Very clearly, cultures and civilizations have arisen without the need for your particular gawds or any gawds at all.
You will need to present evidence of this to make the claim. Do you have an example of any human civilization which existed without any signs of spirituality whatsoever? All that we can go on is what we can observe and confirm. I'm open minded, I can accept the evidence if you can present some, but you haven't. You're simply making statements you cannot support.
Boss, think about what you're asking. You want me to prove a negative.
So, yes. I have examples of civilizations that existed without your gawds or spirit realms. Can you prove I don't?
Additionally, cultures or civilizations having icons or symbols that represented events in nature is not necessarily spiritualism and it certainly does nothing to further your claims to retroactively assigning your gawds to those cultures.
Dear Hollie:
If you define God = Nature
can you find any human being or culture that wasn't affected by Nature?
Agnes Sanford equated God with Nature in her book "The Healing Light"
and she is considered one of the historic figures in Spiritual Healing,
called one of the most authentic and true to Christian faith while being
the LEAST concerned about religion, denomination or faith of others.
Most Christians who take this route are labeled as New Age and rejected,
but Sanford and her teachings on healing are respected as authentic.
And she never made a religious issue out of it.
She focused on healing and health as a natural gift from God/Nature/Life
and didn't worry about religion.
The barrier is in our minds.
We the people have separated church from state,
and religion from science, but these are basically different
languages for the same laws of NATURE.
The barrier is on both sides, the religious reject the secular
and the secular reject the religious.
Hollie I wish you could understand my position for two seconds
(I wouldn't ask you to feel any more than that or it is cruel, but just
enough to get it is enough);
Imagine I am someone who speaks both English and Spanish.
And I work well with people who speak English and work well with
people who speak Spanish. I want everyone to get along well enough
that we can work together and fix the world's problems, and not fight
over language and culture.
But the people who only understand one language, and fear the
other group is forcing their language on everyone else as the
legally required or socially dominant norm are FIGHTING to
make sure their language isn't marginalized or demonized.
And both groups are fighting, even insulting and threatening the other,
so they fight back and go in circles, destroying relations and hope for understanding with resentment.
Now imagine the children and people who are bilingual, who have friends
on both sides, and have to watch as people they love tear each other to shreds over their language
and the cultural ties to that language.
Wouldn't you understand it is better to have both,
to allow people to keep their own language and not
insult or expect them to convert to something else?
Why can't both sides stop trying to attack or change the other
and then defend themselves against equal attacks or forced imposition?
How can we be OKAY with both?
Why should we ASK those who speak Spanish or speak English
to prove the other language is right or wrong, inferior or superior.
WTF?
Hollie can we be as objective about religious views
as we are about language and quit POLITICIZING them.
Why can they be treated as NEUTRAL languages
and separate the politics that has crept in.
I am one of those people who is "Spiritually Bilingual"
I am equally if not more comfortable with SECULAR ways of
expressing the world and relations in life, as I am with
translating these into religious terminology that symbolizes the same things.
Hollie you are like asking to prove the existence of 2 and 4.
When 2 is just a symbol of * * and 4 is just a symbol of * * * *.
The concepts exist, like God = equals "NATURE"
but the disconnect is coming from politics.
People fighting over control and getting attacked or defensive.
That's where the problem is coming from.
If you scare little kids to death with Math, they don't want to hear about
2+2=4 or 0*0=0, they are scared of failing at Math.
So Hollie you remind me of students with Math anxiety
who have been taught Math is something scary to be pushed
on people to make them fail, to punish and kick kids out of school
and embarrass them in front of everyone else who can do well at Math.
And I am trying to help overcome these fears
so we can discuss how * * + * * = * * * *
and the symbols used for that are 2 + 2 = 4
I am sorry for whatever has angered or traumatized you in the past
about God, religion, Christianity and the Bible.
When I found out what these really mean,
Hollie I was FURIOUS, I flew into a panic,
cried and raged for weeks in a brainstorm of
OH MY GOD what have we done? Religions and politics
has created war when all these things were supposed to bring peace.
I cried and went to pieces, where my thoughts flew in all directions,
to heaven and hell at the same time, trying to figure it out how to
fix the messes that religions have made teaching it separated
when it was all supposed to point to the same message, not making one right and others wrong.
All religions were symbolizing parts of the truth,
and the point of Christianity was to unite them by conscience,
by agreement in Christ, and this WASN'T BEING TAUGHT.
Only division was being taught, rejection and calling other people wrong.
I thought I had died, and was going through hell to get to heaven.
So Hollie, whatever anger and rejection you feel, I am probably
10 to 100 times worse than you, so I couldn't take it, and had to find a solution.
You are actually more gracious than I was about it.
If you had been as incensed and made sick as I was,
you would not be able to tolerate the conflicts and would not stop until this was changed.
I hope you do have that faith that things can change,
but no, I would not wish on you what I went through
to see the need to push for agreement.
What I wish for you is to be able to see that end
without having to suffer in the anger and angst I did,
and my whole family went through to get to that understanding.
I hope you may receive it, and that peace from knowing
there is a better way to teach Christianity where it does
not exclude secular gentiles but is perfectly in keeping
with science, medicine and social psychology that teaches
us the same things about forgiveness, healing and spiritual peace.
I hope you can have that, and don't have to worry about
Christians who don't teach it fully so it causes division and confusion.
My apologies for that, and it blew my mind and broke my heart
also when I realized what was missing, and found all the
Christians who were struggling to teach this correctly,
and they have also been rejected and silenced by fellow Christians.
it's really sad, and I hope you can see past it.
Thanks, Hollie
Yours truly,
Emily
