Why is what God is so important?
Why do we need to define and put into
Parameters we can understand
Something so vast and undefinable as God,
Or what God might be?
How can we believe that
A God of All Creation
And personal relation could
Possibly not speak in the
Language and cultural norms
Of the Hindi of India,
The Bantu of Africa,
The nomadic tribes of the Sahara,
Or the Malaysian and other
Cultures of the great continent and
Outlying Isles of Asia?
I was born Christian,
But am I damned for believing
That the same God of Abraham,
Moses and Isaac –
the God whose son walked on this earth –
might also be the God of Mohammed,
the God named Shiva, Allah,
Yahweh, Susie or Fred,
Depending on who you are asking?
Am I to be relegated to a fiery
Eternity for considering
That perhaps the similarities
Between myth and current religion
Might be clues to the divine
Connection of all that was,
Of all that is,
And all that will be –
In the same way that we humans
And other inhabitants of
This earth are
A part and parcel of whatever
God may be;
Individual cells in one vast body?
Many years ago,
Studying world religions
And mythology, I learned
That even the Bible and
Christianity as we know it
Was created and written
325 years after Christ’s death,
By an emperor and
Council set on combining
The prevailing religions
Of the time
With The Way,
The original teachings
Of Christ and his apostles,
Into a tidy Package
That people could
Easily follow and call
Truth.
But I believe those things
That we call Truth
Are both relative
And often found
In less likely places
Than many sacred venues
Where we go to worship.
Truth can be found in the
Whispering of the wind
Through the long grasses
Where my dogs romp,
In the shadows cast and raucous
Calling of the Ravens as
They fly overhead.
I believe God can be found
In the quiet rising of the sun
over the misty hills of my home,
In the sound
Of my children’s laughter
Or good-natured argument,
In the chirping of the colony
Of frogs in the evening
And in the geese and swans
Gracefully swimming by
With their fuzzy young
on the river that
Perimeters my farm.
I’m not saying that God
Can’t also be found in our sacred
Temples and churches,
In monasteries and mosques,
Because if there is any such
Thing as a Universal Truth
It is that God is, and can be found
Anywhere and everywhere –
If you are looking for Wonder,
For Awe, for Joy, for Love,
For Inspiration, for Redemption,
For Perfection and Connection.
But if you are looking,
It can just as easily be found in
The whispering of the wind,
A single drop of dew upon a
blade of grass, or the laughter
Of children in India, Nepal,
Or Iran
As in those sacred venues
And places of worship,
And that God cares not
If he/she is called by Yahweh,
Allah, Shiva, Susie or Fred –
As long as you call.
This Blessed Sacred Life 