Sunday Wisdom

From One Mountain, Many Paths
An American Freemason Speaks Out for Peace

by Dr. Patrick Swift
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Your God is One God, there is no God save Him; the Beneficent, the Merciful.

The Meaning of the glorious Qur'an 2:163
Islam

Becoming one with everything, a person should perceive the highest truth. There is nothing higher than the highest.

Shri Guru Gita 123
Islam

It is interesting to me that I woke up this morning dreaming that I was helping to set up a worship service in a room behind a flower shop and it had just been robbed. The little statue of a head had been taken and was no longer there. I think it was supposed to be the statue of the head of the deity. It doesn't make any difference what it was exactly. We were setting up and discovered that it was gone. It didn't seem to matter, we went right on getting ready for worship. I lay there thinking about it and realized that the message was that we should not put our devotion on to "things" - So many things which become the object of our devotion.

There is a group of (so-called) Christians who meet in a mega-church in Texas. As part of their service they hold up the Bible and repeat a litany which starts "This is my Bible..." They have put their worship and devotion on to a book. A book written and translated by men. Interpreted by other men. Now I don't want to minimize the Bible or its place in our society. I love (parts of) the Bible. But in the church I used to attend we said that we took the inspired word of the Bible as our sufficient guide to eternal life. The key word for me was inspired. Every single word is not inspired - There is a lot in there that I reject. For one thing I reject a God who would rain down fire and brimstone on an entire city for whatever reason.

I love a lot of things. I love Bailey and Max and family (and you know who you are) and friends. I don't worship these things. When Princess Diana died I was saddened by her tragic death and the loss of her life. I watched as thousands of people paid tribute to her and placed flowers (offerings) all around the palaces. I remember having the thought "this is worship of a person." A person, for that is what she was. A good person who did good things but a person, nevertheless and a flawed one at that (as we all are).

So this morning I am going to fix my mind on God, the God named Love who has given His Love to us unconditionally without reservation and I am going to be grateful to Him for all of the ways he has manifested Himself to us.

Have a blessed week and Always Remember That You Are Loved.

ADDENDUM - I read about this today (Monday) which tell about another instance of turning a person into a god.