G-O-D

G-O-D

This is the fulfillment for my promise of writing about God. Before you read this, though, I have to warn you that this writing may cause some conflicts, though. I know that the topic is pretty sensitive because it’s about God, about faith, and about religion. Those are things that have no proof but can affect people so deeply that they are willing to sacrifice anything. If you are sensitive with this kind of topic, DON’T read this.
Okay, first thing first. I’ll give you some quotes from ‘Hesed’, by Mayt just to prepare you to what I’m about to write. If you have some time, you’d better read the fiction, though. It’s a very good fanfic.

“Her god – and given a choice her god was always a small ‘g’ – is the source of the mystery of existence. Her god is the creative spark of life and the cessation of that spark in death. Her god is humanity’s capacity for compassion and rage, for trust and fear, for love and hate. Her god flows from her and to her during a passionate yet tender sexual union with another, as well as she gently places her hand over that of a friend. Her god allows for tears of joy and sorrow, knowing that the line between pain and pleasure can be rather thin. Her god abounds in a shared silent gaze when there are no words to convey what is felt or understood – when silence is enough. For her, god is all and all is god. She found god in her friend, in the surrounding environs, in her own capacity to feel, to will, to breathe.”

“I look up at the cross and I see a man who died because he wanted to change the world. I believe he was frighten in the Garden of Gethsemane when he asked God to remove his cup from him but also said he would accept God’s decision. And I believe that on the cross when he cried out, ‘My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?’ his heart was broken. I believe a group of people tried to create a movement based on that broken man’s teachings and during the centuries it has been twisted and turned to the point that it’s sometimes hard to find the original message to love God with all your heart and your soul and to love your neighbors as yourself.”

“The people maybe poor and they maybe struggling to survive the streets, but that doesn’t mean they don’t know life. Actually, I believe they know more about life than the better-educated living in their middle-class neighborhoods. And isn’t that what theology is about – making meaning out of life, finding the divine in the God-forsaken corners of the world?”

Isn’t it so true? Sometimes when I see articles in the newspaper about some confrontations between people just because they have different religions, I think it’s better if there’s no religion in this world. We don’t have to have a religion to believe in God. Like Nicole, the woman who doesn’t believe in God, but she has a ‘God’, anyway. And her ‘God’ is a much better ‘God’, compared to the ‘God’ whose name is used as a reason for killing other people. Many people would say that they’re ready to die to defend their God from the others. Isn’t that funny when you hear it said in a war between two different religions? There’s only one God in this universe… so why defending Him from… Himself? God can be named anything… but He’s still one, isn’t He? I just don’t get the point when people fighting each other over ONE God.
I am not a religious person. I’m a Catholic, but I rarely go to church. My friends often chide me for not going to church and for not praying before eating. Heck, I don’t even go to church on Christmas and Easter! Kinda like a tradition in my family. My grandparents are Christian, but they don’t go to church often, too. My parents are Buddhist, but they also rarely go to vihara. Growing up in a multi-religion family, I came to realize about differences early in my life. Being different doesn’t matter. Having different religions doesn’t matter, because there’s only one God above all, no matter what His name is in your religion, and even doesn’t matter when in your religion there’re many gods, because there’s always one God above all. It even doesn’t matter when you believe no god, as long as you believe in ‘something’: Gaia, Mother of Earth, Spirit Guide, creator, karma, afterlife, or whatever.
For me privately, I want a life-partner who believes in something, too. It doesn’t have to be a religion. Just believe in something. I want someone who believes that we are here not just by some cosmic accident; that we won’t just vanish once we die. I believe that God is love and I don’t know if I can love someone who doesn’t believe in what I believe as the source of love. I can be with someone who is atheist as a friend, but not life-partner. Mm… maybe you’d say that I’m too demanding. But I don’t want to be with someone who is too fanatic to a particular religion. I’m scared of someone like that because they can do definitely anything for their God.
I think everyone has to find their own definition of God, to find their own core of belief. It’s easy to follow what your religion tell you, but in order to be close to our creator, you’ll have to find the answer yourself. Just a piece of advice… if you’re anything like me that you find it difficult to love God who’s invisible, it’s okay. Just by loving the people around you and living in harmony with the earth… somewhere in all that… you’ll find ‘God’.