The Living Universe

Religions are created by people who have had moments of spiritual insight. As they attempt to share their discovery, they describe it as best they can, as it appeared to them.

When they try to share their moment of "mysterium tremendum" -- as William James called it -- they try to define their communion with this Great Mystery. To them, The Divine may have appeared as a single God, consciously ruling the universe. Or they may have seen The Divine as a general force which flows throughout creation. They may have seen the various things working together toward the same aim. Or perhaps they saw an independant spirit at work in every thing. They may have seen everything working together without an apparent consciousness linking it all together. Or perhaps they saw the Divine Mystery working together, but it was unclear to them if there was anything more behind It.

Depending on how the universe appeared to them, they may have believed in monotheism, or pantheism. They may have believed in polytheism, or animism. They may have seen the universe in an atheistic manner, of perhaps an agnostic one. The amazing thing is that these general patterns of religious thought are repeated around the globe. Monotheism, polytheism, pantheism, animism, atheism, and agnosticism can be found in many places throughout the earth. This would seem to indicate that quite a few religious thinkers have observed the same patterns to the universal whole. I believe, therefore, that these patterns are all valid ways of observing the Divinity.

But how can these points of view all be correct? How can God be one and many at the same time? How can God be formed and formless, conscious and unconscious? How can these vastly different beliefs all be true?

In my own personal search for understanding I labored on this for a good deal of time before finding the only logical solution I could find. I reasoned that the universe itself must be a living thing; that it was a large enclosed sytem which functions cooperatively as a life-form. And if, indeed, the universe is the ultimate organism, which we may call "God", or "The Divine", then these points of view can all be valid. Therefore, God is one: the living universal whole. God is many: the many individual parts which make up the whole -- much as the various organs and cells of our own bodies. God is formed: in the physical substances which make up the universe we can observe. And God is formless: what many refer to as the "Web of Life" -- the connection we all share to the greater cosmic whole. The matter of the consciousness of God is a difficult one, as it is most likely on a level which we can not hope to understand.

Understanding "The Divine" as the Living Universe opens up a great many doors of understanding. As we are contained withing the universe -- and indeed we are a part of it -- we are a part of God, just as the cells of our bodies are a part of us. So, wherever we turn we are looking at another part of the Divine Being. And just as the cells in our bodies contain DNA marking them as parts of our selves, so also do we each contain a part of the holiness of the Divinity within us.

A Matter of Perspective

I believe that religion is shaped by our perspectives. If I live in the desert and you live in the jungle our views of the world would be quite different. I may believe that God is a fierce and demanding God. You may believe that God is bountiful and always-giving. Yet each view would be true, from our certain points of view.

When I began searching for spiritual meaning I began to examine the various beliefs people have concerning God. These can be classified into various ways of conceptualizing the Deity. Some believe God is one. Some believe God is many. Some believe the Spirit of God flows throughout the universe. Some believe that each person, each animal, each plant, each inanimate object -- that all things have a spirit associated with them. Still others believe that God doesn't exist: at least not in a form that can easily be recognized. I examined these beliefs and wondered how they could all be true. I wondered why people would have so many vastly differing beliefs as to what the Deity is.

I then began looking at how the universe works together. I looked at how things are organized. I saw the atoms as reflections of solar systems and galaxies -- spinning as greater and greater wheels. I looked at how our bodies work: how the cells of our bodies do the many things that they do in order that we may survive. And I looked at the thoughts of other pioneers in the religious, spiritual, and scientific worlds. I looked at the works of Carl Sagan, Joseph Campbell, and Stephen Hawking. I looked at theories such as evolution and the Gaia Hypothesis. And, as always, I looked to the patterns which shape the world we live in.

Perhaps the greatest revelation I had came to me one night as I contemplated these various views of the world and of God. I thought for a moment about how the many parts of the universe work together as the cells of a living body: all interconnected and all interrelated. I thought about how a tiny pebble thrown in the ocean ripples across the entire ocean, even as small as the ripples become. I wondered how God could be one and many, formed and formless, spirit and host. And the conclusion I came to was a radical one indeed: that all this is God. My solution was a simple statement: the universe is alive!

I began to understand the universe a living organism -- in fact, the largest conceivable organism. And I began to think of God, not as a being outside and in control of the universe, but as the living and creative force within the universe itself.

And here is where my re-conceptualization of divinity began to make a lot of sense. All of a sudden the many different ideas about God began to fall into place.

God is one: the largest organism which exists. All things are contained within the universe. In fact, "universe" means "one word" -- the one word which describes everything, both the known and the unknown. The Living Universe has countless parts to it: all which effect all else in a continuous chain of actions and reactions.

God is many: the many faces and voices of which the Living Universe is composed. Every person. Every animal. Every plant. Every grain of sand. Every drop of water in every ocean. Every distant star. Every force of nature. All are different aspects, or faces, of the Divine.

God is formed. For all that exist are parts of the body of God.

God is formless. For as all things which exist are part of the body of God, so do all things have part of that Divine Whole within them. That is to say: just as the pieces of a jigsaw puzzle each have a piece of the whole picture in them, so also does each piece of the Living Universe. Just as each cell within a living body contains DNA: the blueprint to that organism, so also does each thing existing within the Living Universe contain a piece of that (w)Holiness. So it stands to reason that every place, every thing, every plant, every animal, and every person -- we each have that same Sacredness within us which is a part of the Body of God. And so there is Holiness every where if we but look for it!

In the Q'uran it is said "everywhere you turn, there is the face of God!" And rightly so. If we can but find it ourselves, our neighbors, and our world perhaps our future history may be a bit less bloody...

A Pantheist Song...

We were treated to this at the Unitarian Universalist Church this past Sunday morning. Every so often I find a song which is directly on target for my beliefs. Here it is!

My Beliefs

A good place to start is at the beginning...

How do I define my beliefs?
This is a question that tends to plague me very often. Many times people will come up to me and ask, “So what is it that you believe?” And so I am often left wondering how best to explain it to them.
Perhaps the easiest way to explain it is like this:

I believe that God is the Living Universe. I believe that It is continuously growing and changing and that, perhaps, It is conscious at a level very different than what we understand.
As each one of us is a part of the Living Universe I therefore believe that each one of us has a piece of that Divine Sacredness within us. Therefore I believe in the inherent worth and dignity of each person and every thing. I believe there are no useless or worthless people. Rather there are people who simply fail to live up to their potential.

There are many faiths around the globe. Many people have created their faiths based on their perceptions of the world. Today our world is filled with so many different beliefs. And they all seem so contradictory.
But the tools of our modern world help us understand where these beliefs come from. We can call someone with our cell phone and discuss these things. Or we can search the World Wide Web to understand the feelings and perceptions of people a world away. And perhaps we can begin to understand the broader picture.
For we each see only in part. But perhaps together we can make sense of it all.

Welcome to Pathwalks!

I've been writing for over 20 years now, what I expected to be a different sort of book on spirituality. From the more-conservative and traditional views I had as a college undergraduate to the more inclusive beliefs I now hold, the book has been the biggest constant. At times I've hoped the book would be a meal-ticket and lead to greater audiences, and at times I've stopped to consider that knowledge should be free, and freeing knowledge more so.
When I came to the beliefs I now hold dear, I began writing a book I still hope to someday publish, if only here in the pages on this blog. Some of my writings were circulated around among friends a few years back. And a couple friends of mine began to form a spiritual group, and then church, largely based on them. After several meetings and writings I discovered that we were on the same page (strangely, I hadn't realized how close our beliefs were. I was a bit thin-skinned at the time and I was too concerned with what I was doing to notice anything else).
And so, after a great deal of board (read: boring, technical, and sometimes downright scary with regards to synchronicity) meetings, we decided to lock one of our founders in the local Law Library for the greater part of a year. When she came out, she led us through the process of legal recognition, and thus was born Path of the Personal Divine!
A video ministry has been a pet project I've considered for a good deal of time as well. That is where I first came up with the name "Pathwalks". I even came up with a theme song!
But, more recently, I find that a blog is perhaps the route I wish to take with this project. After all, most of my writings are small articles and difficult to edit into a proper book. Also, my writing goes in cycles, much from observations I make during the day. Often, I find myself shaking my head at how people waste their lives concerned with the things we create in our lives that don't matter. I despair at the level of unproductive instincts people follow (things I often refer to as "evolutionary holdovers"). And I end up shaking my head at the sorry way people treat each other.

But my beliefs are not based on any dogmatic approach to the human condition. Rather I have examined the patterns of life, existence, and belief that occur and recur throughout the world, and I've sought to understand our relationship to all this.

And so what follows is what I've found...