all the other gospels that were in circulation. It was an arbitrary decision made to separate Christian orthodoxy from Christian heresy (right vs. wrong again!
. Moreover, each of the writers of the gospels had a specific theological agenda. For example, "Matthew" is written for Jewish Christians with its emphasis on Jesus as the fulfillment of Old Testament prophecy, "John" is written using Greek philosophical structures to a "Gentile" audience who would understand the lingo, etc. Each of the 4 portrays a very different Jesus if you read them closesly. Furthermore, although most scholars side with the "Markan Priority" (i.e., "Mark" is the earliest of the 4), there exists a hypothetical gospel from which all of them derive which scholars call "Q" (you can find the Gospel of "Q" online). It is a "sayings" Gospel rather than a biographical narrative, much like the Gnostic Gospel of Thomas (also online). Check out the Nag Hammadi Library (online) for a real mind bender and a lesson in how many variations of Christianity existed from the get go. If only we hadn't lapsed into fear and the need to be right, rather than live and let live, Christianity might have progressed very differently!
Lastly, my friend who was damaged by the Roman Catholic Church. I'm deeply sorry for those wounds. They've obviously altered your path a bit. But fear not; it's just grist for the mill. Try to remember, that it wasn't the "Church" who did it, rather, the church", and try to live in a place of compassion for those who misguided, fear filled soulds who took their shit out on you. There are many Christian denominations (mainline or esoteric) who would welcome you (all of you) warmly. See me for some suggestions if you want to continue treading the path of Christianity. If not, I can suggest other avenues equally valid and accepting.
GBO, try this one on for size. Instead of using the term "unconditional love", try reframing it as "disinterested love". That is, love for its own sake, free from attachment to outcomes. This is the love, I believe, Jesus of Nazareth modeled. Indeed, his commitment to loving this way, led him directly to his execution, and as you so rightly mention, even in the agony of crucifixion, he still said "Forgive them for they know not what they do." Can you imagine that kind of pure love? Yet a bit later, even Jesus betrays his all too human and natural tendency to be AFRAID, to NOT UNDERSTAND, to feel ABANDONED: "My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?" Quickly, I think you're referring to the passage wherein the Pharisees are attempting to trap Jesus and ask him which are the two most important commandments. In other words get him to compromise himself legalistically as a practicing, devout Jew. His response was "You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart , mind, and soul. And the second is "Love your neighbor as yourself." Get the distinction? Jesus wasn't issuing a commandment, he was cleverly outwitting the fuckin' Pharisees! Also, remember that because Jesus of Nazareth is a historical personage, he would naturally have used the lingo of his historical context: 1st century Palestinian Judaism (what you refer to as his "theism", although correct, isn't necessarily his "flaw", rather, a product of his environment and socialization in a particular place and time), just as we naturally refer to things in our contemporary historical context. In another century or so, our reference points will no longer make sense to the people in that historical context. And so it goes. What I keep coming back to in my own "search" is separating the message from the messenger. In order to gain any understanding or universal truth from the words of the historical Jesus ergo The Bible, one must de facto separate them, because others before and after him said the same things and will continue to. It was Buddha who said, "Suffering is caused by attachment," centuries before Jesus was a gleam in anyone's eye! In other words, don't be attached to a goal, an outcome, a person, a thing, etc. Disinterested love, right? Different language, different culture, different messengers, the same message. Peace.
