Anti-Religion?

Before I go too much further with this blog, I want to address the fact that religion, and maybe my perceived dislike of it, will come up in quite a few posts. I will state for the record that I am not anti-religion, but I will also add a few caveats to that declaration.



I understand the need for religion. I understand how belief in an all-powerful god can bring comfort to many. I understand how the rituals of religion tap into the human need for order and repetition and ceremony to create a secure existence. I understand all this and more, I just don't find the need within myself to adhere to these ideals. So, while I am not anti-religion for some, I am anti-religion for myself.



Do I believe in God? While I'm not an atheist, I personally don't believe an any god I've encountered so far. My most formal acquaintance has been with the god of Catholicism, the god as father of Christ. But, in addition, I've read up on other religions (Judaism, Kabbalah, Buddhism, the Quaker religion) seeking understanding of the world and my place within it, as well as understanding of what I innately know within myself. What I have come to discover is that each religion's god can't exist outside that religion. The god is formed by the religion. The god acts within the parameters of the beliefs of the religion: almost as if the religion created the god and not the other way around. How else to explain different religions that all work off, essentially, the same book and supposedly the same god, yet the gods all appear to have different agendas for us humans.



Religion is about parameters, for the god and the follower. And I understand this, as well. Humans need, desire, and crave boundaries, as I've stated many times. Without boundaries, we can easily go off the rails of what has been deemed acceptable by society (and what is socially acceptable depends on the society in which one lives). And a world without a god is an unbound world. The god is the ultimate parent (which could explain its creation: adults, no longer guided or hemmed in by their parental guardians create an ultimate being as a substitute to trick their minds into curbing their desires). Many of us need the idea of constantly being watched in order to keep us on the straight and narrow, to keep us safe from self-harm. I believe this aspect of religion is good and needed, but again, for some.

I put more trust in myself. I am my own god, which may sound extremely blasphemous to some but if one doesn't believe in an all-powerful god, then one is not being blasphemous when one states that he or she is a god. I believe that we are all gods, born of the same universal energy. Some have told me: "Well, that's belief in god right there. That's what god is: power and energy." Yes, but the energy I believe in doesn't filter down in some patriarchal hierarchy. We are all equal in energy, even the energy from whence we come. That energy within us is our "soul." I air-quote the word 'soul' because the word connotes a religious belief to many. I believe when our bodies die, our energy re-enters the universe, to re-infuse the world, maybe into another body, maybe not, but it doesn't dissipate or rise to a heaven or sink into a hell.

Am I sure of any of this? As sure as you are of your god. It's all just theory until proven right or wrong. No one knows for sure if gods exist, though passion and belief can be powerful emotions, so powerful they feel tangible, which makes god seem tangible, but, in truth, no one knows. The Bible is just a book written by men with their own agendas: to control the masses, to lay down a belief that tried to make sense of the world and, ultimately, of their own existence.

But: If there is no god, then what the hell is this? What are we doing here? Why do we exist? A belief in a god answers these questions, however vaguely (and with so many stipulations that one wonders if god is good or evil, or just some crazed, bored, ancient energy toying with us on a daily basis.). My idea of universal energy answers none of these questions, but I don't need it to. I'm fine without knowing the purpose of this world or any others that might exist. They, and we, exist and that is that. And that is enough for me. I can sleep at night and not dream of heaven because I believe that "heaven" exists within all of us, because all of us are gods (though not the all-powerful ones of the storybooks. None of us have dominion over the others, a vital misconception of godliness.)

And that might be the crux of my anti-religious stance: "None of us have dominion over the others!" Each individual religion believes that they are the one that is right. They have figured it all out and everyone else is wrong. We win and they lose. Religion, and the belief in gods, creates a belief that this is all some kind of eternal war with winners and losers, rights and wrongs, uses and thems. Religion pits one against the other, when we should all be one. Yes, I'm speaking of a Utopia, the most idyllic of dreams. But I believe Utopia, along with godliness, is within all of us, too. We merely need to tap into it. Believe in ourselves as gods, capable of existing without parental supervision and achieve the ultimate existence.

Religion fascinates me, and always has, which is another reason it will come up over and over again in this blog. While I believe I understand the need for it, its repercussions are endless and fascinating, something I truly want to understand and explain.

Whatever your beliefs, I hope we can have lively, though respectful, debates in the upcoming posts.

Jeffrey