Question: Why don’t more people think about God and religion for themselves?
Answer: In the end, I suppose it all hinges on where we start from. At some point in my journey with God it became clear to me that the purest way to know God would be to start with my personal experiences first, and build from there. That meant letting go of any descriptions of God that contradicted these experiences (and, of course, using logic and reason, including spiritual logic and reason). To do that I had to undo any previous programming or indoctrination that I’d already been exposed to. That’s not an easy thing to do, and the very idea of it terrifies most people.
The reality is, most people are very insecure about their beliefs. I feel that the majority of people don’t know and can’t envision any other way to approach God and spiritual matters than the way they already know. Also, they don’t want to be an “outsider”; they want to be a part of an organized religion for the sense of community they get from being part of the group. (Community usually is, or can be, a positive thing; I’m not knocking that.)
As I illustrate in my writings, most people want a doctrine or set of beliefs that is already figured out for them. They start with someone else’s ideas or experiences of God and build from there. Therefore, their starting point is always from someone else’s point of view, and has, in many cases, thousands of years of dogma and tradition already built into it. If that’s the way someone wants to go about it, that’s their choice, and they’re free to do so. But what happens when some of our most basic questions about God and existence are asked and thought about starting from the ground up, without any preconceived notions?
That’s why I have such a hard time with religion. Most of it is based on hand-me-down theology. Very few people think about God and existence on their own. They limit their understanding to a very strict set of unquestionable ideas, and never test these ideas against all available evidence.
Maybe I’m right, maybe I’m wrong, but that’s The Truth as I See It.
Mind / Purpose / Truth 