[ Return to The Pub ]
Posted by Kate on 12/23/2008, 7:17 am, in reply to "Toto, Kansas... Re-Visited."
So I moved in with my sister and her husband, took a job working graveyard shift, and continued going to my ex's house every day to home school the kids while he was at work. Talk about burning the candle at both ends. I felt like a zombie. We finished out the school year, and the kids went in to public school the next year.
There was a friend I had met on the internet, a fellow writer who lived halfway across the country. He knew that I was separated from my husband, and he told me emphatically that he didn't want to be involved in the break up of my marriage -- but he wanted me to know that he was interested, and would wait patiently. He moved out here, and we've been married almost nine years now.
Since this time, I've talked with a lot of Christians, in real life, and on the net. I've talked with and made friends with people of other faiths -- Muslims, Buddhists, Wiccans. I've done extensive reading, accepted some new ideas, and rejected others. I've studied other world religions, enough to know that not one single faith holds all truth, but there is truth and inspiration from God in many faiths.
I've come to the conclusion that the Bible contains the Word of God, inspired Holy Scripture, but that is not all it contains. I've chosen to walk the slippery slope and read and weigh each passage of scripture I'm studying, and decide for myself whether or not I believe it to be true, and in keeping with who God is, and who I believe God to be -- the Creator, holy, loving, spirit, and all good, with no evil in him at all.
I believe that since God is spirit, then God is beyond gender -- that God revealed himself to us as our Father to make it easier for us to try to comprehend and relate to him, because we know what a good human father is supposed to be like. I do believe there are "feminine" qualities to God (compassion, gentleness, nurture, creativity) and I see the Holy Spirit as having many of those qualities, as being the feminine aspect of God.
I still believe Jesus was the incarnation of God, and I believe he came to offer forgiveness and reconciliation to all people. My beliefs lean strongly toward Universal Salvation, that all are saved by Christ, in this life or in the age to come -- that the Father sent the Son to be the Savior of the world, not just a small group of people.
I have seen inspiration from God in other world religions. Jesus told us the two most important commandments -- in fact, the only two we really need to worry about -- are to love God and love our neighbor. Almost every world religion teaches this Golden Rule. Just because the words weren't written in Aramaic doesn't make them any less inspired by God:
Bahá'í -- "Ascribe not to any soul that which thou wouldst not have ascribed to thee, and say not that which thou doest not."
Buddhism -- "...a state that is not pleasing or delightful to me, how could I inflict that upon another?"
Confucianism -- "Do not do to others what you do not want them to do to you"
Hinduism -- This is the sum of duty: do not do to others what would cause pain if done to you.
Islam -- "None of you [truly] believes until he wishes for his brother what he wishes for himself."
Native American Spirituality -- "All things are our relatives; what we do to everything, we do to ourselves. All is really One." "Do not wrong or hate your neighbor. For it is not he who you wrong, but yourself."
Sikhism -- "No one is my enemy, none a stranger and everyone is my friend."
Wicca -- "An it harm no one, do what thou wilt" (do what you want, as long as it causes no harm to anyone)
Zoroastrianism -- "Whatever is disagreeable to yourself do not do unto others."
I believe there is only one God, one truth, for all people, all time.
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