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The God we worship is the god we ourselves create .
God is knowable. God is unknowable. God is the compassionate God of the Quran. He is the angry God of the Old Testament. He is the loving Jesus. He is the many gods of Hinduism. He is the non-existent god of Buddhism.
Which God do you believe in? And how does that God demand to be worshipped? Do we have a direct line to God or must we go through intermediaries? Is he loving or vengeful? Is your scripture the perfect and unalterable word of an immortal God or the fallible writings of long-dead prophets? Which sins does God condemn and which does he ultimately forgive?
Your answer to these and many other questions determines not only whether you are Hindu, Christian or Muslim, Catholic or Protestant, Sunni or Shia, but which sect you belong to within these broad traditions.
And if none of these correspond to your vision of God, then you can set up your own religion and persuade others that only you represent the True Faith.
And how do you know that your vision, or someone else's is true? Because you feel it in your heart. The problem is, every believer feels it in their heart - and not everyone's feeling is the same.
The believer needs go no further. He or she knows God; other people may be close to or distant from the real faith. The problem for the rest of us is that we don't have that certainty; if God does exists, how do we know whose faith is true?
While we're contemplating that problem we can quickly come to a very obvious conclusion: irrespective of God's existence, each believer creates their own image of God.
Each believer takes from scripture what they want - what reflects their personality. They
insist on the passages that affect them personally and ignore or belittle the passages that do not meet their needs.
Christian preachers whose personalities are dominated by anger or insecurity focus on the Old Testament and God's anger and retribution. Muslim preachers with the same
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Chapter One: Defining God
Does God exist? Before we try to answer that question we
need to have a clear idea of who or what God is. How do we
describe God? What versions of God are on offer?
1.1: God, faith and religion
Do they need each other?
1.2: What is God?
God comes in several styles and models
1.3: Perception and reality
Is what we see what we get?
1.4: The evolving God
From prehistory to today
1.5: El, Yahweh et al
The Old Testament family of gods
1.6: Three's company
The Christian Trinity
1.7: Allah
Over to Islam
1.8: Majors and minors
Polytheism
1.9: The unknowable God
Is he there?
1.10: Your god or mine?
Made in our image
1.11: Summary
Finished this chapter? Move on to
Chapter Two
Problems with God
The real God – if such a thing exists – may be very different
from the god portrayed by Jewish, Christian or Muslim
scripture.
But whichever picture of God we look at - from the
Bible and Koran to the images presented by other
faiths and believers - we are confronted by problems.
When examined closely, God's nature is so contradictory
that it is unlikely, if not impossible, for him to exist.
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emotions hammer
insist that Allah condemns all thieves to amputation and infidels to violent death.
Pat Robertson and Desmond Tutu offer their believers very different
versions of God. Unlike Tutu's God of Love, Robertson's deity is unforgiving and aggressive.
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Christian preachers whose personalities are dominated by love and self-worth turn
their attention to the New Testamant and Jesus' messages of acceptance and forgiveness.
Their Muslim counterparts stress Allah's compassionate nature and the duties of respect and charity.
At the end of the day, we worship the God that we ourselves choose.
Religious leaders reveal little or nothing about the deity;
their actions and words, their gestures and emotions reveal only their own
foibles and weaknesses. The truth is that whether or not he exists,
the God we worship is the god we ourselves create.
for a summary of this chapter click here
or move on to
Chapter Two: Problems with God
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If God existed, he would...
admire the beauty of a universe that he did not create
recognize that eternity is meaningless
deny both heaven and hell
disown all men and women who speak in his name
denounce the harm caused by religious "morality"
help the human race to thrive without him
If God existed, he would be an atheist.
What is the difference between science and faith?
science is certain of nothing and requires proof of everything
faith is certain of everything and requires proof of nothing
Which do you trust?
"I know there is no God"
or
"I believe there is no God"
???
Check the answer
wear the Scarlet letter
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