Freelance Religion

Wall Print - Salt Lake City Utah

Being an Amateur Theologian

Because I know that time is always time

And place is always and only place

And what is actual is actual only for one time

And only for one place

I rejoice that things are as they are and

I renounce the blessed face

And renounce the voice

Because I cannot hope to turn again

Consequently I rejoice, having to construct something

Upon which to rejoice.

~ “Ash-Wednesday” T.S. Elliot

The Latin root of the word “amateur” means “the love of one’s subject.”   I didn’t always have a love of faith.  In fact, many years struggling to conform and confusing the concepts of obedience, self-worth, love, and happiness, nearly left me unable to think about faith at all.

In all honesty, this was my own failure.  Like many “Mormons,” my limiting factor was how I embraced the theology and eagerly allowed it to be twisted into an all encompassing lifestyle of control.  I wasn’t encouraged to think or explore and obedience was all important.  I was expected to be subservient to my religious collective... seeing my leaders in the place of God as His defined ecclesiastical line of authority here on Earth; as prophets, high priests, and elders, bishops, presidents and counselors, those with the final word to protect sanctioned orthodoxy.  I didn’t feel free to explore my own thoughts and ideas, or express any doubt or confusion.  My undefined spiritual longing went unfulfilled as the structures of that religious life took precedence.

I learned not to think creatively and reason out my own responses but rather to seek out the "approved" or sanction belief if I didn't know and to react "appropriately."  I felt prisoner to my doubts.  I couldn't share them so I ignored them.  Over time, this damaged not only my thinking but my self confidence.  To habitually deflect one's intellect from a healthy bias prevents one from seeing things as they are.  It places the importance on the continuity of the faith at the cost of rational thought and true spiritual growth.

Here lies the crux of my trouble... my over sensitivity to what mainstream Mormons thrive on; the reverence for obedience and the worship of stalwartness.  Looking in on their peculiarity from a perspective more outside, it’s quite shocking and heartbreaking to see how disconnected so many of them have become.  And to have one of them attempt to elevate their malformed, unreasoned, myopic opinion to the status above my equally flawed perspective, well, it offends all logic and reason.  Faith is faith.  Belief requires a certain humility and reverence when compared to actual knowledge.  Those who can’t tell the difference are foolish.

I know my place as an inferior intellect among the gods.  They do not.  And it offends my pride and ego.  Their circular logic and placating tones are like a battle cry in my mind to stand firm against the cultist mindset of Orthodoxy.   And this just can’t be.

I become the hypocrite and the cheat by denying them those things they deny me; mutual respect and the free-agency to find our own way and our own voice.  Instead, I seek two things they can not and will not ever give; their approval and acceptance.

This is my greatest obstacle in life.  I believe it is the principle lesson I have been sent here to learn and it is the fundamental reason for this blog.  This is a forum of self-discovery where I may uncover within myself the key to conquering this failing and allow me to truly be my own amateur theologian... of a freelance religion... where I permit myself to be guided along those paths most needed.

There are many things in religion that I haven’t yet absorbed.  Things that are difficult to see without acknowledging the profound similarities divergent faiths share.  Too often religion attempts to work in isolation... jostling uneasily with one another... downplaying the similarities the bind us all together.

We are asking similar questions and coming up with remarkably similar solutions.  This says something about who and what we are as human beings and what brings us to enlightenment.

I have got to find that common thread for this conversation.  I am dumbfounded by the sectarian doctrine embraced by Orthodoxy.  I need to see what pain and fear lies at the root of it.  They are trying to express an anxiety and answer a question I truly do not understand.  It is too easy to use God horribly to endorse our own fears, loathings, and hatreds.  Most people are not disciplined enough to realize God is NOT just a bigger and better version of ourselves with our likes and dislikes but is a reality quite apart from our own.

This is a mid-voyage course correction of sorts.  I will be reorganizing and redacting some of my previous posts to eliminate the “broken-record” effect currently surfacing here and to better reflect the new voice I wish to develop.

The Value of Storytelling

The Great Salt Lake and Antelope Island - Utah

Myth and Legend

"To wish to teach all men the truth of the gods causes the foolish to despise, because they can not learn, and the good to be slothful, whereas to conceal the truth by myths prevents the former from despising philosophy and compels the latter to study it."

~ Sallustius

I’ve long been fascinated by parables and allegory... especially those involving Jesus.  Human beings have used allegory as a teaching aid for as far back as anyone knows.  Scripture employs allegory on a grand scale.

The Human Genome Project, comparing samples from hundreds of thousands of native populations from every corner of the globe, has pretty conclusively ruled out the possibility of the Jewish nation being the “principle ancestor” of any surviving native American.  For as long as Jews isolated themselves as a distinct population, there has been no identifiable relation between them and native American populations before modern times.  Their connection dates to the out-of-Africa bottleneck of pre-history in the days of Neanderthal predominance.  Even within the Book of Mormon narrative itself, there are many glaring inconsistencies with the anthropological record.

Given the conflicts and other social issues with native peoples dominating the American mindset during our nation’s expansion westward, it stands to reason these native populations would have been an excellent learning tool.  I view the Book of Mormon as a parable or allegory instead of an exacting history of a people.

Like the Book of Mormon, the Bible also suffers from many irreconcilable differences with the archeological record.  For example, we now know the destruction of the Walls of Jericho predates Israelite occupation by several centuries.  The massive ruins would have still been impressive in those days.  It stands to reason, religious scholars used them as teaching elements.  Hence, the story of God’s destruction of wicked Jericho at the hands of the faithful Chosen.

Now, some faithful instinctively react against such notions in a vain effort to preserve the orthodox view.  Without understanding the science or even being familiar with the evidence available to us, they dismiss it all as error.  This is a dangerous stance to take.

Faith, by definition, is belief based on spiritual apprehension rather than proof.  Until our modern age, there were no tools available to us to prove or disprove our mythology.  Some naively hold to the believe of their absolute veracity and turn a blind eye to the mounting evidence against such a claim.  If our mythology is not permitted to disassociate from fact and be allowed to reside in the protective realm of allegory, we risk loosing its spiritual and social relevance forever in our relentless pursuit of empirical knowledge.

The Road to Exaltation

Rocky Mountain National Park - Colorado

The Freedom to Pursue Gnosis

I hold strong to the belief that free agency is paramount to our pursuit of peace and happiness... not only in this life but forever.  I may sometimes adopt the absolutist’s speak when sharing my beliefs.  I am absolute but only in the limiting confines of my own faith and my own belief.  My thoughts are not intended to correct or challenge your viewpoint.  Their sole purpose is to share my perspective with you so that you may know and understand me.  It is all done in the spirit of mutual respect and a deep seated faith I have in pluralism.

In the context of faith, I define pluralism as a belief all humankind may and, more importantly, should worship how, where, and what they may. I rejoice in this.  May we celebrate our differences, acknowledge our similarities, learn from one another, and compete in good works.  I reject the hope or belief that one faith will someday become ubiquitous among us.

I reject it for one critical reason.  There is no meaningful choice in such a plan.  To be "meaningful," there needs to be far more choices than just those between right and wrong.  Without this choice, there is no reasoning out and no exercise of faith... and without those, there is no learning and no progression.  The Plan of Salvation collapses in on itself and existence becomes meaningless.

I consider it sinful to impede the process of self-discovery required for true spiritual progression by negating the thoughts, opinions, and beliefs of another in favor of our own.  Sharing is not an act of insistence.  The insistence that for me to be right all others who disagree must be wrong is shamefully erroneous in philosophical terms!  To dictate to others what they should or should not believe is an exercise in unrighteous dominion.  And to call another to repentance skirts blasphemy.

I have long hesitated to share my beliefs because of the language of faith I inherited... a language of absolutes is the language of sectarianism and orthodoxy.  It’s something I can not escape.  I have yet to learn to articulate any other way... I may never learn.  My sincerest apologies should I ever offend you or your cherished beliefs.  I know first hand the harm such a thing can inflict.