Dear Jon,

We're on the same boat because access to moral-high-ground is reserved for those who (unlike myself), actually comply with their moral ideals, rather than those who merely hold them. Failing to follow one's ideals can only lower one's self-esteem.

Factory-Labor is a modern-feature and 1960 is well-within modern times. We certainly have more today, but we also want more, expect more, so overall we're not happier. Your father for example wouldn't have worried about the quality/speed of his internet-connection. If he wanted to express a view, he would write a letter-to-the-editor, place it in an envelope, affix a stamp and hope to find it printed in the following week. We however require instant-gratification and get concerned if our response fails to appear within a couple of seconds.

You say that you find meaning in your job -where does this meaning come from? Surely not from material nature because science never detected or even hinted at some 'meaning-particle'. I claim that you created that meaning yourself, but how could that be if you were a finite and temporary part-of-nature?

Your body is temporary. Unfortunately you seem to believe that you are that body, thus temporary yourself. Subsequently what's left for you is to seek pleasure in the details of the world, but seeking pleasure is an indication of displeasure.

Dear David,

Of course religions aren't models of reality, nor designed to be. Religions are sets of methods designed to come closer to God. Some religions may include providing explanations about reality to their adherents and/or a community experience and/or the offer of comfort. None of those three elements, however, is strictly required.

Now when explanations about reality are provided, their value is measured not by their ability to describe reality itself, but by the extent they help or encourage the devotees to come closer to God. Any other claims about them are mumbo-jumbo.

Dear Trevor,

What's wrong with being flexible? If a different theology works better, helping and inspiring more people and more deeply to come closer to God, then one would be a fool not to use it.

Dear Yuyutsu,

You wrote: “Religions are sets of methods designed to come closer to God.”

You have repeated this statement or variants of it, and it is not true. No matter how many times you repeat it will still be false. There are non-theistic religions such as Buddhism which do not have the concept of a God. This is it, and I am not going to discuss it further. You prefer to ignore facts. Sobeit.

Dear David,

<<There are non-theistic religions such as Buddhism which do not have the concept of a God.>>

You are bursting into an open door:

Not only do I agree, but I even just wrote exactly the same in my last post, saying: "None of those three elements, however, is strictly required.", the first of those three being "providing explanations about reality".

A concept of God would come as part of such an explanation about reality, thus a concept of God is not a requisite for religion.

(although IMHO, many find the concept of God useful along their religious journey)

I am well aware of the sad fact that some people attribute the noun "religion" and/or the adjective "religious" to undeserving organisations: I am not willing to go along with their ignorant assumptions. A church may have billions of followers, trillions of dollars and powerful connections with governments, but if it doesn't lead its followers towards God, then it is not a religion.

Would you care to tell me which facts I ignore?

At last it seems that Sells has come to his senses and realises that God is but an illusion, born in the minds of men who in the case of the Abrahamic religions seek to control the lives of others.

David

Dear Other David (VK3AUU),

If God were an illusion, would you also say that an illusion created heaven and earth?

A concept of God, regardless how brilliant or otherwise, regardless whether born in healthy or in sick minds, benign or aggressive, is necessarily limited, hence cannot be called God, only ... a concept.

As God cannot be described, imagined or captured by the mind in any other way, humans developed various representations of God which can aid them in His worship.

Early representations were material: it could be either man-made idols of wood, stone or metal, or natural objects or even Mother Nature Herself. These however were excluded by the biblical second-commandment and that Jewish taboo then extended to the rest of the western civilisation.

In place of the ancient material representations of God came abstract mental concepts, which in the West lasted for millennia, but are currently in the process of falling out of fashion. At the same time, Buddhism often represents God as emptiness (Shunyata).

So which is the 'correct' way?

There is no such universal 'correctness': choose whichever representation of God you are more attracted to, that would tend to inspire you into coming closer to Him - be it a physical object, one you make yourself or one you find in nature; or be it a natural element; or be it Nature itself; be it a star or be it an historical person; or be it an imagined mental concept, including "Father" or "Trinity" if so inclined; or an illusion; or emptiness; or no representation at all: what personally works for you most in reducing your attachment to your body/mind and their limitations, that is the best.