I am not religious in the traditional sense. I don't believe in a personal God or consider it necessary to visit a particular temple or church for prayers. Neither do I follow some religious organization. Yet I have formed a concept of God, which I consider the most important thing in my life.
I was born in a catholic family. Childhood memories bring vivid images of solemn sunday mornings and colorful church festivities. A loving God looked after us from his heavenly abode while we went about our human ways, laughing, crying, fighting and praying. I believed in such a God for many years.
This image of a Christian God was never at conflict with other possible Gods. In fact my earliest lesson on religious tolerance came from a catholic priest, who explained to our sunday class that 'God is like a fire burning atop a distant hill. There are many paths leading to the summit. Different religions are ways leading to the same final goal'. Together with our God in heaven, other ethereal beings such as angels, demons, djins and village spirits were realities of my childhood.
My irreverence began as an attempt to impress my classmates in our sunday catechism class. 'How can God create Light first and then the Sun?' I was excited at the attention I received as much as puzzled by this illogical act ascribed to my God. The book of Genesis says God created light on the 1st day of creation, but the sun and stars were created only on the 4th day!
Such nagging doubts continued throughout my adolescent years. I moved deeper into naturalistic explanations and new scientific discoveries. Years passed and the God I once loved and feared slowly turned into a distant memory, inseparably linked to other tender images of village life.
I was both saddened and relieved by these developments. Sad because I had a feeling that I am missing something beautiful in life. I had had many long arguments about God with my earliest teacher, my mother, who at first tried to explain God to me in her own simple ways, but later faced my doubts with an impenetrable smile. However irrational her faith appeared to be, it helped her maintain a healthy respect towards all forms of life and to find hope even in most difficult of situations. At the same time I felt relieved, because my juvenile exuberance had began to equate blind faith with intellectual dishonesty.
Later I discovered Charles Darwin. Science is a great liberator. Of all scientific breakthroughs, I consider theory of evolution as the most important because it provides a framework to understand life and ourselves. Earth, stars and galaxies are important subjects of study, but most important of all is life itself. Theory of Evolution establishes indisputably that we are linked to all other forms of life. It is a very powerful as well as beautiful explanation for life.
My doubts returned as I saw more of the world and read more about human history. From the beginning I had a powerful sense of inner meaning. There were brief moments when I felt an overwhelming sense of goodness and harmony. Even though I couldn't communicate this with other people, such experiences were as real to me as wind power or the force of gravity. Slowly I realized that there is no way of relating this subjective reality with the world of atoms and forces.
It took a long time, more than 15 years, to reach this conclusion. Life evolved, but not through natural selection as modern life scientists have us believe. The doctrine of Neodarwinism is a logical black hole. It is possible to understand both the objective and subjective worlds naturally, without invoking cumulative random mutations or a creator God perilously hanging from nowhere.
You could call it whatever you choose. Creativity, God or the universal Mind. This ‘ungraspable’ thing is a property of our universe. My apologies for stating it so bluntly but I cannot think of a better way to express it. Believe me, you could realize this yourself if you begin with an open mind and question your own fundamental assumptions. No need to visit a medium or shut-off your reason. I have tried to explain the path I took through a series of posts on this site.
Imagine digging into the remains of a long lost civilization. How would you feel If you come across a clay tablet engraved with E=MC2 among the ruins? Did this ancient people know about matter-energy relationship? Or did they unknowingly use these symbols to decorate edges of their clay tablets? Is it possible to know something without being aware of it? This is exactly how I felt when I re-read bible 20 years later. I saw that the garden of Eden, virgin birth and death on the cross are myths representing colorful reflections of the movement of biological evolution.
God created us. Like a parrot repeating 'one plus one is two', man for countless generations has been telling himself that God is his source. It is not an article of faith, but an absolute truth. There is no creator except the irrational creative drive inherent in matter. God designed eyes to see itself, hands to touch itself and awareness to know itself. Man must worship this God and make offerings to renew his sacred relationship.
A spider spins its web without realizing the meaning of its labor. If we somehow succeed in asking the spider what it is all about, we might receive only a bewildered look for an answer. Spider's intelligence cannot comprehend the fact that web is essential for its physical survival. Like spiders incapable of seeing the purpose of their web, modern man cannot comprehend the real function of his temples and churches. The activity of building a place of worship is instinctive. We build these magnificent structures without realizing their purpose. Unfortunately we cannot afford the luxury of a spider's bewilderment because we, unlike spiders, are self-aware. We carry the burden of providing rational justifications for our actions. Therefore we invent explanatory stories. Religious myths are such inventions. These stories will always contain some embarrassing twists because worship in fact has no rational justification.
This is my idea of God. I have tried to explain my logic to few others, but with limited success. Most people are too comfortable with what they have been taught to believe. But to keep on questioning with an open mind is a rewarding effort. After all, we spend only a limited time on this beautiful planet. Isn’t it terrible to drift through life without even making an effort to know the most beautiful of truths?
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