sophiaserpentia (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
sophiaserpentia) wrote2006-11-08 12:12 pm
sophiaserpentia) wrote2006-11-08 12:12 pm
(no subject)
In conversation with ![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
lady_babalon this morning, she was surprised to hear that, while i consider myself a godless atheist, i do not renounce my experience of communion with the goddess, the meaning of my dream of the green man, or many of my other mystical or esoteric experiences.
This is not an inconsistent position, and i'll explain why.
The trajectory of religion throughout human history is to co-opt and misappropriate peoples' mystical experiences, to essentially steal and mislabel them and claim them in support of various power agendas. We learn early on that mystical experiences are "encounters with the divine," and are taught to correlate our various experiences with the concepts that other people, and institutions, have about the divine, and further, with the political and social ramifications connected to those beliefs.
One who has a mystical experience is told to tie this experience to a massive edifice of ideology, and offer it in support to the authoritarian institutions which speak in religious terms.
Consequently, i don't know what the word "god" means. I don't know what "divine" means. Yes, i know the dictionary definitions, but i don't know what the words really mean. We don't know what god is made of, or what clearly distinguishes god from the rest of the universe. What makes god stand out against the rest of existence? I don't even begin to know what god is supposed to be.
So all i know about god is what people say about god. And almost all of these comments are driven by some sort of personal, political, or institutional agenda. The word is nothing but a psychological pressure point, a button which institutions press to make us bend to their will.
I don't believe in or have faith in gods, divinities, deities or spirits -- by which i mean, i don't give any weight to what other people say religiously. (ETA: well, let me temper that. I react to other peoples' description of their experiences and frequently see parallels to my own experiences therein. What i discount are proclamations of doctrine or over-arching interpretations.)
In rejecting what other people say about "god", i am not going to also reject my experiences. My experiences are all i have. The mystical experiences i have had were profound and transformed my life. But i do not offer them up for institutional or ideological sacrifice.
Unfortunately, the only vocabulary i have to describe these experiences is a religious vocabulary, which makes them all too easy for other people to co-opt and speak about, as if they knew what was going on in my head or in my part of the world.
lady_babalon this morning, she was surprised to hear that, while i consider myself a godless atheist, i do not renounce my experience of communion with the goddess, the meaning of my dream of the green man, or many of my other mystical or esoteric experiences.This is not an inconsistent position, and i'll explain why.
The trajectory of religion throughout human history is to co-opt and misappropriate peoples' mystical experiences, to essentially steal and mislabel them and claim them in support of various power agendas. We learn early on that mystical experiences are "encounters with the divine," and are taught to correlate our various experiences with the concepts that other people, and institutions, have about the divine, and further, with the political and social ramifications connected to those beliefs.
One who has a mystical experience is told to tie this experience to a massive edifice of ideology, and offer it in support to the authoritarian institutions which speak in religious terms.
Consequently, i don't know what the word "god" means. I don't know what "divine" means. Yes, i know the dictionary definitions, but i don't know what the words really mean. We don't know what god is made of, or what clearly distinguishes god from the rest of the universe. What makes god stand out against the rest of existence? I don't even begin to know what god is supposed to be.
So all i know about god is what people say about god. And almost all of these comments are driven by some sort of personal, political, or institutional agenda. The word is nothing but a psychological pressure point, a button which institutions press to make us bend to their will.
I don't believe in or have faith in gods, divinities, deities or spirits -- by which i mean, i don't give any weight to what other people say religiously. (ETA: well, let me temper that. I react to other peoples' description of their experiences and frequently see parallels to my own experiences therein. What i discount are proclamations of doctrine or over-arching interpretations.)
In rejecting what other people say about "god", i am not going to also reject my experiences. My experiences are all i have. The mystical experiences i have had were profound and transformed my life. But i do not offer them up for institutional or ideological sacrifice.
Unfortunately, the only vocabulary i have to describe these experiences is a religious vocabulary, which makes them all too easy for other people to co-opt and speak about, as if they knew what was going on in my head or in my part of the world.