I had this great convo with a friend today. We agreed on some stuff and disagreed on some stuff. We never argued. We considered each other's points of view because we had a mutual respect and could tell that the other had put some thought in to their opinion. We both agreed that neither of us could be considered "right wing" or "left wing", "conservative" or "liberal". We may swing either way depending on the subject or believe something that doesn't fit rightly into either. That's right. My ideas, thoughts and feelings are so complex that they cannot be boxed in. Most people are simpletons, and just choose a box without doing much thinking and then will viciously attack you defending those ideas that someone else thought of.
My friend went on to tell me of a guy who was offended by the title of my blog: "My War with God". If the guy had ever read my blog and tried to comprehend what he was reading he would have found that, in a lot of ways the idea was meant to be ironic...and in other ways it would have been better to say "My struggle with other people's ideas of God". The guy would have seen that it was thoughts and ideas on a number of topics from my life that i summed up as a spiritual struggle...or perhaps more like a spiritual journey. Which we are all on, but I try to be conscious of my spiritual journey and guide it. Most people are just sitting in their recliners eating cheetoes and watching nascar. I'm trying to think, to learn and to grow. To wrestle with the ideas I've been fed and test them instead of blindly accepting. Why would we ever have to argue over the truth?
I've found that, just as I can not be easily defined politically, I cannot be easily defined spiritually either. Perhaps if the people who judge me were to really hear what I'm saying they would understand that I hold many "christian" values. Here's a small piece of what I believe:
If we were all created from 1 God, wouldn't god want us to honor and respect all that he created? I don't believe he would want us drawing up divisions against one another. Because the divisions don't matter. If no label you could ever try and put on ME will do any justice to the complexity that is within me, how can any Label do justice to the complexity of god? How do the words jesus or allah or yaweh do any justice to the thing that created the universe? That is all things and is within all things? How can those paltry syllables, these faces of men do any glory to that which is all encompassing? Those are just syllables. The language that should be important is the language of your spirit which is beyond words and names. In death, all these words and names will be washed away.
I got frustrated on the 4th of july. I heard a lot of words of pride and patriotism. Well, I believe pride is a sin isn't it? And what are you proud of? Being born on a particular spot of land in a particular time? You didn't do anything. It made me think of children drawing circles around themselves on a playground. If Jesus came to earth right now would he call himself an American or would he view all life as his father's children? The names are what divides us.
Me and a friend had some words on the 4th. She asked me what I was doing to change things. It made me think a lot. I believe that we need to grow beyond our petty divisions of nationalism, class, sex, race and religion and try to solve our real problems. Every day I try and think for myself instead of just accepting what I'm told. I changed the name of my blog because it just doesn't fucking matter. These are just ideas, and they will change and grow and expand and they don't fully define me no matter how hard I try. So, I'm sorry to all those I offended. From now on, I won't rock the boat. 'cause that's how shit really gets done. Blind acceptance is what this world needs, by golly. This will be the new me. I will throw as many boxes and labels on myself as i can find and will stop all this "thinking" and "researching" and "questioning". Boy am I glad. all that shit was hard work. Can you pass the cheetos? Is wrestling on?
