I love this church, not because it houses some of my close friends every Sunday, but because it is a place where I am challenged, weekly, to think about my truths, my values and my beliefs. I compare this experience with those of the great Jewish activist, Jesus Christ, who challenged his home town religion and the Roman rulers of his country.
I am challenged every Sunday to examine my life in relation to both what Christians believe to be his words, and the words of other writers who contributed to the Bible; a uniquely Christian book that some claim to have divine significance.
There – you have survived this person’s perspective of the J-word and the B-word and even the C-word, without curling into a fetal position.
A refection on “knowing”
In our church, we try not to worship the Bible, in fact we sometimes challenge it, pointing out the parts that make no sense or contradict. We use it as a way to frame the history of Christian beliefs and to consider the relevance of this history to today’s world and to our belief system. Along with this, we are also challenged by what we call the New Creed, a revised statement of United Church beliefs, which allows you to measure yourself as a person to the Christian values.
I fail miserably at this test, yet I am a member of the Lumby United Church and I consider myself to be a Christian. I do believe that Jesus and I share a great genetic possibility, and one that some Christians might find radical: we are both sons of God. That links me pretty close to declaring myself a god, and that would be right because we are linked in spirit. My creative self draws from the spiritual well that I feel within. I am composed of water and spirit, with a few bones and organs thrown in.
I believe in a modification of Darwinism, where those who can cooperate which is a form of loving, are more likely to survive and evolve – not quite the “survival of the fittest” which popularly seems to define Darwin, but I suppose that would depend on your definition “to be fit”.
There is room for a God in any theory of Evolution. I believe that Jesus, along with other great “religious” teachers, have helped us to understand another popular belief: “The whole is greater than the sum of its parts.”
It is believed that Aristotle, a student of Socrates, initially came up with this concept. Since then understanding this holistic or systemic view of the “things” that are contained within our thoughts, has occupied scientists, psychologists, and other professions and trades, including theology. Finding out what “more” there is to our “parts” is a worthwhile and often spiritual Quest that ends up framing our civilization and, in particular, our moral views.
I receive most of my sense of morality from teachings that came through my church. My mother was and still is another Mother Theresa, an unconditional lover of all; my father was a Methodist minister’s son, but became bitter against the dogmatic church. Nevertheless, he was a moral man.
Many of the teachings from the churches of my youth might now be seen as nonsense; nevertheless it had still pushed my parents to struggle and think about the moral questions of the day. Today, my devout mother at 99 years of age is challenged by her belief that there is something beyond death. She considers herself heavenly-challenged because she doesn’t believe that going to heaven is that primary reason for being a Christian or doing good work. She is a follower of the same Jesus Christ as I, embracing the amazingly clear statement that “God is Love”. On this we agree.
Indeed, in my experience, the G-word is less threatening to most people than the JC-words. Sadly, some of these people would never be caught dead in a church, quite literally. I believe that it has something to do with traumatic childhood experiences. If you could measure the strength of this trauma you might find that more recently the condition may have been escalated to a diagnostic post-traumatic stress syndrome.
Or the condition might just be based on fear, which is the opposite of love.
The struggle to “know” and embrace love is a lifelong journey for most. We fail miserably, with our issues of intimacy and our moral questions about who is allowed to love whom. It is little wonder that we seldom really get to understand this thing called God.
The term Christian Church as a proper noun refers to the whole Christian religious tradition through history. Within its broader definition it includes each small part of its entirety. In other words each believer is not only a part of the larger church but they themselves are a church. In my life as a church, I don’t claim to know God, but I do have a different way to access the part of God within me that screams out to be understood. It is from within the paradoxical feelings of wonder that I can see my small part of a whole that lies, tempting me, outside of my immediate vision.
Being a church, and being within a church allows me to look at my inner self by standing outside of myself – and to join with others as they do the same.
This process demonstrates quite clearly how we are all connected.
What is the truth of the matter?
Our truths and beliefs come from strange sources. I have discovered some marvellous truths from strange bedfellows, like Stephen King, Dean Koontz and Robert M. McCammon. These psychological “horror” hosts take the risk of looking into the dark side of destiny, and in the process are often free to examine the whole spectrum of life’s colours. Dean Koontz, in a novella of 2011 called “The Moonlit Mind”, said this:
The true nature of the world is veiled, and if you shine a bright light on it, you can’t expose that truth; it melts away with the shadows in which it was cloaked. The truth is too awesome for us to stare directly at, and we are meant to glimpse it only at the periphery of our vision. If the landscape of your mind is too dark with fear or doubt or anger, you are blind to all truth. But if your mental landscape is too bright with certitude and arrogance, you are snow-blind and likewise unable to see what lies before you. Only the moonlit mind allows wonder, and it is in the thrall of wonder that you can see the intricate weave of the world of which you are but one thread, one fantastic and essential thread.”
I love the enlightening metaphor of Koontz’s moonlit “Shadow Street”. Of course what follows is his paradoxical assertion that “…terror lives on Shadow Street”. Along with the risk of shedding our doubts and moving into the moonlit mind, in hopes of discovering wonder and truth, we sometimes do, indeed, discover terror.
Like faith, we are sometimes fooled when we take that first dive off of the edge and then find that someone failed to fill the pool.
Such is the risk of belief, a constant companion of truth.
It is often understood or believed that the ingredients of a person exist within their body which contains emotions and intuits; the mind which represents reason and thoughts; and their spirit which consists of soul and ether. I’ve observed that many people say they are spiritual; however they don’t seem to want to connect with Spirit. They are spiritual but not religious. They hate dogma and superstition. That is why they don’t come to church.
I feel the same way, but I go to church.
I’m interested in finding a place where I can explore those slippery, but necessary words: right and wrong; true and false; good and bad. I also happened to be interested in the life and times of this great teacher, Jesus, and the small belief movement of the times that evolved into the major religion of Christianity.
Jesus believed, perhaps after some persuasion, that he was the Messiah that the Jews had long waited for. They believed his coming was imminent. His presence and his story would change the world. Ironically, most Jews are still waiting.
What is the truth of the matter?
Well, one might say that Jesus Christ presented a whole new way of perceiving the sometimes violent, judgmental and wrathful God of his Jewish faith. His God was forgiving and compassionate and expected the same from all people. Indeed, He was even the God of the Romans – who persecuted him. This was a very revolutionary idea, to his church, his family, and the political forces at the time.
He pretty well got what he felt he had to get: a crucifixion.
We know some of this because it is supported by historical secondary sources - the rest is “belief” to some, and “dogma” to others.
Within this context, I try to agree with what Harold Pinter had to say about art, reality and living:
“There are no hard distinctions between what is real and what is unreal, or between what is true and what is false; (something) can be both true and false. I believe that these assertions still make sense and do still apply to the exploration of reality through art. So as a writer I stand by them; but as a citizen…I must ask: What is true? What is false?”
An interesting statement, I think. Living in a world that may be real or a dream; it seems only convenient to take a stand on some things. Sitting on the fence being doubtful or agnostic, might be the dalliance of youth; with time we go either one way or the other on a question, but hopefully do not land so hard that we become intolerant people.
The Atheist and the extreme Fundamentalist share one thing in common: their truth is the only Truth.
Most of those who have decided on the issue of spiritual or religious belief have left room for adjustment and change. I am indeed part of that crowd, and in doing so, I have come to believe in a Spirit that is implanted within all of creation, which means that it has been a participant in all of evolution as well. I don’t believe in the God incarnate as Jesus Christ; however I am open to the possibility that I might be wrong.
To tell the “truth”? ... well, that may actually hinge around whether Christ really walked on water, or not. If he did, I’ll give him the power to be a supernatural God. This amazing miracle did not get around the Empire at the time, so we have no secondary sources to the Biblical allegation.
The belief that Jesus was a healer is more believable, as such healing was likely the cure for the incurables of the day. Even today we have healers. My faith never strays far from reason - as my reason, never strays far from faith.
My life as a church is a feat in overcoming fear. Just as love is the great conqueror of fear. So when I participate in a service of homilies, songs, prayers and recitations, I find myself reinforcing a belief in love. I am not sure where else I could do this without having to hike for miles into the woods under the moonlit skies.
The peace and contentment I find worshipping “That thing called Love” is only matched by walking in a world that has the stamp of “miraculous” imprinted all over it. How do all of these things fit together?
Why does nature work so harmoniously well together?
Out of the chaos of the beginning, how did we get here?
Perhaps, more important, why is it that the human species seems to be destroying the harmony of what seems to be a perfected creation?
It makes me think that God may actually look like an amoeba. It seems to me that a study of basic scientific laws, quantum physics and religions might be a good start at answering questions like this. My life as a church, however, is about worshipping life, love and creation – all things good in this world. Wonder and study are secondary to such joy.
Exploring your spiritual self
What anchors me to the church and its belief system is the idea of The Holy Spirit, which followed the death of Christ. I “believe” that we all have “the Spirit” within us and that it is part of our makeup.
I believe that all living things have this Spiritual matter. I call it a “God-chip” because it is a part of our wholeness, it is something we must strive to understand, as much as our emotions (Body) or our thoughts and beliefs (Mind).
As we have evolved, through creation, we have been “blessed” with this Spirit. The question I would pose to the audience is this: What are you doing to help access your own spiritual self?
I pose the other question to my church and other churches: What are you doing to adapt to be relevant to the post-modern world?
My life as a church went beyond the walls of our United Church sanctuary. I had the honour to work with a team to produce wonderCafé.live!, a coffee house of sorts – housed within our local church. The community participated within our events for over 3 years and we celebrated our diversity of beliefs by listening, sharing and later debating values and beliefs that were important to the growth of our community and to the growth of our personal awareness, knowledge and sense of social justice. I grew as a church within a concerned community.
Belief is a fluid thing. It comes from examining life and the self in relationship to others; indeed in relationship to the whole Universe. Yet some have the supreme idea that their beliefs are not just personal therefore temporary and fluid truths, but Truths that are immutable and inflexible. These folks might lean on the fundamentalist side of any religion; they might be Scientists; or just plain folk who prefer to have one perspective on any belief including their own invented ideas of things. Yes, Science has discovered some immutable principles, but few have much to do with what concerns the core of our humanity: What is the meaning of life?
Psychology comes close to touching the spiritual, and it scares many of us. Perhaps most of our problems in life come from our failure to listen to our spiritual selves. Perhaps we can most easily find this in a moonlit alley with our psychology (psyche) as our companion. Is psychology the window into our souls? Should we embrace our intuitions more and recognize where reason has failed us?
There are many, many questions like this that might intrigue us – if there was a place where we might discuss them with others.
My church is where I ask these kinds of questions and where I am free to discuss them. I am told not to “upset” the seniors by discussing them over a Saddle Mountain lunch; I am given strange looks when I sip a cup at almost any café or take a chew at any restaurant and wax too loudly on such topics.
A church, like a person, is only as good as it acts. In my life as a United Church, I have tried to outreach to the local population to encourage people to open their minds, hearts and doors to questions and diversity. It’s not that I don’t understand those who choose to use other ways to grow and stretch their being; it is, however, my belief that there are those who are paranoid about the churches of their childhood and I would suggest to them to give a bit more time towards exploring the differences in approach between various churches. While some people want strict dogma to satisfy their need for “the Truth”, others have no need for dogmatic statements from the church, preferring to accept that each truth is personal and temporary in a creative and growing culture.
Did Jesus really walk on water?
I doubt it, although I learned to walk on fire, so perhaps he knew something I did not. It is, however, the messages about his walking on water that have stood the test of time and remain fascinating to this day.
Did Jesus heal the sick? Likely.
Did he raise the dead? Unlikely.
At least that is what I believe. Removing the supernatural from Biblical stories does not dilute the message or the meaning. We all grew up with fairy tales and were nurtured by their moral or immoral lessons. For the most part, most of us don’t want to go to church to worship the Bible, or our God for that matter; rather we go because we need to strengthen faith and hope and a sense of community, a sense of togetherness.
And still, we might consider going to church to acknowledge the miracle of life and to tap into our spiritual nature. In time, we might, indeed, get to know that enigma we call “God” - or maybe not. As it is said, “If you haven’t tried it, don’t knock it,” and I would encourage everyone to upgrade their judgements, even in this matter.
I am making the case for Belief as a superior position to Truth, as each is understood. Belief is about Hope; it is about being open to change; it is about being creative and interdependent. Truth seems to be about Fear; it seems to be about rigidity; there is nothing to create nor is there anything to search for; it seems to be about dependency. I say ’seems’ because I am not familiar with knowing all there is to know about Truth.
I believe that I am more than the sum of my parts. Why? Because every day I live in this magical body surrounded by a wonder-filled world and I am forever amazed about Earthly miracles when I take the time to stop, notice and ponder them. Mystery and magic seem to surround me.
What really matters?
My church keeps me from losing myself in things that do not matter. It is the only place I have in my experience where I can freely examine my life. My life as a church is not necessarily similar to many other churchly lives because we are all uniquely different – but we all share this place we call community.
To retain a healthy community requires a strengthening of faith and morals so that we can get through the tough times together. I am not sure our children’s morality is being addressed or maintained. Do we, as adults, know how to refuel our “Spirits” or answer those questions about life that constantly nag at our conscience; are we ready to address those “Big Questions” that come out of the mouths of children that need our encouragement?
Is your experience or mine enough to offer wisdom?
We should hope so, because they depend on it – and this in itself is good reason for each of us to search for truth and to be a church…
…together.
Participating in a
spiritual community
may be good for our body,
mind and soul
By Don Elzer
We have become a people who have folded an extreme number of beliefs and motivations that now drive our spiritual engines with high octane fuel as we seek to juggle our foundation spiritual upbringing with values collected from school and lifestyle choices. We are bombarded with the values that we should partake in like social and environmental responsibilities and tolerance for others and their beliefs.
Many of us ask ourselves "What do I believe?" in order to clarify some sort of spiritual identity. For many of us, what we believe to be true about the spirit, whether or not it exists and to what extent we interact with the spirit, comes from our personal experiences. Very few of us actually and authentically believe in something without the aid of experience. These experiences can range from feelings, dreams, statements you have said that came true, or anything else along these lines.
Based on these experiences, we identify what we believe but being bombarded everyday by information that challenges our belief systems requires a super-human ability to discern what’s of value to us as opposed to information we can largely do without.
For many of us the bombardment of information becomes unmanageable and we crash and burn – often walking away from our spiritual side and in particular the structured framework of religion. Now researchers are discovering that losing religion might be unhealthy – particularly if you have been a life-long church goer belonging to a relatively strict religion.
People who leave strict religious groups are more likely to say their health is worse than members who remain in the group, according to a Penn State researcher.
The percentage of people who left a strict religious group and reported they were in excellent health was about half that of people who stayed in the group, said Christopher Scheitle, senior research assistant, in sociology.
"Previous research showed some association between belonging to a religious group and positive health outcomes," Scheitle said. "We became interested in what would happen to your health if you left a religious group. Would people demonstrate any negative health outcomes?"
About 40 percent of members of strict religious groups reported they were in excellent health, according to the study. However, only 25 percent of members in those groups who switched to another religion reported they were in excellent health. The percentage of the strict religious group members who dropped out of religion completely and said their health was excellent fell to 20 percent. The difference between switchers and non-switchers, in reference to health, is statistically significant for the strict groups. The researchers reported their findings in the current issue of the Journal of Health and Social Behavior.
The study also indicated that people who were raised and remained in strict religious groups were more likely to report they were in better health than people affiliated with other religious groups. Scheitle, working with Amy Adamczyk, assistant professor of sociology, John Jay College of Criminal Justice, and assistant professor of sociology and criminal justice at the graduate center, City University of New York, defined strict religions, such as The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and Jehovah's Witnesses, as exclusive groups with strict social, moral and physical guidelines for members.
The researchers suggested several possible reasons for the declining health conditions reported by former members.
Strict groups typically require members to abstain from unhealthy behaviors, such as alcohol and tobacco use. These groups also create both formal and informal support structures to promote positive health, according to Scheitle. The social bonds of belonging to the group might be another factor for better health.
"The social solidarity and social support could have psychological benefits," Scheitle said. "That could then lead to certain health benefits."
Religious beliefs may also promote better health by providing hope and encouraging positive thinking.
Besides losing connection to these health benefits, exiting a religious group may increase stressful situations.
"You could lose your friends or your family becomes upset when you leave, leading to psychological stress and negative health outcomes," said Scheitle.
The study does not necessarily mean that leaving a group causes poor health, Scheitle said. Poor health actually could prompt a member to leave the group. Strict sectarian groups require active involvement in meetings, services and social events that hinder participation by unhealthy members. An unhealthy member may also question membership in a group that promotes the belief in an all-powerful being who has failed to heal his or her condition.
For the study, Scheitle examined a total of 30,523 cases collected from 1972 through 2006 in the General Social Surveys. Of those, more than 10,000 switched to another religion and more than 2,000 dropped out of religion completely. A total of 423 strict religious group members were studied with approximately 96 members switching to other religions and about 54 members no longer affiliated with any religion. The Opinion National Research Center has conducted this survey annually or biennially since 1972. Scheitle said drawing deeper conclusions about the health issues from leaving a strict religious group would require more exact studies. Those longitudinal studies are new in the religious field, he added.
So perhaps at the core of this finding is our inner need to join with others who can challenge our moral descionmaking and in the process develop our personal choice-making. For many of the great religions and spiritual movements around this planet have a belief of sustainability that is grounded in the most fundamental of spiritual insights, i.e., that all life is an expression of a single spiritual unity and that the spiritual growth of the individual consists of advancement toward the full, conscious realization of this unity.
Spirituality, community, and a bonding to place or habitat are central values that have unified many of these beliefs over centuries – perhaps re should remind ourselves of this everyday – perhaps in the company of others.
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