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.

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...