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Poll: choose your religious experience...


Carlos Allende

Poll: choose your religious experience...  

30 members have voted

  1. 1. Poll: choose your religious experience...

    • Meeting with Jesus / Messiah
    • Joan of Arc style visitation
    • Tunnel of Light Near Death Experience
    • Philip K Dick style freakout
    • Transcendence through meditation
    • Other (specify)


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So, yeah.  Imagine a religious experience coming your way. What’s more, imagine being able to choose what variety you can have.  Imagine what it would say about your character. But first, can I ask, please, if you’re an atheist, don’t take this as an opportunity to fart on with, ‘I don’t need a religious experience to start with’... because those conversations are old.

First, I suppose the natural place to start would be an encounter with Jesus, not that I’m a Christian meself. They call his life ‘the greatest story ever told’ (or at least, Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer did), and I subscribe to that. At this late stage of the game, we're all a bit over-familiar with the New Testament, and we don’t see how clever it is, but stop and think: the high concept of universal love being a workable, practical force, the intricate ensemble of Disciples and Romans, the way it all fell apart / fell together with the crucifixion. I read (and regretted reading) Barbara Thiering’s weirdly detailed, nigh forensic research indicating that the ‘historical’ Jesus was just a non-miraculous, bureaucracy-ridden Jew-king –but nonetheless, the legend we’ve come to know is still so profoundly meaningful, it’s gotta be somehow transcendental, right? Besides, we’re all fictional characters in a way innit.

For me, I’m not sure Christianity holds up in the age of quantum physics, and I’m _sure_ it doesn’t hold up in this world of unchecked capitalism. Why would someone choose to believe what _seems_ to be the fantasy, arbitrary story of a better world, when you’re not even interested in the _logical, necessary_ better world of communism?

And before anyone asks, ‘Carlos, how come you’re allowed to bring everything back to communism but we’re not allowed to talk about atheism?’ Just because, m8.  

What about a meeting with some impersonal God a la Joan of Arc, or George Washington’s vision of an angel during the darkest days of the civil war? A god that comes down one way or another in earthly politics?  An 80’s teenager seeing Amanda Donahoe in ‘Castaway’ would be less turned on than me with that concept. But it’s still not enough. I don’t know about you, but too much has happened in this life, over and over again and sorrowful out of all proportion, I no longer care about being a middle-man between God and the world getting saved. ‘Sorry’, he said in the style of Johnny Rotten on the Bill Grundy show.

So what are we left with? I’ve listened to enough editions of Howard Hughes: The Unexplained to know that ‘there’s something to’ Near Death Experiences. They might even be kinda cool, and a reassuringly formulaic way of experiencing ‘the ultimate truth’. But I figure I want something more elaborate and personal. The universe being peeled away through quantum holography. I want my own personal detective story like Philip K Dick in the ‘Valis’ trilogy, or to a vaguer extent, Robert Anton Wilson in his Cosmic Trigger books or every other Dennis Potter play. I’m not even bothered if it gets solipsistic because, hell, I’ve had plenty of lucid dreams; my brain doesn’t need _much_ more processing power to take responsibility for the universe. It’s reassuring, in a way, that most of us already have recourse to a flawless virtual reality world while the greatest barrier to spiritual paradise just is the hoary old chestnut, ‘Why do bad things happen?’, ‘Is this just a cosmic suicide cult?’

Lastly, I suppose you’ve got the idea of Buddhist transcendence. Educate me. Because at the moment, I don’t see the appeal. Maybe if you were actually sick and tired of having a finite, personal, localised consciousness, it fine, but why keep returning to your original state here on Earth? Seems a bit disingenuous to me. Y’know. No offence, Lisa Simpson.

Anyway. Let me know if I’ve left anything off the table.

religious choices2.jpg

Edited by Carlos Allende
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I wouldn't call my P.K.Dick experience religious.
When I was first introduced to my favorite model of reality I dismissed it as fiction.
2nd time there was scientific probability attached, and I though "Whaaat?!?! NO WAY!!!".
I had to debunk it. I tried really hard. But there was more evidence for it than against it. So finally I accepted it as a possible reality. Now it's my favorite.

Edited by sci-nerd
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I'd have to chose other also, i simply have no desire for any of the choices offered. My 'conversation' is'nt old my viewpoint simply remains unchanged. Why does that bother you?

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One time I came downstairs into the main living room of the house & there was a bright white light filling the room, & in the centre of the room The Holy Mother was standing there watching me. She was stunning to look at. Absolutely wonderful. Then slowly the light diminished & She vanished & The Tree of Eternal Life was standing there instead. A spiritual Tree.

oOYjDXN.png

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4 minutes ago, Scudbuster said:

Religious experience you say...? For me, that's a big zero, zip, nada. And I kinda like it that way  :D:D

You sure you don't want one of those Grant Morrison Kathmandu experiences.:lol:

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My religious experience was realizing there was no father christmas and that there was no god followed shortly after, i think i was 8 at the time. 

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Sitting under a tree I came to the realization we are part of a living system and its evolution to reflect on itself.  Not really as a conscious effort on universe's part, but in the nature  how life and the universe develops.   

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1 minute ago, Scudbuster said:

HahaHa...now guys like him truly, truly,  spook the hell out of me....wait, there is no "hell". Well, he spooks something out of me:D:D

Alan Moore is almost as bad, but he's more grounded than Morrison. I mean 5th dimensional alien gods. Wait....reminds me of someone on here....but who???:lol:

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17 minutes ago, freetoroam said:

My religious experience was realizing there was no father christmas and that there was no god followed shortly after, i think i was 8 at the time. 

Santa's not real???:cry:

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God is love. Nothing but love. Sometimes your mother or father smack you upside the back of the head to correct you, out of love. That's all. All manifestations of God are described as having different kinds of emotions at different times. Jesus would call His best friends 'satan' if they said the wrong thing sometimes. If you want God to be Santa Claus who just smiles & chuckles all the time & gives you free stuff then you are going to be disappointed i'm sure. 

 

7eae08bd6006.jpg

Edited by Perfection
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1 minute ago, Perfection said:

God is love. Nothing but love. Sometimes your mother or father smack you upside the back of the head to correct you, out of love. That's all. All manifestations of God are described as having different kinds of emotions at different times. Jesus would call His best friends 'satan' if they said the wrong thing sometimes. If you want God to be Santa Claus who just smiles & chuckles all the time & gives you free stuff then you are going to be disappointed i'm sure. 

So why the Lovecraft picture? 

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Just now, XenoFish said:

Santa's not real???:cry:

Sorry Xeno, yep, you know those  pale blue and purple  knitted ankle socks which come over your knees, they were not from santa.

And the Bart Simpson tie....not from santa.

And the Ferrero Rochers and over sized Toblerone, not from santa.

sorry.

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3 minutes ago, Perfection said:

Sometimes your mother or father smack you upside the back of the head to correct you, out of love.

Got nothing to do with love. It's coming short. Children learn nothing good that way.

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2 minutes ago, freetoroam said:

Sorry Xeno, yep, you know those  pale blue and purple  knitted ankle socks which come over your knees, they were not from santa.

And the Bart Simpson tie....not from santa.

And the Ferrero Rochers and over sized Toblerone, not from santa.

sorry.

My life is a lie.......

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1 minute ago, sci-nerd said:

Got nothing to do with love. It's coming short. Children learn nothing good that way.

I don't even show visible anger. Most of the time I'm actually not. Positive reinforcement.  Christians are such barbarians with that spare the rod crap....

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Okay quick question. What's the point? I mean of a spiritual experience....what exactly is useful about having one? I mean the crazy guy down the street who talks to squirrels isn't exactly having a one on one with god.

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2 minutes ago, XenoFish said:

My life is a lie.......

Only if you are still wearing those socks.

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well all ancient religions speak of a tree that creates souls & gives eternal life. If you look at that slab of stone above you can see a tree-like entity holding a soul orb in its hand. That slab is fashioned after the ancient understandings of the tree of eternal life that holds all soul orbs that are inside people. It is not exactly what the tree looks like but it is defining aspects of what the tree does.

People can only write about what they know. Even when they write fiction they use real life things as their background & props etc. If an author called Lovecraft wrote about  a tree type god then he was no doubt influenced by older religions which spoke of such a tree. Mayan religion speaks of the same thing. If you look at the mayan spaceman he has a tree wrapping its branches around him & a snake & an insect-like bird in front of him. Tree & snake. Just like the christian garden of Eden story. It is all the same God being portrayed in different ways at different times. Sometimes many thousands of years apart

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Edited by Perfection
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1 minute ago, XenoFish said:

Okay quick question. What's the point? I mean of a spiritual experience....what exactly is useful about having one? I mean the crazy guy down the street who talks to squirrels isn't exactly having a one on one with god.

Maybe he can speak to god through the squirrel. 

Red squirrels - talk to god

Grey squirrels - talk to the devil

 

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4 minutes ago, freetoroam said:

Maybe he can speak to god through the squirrel. 

Red squirrels - talk to god

Grey squirrels - talk to the devil

 

What about black or white squirrels? I mean that's kinda racist. All squirrels are created equal. No need to be a bigot. 

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Stick to the topic please.

Let's keep the comments here civil, respectful and constructive.

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