Ros Barber's new novel Devotion is about God and parallel universes.
Finlay Logan's daughter has died, in a parachute accident.
And Finlay Logan, who is a psychologist, is assessing the sanity of April Smith, a Christian fundamentalist who has blown up a bus.
Finlay says: "There is no fucking God. Because it simply wasn't possible that God the Father would smear your twenty-one-year-old daughter across a field in the Surrey Hills."
Finlay meets Gabrielle Salmon.
Gabrielle Salmon is a scientist who studies consciousness.
Finlay meets Gabrielle Salmon.
Gabrielle Salmon is a scientist who studies consciousness.
She claims that she can help people to connect to God, and thus find peace.
She has managed to reproduce Religious, Spiritual and Mystical Experiences (RSMEs).
Author Ros Barber now presents two parallel universes for Finlay.
Finlay can choose.
Finlay can choose.
Things are made out of tiny 'particles'.
According to the scientists, when you come a cross a 'particle' it does not have a 'fixed state' - until your mind decides what its 'fixed state' will be.
In other words, if you come across Mr Schrödinger's cat lying very still on the grass, the cat is neither dead nor alive - until your mind decides what its 'fixed state' will be.
Let us imagine that you have a very strong feeling that the cat will be alive and well next year.
Then the cat is currently not dead.
The future has affected the present.
dailymail - Can the past change the FUTURE?
Christians believe that things go better when you tune into the Holy Spirit.
The Taoists would call the Holy Spirit the Tao.
When you are tuned in, the cat is not dead.
Some Taoists and Christians and others believe that bliss can be achieved when:
1. You believe that, when tuned in, life works out for the best.
2. You are compassionate
3. You are moderate (Avoid extremes)
4. You are humble (The selfish ego is switched off)
5. Everything is in balance
6. Being tuned into the Holy Spirit or the Tao or whatever you want to call it, you go with the flow.
(You are not battling against the Holy Spirit or Tau)
7. You avoid the use of force; you avoid pitting your will against the universe.
Eventually the cat will die, but it will continue in the Spirit.
....
Never were devotees of any creed or faith as fast bound in its thraldom as are the disciples of Gautama Buddha. For nearly two thousand four hundred years it has been the established religion of Burmah, Siam, Laos, Pega, Cambodia, Thibet, Japan, Tartary, Ceylon and Loo-Choo, and many neighboring islands, beside about two-thirds of China and a large portion of Siberia; and at the present day no inconsiderable number of the simple peasantry of Swedish Lapland are found among its firm adherents.[297:11]
ReplyDelete[Pg 298] Well authenticated records establish indisputably the facts, that together with a noble physique, superior mental endowments, and high moral excellence, there were found in Buddha a purity of life, sanctity of character, and simple integrity of purpose, that commended themselves to all brought under his influence. Even at this distant day, one cannot listen with tearless eyes to the touching details of his pure, earnest life, and patient endurance under contradiction, often fierce persecution for those he sought to benefit. Altogether he seems to have been one of those remarkable examples, of genius and virtue occasionally met with, unaccountably superior to the age and nation that produced them.
There is no reason to believe that he ever arrogated to himself any higher authority than that of a teacher of religion, but, as in modern factions, there were readily found among his followers those who carried his peculiar tenets much further than their founder. These, not content with lauding during his life-time the noble deeds of their teacher, exalted him, within a quarter of a century after his death, to a place among their deities—worshiping as a God one they had known only as a simple-hearted, earnest, truth-seeking philanthropist.[298:1]
"Gautama Buddha taught that all men are brothers;[300:2] that charity ought to be extended to all, even to enemies; that men ought to love truth and hate the lie; that good works ought not be done openly, but rather in secret; that the dangers of riches are to be avoided; that man's highest aim ought to be purity in thought, word and deed, since the higher beings are pure, whose nature is akin to that of man."[300:3]
http://www.gutenberg.org/files/31885/31885-h/31885-h.htm#Page_289
http://www.gutenberg.org/files/31885/31885-h/31885-h.htm
https://archive.org/details/biblemythsandthe00doanuoft
Very nice.
DeleteIf we view the cat as dead, what does the cat view us as?
DeleteThe cat views us as someone who got it wrong.
DeleteWhy is the Tao / Holy Spirit reported to prefer an alive cat to a dead one ?
ReplyDeleteAnd why is force somehow a bad thing - try building a house or a bridge without it.
ReplyDeleteReading around backward or retro-causation makes m’head spin. The simplistic ‘ain’t logical’ is the converse of, ‘course all flows which way and that’. I’m wary of an over-confident tone that dismisses debate. Yet truth is, I want controversies to demonstrate my world-view, at least not successfully sound like they overturn it. I can manage to accommodate (bring on the aliens etc - although I doubt this/expect a Project Blue Beam) but there’s little imaginable that could conclusively knock: God in Christ came...
ReplyDeleteI live amongst a church of timeless believers, although the majority blur their position to maintain paradox allows for genuine freedom. Alternatively a growing minority argue a pre-Augustine view is clearly early church and therefore most importantly ‘biblical’. For us, the necessity of a fully-fixed future is abhorrent and for our opposite Reformed counterparts, we’re the significant heretics within.
I wonder what the Illuminati believe? And what would they promote? I think the top (lowest of low in reality) crew, are probably driven by purported to be ancient texts and supposed hidden knowledge that proposes their call and destiny, theories of heritage/bloodlines, whilst encountering deceiving spirits to finally confirm and bolster the evil. Their view of the bible could run a number of ways. Two might be; it’s exposed by their ancient and hidden debunking texts and revelation as a complete fake, a blueprint to keep its believers on a script or; it’s for a Luciferian reading, compiled by their forebearers, who were supernatural or connected therein. Of course sleepy church (“so the world goes...”), generally grasps the demonic-ish but can’t see false-flags from establishment lies.
Finlay’s ‘it simply wasn't possible’ is answered by ‘it isn’t’ because God didn’t and doesn’t.
As is the misreading, Neoplatonic, ‘conscious eternal punishment’ with the drive in ‘Devotion - God’ for some understandable conditional universalism, certainly in this life.
There’s an evangelical school that posits universalism in a variety if degrees, see http://theologicalscribbles.blogspot.co.uk/ I’m personally not fully convinced but then neither is the Bible proclaiming such certainty either way, although the urgency and necessity to “come...”.
As far as what ‘continue(s) in the Spirit’ (although Bible claims, this is firmly in a different kind but nevertheless - ‘body’), there’ll be no sitting on clouds, or it’ll only-be, one forever worship fest. The talk is ‘on earth’ and hints of action, adventure, a new earth to come. Nothing definitive in detail but reconciliation, and for now - hope.
What these scribbling theologian’s need to do is is wake up to the material reality of the battle. This is the prophetic message. Evangelical’s emphasis is more personal with progressive and Liberal influence - social. The missing insight, is the empire the early church faced and fought. The unmasking, naming and overcoming. Aangirfaning in the Holy Spirit.
Cramming it in, same ol’ song, thanks for the time and space
Mark
^
Deleteu
⌄
wonder what the Illuminati believe . . .
ʬotever
ʬ0RXX
"No” (assuming the following). Them be religious - in the unseen - zealots. All available indications points to this. Beyond and through trans-humanism the way they do: these are ‘believers’. You could argue; I’m another believer in the active non-material, bolstering their worldview. But if they were materialists it might, in some ways, make clearer sense. If Luciferianism, (probably the description), was only their humanism on hyper-overdrive, I’d be quick to admit but self-revelation, all the symbolic, secret society history and anecdotal evidence say otherwise. I’ve heard, and could believe, there’s some divergence in position at their HQ, alongside the younger up and coming ones not as widely orthodox. Yet, their theories and practice are a con and they are the ultimate sheeple. Weak, wild, intellectual, drugged-up, fearful, blind, romantic, twisted, confident, arrogant, nasty yet selectively kind, mentally unwell and - here’s the debatable point, utterly taken-over by outside forces. Biblical figures, ‘signified amongst pagan Greeks, an inferior deity, good or bad’ (Vine), the roots from ‘da’ to distribute, more likely ‘to know’. For a Christian definition/claims: Jesus (aside from a Job-like exception) and the early church, engaged in their exceptionally abundant manifestly open activity. No discussion, no sympathy, no truck - only utter opposition and power over. Why are the elite elite running amok? We allow them, something they know and therefore conversely justifies their plans. We can, and I - this is called faith - believe, we will rise up... PS ‘we’ includes, and is necessary, that all good, loving, life-affirming made in God’s look come together... our ‘beliefs’ in God’s sight doesn’t disqualify us. As for the church? Shame on us. No wonder less and less believe us. Dreamers and deluded playing chapel. God have mercy on us and wake, wake, wake us up. Exile on main street. Forgive us people but to those sha-la-la la’s through to Greenbelt festy goers (can’t go at last minute - too angry and disturbed at their sickness): when you gonna wake the - “you know the word that punches best” - up?
DeleteMark
RELIGION IN THE HEAVENS;
DeleteOR,
MYTHOLOGY UNVEILED
IN A SERIES OF LECTURES,
By Logan Mitchell,
A Follower Of Nature.
Excerpts from the Preface:
ACCORDING to the ignorant prejudices which priestcraft has interwoven through the human mind, the subjects treated of in the following Lectures, are considered as sacred ground by the votaries of superstition; and therefore every attempt to examine them with freedom, or to expose them to the test of reason and free discussion, appears shocking to the blindly bigoted, and alarming to interested priests. But as neither complaisance nor forbearance is due to either of these parties, the free inquirer, stimulated by the love of truth alone, will be earnestly desirous of emancipating the minds of his fellows from the fears and delusions of a sanguinary and distracting superstition, which has no foundation in reason, either as regards the past or the future; and from the gloomy grasp of its active, subtle, and vindictive priesthood, who want nothing but the power to imprison and roast alive, as they did in former ages. Yet even in the present times of science and reform, what has been the fate of the daring wight who has ventured to expose the origin and shown the terrible effects of Christianity during fifteen hundred years? He has drawn upon himself the concentrated essence of malice from all the hireling sacerdotal orders, abetted by their allies the aristocracy of every country, by whom he has commonly been robbed and imprisoned, or otherwise ruined both in fortune and reputation.
...
Do the Jews, Christians, and Mahommedans, by their wild and degrading anthropomorphism, or by forming their deity in the likeness of any entity that the human mind can conceive, evince a worthy, or anything approaching to an adequate, conception of the unknown,* all-ruling Power? Quite the contrary; for in absurdly imbodying it as a located Being, or by conferring personification in any shape or manner whatsoever, they impiously create one of those idols which they pretend to abhor, and become themselves idolators. These alone are the real Atheists, as they not only endow their man-God with the worst of human frailties and passions, but contemn and repudiate the true revelation of Nature. The mean and grovelling notions which the half-inch mind of the priest-led fanatic has of his God (for instance the Jewish one), form a striking contrast with the elevated and pure ideas which fill the mind of Nature's free votary, towards the one universal Power,—a veneration infinitely too exalted to allow for a moment the puerile and ridiculous notion of its being personified in the form or likeness of any existing thing.
http://www.gutenberg.org/files/38375/38375-h/38375-h.htm
https://books.google.ca/books/about/The_Christian_Mythology_Unveiled.html?id=Ft9LAAAAYAAJ
https://archive.org/details/religioninheave00mitcgoog
I have a book written by a western Buddhist practitioner where he says that mindfulness and Nirvana are better than sex. I believe him. When we are in bliss we feel loveable, and then we feel attractive. When feel loveable and attractive we live in bliss. Not many people feel like that all that often.
ReplyDeleteThe libertarians say that everything we do is for selfish reasons. This is Any Rand philosophy. If we save a starving child we only do it only because it brings us pleasure, they say, and in this way we are acting entirely selfishly. But only selfish people who have always had all would say would say this.
I sometimes argue with the libertarians online, and I tell them that they have it the wrong way round. I couldn’t start my car the other day because of a flat battery, but a West Indian man told me what to do as he pushed my car. He pushed really hard and I did as he said and I managed to start the car. As I drove down the road I gave him a wave and he waved back. It was a great feeling, sort of like Bliss, I guess. I really liked him.
Years ago there was no money, but Adam Smith said that primitive people battered to exchange goods trying to get the best deal for themselves. But early mankind never bartered - Adam Smith got it wrong and never did any field research to back his theories – because people would just give stuff away. If you were good at making shoes and had some spare pairs and your friend needed some shoes you would just give him a pair. And if the next day he needed some help in his field you would just help him for as long as was needed and it would never occur to you say that he owed you so many hours afterwards. You would just enjoy helping your friend. It has been shown that primitive people who live in small tribes never get depression. Depression is a state of self-hatred. Read ‘Debt: The First 5, 000 Years’, by David Graber.
So, if you lived in a small village and your house got blown down then everyone in the village would club together and help you to build you a new one. And they would all really enjoy themselves having a great time while that were at it too.
It is true in a way that everything we do we only do for our own pleasure, but it truly does give us pleasure to selflessly help somebody else. And when we feel accepted and loved this gives us joy. Feeling loveable is extremely important to humans.
The libertarians would say that because we feel joy when we help someone then that’s the only reason why we do it, but the joy comes from the selfless act, not the selfish act. It’s hard to explain, is it a vase or is it a face? The two combine are one. But the libertarian view is cold and calculating because these people have very little empathy and are not as happy as people who are more warm hearted and generous. We are community based creature rather than individually based ones.
Nirvana is where we are truly at peace with ourselves, where we like ourselves, our friends, our communities, our world and universe. The evil people who run our world are full of hatred, and they think that the only way out of their misery is to require more possessions, power, and domination. They are selfish Ayn Rand-ians, but Any Rand was drug addict and a pervert which is not a very happy place to be. And she suffered from chronic depression towards the end of her life. Her philosophy did not bring her peace, joy, or happiness.
I never used to like Buddhism because I was sex mad. There were all these gorgeous woman at my local Buddhist centre but although they wore ordinary cloths they were really ascetic nuns. In other words, I was never going to get their knickers off. But I never lost my fascination for Buddhism because I had no peace in my life and I was in awe their peace.
ReplyDeleteCheri Huber was a manic depressive who once tried to commit suicide by shooting herself with a shotgun. She then turned to Buddhism and found peace. She says that many people come to Buddhism when they can't stand the pain anymore. I think I'm at that point now. And you don't have to give up sex, even if some Buddhist groups say that is better that you do.
Acceptance and Commitment therapy is a mindfulness based therapy. The psychologists and scientists who developed the therapy did not draw on Buddhist teachings, but when they finished developing the therapy they realized that it had much in common with Buddhism, except that snuffing out the desire for life and becoming dispassionate is not part of it. I guess ACT is enough for most people, but if you want to go further there are more advanced mindfulness techniques, or even buddhism.
anon 20:06 - You're positing a universal attitude/belief, held by all libertarians ? Tish. ,
ReplyDelete"Cheri Huber was a manic depressive who once tried to commit suicide by shooting herself with a shotgun. She then turned to Buddhism and found peace".
ReplyDeleteAny stats on troubled Buddhists who've found peace and contentment via shooting sports ? :o)