Ah, Religion!
Religion has many uses. It is a unifying force among peoples. Its use by a governing body can be critical to control of a population. It confers upon people the sense of belonging to something greater than themselves. Belief in a divine spirit delivers a comforting sense of a great power overseeing events. Humans endow a universal spirit of godliness with attributes of compassion and care while demanding of mere humans respectful attendance to the deity's divine dictums. The omniscient god is to be worshipped and his instructions obeyed.Independent thought expressing doubt is to be deliberately excluded from a believer's mindset. The focus of thought, behaviour and mode of living to be entirely consonant with the deity's outline of the code of human behaviour. A brilliant concept, to introduce to the mind of uncertain humankind awed and inspired by the glory, the power and the unanticipated events which nature showers upon her observers, an immortal being whose image mankind reflects.
We consider ourselves in a way, children of nature. Without accepting the scientific fact that we are indeed Nature's offspring. Nature, however, in her infinite wisdom simply is. Nature is the result of he interraction between the cosmos and the elements abundant within it, the fortuitous melding of time, circumstance and the elements of life. Happenstance. Nothing deliberate.
But this elegantly simple yet complex conclusion would mean that everything that happens in the natural world is a result of accidental fortuity. That no magnificently brilliant mind belonging to a universal overseer deliberated with himself and from the vast expanse of his intelligence brought forth mankind and all the other natural elements of the world we inhabit.
Clearly, this explanation lacks dignity. Mankind requires the existence of an all-powerful god to explain our exceptionality, our existence as superior creatures.
The cosmos, the universe, is an immense construct of fact and imagination, too powerful in and of itself to be handily grasped and appreciated. That it might also be a non-presence, a stew of chemicals and little else is unacceptable. Where came direction? Where is the purpose of it? What speaks to our place within this accident of nature? God's will.
Human beings are capable of great good between and among themselves, just as they are imbued with the alternate qualities of wretched behaviours which can visit misery and mayhem one against the other. A great percentage of humankind has a natural tendency to view the presence of others with good will. While another great percentage harbours ill will against others, the "good" qualities inherent in us all, submitting to the "bad" qualities within us.
Nature is neutral, what will be will be. She merely provides the playing field where events, dramatic or plebian play out over a hugely prolonged period of time. Since she is unaffected by unfolding events, it's obvious that another, far greater presence is responsible for all that occurs, and to which Nature herself submits. God, the chess master. The Master of the Universe, the all-powerful, all-seeing, pitiless yet compassionate.
Or so needful believers adhere to. Better not to feel alone and powerlessly vulnerable. Better to believe in a universal spirit of kindness. Humankind shares one basic emotion that has the qualities to enable us to persevere through any conditions otherwise inimical to survival: hope. God has become hope's enabler.
Or is it hope that has become God's enabler?
posted by Pieface @ Tuesday, November 28, 2006
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