The problem with praying is that I don't know who I'm talking to. "Dear God", doesn't mean anything to me. I believe that the universe is alive and I believe that everything and everyone in it is connected (either by the wave/particle duality or simply by the Great Spirit). But who's driving the bus? I don't know. Maybe there is no bus. Maybe there is and we're all driving, like those extra set of pedals in the passenger seat your teacher used in Driver's Ed.
Is Someone listening? I don't think so, it doesn't feel right. That is, it doesn't square with my sense of the divine. A great living, breathing universe is not something I can address a prayer to as I would a Creator. I don't know if you've been around traditionally religious people when they pray. It was a new experience for me when I first heard my in-laws utter a very personal and very specific prayer on my behalf. "Dear God, please be with Moose as he drives home and see that he gets there safely..." I've never talked to god this way. I've never talked to God at all. (Also, because of my knee-jerk habit of referencing movies, every time they pray I want mutter, "Get Lazlo in there!")
The question is: do I really need to address the divine? Prayer is a way of focusing your intentions and directing the positive flow of your heart and mind. You do it because you believe your actions and intentions will change your reality. So do I believe my reality is malleable? Yes. "With our thoughts we make the world", said the Buddha. And he didn't talk to God either. He found his own way of praying. I guess I'm still looking for mine.
Actually, the question is also: does the divine address me? Yes, it does. Sometimes through nature, sometimes through other people, sometimes through random but meaningful song lyrics that pop into my head just as I am searching for a solution to a problem. The living universe is talking all the time whether I talk back or not.
Maybe this blog is a prayer.
Praise be to HTML, the Cherisher and Sustainer of the blogosphere;
Most immediate, Most accessible;
Master of the Age of Information.
Thee do we laugh with, and thine memes do we seek.
Show us the typed way,
The way of those on whom thou hast bestowed thy accounts,
those who portion is not gossip,
and who go not astray.
Forgive them oh Lord, they know not what they blog.
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6 comments:
and the lord spoke ...and asked for script notes ;-)
I thought you quit smoking dope?
………………….around traditionally religious?
All my life. The blinkered race I called them. Blinkered in Belief, just like a hors can’t get distracted/spooked in traffic by things coming up from behind, and to the side; they never get to see what’s going on around them.
Dear God, thank you for everything, and God bless Lazlo too, and roll another number for the road, if we’re goin’ to do the time why not do the crime? Ha (I laugh at all my own jokes)
Yes, just get into it like a meditation …. Every thought, every move you make- the Police are in the house.
Hang on I’ll look up ”malleable”
O yes, I’ve been fucking hammered quite a lot. My dad told me to stop thinking too much, it’s not good for you. So you can imagine what kind of world I’ve made.
”Look everybody, hey, where is everyone.”
Forgive indeed. I’ll have to think about all this.
(it’s old hat I know, but) I’m really beginning to think I am God.
Every time I pray, I feel I’m talking to myself.
Great post. A topic that needs to be addressed more often.
When you build your house call me.
This is an interesting question - how to address the concept of God.
I've grappled with this all of my life. I do pray - consciously and subconsciously - all day long. These prayers take various forms and range through the gambit of emotions. They can be simple and mundane like, "God I wish I could win the lotto". They can be questioning like, "Damn, God, what the fuck is up with sand gnats?" They can be angry like, "Did you see that! Another act of senseless violence! You wait till I see, you, I oughta bitch slap all the God outta you, you big moron!" They can be an act of contrition like, "Oh that was so wrong God, please forgive me." And sometime I am in awe of God, in love with God and very thankful like, "That was a glorious sunset, or a great piece of fruit, or just look at my lovely children and my beautiful wife, thank you God."
But through it all, and in every sacred place I've had the privilage to visit (natural and man made), I have to admit that I believe. My spiritual side is still there - tattered, torn, but with me. There's an old baptist hymn that sums it up for me:
Pass me not my precious savior
Hear my humble cry
While on others thou art calling
Do not pass me by
Here's hoping we all catch the bus of our choosing.
Bismillahir Rahmanir Rahim
Pops
…………… “it doesn't feel right.”
Now that hits it on the head. Hold that thought. That is the best place to start….. Damn right it don’t feel right; the fact God just don’t fit into our concept, our belief.
Our life is obviously so far removed from God otherwise he would permeate our whole existence to such a degree we would not even have such a question as who, what, is (there a) God. We would just know.
The reality is simply, we don’t know. Those that say they know, and pray are lying to themselves.
Do you think living in a refugee camp with war, and rapists , and nothing but hunger, and death outside it makes a difference whether there is a God or not.
Who gives a shit.
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