It’s clear to me that there is no almighty God. My prayers and faith are directed towards freelance angels. I don’t know what they are “really”, only that they are real.
Each one of us is vulnerable, so long as we are somewhere between birth and death. Being alive entails having everything to lose, bit by bit or all at once.
Religions offer insurance against the hazards, in the form of comfort. I shall continue to trust my own deepest nature, and angels working on our behalf.
In the UK, we have a state religion, it’s called the Church of England. Its head is the reigning sovereign, by historical accident. King Henry VIII was furious that the Pope wouldn’t approve his habit of divorcing wives who couldn’t provide him with a legitimate male heir, and rejected the claims of the Catholic Church to supremacy in religious matters.
And now Pope Benedict XVI is here on a visit. He complains of our country’s aggressive secularism. I’m not surprised. His state visit is seldom mentioned on BBC radio news without a mention in the same breath of sexual abuse by priests. Leaving that provocation aside, two of the world’s leading aggressive secularists, Richard Dawkins and Christopher Hitchens are English (though the latter became an American citizen). Stephen Hawking, who used to be neutral in the matter, has amended his position and declared that cosmology has no need of God to explain anything. Charles Darwin, who never broke with the Church of England, gave more headaches to theology than Galileo. The Church of England has never kept a grip on its congregations in the way that the Catholic Church, Islam & some non-conformist sects have. If God-worship were not kept alive by various groups of immigrants and their descendants, this land would soon become a godless state..
And what does God say to this? Nothing except through alleged spokesmen and scriptures.
I respect unbiased scepticism. “Don’t know” is a fine honest position; but human nature abhors such a vacuum of belief. When “false gods” are persecuted it is not from kindness, to free us from the burden of superstition. It is to replace them forcibly with other gods, other superstitions. In an atheist culture, scientific sacred cows flourish in the green pasture of a state-funded broadcasting corporation and National Health Service.
My own life is comfortable these days, for which I never cease giving thanks. But from this plateau of safety, I set my sights on new summits, whose ascent is beset with risks. And I see plenty of vulnerable souls in my neighbourhood, who need more than they get from the atheistic State.
So I too depend greatly on praying, and faith in that which transcends reason.
a wayfarer’s notes 
Special note to Hayden: it's not so long ago that I took a sceptical view of angels, calling them “metaphors”, implying they didn't really exist, but were aspects of the individual unconscious mind. You'll be glad to know I've revised that position, Hayden!
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Great essay, imo.
The god I pray to is arguably a product of my mind. But she delivers, despite my mind. That's all I want from a god, deliverance in this moment now. I am not greedy; I don't need to be delivered forever. To be satisfied for this moment is a great treasure to me.
As for the Pope, he reaps what he has sewn. If there had been women priests, there would have been very little abuse. It would not have been tolerated.
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Yes, important points, Raymond.
I want a little more from an angel, though, more than deliverance in this moment now. I want guidance with my long-term project!
Yes, now would be a good time to start women priests. I suspect Benedict would say “Over my dead body” but I hope he doesn't tempt fate whilst he is within our shores. Our police and security services are currently flat out trying to save him from martyrdom.
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Several issues here.
First, I personally think that awareness to child sexual abuse, which has gone on amongst the 'sanctity' of the priesthood, globally, for centuries, and in modern times, much more than we know, can't be talked about enough. It is this that will make this sect and others of similar mind, put their minds to doing something socially and morally acceptable about it.
I too, have been pondering on the snippet that has been broadcast about certain research into health remedies and their remediation abilities. One large factor that springs to mind is how and on what basis was pain assessed and measured. Pain is not, in my view quantifiable, except on a scale of physiotherapeutic and medical 1-10 scales. Even those measures are qualitative. Was every patient in the research (I have no knowledge of the size and length of the trial)x-rayed, or given CT or MRI scans at intervals, if so, what were those intervals and what was sought? There should be more detailed reporting, the reliability of the research raises more questions than it answers.
If we all have to live by the devised gold standards of research, then nothing we say, think or do, will be other than dismissed. As you say, we will be expected to continue as the guinea pigs for side-effects of a large number of alopathic remedies. That said, there are treatments for which we are all grateful, contra-indications or not.
Dilemmas, dilemmas!
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Interesting photo. Which one is the Pope? 😉
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No comment, Luciana! They are just fighting dogs but if you see the Pope in it I cannot stop you.
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“Can't be talked about enough”, ZACL? Oh well, we don't need to agree.
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“It's clear to me that there is no almighty God”
just curious, Vincent… how is this clear to you? was there an expert who said so?
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I like your question, Joanne. I'm halfway through watching a DVD of “Bruce Almighty”, in which Morgan Freeman plays God, who delegates his powers for a while to Jim Carrey.
I should have said “There is not one almighty God”.
No, it wasn't an expert who told me! I received a revelation in the night of Dec. 25th 2006. My blog refers. but I've cleaned up the piece for my book.
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Vincent…
I scrolled back to your archives to refresh my memory… What I found there among the posts you had written about the revelation you refer to was this…
“It’s a relief to realise that I still know nothing.”
When i asked you about the expert in my previous comment, I wasn't necessarily referring to an expert “out there” somewhere. Your experience seems to have had sufficient authority over you for you to now conclude there is no one almighty God.
So, where did this revelation come from? And who is the authority that seems to have been sufficient for you to have reached this conclusion, so much so you no longer seem to “realize you know nothing”?
It seems to me it must have in your eyes been some sort of “expert” for you to make such a declaration, even if it was something percolating up from deep inside of you.
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I think the archives will show that I have changed my mind more than once. I still know nothing, but then some things seem clear too.
When I referred to experts I meant other learned people in the role of priests or scientists or others with authority. An inner voice is something else, not necessarily even an authority; perhaps the coming to the surface of the unconscious, whatever that means.
My being sure that there is no one almighty God arises from a consistent feeling that the answering of prayers, the showing of signs, the appearance of miracles, are not co-ordinated but local occurrences. Hence a belief in freelance angels.
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Joanne, I emailed you at the gmail address you had in February. Did you get it?
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'freelance angels', what else might they be known as?
The nomenclature you use is such that there has to be substantive hooks to hang ones thoughts upon. This I can understand. Yet, what is underlying all of this seems to me to be nebulous and I wonder, Vincent, if your beliefs would be undermined by discussing the nebulous aspect of it without the nomenclature used thus far.
The angle you open up is fascinating and I want to emphasise that my thoughts are in no way pejorative.
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All I mean by freelance angels is that I don't envisage them reporting directly or indirectly to a centralised God. I have no idea what they are because my impressions are indeed nebulous.
We know that a tree doesn't need day-to-day instruction from any boss. We have recently understood why a particular species of tree follows particular rules of shape, method of reproduction, seasonality and so on. It's all encoded somehow in its DNA.
Religions claim that angels are servants of God. I just wanted to explain how I can believe in angels but not a transcendent God. I think I believe in an immanent God.
However I don't attach much importance to beliefs. If you have an open mind you are more open to actual experience. I have plenty of experience of angels.
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What an interesting frame of thought. I fully understand your point about being open to experiences, which can be rather difficult within a cloister.
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Hi Vincent.
Actually, no, I haven't seen your email. But it's no problem for me to find it in the email I was using at that time.
I wanted to return and apologize here though if I might have caused any offense to you. Not my intention at all.
I am just really fascinated by experiences such as you describe, particularly when they are sufficiently powerful to lead someone to conclusions as strong as has seemingly happened for you. I am equally curious about a person who has an experience sufficiently powerful in their life to convince them there is one almighty God.
Changing your mind, in my opinion, is really just opening your mind. Renewing our minds. Therefore, I change mine frequently. I'm glad you change yours too. 🙂
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Interesting Vincent.
I personally think the aggressive secularists have a point, and that as ever fundamentalist from both ends of the spectrum attract each other. For every fundamentalist christian, there is a fundamentalist atheist – a match made in heaven, perhaps.
Angels…how can they be anything more than metaphors? I will have to think some more.
My personal belif history – I was brought up Methodist, was a born again teenager, went through a period of paganism in my twenties when I was initiated as a witch, and gradually grew to be an older, wiser? and sadder atheist.
I would love there to be something more – as you can see I really tried 😉
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Yes, Ann, one can say that they are metaphors, but of what? I mean, there really is something at the bottom of it, that can only be talked about in metaphor.
And certainly the aggressive secularists have a point, but in any kind of politics (that is, the struggle for some kind of secular ascendancy) the opposing sides take a consciously or unconsciously one-sided view. And in this one-sided view, they usually fail to see precisely what matters more than anything to their enemy.
It's not that I am free of politics myself. I'm as guilty as anyone of one-sidedness.
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“I respect unbiased scepticism. “Don’t know” is a fine honest position; but human nature abhors such a vacuum of belief.”
This is so super interesting, that human nature may in fact abhor it. It still befuddles me how parents will frequently happily lie to children rather than state “I don’t know.” One reason why I love Socrates.
“my prayers and faith are directed towards freelance angels. I don’t know what they are “really”, only that they are real.”
Awesome 🙂
While driving for Uber one day, I had a short discussion with a Jewish person, and I asked him about what is the Jewish position on angels, (specifically at least his Jewish position) and i loved his reply: “God is so omniscent/omnipotent/omni-whatever that God doesn’t really know what God is doing…so that’s why there are angels…”
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thanks very much for this, Kid! So you drive for Uber? A great way to pick up discussions with strangers. I’m very interested in that religion, from readings of Martin Buber, Annie Dillard, Isaac Bashevis Singer and others. Also a blogger who’s disappeared called Jim Charles.
I love your passenger’s reply too.
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