From: Staci_Young@webtv.net (Interloper)
Newsgroups: talk.bizarre
Subject: Neurotic Ramble: Part Two
Date: Wed, 1 Dec 1999 01:39:44 -0500 (EST)
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I abandoned the possibility of a god when I could no longer accept God
according to Christianity. I accepted at least the possibility of a god
later when I was able to see beyond Christianity. 

People often use the presence of so much suffering in the world to
discount the existence of God. Possibly humans often seem let down by
God because our concepts and ways differ so much from those of God. Of
course God must have "concepts and ways" for this to be possible. 

It's not just the simplistic concept of God working in mysterious ways
that I'm talking about. That concept implies a god who means to conceal
his ways from us. It's more like we fail to understand the ways of God
because they're so outside of what is human.

If God indeed has ways that are driven by awareness, I don't think they
can be distinguished from what is human with terms like "good" or
"better". It's as ridiculous as saying the ways of a human are superior
to those of a bee.

I can't really see how you can compare species by ranking them. Is an
ant inferior to a human because it can't write a poem or do math
equations? An ant has no use for those things. 
And whether or not an ant is aware of itself  doesn't matter. Just
because being aware of oneself works for a human doesn't mean it would
work or be necessary for an ant.

It is my opinion that people can't be singled out from all of God's
creations as being particularly divine. If everything is created by God,
it's all equal in its divinity. Neither can God be perfect alone. Either
God and all things are perfect, or everything is flawed. Because if
something creates something flawed, it must be flawed itself. Yes, in my
opinion, if something perfect creates something meant to be flawed, it's
not perfect.

Perfect and flawed for now can only be viewed as human concepts. We
really have no idea if they are shared by God. I just think they should
be applied equally by humans if they're to be applied at all.

The ways of God may or may not be very removed from the ways of
humanity, but if they are, that still doesn't mean we can't look to
ourselves to find some of the patterns of God. We see similarities
between the actions of humans and other creatures, though we also see
ways where we differ and do not understand why completely. 

The life of a bee is very different than the life of a human, but it is
also very much the same. Perhaps the same goes for God, if God is a
being.  

It just seems that too many people focus on the perfection of God in the
hopes that, that perfection will aid them in some way. If God and humans
and all creatures are put on one level playing field by viewing each
with an absence
of bias or hope for the aid of one, then maybe we can better work
towards understanding the way we interact with each other. 

Trying to understand the way God interacts with humans as though God is
an organism with ends to meet separate but related to our own, I think,
is better than trying to figure out what we can do to gain God's favor,
or where we'll end up in the after-life. Again, that's if you're going
to view God as a being.

What does all of this have to do with my self-destructiveness other than
wondering if God is part of it? I've resented and beseeched  God on
behalf of my self-destructiveness, and all because of the belief in
God's perfection and omnipotence. I've come to the conclusion that if
God is a being, it doesn't care about many of my problems because they
don't seem like problems to it. <sarcasm> Wow, pretty darn deep, eh?
</sarcasm>

(Be sure to tune into Part Three for more about my problems. Here's a
tease to keep you interested. It's one of the problems I'm having right
now. I have a headache.)

---
Staci Michelle Young, "Beelzibub personally told me I DO NOT BELONG!!!
Damn him for dashing my dreams of burning in hell."
p.s. this is true or false, use a #2 pencil