[pbecke]

Hi, folks. I'm Paul. Perhaps I'll need to add something, as it's a common enough name.

Though very non-technical myself, I've long been fascinated by Relativity and quantum physics, as popularized for Noddys like me. I was just reading Bill Bryson's a "Brief History of Nearly Everything", and it got me going.

I may have a unique perspective up to a point, but I'm a Christian, a Catholic, so share the basic fundamentals of my belief system with many others.

After a stint in the army, leaving it with the rank of Duane Doberman, i.e Private Class II, having spent much of the time in the motor pool, I studied to become a modern languages teacher, but went out teaching and didn't complete my studies. For the last 17 years I've worked as a translator, mostly of legal and commercial documents.

[pbecke]

Harmony girl, I think women should be proud to be women and men to be men, but I also believe that Christ became a man, rather than a woman in a spirit of humility, in keeping with the principle and purpose of his incarnation.

After all, it is a matter of common experience that, for better or worse, like the angels (of light and the fallen type), who are pure spirit, women are more spiritual than men, more intuitive and sensitive to the spiritual. Even their less hirsute physical appearance seems indicative. More like God the Father in his eternal essence. "From the womb before the Daystar I begot you". A curiously female physical attribute for God to claim, in view of the patriarchy he seems to have generally instituted.

I'm not for political correctness in terms of equality or suppression of gender in favour of "person"hood in the written word, but again, it does seem that women are actually the default version of mankind, biologically speaking.
I don't know if any of that would interest you, but them's thar's my beliefs.

[harmonygirl]

Hail and welcome Paul. Needless to say we appear to disagree on the difference between a patriarchal interpretation of scripture and spirituality. (Note I said interpretation, not patriarchal system that the Goddess instituted, for example the original word in Hebrew for God is gender neutral but has always been interpreted as "He" or "Him"-utterly ridiculous to believe the creator would chose a gender!). Earth-Mother-Goddess has always made more sense as the image of the creator (despite a Roman Catholic upbringing!), seeing as how women create and men destroy (generally speaking). You believe you have divined the reason behind Christ's choice to be a man. I disagree. Who's right? anybody's guess. I am not sure what you mean by "default version" of womankind, but you're entitled to your beliefs. Thanks for your comments and I look forward to hearing your thoughts on the various threads....

[Mr. Nobody]

There is no god in the sense of a supreme consciousness. Our brains evolved in recognition of observable patterns which brought us intelligence. Awareness of inevitable death was an unfortunate by-product of this acquired intelligence. Death completes the circle of life. The circle of life brings a definite beginning and end. This thinking in terms of beginning and end has led us to the big bang and a supreme being.
In reality, all there is or might be, is energy (matter) in a reasonless dance towards greater order opposing the increase in entropy. This dance is being performed within phases of an infinite reality.
No purpose, no existential good nor evil, no religion and no god.

[SinJin]

I think this is one of the problems when discussing religion. We could go on for ages discussing which god is a male and which god is a female, and everyone would have their own interpretation and no one would be wrong! Is it pointless? Of course not - it gives you that warm fuzzy feeling inside to believe that your god is watching over you. However I think it greatly hinders the progress of science, something we will definately need to improve before our sun becomes a red giant.

[mkirkpatrick]

Originally Posted by SinJin I think this is one of the problems when discussing religion. We could go on for ages discussing which god is a male and which god is a female, and everyone would have their own interpretation and no one would be wrong! Is it pointless? Of course not - it gives you that warm fuzzy feeling inside to believe that your god is watching over you. However I think it greatly hinders the progress of science, something we will definately need to improve before our sun becomes a red giant.

I agree with you Sinjin,however,science,and physics are now accepting ideas
that would have been unthinkable a while ago,the holographic universe,which
has runningthrough the very idea of an absolute intelligence(God)The elegant
universe is another!

kind regards michael.

[SinJin]

I suppose you are right. Whatever is outside the universe might not be subject to the laws of physics we're familiar with. And if science points to an all powerful conscious being that watches over everything and everyone, then so be it. I do realize that religion and science must co-exist. However if we put too much thought into religion and not enough into science, then we'll be stuck with problems like waiting for our god to save us when the world comes crashing down, instead of when we could've been working on stem cell research, which might've led to somehthing else, which might've led to technology that could terraform other planets.

[mkirkpatrick]

Originally Posted by SinJin I suppose you are right. Whatever is outside the universe might not be subject to the laws of physics we're familiar with. And if science points to an all powerful conscious being that watches over everything and everyone, then so be it. I do realize that religion and science must co-exist. However if we put too much thought into religion and not enough into science, then we'll be stuck with problems like waiting for our god to save us when the world comes crashing down, instead of when we could've been working on stem cell research, which might've led to somehthing else, which might've led to technology that could terraform other planets.

You are quite right,and i agree,we have the inbuilt intelligence and I feel we
are duty bound to use it.We do indeed need to solve our problems,together
as a human family,and not as enemies to one another.

regards michael.

[HappytheStripper]

I have answered so many threads in many different forums .. about God .. and oh .. *my head hurts* .. this is one debate that will never find a common ground with everyone ..

Ashley

[Robert]

The question of whether the God/Goddess is male/female seems to not apply since male/female is likely a property of the brain. Assuming we have non-physical bodies (e.g. spirit/astral body/mind), our non-physical body would merge with our human host and only then become male or female. Our true selves, our spirit (if it exists) would be gender neutral so God (if he/she exists) would be gender neutral also. To want God to be male or want God to be female seems to be a psychological issue. God must be neutral should he not? Sorry about the 'he' reference. One problem is that English does not have a good gender-neutral reference, and 'it' certainly seems inappropriate. Buddism suggests that we reincarnate in multiple bodies, both male and female, for the purpose of experiencing life from different perspectives. But this is getting off track...

Why a God? I think the idea of God is hard-wired into us where the strength of it's influence on us can be plotted in a bell-curve distribution. I'm not quite sure why this would have evolved in us, but it must increase our survivability somehow.