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I've noticed this time and time again when I, a mystic (Gnostic Christian) who was raised by non-religious parents, try to talk to atheists, either online or in the flesh...and notice what I said, "talk", not "preach." I am not trying to spread any religion or another and I SURE DON'T WANT SOME OF THEM IN MY RELIGION! Sorry, but if Dawkins was to become a gnostic it would be the worst thing to happen to us since the Albigensian Crusade.
When I talk about GOD, mythology and such I am simply entertaining people. Just as Black Sabbath cover band isn't trying to "convert" people from Pink Floyd, I am not trying to convert people to Gnosticism. The black Sabbath cover band is just trying to entertain people with music they like, not necessarily cause them to give up whatever music they prefer. Likewise, I am simply trying to entertain people with the idea of Gnosticism, not trying to cause them to give up other ideas in favor of it.
Anyway, every time I talk about GOD, religion, Mythology etc I've noticed this: They hear "God" and their minds right away go to whatever fundamentalist religious upbringing they had, and NOT the conceptualizations of GOD, Mythology and religion I am talking about.
I say "pray" and I am thinking about and say communing with that which is above us, be it our super-ego, reality itself, a supernatural force or some combination of all those things...they ignore said definition and instead get flash backs of their parents jumping up and down in a Pentecostal church before yelling at them at home for reading ghost stories.
I say "God", and say and am thinking of the Pleroma/Brahman/Tao or whatever else you want to call that undefinable it that we cannot understand but can only experience...they hear the word "God" and immediately think of big mean Southern Baptist Jesus come to rapture the good people away and punish the sinners.
I say "religion" thinking or going to the woods and listening to all animals running around or lighting a candle at midnight alone in a quiet room...they hear "religion" and think of their parents or pastor flipping out at them for dancing with someone who wasn't their spouse.
I say "music that brings out my spiritual side" and they think this:
When what I really mean is a song that makes me dream of seeing the face of GOD and the song I'll hear in heaven (if there is a literal heaven) which is of course one of the greatest songs of all time*:
Basically, I've noticed that so many atheists have such a completely different point of reference from me and other Mystics that it is impossible to talk with them.
I had an awful abusive childhood, but religion was never a part of the abuse as neither of my parents were religious. I was free to read and think what I wanted about religion, and I was simply fascinated by it at an early age. I was not "indoctrinated" into Gnosticism, a religion that I stumbled onto and read about on my own as an adult...and yet SO MANY atheists hear that and still say "you only believe in GOD because you were indoctrinated!"
And even when I spell out what I am saying, how I can to understand it and what I mean by these things, they go right back to whining about fundamentalist literalist Nicene Christianity, which I was never a part of. They hear a Mystic talk but their minds listen to what they grew up with.
And so many of them at the same time say the fundamentalists are close minded because they don't like gays, yet they are ten times more closed minded themselves because they can't accept the existence of religious people who don't believe in a personal GOD or any literal interpretation of Mythology.
This is the problem we have with atheists: we can't speak the language of former fundamentalists who went from one set of ABSOLUTE BELIEFS (JESSSUS IS LORD AND YOU CAN'T GET TO HEAVEN WITHOUT HIM!) to another set of absolute beliefs (GOD IS JUST A BIG FAKE MAN IN THE SKY!)
Albert Einstein once said: "I have repeatedly said that in my opinion the idea of a personal God is a childlike one. You may call me an agnostic, but I do not share the crusading spirit of the professional atheist whose fervor is mostly due to a painful act of liberation from the fetters of religious indoctrination received in youth"
*
"Yours is the cloth, mine is the hand that sews time
his is the force that lies within
Ours is the fire, all the warmth we can find
He is a feather in the wind"
-Every single Southern accented screech of every fundamentalist preacher put together does not come close to praising GOD as beautifully as Robert Plant did in four lines of one of his songs.
I moved the thread here to the A&A forum since it is specifically directed toward Atheists. Some Atheists may only post in this sub-forum, and, perhaps, some Christians may leave the thread alone that might have hijacked it in the main R&S forum.
The primary problem which you would have when talking to this particular atheist is that I do not recognize a distinction between mysticism and any other form of emotional conclusions. From my point of view you are packaging how you feel about things into some attempt at a larger truth, which is not a valid approach to the cosmos. It may be a practical means for your getting through life, but I won't go along with elevating it beyond just that, one more scheme for getting through the days.
So, no I do not mistake your approach for fundamentalism or equate it with that, beyond personally placing no value on either approach.
Well that's just it. "God" can mean almost anything.
For Mystics, God is (apparently) some kind of emotional experience. Maybe it's a kind of placebo effect, where mere belief actually causes real psychological and physical changes in the human body.
Personally, I don't find mysticism to be entertaining. It's just incomprehensible mumbo jumbo to me. I also find it to be somewhat creepy.
For the record, not all atheists are former religious fundamentalists. Many are "lifers."
Anyway, every time I talk about GOD, religion, Mythology etc I've noticed this: They hear "God" and their minds right away go to whatever fundamentalist religious upbringing they had, and NOT the conceptualizations of GOD, Mythology and religion I am talking about.
I generally avoid using the word 'god' for mostly this reason. I think of myself as atheist because I do not believe in a personal god, or any sort of traditional "Intelligent Designer" type of being. I say atheist rather than agnostic because I think there are some good reasons to explicitly believe that a personal ID type of being does not exist, just as there are some good positive reasons to believe that Tinkerbell will never land on my shoulder and grant me my wishes.
But I also have to admit that, by some standards, I'm a somewhat unconventional atheist. I admit to praying to a goddess (of sorts) and I believe that prayers can often have tangible effects on the physical world. For this, and other reasons, I have to admit that I'm rather mystical, for an atheist.
Anyway, I know what you mean about the difficulty of dealing with stereotypes and people jumping to conclusions. Some atheists are a bit too rabid for my tastes but, of course, it's a problem that is not unique to atheists. It's just the way some people react to certain labels - it's a phenomena that crosses all categorical boundaries, so far as I can see.
Well that's just it. "God" can mean almost anything.
For Mystics, God is (apparently) some kind of emotional experience. Maybe it's a kind of placebo effect, where mere belief actually causes real psychological and physical changes in the human body.
Personally, I don't find mysticism to be entertaining. It's just incomprehensible mumbo jumbo to me. I also find it to be somewhat creepy.
For the record, not all atheists are former religious fundamentalists. Many are "lifers."
One thing I wonder about is...if it is a placebo affect and you stop believing it works, it will tend not to work anymore. That is one value I see to GldnRule's and victorianpunk's god=anything view.
From the other side, I see the advantages of society understanding a god to have a clear and simple definition that is basically powerful ruling single intelligence beyond time and logic. After all, without some agreed upon definition of a god, of what use is discussing whether it exists or not?
There is also the third group in addition to the fundies and lifers. There are former light believers who don't find their former views to have been particularly harmful such as myself.
For the record, not all atheists are former religious fundamentalists. Many are "lifers."
Accurate. The complaint seems to be with Atheists specifically from fundamentalist Christian cultures who later converted and have lots of baggage re: religion. That certainly doesn't describe my background and perhaps I wouldn't make the same assumptions, but OP there are such misunderstandings because the words you are using are generally associated with slightly different concepts in your area, so perhaps it is on you to further clarify what your spirituality entails when speaking to someone, so that they will better understand what you are talking about. It seems your complaint comes mostly of being misunderstood if I understand correctly, so simply you must make more of an effort to explain, and I'm sure most will understand the distinctions between your practice and those of others. Since you say that your intention is not to convert, that is all that is needed to achieve your goal, but I cannot guarantee that whoever you're speaking to will respect your beliefs anymore then they do those of the fundamentalists once they understand. I, for one, prefer your path as it seems less authoritarian. I simply cannot believe in it, but that doesn't mean we couldn't get along better then I might with some fundamentalist literalists (some of which I do count among my friends).
I suppose there is a problem in that atheists will consider this sort of stuff pointless speculation or, when it is about feelings or experiences, will be likely to consider that the person who has them is the last person to correctly know what they are.
I'm not saying they must be right, but that is why they won't want to discuss it.
Those who find such things interesting would probably have enough suspicions that there is Something More' that they would probably not refer to themselves as 'atheist'.
In view of the miss -match between those who want to talk about such things and atheists who might tend to not want to do so, it is probably best not to try to.
-Every single Southern accented screech of every fundamentalist preacher put together does not come close to praising GOD as beautifully as Robert Plant did in four lines of one of his songs.
VP, I have no issue with you espousing a personal taste for Plant's lyrics or your private concept of god, etc.
Frankly you seem to have mellowed out an awful lot since a few months ago when you were insisting essentially that the correct definition of god is, e.g., the universe rather than simply stating that is your opinion or how you see it or enjoy thinking about it. I don't feel condescended to by this post and that forms a basis of mutual respect. Indeed, while I don't necessarily agree with all your beliefs or concepts, I have far less of a malfunction with them than I do with screechy, sweaty, Bible-thumping evangelists, and I would greatly prefer that most theists were like you.
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