# What I read!!



## melissa (Jun 18, 2003)

I know that this is totally in left field compared to what others in the books & authors section are reading. I am a huge fan of Danielle Steel and I am currently reading one of her newest books, Answered Prayers. I enjoy her books because they are about life, love and tradedy. I am also reading Conversations with God, book 3, by Neale Donald Walsh. His book is very fasinating and I myself never believed in the church kind of God that most people worship. I have always felt that the God they adored was to much like us humans, judgemental, and harsh. How can we be a part of God, when their God seperates us from himself? Why is it that their God is male? If their God loved us so much, then why did he cause so many to die in the flood and fire? He would have forgiven them and loved them no matter what, and allowed them their free will. There are to many loose ends with the 'bible God,' and I think the people who believe in such a thing are going to go about life as though they were blind. Never being able to see what is really there. A quote from the book, "I will not experience that I have it, until I know that I do."
Anyway, I have gotten way off topic. Thanks for reading


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## mattquarterstein (Jun 22, 2003)

melissa said:
			
		

> I myself never believed in the church kind of God that most people worship. I have always felt that the God they adored was to much like us humans, judgemental, and harsh. How can we be a part of God, when their God seperates us from himself? Why is it that their God is male? If their God loved us so much, then why did he cause so many to die in the flood and fire? He would have forgiven them and loved them no matter what, and allowed them their free will. There are to many loose ends with the 'bible God,' and I think the people who believe in such a thing are going to go about life as though they were blind. Never being able to see what is really there.



In the Bible God does give man free will, right from the start. Adam has the choice to serve God, or to disobey. Serving god isn't a burden. God's will is the best thing for man, according to the Bible. His commands PREVENT humans from being hurt. A sin is something that will inevitably cause pain to either yourself or someone else. To not sin is to ultimately do the best thing for yourself. But man didn't want the best for himself. No matter how many chances God gives man, man always stuffs it up.

On a literary level, the Bible is more complex than people give it credit for.

And as for people who believe in the Bible being blind, there is evidence of God everywhere. In the trees, in the complexity of nature, in the laws of the universe, in the colours of the sunset. You may not be able to see his face, but his reflection is in everything.

I'm not exactly a Christian, by the way, and I don't mean to go overboard, but I see a lot of people knock Christianity because it's one of those religions that no one cares about if it's stepped on. I thought I'd just stand up for them, because I know if someone knocked Buddhism or Confucianism or Shinto or whatever, there'd be someone racing to their defence.


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## Spudley (Jun 22, 2003)

Matt, that is one of the most accurate and insightful commentaries I have ever seen on this topic. Particularly that last paragraph.

To keep on-topic for just a moment longer, I also agree with you about the literary value of the Bible. The Psalms, for example, include some of the most beautiful poetry you'll ever read.


Now, I just wanted to bring up a couple of the other points that melissa mentioned...  (well, you _did_ ask...  )



			
				melissa said:
			
		

> I myself never believed in the church kind of God that most people worship. I have always felt that the God they adored was to much like us humans, judgemental, and harsh.



It's true, there are many churches which teach this view of God, but it is not the right one. God is recorded in the Bible as being slow to anger, and quick to forgive. Particularly in the New Testament.



			
				melissa said:
			
		

> Why is it that their God is male?



Uh... because.   :?  But I don't think it's particularly important; certainly not something to get hung up over. If nothing else, it's easier than referring to him as 'it', or something.  



			
				melissa said:
			
		

> I think the people who believe in such a thing are going to go about life as though they were blind.



It is an absolute truth - regardless of your stance on the matter - that it is impossible to prove the existence or non-existence of God. No matter what discoveries are made, it is not possible to determine conclusively one way or the other whether God exists. Therefore, in the final analysis, you are left with a question of faith. You can either have faith that God exists, or you can have faith that he doesn't. Either way, it is a step of blind faith. In that respect, we are all blind.



			
				melissa said:
			
		

> Anyway, I have gotten way off topic. Thanks for reading



Hehe. No worries. I think it's a pretty open forum, this.  

And my own appologies for rising to the bait!    (Well.... someone had to. )


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## Kimberly Bird (Jun 22, 2003)

Matt, one thing, God is not a HE.  God is both Mother & Father, HE/SHE.


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## melissa (Jun 22, 2003)

*Hey, wait a minute . . .*

The bible teaches us to fear God, and I believe that paralyes our relationships with our Supreme Being(not the bible god). We must be fearless enough to step away from what we think we know about God and be fearless enough to step away from what others have told us about God. Humans have created a way to put fear into people, the devil. If we do not obey this bible God, then we will be sentenced to hell. How can that be if we are a part of God, would he not be punishing himself? Most of us are writers here, and we create stories about all aspects of life. Could the bible not have been started by someone who was putting their thoughts and ideas down, and thus ending up with a story about how we got here and so on. Then as time went on, others added to the story. Then one day, someone find the writings of this supposed God, and believes what he/she is reading and the next thing we know we have a religion on our hands. I never said that I didn't have faith, I do, just not in the bible God. I believe that there is a Supreme Being, one that truly allows us free will. We will not be sent to hell if we make the wrong decision, or 'sin.'  The Supreme Being has a purpose in creating us, and that is so that it might experience ITSELF as the Creator of IT'S own experience. Through us IT can know every aspect of itself, the perfect beauty of the rose, the warmth of the sun, the whisper of the wind. We are the part of IT which is awareness experienced. What we are experiencing is IT creating IT. When we die I believe that we will experience our 'afterlife' exactly as we expect, and choose to experience. As long as we remain in this created reality, we will not experience what really is. Those whose only desire is to know the eternal truth of All That Is, to understand great mysteries, to experience the grandest reality, do so. 
I was not critizing the beliefs of other people, I was only stating my own. You said right from the beginning of the bible, that God gave Adam a choice to either obey or not. What happened when he disobeyed? He was punished and thrown out of Eden. If God is so forgiving why did he not forgive Adam his sins then? If God was allowing man free will, why did he take away that right when he flooded the earth and burned the city? He took away the rights of those people and caused them to die. 
Anyway, I have gone on long enough. I hope no one is taking offence to any of this, because I had no intentions of doing that. I just got off topic.


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## Kimberly Bird (Jun 22, 2003)

Melissa, you are basically speaking what Jesus taught; his original teachings, nothing to be ashamed of.  The native teachings, Hinduism, Buddhism, and many more fall on this base.  Gnostcism & Druidism I believe also falls into this category.  It is a belief that has been around forever.  You are remembering.  

Kimberly


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## rcallaci (Jun 23, 2003)

Who or what is this presence or non presence we call God? Is God a He, a She, an It, a thing, being, nonbeing, the creator, creation, the All. the Other, everything, nothingness or emptyness? Is God all of these things or none of these things? Did we create God or did God create us? Is God Dead, Living or Sleeping? When we speak of God , when we deny Gods existance or affirm that God exists, one first must make clear on what do we mean by or what our interpretation of God is. God is many different things to many different people. 

Now if someone were to be  speaking of the judeo-christian concept of God, A transendent being, something other then ourselves or this world, a being seperate from us that created us , an all knowing , all seeing ominiscient God, and if that same someone asked me if I believed or accepted that concept of God I would politely say that, that God is not a construct of my choosing.  I might even say that, that God is Dead! I would then say that me, you , the trees, the wind , the stars, all that is and ever will be are all the stuff of GoD. We are all part of the same thing, we are all God. Just a short time ago , two hundred or so years ago , I would have been called a heritic and burned at the stake. 



Warm Regards,
Bob


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## melissa (Jun 23, 2003)

*Continued . . .*

Hi Bob, that is exactly what I was trying to say. As said earlier by Kimberly, I believe that Jesus did exist, he was a man that came here remembering things that most of us do not. We get to be the expression and experience of our Supreme Being at whatever level we choose. Some of us have chosen very grand expressions and there has been none other than Jesus, though I believe there has been others as equally high. Yeah, Christ is our Supreme Being made man, but he is not the only man made of our Supreme Being. We are all ONE, and we are all expressing our Supreme Being in different ways, allowing 'God,' to experience itself. I also believe that someone wrote about this man named Jesus, just like we are writers, we write about what is around us, and what we know. So, someone wrote about Jesus. The Bible God is nothing more than a way for society to gain some control and set rules for people. If people disobey, then they will be punished and sent to hell. This hard to believe because how could this 'God,' create something and then punish it? Just like a child. If my daughter were to make wrong decisions, or sin, I would never send her to 'hell,' to be punished. I will love her no matter what she does. The same goes for our Supreme Being, it loves us no matter what we do because we are a part of IT, and IT loves itself. If hell and satan were to exist, he exists as every thought we had of separation from our Supreme Being. We cannot be separate from IT, for IT is all that is. Men invented the devil to scare people into doing what they wanted, under the threat of separation from 'God' if they did not. Condemnation, being hurled into the everlasting fires of hell, was the ultimate scare tactic. Nothing can or ever will separate us from our Supreme Being. IT and us are ONE. We cannot be anything else if IT is what IT is, all that is. Why then would our Supreme Being condemn ITSELF? How would IT do it? How could IT separate ITSELF from ITSELF, when IT is all that is, and there is nothing else?
Someone, please continue . . .


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## The Javelina Named Eric (Jun 24, 2003)

The bible is truly a difficult thing. It is supposed to be the word of God, and although I do believe in God, I find it hard to beleive that it was written by God himself. You may ask if I beleive in God than how can I not beleive in the bible since Christian faith paticularly the more conservative demonations insist that the bible is written by God. The reason I have what some would a radical religious opinion is that I believe that humans are God's consciousness, which is certainly not what the bible teaches. Therefore if humans are God's consciousness you could say it was written by God, but the human beings who did write it were also merely human beings and what they wrote could be morally flawed.
             What you were talking earlier about God being a he, is often reffered to as the old man upstairs theory. I do not beleive in the old man upstairs theory, that God is a white bearded, white skinned male. I think God is an it, but much more than an it. That is because everyone believes God is seperate from everything else. But I believe that God is everything. God is the universe we live in, and our thoughts are his thoughts, that is what I was meaning when I said we are his consciousness. 
             Also the universe is not multiple places confined in one big place, it is a single place, with a strange shape, people in it make the shape. This makes God's existense very simple to prove if we are him.


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## Kimberly Bird (Jun 24, 2003)

I was raised more with the philosophy of the native teachings and shamanism I guess.  I have read the bible though and like and enjoy the stories in it.  I was taught as the bible teaches that all things are equally created.  When you hurt yourself you are hurting others around you and God itself because we are connected to God as we are our Mother & Father.   When you slice your wrists or beat yourself you are abusing God itself, your body is a temple.  When you kill, you kill all the other things that depended on that one small creature, thus destroying a circle.  Of course this is very hard to live by in the world we created.  So all we can do is try and do more good things than bad, and hope that one day if the good outweighs the bad, some generation years from now, can live in relative peace.

Kimberly


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## melissa (Jun 24, 2003)

*More . . .*

You said if someone were to slit their wrists then it would be hurting us all. They are not hurting anyone by killing themselves, they are just being given their deepest desire, and that is to escape from the body and be a free spirit again. We always get our deepest desires, no matter what. I do not believe in death, how could anyone. We are life itself, we can never, ever die. At the moment of our death, we go on living, just not in the body anymore. We can choose to come back to a body, or go on to other things. I do not know if any of you have ever had out of body experiences, but if you have, you would know what I mean by our bodies being totally separate from the 'real' beings we are. During out of body experiences, we are able to leave our physical bodies and feel absolute freedom. I have had these experiences since I was a kid, and they are awesome!! Life is all there is, and all there ever will be. I believe that everything that happens in our lives happen for a reason. They happen because that is what we came here to experience. I know there are some terrible things in the world we live in, but somehow it all connects together.


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## Kimberly Bird (Jun 24, 2003)

Sorry but killing oneself does hurt others.  They may think they are putting themselves out of misery but they leave those behind in pain.  

You coudn't tell that to a mother who watches her child bleed to death.

Kimberly


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