My theology

Over the years I've spent a lot of time thinking about religion -- some of that has come up here -- but only in the past couple of weeks have I really began to organize my thoughts into a coherent theology that I think I can live with for quite some time. It'll change, of course, as everything does, but nonetheless I want to record it here, organize it and write it down for the first time so that I might not forget where I came from.

My current theology is based on several principles that might at first appear somewhat contradictory:

1. A physical or material divinity (i.e. one capable of exerting influence on the physical or material world) does not exist.


2. Worship of any entity, physically real or not, is wrong.


3. Divinity as an ideal state does exist, though my particular ideal exists only as a figment of my consciousness and cannot be communicated wholly to any other.


4. That ideal of divinity deserves to be emulated as best I can, though it can never be achieved.

First of all, the common idea of God as some old angel watching over us and ensuring that the righteous are rewarded and the wicked are punished is bullshit. It's pandering, infantile lies meant to "help" people get over losing loved ones or their own fears of death. People aren't children. They have to accept reality for what it is, and it is not ideal. That doesn't mean you can't have ideals, but that your ideals are not possible to achieve. You have to be willing to strive for something without hope of achieving it. Selfishness wins out in the end, corruption wins, evil wins. We're fighting a losing battle -- but that doesn't mean the battle isn't worth fighting. It's a very Norse way of looking at things, but the only reasonable conclusion I can draw from my own experiences.

Second, to amend the Christian commandment, rather than "Worship no false idols", I say: "Worship not." To me, deities are symbols that have lost their meaning; it is the danger of any symbol to become disassociated from the ideas (or ideals) it once represented, because it is easier to support a symbol (to worship it) than to support the idea(l)s behind it (to emulate it). Jesus himself preached this, after a fashion, warning against praying for appearance and telling people to be more concerned with acting as God wanted them to than worshiping God himself. In this way, the idea(l)s also are not in danger of becoming too entrenched; loyalty to idea(l)s can shift and change, but loyalty to symbols is much more stubborn (Rufus's discussion of beliefs vs. ideas in Dogma comes to mind here -- a deeply philosophical and thought-provoking film, I know).

Third, God's second purpose (besides comfort) as a model for behavior is a good one. In my theology, God represents the trio of infinite understand, infinite faith, and infinite mercy: to know, to believe in, and to forgive. (These three things are also my definition of love, or at least agape.) God is different for everyone, however, because everyone's consciousness is different and aspires to different ideals. Some may be close enough for them to convince themselves that they are feeling the same God -- and in some ways they are, but never does God mean exactly the same to any two people. God represents our ultimate ideal, and thus is as unique as each of us are (and a person's conception of God could likely tell you a lot about that person).

Fourth, we should strive to emulate our God (but not to worship it). As an ideal, however, and not a rational, material entity, we can never achieve Godhood or divinity. No one can. No divinity will ever physically exist. Nonetheless, we must hold it up always as our end-point, never to be reached but always to be striven for.

Okay, so I ended up really just rehashing a lot of what I've previously said in a rather disorganized and incoherent fashion . . . not what I intended to do when I set out. Maybe with some editing it could turn out somewhat understandable, but I'm not willing to go to that much effort at the moment.