Hello. I'm not sure that there even is a label or "-ism" that fits what I really think. If asked whether I believe in God, the best answer I can honestly come up with is "I believe in either all gods or none of them. It just depends on what you mean by the words 'believe' and 'god.'" Ever since I de-converted from Christianity nearly thirty years ago, the idea of Big Angry Father Figure in the Sky has made no sense to me at all (and I have loads of problems with Christian doctrine), but I'm sure that the gods/goddesses of various myths reflect aspects of our experience and I have some favorites. While I don't believe in God (capital G) anymore, I do think there's a lot of scientific evidence that the universe might be a single process rather than a bunch of separate objects and forces jostling against each other, and that it is at least potentially sort of proto-conscious if not actually fully aware. I am very open to things which are generally called "spiritual"--e.g. connection with life, empathy, compassion, love, justice, etc. I just don't believe those things, or anything else, actually are "spiritual" or that the word makes much sense or is even necessary. In fact, I prefer thinking of all those wonderful, necessary, and so-called "spiritual" things as being accessible right here right now, rather than on some "higher plane" or "non-physical." I think humans tend to call anything we don't quite understand "non-physical" (and "higher" when we like it, or "lower" or "demonic" when we don't), but to me those are just arbitrary boxes. I surf both atheist-oriented and occult-oriented corners of the Web, and see no conflict at all there. I see room and need for both the rational and...I guess one could call it the arational?...in life, but most definitely not the irrational or antirational. I'm not particularly big on faith, but see plenty of room for logic and myth to co-exist and think they may even be facets of the same diamond rather than "opposite." I consider both magick and science valid, and often find myself wishing the boundary between them would disappear. One could say, I guess, that the boundary was never actually there to begin with. I think I may be some kind of pagan atheist, or atheist pagan, or agnosto-atheo-paganoid, or smartass who has to question every damned thing. As I said, I don't know that there even is just one label that fits, and more and more that's fine with me. It isn't confusion about what I believe. I just color outside the lines. So, does this convoluted mess of ideas make any sense to anyone else here?
Yes, it makes a lot of sense & I think there are quite a few people on here with similar views. They may not phrase them in exactly the same way, but you're in good company I actually find it insulting, the way the christian religion portrays the idea of a deity. They try to push the idea that a single supreme intelligence would be childish, petty, require worship, punish those who question, punish those who live their lives, torture, test, etc etc... it's abusive fear tactics to force people into submission. I despise organised religion in general. Surely anything of such ilk would welcome people to live their lives in the way they saw fit & I don't think even the worst of "offenders" would be sentenced to an eternity of damnation. They would get their own, personalised heaven, if that even existed - they would have had torture enough in their worldly existence. But enough about that... I could ramble on about the vile-ness of organised religion for a long time I'm an astrophysicist, quite logical... trying to become more spiritual. One of the key things I've always argued, yet never truly accepted mentally - even to this day - is that quantum physics effectively allows every possibility to come to fruition. Perhaps even to the extent that every possible choice, every possible interaction, every possible thought or imagination could spur a brand new universe into existence. Our very consciousness could spur new universes into existence without even realising it. Once you realise that, anything is possible
Yes, I've always had trouble with the whole "God made you so you want to 'sin' and then made 'His' son die for you because of it--Now don't you feel so grateful?" aspect of Christianity, and when I tried believing "everything but that part" I found that I'd pretty much taken out the foundation of the whole house of cards. Oh well. To geek out for a second...I always think of the multiverse model of quantum mechanics as being analogous to having a matrix with more than one element (as most of them do), or the way every positive real number has two square roots, that sort of thing, so it really doesn't seem like that much of a logical stretch--and besides, it makes for some really cool sci-fi plots! I've also dabbled in some magick-y workings that made use of this model, so again there's the coloring outside the lines. I also usually find myself making programming analogies when encountering various magickal concepts (e.g. the Tarot or the Tree of Life as APIs, gods as threads of execution or processes, etc. Have you ever read Robert Anton Wilson? His fiction is very good, but his non-fiction touches on a lot of the sorts of things I'm talking about, but much more articulately than I'm probably doing here. I'm really glad to have found this site.
Oh yes. In fact, Chaos Magick makes a lot more sense to me than what's generally called High Magick, since the Chaos variety tends to be a bit less formal and that seems to fit my character a bit more than High Magick would. I'm not even sure I'd call myself a "practitioner" per se, since for me even the boundaries between what does and does not constitute "magick" blur quite a lot, so there are some magick-inspired things that I just...do...like looking for (creating) synchronicities, being aware of my personal associations/correspondences, etc.
diversity is the nature of reality, and we live in a statistical universe. unseen things do not have to be gods, nor their realm hierarchical. though they may be diverse in degree as well as nature.
I don't think there's anything too unusual about being a "pagan atheist smartass", or however you phrased it .. lol ... or maybe I should say, going through a "pagan atheist smartass" phase. I'm 66 years old and I still go through my PAM days. I think this is just part of being human. However, I also think that, ultimately, the human spirit will not be at peace until it comes to grips with its connection to the "I am that I am", in whatever way it can. In contrast to you, I do believe in God ... why I do would be a long discussion for another day However, I also believe that we were given the gift of intelligence with the intention that we should use it. It makes no sense that we would be given a brain with the admonition that we're not to use it, no more than we would be given a pancreas and cautioned not to use it. Therefore, we are free to work this out for ourselves. What I do find mildly annoying is the number of people who feel absolutely compelled to bash Christianity and other established religious systems. I always wonder who they're trying to convince. Too much "I despise this" or "I hate that." I would say that "hating" is more their problem than any religion. At my age, I accept that people are going to believe what they believe, and it's not my place (nor anyone else's) to bash. And look at it this way ... what if they're right? The fact is no one on this earth knows for sure, so why not just let it be? In addition, I find it amusing when people make pronouncements about the ultimate nature of God (as several have just in this thread), as if they alone were the possessors of some ultimate truth. Please! Don't try to tell me what God is or isn't. Or more to the point, don't try to tell God what to do.
indeed. if a god owed it to anyone to resemble what they pretend to know about it, would it even be a god? i believe there are things we don't know. and that some of them might even love us. but i don't believe in their being a NEED for there to be any sort of hierarchy among them. if some or one, just happen to be in some way "bigger" then all others, that is only a circumstance, not an intrinsic requirement for anything to be.
I disagree with you. But again, no one knows for certain. So we make our choice and hope to hell we're right.
