If You Love God, Let Him Go

We can never really know each other. Our views of our friends, neighbors, lovers, enemies, and even ourselves, have to ultimately be mere fragments of what is actually the case.

This is because there is so much hidden from us. So much of our view of others is based not only upon scant evidence, but also is infused so irreparably with our own experiences and biases. Our perceptions of others are only shells--crude mockeries--of their true and dynamic selves.

If this is so when dealing with other human beings, how much more must it be the case when dealing with a potential creator being? What makes approaching a potential deity even harder is that you can ask me about your perception of me. You and I can sit down and talk about you or me and hash out some of our misconceptions about who you and me are--and thus maybe get a little closer to the truth--but there is no sitting down for coffee with Jesus, Mohamed, Zoroaster, or Thor. We can approach these characters from a mytho-historic perspective, but that doesn't bring us into personal contact with said proposed beings. Ultimately our views of possible gods are fated to be projections of our own goals and ideals or the deification of the goals and ideas of other people.

Every God we solidify our mind around is thus bound to be a false idol. Only by giving up belief in gods altogether could we possibly remain open to such a complicated, enormous being...and only then in the smallest and most humble of ways.

By abandoning belief in gods you clear your mind of preconceptions of what that being is made of, motivated by, and desiring of. You allow your brain to appreciate its unpreparedness for the task at hand, and encourage it to embrace humility. The word 'god' is so crowded with preconceptions...there is practically a different god for each believer in the world; each god fashioned after that believer's own image (or desired image). To abandon belief is to admit that any potential god is too large and incomprehensible for the human mind. It is to cease trying to catch the wind in a net.

We are all agnostics. None of us know whether there are gods or not. What I am advocating is not agnosticism, but a practical atheism that says 'I do not believe in god, because that word could not even begin to comprehend what it tries to articulate'. Paradoxically, the atheist may be in a much better place to fully appreciate any possible supreme being because of their lack of belief--they have already busted down the false idols constructed by themselves and others, and stand ready--blank--in the eventuality of contact with such a being as a god.

So not only does reason advocate the acquisition of an atheistic stance, so does humility. So does any desire to fully appreciate the sheer bigness of this life and what it potentially entails. If you already don't believe in god, good. If you do believe in God, reconsider; it is probable that you are investing your energy in self created illusion. If God loves you, let him show you. If you love God, let him go.