The world made a mistake - God is not love.

[Cronus Protagonist]

That's the cause of all this fighting on earth; using love as an excuse for the passion to kill, dominate and be righteous. The worst evils in the world are caused by people "doing good".

Humanity is escalating its religious thrust for perfection, trying to make a dream come true - a perfect reality in an imperfect world. In doing so, mankind is flirting with its own death - using its passion for love as an excuse for acting against its own best interests.

It's insane.

I think the problem is that we (our ancestors) have misinterpreted what God is. Here's the solution right here...

God is happy.

[mebadgett]

1. Only 6 More Killing Days Until Christmas

We Americans talk of 'Peace on earth,' but our actions speak louder than words

Excerpt:

"Now we are in the season of Christmas. Celebrations are being held, carols are being sung and prayers are being prayed (not to mention consumers going amok and Atkins dieters falling off the wagon). And in this season many of us honor the birth of Jesus of Nazareth.

As much as we talk of 'peace on earth,' our actions make our words ring hollow.

If we were really serious about creating peace in our time, wouldn't we be putting a more substantial portion of our resources toward that end? As long as we put our focus on kicking our real or imagined adversaries' butts rather than reconciliation, on glorifying young warriors rather than honoring youth who choose a path of peace, we will continue to create death and destruction . . . for others and for ourselves. Let's face it; we've got a lot of guns and soldiers. We're going to wind up shooting somebody eventually. And as long as we keep making the same kinds of choices, we're going to keep getting the same results. To expect otherwise is insanity."

By Bruce Mulkey
Asheville, North Carolina

Entire article: http://207.44.245.159/article7479.htm

P.S.

To subscribe to Bruce's e-newsletter, Walking My Talk, visit his website at www.brucemulkey.com

[Cronus Protagonist]

2. Thanks.

Happiness on Earth to you this holiday season.

[Disturbed]

4. God is love?

Whoever came up with that absurd notion was doing a lot of wishful thinking. Studying the Old Testement disproves that notion. God supposedly proclaimed to Moses the Jaweh is a jealous and vengful god and not to put other gods before him. There are plenty of stories of how this God of War told his people to sack cities and kill every man, woman child and even animals in that city. This was not a god of love;far from it.

Jesus according to various writings seemed to be more about love but Jesus was not god. He was proclaimed as being the son of god. His father ordered him to be crucified. Glad that I didn't have a father like that.

[Cronus Protagonist]

5. Actually, it says that right in the bible - "God is love"

"God is Love" (1 John 4:8)

Supposed to be the literal word of God for some people.

However, a Christian God is not the one of which I was thinking. I was thinking of a HAPPY God. Nothing to do with Christianity, really.

Happiness to you this holiday season. May joy light up your life.

[Sin]

12. Yet again

Think not that I am come to send peace on earth:
I came not to send peace, but a sword.
Matthew 10:34

[Cronus Protagonist]

13. That's the whole problem - people think God is love, and that brings death

.... death comes because love is jealous, love is exclusive, love is passionate and love is serious. In your example, God is a fucking warmonger - ah, the power of righteous "love".

However, in the real universe, I say that God is happiness.

Many happy returns to you.

:)

[Ron Green]

30. Maybe love is the OPPOSITE of jealousy, exclusivity, passion and

seriousness. Maybe the Old Testament God is not God at all, but a huge PR campaign to keep a bunch of warring, nomadic assholes in line.

[aneerkoinos]

33. Bingo. nt

[mutius]

6. Peace on earth good will to wards men

This Christmas is so far from what it should be makes me sick. The religious want to love anyone who does not have the same values as themselves. Christ said, kill them that use you, kill your enemies, and then pray for them, he didn't say love them. On ward Christan soldiers going on to war.

[mutius]

9. Put very well

Real help with the Christmas spirit.

[demnan]

3. Yeah, how could we have been so wrong?

Anyone who watches those nature programs where big lions kill and ruthlessly devour other creatures has to know that there is no moralistic God thing up there telling us to observe the 10 commandments. I thought we threw that one out in the 19th century. Pretending that life is anything but a struggle for survivial is delusional.

But happy means living in a society and contributing towards it's betterment. Those same lions tenderly wash their cubs and nuzzle their sisters in affection. If our society is truly to be happy it must encompass all our brothers and sisters. As globalism occurs, we must either be globally family or globally in turmoil.

[Cronus Protagonist]

7. Thanks for that comment.

I also think that when you look into the face of a truly happy person, you look into the face of God.

Not just in a metaphorical sense, but in the actual real radiance of being in the presence of another human being happy. That radiance is God. It has to be. Where else could it be?

God is happy. Happy is real. God is real. Here on earth, too.

Many happy returns to you.

[mutius]

8. lions also

will drive another out of the den, if this lion does not follow the rules.

[Cronus Protagonist]

10. Who would a lion bomb?

Just a thought.

Happiness to you this season of goodwill.

[Festivito]

11. Naw, you're just reducing God to a stereotype you won't like later.

Paper can be used for bad things. Doesn't mean the paper is bad. Religions can be used badly, which does not mean the religion is bad. Love can be used vainly for power, control, money, ..., but, doesn't mean love is the problem.

If books and love are misued in life, you want to burn books and love. That's not sane.

Acting with love in your heart does not mean always making people happy. Love being equated with happiness is a stereotype. It may lead to the most happiness, but, later.

The problems we face are from people misusing and misrepresenting religion, not from relgion itself. And, certainly not from love.

[Cronus Protagonist]

14. I didn't equate love with happiness

Apparently my entire point was missed. That's OK, I know it's a little obscure. Please do read it again, though. :)

Peace, love and happiness to you. May the happiness of God be with you.

[Festivito]

23. Well, you did and you didn't. It doesn't change my point.

You equated God with happiness. I equate God and love as a Biblical definition of God. So, I saw them as all as equated. You don't, good enough, so, you can reread the point as: "God being equated with happiness is a stereotype."

I see your point to be that God as love is the problem, and if redefined as happiness goodness will follow. I say, if happiness even works as a new definition of God, it will, later, be just as misused. The problem is not love, not God, not religion, and certainly not happiness, it's the mis-users.

[Cronus Protagonist]

24. I see your point now

Still, it's not just the mis-users that's the problem. It's the users too. Evil is caused by people trying to do good, to create a more perfect, better world - one closer to God or Godliness. "Cleanliness is close to Godliness", you know :)

Obviously a religious war would fall into the mis-users category, but that's not the only problem.

The users also promote their own brand of world-perfecting plan based on their own religious beliefs, and it is also evil and devastating, perhaps to a lesser degree than overt warfare, perhaps more.

The users use their religion to persecute their children and family members, for instance, in the name of God. They destroy the psychic and emotional lives of their gay, transgender or non-believing or differently-believing children, all in the name of "tough love", to cite just one simple example in addition to warfare.

And it's not just religious people that do this, nor are they the only people to start and fight wars, it's everyone: because the religious ideal of "perfection-striving in reality" is endemic in all cultures, and it's all sourced back to the same idealistic ideology, namely that belief that it is not only possible to achieve perfection in the real world, but it's desireable.

This idea has been expanded to create religions, of course, but also nations, groups, regions, countries, nationalities, companies, corporations, unions, etc., all of which strive to create perfection in a world that has no room for perfection other than its own.

The definition of God as love is not just a Christian concept. It's also in many eastern agape religions too, and it's the clashing interpretations of this ideal unity or perfection that causes them to, in essence, devour each other. "How can the Islamists claim God is on their side, when he's on our side?", is a common question religionists have to ponderm and many come to the conclusion that the world would be better, closer to God in fact, if these pretenders were removed from existence. The same applies when nationality or race or any other classification is used for good, and indirectly, in fact, creates evil instead.

So, to redefine God as I am proposing, correcting the error, choosing God to be happiness resets the clock, so to speak, and gives us time to avoid tearing the world asunder for a jealous lover.

And you're right, in a thousand years, happiness will have been subverted too and it will again be time to renew our definitions, but hopefully with this small change, we'll at least be able to reach that thousand years, which does not seem possible right now, as things are, based on the occurrences that happened in the current epoch.

Many happy returns to you.

[Festivito]

25. It will cost dearly then fail quickly.

You want to manufacture a diversionary religion based on something you do not believe yourself for the result of biding time to confuse the mis-users. If you accomplish this, the mis-users will gladly use your roadmap to instill beliefs they don't believe in either -- and we'll have you to thank.

The good users are not, repeat, not the problem, just as the good users of paper are not the problem of printed propaganda. If good creates evil, then so will your happiness create its evil.

Religion connects us to the absolute. We should always at all times realized that we are never connected to the absolute. Still perfectionists attempt to be gods which is the first great Biblical sin that sent the head angel to become Satan. Mis-users.

Much happiness to you also.

[Cronus Protagonist]

26. Hahahaha

It will cost nothing and spread happiness. Sorry to see you don't want that. Still, most people do want peace and happiness and I think you'll come along when you see how happy people can be without inciting violence in the name of love, as you prefer.

I do wish that one day you will find God to be full of happiness, since God IS happiness.

[Festivito]

28. Good luck lowering violence and increasing happiness.

I hope your gambit does so, but, I still think its basis is wrong. Wishing happiness while making uncalled for digs makes for an interesting start for happiness as god.

Not defining god as happiness is not the same as not wanting to spread happiness, prefering to incite violence, or even not finding God to be full of happiness.

[CarbonDate]

40. Killing makes Bush happy

Perhaps God is the same way?

[aneerkoinos]

32. Ignorance

>>>Religion connects us to the absolute. We should always at all times realized that we are never connected to the absolute.<<<

In Buddhism and Gnosticism, ignorance is the definition of not realizing the absolute (of which nothing can be said). By practice we can become less ignorant. And one step in becoming less ignorant is, as you say, realizing that one cannot be "connected" to absolute, because connection is relation, not absolute.

[Festivito]

34. A little heavy handed to add the connotations of ignorance.

A person who accepts absolute as a possibility, has no realization of of an absolute and is not necessarily ignorant by action or inaction.

I've been working on a definition for religion. Religions seem work on our understanding of the absolute. But, no, we never reach the absolute. That is God's territory.

BTW, thank you for wading through that sentence you highlighted. I saw it and had the edit window open when knocking at my door stopped me.

[aneerkoinos]

35. So blame Buddha

In Buddhism ignorance is defined as attachment to emotions, consepts and things they denote, none of which are permanent, and as such, the cause of unhappiness. If ignorance is a word that has connotations that you perceive as heavy handed or hurtfull to you in any way, try remember that we are not insulted, we choose to be so.

I share your intuition about religion, but why try to define it analytically, nobody has succeeded so far and nobody ever will. Like all consepts, it's prototype and/or family resemblance kind of thing which are fuzzy in nature, better described by some sort of open ended mind map.

"Absolute", "Ultimate Reality" "God", "Otherness", etc. these are just names we try to give for what cannot be spoken about because any attempt to conseptualize about it just keeps it hidden, keeps us blind, furthers our ignorance. We cannot even make such statement that it is something that "we never reach". Least of all that it is something's or somebody's "territory"!!!??? If your God or those pretending to speak for it tell you God's got a territory were no-one else can enter, kick it where it hurts, stomp, mosh... Buddha, Christ and many others say that it is possible to brake free from the cycle of ignorance or unhappiness, but naturally I can't know if that's true if I don't try.

[Festivito]

36. We agree, but, let's let Buddha be..

..Siddhartha, another human. Ignorance, NOW, has connotations. If I were to use it now, I'd hope that I'd not just proclaim ignorance as a title when I mean ignorance as just non-acceptance or non-knowing without the connotation of indolence and/or stupidity.

I wasn't insulted. In fact, I'm happy to have response to challenge and hone my being. Thanks.

My metaphor of territory as God's domain, his absoluteness, seems to bother you greatly. I do not understand why. I did not say that no one can enter that territory. But, then, I know of no example where we can. For example, a broken clock is right twice a day, exactly right, perfectly, absolutely.. However, inasmuch as a moment of absolute correctness is reached, the amount of correctness becomes a duration of zero. Thus the absolute remains untouched -- by us. We only talk about and maybe around it all.

I think it was Zen that said it best: "Those who know do not tell, those who tell do not know." (Well! Pardon my blather! And, that of Gautama as well!)

Peace, joy and love be with you.

[aneerkoinos]

37. Thank you

And may you and all being become free from the bounds of suffering, if you so wish.

I'm indolent and stupid and thus ignorant, but less so than week ago. Progress is possible. But progress is harder or impossible if I'm dishonest about my situation.

Buddha is not important, everybody is one, Siddharta who became one even less important. For me, what is somewhat important that i get that Aha! e.g. when studying what Buddha taught. Or studying what Gospel of Thomas says, truth is everywhere.

Yes, talk of God, Absolute and especially territory bothers me, don't know how greatly. I think those kind of words just lead to confusion. Buddha, so they say, after his physical death left for what is called Parinirvana, beyond all conditioning, and I have no good reasons to doubt that. What is referred to by Nirvana, sorrowless state or Enlightment, which can refer to single event or stages of freedom, by my best critical thinking abilities I have no doubt that it is possible and has happened to many people even currentlty living, not only by the method Buddha taught, even though he and later teachers of that school taugh many and more, they are not claiming exclusivity.

But when enlightened beings like Buddha Sakyamuni - or later Wittgenstein, Sokrates and even Plato for that matter - absolutely refuse to make any positive or negative statement about the nature of Absolute, perhaps they do it for a good reason? Just like the Zen quote you repeat. But surely talking and philosophising are not the only methods available to humans, though IMHO they are certainly not to be looked down upon?

[bloom]

27. I sort of like it

a lot of people get the concept of love so confused and expect more than what is possible.

Wishing people happiness seems like a very simple thing.

[aneerkoinos]

31. Freedom from un-happiness

Buddhists prefer not to speak about God, or give any positivist statements about anything, because all of them are inherently contradictory, but defining God as freedom from dukkha (unhappiness, suffering, sense of imperfect) would be no problem for Buddhists, in fact Nirvana means 'sorrowless state'. So your idea is in accordance with the Four Noble Truths, which are the cornerstone of Buddhism.

Even though it is accepted by Buddhists that even Dharma is not permanent, but subject to change (Mahayana school being one example of such shift), Buddha's core teaching has been doing relatively well for 2500 years and survived "subversion", because it is not defined in positivist exclusive terms, but offering pragmatic way to reach freedom from unhappiness, if that is what one wants.

[AliciaKeyedUp]

15. Love thy neighbor

Even so many here are determined to mock religion.

Merry Christmas!

[Cronus Protagonist]

16. Happiness and Joy to my neighbor (eom)

http://brainbuttons.com/home.asp?stashid=13
Buttons for brainy people - educate your local freepers today!

[hollowdweller]

17. Go read "The Mysterious Stranger" by Mark Twain.

[pen dragon]

18. God is an artist

tortured by creative angst, with a full set of neurotic complexes, dark streaks and blue moods to offset his kindness and mirth. Artists understand God, because we strive for perfection but always fall short. God obviously fell short of perfection on this earth project, and he's probably genuinely depressed and ridden with self criticism and anxiety over the major flaws he didn't foresee.

Myself, I think earth is in his closet under a tarp, and his attention has been focussed on a more hopeful project for the last couple thousand years.

it doesn't mean he doesn't love us. he probably regards us as some of his best work. It's just that he can't fix the flaws without destroying the creation totally

[AliciaKeyedUp]

19. Freedom of choice

God left earth to mankind to finish and we have nearly done so in the worst possible way.

[RC]

20. Most people haven't a clue

at how close we Humans are to finishing ourselves off.

[indigobusiness]

22. You make God sound like my Uncle Leon.

No wonder we're in trouble.

[indigobusiness]

21. God abuse is the problem.

If the issue got the serious attention and scrutiny as child abuse, we wouldn't in such a mess.

[Stinky The Clown]

29. God is not the problem

Man's perversion of religion (a man made concept) is the problem.

Virtually all of history's wars had some "god" aspect to them. Nothing we're seeing today is new from an historical perspective. God has either been the excuse for the war (i.e.: the Crusades) or was used to whet the appetite for war (i.e.: Hitler).

Man is the pervert, not God. Religion has shown itself to be oft perverted into the ultimate cult.

[Kablooie]

38. A Dog is love, a God is evol. (love spelled backwards)

[Az]

39. Belief

When a person believes that when they die they go to a better place what fear have they for death. When a person believes that the way another is living their life endagers an immortal soul for eternity what fear have they of violating some of their rights now to save that eternal soul?

If you can control what a person believes you control everything. It defines them. It is them.

People generally want to do good. It's in our nature. We are a social species. But part of our coding allows us to overright our instincts with new information. We are able to imagine worlds beyond what our senses inform us of. Thus we can replace the notion of death being final with the idea of an eternal soul. This replaces our own natural drive to survive with that of protecting that which creates and protects this idea of a soul.

In this way our own natural instincts are usurped by beliefs. We are made to propogate and repeat these beliefs and spread them far and wide.

God can never be happy. God must be love. A happy god is a content god and that cannot be for content does not strive. Content does not push. Love can drive us to do extrodinary things. Contentment has no desire to move.