DaBear,

I have been thinking about your posts most of the morning -- since awakening, though these days the word awakening has different meanings for me.

I have been considering your questions about the aftelife and the conflicts you endure at this important juncture in your life. Today, I am moved to add something for you that you can use as a tool or disregard if you so choose. I post it here, as a separate topic, so as to avoid any associative links with other topics, yet to connect them nonetheless. I hasten to add that I am not normally moved to such instances often, but shall make a heart-felt attempt here.

Religion: a topic most fundamentally that brings about the most diversity. I do not endeavor to believe that this topic will do any less. A beginning: let us define two terms: faith and belief. These definitions, existing elsewhere, are arbitrary, but necessary. Faith is defined herein as a conviction of the intellect whereas belief is defined herein as that you accept something as true because of a testimony of another or a probable knowledge.

Religion is a device through which people live with realities, whatever they may be or however they may exist. Religion, its inner aspect, its inner essence, is very simple and true and does not change regardless of the brand of relgion (i.e., Hindu, Catholicsm). The outward expression of relgion is infinite, woven from the fabric of experiences within different environments (physical through spiritual). The outward expression never truly expresses the first, much like a something on the "tip of the tongue" this is known but not expressed. Many do not question the outer expression (belief) and thus it is adequate. Others, who sense something larger, take it on faith (intellecutal conviction) that there is something more than what is expressed.

When faith supercedes belief, you experience growth. The "testimony" you are given is no longer enough, because you "know" that there is more. As you progress, then, you change. Relgion can also serve to insulate against reality. Much can be considered over the relgious fervor in the world as, perhaps, an attempt to maintain an insulation against a reality that can't yet be accepted.

Relgion is really a very deep definition of you and your development.  At its essence, we have a simple art: a faith that life goes on, that is progresses, and expands and that we do not simply not exist upon death; that there is a purpose to it all, though our ability to discover it may be limited, we know there is more; that we have an inner identity (a communion) with a larger identity (God, the ALL That Is, The Highest You, whatever YOU call it), and that this larger identity is infinitely loving.

I have freed myself of the entanglements of other expressions of religion. I trust myself. The old adage about knowledge and responsibility has come true for me. With my new knowledge on religion, I find that I can no longer be irritated and upset with them -- though in off moments they can get on my last good nerve    -- when I see them in this larger context. I am not omniscent and only omniscence can give one the whole truth. We, at this stage, endeavor to piece it together, stopping along the way to meet friends who have traveled this path before (Alysia actually jogs at this point) and share our experiences.

This was my experience to you, without expectation, without reservation.


   E.