#church

I am atheist in a very religious mould. I'm always asking myself the big questions. Where did we come from? Is there a meaning to all of this? When I find myself in church, I edit the hymns as I sing them. ↗

— Mark Haddon

#am #asking #atheist #big #big questions

A friend of mine commented yesterday that she has experienced similar insights that I talked about that all enlightened Masters and founders of religion are actually talking about the same ocean, the same invisible life source, the same God. She also said that she worked in a Christan environment at the time that she received these insights, and when she tried to share these insights with the Christians she was accused of being "impure" and of being associated with the "Devil". Christians hold on to the idea that Jesus was the only son of God, without realizing that we are all son's and daughter's of God. By holding on to the idea that Jesus is the only son of God, they do not either to realize that all enlightened Masters are talking about the same God. Jesus did not talk about faith, he talked about trust. He talked about discovering a trust in yourself and in relationship to God. Jesus said that the kingdom of God is within you. In Christianity, the church has become the intermediate between man and God, and people who claim that they have found a direct relationship to God are accused of blasphemy. The Christan church has become a barrier between man and God, and anyone who has declared that he has found a direct relationship to God are immediately banned by the church, for example Master Eckhart and Franciskus of Assisi. I have always had a deep love for Jesus, but it is not the picture of Jesus that the Christian church presents. I was a disciple of Jesus in a former life, and was thrown to the lions in Colosseum in Rome as one of the early Christians. Jesus had many more disciples than the twelve disciples mentioned in The Bible. In this life, I resigned my automatic membership in the church as soon as I could think for myself when I was 15 years old. I was also disgusted with an organization that said that they preached love and which has murdered more people than Hitler. My experience with these rare and precious insights are that they expand our consciousness of reality. They are gradual initiations into reality. They may fade away, but we will never be the same again after receiving them. They will also come more and more, the more committment we have to our spiritual growth. ↗

— Swami Dhyan Giten

#enlightenment #faith #franciskus-of-assisi #god #jesus

The Christian churches were offered two things: the spirit of Jesus and the idiotic morality of Paul, and they rejected the higher inspiration... Following Paul, we have turned the goodness of love into a fiend and degraded the crowning impulse of our being into a capital sin. ↗

— Frank Harris

#capital #christian #churches #crowning #degraded

I get asked a lot why Apple's customers are so loyal. It's not because they belong to the Church of Mac! That's ridiculous. ↗

— Steve Jobs

#asked #because #belong #church #customers

There is no heresy or no philosophy which is so abhorrent to the church as a human being. ↗

— James Joyce

#being #church #heresy #human #human being

I have a much wider, freer view about spirituality. I feel that people need to pursue it on their own, personally. You know, let it be theirs - a personal relationship with their soul, or their God, or with their church. ↗

— Peter Jurasik

#church #feel #freer #god #i

I left because I decided it just really wasn't for me, and I got a better understanding of what the Catholic Church needed from its priests and ministers. ↗

— Peter Jurasik

#better #catholic #catholic church #church #decided

I was unwilling to - without getting too philosophical about it - I was unwilling to structure my spirituality in the way that the church wanted me to structure it. ↗

— Peter Jurasik

#church #getting #i #me #philosophical

My whole damn family was nice. I don't think I've imagined it. It's true. Maybe it has to do with being brought up as Christian Scientists. Half of my relatives were Readers or Practitioners in the church. ↗

— Henry Fonda

#being #brought #christian #church #damn

And I definitely wanted to be a writer, but I felt a duty now, having used up those educational resources, I felt a duty to the church and my parents to become a priest. ↗

— Thomas Keneally

#church #definitely #duty #educational #felt