Belief in God, believe it or not, started around fourteen thousand years ago. Years ago people believed spirits resided, as many of us still do, in places and things such as rocks, mountains, plants, and other beautiful objects of nature.
The Arabs called this Jinn, various tribes around the world knew this as Manna, and Latin’s, as Numina. All religions revered nature as being close to God. Atheists, which are looked down upon by the three great religions, also believe in this and revere nature. So you see, you are all right, and just differ in the respect that atheists do not feel the need to carry knowledge any further as some of us do.
It all depends on how much of an explanation one needs to understand his or her role on the planet and in life. Depending on a persons needs they will go to, and find what they need in many of various religions. Atheists believe that life on this planet is a very rare but natural occurrence, as naturalist, evolutionist, and many of us others do.
Some people only have a need to carry the process further and assign these creations to the doings of a God, and further, to a vision by an identified prophet. At one point in time every religious faith including, Jews, Muslims, and especially Christians, were thought of as atheists. This was because their beliefs did not agree with existing beliefs in practice at the time.
Nonbelievers, (atheists), until very recently, were very rare. During Abrahams, time, virtually everyone believed. With the advent of ever improving fields of science being able to explain many of the great mysteries of the world many people all over the world have of late, been moving away from their belief in the one God.
What most people fail to realize, is that another perfectly natural and cyclical occurrence, is unfolding right now. It is one, of many that is happening all at the same time. One is feeding the other and God willing, everything will work out favorably.
Once again, Christians and Jews, due to the increasing unease about their surroundings are beginning to look to God for answers. All the bombings, killings, terrorism, and many, many, problems in our Governments have become too much for most to bear alone. This is especially true in the U.S. with a multitude of systematic moral inequities right here at home. This is due in large part to our moral degradation and our perceived inability to do the right thing. People are more and more turning back to the one true God in ever increasing numbers.
Many may find it odd that I say this, however. We will be pointing out something that has happened to both the Jews, and the Christians, and is now happening to the Muslims.
Yes, what we are conveniently calling terrorism is once again, a natural occurrence. The big problem now is that the shoe is on the other foot. With the stakes certainly being much higher, and the weapons and means, a lot more violent we cannot allow this to happen.
I believe it would be more accurate and in line with mans cyclical history to stop calling the blight facing the entire world today terrorism. It would be more accurate if we started to start calling it what it really is, an ”Islamist Jihad”.
As we discussed, with the early belief that spirits resided in naturally beautiful places in nature. Civilized man has always sought to get as close to nature as he could. Man has always believed that this would bring him closer to God. This, as my fellow Americans well know, is how Native Americans felt.
This in particular is what makes this Islamist Jihad so particularly disturbing. It’s not that they don’t care about human life, including their own. It is that they are willing to destroy the very planet that they believe God created for them."I'm ashamed to say that sounds like us"
Anyway they do this with the absolutely ridiculous belief that they are going to be rewarded once they die and go to heaven. The unbelievable part of this is that they expect 72 virgins, and rivers of gold, or something like that.
Come on people of the world, this planet, this world, this land, is all we are going to get. For the sake of the generations to follow us, we must take care of this. It is all we are going to get.
The Islamists leave behind, ruins, and very often, land that is no longer viable for human habitation.
Collectively we can not go down this road that we are careening down, "world war". we can not survive an all out war at this time as the weapons are too horrific for man or the planet to survive. Lastly I am not overly Religious.
I am a life long Christian with a very strong sense of spirituality that I seem to have been born with. With that said, I cannot go into it any deeper in this context. This is my question to you. Do you agree "God" who or whatever he, she, or it is, is on the move in many ways around the world?
James Joiner
Gardner, Ma
http://anaverageamericanpatriot.blogspot.com
1 comment:
I read your posting with interest. I declare my interest at the outset. I'm an atheist although brought up in a Christian (Episcopalian home). It seems clear to me that there is a basis of religious fanaticism at the root of the majority of terrorists based on a conviction of their rectitude which gives them the right to impose said religion on everyone. To an extent the vast majority of Christian and Jews have got past the stage of absolute conviction to allowing both doubt and other beliefs to persist. Not all however. from across the Atlantic I can't see much difference between the absolutist beliefs of fundamentalist Christians - the dominionists and those who daily seek rapture for example - and islamists. Indeed to read and hear on the TV what men like Congressman Akin say is to hear Islamist loons talk about Sharia.
I came to my absence of belief in a supernatural creator and the rest through honest doubt and questionning what I was told. You will note that all the monotheist religions require obedience to their dogma and conviction for observance. Otherwise dissenters face ousting and in Christianity burning for heresy. Just read what some Roman Catholic Bishops are saying in your present elections
I notice the Mormons (that's OK I remembered the second m) are seeking to excommunicate a writer for casting doubt on Mitt Romney and in that connection I must say that anyone who swallows the utter twaddle of Mormonism is not fit to hold office anywhere.
Sorry for the length of this - what it actually boils down to is my conclusion from life is that too much conviction in the rightness of a set of beliefs causes the damage and we would all be better off from a strong dose of honest doubt.
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