In Reply to: Re: Human nature? posted by Visitor on April 02, 2004 at 14:41:56:
Thanks for sharing your thoughts. What you are saying makes sense to me, as does your reason for putting it all together the way you have.
For me personally, I have long thought that the most logical reason to believe in a higher power is because it helps me live a life in the here-and-now where I do less injury to myself and others than I might if I did not have a faith relationship of this sort. The relationship with my higher power is my source of serenity, so that regardless of external pressures and stress, I remain anchored. It works for me, and that is the most I can say about it.
I have learned to live with a lot of uncertainty about the supernatural world--and the thing that is of most interest to me--what happens when humans die. It is possible that I "know" something about that dimension within the mind of my spiritual body (if such a thing exists).
However, if I do "know" something about what lies beyond death's door, I do not have adequate words or concepts to communicate that knowledge to others. This is partly because I am not convinced that what is subjectively true for me--my personal experience of the Risen Christ, for example--is objectively true and generalizable to everyone else. I can only say what is true for me.
More to the point, if I say I have "seen" the Risen Christ, I am not totally convinced that my own experience and understanding of the empty tomb is what the writer of John's gospel describes in chapter 20 or what many Christians believe and teach about everlasting life. I might try to explain what I "feel" awaits me at death as a consequence of having visited the empty tomb, and it is very possible you or someone else will say, "That is not of God" for this or that reason.
Although I cannot claim with certainty that my understanding of Christ's empty tomb is true, I still hold on to hope that what I have "seen" is true. Fortunately, my hope is not something that is subject to reason.