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• Tuesday, November 18, 2008 06:17 PM

  We don't need to bridge the gap with ideas.

  These are nice ideas -- I especially like the phrase "God enough for me" -- but I am pretty pessimistic about the idea of using these ideas to somehow bridge the gap between adherents to a traditional understanding of God and atheists. There have been Christian and Jewish groups saying the same type of thing about God for decades (check out Bishop Spong, for an Episcopalian example), and it seems only to add another layer of contention to the issue.

  I would suggest that a far more viable alternative is to stop approaching the issue with the idea that there is some imperative to find common intellectual ground about the existence and nature of God. We can work together and enjoy life together and feel awe together without needing to have the same framework for understanding the experience. It is the experience itself that matters, and the actions we take in response to that experience. I work side by side on social justice issues with people whose idea of God (or lack thereof) is totally foreign to me and feel no less fellowship for that disagreement; and I go to church with people who think about God the same way that I do, and this does nothing to guarantee that I will connect with them in any meaningful way.

  So I guess my point is that the ideas are a distraction, it's the experiences that ought to be "fellowship enough" for us.

  —DonaQuixote Read DonaQuixote's other letters
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