conversations with kathy
(part one)


CWG, book 1, p. 39:

"There are those who say that I have given you free will, yet these same people claim that if you do not obey Me, I will send you to hell. What kind of free will is that?"

It seems to me that the religious concept of God as unknowable is accurate. The "Ultimate Reality" or whatever we choose to call it, cannot be comprehended by the human mind. ALL religions say this somewhere in their scriptures. It follows then, that in our attempt to comprehend the incomprehensible, we project onto God characteristics that we as humans can understand.

We touched on this in Sunday school yesterday (sorry you weren't there Kev!). The idea of hell and eternal damnation, in my opinion, is and was created by humans. WE need to believe that "bad" people will be punished. It's hard to see people behaving in ways that we think are wrong or even evil, and yet they seem to continue on with their lives relatively unharmed. Where is the punishment, the retribution, the consequences? Life seems unfair. Thankfully, God will give them what they deserve in the afterlife! Whew! I feel better, don't you?

If this is your belief, that's fine- I'm pragmatic when it comes to religious beliefs and practices. After all, if it's working for you, what more can you ask? However, if you're really in the business of KNOWING God as much as He/She/It can be known, then we have to be a little more objective. That's where I have a problem with the conventional idea of free will- you know the one that says that we can do whatever we want, but if we don't do what God wants, then we're going to hell? Hmmm. Maybe we just need to forget what we want and try to figure out what God wants...

Here's my take: If there is a cost associated with a certain choice, then choice is no longer free.

I'm frustrated by the mental gymnastics that Christianity asks us to perform in order to accept this idea of free will. We must suspend all logic in order to accept the concept of free will that isn't actually free. I know, I know- you can't know God through logic, but must know God through faith. But putting faith in convoluted thinking which was created for the purpose of making us feel better about the obvious "unfairness" of life is stupid.

If there is no eternal retribution, of course, then how in the world can we control people's behavior? It IS a dilemma.

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on the whole, kathy, i agree with most of what you are saying. having grown up in the church, i always associated free will as being somewhat conditional. it wasn't 'til i got out and away from the church for a little bit that i was able to understand just how conditional it really was for those that chose to immerse themselves in the thinking that God would have us running through a maze for this portion of our existence.

obviously, there is a comfort to the conditions if you adhere to them, and i am sure we'll touch on some of the more specific conditions as we continue this conversation. as it relates to the subject of free will, though, let me look at it for a second through the lens of humc's current senior pastor. i love brother harris, and i don't know that i could convince myself that he had one disingenuous bone in his body. let me say that first and foremost. i believe with every ounce of my heart that he has my and the congregation of our church's best and eternal interests at heart when he delivers a message to us on sunday morning. having said that, i'll say this. many of his sermons center around a recurring theme. as our pastor, he warns us in so many words that free will is something to be tamed, not embraced. he has said many, many times that all he wants for his congregation to know is the information that is vital for us to pass through with him into the kingdom of heaven. and i love him for that. even though he is constantly reminding me of my mortality and the fears that have enveloped me since last july, i love that my senior pastor cares for me and my church family so much that he is doing everything he feels called to do to make sure we spend our eternal life enjoying the same heavenly reward. 

as it pertains to this post's topic, though, it's the taming of our free will or the bending it towards one specific answer, one truth, that i have a hard time swallowing. if God, in fact, formed us truly in his image, it seems preposterous to me that he would allow our eternal separation to be so mechanical and unrelenting and un-grace-full to be risked on my perpetual questioning. did He not build me to question? does He not question, himself? wouldn't it make more sense that the free will that we all struggle with, when it comes to our desires and our vices and our loves and our interests be looked upon as a gift and not a curse? to me, it does. 

to most, they would agree...to a point. to the point where they've drawn their conditional line in the sand. i've been raised to believe this. and i can't so far as to believe that. so, i'll end up settling here, because it's much too scary over there. i am guilty of drawing lines in the sand too. i am happy, though, that it seems, as i am getting older and obtaining a broader sense of who i think God really is, that my line continues to pull back to allow many others behind it rather than pushing forth and becoming more exclusive. 

after all, free will is not just my gift. it's yours too.

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If we want to get to the crux of the matter, which is what Walsch tries to do, then we have to ask the big question. Can you do anything, no matter how "bad," and still be reconciled with God in the end? I'm not talking about being sorry and asking for forgiveness, saying a gazillion Hail Mary's, and generally jumping through all the religious hoops, etc., that are required by most religions in order to get back on the good list. I'm talking about there being a predetermined outcome of reconciliation- a sense that, no matter what, you can't lose because Life isn't a test to be passed, but an experience to be savored. I'm talking about eternal reward/outcome here, not the natural consequences we face for our choices in this life (which we should definitely talk about), but ULTIMATE outcome. As I touched on earlier, this is a dangerous idea because it takes away God's big stick, which religions clumsily try to wield in order to control human behavior. Still- what would the world look like without the threat of eternal damnation? What do you think?

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well, if we are talking about "the world" as we experience it now, it sounds really scary to not have a check (whether that check is represented by religion, government, etc. doesn't really matter i guess) that might balance out the manifestation of "evil" in the world. that being said, the rhetorical you pose is one that we already have a metaphorical picture of in the story of adam and eve before "the fall". this picture is very attractive. it is one that, in my heart of hearts, is close to what i used to dream of when i thought of what waited for me beyond this life on earth. no worries. no thought of "evil". eternally, immediately and always tangibly in the presence of God, never worried with even the possibility of being separated from that Presence.  

i love the idea of taking away "God's big stick". doing so would , in my opinion, impactfully and relevantly revolutionize the way we did "church". i might choose this as our next topic. we'll see. 

i'll conclude my thoughts, though, on free will with this. i tend to agree that "free will", as it is marketed and practiced today, is severely perverted from how God might define it for us. 

i'll let you close us out.

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Of course it would be nice to close with a definite answer. You and I could figuratively dust our hands and then high-five each other for figuring out one of life's mysteries :) Good job!

Who knows whether or not there will be eternal retribution. I think not, but that's just me. What I do find tantalizing is the idea that if we let go of the idea that there is ANYTHING of which God would disapprove of and thus disown us- well, if God's not judging us, then how could we judge each other? Instead of judging and condemning one another, maybe we'd simply observe and learn from one another- and when we see that someone has made a choice that leads to pain and suffering, then we could offer our help.

Maybe I'm just a Pollyanna :)