A chat I had on MSN yesterday got me thinking.
We were talking about relationships with God. I've been studying - formally and informally - theology for at least 17 years now, and one of the things I've spent a lot of time mulling over is the nature of our relationship or interaction with the Divine.
The Bible talks about having a personal relationship with God. Prayer is our hotline to Him. We don't need the heirarchy of a church governing council dictating our every action and thought. If you believe such things, then God gave us autonomy for a very good reason - we must be allowed to make our own way, have our own minds and shape our own destiny apart from the hand of God so that our decision to turn to Him and have faith in Him is valid. Any coercive action on the part of God would mean that we would become nothing more than His puppets, the choice would not be ours and the practise of our faith becomes invalid.
One of the reasons I left the church at the age of 19 was because I saw a very marked swing away from this line of thinking. I became more aware of the Minister's and the Deacon's controlling influence over the congregation. Also there seemed to be a trend whereby the acceptance of the trinity as one was being challenged, to the point where I actually heard someone being corrected for saying "God" instead of "Jesus".
I always believed in a less structured form of belief. A more personal, private form of worship. The young people of the church, myself included were taken to see a performing troupe of evangelists one Sunday. The show was quite entertaining and funny in parts. At the end there was the usual evangelical speil, and as we stood to pray to the sound of "Amazing Grace", I felt the strangest shock, like a little lightning bolt from the top of my head all the way to my toes. As the buzz thrilled down my spine, I knew what was happening instinctively. A thought that wasn't mine entered my head, three simple words: "I want you".
"Not yet" I replied, "There's things I need to do first."
The feeling left me. I swayed a little but managed to remain in control. Since that day I've gone over the event a million times. It's greatly influenced my faith in the Divine and my attitude towards formal, structured religion. I know now that you don't need to be anyone special for Divinity to communicate with you, that you don't need the intercession of a Minister, Bishop, Pastor or any other such "holy person" on your behalf. That short conversation has left me with a first hand knowledge of just how intimately God is involved with my - with everyone's - life.
I know now, better than I ever could have before it happened, that Divinity is all around us, in everything you do and see.
How does this tie in with my Paganism? It's very simple.
I know there is a God. At the time, God was the only word I had for the Divine, and it remains the title I'm most comfortable with. Church does that to you. I know, however that the christianity practised today is wrong for me. It is not a belief system I can be comfortable in, it doesn't allow it's followers to praise or worship as I want to. it makes the act of worship something separate, something special and distinctly apart from your daily life.
I knwo this isn't so. I know this isn't right. Every minute of every day you are in contact with God, you are surrounded by Divinity constantly. There fore we have no need to set aside times of day, or perform special actions or rituals in order to communicate with It. Your relationship with God can be as informal and as natural as talking to someone on the phone, or talking to yourself, or muling somethng over in your head.
This is why I'd make a lousy Wiccan. The Wiccan faith concentrates to a greter extent on Ritual and consecration. This is not for me.
The More I read of Rae Beth's book, however, the more i see how compatible that path is for me. It's not like it's some great revelation want to subscribe myself to straight away, it's more like she's describing the way I've felt and thougth about things for a long long time.
I'm not "going to be" a hedgewitch, I've been a hedgewitch for a long time but didn't know that's what it was called.
